The remarkable victory of the EPC

Day 1,610, 07:26 • Published in USA Canada • by Rigour6

Over the past several weeks, it has been this author’s unique privilege to observe the inner working of the Exiled Patriots of Canada. Despite not agreeing with the central tactic of most of their members (to apply pressure on their former homeland through the direct application of military force) I was allowed full and free access to their inner counsels.
I was also privileged, due to the goodwill of former CP Acacia Mason, to sit in on a full round of discussions/negotiations in the early days of the rebellion.

As I am sure you understand, I observed these conversations under an implied agreement to respect sources, so this article will not be a tell-all of who said and did what during the campaign which ultimately (and to my mind, astonishingly) achieved complete military success in extinguishing Canada’s foreign colonies. But in an effort to preserve some of the historical record before it is lost to history and painted over by successive attempts to propagandize, I wanted to set down some general impressions. These, for the sake of full disclosure, are from the perspective of someone who was no doubt permitted access because he was seen as sympathetic, so I cannot pretend to full objectivity, even though I have said and tried throughout to be an objective chronicler of what I observed and in a very limited way (the occasional snide joke) participated in.

It was, to be blunt, a remarkable display. The closest thing I can compare it to is fighting with Banach in the 65th Iberian in the aftermath of the Canada’s wipe, but even that did not have the sort of direct activity and esprit de crops the EPC did.

I’ll begin with how I got there and my own expectations. After the unconditional pardon to the most selfish player eCanada has ever been afflicted with, I realized it was time for me to get out. You can check past issues of this newspaper for my own explanation of my reasons for that. That was simply a personal decision. There comes a point where your continued membership in an activity which lacks integrity becomes complicity and for me I’d reached that point – with all due respect to those who did not see it that way, and as I have said before in many ways I will always acknowledge the Loyalists in particular as my superiors for staying and fighting the good fight even though they knew how hard it was going to be. In any event, I left and to me that was a sort of “wash my hands of the whole thing” moment for me. It was hard to do, but I felt immediately afterwards I had done the right thing, and still do. In any event, I had no sense that there was anything coming like there was.
However, it turns out all around me, many players, including some of the nation’s best and brightest, had also reached a tipping point. Some had already done so before even this latest travesty.

My own emigration was not designed to be part of anything bigger, nor did I expect it to have any larger influence – and I will state without false modesty that I don’t think it did. What I observed however was that others were doing the exact same thing. Voting with their feet, as Lenin called it. Certainly my departure might do little to affect eCanada (except free up some bandwidth) but I did notice some heavy hitters. You don’t lose your biggest tank, for example, without feeling that on some level.

What I totally did not expect but observed was that these same players, who had been stalwarts of the community in building player co-operation, would not be able to just go quietly, but that, ironically, their feeling of loyalty or nostalgia for what their country had meant to them would cause them to cast about for a way to rouse their former compatriots from moral slumber. I will be honest and say that at first I thought this was a combination of hubris and arrogance. As the trolls suggested, were these not players who had been used to getting their way and were now annoyed that they had been usurped? You have to remember we are talking some very heavy hitters here. But here is the fascinating thing: in the weeks that have followed I have literally read hundreds of messages from these players. And what I have observed is thoughtful, realistic, idealistic yes but extremely strategic thinking on how best to try and change the culture of eCanada. And not because this new culture would better serve those players – in fact a number of them said they would probably not come back – but because of their firm belief that a new culture was needed to save the nation and preserve the game experience for those eCanadians that remained.

There was almost constant debate, even as these players began to draw support both foreign and domestic (my own attempt to chronicle the members ironically became a recruitment tool and I had to eventually discontinue it because of the constant requests for new people to be added to the list). Given the limitations of the game, what realistically could be done? Was there any point? Wouldn’t people just say this was being done for this or that reason and should that even factor into their decisions? Some of the debate was heated. By times it was a bit like We Are the World, people were asked to “check your ego at the door”. That didn’t always happen. Some people couldn’t resist snapping at each other, or running them through when they saw a funny opening, or a chance to redress old wounds. Occasionally tone got lost and things degenerated. Rylde fell off the wagon a couple of times. I kept thinking “There is no way that a group this diverse of players this strong is going to not fly apart.” I assumed the anger they felt at what had been done to their country would soon turn them on each other. It didn’t happen. Time and time again, people with strong opinions turned back and kept their eyes on the prize.

Their conduct of foreign relations in particular was, to a person unfamiliar with that part of the game as myself, jaw-dropping. These were people who had built credibility with big players internationally and those international players of very high standing were to my surprise well informed on what the situation was and had been in Canada for some time. They got what the EPC was about instinctively and wholeheartedly. I was gobsmacked.

