What is the impact of a Frontier War?

[kaladorn]

This area of thought came up when I was commuting to work. The commute is not short...

So here is the subject I'd like to collect some thoughts on:

The Imperium fights Frontier Wars. But what does this mean to the Imperial Citizenry?

I suppose it may be broken down into 4 'zones':
1) Citizens on planets actually attacked.
2) Citizens on planets near those attacked (that could reasonably be attacked)
3) Citizens in the same domain (ie the Marches) but who are far enough away from the front to never likely see an enemy
4) Citizens from other domains, to whom the Marches may be far away indeed (ie Core, the Solomani Rim, or even Deneb)

How do you see this as affecting people in these zones? I'll add in a 5th 'zone' of sorts: Persons in the military or paramilitary arms of the Imperium.

Do people huddle in fear of attack from the skies?
Do they carry on, unafraid that this will impact their daily lives? Is it like the London Blitz or more like a distant report of Somalian conflict? Does it rate the weekly updates from the Archduke or merely a footnote from TNS?

And if you are in the military, what does it mean to you? Are you actually likely to see combat? How likely are you to get killed? Anyone have actual figures on tonnage or personel losses? Are you likely to be Stop-Lossed when you want to retire due to 'needs of the service'? Or is the Imperial Forces so large that they just discharge you anyway, knowing you are only one of 57 million Marines in the Marches alone!

I guess I'm trying to get the feeling for just how deep an impact the 5FFW would have had on the Marches-dwellers and ex-service folks mustering out into the aftermath. My game is currently in 1114, and I'm not sure if this should be 'old news' by this time, or something that will linger in the memory (and fears/hatreds) of all for the next three or four decades... I'm trying to figure out if 'the War' was the preoccupying activity of the Imperial Military, or if it was just another, slightly larger, minor border action which some people might have been involved in while most of the Forces did other things.

I guess you can play it any way, but I am interested in any kind of cohesive view of it anyone can suggest or any canon that might be illustrative as to the true level of displacement, damage, loss, and general significance this conflict had to March dwellers and to average joes beyond the Marches in the Empire. Is it just like some conflict between England and Argentina to a New Yorker? (a Core Dweller)?

Thoughts, historical commentaries or citations, comments? <If this topic doesn't bring Larsen out of the woodwork with a long ramble, I don't know what will... *poke poke* *grin*>

 

[Spinward Scout]

I've thought of this before. It was along the lines of what happens after the war has ended. I set the game I was going to run in 1111, about a month after the 5th Frontier War ended. How do you recover? Are people treated as War Heroes? Or was it like VietNam and the people who fought are shunned as BabyKillers and such. Are there a lot of bionics from war wounds? Or is the world too poor to provide them? Stuff like that. Since it was against Zhodani, are a lot of people paranoid of psionics? Were a lot of people left brain-burned by Psionic Assault? I think I looked at it more of how the players would interact with it than the "big picture." I thought a lot about it, but I never came up with much. Also never ran the game. Can't wait to see this thread, tho...

Later,

Scout

 

[Hal]

Much of the issue you raise depends on the speed at which information travels in your Universe. Most people will realize that there is a time delay involved in gaining such information. Those who are too far to have heard the information except for months after the events happened likely won't be TOO worried about an unexpected attack. On the other hand, systems that hear about it a mere weeks after it happens might be more "afraid". If you read the Fifth Frontier War thread in the boardgame section, you can see where the Zhos might use a "pilehammer" strategy with what appears to be an invincible fleet bearing down certain world's throats. There you might find war hysteria in full swing. But that speed of information travel acts to some extent as a buffer.

 

[The Oz]

I think the 3I as a whole is too d*mn big for any Frontier War to have a major effect. Heck, only a few subsectors were involved, and for less than two years. Yes, in those subsectors people probably did live in some fear of the Zhos, and military units stationed there suffered losses and have all the "post-war" problems we think of these days. But even in the rest of the Spinward Marches, the war was mostly a news story from TNS every day or so and not much more, unless you were in the military (including the colonial forces) in which case you either got sent to the front or had to work extra hard to cover more duties while =others= went to the front.

Prices for a few things (of military use, or from the affected subsectors, or imported from the Zhos, Swordies, or Vargr) might have gone up enough for the ordinary person to notice if they had need to buy such things, which I doubt.

Outside the Marches, most Imperial citizens probably barely knew there was a war going on. Only the military would have been doing anything different because of the war, and even then only the military in Deneb, Corridor and the Trojan Reaches.

So, in summary:

Citizens in the invaded subsectors (Jewell, Regina, Aramis, Vilis, Lanth, Rhylanor, and Lunion) knew much about the war, and people from planets raided or invaded knew more about it than anyone. In the rest of the Marches civilians knew about it and probably kept track of what was going on, but it didn't personally affect them much (about as much as World War 2 affected the average US citizen). Outside the Marches ordinary people hardly knew the war was going on.

Military personnel in the Marches knew all about the war, either directly or by the extra work they got. If you use a "mobilized reserve" model for the Imperial military (colonial forces?) then reservists in the Marches were certainly called to duty. It was probably just about the same for military personnel (and reserves?) in Deneb and the Trojan Reaches, and active-duty military in Corridor were probably affected as well. The rest of the Imperial military probably felt little impact from the war.