Kerensky was kind of a selfish dude.

[abou]

Reading our new First Succession War book and it keeps striking me how awful Kerensky was. Certainly this is a fair amount of fodder to bring up with a Clan warrior as well, but I just cannot get over how miserable of a person he could be. To be fair, this fits within his character as more of a melancholy idealist than a realist, but his abandonment of the Hegemony after the civil war is inexcusable.

Even if the SLDF was a shadow of its former self, it was still large enough to quash any challenger. The dissolution of the Star League was not a dissolution of the Terran Hegemony. Even if Kerensky could predict the coming conflict and chose to leave the Inner Sphere so as not to drag the SLDF into yet another war, he willingly abandoned many of the worlds that depended solely upon his army for protection. Hell, the core military units of the SLDF were originally Hegemony units.

Even if Kerensky's continued presence in Inner Sphere could not prevent the 1st SW, he could have protected the Hegemony worlds. The sheer size of the SLDF could have made it an island of safety amidst the storm. I doubt any of the House Lords would have challenged him militarily. A firm, deliberate hand could have prevented the collapsing morale of the SLDF and prevented worlds from leaving the Hegemony; stopped the various House Lords' shenanigans; units from leaving for "greener pastures"; and more importantly prevented several worlds from dying.

Depressed, exhausted, or whatever excuse Kerensky had, it doesn't change the fact that he was a selfish jerk who abrogated his obvious duties to the Hegemony once the First Council got dissolved the Star League.

EDIT: And yes, I am aware that Kerensky's leaving is critical to the metaplot of BattleTech. A stabilizing force such as Kerensky and the Terran Hegemony would radically change the history of the game.

[Nerroth]

If you haven't seen it already, I might suggest taking a look at the Empires Aflame PDF, which takes a look at an alternate timeline in which the Exodus didn't occur.

It should be noted, however, that the EA timeline splits from the "prime" BT universe in such a way that Kerensky, himself, is not the one to choose the alternative option... In fact, it's the nature of Kerensky's premature death which enrages the surviving SLDF, enough to set the events in motion which lead directly to the establishment of the EA timeline's Terran Supremacy.

[PurpleDragon]

*snip*

I beg to differ.  I have not read the book you have; however, I was introduced to Battletech back in 1988, when it was just getting started under that name (well, within a couple of years anyway).  I have read the old Star League source book.  Honestly, the impression I got was that it was a good thing Kerensky left and took 75% of the standing military and their scientists with him. 

The squabbling houses were starting to turn their eyes to him and if he had not left, they were eventually going to unite against him.  Sure he could take on any one or maybe two of the houses at one time.  But not all five.  Which was his concern.  Had he stayed, eventually, the five houses would have gotten their hands on the weapons he had available at the time; and, they would not have survived the first succession war.  ComStar would not have become an entity.  Communications would have broken down.  And, the dark ages would have started at that time, without an ares conventions to reel in the use of WMD.  Humanity would have destroyed itself all in the name of (insert whichever house you support here)'s self appointment to be the First Lord/Star League. 

So, you see, he was actually being quite selfless when he left, taking the destructive forces and their scientists with him, so as to have a gene pool to re-establish the human race within the bounds of its home.  I have not read the EA AU PDF.  I think it might be interesting to see what they did. 

(Edited: changed the word "unit" to the intended word "unite").

[Scotty]

The SLDF could quash any one challenger.

The problem: there was more than one challenger.  The Succession Wars would have started anyway.  There would still have been nukes, there would still have been planets depopulated.  Nothing would have changed, except the planets depopulated and nuked would have been predominantly Hegemony worlds while every House fought against a battle-hardened, veteran SLDF for every inch.

Kerensky's Exodus ensured that the planets that died in the 1SW were mostly not Hegemony worlds.  The Exodus was arguably the single most effective life-saving measure anyone in the Hegemony every did.

[abou]

I just don't see why any House Lord would even consider trying to take a Terran Hegemony world if the SLDF was still present. The House Lords had grievances mostly with each other rather than the Hegemony. What's more, you are talking about the presence of an army and navy much larger than any neighboring state in a much, much smaller area; ergo, the density of units is much higher. On top of that, the defenders would be dug in with significant defenses -- assuming the attackers could get past naval defenses.
 
To take a Hegemony world would be a tall order compared to a softer target across another border.

[Scotty]

Just because you don't see it doesn't mean they wouldn't.  When the Lyrans launched the 1SW against the FWL, they targeted the most heavily defended world in the Bolan Thumb.  There were plenty of softer targets, but they didn't hit them.

Hegemony worlds were jewels among the stars in many cases, sporting facilities and factories that the Successor States could not easily match.  They would be targets of opportunity, and they would be attacked.  If multiple Successor States ganged up on the Hegemony, it would fall, and the death toll would have been an order of magnitude larger in the first war.

[Giovanni Blasini]

Reminds me of chanman's thoughts on the topic.

[abou]

Even what was on Bolan paled in comparison to what the SLDF had -- especially if they were to get the SDS on planets restored. And all five Houses? The FedSuns were very unlikely to attack. Barbara Liao expressed regret at the dissolution of the Star League. The Lyrans would be much more interested in the economics of a continued and viable Terran Hegemony.

The only two I see attacking would be the Free Worlds League and Draconis Combine, which would leave them open to predations from their neighbors. Once you factor in the will of the population, it just seems less and less likely that the Terran Hegemony would be attacked by ALL five neighbors.

Even then, you still have the fact that Kerensky left the Hegemony defenseless. They abandoned their duty. Considering what happened on several planets during the course of the first two Succession Wars, I just don't see it being any worse to the Hegemony with the SLDF staying.

[Nerroth]

From a logistical perspective, it is difficult for any one House to rapidly re-deploy the bulk of its assets from one front to another. One of the reasons why the Combine was so heavily focused on the invasion of the Federated Suns is because most of the ground work had been done on this front beforehand. Even in the "Prime" timeline, it would have taken a massive effort to uproot the regiments, transports, and WarShips primed for action on the Davion front to, say, make a march on Tharkad. And on the opposite end of the scale, the heavy AFFS deployments on the Capellan front were quite difficult to wind down, even as the DCMS bore down on New Avalon itself.

In the Empires Aflame timeline, these efforts were compounded by the effects of Operation BLACK SHIELD, which disrupted the Houses' access to the HPG grid during a critical period of expansion and consolidation by the soon-to-be-TSDF. While there were a lot more JumpShips in service at that time, establishing courier lines and command circuits would have been a hefty challenge, not least when the ones doing the disrupting had full access to their own HPG network.

Plus, it is notable that the degree of commitment within each House varied. The Lyrans were the first to the negotiating table, and they even assented to the establishment of the Rim Federation (albeit as a joint Terran-Lyran enterprise). The Federated Suns soon followed, while the Capellans renounced their claim to the first Lordship in alt-2808.

Interestingly, there is no actual date set in the EA timeline for any sort of treaty between the Combine and the Supremacy. One wonders if that means the Combine still does not officially recognize the existence of the Supremacy, and still claims the mantle of First Lordship as of alt-3095...