However, the one thing I have to confess that I was really 100% wrong about was how much this group, albeit one that had expanded in numbers substantially, could project power militarily. At a certain point, Addy Lawrence began using the phrase “raising the cost of indifference”. I thought to myself, yeah, that’s about all you’re ever going to be able to do. Maybe Canada has to make a moderately better effort to hold UK territories but I was fully convinced that there was absolutely NO WAY EPC was ever going to make a difference in one of those battles. Maybe, maybe a single round. And I predicted that failure to project power militarily would eventually show the movement to be a paper tiger and frustration at their failure to be anything other than the object of scorn would then discourage the members and cause them to turn on each other and the whole thing to fly apart.

How wrong I was.

I’ll leave it to others to conduct detailed analysis of the actual battles, and I know that victory has a thousand fathers, but the fact is that these guys actually did it. I still have a hard time believing it, and surely some propitious timing had something to do with it. But EPC through its connections, co-ordination, gifts of weapons, and most obviously direct infliction of millions of points of damage was such a large part of it that the UK CP saw fit to acknowledge their efforts openly and prominently as part of his proclamation of his nation’s liberation.

How is such a thing possible? I have to assume it was a combination of a number of things, including:
- Fatigue of Canada’s allies with all the time jumping in to moderate our internal mess
- Fatigue of a number of Canadians with fighting for colonies over and over again
- Heartening of the effort of UK liberationists as they saw the opportunity EPC presented
- Failure, for whatever reason, of the Norsefire network to effectively counter this military challenge.

The last in particular I am baffled by, because on the political front it seems Norsefire is able to repel all boarders without much difficulty. Why did they not stir themselves to repel an actual military campaign waged by a much smaller group? Surely it was a golden opportunity for a certain someone to actually earn his self-proclaimed laurels as a hero and patriot. Is it that he didn’t give a crap about the bonuses for the broader nation or he just couldn’t match the strength of EPC? I suspect that maybe Norsefire couldn't expend their tanks to defend Canada because they chose to stockpile them instead for bribes to hold on to political power, but that's conjecture. I honestly don’t know and I have zero confidence that we’ll ever get a straight answer out of him and his trolls. But whatever the whys are, it is the what I am amazed at.

And then, having achieved total victory in their military objectives, EPC Just. Stopped. They debated what the next steps would be, again there were different sides. They noted that a lot had been stirred up in the Canadian culture but that no real tangible progress had been made yet, but at the end of the day, they’d set an objective, they’d achieved it, and they just shook hands and walked off in several directions. It was like that scene at the end of the Oceans movies where everyone just smiles and heads back to their own thing. Some had already chosen to return to Canada before that to work from within and in co-operation with Loyalists. Others were still weighing their response to Loyalist appeals to return. Some just went back to the lives they’d had before EPC, be they quiet or focused on other things.

When the smoke cleared, so many people had left the CIA Military Unit that I, your humble narrator was left in charge. (My first daily order as new Commander is to fight for Canada vs. the UK, btw)

Will we see the EPC take action again? I’d like to say I have my doubts but they have so thoroughly exceeded my expectations at almost every juncture to date that I dare not rule it out. As they themselves discussed, the problems in Canada are deep and will require long term and heavy effort to correct. Even something as simple as allowing people true freedom of democratic choice in forming a party with others who share their goals unfortunately requires a huge effort against the vandals. There are many long days ahead and no doubt many of the former members of EPC, tarred as they will be with the brush of traitor, will be continuing to work for what they believe in. I suspect they will wear the Class of 2012 badge with pride.

It has been one of the most remarkable displays I have ever had the occasion to witness in my almost three years in the game. And although I never agreed with the strategy of direct military action, I have to admit it has been far more successful and effective than I predicted. More than that, however, it has been frankly inspiring and a privilege to observe a diverse group as this one, strong opinions, but united in their desire to do what needed to be done to make Canada a better place. Some will say they should have focused their efforts in other arenas, and that is a debate which will no doubt rage on for a long time. But the results are there, and the culture of the nation is no longer in slow sleepy decay but now churns with active and engaged debate about what eCanada is and should be.

For my part, I am returning to my quiet life in Maine, my new home. I hope to resume publishing on matters economic and various legal proposals. I don’t know even now if what EPC did was right. I can say with absolute certainty from detailed observation that it was done for the right reasons. And as a silverback who thought that my way of looking at the eworld - asking what one can do for one’s fellow man first, seeking to do what is right rather than what is expedient – doomed me to a life of isolation, it was immensely heartening to see experienced, powerful players who just fundamentally got that things like honour and integrity matter – even here in the eworld. And so I end this experience personally revitalized and forever grateful for being allowed to observe and in some small way be part of the noble crusade that was EPC.

Gentlemen, it has been an honour.

o7


N x NE, Volume 4, Number 3