in some ways was houseman right?

tlb wrote:PS: McQueen had ambition that matched her ability, most people have much more of one than the other.

I realise a lot of people accept the premise that McQueen is some kind of superstar genius. I don't. She was a ruthless brute willing to sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice. From throwing battlecruisers against dreadnoughts to cluster bombing civilians to launching her own coup attempt prematurely because of bad intel.

She had some ability, no doubt, but its height is overly exaggerated by the burnt-down wasteland that the People's Navy was after Saint-Just started purging the Legislaturalist officer corps.

It's like saying an one-eyed person would be queen in the land of the blind. Technically correct, but that doesn't mean they have the abilities of a person with two eyes.

Jonathan_S wrote:(OTOH I wouldn't want to be the first one to seriously break the Republic's newly restored democracy -- not if Theisman is still alive, knowing he put a pulsar dart through the head of the last person to wreck (what was left of) the democracy. Retired or not he could probably quickly pull an effective counter-coup together!)

That's not a great option. You don't protect a democracy by having a long-lived Cincinnatus lurking in the shadows to assassinate anyone he considers to have crossed the line. That's ultimately just a shadow dictatorship with a puppet democratic facade which may fall apart when the judge finally dies.

And I wouldn't be entirely sure that the whole Havenite Navy will follow him everywhere forever. There has to be a lot of hate stored up and a long-seated dislike of Manticore because of the PRH's constant propaganda. The Legislaturalists started way back in the late 1800s and it rolled until 1915. Pierre's regime doubled down on the crazy, with officers being shot for not saying "Citizen" before any title. Then the High Ridge government ironically did its best to validate this propaganda.

So an anti-Manticore political party should be able to tap a rather large pool of voters, especially if something the Grand Alliance does results in an unanticipated negative impact upon Haven.

Hypothetically, suppose that the Grand Fleet which attacked Galton had brought 100 Havenite SD(P) along and Galton's defenses concentrated on those. I bet a Havenite politician or two would be howling about Manticore using Havenite lives and ships as cannon fodder. "Those Galtons were the enemy of our enemy. Why did we even attack them? They did us a favour when they blew Manticore's infrastructure up. Renounce the alliance, we can now attack them with their own technologies and it'll be third time lucky!"

tlb wrote:PS: McQueen had ambition that matched her ability, most people have much more of one than the other.

munroburton wrote:I realise a lot of people accept the premise that McQueen is some kind of superstar genius. I don't. She was a ruthless brute willing to sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice. From throwing battlecruisers against dreadnoughts to cluster bombing civilians to launching her own coup attempt prematurely because of bad intel.

She had some ability, no doubt, but its height is overly exaggerated by the burnt-down wasteland that the People's Navy was after Saint-Just started purging the Legislaturalist officer corps.

It's like saying an one-eyed person would be queen in the land of the blind. Technically correct, but that doesn't mean they have the abilities of a person with two eyes.

Saying "cluster bombing civilians" is somewhat like saying those people in the streets were just sightseers, enjoying the beauty of the Capitol buildings. "A Whiff of Grapeshot" in More Than Honor is about saving a bad government from something worse. It is not the first instance of using pinnaces with cluster bombs against crowds of people, Honor did it in On Basilisk Station. Is Honor also a "ruthless brute"?

McQueen was considered a woman of great ability by her enemies and they all had two eyes (although one was artificial in the case of Honor).

tlb wrote:McQueen was considered a woman of great ability by her enemies and they all had two eyes (although one was artificial in the case of Honor).

Indeed. McQueen is not being compared against her peers in the PN, because there weren't any. Any possible ones had been eliminated by the CPS purges. In that sense, we don't know how many eyes she had.

She's being judged by her ability to fight the Alliance. She did managed to hold them out of Trevor's Star for a while and Operation Icarus was a moderate success.

And the coup too. She jumped the gun, but when executed properly, it worked too.

tlb wrote:Saying "cluster bombing civilians" is somewhat like saying those people in the streets were just sightseers, enjoying the beauty of the Capitol buildings. "A Whiff of Grapeshot" in More Than Honor is about saving a bad government from something worse. It is not the first instance of using pinnaces with cluster bombs against crowds of people, Honor did it in On Basilisk Station. Is Honor also a "ruthless brute"?