[abou]

I think I have Empires Aflame kicking around on my computer. I'll have to dig around for it and read it. It was one of those books I believe I downloaded and just never got around to reading it.

[Nightgaun7]

Nobody named Kerensky has ever been good for much.

If Kerensky and the Star League had stuck around, you have to figure that it would be more than a military influence. A hundred scenarios arise, from Kerensky putting himself as new head of the Star League, to picking one of the Lords and throwing his weight behind them, to enforcing a rotating lordship, to having them pick someone totally new to replace the Camerons, and so on and so forth.

[Decoy]

I think we need to stop viewing the worlds of the Terran Hegemony as tormented angels repressed by cruel devils under the Amaris regime. Many of them collaborated with Amaris. Many signed up to join his forces. Heck, if he got no help from the Hegemony itself, the Amaris Civil War would've been over A LOT quicker. In a large part, the worlds had the moral flexibility to do as they must during the Amaris regime. They had the moral flexibility to cut themselves a good deal when the houses came calling. They could protect themselves just fine, unless they decided to be stubborn (looks at Lone Star). Basically, the remains of the Terran Hegemony were not Kerensky's circus or monkey anymore. He could, however, protect the ideals of the Star League and the SLDF in his own way.

[abou]

What choice did they have but to accept Amaris at the start? The economy was in trouble because of Richard Cameron and much of the Hegemony's garrison was now composed of RWR troops. They didn't have the choice Kerensky did when he left.

[Maelwys]

One also has to realize that the plotline has somewhat shifted over time. Originally, it seemed to have been written that the Hegemony was practically a wasteland after the Amaris Crisis, and removing the military was seen as an option to prevent fighting. If there's no SLDF on planet, then there's no need for whichever House is conquering the planet to fight over the planet, destroying more infrastructure.

It was probably a naive hope, as nothing would stop 2 Houses from fighting over a planet, but when they only had to destroy regiments instead of Divisions, perhaps Kerensky hoped the fighting would be more limited, and perhaps he hoped that any Hegemony planets would be negotiated over, much like we see happening early on when the Houses scooped up Hegemony planets before the fighting started.

It was naive, but it could be understood perhaps.

With the latest fluff, the Exodus becomes much more monstrous. The Hegemony planets aren't mostly wastelands, some of them are fully functional and thriving, and in some cases, producing high tech armies of their own for defense. Planets aren't reliant on the SLDF for protection, so removing the SLDF isn't going to stop the Houses from having to fight when they show up.

His decision to leave becomes much more evil in the light of the most reason fluff about the era.

Technology is also an interesting take. IIRC, the early fluff had him leaving in order to keep advanced weapon technology out of the hands of the Successor States (or trying to). With the fluff pushing the introduction of advanced technology to the other factions back to as far as the Reunification War, there's no technology really for the SLDF to try to prevent the Houses from having. They already have most of it. There's some technology the Houses don't have sure, but its limited compared to what it used to be.

[massey]

Reading our new First Succession War book and it keeps striking me how awful Kerensky was. Certainly this is a fair amount of fodder to bring up with a Clan warrior as well, but I just cannot get over how miserable of a person he could be. To be fair, this fits within his character as more of a melancholy idealist than a realist, but his abandonment of the Hegemony after the civil war is inexcusable.

Even if the SLDF was a shadow of its former self, it was still large enough to quash any challenger. The dissolution of the Star League was not a dissolution of the Terran Hegemony. Even if Kerensky could predict the coming conflict and chose to leave the Inner Sphere so as not to drag the SLDF into yet another war, he willingly abandoned many of the worlds that depended solely upon his army for protection. Hell, the core military units of the SLDF were originally Hegemony units.

Even if Kerensky's continued presence in Inner Sphere could not prevent the 1st SW, he could have protected the Hegemony worlds. The sheer size of the SLDF could have made it an island of safety amidst the storm. I doubt any of the House Lords would have challenged him militarily. A firm, deliberate hand could have prevented the collapsing morale of the SLDF and prevented worlds from leaving the Hegemony; stopped the various House Lords' shenanigans; units from leaving for "greener pastures"; and more importantly prevented several worlds from dying.

Depressed, exhausted, or whatever excuse Kerensky had, it doesn't change the fact that he was a selfish jerk who abrogated his obvious duties to the Hegemony once the First Council got dissolved the Star League.

EDIT: And yes, I am aware that Kerensky's leaving is critical to the metaplot of BattleTech. A stabilizing force such as Kerensky and the Terran Hegemony would radically change the history of the game.

Why would he do any of that?

Kerensky wasn't a general of the Terran Hegemony.  He wasn't born in the Terran Hegemony, he was Lyran.  He didn't join the Hegemony military.  He was a STAR LEAGUE general.  He had no more duty to the Hegemony than he did any of the other houses.

The Successor Lords stripped him of his title as Protector of the Star League, and then they disbanded it.  He was 84 years old when he left.  Many of his forces were already defecting to one House or the other.  Kerensky wasn't going to live too much longer, you think things would have been better?  We see what happens when the SL army arrives at the Clan homeworlds.  Within a generation, Kerensky's son has to have yet another Exodus, so that his dad's army can get down to the business of killing each other.

[abou]

I know he studied at the Nagelring, which was a Star League university, but I don't remember where it was stated that he was born in the Lyran Commonwealth. Wasn't his ancestor a guard on Terra to the First Lord? His family was on Terra during the coup as well.

As Maelwys said, in light of recent fluff, he showed straight up dereliction of duty. The SLDF's foundation was the Hegemony military. It makes sense to me that protecting the Hegemony would be the next priority after the Star League (ie. defending the one state without a standing, organized military). Furthermore, Kerensky ended up living another 17 years after the Exodus. Heck, on the back of the Star League sourcebook it mentions how much the human lifespan had been increased.

Had Kerensky been the leader much of the earlier fiction lead us to believe, much of the problems the Inner Sphere has had would never have been. He certainly fits the archetype of the Shakespearean tragic hero: noble and overall well-intentioned, but brought down by his own hubris and selfish avoidance of problems rather than dealing with them.

Kerensky's life seems to be summed up as, "A stitch in time saves nine." He ignored his duties as Regent and Protector of Richard Cameron. Where did that get him? He ignored his responsibility to the citizens of the Terran Hegemony and ran away from the Inner Sphere. Where did that get him? He then ignored his responsibility to the Exodus, allowed problems to fester until they boiled over causing another civil war.

Honestly, if it wasn't for his military acumen, he should be hardly remembered.  And to think that Victor Steiner-Davion gets a hard time from fans.

[roosterboy]

I know he studied at the Nagelring, which was a Star League university, but I don't remember where it was stated that he was born in the Lyran Commonwealth.

He was born in Moscow.

[Maelwys]

Had Kerensky been the leader much of the earlier fiction lead us to believe, much of the problems the Inner Sphere has had would never have been. He certainly fits the archetype of the Shakespearean tragic hero: noble and overall well-intentioned, but brought down by his own hubris and selfish avoidance of problems rather than dealing with them.

