Navlad Military

Military in the Empire

Type
Military, Armed Forces

Parent Organization
Navlad Empire

Location
Navlad Empire

Related Ethnicities
Navlad Commons Navlad Nobility Nehkeh/Savage

Ideally, it was there to strengthen borders and keep the Lords in line. Protection of the populace as planets and systems were settled. The enforcement that mans the customs posts is an offshoot of the Military. There are no separate branches such as we have here in the states. There’s Customs/Barbican Guards, ‘marines’ that are dropped out of or based from ships, and the Astro branch, which is closest to a cross between our Navy and Air Force. Planet side protection, aside from when the Marines are called in, is done on the local Lord’s dime, with his men. Like the National Guard, with each state that it is based out of and protects. When a Lord owns more than one system, he’ll control the same System Guard, with different divisions depending on the system. They don’t’ patrol the space between planets, they keep people in line on the surface and in the non-Imperial owned stations. That’s the ideal of course. In the case of protecting the Net, it is still working. As for structure, it’s not a clone of the American or British militaries or any of their derivatives. There is a main commander who runs it out of the central Imperial Base, in the core of the Empire. The empire is divided into sectors based on population and area. The core sectors have more people, but smaller volume to patrol. The ones towards the edge of the net are more split so that the area is roughly the same (travel time wise), but it may cover fewer people. And the Net itself has a solid concentration of forces minding it. More and more as the Fleet keep getting closer. Most of the force outside the Net was pulled in 50-100 years ago, except in cases of influential Lords, or a high value system. There aren’t many of those left though, because it’s figured that there are plenty of systems INSIDE the Net that were barely populated as people made their exploratory push OUT as far and as fast as they could. That’s the overall structure and distribution. As far as command structure, well, there’s the equivalent of the SecDef, Joint Cheifs of each ‘Branch’ (three of these), the division heads, (groups of X number of sectors each), the sector heads (admirals), and then the Commanders of Battlegroups, Captains of Ships, and on down the line. That’s the Astro branch. The Marine branch has its Chief (really needs a better name/rank-General Equivalent?), then on down the line until we hit what would be our Majors and Captains, which are roughly equivalent to what are found in our military. At about this point, the ranks are still going out with troops, boots on the ground sort of thing. There are no ranks with ‘four star general’. The ranks have separate names for each thing. Syrus was a Captain or a Major, I can’t remember. But he was in charge of his group. Captain I think. And there was a major handling them, keeping tabs on their operations, relaying orders, etc. The ranks aren’t like ‘have college, have a commission’, but they are generally separated out by birth. Lieutenant on up, those are usually the third sons of upper middle class, lords, and etc. Below lieutenant are the commoners. Most middle class, poor, etc. And whatever Savages the Military has grabbed. It’s possible to move from the lower ranks to the high, but you need to have some SKILLS as a soldier. Something to bring you to the attention of the higher ups. The Generals, Admirals, Colonels, etc, are almost entirely royalty/lords, etc. Usually, in the past, the joint chiefs and SecDef would be a member of the Imperial family. That’s still the case, but there’s a high turnover as various Imperial contenders vie for the throne. Maybe at some point one of them made a law about term limits for the Military advisors? Or how they COULDN’T replace the SecDef etc for the sake of politics? Someone noticed how close the Fleet was getting, and along with pulling the Military inside the Net, decided it’d be stupid to have political power plays going on with support of the military for the current Empire and decided that it shouldn’t be possible for the SecDef and his three ‘arms’ to get replaced. Made it a life position maybe? Of course, the solution is for the new Emperor to kill off the old, so the headquarters of the military was moved away from the Imperial Seat, and conditioning put in place so the Generals could never turn against the Empire itself? This is inherently flawed, but it’s been nearly 75 years, and so far the focus of the military has managed to stay on the approaching Fleet and away from the throne. Maybe that’s why the contenders for the throne haven’t done as much about the military itself? As long as it keeps to its mandate of protecting the Empire (also open to interpretation, which is how teams like Syrus’ came into being) and keeps its eyes focus OUT at the Net, the Lords can use their local militias/national guard forces to slaughter each other with happy abandon as they try to claim the throne. Much of the Military’s loyalty also has to do with the culture. Even without select conditioning happening to people who are viewed as possible high ranking officials, there’s the cultural aspect of it too. Third sons are not the spares. And they’re not the heirs either. Not unless they’re Natural Born. Which means that unless the first two children die for some reason, the third child goes into the military. Not so much the high class daughters. Those get shipped off for marriages. But the cultural pressure to serve the Empire is still there. It’s the expectation, and with the boogeyman of the Fleet coming closer and closer, that has strengthened. Nobody knows quite when the Fleet will hit the Net, because many of the records of Barbican keys out past the Net have been lost. That’s part of what Syrus and his crew were doing. Trying to map Barbs out past the bounds. Some in the Military think it was stupid to just sit and wait. The trend has been towards building up personnel and more important, ships and weapons in prep. A lot of confidence has been placed in the safety features of the Net, and the ability to blow a portion of it if needed to plug a hole. Other things that Syrus’ team did have to do with the Seps Gatekeepers and seeing if the civilians can be funneled towards their Barbs and beyond. If not taking the Barbs by force that is. They figured out that that’s not possible, so they look for ways to sneak people in now. Since only certain people are allowed through on an unlimited basis, there’s a sort of cold war going on, the Imperials trying to keep the gates open, the Seps keeping them closed and sending out their own spies. But that’s an article for another time. Suffice to say, the Military is divided as to whether they should go out and meet the Fleets (because by this time they realize they’re sort of surrounded. It’s just a matter of where the first