Murasaki bowed slightly. "Let us say they are not as secure as they believe. You will understand, Capital Prime, my men are specialists and technicians, not soldiers in the strict sense of the term. What we can do is give you secure communications, subvert the enemy's communications and computer networks, and provide a small but crucial increment of highly advanced weapons to offset those employed by the Spartan government. Occasional direct action of a limited nature."
"That's the Royal government," Croser corrected. "The Movement is the legitimate government of Sparta."
"As you say. Now, despite this, the enemy will maintain superior conventional military power almost to the end. As your own plan outlines, we must keep the struggle on a political level as far as possible." He smiled, an expression that went no further than his lips. "In this we are aided by the nature of reality, and the arrow of entropy. It is always easier to tear down than to build, to make chaos rather than order, to render a society ungovernable rather than to govern effectively.
"So. First, we must weaken and immobilize the governing class, the Citizens. Split them along every possible fault line. Next, we must detach as many of the non-Citizens who are loyal to the regime as possible, by driving the Royal government into a policy of ineffective repression. This will not be difficult; to create an atmosphere of fear through terrorism, we need only a small organization and limited support. The countermeasures, if clumsy or made to appear so, will furnish us with our mass base.
"In conjunction with this, we strike both covertly and overtly at the economy; for example, this planet is desperately short of capital, so capital assets must be destroyed, particularly those which generate foreign exchange. Earth Prime will be assisting, of course, with financial manipulations which the enemy has no effective means of countering. Once the economy is locked in a downward spiral, the NCLF and its Movement will become the only factor to benefit from chaos and decay. The Royal government's own diversion of resources to the police and military will work in our favor. In this stage, the NCLF can establish its own shadow regime, its no-go areas, and eat the Royal administration up from below. By then we will have built a guerrilla army capable of denying territory to the Royal forces, which we will infiltrate and subvert as well. Then, victory, and you may proceed to establish your own regime of peace and enlightenment."
The last was delivered deadpan, but Croser stifled a glare. Easy for you to be sarcastic, he thought.
Meiji's a rich planet. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs! He had to admit there was a certain grisly fascination in hearing his own thoughts mapped out so bluntly.
"Best I keep the above-ground NCLF in operation as long as possible," he said. "In fact, I think I may be representing it in the Senate quite soon. Technically as the delegate of the Dockworkers' Union." Which would give him a position of considerable legal immunity. "We don't have much support there, but there's enough to create considerable deadlock, with a little skillful horsetrading."
"Yes," the Meijian said, warming to his topic; there was almost a tinge of enthusiasm in his voice. "Also for your already-skillful disinformation campaign. If enough plausible lies circulate, truth becomes lost and all men begin to fear and doubt. The easiest environment for conspiracy is one where conspiracies are suspected everywhere. May I suggest that part of the funds I brought with me be used to make additional purchases of media and transport companies?"
Croser nodded. "We'll have to be careful," he said. "The Finance Ministry is already checking my books."
Skida sipped at her fruit-juice; the others were drinking wine, and she had always found it advisable to have her head straighter than the company.
"Skilly likes all this if it works," she said. "But the outback operation is as big as it can get without doing some serious fighting, especially now that the enemy bringing in mercs. Skilly needs to get out from under their spy-eyes, faster communication, and something to counter their aircraft."
"My technoninjas can provide all that," Murasaki said. "Of the two hundred who accompanied me-" many on the BuReloc transports that landed every month "-approximately half will return with you to the outback, Field Prime. From now on, your situation will be very different. For example, on Meiji we have developed a method of long-distance tightbeam communication, bouncing the message off the ionization tracks of meteors."
Of which Sparta had more than its fair share; the hundred-kilometer circle of Constitution Bay was the legacy of one such, millennia ago.
"Soon also, we will be reading the enemy's transmissions as soon as they do. You will have abundant computer power to coordinate your logistics, and we will be able to manipulate the enemy's accounting programs to conceal our own shipments. Also, we can degrade performance of automatic systems, the surveillance satellites the Royal government has put up, similar measures elsewhere."
"Skilly likes, but when we start popping, they going to know we getting stuff from off-planet," she said.
"Then they start looking physical."
"Olympian Lines uses the Spartan system for transit to Byer's Star," Murasaki said enigmatically.
The outermost colonized system, reachable only by a complex series of Alderson Point jumps from Sparta and a full year's journey from Earth. It had a quasi-inhabitable planet; Haven, the second moon of a superjovian gas giant, a unique case. Croser remembered reading of it, and nodded to Skida. There was a CoDo relocation colony there, and some minerals.
"Earth Prime controls the Olympian Lines and has interests in the shimmerstone trade with Haven.
While transiting this system, parcels can be released on ballistic trajectories. Given stealthing, and some minimal interference with the local surveillance computers, they will appear to be normal meteorites."
Croser clapped his hands together. "Won't that be a lovely surprise for Falkenberg's killers," he said.
"Speaking of which, how's he doing?" Grand Senator Bronson had excellent intelligence, from his own resources and his leads into the Fleet.
"They are expected to land on New Washington shortly," Murasaki said. "With luck, while we destroy the Fifth Battalion here, the Friedlanders and Covenanters will do the same for the rest there."
Croser grunted skeptically. Falkenberg's Legion were some of the best light infantry in known space.
Scum soldiers, but well trained, well equipped and well lead; and Falkenberg had a reputation. Men like that made their own luck. Men like me, he thought. Still, New Washington was five months' transit from Sparta; they ought to have ample warning of any move.
"We'll see," he said. "Now, the other half of your people will be integrated into my clandestine operation in the towns?"
"Yes; the companies our sponsors own will provide excellent cover. I myself and my closest aides, with your permission, will form the cadre for the extension of your Spartacus organization." The inner-circle hit squads. "We can begin Operations against enemy targets almost immediately."
"A little early for that, surely?" Croser said.
"I think you are underestimating the element of ju," Murasaki said.
Croser blinked for a second. Ah, "go-with," he thought. The Meijian was fond of using martial-arts metaphors for political struggle; only to be expected, of course. The man was a mercenary, with a professional's emotional detachment. All to the good. You need a cold head. Anger was like compassion; for afterwards, when the struggle was over and it was time for the softer virtues of peace.
You made the decision, you had to make the decision, from your heart. Grief at what his father's dream had become; rage at the smug fools who ignored him when he warned, when he pleaded, when he showed them and they wouldn't believe. After that everything had to come from the head; anything else was a betrayal of the Cause.