Raven Alliance: The Shiny Red Button of Orbital Doom

[Knightmare]

...and did so against Alaric's specific orders.

I don't remember Alaric issuing specific orders. I'd double check.

Keep in mind that the Raven attack was a message for many different audiences. Traditionalist Clansmen will likely see a strong ilKhan punishing those who purposefully defile their history out of spite, use nukes, etc. Clan leadership might see a strong and decisive First Lord who may not be as physically or politically weak as they first thought in May 3151. After all, he got the Ravens to bombard an important House world and *possibly* kill a House Lord. The other major House players may take note of Daoshen's target selection & use of WMDs, and recognize that some messages shouldn't be left to interpretation. Or, that for better or worse, attacking culturally important locations will be met with surprising ferocity. Or, that Alaric may be a bit of a wild card, no location is safe, and maybe they should rethink their current strategy. There's likely no single view or reaction to the Chang-an attack, and maybe that's the point?

Also, how Alaric feels about the Ravens behind closed doors is one thing, but I'm fairly certain his public persona is saying something else. 

[Cannonshop]

I don't remember Alaric issuing specific orders. I'd double check.

Keep in mind that the Raven attack was a message for many different audiences. Traditionalist Clansmen will likely see a strong ilKhan punishing those who purposefully defile their history out of spite, use nukes, etc. Clan leadership might see a strong and decisive First Lord who may not be as physically or politically weak as they first thought in May 3151. After all, he got the Ravens to bombard an important House world and *possibly* kill a House Lord. The other major House players may take note of Daoshen's target selection & use of WMDs, and recognize that some messages shouldn't be left to interpretation. Or, that for better or worse, attacking culturally important locations will be met with surprising ferocity. Or, that Alaric may be a bit of a wild card, no location is safe, and maybe they should rethink their current strategy. There's likely no single view or reaction to the Chang-an attack, and maybe that's the point?

Also, how Alaric feels about the Ravens behind closed doors is one thing, but I'm fairly certain his public persona is saying something else.

impression I got from the text is that he didn't explicitly say anything until afterward-he was caught by surprise.

[BaachicLitNerd]

Page 86 says that, after weighing the various Khans' proposed responses to Fort Noruff, "[Alaric] ordered McKenna to keep her WarShips in reserve for now" after she suggested a major show of force response. Everyone in the room seems aware that Raven Alliance ships are the available means for "overwhelming retribution," but exactly what form that retribution would take is left unclear. Alaric doesn't totally shut the Ravens down, given the "for now" portion of his order, but it's a pretty huge stretch to fit "going to Liao and atomizing the Chancellor" in any reasonable understanding of "holding in reserve." Alaric never explicitly orders them not to do that specific strike, and it's possible that the initial Raven offer was to systematically glass every Capellan regiment between Terra and Gan Singh from orbit so that merely glassing Chang-An represenrs a compromise, but it's clear that Alaric didn't want the Ravens taking the lead and they did so anyway.

[Cannonshop]

Page 86 says that, after weighing the various Khans' proposed responses to Fort Noruff, "[Alaric] ordered McKenna to keep her WarShips in reserve for now" after she suggested a major show of force response. Everyone in the room seems aware that Raven Alliance ships are the available means for "overwhelming retribution," but exactly what form that retribution would take is left unclear. Alaric doesn't totally shut the Ravens down, given the "for now" portion of his order, but it's a pretty huge stretch to fit "going to Liao and atomizing the Chancellor" in any reasonable understanding of "holding in reserve." Alaric never explicitly orders them not to do that specific strike, and it's possible that the initial Raven offer was to systematically glass every Capellan regiment between Terra and Gan Singh from orbit so that merely glassing Chang-An represenrs a compromise, but it's clear that Alaric didn't want the Ravens taking the lead and they did so anyway.

YUP I was wrong.

McKenna may have made a critical error wrt her political position in the ilKhan's court, even if it did give him the victory.

Alaric now knows he's given control over his Navy to someone who will break orders and take initiative.  McKenna did something very dangerous for her position at court, if not in military circles.

When you've put yourself under the authority of a narcissist, the last thing you want to do, is successfully violate his orders.  That's like painting a target on your forehead and giving him the gun.  She can't afford to ****** up now, and she can't afford a setback.