I don't know about that. Staying doesn't guarantee anything, even if you ignore the plot idea that it has to happen. If Kerensky secures the Hegemony, then he's going to have to stay put in the Hegemony. The Houses had already been flouting the Star League's control by having "Bandits" fighting, even before the Amaris Crisis. Without the threat of the SLDF, its going to pick up. Kerensky also had trouble with units defecting, and that's going to continue, even if you manage to convince the SLDF that they still have a job to do. We see the SLDF-in-Exile splitting along Faction lines in the Pentagon worlds, can you imagine the trouble with SLDF soldiers trying to defect when they see the FedSuns getting beaten by the DC?

Staying put may be slightly more moral than leaving, but it certainly doesn't mean everything is smooth sailing.

[abou]

True, there could be something else to come along and tear the SLDF apart. And that gets into the various scenarios of how the universe would move forward.

My argument is mostly that Kerensky's abandonment was amoral to the Hegemony. He could have done a lot of good for those worlds with his military and moral superiority as guardian of that state. Part of the reason for defection of units was the poor morale and lack of decisive hand in the face of collapsing central power. You would have thought Kerensky would have learned something from all those morose Russian authors he was so fond of.

I know I'm sounding very vociferous, but I just find Kerensky more and more annoying the more I read. That, I think, is what TPTB intend. He is inconsistent and not the strong patriarch we were previously told.

[Scotty]

Amoral is not immoral, they are different concepts.  Amoral is correct, immoral is debatable.

Let us also keep in mind that one does not have to agree with decisions for them to be good/bad/right/wrong.  You don't agree that Kerensky did the right thing.  Great.  I think he did, because frankly the idea of a 1st Succession War plus three hundred Regiments of 'Mechs and 500 WarShips is a terrifying prospect.

[Natasha Kerensky]

Even the duty of the most moral soldier has to be tempered by reality. 

The canon sources don't make much of this, but before the Exodus decision, the SLDF had fought no less than three major wars (Periphery uprising, conquest of the Rim Worlds, reconquering the Hegemony and Terra) nearly back-to-back over the past 20-something years.  After all that, it's arguably unrealistic to expect the SLDF to then fight some, most, or all of the Great Houses in what became the First Succession War.  That's like expecting a 20th-century military to fight Vietnam, the first Iraq war, and WWII back-to-back, and then expecting that same military turn around and fight WWIII.  There's a certain amount of "get real" that needs to injected into such a proposition.

There's also the question of who pays the SLDF to go to war with the Great Houses, which the canon sources do go into a little.  The Star League is no more, so there is no Inner Sphere-wide tax base to support the SLDF's massive payroll and logistics.  The Terran Hegemony is leaderless, but even if it still had political decision makers, would this hypothetical Hegemony government be able to support the SLDF on its own after what Amaris did to its worlds and economy?  And would this hypothetical Hegemony's leadership want to support the SLDF given other priorities like reconstruction?  And after getting decimated by Amaris's forces, would this hypothetical Hegemony leadership really want to go to war with multiple Houses?

Given that the SLDF had been fighting almost non-stop for a generation and given that the SLDF had no real means of supporting another generation of warfare against the Houses, it's very reasonable that the SLDF's leadership (Alex K, DeChevy, and on down) decided that the best they could do was to ensure that their massive weapons stores did not fall into the hands of the House militaries and that their exhausted soldiers and families had a safe place to go to live out their remaining lives.

In that light, it's hard to see any option other than something like the Exodus.

My 2 C-bills... YMMV.

[Iracundus]

Kerensky could have played kingmaker.  By throwing support behind one House Lord, there might have been a new First Lord.  Alternatively, he could have put one of the distant Cameron cadet family lines into power as a new Cameron line for the Hegemony.  Now granted, this might have still provoked war and maybe also internal revolt within the SLDF.  Perhaps it might only at best have delayed the final death of the Star League given how partisan and biased the individual House rulers were.

Alternatively one could view Kerensky taking the same sort of neutral "make no choice favoring any side" policy as the Camerons did as why the Star League was doomed regardless of the Amaris coup.  By dithering and not taking sides in any disputes between the Houses, the Camerons' authority and that of the Star League was eroded.  By the time the Camerons did act, their intervention ended up pleasing no sides. 

Ultimately though Kerensky was a bad ruler and administrator.  The sources and recent Touring the Stars releases mention how the Hegemony's collapse was made inevitable by the decision to dismiss any civil servant that had served during Amaris's rule, which effectively gutted the government at a time when coordinated government was needed for rebuilding. 

[GoGo Yubari]

He could have played Kingmaker, but then he would have had to make a political choice. I don't think he saw good alternatives and more importantly, I don't think he wanted to get into politics. Putting himself as the leader of a government would have made him a military dictator. I don't think he wanted that, either. He was willing to play ball if everybody else carried their weight, but everyone was looking at their own interests.

So, I don't think he was selfish. On the contrary, even. However, whether it was a good idea to go, is another question which I find more difficult to answer. It is nuanced, which is great about it. In the end, he followed his own moral compass, which was made of a lot more honorable stuff than the House Lords who plunged the Inner Sphere into war.

Also, I think it is important to consider that after so many wars and years of service, he was probably reaching "War never changes/stops" kind of position, so he suspected they were damned if they do, damned if they don't, so he opted out. You could say that there is some selfishness in that, but I don't think it is purely that, when he is also doing that to save lives and worlds by removing a big military from the picture (which was, it is very important to note, hemorrhaging units to the Houses).

[Paladin1]

The SLDF could quash any one challenger.

The problem: there was more than one challenger.  The Succession Wars would have started anyway.  There would still have been nukes, there would still have been planets depopulated.  Nothing would have changed, except the planets depopulated and nuked would have been predominantly Hegemony worlds while every House fought against a battle-hardened, veteran SLDF for every inch.

Kerensky's Exodus ensured that the planets that died in the 1SW were mostly not Hegemony worlds.  The Exodus was arguably the single most effective life-saving measure anyone in the Hegemony every did.

Actually the numbers don't bear this out.  The SLDF ground forces were, roughly, the same size as the combined ground forces of all five of the Houses.  In a purely defensive situation, that makes the Hegemony worlds a no-go area for the other five Houses because of the inability for a House unit to achieve at least a 3:1 ratio of troops, not to mention how that the SLDF was a veteran army at this point and fighting on their home turf.  That is NOT the kind of fight you want to undergo at anything less than 6:1 odds.  Now I'll grant you that the Navy was only as powerful as the two largest Nations, but even this is deceiving as all of those SLN ships would be veterans of the Amaris War as well and you're going to be hard pressed at 5:2 odds against a veteran opponent.

The truth is that Kerensky caused more harm than good by abandoning the Inner Sphere.

[False Son]

The truth is that Kerensky caused more harm than good by abandoning the Inner Sphere.

