(07-29-2014, 04:44 PM)southern bellz Wrote: This is mind boggling to me. The statement says twice about how our cabinet tried to resolve this via communicating and it made every effort to make our intention clear.

In the Cabinet statement, we said that we had issued a formal complaint to TNI and the UIAF, and didn't receive a real response that would have mended the issue. Had we received a response that showed TNI and the UIAF actually cared about our concerns, we would likely be at a different place.

(07-29-2014, 04:44 PM)southern bellz Wrote: Yet, now the clarification is that we didn't communicate anything to TNI.

We communicated a serious concern. There was some, but little, communication prior to the Liberal Haven incident. The fault of that lies with both sides, but I wouldn't say either side had any nefarious purposes. Up until the Liberal Haven incident, communication was rare simply because the TSP-TNI alliance was not the focal point of either region's foreign affairs. Various conversations with Onder, and then the Liberal Haven incident, created animosity that further deteriorated the little communication that was already occurring.

I'm not sure what is so difficult to understand, here. We did not communicate as allies. For some people outside of government, there is this romanticized view of the alliance as this great and fruitful thing. But for those of us in government this past year or so, TSP-TNI only ever came up in the whole Cabinet when there was a problem. This alliance has not been as strong as you guys think it has, and that didn't just start this past term.

(07-29-2014, 04:44 PM)southern bellz Wrote: Apparently making basic efforts to maintain assembly voted treaties is considered bending over backwards.

"Bending over backwards" refers to the sentiment some members of the Cabinet had at the time. TRR treaty negotiations started when Escade was still in government, before the Liberal Haven incident. After that, I personally wasn't in any rush for the Cabinet to go out of its way to talk to an ally that most of us believed didn't care about us anyways.

Anyways, like I said already, notifying TNI wouldn't have done anything. The Cabinet had already discussed TNI, and decided to go forward with the TRR treaty. Notifying TNI wouldn't have changed the outcome. And I'm not entirely sure they didn't already know about it -- we have a member of TNI who is a relatively active TSP citizen, after all.

(07-29-2014, 04:44 PM)southern bellz Wrote: If the issues with TNI was so bad, the cabinet should have brought the debate to leave the treaty to the assembly floor.

The Cabinet didn't want to end the alliance. As several Cabinet members stated during the TRR treaty debate, we didn't see any reason why the alliance had to end, unless TNI didn't agree with our stance on GCR sovereignty and security. "TRR and TNI are at war" isn't, in my opinion, a great reason to end the TSP-TNI alliance. TNI/UIAF prides itself on being very pragmatic and rational with its foreign policy. They could have seen that TSP-TNI cooperation was still very much possible. And if they really cared about protecting TSP from attack, they would do so without a treaty. Obviously I personally overestimated just how pragmatic and rationalist TNI/UIAF are. I certainly didn't expect a treaty dissolution the day after the TRR treaty passed.

Now, were there communication issues? Obviously, yes. I've been saying that for a while now. The Cabinet lamented it in the statement. And despite how you're reading it, SB, I don't think everybody the Cabinet is placing the blame solely upon TNI. We've acknowledged the breakdown of the alliance as a long-term issue, not something triggered by a specific event. However, we also remain convinced that the Liberal Haven incident was indicative of the underlying problems with the alliance.

None of that is ground for accusing any member of the Cabinet of lying and misleading the region, though. Those claims are politically motivated.