60

12 Mars 3042, Taurus, Taurian Concordat

The meeting with Comstar representatives was a surprise from the start.

First, they didn't have the usual robes, but rather expensive business suits. Secondly, they informed us that they were representing the Terran Government, not the extinct (!) ComStar. Apparently Earth was now governed by a Joan Stark, someone that nobody in the Taurian side had ever heard about.

However, their technological advance was still there; the Terran delegation had a permanent HPG contact with Earth, an impressive feat since many of the HPGs in the line of communication were damaged or in the Taurian or FedCom hands, which made this network an unlikely mix of Magellan JumpShips and comsats from the DRUM network, with a few operable HPGs (mostly inside the Capellan Confederation) but one that was still efficient. From what we understood, similar contacts were being established at the same time with the leaders of all the Great Houses. The Concordat was the only Periphery Realm contacted because of their mastery of their "own" HPG network.

Apparently the dispute between the religious / ROM fanatics and the secular / ComGuards had been won by the ComGuard - with a little help from the Comstar Navy, a fact only known later. With the WarShips and a large portion of the military DropShips lined up on one side, the religious fanatics and ROM had stood little chance as soon as ComGuard was able to concentrate its forces.

During the conflict ,both leaders were killed and the emerging faction in control, instead of continuing business as usual, decided in collaboration with other big corporations, and the different factions that formed the Earth government under Comstar, to take a new direction. Under the leadership of Joan Stark, they assumed the control of the Sol system and after a small interregnum to put the house in order, started to contact the other nations.

Initially, they pushed for a return to the old status quo, ie that the Concordat would return control of the stations it had captured so that the HPG service could resume under their control. Obviously, the Concordat representatives responded in more courteous and diplomatic language, hell no. 

Honestly, that is what the Terran representatives expected, so they changed the negotiations, to their true objective, ie to try to negotiate inter-state communication protocols and fees, extract as many of the ex-Comstar people (and hardware) that might want to come to Earth and obtain rights for they massive civilian JumpShip fleet to operate inside the Concordat while trying to obtain a trade agreement for several civilian products that Earth apparently was going to start producing. 

With my arrival at Taurus, almost at the beginning of negotiations with Earth, the information that Davion had an alternative FTL communications system had an interesting effect.

Claiming he had to confer with Kamea, which gave him the opportunity to delay negotiations whenever he wanted, since there was no working HPG link between Taurus and Coromodir, Thomas discreetly called the ambassador of the Federated Commonwealth, and after informing him that Concordat already knew about his alternative communications system, proposed a joint negotiation of both nations, which would obviously bring advantages to both. And by the way, he gave them all the information that the Commonwealth had about the new Director-General (yes, she had returned to the Cameron era title), Joan Stark, which was close to none.

Ten days later, the ambassador returned with an answer , that was not as good as Thomas expected. It was divided in four relevant parts - a) He informed Thomas that the FC didn't have any data on the new Earth leader, b) that the FC JumpShips had detected no less than 12 WarShips in orbit around Earth, at least 2 of them being Battle Cruisers or larger, c) he recognized that the Federated Commonwealth was indeed in negotiations with Earth, not including any details and finally d) that obviously if such a strategic technology existed, details for a potential alternative FTL comm system would not be shared with anyone.

When pressed to give a date on their estimation for resuming normal communication activities, and after speaking with Earth, the representatives of the new Terran Government recognized that unfortunately during the fight, the industrial complex that produce HPGs (and parts) had been severely damaged, and that on top of that the few (their words) "fanatics" that had escaped taking with them a considerable part of the existing stock of spares. This meant that the repair of the HPG network was going to take time and would probably not be concluded before the end of 3045 or even later. Since the estimates of the Concordat were that by that time, it would have already repaired its network, no further collaboration was offered from both sides on that particular area.

In a gesture of good will, the Earth representatives informed us that the ex First Circuit had gifted about five hundred 'Mechs of SLDF origin to the CCAF, thankfully none of them (unless handling errors) Royal. So far, Romano Liao had used these forces to bolster his defenses which needed this help and hadn't not (yet) entered in new adventures. During this time, a deep analysis of the control boards, and software, of captured Comstar's HPGs revealed that they had hidden codes that allowed messages to be sent without registration or even knowledge of the station operators. Another interesting piece of data was that also it was possible to send messages to some addresses, that didn't exist in the official database of HPGs, and messages send to these 'hidden' address were automatically treated without registration also. Comstar secret bases ? So secret that only a small core would know of their existence? So far the mechanism that let the HPGs 'know' where to send these messages had not been found.

Because the FedRats had not proposed to share info / use of they alternative FTL comm system, no information on the possible SLDF base near Tharkad, nor the findings of the secret codes in the HPG network was shared and it was decided that a later mission lead by TMI to the location was to be planned.

Over the next years, the ex-Comstar, renamed Earth Communications, ECOM for short, for now operated in all the nations outside of the Taurian+Reach and the Federated Commonwealth. It was observed that the people that had believed in the religious side of the organization had disappeared in great numbers, destination unknown. Several of the ComGuards – now also renamed Earth Defense Force, deserted the organization, but in their case, they mostly turned mercenary, or applied to the armed forces of their former nations.

Earth started to offer high tech products on the market taking advantage of their big and modern industrial capability and commercial fleet, taking a not small share of the most profitable area of the Concordat exports and of mine.

Because of the need for many JumpShips to operate as replacement for HPGs during the crisis, and because a complete change in the production planing of several industries was need to prioritize the replacement / production of parts for the new Taurian HPGs, several new and expansion industrial complexes were delayed in the Concordat + Reach. Including on that list were the shipyard on Mechdur that was delayed by two years at minimum, the new lines of DropShips in Illiushin, the new high tech factories in Coromodir V and several military and civilian production lines all around both nations.

If the objective of Earth was to maintain the control of the HPG network outside of the Taurian Concordat and Federated Commonwealth for a long time, they failed miserably.

By mid 3043 it was known that the fanatics had moved to the Free Worlds League and had been welcomed by Thomas with open arms. The reasons became know very soon, when in early 3045, the League took control of its HPG network and also used several WarShips – all ex-SLDF Navy designs.

By late 3044, the covert mission led by TMI to Odessa had discovered that indeed a repair / mothballed base indeed had existed in the system, but had been emptied recently…

By mid 3046 the Draconis Combine went dark for two full months. When communications were resumed, the HPG network was fully in the Combine hands.

By the end of 3046, this let only the Capellan Confederation, that was too poor and under the reign of Romano Liao, not stable or lucky enough to embark in such long term and expensive research program or to get it from spies and the other Periphery Realms using the Earth HPG network.

It was later discovered that Romano had decided to invest more in rebuilding the nation shipyards, and constructing a new one , capable of producing WarShips in the Sian system, instead on put money and resources in developing they independent HPG network.

So far, all nations had agreed to use ECOM protocols and to talk with each other, but how long this was going to last was anybody guess.

By late 3045, the construction of the Concordat class Frigate had started in Bolthole.