This point has been debated at some length.  The general consensus is that we will never know.  Kerensky could have stayed and could have helped, but he'd have needed to be the sort of military dictator he would have hated.  Kerensky was not fond of politics, and as his Pentagon Worlds experiment shows, wasn't sympathetic to or capable of leading civilians.  He was doing this in pretty much a political vacuum, whereas the Inner Sphere had it's fair share of plotters.  People might dismiss that Kerensky knew he was unable to hold it together by force of arms alone and hedged his bets by taking the one group of people he thought he could control away from the people that would lure them away. 

[Iracundus]

Actually the numbers don't bear this out.  The SLDF ground forces were, roughly, the same size as the combined ground forces of all five of the Houses.  In a purely defensive situation, that makes the Hegemony worlds a no-go area for the other five Houses because of the inability for a House unit to achieve at least a 3:1 ratio of troops, not to mention how that the SLDF was a veteran army at this point and fighting on their home turf.  That is NOT the kind of fight you want to undergo at anything less than 6:1 odds.  Now I'll grant you that the Navy was only as powerful as the two largest Nations, but even this is deceiving as all of those SLN ships would be veterans of the Amaris War as well and you're going to be hard pressed at 5:2 odds against a veteran opponent.

The truth is that Kerensky caused more harm than good by abandoning the Inner Sphere.

Don't forget however that the SLDF had members from all the Houses and their ties to their homelands were never entirely cut (as the subsequent post-Exodus revolts and infighting in the Pentagon worlds showed).  If Kerensky turned into purely promoting and safeguarding the Hegemony (as opposed to the idea of the Star League), I think there would have been defections as individuals and units refused to fight against their homeland (or heeded their homeland's call to arms), so I wouldn't use those ratios as absolute ones. 

By that point in time, anything Kerensky did would have been a political action, even the Exodus.  If he had truly been tired of politics, he could have chosen at that point to retire and put up a successor in his place that would be willing to make the hard choices among the House lords. 

[sillybrit]

Now I'll grant you that the Navy was only as powerful as the two largest Nations, but even this is deceiving as all of those SLN ships would be veterans of the Amaris War as well and you're going to be hard pressed at 5:2 odds against a veteran opponent.

It could be argued that the Exodus SLDF were more than twice as powerful as the next two largest navies in 2786. The House navies mostly fielded light WarShips, so while their numerical strength might individually appear to be a third to a half that of the SLDF, their actual strength would be lower in comparison, even before considering the experience issue you mention.

Size matters in WarShip combat and the SLDF still had a lot of big ships. The House numbers in 2786 also includes some deserters, and those desertions may not have occurred if Kerensky had opted to stay.

It's true that if Kerensky had opted to stay that more desertions might have occurred, it again falls under the category of Things We Will Never Know. Personally, I believe the biggest problem for the SLDF and Hegemony is that Kerensky did not provide a strong, clear direction until he finally decided to fold and flee, and by then - for some troops - it was already too late.

How many troops would have stuck to the SLDF, telling the House recruiters to go hump themselves, if Kerensky had declared much earlier that the Star League still stood and the SLDF still had a mission to do? How many troops deserted because they were suffering from the disappointment and perhaps even feelings of betrayal after they'd fought a long, brutal war to defeat Amaris and then there didn't even appear to be a step 4 in the plan? Give them a continued cause from a leader that they'd followed through hell, and that's a big appeal for them to stay loyal.

Even the non-Terran SLDF troops could have cause to stay loyal. These are people who had chosen to join the SLDF instead of their own House military. In some cases, this would have no doubt be seen as a betrayal of their mother country, but they still chose to join, to perhaps have to leave behind everything they'd known. That's a high level of commitment. With Kerensky not providing strong direction and reassurance about the future of the Star League and the SLDF in the early years after Amaris was defeated, and with the Houses trying to tempt every breathing trooper, it's little wonder that some opted to jump ship.

[Iracundus]

Even the non-Terran SLDF troops could have cause to stay loyal. These are people who had chosen to join the SLDF instead of their own House military. In some cases, this would have no doubt be seen as a betrayal of their mother country, but they still chose to join, to perhaps have to leave behind everything they'd known. That's a high level of commitment. With Kerensky not providing strong direction and reassurance about the future of the Star League and the SLDF in the early years after Amaris was defeated, and with the Houses trying to tempt every breathing trooper, it's little wonder that some opted to jump ship.

That's what I meant with my earlier post.  If Kerensky had provided some vision or some action to show that he still fought for the Star League, and some glimmer of hope that the Star League was not defunct and beyond hope of salvaging, then there would have been fewer defections.  We saw that some units stayed behind because they did not agree with the Exodus abandoning the Inner Sphere.  If Kerensky showed himself to be partisan and just promoted the Hegemony then there would have been some more defections as it might have signaled to more personnel that the Star League was truly dead.  However I think some defections were inevitable by that point no matter what Kerensky did. 

I could even make the argument that Kerensky should have supported Amaris as the new ruling line of the Hegemony.  That might have saved the Star League, at least for maybe 1 more generation. 

[sillybrit]

I just thought of another reason to effectively boost the SLDF's naval strength compared to the Houses: bracketing.

The Houses didn't have this technology, and that gives the SLDF a big advantage in long and extreme range fights.

[Giovanni Blasini]

He would also have, in addition to what became the Exodus Fleet, the majority of what would become the Com Guard Navy, minus new construction.

In the end, I think Empires Aflame shows, though, that the best thing Kerensky could have done would be to become a martyr the SLDF could rally behind.

[JadedFalcon]

I'm also on board with the Empire Aflame analysis. Kerensky dying sooner than later would have probably saved lives.

Let's look at Kerensky's score card: He happily skipped off to wreck the Periphery after the First Lord he "mentored" effectively dissolved the divided Star League council. After taking Terra, he left the divided Inner Sphere to tear itself apart. And when he died, he left his divided SLDF to tear themselves apart.

Kerensky was great at trashing things, but clueless on building things like stable governments, peaceful transitions between leaders and events, and consensus between powerful leaders (both within the IS and under his own Pentagon rulership). He was a fist, and the second he didn't have an insightful or vaguely benevolent politician to point him in the direction that would do the most good, he became nothing but an agent of destruction and harbinger of death.

I could even make the argument that Kerensky should have supported Amaris as the new ruling line of the Hegemony.  That might have saved the Star League, at least for maybe 1 more generation. 

Maybe an entirely different discussion, but a more politically minded and ambitious SLDF leader could have eroded the Amaris Star Empire from within before initiating their own coup. Different from the wholesale destruction that Kerensky brought with him. And if Kerensky had sided with the new regime, how long would Stefan Amaris last with someone like Jess Cole around?

[Nerroth]

One of the key aspects of the two Historical: Liberation of Terra volumes, and of Historical: Operation KLONDIKE, is how important Aaron DeChavilier was in terms of taking Kerensky's ambitions and aspirations and then setting them into motion.

