On 18Jun2020 1703, Phil Pugliese - philpugliese at yahoo.com (via tml
list) wrote:

> Actually the Core Fleet was probably the most modern & advanced,  > IMO.
But it's also not seen any sort of fight for centuries. It's there to
stop a new round of Barracks Emperors, but has had no need to do
anything for ages. It might have new kit, but let's face it - for
decades and more it's main use will have been parades and a place to put
high born but useless officers until they 'retire' to the high life in
Capital or their estates with a suitable array of medals.

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The Core fleet was in the same position as the Illelish Fleet & it hadn't been centuries but only since the end of the 4th Frontier War/SolRim War (The Long War) that had gone on for decades & by the end of which the 3I must've been fully mobilized.

The fleets in Illelish had even less to do than the Core Fleet but the Corridor Fleet had sent a sizable contingent to the S'Marches for the 5th Frontier War & the Old Expanses fleet was right on the SolConfed border. So they were both in a high state of readiness when they packed up, lock, stock, & barrel & headed off back to Core, Not to mention other sectors to trialing of Core that would've responded too.

And it's silly to pretend that all the regular or colonial sqds in Illelish would immediately & fanatically throw in w/ Dulinor.

Heck, a civil war would've already been raging in Illelish before the Core Fleet even arrived.

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> Plus you had at least two frontier fleets, Old Expanses & Corridor  > that just picked up & shipped out, back to Core. Which is why those >
two sectors went down so easily.
The Corridor fleet is going to be mostly fairly small units, as it's 
main job is controlling Vargr piracy and raiding, and there's a shortage
of good basing there.

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Nope, the Corridor Fleet was a large & robust force that sent a large contingent to reinforce the S'Marches in the 5th Frontier War & helped to turn the tide.

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> Illelish was still a backwater with no real reason to have such large  > fleets.
You never know what might come in through the Rift, you know. And it's
not really a backwater - there are a lot of hi-pop worlds there.

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I'm sure that was said but as it never happened the urgency had long worn off.

Your description of the Corridor Fleet would actually be apropo for the Illelish 'edge', IMO.

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Remember also that Lucan, military genius that he was, allowed himself
to be distracted by Strephon's return (or his clone, body double,
android copy, or whatever), and all the other new factions and spread
his forces, rather than concentrate on one thing at a time.