[Metallgewitter]

YUP I was wrong.

McKenna may have made a critical error wrt her political position in the ilKhan's court, even if it did give him the victory.

Alaric now knows he's given control over his Navy to someone who will break orders and take initiative.  McKenna did something very dangerous for her position at court, if not in military circles.

When you've put yourself under the authority of a narcissist, the last thing you want to do, is successfully violate his orders.  That's like painting a target on your forehead and giving him the gun.  She can't afford to ****** up now, and she can't afford a setback.

Which might be the first time that Sterling McKenna's actions backfire on her. So far every time she initiates some form of betrayal she comes out on top. Maybe this time she might have taken a wrong turn despite all the assets she has gained so far. And I would wager that if this spreads around the IS some military commanders will make plans to counter this particular brand of battlefield savagery. Or do you simply surrender just because the "planetkillers" come visiting? At one point someone will go the WoB route and use atomics in space. Maybe with the same trickery the Blakists did (hide the capital missiles with seeded ECM gear)

[tassa_kay]

I don't remember Alaric issuing specific orders. I'd double check.

I don't need to double check anything, LOL. He ordered them to hold their fleet in reserve. They did the exact opposite.

[Mendrugo]

From Sterling's POV, she had a duty to save Alaric from himself.  If the poor dear is waffling and unwilling to do what's necessary to end the threat, she will just take care of it.  Always easier to ask for forgiveness than permission, once the problem is dealt with.

Plus, possibly a wee bit of "Let's see a disarmed ArcShip do that!"

[tassa_kay]

Well, yeah. Everyone tries to justify their actions in their own minds, LOL. That's patently obvious to anyone with an ounce of awareness as to how human nature works.

McKenna may have made a critical error wrt her political position in the ilKhan's court, even if it did give him the victory.

Alaric now knows he's given control over his Navy to someone who will break orders and take initiative.  McKenna did something very dangerous for her position at court, if not in military circles.

When you've put yourself under the authority of a narcissist, the last thing you want to do, is successfully violate his orders.  That's like painting a target on your forehead and giving him the gun.  She can't afford to ****** up now, and she can't afford a setback.

This was my takeaway, too.

[Knightmare]

McKenna may have made a critical error wrt her political position in the ilKhan's court, even if it did give him the victory.

This is assuming that every order Alaric gives to a member of the Council is done in session. He said, "for now" during the session and then later, changing his mind, have issued orders directly to McKenna. Just something to consider, is that Spurlock isn't privy to every decision or meeting—and a reminder why novels trump sourcebooks. We're seeing some of the behind the scenes and very public activity. The private deals and discussions aren't always available in these reports.

Alaric now knows he's given control over his Navy to someone who will break orders and take initiative.  McKenna did something very dangerous for her position at court, if not in military circles.

Perhaps, but it also feels like McKenna was banking on her expedition going over well with Alaric along the lines of "wink, wink, I know what you really meant in session," or that she's insulated herself with some form of plausible deniability that even a small loss of position won't affect her overall standing in the long game. I expect someone else's head will roll for Liao, and even a public or semi-public chastising won't move McKenna too far from Alaric's ear.

He's low on allies, and even semi-unreliable ones are better than nothing. How Alaric handles McKenna privately, in council, and publicly will be telling.

[Tyler Jorgensson]

I will say I’m always a little bit surprised when Warships show up and people are surprised when they breakout the orbital bombardment. Like I know it’s one of the reasons the Devs mainly hate them because of the sheer devastation they can bring but suddenly when one shows up and does that people lose their minds.

Like in the era of limited aerospace…. That’s what they’re for quiaff? And then pissing off the guys who have the biggest Warship fleet: I wonder how they’re going to respond?

Is it just me? Am I the odd one out here? Like if I pissed off the Bears I expect Elementals to be tearing apart my forces. If I anger the Capellans or Taurians I expect nukes… just seems standard to me


Also on another point: the Raven Star Admiral kinda went AWOL to perform this retributive strike.

[tassa_kay]

I will say I’m always a little bit surprised when Warships show up and people are surprised when they breakout the orbital bombardment.

I haven't seen a single comment in this discussion to suggest that anyone was surprised by the Ravens being Ravens.

[Tyler Jorgensson]

I haven't seen a single comment in this discussion to suggest that anyone was surprised by the Ravens being Ravens.