Unfortunately, DeChavilier also unwittingly proved the wisdom of Kerensky keeping his family life a well-guarded secret; while Katyusha, Nicholas, and Andrey were able to survive the long years of Amaris' occupation of Terra, the listing of the DeChavilier family on the public record proved disastrous for Aaron's kith and kin.

As noted in a recent post, Kerensky's martyrdom at the creation of the Empires Aflame timeline was one thing; but one could argue that no-one was in a more capable position to effectively channel the rage and grief of this loss into decisive military and political action than the man who would become the founding First Lord of the Terran Supremacy. Which makes it ironic that after Aaron's death, "House DeChavilier" became, in essence, House Kerensky-Cameron(-Amaris?)...

[Liam's Ghost]

This point has been debated at some length.  The general consensus is that we will never know.

No such consensus exists, as indicated by this thread actually continuing.

[PurpleDragon]

By that point in time, anything Kerensky did would have been a political action, even the Exodus.  If he had truly been tired of politics, he could have chosen at that point to retire and put up a successor in his place that would be willing to make the hard choices among the House lords.

except that, then, he would have had to live in the realm, under the consequences, of doing nothing.  His own conscience could not allow him that.

[The Eagle]

The reason, I think, that the SLDF sticking around and protecting the Hegemony would not work (and my biggest issue with Empires Aflame) is that once the SLDF establishes itself as the defenders of the Hegemony, they're no longer the SLDF.  They're the Hegemony Armed Forces at that point, and I feel that the majority of non-Hegemony members would have jumped ship back to their home nations....and we get the desertions and defections that helped ramp up the 1SW to begin with occurring anyway.

[False Son]

No such consensus exists, as indicated by this thread actually continuing.

We'll get there.

[Paladin1]

The reason, I think, that the SLDF sticking around and protecting the Hegemony would not work (and my biggest issue with Empires Aflame) is that once the SLDF establishes itself as the defenders of the Hegemony, they're no longer the SLDF.  They're the Hegemony Armed Forces at that point, and I feel that the majority of non-Hegemony members would have jumped ship back to their home nations....and we get the desertions and defections that helped ramp up the 1SW to begin with occurring anyway.

With the exception of the jointly administered worlds, the SLDF was the Hegemony Armed Forces.  I mean, look at the deployment zones.  If you remove the jointly held worlds and the periphery, all that's left is the Hegemony.

I know that they're supposed to be a multi-national force, but for all intents and purposes they're really nothing more than the HAF on a huge scale.


Edited to say: You know, I just went back to FM:SLDF and I was completely wrong.  I thought that the deployment was just along the borders, but they were in almost every area.  That's going to change a LOT of my thoughts on the subject of HAF=SLDF.

Mea Culpa

[Nerroth]

Whatever lingering sentiment there was in the SLDF towards their home realms was not enough to prevent those who took part in the Exodus from leaving them behind in the "Prime" timeline.

One real problem with the Exodus was that there was no concerted effort to do what Nicholas did during the Second Exodus: to actively sell a new vision of what a post-Exodus society would be, and then to implement policies aimed at turning this vision into reality. Without some means of transitioning towards a new social and political framework, the old nostalgia and hatred was able to bubble under the surface across the Pentagon worlds.

Which is one reason why I don't see it as a coincidence that Empires Aflame had Aaron DeChavilier establish his new title as First Lord of the Terran Supremacy, not as Director-General of a now-defunct Hegemony. The creation of the TSDF was arguably intended to make a break from the HAF legacy; those who would remain in service would not be trying to wind the clock back to the Age of War, but rather to forge what in their minds would be the true "Successor State" to the Star League itself. Over time, the Supremacy would mature into a "traditional" realm in its own right - but by then, the majority of those running it would have been born and raised under its aegis.

Actually, I do wonder how many ex-SLDF recruits would have gone (or had been sent to) Rim Federation space, as part of the establishment of the FAF. Since both the Supremacy and the Commonwealth had a hand in its creation, it would make sense for each fostering realm to want to bring in soldiers willing to sign up to this new project, without undue levels of irredentism towards the former Rim Worlds Republic territories lying beyond the Federation's borders.

[mitchberthelson]

No such consensus exists, as indicated by this thread actually continuing.

Yep, and new books add new wrinkles, or explain old ones in sufficient depth to reignite the discussion.

There are things in Klondike and Liberation of Terra that show just how polarizing Kerensky and his invasion were in a Hegemony that partly supported Amaris. They also show how an entire generation of soldiers (much of the rank and file of the Exodus movement) reached their majority in training camps during a time of seemingly endless war, knowing a "normal life" only as some far off dream that would be realized if they followed Kerensky to the end....and then that dream was denied by House Lords that they knew mostly as fence sitters or suspected collaborators. Add on battle fatigue, mixed reception from the populace, problems with pay and stability, and the fact that the SLDF contributed to the economic destruction of the IS in order to finance its war, and you can see how the Exodus movement developed.

I personally believe that their reasoning was tragically flawed, but I think TPTB have done a great job of letting us see, in these new books, how it could have evolved organically among a group of real people, rather than just being a case of the dreaded "Author Fiat." Based on this, I can also see why some fans actually agree with the Exodus.

There are also new facts, on the other hand, that make one much less likely to forgive Kerensky.

For example, pg. 13 of First Succession War indicates that Kerensky's own journal seems to say that John Davion was amenable to Kerensky being First Lord. It also explicitly states that Barbara Liao was sympathetic, but refused only because the situation was too far gone. Jennifer Steiner was also supportive, but she could not give back the RWR worlds her brother had taken and Kerensky couldn't let that slide (IMO that was Alex's fault for not leaving a garrison).

I can see now that had Kerensky worked early for Capellan AND Davion support, plus giving more aggressive support to Blake and a hefty chunk of the Steiner populace that hated what Richard had done, and then spent more time doing things like undermining the supposed legitimacy of Amaris' election (part of the reason a fair bit of the Hegemony populace believed his war was illegal), he could have pulled it off. Even better if he had left a garrison in the Rim Worlds to deter Richard rather than trusting someone proven to be so selfish and unreasonable.

However, taking power would have required him to WANT to pull a James McKenna and he explicitly did not want power. He believed it was wrong to take it. Instead, in my opinion, he pulled a Ned Stark, and here we are.

[False Son]

Yep, and new books add new wrinkles, or explain old ones in sufficient depth to reignite the discussion.

Which still lead to Kerensky's plan C, avoid responsibility.  All of this is meant to get you thinking about something in hindsight.  Truth is, for Kerensky to have chosen something other than the Exodus would have required him to have been a different kind of person, the kind of person that would have made all his detailed qualities different.  Everything happened exactly how it should have happened. 

[Kit deSummersville]

He was born in Moscow.

Moscow?

[mitchberthelson]

Which still lead to Kerensky's plan C, avoid responsibility.  All of this is meant to get you thinking about something in hindsight.  Truth is, for Kerensky to have chosen something other than the Exodus would have required him to have been a different kind of person, the kind of person that would have made all his detailed qualities different.  Everything happened exactly how it should have happened.

