Imperial Law / A change in myself (2 topic post)

[LC La Forge]

Yes... there were some very prominent cases in the older days of the GE. RayCav and Beta Squadron come to mind.

[AD Polanski]

Mr Solidis,

Let me say that I'm sorry that you had to go through what you had to; it is indeed a terrible incident that will live with you for the rest of your life... I'm not going to embark on a large amount of discussion here as it's not my place to do so.

As for Imperial Law, it is nto a priority at present. It can be done at a later date, but for all intensive purposes Admiral Fel is correct, what I say does go. Sounds draconian, but that's how it all works. We arent a democracy here Also it is true that there is hardly any need for the ISB at present. This does not rule it out, but the development of it's future is not a priority either at the moment..

(Historical note: there have only been less than 4 major ISB involvements that I can think of or know of)

[Calder]

RayCav, the Beta Squadron incident, McCain/Washington, and Donitz are the only ones I can think of offhand, though there might have been one or two others where the ISB was collaterally involved.

At any rate, one of the beauties of a dictatorship such as this is that you don't need any written law. The word of the Supreme Commander, or his designates in the High Command, is law.

Now, the written law was a great step forward in human society because it drastically cut down on unfair and biased punishments, but in an organization such as this if some things are out of date or incomplete, then it really doesn't matter. Admiral Polanski still has the final say in all matters, and in that he is assisted and dutifully supported by the rest of the High Command.

In actual practice, the HC serves as a military tribunal of sorts anyway - we have far more in common with a ruling junta now than we ever did under Daemon anyway. In that I mean that although Admiral Polanski can essentially do as he pleases, if he did anything too crazy then the rest of the High Command would not go along with it. Thus, as long as you are confident in the collective ability of the High Command, there is no problem whatsoever. We police our own areas and report to the Supreme Commander as necessary.

So I want to state that I completely agree with Admirals Polanski and Fel and General Jansen: we have bigger fish to fry these days than fine-tuning nuances of Imperial law when we can take whatever action we please anyway. Were there situations arising in which it was found that there was a need for a more concrete legal system because our current system was failing or was not up to the task at hand, then I would be more proactive about it. But for time time being, I will point out that "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

[Vortagh]

I still love how the GA kicked Don out and then a couple weeks later everything happened exactly as Don "prophezised".

Ahhh, the irony.

[Syrtaras]

And speaking of irony - I was one of the biggest anti-ISB advocates in the old days. Guess who was on the other side. Exactly! The same officers who just stated that there is no real need for an ISB.

You know, it just feels good to be right. :-D

[Jagged Fel]

Article 2004.11.15:I:6.a:
"...The word of the Supreme Commander is considered law in any facet of the Empire, superseding the authority of any other officer or formal document of Imperial Law."

[Guest]

was that edited in?

If not i probably didnt reach it yet. Calder i agree with you 100% I just wanted to bring this up.

[Calder]

Not exactly, Syrtaras.

In the old Fleet, there was a purpose for the ISB because of our size. The ISB never needed to be more than a few members even at most (and ot be honest, even then I think it could have been done by one person as a full-time job ala ISB-General) but right now we do not need an ISB.

I see it as simple ratios. For a given number (x) of generic officers in the GE you need y number of ISB agents. At present, x=77 and y=0. Were x to go up to 100 or more, then perhaps we would need to appoint a new ISB agent.

Times change, and I want to make it clear that what is good for an organization one day is not always best for it the next. You must adapt to meet ever-changing situations; as I believe we have done fairly well recently.

[Fel]

In addition, DivComs now have a lot more of the duties that used to be ISB duties -- for example, High Command has mod powers on the message boards, which wasn't the case when we used EZBoard (or as Mr. Vortagh liked to put it - EvilBoard).

So by making each DivCom responsible for his/her own division, it makes it so an actual ISB is not necessary. But the counterpoint (which applies only in a bigger fleet) is that you could centralize all those duties to one person once there are enough people in the fleet.