Sorry I should have clarified: not from the Raven fans here in this thread. In other forums, threads, Discords, social media Battletech channels.

[Cannonshop]

This is assuming that every order Alaric gives to a member of the Council is done in session. He said, "for now" during the session and then later, changing his mind, have issued orders directly to McKenna. Just something to consider, is that Spurlock isn't privy to every decision or meeting—and a reminder why novels trump sourcebooks. We're seeing some of the behind the scenes and very public activity. The private deals and discussions aren't always available in these reports.

Perhaps, but it also feels like McKenna was banking on her expedition going over well with Alaric along the lines of "wink, wink, I know what you really meant in session," or that she's insulated herself with some form of plausible deniability that even a small loss of position won't affect her overall standing in the long game. I expect someone else's head will roll for Liao, and even a public or semi-public chastising won't move McKenna too far from Alaric's ear.

He's low on allies, and even semi-unreliable ones are better than nothing. How Alaric handles McKenna privately, in council, and publicly will be telling.

Stalin and Trotsky.  Trotsky didn't really do anything WRONG per-se, he was simply a threat to Stalin's authority.  McKenna doesn't need to worry about the usual overt stuff, she needs to be concerned with two things:

1. how did he REALLY take the move?
2. How fast can this be converted into a move against her among Alaric's inner circle?

Here's the thing; she might be right, but I don't think she is, if her logic is what it appears to you to be.  The big problem here, is how unstable Alaric's rule looks...to Alaric Ward.  Because that's where the problem is for Sterling McKenna.  If he feels comfortably in charge, he can let it go, and probably will...but if he feels insecure?  there will be motion behind the scenes to either a frame-up, or to exploit her next mistake and he might just use the internal political divisions inside the Snow Raven clan to arrange her...replacement.

One takeaway I got, is that there ARE internal divisions within the Snow Ravens and that's a structural weakness that an insecure 'Dear Leader' can use to eliminate a rival who's been successful at defying his express orders (even if those orders were behind the scenes.)

you know what I'm referencing, I expect, better than I do and I've got the document open in another tab.

[tassa_kay]

Part of me wonders if Grady Magnus didn't take the action that he did specifically to make problems for Sterling, as his bio blurb in IKEO does state that he is angling for the Khanship (and willing to force her out if need be). And this would be a great way for him to do that, if indeed that was his intention.

I suspect A Treachery of Ravens will shed more light on this when it comes out.

[Blkbr2020]

Part of me wonders if Grady Magnus didn't take the action that he did specifically to make problems for Sterling, as his bio blurb in IKEO does state that he is angling for the Khanship (and willing to force her out if need be).

I suspect A Treachery of Ravens will shed more light on this when it comes out.

And on what they are searching for.........I wonder if they did up any more warship hulks to keep adding to their fleet.

[Alan Grant]

Some BT fans also just put orbital bombardment on the "insane war crime" list. As in there's no justification, it's evil, awful, and anyone doing it should be viewed as such.

Folks with this view often pull heavily from thinking about its use in the 1st SW, where it helped to contribute to the near downfall of human civilization. Not just lives and property destroyed, a general backsliding of the human civilization, the depopulating of entire worlds and the subsequent technological decline.

They point to a few other cherry-picked other instances of it, like the Wars of Reaving, as further reinforcement of this view. Because in part of how insane and irrational some of the WoR stuff got.

But they are cherry picking their evidence. Never-mind that the 1st Star League widely did it during the Reunification War just prior to their golden age. Never-mind other uses that didn't contribute to the backsliding of all civilization.

To subscribers of this view, it's insane that anyone would do it. You are tempting the fates of a chain reaction that will bring down human civilization. So anyone who does it must be insane.

So I'm not surprised that there are some BT fans out there who view what the Ravens did this way. It just stems from a particularly extreme black-and-white perception of orbital bombardment.

It must be said also that another piece of this is media reaction stuff. In media today outsized reactions reign supreme. Especially if you want people to pay attention to you. Nothing can be "meh" your reactions must be on the fringes of the extreme.

So I'm BEYOND SHOCKED AT WHAT HAS TRANSPIRED!

If you like this content, consider subscribing to my channel.

[Mendrugo]

And on what they are searching for.........I wonder if they did up any more warship hulks to keep adding to their fleet.

