Re: The GZGverse UN

--- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote:
> John Atkinson wrote (was your post off- or on-list
> BTW? Ah well - FH posts 
> are on topic here):

Both, actually.
 
> A weak force like the UNSC you describe -
> appearently based on the UN of 
> today which you know about - can only build
> confidence and do policing if 
> the powers it keeps apart are also relatively weak -
> which is the case in 
> Sinai, Lebanon, Cyprus, etc.

Right.
 
> However, we're not talking about lesser regional
> powers in the 2183 
> scenario. We're talking about a UNSC prepared to go
> between the 2183 
> equivalents of NATO and the USSR on the former
> intra-German border - which 
> is the biggest potential hot-spot where today's UN
> did *not* send any 
> troops during the Cold War era.

Because it was a frontline conflict like Korea,
Taiwan, and Indochina were.  It was just a state of
siege (decisively won when the Soviet economy went
'boink') rather than a more active war.  The two
powers chose to compete and chose to compete at that
level.	The UN held down conflicts that the
superpowers did not want to get out of hand.
 
> My point is this: if, which you suggest, this same
> "costs more than it is 
> worth" mechanism still kept the fighting outside the
> Core Systems in 2183 
> *there would be no need for an armed UNSC to do that
> very same thing*. 
> Since the UNSC *does* exist in the Tuffleyverse, it
> seems to me that the 
> "costs more than it tastes to fight in the Core"
> mechanic has ceased to 
> function.

So, are nuclear weapons, orbital bombardment, and the
asteroid strikes so beloved of this list when
discussing the all-powerfulness of spacecraft
suddendly less destructive?  The UN would be, in my
view, an excuse the politicos use to prevent any
problems at home.  "We have to stop the Godless
Commies, but we have to do it in deep space because
the UN won't let us fight it out in the Solar System".
 Gives the government an out when they have to relieve
future MacArthurs for running his yap about nuking the
enemy's core systems. . .
 
> >Actually, Japan is specifically mentioned as being
> a client state of the 
> >NAC.
> 
> Where exactly is that stated? I can't find it in any

Page 51 of DSII.  The line is "Japan, (technically
"independant", but jealously protected by the NAC)

> of the 'canon' 
> timelines :-( The RN's re-naming of its
> Japanese-named ship classes in the 
> 2170s (documented cases are the Miyazaki-class
> frigates and Hoshino-class 
> light cruisers being upgraded and re-named Minerva
> and Huron; there are 
> probably other cases as well) and the appearance of
> an independent Japanese 
> fleet strongly suggests that the client status was
> transient though :-/

Nah, it just means they are a client state with their
own armed forces.
 
> >And while Iran and Afghanistan aren't mentioned,
> Pakistan is mentioned as
> >being in the IFed.
> 
> Another reference I can't find in the canon
> timelines. The closest I can 
> find is the 2051 note about *ESU* (not IF) invading
> the entire Indian 
> sub-continent in which Pakistan is currently
> located.

I stand corrected.  However the 2123 entry in SGII
refers to the IFed and EU clashing with "crossborder
raids and artillery duels".  Either A)India is in ESU
and Pakistan is in IFed, or B)The border between IF
and ESU is further West.  Regardless of which case you
choose (personal preference is A) you still can't have
independant Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan
because then there are no ESU borders for the IFed to
raid across and vice versa.  
 
> Afghanistan has been surrounded by mutually hostile
> expansionistic powers 
> for the better part of the last four thousand years,
> yet they're still 
> independent :-/ So far everyone who has tried
> conquering them has found 
> that it costs far more to take than it is worth...

The jury is still out on the latest conquest. 

Granted we did it with feoderati rather than our own
troops, but that's the cheapest possible way anyway.

> On the Finnish side, I suspect that they still
> remember 1939-1945 quite 
> well - prior to the war there was quite a bit of
> Swedish talk about 
> standing united with the Finns, yet all we sent was
> a smallish "volunteer" 
> force (not to denigrate the contribution of these
> volunteers to the war, of 
> course!). On the Swedish side, I fear that it'll
> take a long while before 
> we willingly allow anyone who might need serious
> support into any kind of 
> official mutual defence union with us as the senior
> partner 

Neither of which comes close the kind of regional
rivalries and outright hatreds that have to be
overcome to form the rest of the superstates (I think
the NAC is the only case where none of the major
precursor states hate each other).  Go with the genre,
man.

>>Balkans is a clusterfuck that will never amount to
>>anything.  Been there, done that, got the verdammt
T->shirt.
>
><chuckle> Except of course that it made up a major
>part of your beloved 
>and 
>resurrected Rhomaioi Empire ;-)

Rarely an economically significant portion (excepting
Hellas, Macedonia, and Thrace). . . and note that was
mostly before those Slavs invaded, and always with
Roman guidance.  On it's own, feh.

John

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