The official commander-in-chief of the Imperial Military was the Emperor. Every decision made went to them for ultimate approval, with a single word that could order millions across the galaxy to mobilize in any way they pleased. In reality, of course, this power was rarely used. Under normal circumstances, military power was delegated to the Imperial Martial Council, a board of the 5 leading Imperial generals. Of these, one represented the navy, a second represented planetary garrisons, a third represented offensive ground forces, and the fourth for “special purposes,” a catchall category referring to everything from elite units to expensive technology. The fifth was reserved for the Governor of Wallach, who acted as an unofficial head of the Council, one who had to be elected unanimously by the other 4 council members and who served in ten year terms.
General Lorkisian had been the Governor of Wallach for the past nine years and had the Imperial Revolution not broken out he would have been entirely forgettable in this role, totally forgotten today. But events can put otherwise unremarkable men in remarkable circumstances, and change them into something remarkable themselves. And this is what was happening to Lorkisian. We have already remarked upon his hatred of inefficiency and the Imperial bureaucrats which made him more ready than it might appear to support the Revolution, but just as every other delegate was becoming acclimated to taking more radical actions, Lorkisian was as well. In doing so, while the propositions he was about to make appear a massive departure from his pre-Revolutionary behavior, they in fact perfectly track the evolution of hundreds of delegates.
While Lorkisian was the most prominent member of the Military Committee and the one who would play such a bombastic role in its earliest phases, he was not the only one. A majority of delegates assigned to it were currently serving or had previously served in the military, a choice many saw as conservative on the part of the Emperor, attempting to use the internal conservatism innate to soldiers to prevent major changes that they might have desired elsewhere. If this is so, the inclusion of Colonel Javier Simsek was a poor choice. On the other hand, the choice of Corporal Lourga Neptuna certainly was.
Neptuna was from a long serving military family. Born and raised on Wallach, she had been spending her term of service in the campaign to pacify Warren. She had been a member of the Imperial faction led by Vestin Vestowski, although had been offput by his domineering attitude and became upset as she realized he was beginning to overstep his place and decide things for the Emperor instead of simply making sure the Emperor’s decrees were followed. She broke with Vestowski soon after he was defeated and while she was undeniably one of the most conservative delegates, she was not in outright opposition to events in the way that Vestowski was.
Due to Lorkisian’s presence, the first week of discussion started incredibly formal. He was immediately elected as Committee Chair, and served as an impartial but strict arbiter, as fit with his demeanor. It was not as if the more radical members of the Committee like Simsek thought any reform would be impossible, Lorkisian had opposed the Emperor during the Command Crisis after all, but no one was quite sure how far he was willing to go. Simsek’s actions at this time appear as that of a man bidding him time, waiting for Lorkisian to make the first move so he could react in response.
Meanwhile, to Lorkisian's right, Lourga Neptuna was committed to limiting reform to only the most necessary changes. In conjunction with the changes in administrative structure that were being worked on at the same time (changes that had not even been proposed yet, but everyone knew would be significant), she made it clear in this first week that she was open to restructuring the precise distribution of military personnel across the galaxy. This was a real concession over probably the single greatest issue with the pre-Revolutionary Imperial military. As it would come to be known, the “Military’s Black Holes” referred to the fact that there were around a dozen planets which over 90% of the Imperial military was assigned to. The problem was slightly overstated in some ways, a few of these planets made sense. Wallach had always been the Imperial training ground and shipyard and would always be the single largest concentration of soldiers in the galaxy by dint of it being the informal headquarters. Similarly, Eonissi Avis contained a large number of the logistics officers. It was simply more convenient for them to be located alongside every other major bureaucrat in the Empire. But there were planets who were genuinely stuffed with soldiers beyond any realistic reason. To take only a single example, prior to the Revolution the population of Mawr was 5% soldiers in the Imperial army. That figure is slightly inflated as all law enforcement on the planet were counted as soldiers, not only regular troops, but it was still an astounding amount compared to the rest of the galaxy. Many planets did not have even a single unit in their official garrisons.
What Neptuna also made clear though is she would strenuously oppose any attempt by the reformers to go beyond this. There had been a lot of whispering in certain corners of the Vaird about how the command chain was becoming stagnant, about how the opacity of the military was unjust, and even a few murmurs about a lack of civilian oversight. By giving a bit on the Black Holes, she was shoring up the conservative reformers within the military against any further changes enacted by civilians.