They're going over the ground on Epsilon E. and doing detailed scans of other bodies in the system.  Doesn't seem like the kind of places you'd find a stray WarShip.

[tassa_kay]

They're going over the ground on Epsilon E. and doing detailed scans of other bodies in the system.  Doesn't seem like the kind of places you'd find a stray WarShip.

I think he's talking about their actions in the Deep Periphery.

[Blkbr2020]

Yes indeed! Guessing everything close to Terra got pretty cleanly picked over by Comstar and WoB or others over the centuries.

[Mendrugo]

In that case - yes - while staying largely off the radar in the 3130s fiction through Palmyra, the Ravens were indeed busily sending R-Teams far and wide through the Deep Periphery looking for anything shiny.

Their latest hunt appears to be concentrated on a system in the Chainelane Isles.

[Metallgewitter]

But they are cherry picking their evidence. Never-mind that the 1st Star League widely did it during the Reunification War just prior to their golden age. Never-mind other uses that didn't contribute to the backsliding of all civilization.

The 1st Star League also suspended the Ares conventions to fight the Reunification war. They basically absolved themselves of any wrong doing although at first Orbital bombardment was only meant as a last resort not as the order of the day. Just look at the battle of Robsart: the bombardment was unnesseary as the Star League had just eradicated the majority of the Taurian Fleet but the Commanding Admiral still did it out of anger despite standing orders that only the Commanding General had the authroity to order them. And what did it do? Make the war even worse because after that the (admittedly thin) gloves came off and the Taurians fought tooth and nail

[Kerfuffin(925)]

I had assumed and, thought it implied in the text (but I could misremember), that the bombardment was a result of bloodhouse Shukanov maneuvering. They have been sabotaging Grady at every turn.


I can’t read. Ignore the above

[Gaiiten]

I wonder how the Capellans might answer this.
If they take a hint from how they fought the Blakists in the Jihad the Ravens will get a serious problem.

[Cannonshop]

I wonder how the Capellans might answer this.
If they take a hint from how they fought the Blakists in the Jihad the Ravens will get a serious problem.

the Cappies needed Sun Tzu to do what they did during the Jihad, if Daoshen''s actually dead, they don't have that divine figure with the hard-coded record of success to galvanize them and rally around.  They also don't have Sunny Boy's alliances that stiffened their economy and their lines, since Dao Dao screwed the pooch with the Canopians and overextended his forces.

kinda something people forget about that, Xin Sheng relied a LOT on outside support, and also on being run by a certified genius who was NOT insane, but WAS charismatic and was exceedingly successful prior to the kickoff of the Jihad. 

Daoshen, on the other hand, may be dead and was in the process of losing the ground war to a stalemate.  Popular mood and support, morale in their forces, communications issues,  and a few other things may well be a marker indicating that the Cappies are going to end up on the back foot until something else catches Alaric's attention.

In the meantime, right now, Clan Snow Raven has a Navy, and nobody else does (everyone else has some collectible relics and a selection of dropships.)  What I mean by that, is nobody else has the developed infrastructure to go challenge the Ravens unless they make a few serious mistakes.  By 'infrastructure' I mean training, experience, equipment, consumables and supply infrastructure.

Y'know, that stuff your warships need in order to stay fueled, the crews fed and watered, sufficient replacements for personnel that don't have to be trained from the ground up, airframes, antishipping weapons...  This is all fundamentally undeveloped where it isn't underdeveloped.  Doctrine also factors in-nobody else has one, so nobody else has one that can counter the Ravens if they really focus on 'Navying' instead of stabbing each other in the back.

[Alan Grant]

I'll be curious to see what the potential adversaries of the Third Star League will do in regards to that Snow Raven navy. They've demonstrated that they are willing to use it in all possible uses, including orbital bombardment. Can't just ignore that. Militaries aren't in the business of having zero counter-doctrine for a thing. They always develop something to counter a possible threat like a particular type of weapon system, even if it has a low chance of success, or is based more on hopes and dreams than reality.

That could mean they develop a navy of their own but even if they adopt that approach it could take a long time to implement. Likely to be implemented faster is a counter-doctrine focused approach. Developing out the way of countering those warships. Counter doesn't have to mean kill, it could be a deterrent effect.

