The End of the 3rd Succession War in game time is 1920 IRL. A massive war has just been fought to a grinding halt, and both sides have tons of data on how the war was fought, what was successful, what was unsuccessful, and both sides are using that hard earned data to prepare for the next war.
The Capellans are the French. They say "This is how the war was fought last time, this is how we won last time, and this is how we prepare to fight the next time. But instead of building a Maginot line they deploy in trip lines, expecting an attack, and expecting to reinforce an attack from the interior. As the 3rd SSW wound down, you did not have the massive military movements that characterized the 1st SSW, and it was the strategy that worked for them.
The Davion are the Germans. They looked at the last war, they study the data and outcomes, and they say "We aren't going to fight the last war, we're going to fight the next war." Both sides have the same data, but they each draw a different conclusion, a conclusion that is validated by what they learned the last time they fought.
Cue to 1940/3028. The Tactical problem is this: There's a huge fortified line in front of you/Your enemies deployment is built to take advantage of his interior lines of reinforcement. So, what do you do? In 1940 you send the Panzers lancing through the Ardennes; in 3028 you have multiple units hitting individual units, overwhelming then before the reinforcements can arrive, and then attacking again. Yes, in a standup one on one fight, your average Capellan is better than your average Davion. That's why you send two or three (or four) Davions each time your attacking.
The Capellans weren't a crappy military, anymore than France was a crappy military in 1940. They were just unprepared to fight the way they needed to in order to win, and once attacked, were not given the chance to recover.
Also, the fact that Davion was willing to ruin his economy by appropriating jumpships and had an ally who was distracting his other opponent had a lot to due with the successes in the CC.
Dav
I think that's absurd. There are clear tactical reasons why the French army (which was set up for static defence) was defeated by the Germans at that time - there are no clear tactical reasons for the conquest of the CC. We were simply told (suddenly) they were a crappy military, when that had not been the case prior to the Warrior Trilogy. They were smaller in numbers, but were shown to beat HD in late 3SW at least as often as they lost.
I am not one of these strange posters who favours one or other faction, I just like consistency. Also I didn't like the way HD seemed invincible suddenly, seemingly due to some kind of moral decency as much as anything else. It was not a good way for a morally grey setting to head. Indeed it led to many another metaplot mess that came after. IMHO.
But, we're heading into well trod territory, so I'll agree to disagree and bow out of this one.