The historiography had very little positive to say about Lourga Neptuna in the immediate wake of the Revolution. It’s not hard to see why. Of the successors to the Empire and the kaleidscopic views on the Revolution, no one had any interest in rehabilitating her clique’s reputation. As with so much in revolutionary historiography, with time the opinion of historians has changed and somewhat softened with regard to Neptuna. This softening should not be exaggerated, the measures she took to oppose reform are still regarded as one of the major causes of the Revolution proceeding in the way that it did, and it is more focused on her motives than actions. Because, while it was regarded as a lie during the Revolution and in its immediate aftermath, Neptuna really did believe in further military reforms than what she affirmed in front of the Military Committee. She even believed in some of the ones that she explicitly said she would not accept to be recommended by the Committee. As she said at the time though, she was unalterably opposed to them being imposed on the military by any civilian body. While radicals like Simsek were whispering about the injustice of the military being unaccountable to military control, Neptuna was convinced that civilian oversight would be the death of the Empire. Change was possible and even desirable, but it must come within the structure of the military itself. This would inevitably make it much slower, but that wasn’t such a bad thing in Neptuna’s eyes either. Too much change too quickly could result in considerable upheaval.
Exactly one week after debate started, just as certain factions were beginning to draw up plans, assuming that Lorkisian was intending to remain a mostly impartial moderator, Lorkisian dropped, without warning, his list of recommendations. A man of few words, he presented his list of recommended reforms by simply handing every delegate a copy and allowing them to read it. It read:
This simple list, by the current commander of the Imperial Military, gave the reforming faction much more than they had been preparing to ask for. The possibility of civilian control had been thought nearly impossible, let alone totally splitting the branches. Neptuna and the conservatives were totally shocked by this turn of events. They, too, had been aware that Lorkisian had some reformist tendencies, but none of them had dreamed they ran this far. Certainly, none of them dreamed that he would be willing to cede control to civilian processes like this. The isolation of the military from the rest of the Imperial state was something it prided itself in, at the highest levels more confidently than any other. So, the question must be asked, why was Lorkisian willing to go this far, to outflank the reformers on reform? In part it was genuine belief. The reforms he suggested had been ideas tossed around among the high officers for centuries, but there had never been a political situation through which they could be forced through. While they may have been desirable, the military was able to function as it was and there would be too much organized opposition by those who stood to lose from the reforms. The fact that this was a group of civilians imposing reforms in this case might have been seen as a positive, they would be above the internal politics (this, in fact, is the explicit defense Lorkisian would make for allowing a legislative body to potentially appoint the Commander-in-Chief). There were, however, also undeniably personal reasons. General Lorkisian was in the ninth year of his ten year stint as Governor of Wallach, a stint which was considered the capstone of a military career and almost always followed by retirement. And, more broadly, he could see the way the political winds were blowing toward further radicalization. When this happened, Lorkisian intended to make sure he was in a position to influence events. He was not unduly confident that he would be elected as Commander-in-Chief of this new military and by pushing for the reforms brought himself genuine political capital to support or oppose any measure he might desire in the future. In short, he was already planning to make himself a key player in the Revolution by making himself the singular leader of physical power.
While the exact details would be ironed out in committee meetings, in order for Lorkisian’s proposals to pass and be officially recommended, all that was required was a majority vote. As the more political minds on the Committee quickly realized, Lorkisian undeniably had those votes. Historians place around 9 members firmly in the Conservative Reformer’s camp, compared to only 5 Radical Reformers. The 12 remaining members either had politics too varied (or incoherent) to easily classify into one of those categories, were too moderate, or were what might be called “Lorkisian’s lackeys.” Lorkisian’s lackeys only consisted of 7 members itself (including Lorkisian) and entirely composed of high level officers who were personally bound to the general. Being Governor of Wallach for nine years had given him a long time to grant patronage. Many of his closest political allies owed him their jobs and none of them were inclined to forget that. All of them could be counted as unshakable votes for anything he might support. His endorsement alone would move at least a couple of undecideds, making any reform essentially guaranteed to pass.
Neptuna took to measures that every embattled opposition has ever taken: she used procedure to drag out the legislative process as long as possible to stall. The speeches she gave and impassioned defenses she delivered were legendary, frequently expanding across multiple days. Lorkisian couldn’t simply stop her from speaking either. By the rules of the Constitutional Chamber, rules decided by the Emperor for this very purpose rumors began to swirl, cloture could be voted for only with a four-fifths majority. In practice, this meant that 20 of the 25 member committee had to vote for cloture, something that would have been impossible without the votes of nearly half the Conservative Reformers.
