Mark wrote:AS OF YET, WE HAVE NOT FOUND THE DEVICES THEMSELVES. WE HAVE HOWEVER, FOUND COMPUTER RECORDS OF THE POSSESSION OF A "CODENAMED" DEVICE AND A DEPLOYMENT PLAN.
AND YES, THE EMPIRE IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE COMMUNICATIONS BLACK OUT AND NO, IT WILL NOT BE LIFTED. WE WILL NOT ALLOW THE YRRIDIANS TO CONTACT THEIR ALLIES.
AND WE MUST BE VERY CLEAR HERE. ANY MILITARY VESSEL FROM ANY STARFARING POWER ATTEMPTING TO ENTER THOLIAN OR YRRIDIAN SPACE WILL BE CONSIDERED TO HAVE HOSTILE INTENT AND WILL BE TREATED AS SUCH. ANY NON MILITARY VESSELS THAT DEVIATE FROM THEIR PRE ASSIGNED COURSES WILL IMMEDIETLY BE SEIZED, IMPOUNDED, AND THEIR CREWS WILL BE SUBJECT TO INTERROGATION AS SUSPECTED TERRORISTS.
QUITE SIMPLY....WE HAVE LITTLE TO NO REASON TO TRUST ANYBODY AT THIS MOMENT. WE CAN THINK OF SEVERAL POWERS THAT WOULD BENEFIT FROM THOLIAN INSTABILITY AND WOULD OPERATE VIA A THIRD PARTY TO KEEP THEIR PUBLIC FACES.
We seem to be going well down the road of dangerous implications here. Are you implying that someone would provide them with a weapon of mass destruction to create instability within the Tholian Empire? What purpose would this serve anyone who boarders you? None of us has anything to fear from the Tholian Empire given the present alliance structures and the relative balance of strength in the area.
The decision to block all communications is troubling as well. The Tholian government must know that it would be an act of war to forcibly remove anyone from another nations embassy. It also seems callous in the extreme to deny other governments the ability to evacuate their personel from harms way in a war that for lack of a better term amounted to a surprise attack. Given no notice to do so beforehand we could hardly take action then.
If the Yridian government wishes to deny ships passage then so be it, that would be their business. But we must object to the Tholian position on this issue. What is proposed makes little sense.
One the one hand you say the Yridians are prepared to use a WMD against you to stop your colonization efforts, yet they have not used one even as you invade their space. If they were willing to do the former then surely they would do the later. You have no weapon as physical proof at this point but logically if it existed would it not be used? Even the basic logic of their plan seems flawed on a basic level. What good would destroying a colony be other than to invite the wrath of the Tholian Empire and do so in a manner that would ensure the Yridians would receive no help at all? It would in fact be more credible if the claim were that the Yridians planned to destroy all major Tholian worlds. At least that plan would logically acheive their supposed objective rather than simply ensure their own destruction at the hands of the Tholian Empire.
You say you are moving against them to staunch a threat posed by a WMD but your plans clearly call for an enduring occupation.
You claim to have proof yet you share nothing with anyone else and go out of your way to deny communication with the Yridian government so that they might answer your claims.
Most distubingly you now not so subtely imply that other powers would provide such weapons, which you cannot locate, to the Yridians, so that they can implement a plan that appears to make no sense, and in doing so that the supplying power would willingly violate a major international treaty AND be responsible for millions or billions of deaths?
If you really believe that to be the case then the Empire should simply name who they believe supplied a weapon and detail the type of weapon so that the veracity of your claim may be examined fully.