Absolutely. Like I said. He believed taking power was wrong and he was both a fanatical idealist and a terrible judge of character. There's not really another outcome, given those issues, unless he's removed from the equation. I believe what he did was wrong. However, there's no way he could have done anything else, given who he was.

[False Son]

Absolutely. Like I said. He believed taking power was wrong and he was both a fanatical idealist and a terrible judge of character. There's not really another outcome, given those issues, unless he's removed from the equation. I believe what he did was wrong. However, there's no way he could have done anything else, given who he was.

Hey, i'm all for "what if?" scenarios.  But, it is all speculation.  The detailing of history after the fact is fun because it gives people weight on either side of the stay/leave argument. 

[sillybrit]

Basically Kerensky was just a massive fan of The Clash and he simply took their lyrics too much to heart... and Terra just didn't let him know.

[abou]

*groan*

[Maingunnery]

Absolutely. Like I said. He believed taking power was wrong and he was both a fanatical idealist and a terrible judge of character.

Maybe deep down he knew that he was incapable of leading a nation.

[Liam's Ghost]

We'll get there.

If you're expecting a bunch of guys on the internet to reach consensus, you'll be here for a very long time.

Personal thoughts: Troop strengths and the houses tendencies and desires to fight each other tells me that the Hegemony had a very good chance of holding together, if Kerensky had stayed. The notion that the houses would band together and destroy them is flawed on its face by the idea of the houses doing anything together willingly. And even facing a fight from every direction, there were a lot of SLDF troops, and the houses had to watch all their borders simultaneously.

Conclusion: Kerensky put the good of his army over the good of billions of people his army was sworn to protect (And yes, they were, every citizen of the Hegemony was also a citizen of the Star League), without even an attempt to protect them. Guy was a traitor and a dick.

[mitchberthelson]

Maybe deep down he knew that he was incapable of leading a nation.

That makes the Exodus mess even more tragic because that was all about him trying and failing to lead a nation.

[Scotty]

Personal thoughts: Troop strengths and the houses tendencies and desires to fight each other tells me that the Hegemony had a very good chance of holding together, if Kerensky had stayed. The notion that the houses would band together and destroy them is flawed on its face by the idea of the houses doing anything together willingly. And even facing a fight from every direction, there were a lot of SLDF troops, and the houses had to watch all their borders simultaneously.

If, and only if, the defections stopped and House Troops remained with the SLDF, which they had no real reason to do after the Star League was formally dissolved.  Even on the Exodus, house troops quickly reverted back to killing each other instead of furthering the goals of the Star League, to the tune of millions dead starting with a much, much, much smaller population.

Expecting it to hold together was impossible.  Empires Aflame is a fun "what if" that is not canon and cannot be assumed to be a canon-except-for-X scenario.  It's an April Fool's joke product, not the proof that the SLDF could have held together.

[ColBosch]

I am firmly behind the hypothesis that Kerensky acted selfishly at the end. If he couldn't save the Star League, he at least could've acted to protect the Terran Hegemony and Rim Worlds Republic. History is often kind to those who assume tyrannical powers to preserve their nations, as with Caesar, Lincoln, and McKenna. His forces - even those technically on loan from the other Great Houses - were loyal enough to follow him into the Deep Periphery, so I don't doubt that he would've had their support to preserve the Hegemony, perhaps by declaring a "Star League-in-abstentia." Davion, Steiner, and Liao wouldn't have pushed him, Marik really wasn't that strong at the time, and Kurita wasn't so stupid as to invade against overwhelming odds.

But Kerensky was tired of fighting, and he would have had to fight. That he would've won is irrelevant to him. Look at his overreactions to the Prinz Eugen mutiny and the outbreak of civil unrest in the Pentagon cluster, or even how he condoned crippling the THAF bureaucracy after the Amaris Civil War. Those were not the actions of the once-great general and student of history, but instead those of a tired, frustrated old man. I have nothing against a combat-weary veteran wishing for nothing more than to retire, but when the lives of trillions are at stake, one should show more intestinal fortitude. He didn't even appoint someone to represent the Terran Hegemony at the final Star League conferences!

No, when history demanded more from him than an ability to lead troops in battle, he folded and ran away.

[JadedFalcon]

If, and only if, the defections stopped and House Troops remained with the SLDF, which they had no real reason to do after the Star League was formally dissolved.  Even on the Exodus, house troops quickly reverted back to killing each other instead of furthering the goals of the Star League, to the tune of millions dead starting with a much, much, much smaller population.

The Pentagon Worlds didn't have an external threat to unite them. Many citizens from the great houses joined the SLDF during the Amaris war because of their belief in the Star League, and had the SLDF stayed and continued to fight for what they believed in, they would've had a reason to focus, a struggle to overcome. Instead of sitting around with nothing to do, spoiling for a fight while the senior military leaders argued and played power games.

The Terran Hegemony had a chance of existing, even if it meant losing planets to invading house forces. Millions, if not billions died because of Kerensky's decision take DeChavilier's frustrated comment to heart, and skip town. He was the wrong person to have that much power with no one to tell him what to do with it. And his ego prevented him from handing control over to a more capable leader who could have made compromises to protect their citizens.

[Maelwys]

If, and only if, the defections stopped and House Troops remained with the SLDF, which they had no real reason to do after the Star League was formally dissolved.  Even on the Exodus, house troops quickly reverted back to killing each other instead of furthering the goals of the Star League, to the tune of millions dead starting with a much, much, much smaller population.

They weren't House troops. They were citizens of one of the Great Houses who decided to join the SLDF. It wasn't like it they were Davion regiments seconded into the Star League, like it was in the Reunification War, unless I'm missing something. The exodus had the problem of "Well, now that we're not really the Star League anymore, how do I identify myself." And the answer was unfortunately, "Well, those people over there speak the same language I did when I was home, so lets get together with them."

[Nerroth]

At the risk of splitting hairs, I might note that Empires Aflame was a Halloween product, rather than an April Fool's Day release.

Which still means that everything that takes place in EA after the misjump is non-canon - but I was under the impression that Halloween products were intended to be at least marginally more feasible than AFD ones.

And while it represents but one of any number of alternative scenarios to that which played out in the "Prime" timeline, it happens to be one which works for me. Not that I would expect it to do so for anyone else, of course.

[marauder648]

A little what if, instead of doing the original campaign, Kerensky and the SLDF just bulldozed its way directly to Terra instead of slowly constricting on the world.  The SDS did most of the damage to the SLDF and gutted its navy. by ignoring most of the worlds and trying to cut the head off the snake so to speak in a shorter war, could that not have helped out? A less damaged SLDF would be a more fearsome prospect and if Kerensky had not gone "Sod it!" and still done EXODUS, could he or someone else have held it together?

[Decoy]

How do you get a less damaged SLDF?  There was a LOT of prepwork involved in taking down Terra's automated defenses.  Furthermore, Amaris could possibly escape and then you'd STILL have to fight a harder, more grueling Rim Worlds campaign. May as well say that "What if Kerensky used a spec ops team to kill Amaris while he was on the john." Lots of whatifs. We can only discuss what is written as canon.

