Posted 13 May 2014 - 09:27 AM
I follow house Davion because PGI are a bunch of jerks who won't let me join the ComGuard unless I work for them.
Still, of all the remaining choices, House Davion is the best. Not that there's much to choose from in the Battletech Universe. The Federated Suns is basically somebody's idealized Space America, which I'm totally on-board with as a citizen of Earth-America. The real America, not that other one.
True, it is ruled by a monarchy, something I would never accept, but it is a benevolent fictional monarchy that is somehow interested in promoting freedom. Normally, I would never fall for that, I vote strictly Libertarian, but within the confines of this universe I guess I can tolerate going all Platonian and tolerate enlightened rule by philosophers.
I enjoy most of the Davion canon, and when that fails I enjoy Davion auto-cannon. Call me prejudiced, but as a former member of the most powerful military in the world, I am somehow inordinately proud of Davion Military tradition. As a rule, I don't endorse the use of lethal force to control people. When I went to Iraq, it was as a peacekeeper, not an antagonist. I never saw the theater of war most did. Sure, I was shot at and very nearly blown up...repeatedly, but I was a friend to even the insurgents. It may sound odd, but that attitude saved my life, and the lives of others.
But that's an OT story, the fun part of that war was having absolutely supreme military dominance over any form of resistance. Ignore the media, we could have flattened that nation in a matter of hours if we wished it. Nobody could have stopped us, the US Marines, if we had ever been turned loose. That's not supposition, it is a fact. We never lost an engagement, not even close. Our discipline and fire superiority proved itself time and time again. Nothing could stand against us, we were invincible. The casualties that our nation suffered were only a result of politicians getting in our way. No pathetic insurgency made of half-trained boys pretending to be men ever stood a chance against us. They were terrible shots, incompetent bombers, and disastrously organized. I use the term "organized" loosely, even in the "disastrous" context. I have seen children organize water-gun fights with more planning.
Anyways, maybe you have to stand at that peak to appreciate the value of serving people. Maybe you have to actually hold that kind of power before you ask yourself what you're going to do with it. What would you want to do with it? I never particularly wanted to dominate the Iraqis, I felt bad for them. It was like killing children. Annoying, ungrateful, ******* children that killed hundreds of thousands of Kurds nobody remembers, but children nonetheless.
The Davion fiction goes around all this and just imposes a Great House of Royalty that is primarily interested in bettering people's lives. Well, frell me dead, that's what I signed up for. Moreover, they manage to not {LT-MOB-25} it up with power struggles. Prince Victor stays the course against the Clans, even as his sister betrays him and the Inner Sphere falls apart bickering over power they don't have a right to, that nobody should have a right to.
Call me simple, but Prince Victor and his House are my choice. In this universe at least. He doesn't want power, and that's the kind of man I am willing to follow. Anybody can be powerful, it's so easy once you have the power, but to surrender it in the interests of something greater takes real strength.
My 'mech and my skills are sworn to the service of Prince Ian Victor-Steiner Davion, as readily as I swore my oath to the people of the United States and their Constitution so many years ago.
23
James Griffin, on 30 January 2014 - 08:35 AM, said:
