[eia] limited access revisions

["Kyle H" <menexenus@xxxxxxx>]

    Well, after having just read about 20 emails relating to our previous attempts to revise the limited access rules, I find them difficult to summarize.

    One of our original concerns was to prevent countries from using limited access to hunt down the former enemy's allies in the territory of a country that had just surrendered.  But then we realized that if we weren't going to restrict the allies from attacking the troops of the country in FET (formerly enemy territory), then it wouldn't be fair to restrict the country in FET from engaging those allies.  So restrictions on military engagement were scrapped at an early stage in the discussions.

    Then our focus shifted to requiring troops in FET to move in certain directions to exit FET.  This caused a number of problems that caused some of us to reintroduce the idea of using repatriation to remove garrisons.  At first this seemed like a simple solution to our problems.  But at the end, Mike pointed out that in an invasion of Russia, repatriation could involve teleportation across huge distances.  Mike's suggestions (if adopted) would have rendered much of the previous discussion moot.  As a result, interest in the subject waned, and no final consensus was reached.

    That's a brief summary of the previous discussion that took place with regard to limited access.  Despite our failure to achieve a final consensus, there were a few points that seemed to receive unanimous assent:

Once peace is established, no new land forces may enter FET without access permission of some kind.  (Territory that was ceded in the peace treaty would continue to count as FET in order to prevent forces from being stranded in discontinuously ceded territory.)  However, fleets may enter ports in FET after peace is established.  (This is to facilitate naval transport of troops.  At first we wanted to place limits on when and where fleets could dock as well as how long the fleets could remain in the port, but eventually the consensus shifted to allow fleets to dock wherever they wished and to remain in the FET ports as long as is necessary within the overall 6 month time limit.)  Fleets would be permitted to dock at Constantinople to pick up troops, but they would have to leave from the same direction that they entered. 

Is there any objection to incorporating any of these principles into our house limited access rules?

    As I said above, by the end of the discussion, the previous consensus to allow repatriation of garrisons and the previous consensus to restrict movement out of FET had broken down.  So in the absence of such consensus, I do not think it would be wise to try new iterations of those ideas.  Personally, I could go either way on repatriation of garrisons.  I can see that they would make things simpler, but also very unrealistic in some cases.  However, in the end, I am willing to go along with Mike in scrapping repatriation of garrisons with the understanding that a player's ability to retrieve garrisons may influence the direction that peace negotiations may take.  (As Mike said, collecting garrisons is a logistical problem that can be solved diplomatically by the creation of temporary truces prior to the establishment of a formal or informal peace.)  
    Some players voiced the concern that it didn't seem right that garrisons could be disbanded after the time limit is reached because this would amount to something akin to "desertion".  However, you could think of it a different way.  You could say that garrisons which are disbanded have simply been discharged from military service.  So I don't think that allowing the destruction of some garrisons is completely unexplainable in realistic terms.

    Similarly, I would go along with Mike's final suggestion that we stop trying to regulate how corps may exit a country since this is what causes most of our problems.  As long as the corps is out in 6 months, all is well, and it is up to the exiting power to figure out how best to do this.  The virtue of adopting these two positions is that they require a minimum of changes to the way the rules are currently being interpreted.

    However, if we return to my current situation, the rules I am suggesting above would *not* prevent the French corps which is currently E. of San Sabastian from attacking the British corps at Madrid.  So I propose the following rule to help prevent such attacks on allies in FET:  During the six months of limited access, countries which are leaving FET may not lay siege to any cities which remain in the former enemy's territory after the terms of the peace treaty are applied.  
    I think this rule makes a lot of sense for two reasons.  First, it is realistic.  Surely, laying siege to a city is an act of war in that dong so results in death, disease, and destruction.  From the standpoint of realism, it should not be appropriate for a country that has just made peace with another country to continue laying siege to its cities.  Second, this rule would reduce the ability of a former belligerent to use limited access to hunt down allied forces in FET.  If those allied forces can take refuge in the former enemy's cities without risk of destruction, then there is no point for a country in FET to try to hunt them down.
 
    The basic problem is that not restricting the exit path would allow the country that is supposed to be withdrawing from FET to abuse the rules and hunt down allies of the previous enemy.  This new rule that I am proposing would allow forces in FET to exit by whichever path they choose while also reducing the incentive to abuse the limited access rules.

What do the rest of you think?

kdh

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