A great past example of this was the fluff for the Nokohono <sp?) dropship. Its TRO: 3067 fluff was that the Combine Admiralty was staring at the possibility, the "what if" of the Clans unleashing their full naval might, and the reality that the Combine would be unable to stop them if they did. So one was the measures they took was to develop that dropship where between capital missiles and lots of marines flying around on small craft, they thought it could have some kind of impact. It's an excellent example of what a counter-doctrine can look like.

I could see this era, going forward, generating a lot of possible counter-navy measures by various factions. Some may be quite familiar and predictable, based on ideas we saw in 3050s-Jihad eras. Others may be rather novel/unique/new. It'll be interesting to watch and see what happens with that.

[Mendrugo]

The first such proposed counter appeared in BattleSpace - the pylon-mounted aerospace-fighter carried Alamo.  The self-imposed moratorium on WarShip usage was what stopped those from being rushed into mass production in the 3050s.

[Cannonshop]

Three...two...one...nope, not gonna bite this time.

Anyone who's had to suffer through reading my posts for the last ten years knows where I'm at on this subject, so there's literally no point in adding another to the pile.  Let's focus on the sole and only relevant thing: The political impact what the Ravens did, is going to have, because the second it gets into talking 'naval strategy' it's going to go straight into me pointing out nobody practices it at all, someone else will bring up PWS's and fighter-nooks, then someone will pine for Forbidden Monitors and it will all be dismissed anyway.

But the political fallout, possible consequences and benefits, and the character development? that's a discussion we can have that may actually bear fruit.

[Alan Grant]

Three...two...one...nope, not gonna bite this time.

Hey good for you. Because honestly I wasn't trying to steer things toward that kind of discussion anyway. I said it'll be interesting to see what the factions develop (future-tense here). Not "let's discuss what the factions should develop."

We're stepping into an entirely new era of BT. New era, sometimes all at once but often gradually, comes with new stuff. Like tech we haven't seen before. I could see this being a reason we see some new aero/space technologies. Out of the sheer need of countering a naval threat. So, I'm now interested to see what the writers do with that. I pointed at a past-thing just to demonstrate in-universe precedent.

That's it. Beginning and end of the discussion. Just like how I couldn't have anticipated the writers would dream up sub-capital weaponry, but they did. The writers could in this new ilClan era dream up some entirely new stuff in this particular department.

I'd really suggest confining any further discussion of the sub-topic to perhaps the aerospace forum. And not commandeer the Snow Raven fan thread. But personally I'm not that interested in discussing it that much right now anyway. As I said, I'll just be curious to see what the writers do with this, up to and including new technologies and weapon systems and such that literally don't exist right now. I think most speculation on the topic today will turn out to be wrong.

[Metallgewitter]

I get the feeling what will bring down the Ravens will the Ravens themselves. Their Clan slowly seems to turn into a second Clan Fire Mandrill with the families going at each other (though not directly but instead of manipulating and sabotaging their own forces / assets)

Other then that it might at one point end like how the Terran Hegemony fleet ended when Konrad McKenna was at the helm: ambushed and ripped to shreds. And the Syrma ambush was also an ambush without Warships if my memory is right. Heck it might be even created by an internal Raven squabble. Like teaching a lesson by perhaps letting one or two vessels under the command of another family fall into an ambush. I mean the biggest weakness of the current 3rd Star League seem to be internal squabbles. The Foxes vs the Ravens while the wolves are racking up more and more debt and their own clan touman is slowly bled away

[Crow]

A few points:

Love that the Ravens are finally seeing major limelight in the main storyline

I heartily support the Ravens razing Liao. Honestly, they should have glassed the entire planet. Any faction that says that it's disproportionate is either weak or a pearl clutching hypocrite. Besides, with the Jade Turkeys and the Smoked Jaguars on best behavior, someone has to pick up the torch for Clan baddie who commits genocidal violence and I'm glad that we have the cajones to lean into that role. The 1st SLDF didn't rule with its Battlemech armies so much as with its Warships, and we Ravens now are the incarnation of that fist.

Also, the Sukhanov line needs to be Reaved. I'm with House Magnus all the way.

The only atrocity that the Ravens committed in IKEO was letting Vincente Gupta keep his zoomer broccholi haircut, fr fr