She can be, but Honor's ruthlessness is usually directed at minimising the overall loss of lives. McQueen doesn't care about that and used those weapons(including orbital bombardment weapons from her superdreadnought flagship) in an urban environment in which enormous civilian collateral casualties were to be expected. Honor's marines torched an attacking force in the open moss.

McQueen was considered a woman of great ability by her enemies and they all had two eyes (although one was artificial in the case of Honor).

Her greatest enemy was Oscar Saint-Just. White Haven was more complimentary of Amos Parnell than he was of McQueen. I don't remember Honor expressing an opinion on her. The rest of it is just everyone else swallowing McQueen's personal propaganda while the officers with more ability than ambition kept their heads down as long as Saint-Just was shooting them.

tlb wrote:McQueen was considered a woman of great ability by her enemies and they all had two eyes (although one was artificial in the case of Honor).

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Indeed. McQueen is not being compared against her peers in the PN, because there weren't any. Any possible ones had been eliminated by the CPS purges. In that sense, we don't know how many eyes she had.

She's being judged by her ability to fight the Alliance. She did managed to hold them out of Trevor's Star for a while and Operation Icarus was a moderate success.

And the coup too. She jumped the gun, but when executed properly, it worked too.

First: it is amazing that she was able to set up apparatus to respond to the Levelers and then attempt the coup, given how closely she was being monitored. Yes, she reacted to bad intelligence, but she should not have been able to get any intelligence.

Second: Yes, her coup attempt failed; but Theisman's succeeded because of what she accomplished and the information she had left behind.

Third: Both Pierre and Saint-Just thought highly of her military abilities. So highly that they picked her to run the Navy, despite her ambition. Note that they did have other candidates with good military ability.

PS: What "personal propaganda"? Officers responded to her leadership.

PPS: Although she allowed for the possibility of orbital bombardment, did any take place? Note that the Levelers set off nuclear weapons and I believe some of the casualties caused by those explosions are wrongly being credited to her.

tlb wrote:PS: What "personal propaganda"? Officers responded to her leadership.

Given that McQueen had a reputation for ambition, it's clear she was good at emphasising her successes and downplaying any failures she had. Kind of like certain WW2 generals who write books about their own exploits and take a few liberties with reality to make themselves look better, except she did it straightaway.

Take the Battle of Minette, she can claim victory because she took the system and forced the Manticorans to retreat. The less said about her losing 2 SD to merely damage 2 DN whilst having a 4:1 numerical superiority, the better.

Third: Both Pierre and Saint-Just thought highly of her military abilities. So highly that they picked her to run the Navy, despite her ambition. Note that they did have other candidates with good military ability.

Other candidates? Who?

I think McQueen was simply the most senior officer they had left who had combat experience and hadn't been shot for whatever reason. I do not think either Pierre or Saint-Just had the ability to correctly judge military abilities and by this point they had realised this, that their version of civilian control of the military wasn't working and they needed an insider who knew how to do military things.

munroburton wrote:I think McQueen was simply the most senior officer they had left who had combat experience and hadn't been shot for whatever reason. I do not think either Pierre or Saint-Just had the ability to correctly judge military abilities and by this point they had realised this, that their version of civilian control of the military wasn't working and they needed an insider who knew how to do military things.

In Enemy Hands begins with a prologue of Pierre, Ransom and Saint-Just discussing how to improve the Navy now that Trevor's Star has been lost. In particular they discuss several officers and choose McQueen, dispute her known ambition; being senior (if true) is not one of the criteria. Since a prime reason for being shot is losing a battle, then staying alive in the aftermath of a battle is one way to demonstrate competence.

But if you want to hate McQueen, go ahead; no one will stop you.

tlb wrote:

munroburton wrote:I think McQueen was simply the most senior officer they had left who had combat experience and hadn't been shot for whatever reason. I do not think either Pierre or Saint-Just had the ability to correctly judge military abilities and by this point they had realised this, that their version of civilian control of the military wasn't working and they needed an insider who knew how to do military things.