As far things go, I feel kind of vindicated by the release of Touring the Stars: Brownsville. The Brownsvillians sided with Amaris and later joined the Confederation on their own terms. Brownsville surely wasn't the only planet to make those kind of deals.

[Vition2]

We can only discuss what is written as canon.

False, this thread in particular is filled with speculation and what ifs.  Marauder's reorientation of the topic could have been done in another thread, though this one has been fallow for a day or two.

[Warclaw]

Honestly, if it wasn't for his military acumen, he should be hardly remembered.  And to think that Victor Steiner-Davion gets a hard time from fans.

What military acumen?  Throwing overwhelming force at an objective regardless of casualties/cost is hardly the mark of a military genius.

Yes, the League military won the Wars of Oppression in the periphery...at great cost, and taking FAR more time and casualties than even the most pessimistic projections....though it is easier to amass a winning record when you start with a military force orders of magnitude larger than your opponents.

The best real-world comparison I can come up with is Marshal Zhukov from the WWII Soviet army.  Effective, yes, but wasteful of his troops and uncaring of the costs of his chosen tactics.  (Basically a meat-grinder, attrition based strategy.)  "So what if I pay  dozen troops to each one of my enemy's?  I have them to spend, he does not."

[Foxx Ital]

I think the Great Father was correct in his decision for leaving those tainted freebirths to wallow in their own filth.

 I like that we have more information on him and hes not some mythical being who can and did no wrong. I like this version of kerensky!

[Mohammed As`Zaman Bey]

  Simply put, Kerensky did not have the legal authority to run off with any of the SLDF forces. He decided to incite a mass desertion and engaged in a conspiracy to steal property that belonged to the Houses, who were the actual authority of the Star League and its assets. Some people claim "There was no Star League" and while that may be, when a store closes its doors the employees do not have leave to loot the shelves. The assets belong to its shareholders and executors, in this case, the House Lords, who removed Kerensky from his post. Intentions, good or ill, have no bearing in this case -Kerensky, having failed to raise Richard Cameron, failed to administer the Star League, failed to defend the Terran Hegemony, and finally failed to oversee the Terran Hegemony's reconstruction, finally chose to flee the IS to set himself up as a bandit king, dragging his followers with him.

[Alexander Knight]

Well technically, the SLDF should have fallen under the authority of the Ministry of Communications, being the last element of the Star League government still functional.

[ColBosch]

Saying Kerensky led a mutiny is ridiculous. The Star League was dissolved, meaning the SLDF was free to do as it pleased. Furthermore, the Terran Hegemony was effectively destroyed, meaning the THAF was free to do as it pleased. There was literally no government for the armed forces to answer to. I believe they should have stayed due to simple morality, but there was no legal requirement.

[SteveRestless]

I think the Great Father was correct in his decision for leaving those tainted freebirths to wallow in their own filth.

 I like that we have more information on him and hes not some mythical being who can and did no wrong. I like this version of kerensky!

I concur, trothkin.

There are no surviving worlds we are aware of that maintained the ways and culture of the Terran Hegemony. They were all either conquered and subsumed into the successor states or scoured like New Dallas. The weak were conquered and the strong were destroyed. It would have gone much the same for the hegemony as a whole.

Aleksandr Kerensky was not a head of state. He was a military man, and he knew that was all that he was suited for. It should be respected, to know what you CAN do as well as what you CANNOT. I also respect that he knew that staying would require him to become something he could not stomach becoming, and chose not to.

Might his staying have preserved the hegemony? perhaps. But it is by no means guaranteed. He made a decision and tried to do what he thought was right. Even THAT did not work out well. Staying, and trying to lead, without his heart in it? History would regard him as a monster, and might not even be wrong to.

[MarikMilitaMan]

Basically Kerensky was just a massive fan of The Clash and he simply took their lyrics too much to heart... and Terra just didn't let him know.

Class  [applause]

[abou]

Might his staying have preserved the hegemony? perhaps. But it is by no means guaranteed. He made a decision and tried to do what he thought was right. Even THAT did not work out well. Staying, and trying to lead, without his heart in it? History would regard him as a monster, and might not even be wrong to.

But was establishing the Star League-in-Exile any more guaranteed?  In hind sight, yes, but from the fiction in sourcebooks and what has been published on BattleCorps it does not seem as though Kerensky had a destination in mind.  I cannot remember if anything was said specifically, but it is clear that the Exodus was not smooth sailing.  Much wailing and gnashing of teeth could have been saved if Kerensky had said, "We'll reach our destination in 2 years +/- a few weeks."

But he couldn't say that because it appears he didn't even know. And then of all the planets to pick he had to choose some of the worst he could find. Without the benefit of hindsight, I don't see how the trials of the Exodus were any better than staying.

[marauder648]

The thing is did Kerensky have a plan other than 'head north'.  We know they ignored habitable worlds on the route to the cluster, possibly because they might have been viewed as being too close to the Inner Sphere and found again.  But there was clearly no destination/plan in mind other than 'head north, cross fingers REALLY hard...?????? Profit!'

[Maingunnery]

The thing is did Kerensky have a plan other than 'head north'.  We know they ignored habitable worlds on the route to the cluster, possibly because they might have been viewed as being too close to the Inner Sphere and found again.  But there was clearly no destination/plan in mind other than 'head north, cross fingers REALLY hard...?????? Profit!'

Well there were several established colonies nearby, maybe he heard of them but didn't know their exact location?

[ANS Kamas P81]

I think the two big question for Kerensky was, could the SLDF have survived the first three claimants to First Lord via invasion of the Hegemony, and held off the next two challenges?  And, prior to that, could he have kept the SLDF/THDF together?

I don't know on the first, but it's been argued it would have been a case of 'simply too many enemies' and the only question being who could hold off the longest.  For the second...considering there were desertions to the Houses in small numbers, it was clear the SLDF wasn't going to stay around completely.  When the Fed Suns got their hands on an entire Royal assault regiment wholesale, it was clear there was going to be much more, and that's when he said Nope.

Did he make the Succession Wars easier?  Maybe.  A lot of high-end tech and warships didn't get involved that could have.  In retrospect to the scale of things, though, I think that's the equivalent of taking the third stage off a thermonuclear warhead.  Sure, dropping 2 or 3 megatons from a 5 MT warhead is a big reduction in damage...but you're still talking a multimegaton bomb going off.

Idly, there's a thought - what if the SLN had, horrible pun intended, jumped ship to serve with the House fleets?  Double those across the board and suddenly the 1st SW's naval battles and bombardment tactics might leave us with a planetary headcount equal to the Inner Sphere from the first Mechwarrior RPG...

[Maingunnery]

Idly, there's a thought - what if the SLN had, horrible pun intended, jumped ship to serve with the House fleets?  Double those across the board and suddenly the 1st SW's naval battles and bombardment tactics might leave us with a planetary headcount equal to the Inner Sphere from the first Mechwarrior RPG...

