From: An Anonymous Analyst (fenfront@cia.gov)
To: nttp://fen.current-events.disc
Subject: Re: Politics, Government, Drugs, Really Wild Things.
Date Posted: May 18th, 2013
** To digress from my digression, I've been hearing rumblings
** and rumors against the personage of Haruhi, specifically
** against her tyrannical management style and lack of
** 'personal touch'. The rumblings then express displeasure at
** the eponymous Operation For Great Justice, comparing the
** case of Thionite to the pre-Launch case of Prohibition, or
** the American folly of the War On Drugs.
* And however different other elements may be, this is the
* same: change the economics and the rest will crumble.
Let's get one thing straight, here, folks: This was never about the money.
Thionite is -too- addictive; the first time the FBI got a whiff of it it had their full attention. By the time OGJ kicked off the machinery was in full swing. Despite everything its pushers can do, despite the lowest street price of anything comperable, its market share in the Danelaw is small. Too many shipments get blocked or intercepted - supply gets interrupted, desperate customers turn on their (they think) uncooperative dealers... and people on the street -know- this. Its properties are no secret, and for every guy whose brains are too roasted to figure out it applies to him, too, or who's just too desperate for a way out to care, there are three or four who'd do another drug that won't touch this one.
The biggest selling point for the cartels was always the economic condition of the neighborhoods where they did their business. That's changing a lot slower and a lot less in America than in other parts of the world, but it's changing nontheless, and these folks -know it-. Drugs just aren't as attractive an option as they were ten years ago.
So the Reavers aren't making nearly the kind of cash you'd expect from the scale of their operations.
And... _Everything they make, they spend_. Every dime. Trust me, folks, no one in the office can believe it either, but we've traced it straight through the laundry.
And what they're doing with it is -scary-. Tanks, planes, guns, mercenaries... and the logistical support to operate all of same; it's all being bought up and vanishing from the face of the Earth. I know a lot of y'all at the sharp end are feeling like you're trying to hold back the tide, but, much's I hate to say it: It's worse than that. Even at the most conservative numbers for this side of their operations, the Reavers' spaceside troops can't represent more than a third of their overall numbers.
A -third-.
For now, even that's not so bad. The 'Danelaw's version of professional military has kicked the crap out of the Reavers every time they've tangled to date, and the US alone has more men under arms than even our worst-case estimates of the bad guys. But that'll change: it has to, either when we find that break we've been looking for to track them back to their holes or when -they- decide they're ready for... whatever. I'm sure you can speculate as well as I can.
Scared yet? See where I'm leading? One more tidbit before I get to the point.
So far these clowns have tested their new biomod tricks on noncombatants. But, if they can do -this-, how likely is it that they -can't- do something far more alarming? The idea of facing down a Draka or a Zoanoid or, hell, even just Bebop and Rocksteady scares the -crap- out of me, and if these guys can do it once, we -know- they can do it for -their entire army-.
But it's worse than that. These people have done something with the 'wave that none of us believed possible - overridden one of its apparently basic properties.
What if they do it again? For a different property?
...Yeah. Exactly. Bang bang.
Aren't you glad you're one of the people on the sharp end of OGJ, rather than some guy living safe with no idea what to do when the walls come down? I know I am.
** That factor being - she's almost always right.
The fact that our most accurate prophet of future events is self-evidently -batshit crazy- does not do wonders for my confidence in the state of the universe.
OTOH, at least she's hot.
Yours, AAA
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates! Well there ain't no time to wonder why: Whoopee! We're all gonna die!"
===========
===============================================
"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."
To: nttp://fen.current-events.disc
Subject: Re: Politics, Government, Drugs, Really Wild Things.
Date Posted: May 18th, 2013
** To digress from my digression, I've been hearing rumblings
** and rumors against the personage of Haruhi, specifically
** against her tyrannical management style and lack of
** 'personal touch'. The rumblings then express displeasure at
** the eponymous Operation For Great Justice, comparing the
** case of Thionite to the pre-Launch case of Prohibition, or
** the American folly of the War On Drugs.
* And however different other elements may be, this is the
* same: change the economics and the rest will crumble.
Let's get one thing straight, here, folks: This was never about the money.
Thionite is -too- addictive; the first time the FBI got a whiff of it it had their full attention. By the time OGJ kicked off the machinery was in full swing. Despite everything its pushers can do, despite the lowest street price of anything comperable, its market share in the Danelaw is small. Too many shipments get blocked or intercepted - supply gets interrupted, desperate customers turn on their (they think) uncooperative dealers... and people on the street -know- this. Its properties are no secret, and for every guy whose brains are too roasted to figure out it applies to him, too, or who's just too desperate for a way out to care, there are three or four who'd do another drug that won't touch this one.
The biggest selling point for the cartels was always the economic condition of the neighborhoods where they did their business. That's changing a lot slower and a lot less in America than in other parts of the world, but it's changing nontheless, and these folks -know it-. Drugs just aren't as attractive an option as they were ten years ago.
So the Reavers aren't making nearly the kind of cash you'd expect from the scale of their operations.
And... _Everything they make, they spend_. Every dime. Trust me, folks, no one in the office can believe it either, but we've traced it straight through the laundry.
And what they're doing with it is -scary-. Tanks, planes, guns, mercenaries... and the logistical support to operate all of same; it's all being bought up and vanishing from the face of the Earth. I know a lot of y'all at the sharp end are feeling like you're trying to hold back the tide, but, much's I hate to say it: It's worse than that. Even at the most conservative numbers for this side of their operations, the Reavers' spaceside troops can't represent more than a third of their overall numbers.
A -third-.
For now, even that's not so bad. The 'Danelaw's version of professional military has kicked the crap out of the Reavers every time they've tangled to date, and the US alone has more men under arms than even our worst-case estimates of the bad guys. But that'll change: it has to, either when we find that break we've been looking for to track them back to their holes or when -they- decide they're ready for... whatever. I'm sure you can speculate as well as I can.
Scared yet? See where I'm leading? One more tidbit before I get to the point.
So far these clowns have tested their new biomod tricks on noncombatants. But, if they can do -this-, how likely is it that they -can't- do something far more alarming? The idea of facing down a Draka or a Zoanoid or, hell, even just Bebop and Rocksteady scares the -crap- out of me, and if these guys can do it once, we -know- they can do it for -their entire army-.
But it's worse than that. These people have done something with the 'wave that none of us believed possible - overridden one of its apparently basic properties.
What if they do it again? For a different property?
...Yeah. Exactly. Bang bang.
Aren't you glad you're one of the people on the sharp end of OGJ, rather than some guy living safe with no idea what to do when the walls come down? I know I am.
** That factor being - she's almost always right.
The fact that our most accurate prophet of future events is self-evidently -batshit crazy- does not do wonders for my confidence in the state of the universe.
OTOH, at least she's hot.
Yours, AAA
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates! Well there ain't no time to wonder why: Whoopee! We're all gonna die!"
===========
===============================================
"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."