hit will come), or sit and wait. Much of the system/Empire wide work is done with the Astro branch, understandably. The Border Guards/Coast Guard have a more focuses sense of operation. The corruption here is much more obvious, and getting worse every year. Whole stations have cut themselves off from the Empire, given over to local crime lords, or given their loyalty to actual Lords of the systems and joined the little civil wars over the throne. They do have defensive options on the borders stations. Originally they were meant to deal with asteroid and various smaller crime syndicates, and then as the Empire formed, they were used to defend against takeover by other Lords as various groups scrapped over the throne. Then the Empire consolidated and brought everyone in under its banner (within a certain sphere of the Barbican network) and things on the stations stabilized. There are also smaller strike ships/patrol boats/police officers that are armed and ready to chase down anyone trying to slip past the station. Since the Empire started cracking, the Guards have gone back to blocking trades and other ships and splitting loyalties. Many of the people who go into the guards are local to a system. Not usually highborn. Upper middle class goes into command here more often than in the Astro branch or Marines. Middle class and low class, which is how the criminal element sneaks in. Part blooded Savages on occasion too, so long as they can bribe a priest to lock down the nehkeh glyph in their nanites. The Border Guard is the third stepson (instead of bastard redhead, or redheaded stepchild, etc) of the military branches. The Imperial head of this Branch is looked down on as untrustworthy and prone to betrayal (more than the Marines or Astro branches). He lives under heavy scrutiny and any ties with trading houses or this or that Lording house are examined closely by the intelligence services in the other two branches. This, of course, makes things so much fun politically. (potential here for a character in the fourth book? Either a traitor or someone looking to prove his loyalty? Is the current one really linked to the Seps? Would make sense, if he can keep a handle on his people in the systems bordering the Gatekeepers and funnel people through). Then there are the Marines. Because what is scifi without Space Marines? Is there a maritime derivative equivalent to ‘marine’, only Astro related? Maybe something in Navlad, since all the Branches will need to be renamed in that language anyways. Marine. Function: Boots on ground enforcement when an Emperor thinks someone needs an up close and personal reminder of power. Threatening someone from orbit is one thing, but it’s another to have a strike team take your compound and take your family hostage. Losing money is one thing. Money can be made again. But the bloodline on the other hand, is a finite thing, and having it cut off is the ending of your family line, worship later, and influence. No power. No progeny. (Nice black market for frozen embyros of highborn? Priests in control of the in vitrio stuff too, and frozen embryos generally illegal. Deviating!) So, there’s the branch leader of Marines. The force is split along the same sector lines and divisions as the Astro branch, but the number of Marines assigned to each sector may be different. What takes a number of ships to keep in order might not take as many soldiers. What takes more soldiers may need fewer ships (because they can be dropped on planets, etc and hidden). There’s the open Marine force, but the numbers are fudged, because of how many black ops/spec ops teams are in place in the systems of Lord who are looking to destabilize the Empire That’s the trick with the idea of keeping the same Astro and Marine chief in place no matter the current Emperor. Their idea of a safe Empire might mean taking out a contender for the throne before he gain momentum. Or taking out someone who might strip the military of might. Or who is looking to dismantle the Net. Or stepping aside for someone who looks like they will support the military forces instead. Syrus was one of the spec ops members of the military. The Marines most of all will take on Savages on the sly and hide them in the ranks. Fudge the nanites in the maruste and if needed, promote the person to a certain degree. Captain is usually the highest they get. Major, on rare occasions. That hasn’t happened in years. In the past, this was very, very rare. Only since the Empire cracked into a million pieces has it been a semi-known secret amongst the nobility that there are nehkeh in the ranks. What none of the nobility, not even the SecDef know, is that there’s also a breeding program. Astro and Marines collude together, and it’s kept going in the branches due to select recruitment of particular officers and priests/chaplains, so even if the heads of branches get replaced/die, the next one might know. Or else it just keeps happening without the head knowing. The branches specifically look for people with the blood of the Imperial line, most especially that of the last true emperor (son? Of the one Jossa and Delfi sent bonkers). If they find it in low class and even nehkeh, so much the better, because the lower classes breed easier. They take people with the gene and hidden nanites and stick them in close proximity. Same fire team. Same cover team. Same offices near each other. Fraternization among soldiers isn’t precisely encouraged, but it’s not forbidden either. And in the case of these bloodlines getting near each other, it’s flat out ignored if the female of the pair gets pregnant. To hide this, a certain amount of that should be allowed anyways. This is the case with Syrus and Shezza, but they smelled a rat, and kept apart on purpose. Syrus knew there was something odd in the way that Rissa’s father fostered him along and then virtually sold him to the military, and then the way the priests acted around him after his blood tests went through. His file is sealed, and so is Shezza’s, with layers of security beyond the usual covert ops team. None of this gets into the sai. Most sai are women. The Astro and Marine branches of the military do as much as they can to get sai into the branches. Either contracting highborn ladies, or arranging marriages among teens so that a third son might be in position to move up in rank and his wife is also brought in to do work as whatever branch of sai she may be. Lower class (upper middle, middle, even low class) sai women are even more valuable, because the middle and low classes not only breed easier, they’re not quite as slaved to the concept of perpetuating their bloodline. Upper middle class gets stuck on the idea of bettering themselves, marrying higher, and that can be used to bring a woman in to work for the military if needed, by marrying her to a male officer. And then their kids are even more likely to end up in the military if that’s what the father has to offer. Family tradition and all that.