Hello all,
My apologies for not keeping up with the discussion but here is some information links I've gleamed from
wiki.travellerrpg.com Traveller Imperial Encyclopedia.
During one of the replies at the beginning of the thread there was mention of "Government of Men Not Laws" which I think changed to the "Rule of Man".
Rule of Men vs. Rule of Laws was the context. The Rule of Man, if it came up, was likely a typo.
Folk will claim that Rule of Law implies that matters of governance follow approved laws and are not subject to whims of an elite or single person. The Rule of Men, or singular Man, would imply that the government is that man or the small group of men (in the sense of humans or sophonts) because if they can decide to override, rewrite or ignore any law, then the law is meaningless.
Usually most systems fall on the spectrum those two endpoints bookend. Real systems have laws but often have places where undue influence can be exerted (corruption, bribery, donations of money to campaigns, crony capitalism, etc).
The Rules of War per
https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Imperial_Rules_of_War says the following "One prohibition is clear and firm: use or possession of nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction, if discovered, and regardless of size or type, will almost certainly trigger Imperial intervention. " There is additional material indicating why nuclear weapons a prohibited an the use of meson guns, particle accelerators, or disintegrators are not listed.
But should exist or the whole prohibition on Nukes is a bit ridiculous. There are many other WMDs. They should all be banned from an Imperial PoV.
The Imperium should limit the energy output from any weapon system or systems on a ship (including missile warheads, ordinance on carried vessels) etc. if it wants an appropriate limit to the power of local navies, corporations and individuals. Just limiting nukes in whatever form hardly stops WMD style attacks. So it's kind of a bizarre rule without broader coverage.
Now, it was written when the only real WMD was a nuclear missile (laser turrets, regular missiles, and sandcasters were all you had beyond that). It ought to have been expanded when other large destructive systems (spinal mounts anyone?) came to exist in the rules.