The second part of that sentence is also important. Yes there are big defender regions, but I and the SPSF have no intentions of being pawns of any of them. We don't need to be. We have some of the best defender talent in the game and we can run our military without undue influence from the outside. That doesn't mean we can have good relations with them, it's obviously desirable that defenders work together, and indeed that is the norm, but no defender region is truly a "pawn" of any other.