In Enemy Hands begins with a prologue of Pierre, Ransom and Saint-Just discussing how to improve the Navy now that Trevor's Star has been lost. In particular they discuss several officers and choose McQueen, dispute her known ambition; being senior (if true) is not one of the criteria. Since a prime reason for being shot is losing a battle, then staying alive in the aftermath of a battle is one way to demonstrate competence.

But if you want to hate McQueen, go ahead; no one will stop you.

That's uncalled for. I don't hate her, I merely recognise that the two named alternatives were both better:

IEH wrote:"And whatever negative considerations might attach to choosing her," Saint-Just said, "she's a better choice than the next candidate in line."
"Which candidate would that be?" Ransom asked.
"Before our raid on the Manties' commerce in Silesia blew up in our faces, Javier Giscard would have been an even better choice than McQueen. As it is, he's completely ineligible, at least for now. His political views are more acceptable than McQueen's—in fact, Commissioner Pritchard continues to speak very highly of him—and in fairness to him, what happened to his plan wasn't his fault. In fact, our decision to recall him was probably a mistake. But we did recall him, and he's still on probation for his 'failure.' " Ransom cocked her head, and Saint-Just shrugged. "It's only a formality—he's too good for us to shoot unless we absolutely have to—but we can't rehabilitate him overnight."
"All right, I can see that," Ransom nodded, "but that just tells me who the next candidate isn't."
"Sorry," Saint-Just apologized. "I got distracted. In answer to your question, McQueen's only real competition is Thomas Theisman. He's considerably junior to her, but he was the only flag officer to emerge from Operation Dagger with a reputation as a fighter, and he distinguished himself in the Trevor's Star fighting before we pulled him out. His stand at Seabring is one of the very few victories we've had to crow over, but while the Navy respects him as a tactician and a strategist, he's been very careful to remain totally apolitical."

In the end, Pierre went with his third best military option because of political and seniority reasons.

I don't understand the admiration some people seem to have of McQueen, which sometimes elevates her to approximately Honor's level. C'est absurde.

This was a tyrant-in-waiting. A warmonger who doesn't give a crap about the civilians they're otensibly protecting, more concerned about producing military victories to fuel personal advancement. An user and abuser. Her coup, had it been successful, would have simply unleashed the same counter-purge of StateSec which Theisman carried out without restoring the Republic(or doing so in name only).

I guess her character's charisma is so strong it breaks through the fourth wall.

munroburton wrote:In the end, Pierre went with his third best military option because of political and seniority reasons.

I think that Theisman was only in contention because he had kept his political views absolutely neutral. He was too junior to otherwise assume command of the entire PN.

Giscard being an option is a good reminder. I didn't remember this. Another factor in their choosing McQueen was possibly also to keep an eye on her, not only because of how good she was.

What this shows though is that the PN had a dearth of competent officers and the passage shows that the trio recognised some of it. They are reluctant to kill Giscard because he's too good. It doesn't say that they'd become reluctant to kill the ones that aren't that good yet but who are just learning.

I don't understand the admiration some people seem to have of McQueen, which sometimes elevates her to approximately Honor's level. C'est absurde.

No way she's as good as Honor. Even compared to White Haven I'd say she'd fall short, especially after Honor knocked sense into him. In his pre-eye-opening, "Sonja is mad" persona, she was probably much closer.

But she was good. She was probably better than Kuzak or the current RMN Home Fleet Admiral at the time, James Webster, who was also once First Space Lord, but soon went to become ambassador.

This was a tyrant-in-waiting. A warmonger who doesn't give a crap about the civilians they're otensibly protecting, more concerned about producing military victories to fuel personal advancement. An user and abuser. Her coup, had it been successful, would have simply unleashed the same counter-purge of StateSec which Theisman carried out without restoring the Republic(or doing so in name only).

I guess her character's charisma is so strong it breaks through the fourth wall.

No doubt about that. She had too much ambition and too little care for the people she was supposed to be protecting, or those who were serving with her. And she did have propaganda on her side.

But no amount of propaganda would have worked if she hadn't had some victories, especially among the PN personnel. Unlike the massed population who only got information from PubIn, they were getting some direct information.

Compare that to the old Legislaturalist corps. Parnell managed to lose over a dozen SDs in mostly intact conditions during Third Yeltsin.