The single greatest political flaw made by the Conservatives at this point was that they refused to compromise. Had they accepted just slightly more reforms, it was possible Lorkisian would have broken and taken their deal. Especially if they had supported a way to secure him more time at the top, it seems likely that Lorkisian would have cut his losses. Indeed, one of the general’s closest supporters allegedly made this deal explicit to Neptuna after a month and a half of endless debate. She refused. For all of her flaws, she was a true believer, unwilling to budge even an inch.
t’s unclear who came up with the ploy the reformers would use to force through the measure, but it seems likely that if it was not Javier Simsek personally, it was at least one of his close allies. In the middle of the night, a note was silently placed on the doors of every member of the Military Committee, announcing the convening of a new session in 10 minutes. At the “Midnight Massacre” as the Conservatives would call the incident, a name that would quickly seem incredibly gauche, every Radical Reformer, Lorkisian lackey, and a select few swing votes on the Committee met and unanimously passed every vote on the agenda.
When she awoke to this unpleasant surprise, Lourga Neptuna had a few options at her disposal to fight. Had she so desired, Neptuna could have attempted to appeal to the entire Chamber. While this was not officially written into the rules, the Administrative Committee was still diligently working making the ad hoc solution necessary and there was nothing officially banning it either. It had been used a few times previously on more minor issues and would have been the most legal avenue for her to overturn the recommendations. However, there were several reasons why Neptuna was unwilling to take this out. Firstly, the principle of civilian oversight was exactly what she was trying to prevent. By appealing to the full Chamber, Neptuna would be essentially accepting civilian control over military policy, even if she was using that control to reject major reforms. Secondly, she held a minority position not only within the Military Committee, but among the Chamber itself. The Military Committee itself was probably more conservative than the Chamber, she would have been forced to present her case on unfavorable grounds to an audience mostly of civilians who would be unsympathetic to her appeals for an independent military from the start. Lastly, it is quite possible that nothing about the Midnight Massacre was improper or out of procedure. It was certainly impolite and underhanded, but so had been the endless filibustering. As Chair, General Lorkisian had the right to schedule meetings when he pleased with as much notice as he pleased, so long as everyone was notified. So long as a Committee had a quorum of half its members it could pass any recommendation it pleased to.
Instead, Neptuna chose to resort to the force she had been championing this entire time: the military itself. The day after the vote, in a fit of rage, she secretly recorded videos viciously attacking what she described as recommendations to “abolish the Imperial military” written to provide a “blank check to civilian bureaucrats – yes, those same bureaucrats who our great Emperor just fired.” She railed by name against General Lorkisian as attempting to “impose himself in the Emperor’s place” and of being “a total careerist freak” and “a man who has not fired a shot or loaded a cannon since the age of eighteen.” She ended the video with a vague call that “something has to be done,” leaving the viewers to decide for themselves what that meant. Sending the only copies of the videos along with a trusted (non-delegate) advisor on a supply ship out of the Vaird to return to Wallach, they quickly spread much beyond what Neptuna imagined.
Out in the galaxy, informed citizens had been watching the Vaird for months, with every little piece of news trickling out confusing them more. With the Command Crisis and the Constitutional Chamber entering session, with stories of tens of thousands of bureaucrats swarming to the Vaird to act as advisors or witnesses, curiosity grew and grew. Yet this was only among the informed citizenry for the moment. For the average person, uninterested in politics as they had been conditioned to be, conditions were slowly deteriorating as the administrative apparatus slowly fell apart, but this had not reached the point of unrest. For most, the deliberations in the Vaird seemed far away and unlikely to affect their daily lives.
For the Imperial soldiery, seeing Neptuna’s video was the first moment it really became apparent just how important the Constitutional Chamber was. Before it had been groups like the Lorkisian clique that had been focusing, high ranking officers with a personal stake in negotiations. Now, as the videos were copied and spread faster than censors could eliminate them, they were awoken to this reality. Not that they were all having the reaction Neptuna had hoped for. While a sizable amount did, far more were grateful to take the information she was offering without her conclusions. Neptuna had begged the soldiers to do something – and now many of them were planning to. The kernel of a mass movement was awakening.