Warships were primary targets during the SWs, so the rate in which Warships are lost might just have been higher, as you get WS hunting WS.

[ColBosch]

Warships were primary targets during the SWs, so the rate in which Warships are lost might just have been higher, as you get WS hunting WS.

That's his point. Some early sources had a far smaller Inner Sphere.

[Rtifs]

I would answer the question with another question.  To what end would he have stayed?

I have always viewed Kerensky as an idealist.  He dedicated his whole life to the Star League and its ideals.  He fought for it.  Sacrificed countless lives for it.  And in the end it was for nothing.  Everything he dedicated himself to and fought for was being destroyed. 

What was the point of staying?  To press his own claim as First Lord?  In staying in the IS I’m certain that he could have held out and preserved the Hegemony as a political entity.  So what would having a sixth successor state accomplish?  Even if he sat out the first succession war, one of his descendants would have eventually used the vast military power of the SLDF to try and conquer the IS.  In the end the IS would be effectively no different even if the names of the power brokers were.

In leaving the IS, he had a chance to set up a society where the ideals of the SL could be preserved and lived out.  But this is Battletech not Peacetech, so we know how that went down. 

[Decoy]

This is a strange way to put things, but in the Clans, the ideal of the Star League survived at least. You may not agree with what form those ideals took, but they survived. Furthermore, the Star League was revived for a short time by the great houses willingly. It took the Clans attacking to do it, but they figured it out for it to work for a decade.

In the Empire of Flames universe people seem to point to, the Star League died with Kerensky. The Terran Supremacy is just as it sounds. It is an entity driven to crush and oppress all who are not Terran. It's no revival of the Star League. It's barely different from the Draconis Combine.

[DarthRads]

Well there were several established colonies nearby, maybe he heard of them but didn't know their exact location?

Given proximity, the Tanite system might have been his goal, but he turned right instead of left at that last intersection...

[Vition2]

I always got the impression that Kerensky had a general idea of where he wanted to go, but the exact distance was somewhat in flux.  The Pentagon worlds happened to be one of the locations he may have known about but may only have become his primary choice as the dissatisfaction of ship life began to seriously grate on the fleet.  From what I can recall, the Pentagon worlds had been discovered previously and known to be "livable" but only the most preliminary of information about the worlds had been attained.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Now there's a whif for you.  Instead of going to the Pentagon, the Fleet finds Strana Mechty first and decides to colonize it alone.  One world for 3 million people is much, much more than enough - and instead of barely hospitable hellholes, it's a paradise.

What then?

[False Son]

What then?

A somewhat similar mess, as far as i can see it.  Ethnic divisions, mass demobilization and Kerensky's inability to run a civilian government were the main contributors to the Second Exodus.  But, if conditions on Strana Mechty were better than the Pentagon Worlds and the Second Exodus either delayed or avoided altogether there would be no Clans.  Keresnky Sr had to die after he made the case for the Second Exodus, but before he could found a second society. 

[Maingunnery]

A somewhat similar mess, as far as i can see it.  Ethnic divisions, mass demobilization and Kerensky's inability to run a civilian government were the main contributors to the Second Exodus.  But, if conditions on Strana Mechty were better than the Pentagon Worlds and the Second Exodus either delayed or avoided altogether there would be no Clans.  Keresnky Sr had to die after he made the case for the Second Exodus, but before he could found a second society.

Poor conditions fuel ethnic conflicts, so I would expect a more general rebellion against the local government. 

[glitterboy2098]

Given proximity, the Tanite system might have been his goal, but he turned right instead of left at that last intersection...

which for some reason was labelled "Albuquerque" on the charts

What was the point of staying?  To press his own claim as First Lord?

actually there were surviving members of the McKenna family, the descendants of the first Director-general of the TH and cousins to the Cameron royal line. with all the Cameron's gone, the surviving TH/SLDF units could have championed on of the McKenna's to be the new leader of the Terran Hegemony. alternately, he could have done like what happened to set the Cameron's on the throne in the first place.. declared a military emergency to secure the borders, and buy time for a council to be formed to select eligible candidates, then hold a general election.

pushing for anyone in first lordship would have had to wait till the succession crisis for the Hegemony was ironed out. and to be fair.. Kerensky had no real claim to the TH's throne.. and to be First Lord you had to be the leader of a nation, so he couldn't legally push for First Lordship himself. not without having to fight more than half his own troops as well as the successor states. though had a Mckenna or other successor to the TH throne been sorted out, he could have used the TH's greater technological edge to help that new leader negotiate who would get the first lordship, and other adjustments to the star league organization.

[marauder648]

I know that Kerensky took the families of those who came with him, but did he take along any administrators or anything like that or was it all soldiers/military personnel and their dependents?

[solmanian]

I am firmly behind the hypothesis that Kerensky acted selfishly at the end. If he couldn't save the Star League, he at least could've acted to protect the Terran Hegemony and Rim Worlds Republic. History is often kind to those who assume tyrannical powers to preserve their nations, as with Caesar, Lincoln, and McKenna. His forces - even those technically on loan from the other Great Houses - were loyal enough to follow him into the Deep Periphery, so I don't doubt that he would've had their support to preserve the Hegemony, perhaps by declaring a "Star League-in-abstentia." Davion, Steiner, and Liao wouldn't have pushed him, Marik really wasn't that strong at the time, and Kurita wasn't so stupid as to invade against overwhelming odds.

But Kerensky was tired of fighting, and he would have had to fight. That he would've won is irrelevant to him. Look at his overreactions to the Prinz Eugen mutiny and the outbreak of civil unrest in the Pentagon cluster, or even how he condoned crippling the THAF bureaucracy after the Amaris Civil War. Those were not the actions of the once-great general and student of history, but instead those of a tired, frustrated old man. I have nothing against a combat-weary veteran wishing for nothing more than to retire, but when the lives of trillions are at stake, one should show more intestinal fortitude. He didn't even appoint someone to represent the Terran Hegemony at the final Star League conferences!

No, when history demanded more from him than an ability to lead troops in battle, he folded and ran away.

While the name is not in front of me, IIRC Kerensky did try to reinstall the geriatric former director general of the TH, as well as recommending him as a candidate as the new first lord. The house lord had a good laugh and flat out turned him down, even refusing to recognize the guy as director general, let soon first lord...

[Kit deSummersville]

I know that Kerensky took the families of those who came with him, but did he take along any administrators or anything like that or was it all soldiers/military personnel and their dependents?

Armies have a whole bunch of administrators who have a rank and can use a gun.

[marauder648]

Armies have a whole bunch of administrators who have a rank and can use a gun.

Oh I know, I was one :p  But what i'm talking about is proper administrators from the civil sector and the like.

[ColBosch]

Oh I know, I was one :p  But what i'm talking about is proper administrators from the civil sector and the like.

Not many. Most bureaucrats were driven out of office, if not arrested or lynched, for being "collaborators" with Amaris. It's a huge part of why the Terran Hegemony collapsed.