The Duke had heard enough and stood up, "For Helus sake" he yelled bringing the room almost instantly to silence, a hard scowl on his face. "I now realise why there has been no successful Ardian initiative while other continents manage to get things together. Look north from here and you'll see Alba Karinya, a continent that has agreed to tariff reducation, fast track visas and establishing embassies. Meanwhile I sit around a table with a bunch of people who appear to be of the nature that if one said the sky was blue someone would have to disagree, or even worse someone would then go on to tell me the colour of grass. To borrow an often used phrase, this is like herding cats." He paused and then lowered his voice. "Allow me to address a few things, first to our Rokkenjiman delegations point" he recalled how the High Priestess had removed Beatrice from her position as a Sword/Shield Guardian of the Ironside children, something that carried a deep stigma in the Cultist faith he held dear and so wasn't about to use her title unless he had no choice, "She is correct, the Heyran's are here as our guest, but so is every single nation around this table. You are here because I invited you and you accepted and that means you are my guest" He gave the Empress a stern gaze, "This is my homeland, the people elected me to lead it and I will treat all guests the same as far as possible within our culture."
"Now as for Heyra's position I am not convinced by it totally myself. However there was method in my madness in allowing them to come before we established an organisation. What I don't want is some wishy washy organisation where people pick and choose which sections they follow and which they don't. Heyra applying after the date we negotiate a treaty would mean them perhaps attempting to pick and choose which articles they want to follow. If they've been in the talks all along that is impossible. Now what I suggest is this, we have an agreement around this table that once we finish discussing the actual contents of this charter we give nations the ability to oppose the membership of any other. Should such an opposing motion be made all of those around the table shall vote. Once we have heard all objections those of us left sign the charter. That allows Heyra to shape an organisation they may be admitted to while giving those of us around this table who question whether Heyra is truly Ardian to at the correct moment have that debate."
"Now I wish to see these talks stick to an actual point." Hugo made a play of looking at his watch, "Personally I have heard that our rugby season starts in two weeks and frankly I'd like to be out of this room by then." he teased. "Now this is what we will do." He adopted his best military officer tone, his hands placed shoulder width on the table and his body leaning forward. "We shall discuss this military idea, not whether aid or soldiers should be sent to Pheubra because that would be a decision for the Ardian organisation to determine, and frankly we don't seem to be any closer to having one of those so we may as well be discussing what to do when the Unicorns bring back the magic elves as what to do with regards to Pheubra." He shot King Lapu and the Sirinisin an icey glance.
"Lets for the sake of debate then look at a potential Article 4- The Ardian Peaceforce, or whatever you'd call it. Now I see several issues straight away
[1]. First is this, not every nation around this table has signed the Uppsala Convention. So therefore any force will be dealing with potential clashes in the way rules of engagement are made for a start. Now even imagining those who haven't sign it do we still have the issue that this is not a national military. King Lapu has called for a full time paramilitary, that puts them in the Uppsala Convention as a militia. Article 3.4 of the Uppsala convention states "3.4 Militias should undertake no action that knowingly endangers the lives of civilians." Imagine this paramilitary does....whose government is held responsible because someone has to be? Now in the past the world has seen CTO operations, there the forces while under the CTO banner retain their connection to their nation of origin, granting accountability. Should the paramilitary be say just formed from Quinetlia this would be like the CTO operation, as soon as it becomes the Ardian Paramilitary that accountability goes. Next issue is the funding, many of us around this table already spend many billions on our military, you are now advocating that we send this paramilitary much much more money. Your starting a unit from scratch and so therefore the cost is going to be rather significant. We then have the practicalities, where will this unit be stationed, it'll need somewhere to live, train and equip for operations. How will it get to areas its needed, because as soon as we start combining our standing militaries with a multi-national paramilitary just so we can move them around we have issues of command and control, beside most paramilitaries operate within the country they are raised, that's kind of the point of them, to support at times of crisis the regular forces. This brings me to my last point, one that is culturally very significant here." Hugo unstrapped his sword and placed it on the table, "Our nation is one of Cultists, it says very strictly in our codes to be loyal to YOUR nation. As such Cultists have a very specific hatred of mercenaries throughout history. Serving another country rather than your own is a no no as far as we are concerned. That sword represents my commitment to my faith and I will sitting here depart from it. Having a multi-national paramilitary as part of this organisation is essentially creating a unit of mercenaries with no loyalty to their own homelands and as such I will have zero part of it, nor will Bakkermaya. I suggest therefore we put this matter of creating a multi-national paramilitary to the vote once anyone else has had their say. Now please....keep to the point of this proposed article." Hugo picked up his sword and sat back down cradling it across his lap.
