A Rising Thunder

“Mr. Reid,” she began flatly, with none of the customary ceremonial formulas, “has leveled serious and inflammatory accusations against my star system and its government.

“While hiding behind a pretense of impartiality and fair-mindedness, he’s obviously already reached his own judgment as to precisely what happened to Admiral Filareta’s command when it invaded the Manticoran Binary System without benefit of any formal declaration of war and following repeated warnings from the Star Empire of Manticore that it was aware Admiral Filareta was coming and was prepared to destroy his entire fleet if necessary to protect its own people and sovereignty. In case any of you are in any doubt about that, the Manticoran Ambassador has made public the recordings of his entire diplomatic correspondence with Senior Permanent Undersecretary Kolokoltsov in which he repeatedly requested — almost begged—the League to send an officer to Manticore with orders for Filareta to stand down while a diplomatic resolution to the disputes between the Star Empire and the League was sought.

“The federal government refused to send that officer. Ambassador Carmichael’s requests, his formal diplomatic notes, weren’t even responded to. So far as we know, none of the official ministers of the Solarian League’s government ever even saw them! Although no one is in a position to prove that at this time, it’s the firm belief of the Planetary Board of Directors of Beowulf that the decisions regarding those notes—and Admiral Filareta’s and Admiral Tsang’s movements — were made at the permanent senior undersecretary’s level by bureaucrats. Men and women who’d never been elected to their positions, without any sort of open debate, committed the Solarian League Navy to an act of war against a sovereign star nation without ever requesting a formal declaration of war as our own Constitution requires!”

She realized her voice had risen, sharp as a battle steel blade as fury at Reid’s cynicism and the opportunity to finally speak her own mind clearly, without any circumlocutions, fueled her anger. She made herself stop, draw a deep breath, and heard one or two lonely voices raised in angry rejection of what she’d said. Aside from those voices, the Chamber was silent, and she wished she could believe it was the silence of thoughtfulness and not the silence of sullen anger.

“Completely irrespective of any actions on Beowulf’s part,” she continued after a moment, “the action of those bureaucrats in committing the Solarian League — without the constitutionally required declaration of war — to war against a star nation whose war-fighting capabilities were far superior to the League’s surely constitutes an act of treason against the League.

“I observe, however, that Mr. Reid has not moved to investigate their conduct. No, he’s chosen to accuse Beowulf of treason and collaboration with the enemy. Although he’s been very careful never to call Manticore ‘the enemy,’ hasn’t he? He’s referred to the Star Empire repeatedly as ‘a hostile star nation,’ but not as a formal enemy. And the reason he’s avoided that term is because there’s been no formal declaration of war.”

The last seven words came out slowly, precisely spaced and enunciated, and she let them fall into the Chamber’s silence.

“I remind all of you that while the Constitution recognizes the paramount authority of the federal government in time of war, in time of peace, the self-defense forces of the League’s member star systems are not subject to the federal authority. They remain answerable to the star system which buids, mans, and maintains them. And the territorial autonomy of member star systems is absolute except in time of war. Precisely how is Beowulf supposed to have committed treason while acting solely and entirely within the letter of the Constitution in time of peace?

“Yet let that question lie for the moment. Instead, let’s consider the question of system autonomy and our actions in conjunction with Admiral Truman’s task force to bar Admiral Tsang’s passage through the Beowulf Terminus.

“There were Beowulfan personnel on the terminus traffic control platforms. Solarian citizens, employed by the Beowulf Terminus Astro Control Service, a joint Beowulfan and Manticoran Corporation. They were civilians, not subject to the orders of the Solarian military, and with all the civil rights of Solarian citizens. Yet Admiral Tsang had made it clear she intended to take possession of the platforms by force and to compel those citizens — against their will — to pass her vessels through the terminus. Indeed, she specifically said that in so many words. Not only that, when Admiral Holmon-Sanders announced her intention to defend her fellow citizens from the assault of their own military, Admiral Tsang informed her that her hundred-plus superdreadnoughts would open fire on Admiral Holmon-Sanders’ thirty-six. Clearly the decision of a fearless naval officer fully aware of her constitutional obligations and the need to avoid loss of Solarian lives.”

Hadley’s tone cut like a scalpel, and her nostrils flared in contempt which was not at all feigned.

“The only thing which prevented Admiral Tsang from carrying through on her courageous threat against an enemy she outnumbered three-to-one was the sudden discovery of the presence of a Manticoran task force. A Manticoran task force which could, had there been any truth to this bizarre notion that Admiral Filareta was massacred for no good reason after he’d surrendered, have annihilated Admiral Tsang’s entire command from stealth before she even knew those ships were present. Instead, the Manticoran commander gave warning of her presence and allowed Admiral Tsang to withdraw without the loss of a single life on either side.”

She paused once more, letting her words sink in, then straightened and squared her shoulders.

“Mr. Reid has made what he obviously believes is an eloquent case for how the sudden appearance of Admiral Tsang’s fleet in the Manticorans’ rear might have somehow prevented the destruction of Eleventh Fleet. He’s been very careful to avoid saying unequivocally that it would have, yet he’s clearly implied that the sudden appearance of a twenty-five percent increase in Admiral Filareta’s strength would have influenced the Star Empire and its allies. He was also careful to say that he is no naval officer. That much, at least, is obvious…since any trained naval officer would have known that no more than thirty to thirty-five capital ships — less than a ten percent increase in Admiral Filareta’s strength — could have been put through the Beowulf Terminus in a single transit. And that putting that many ships through the would have destabilized the terminus for many hours before any additional vessels could be passed through it.

“It would have been possible to pass them through in a sequential transit, instead of a simultaneous transit, of course, had not Admiral Holmon-Sanders and Admiral Truman prevented it. Had Admiral Tsang done so, however, her ships would have emerged one by one, at intervals of several seconds, into the concentrated fire of the Manticoran fortresses protecting the Junction. Fortresses which each have many times the firepower of a regular Manticoran ship-of-the-wall. The truth is, it wouldn’t have mattered whether she’d attempted a simultaneous or a sequential transit; in either case, anything which passed through that terminus, as my government has repeatedly pointed out since the event, would have been annihilated. By preventing her from making transit at all, Admiral Holmon-Sanders and Admiral Truman saved the lives of well over a hundred thousand Solarian military personnel. If you wonder what malevolent, Machiavellian motives we might have had for allowing those Manticoran warships to transit a terminus of the Manticoran Wormhole Junction without informing Admiral Tsang of their presence, look no further than those lives. If we had slavishly rolled over before the unconstitutional assertion of federal authority over Solarian citizens and an autonomous star system government in time of peace, those people would be dead today.”

She looked out across the Chamber, huge holographic eyes sweeping scornfully over the men and women seated in the boxes spread across its floor, and shook her head.

“We all know what’s happening here. We all know the script, although the exact schedule may still be in some doubt. And we all know where this little play is headed and who’s directing and producing it. So I don’t expect truth and rationality to be any sort of effective defense. But the record will show what actually happened in Beowulf that day. Someday, the record of exactly what happened to Admiral Filareta will also be clearly and undisputedly available to anyone looking back at Mr. Reid and his motion and its consequences. A clean conscience and a reverence for the truth may not be much in demand in this Assembly today, but both of those are very much in demand in the Beowulf System. So bring on your inquiry. Present your case, and we’ll present ours. Not because we give one single solitary damn for your prepackaged, predetermined ‘impartial conclusions,’ but because we care about history. Because unlike you, we do care about truth. And