McKenna Edicts

ilKhan Lynn McKenna looked at the results of Operation REVIVAL and came to a few conclusions which were not very popular with the rest of the Clans. This led to a series of philosophical changes and military doctrine changes meant to improve the morale and effectiveness of the Clan war machine. While the McKenna Edicts were put down almost as soon as the Snow Raven Khan took the ilKhanship, the effects took the entire Truce period to seep in and change things. Some Clans embraced these changes willfully, while others were far more reluctant.

To setup those edicts and this new doctrine, ilKhan McKenna setup the ilKhan Council (sometimes referred to as the McKenna Council). Non-specific to any Clans, Lynn McKenna invited the most brilliant minds of the Clan to join her in evaluating the Clan society, their military doctrine and seeing how it meshes with the Inner Sphere and “humanity” as a whole. Important figures like Ulric Kerensky worked as part of the council, and retired officers like Khan Severen Leroux also joined the council to assist.

Centralization of military planning also was part of the ilKhan Council’s job, with military action being setup by the Council and assigned to various Clans based on availability, competency and requirements. Each Clan kept their political and military independence, but the Council looked at the macro elements of military planning including logistics, managing equipment stock and weapon’s development. This was a departure from earlier Clan doctrines and closer to the old Star League model, albeit with each “army” being their own entity rather than fully subservient to a central command authority.

Edict of Competency

First, McKenna posited that the Inner Sphere was far better organized and equipped than they had expected. Even through centuries of war, they kept their military going and had capable commanders and pilots. The thought that all the Spheroid were “barbarians” had hurt the war effort more than the High Council wanted to admit at first. As a doctrinal point, ilKhan McKenna required the various Clan leaderships to study Inner Sphere military doctrine and history to understand better their enemies. She also put forward that “fighting fair” with the Inner Sphere was out of the question as they were not going to play fair from the same point of view, reducing the application of zelbrigen in engagement against Inner Sphere foes.

Edict of Hard Work

Second, the ilKhan realized the massive disparity in manpower between the Clans and the various Inner Sphere power. The smallest Inner Sphere realms like Rasalhague and the nascent St.Ives Compact basically had a larger population than the entire Clan homeworld put together. The capitals of the major Inner Sphere powers dwarfed anything the Clan could put together both in terms of raw military power but also in terms of productivity.

For this, ilKhan McKenna put forward was a change in the sibko training of trueborn warriors. No longer would trueborn warriors be washed out of a training, as every soldier was needed in the fight against the Spheroid powers. The overall lethality of the training classes was also discussed, and an agreement was done to make them less dangerous so that more cadets simply survived the ordeal. Trueborn warriors who failed in their Blooding would now be relegated to “2^nd Line Warrior” rank and serve in Provisional Galaxies and planetary garrisons, freeing more experienced warriors to take up combat roles on the front.

This format only covered Trueborn warriors, and Freeborn sibkos were still as cutthroat as they were before. Once a freeborn was washed out of Warrior training, however, the “on the job” training for the other Caste was modified to be more accommodating. Technicians and laborers were most affected by this, as there was a sharp increase in demand for trade products and maintenance on existing products. There was a blurring of the lines between the laborers and technicians when it came to consumer goods, with more laborers being admitted “into the trades” for repair of civilian equipment like trucks, plumbing, appliances and consumer goods.

The Scientist and Merchant Caste received the few “truly washed out” trueborn out there along with many “upper quality” freeborns. Scientists were given additional training and allowed more flexibility in their work, especially towards civilian science. While development of new weapons and equipment was often the priority, research in improving yield of crops, purification of ecosystem and other adaptations received funding directly from the ilKhan’s office.

Edict of Reactivation

Third came the massive reactivation of military asset by the Clans in general. While the Clans could fight the Inner Sphere one on one, planet per planet, the Inner Sphere had such a massive logistical advantage that the Clans needed to quickly catch up. All mothballed WarShips and JumpShips were ordered to be reactivated, the unclaimed vessels being Trialed over under the eyes of the High Council. The mass of personnel required for these vessels were taken from the various lower castes along with the Inner Sphere worlds under the control of the Clans. Generous rewards and payments plans were given to this crew to ensure their loyalty.

Brian Caches were opened up and equipment in them distributed to those which required them, with quick upgrade programs for original SLDF ‘mechs and vehicles taking place to bring them to more modern standards. Older Clan ‘mechs, things like the Thunder Stallion and earlier first generation OmniMechs, were pushed back into service after a derusting period and upgrades to some of the chassis. Second-line units were expanded heavily, and “General Provisional Galaxies” were created to accommodate these old pieces of hardware, which were then deployed on occupied worlds in the Inner Sphere.

Edict of Preservation

Fourth was an imposed limitation on “combat waste” between the Clans and even within the Clans. Lynn McKenna had seen the good in former ilKhan Leo Showers’s restriction on Trials between the Clans during Operation REVIVAL and noticed the issues which arose when former ilKhan Ulric Kerensky reopened the floodgates. None of the Clans had enough warriors to waste on useless endeavors, but rather than completely ban the Trials, Lynn McKenna put strict limitations on what could and couldn’t be done. The biggest limitation was on batchall for Trials of Possession and Grievances, limiting these fights to Star-level engagement at most. Refusals were restricted to unaugmented combat when approved, even though this was not always accepted.

Through this was another doctrinal change proposed (and generally accepted) by Lynn McKenna, which replaced the standard bidding process when invading Inner Sphere worlds. Discussing things with Ulric Kerensky, Lincoln Osis and Elias Critchell, all agreed that the Inner Sphere had understood the way bidding worked and exploited it to their own benefit. Khan Bjorn Jorgensson of the Ghost Bear even posited that the Inner Sphere would always actively cheat during the bidding process by not calculating any planetary militia and partisan units which would disrupt things later. While the Clans did not appreciate having to deal with longer, drawn out engagements, it was clear that “single decisive battles” would not be how the Inner Sphere would be won.

Edict of the New League

The final major change for the Clans themselves was probably the most drastic, as it impacted all the Clans equally. Sometimes referred to as the “Everybody fights, nobody quits” doctrine, it centralized the military planning of the Clan military to the Clan High Council and removed the concept of “invasion corridors” and personal claims to worlds by specific Clans. An exception was made for one “capital world” each Clan could claim within the Inner Sphere and its periphery, where the administrative center for the Clan would be.

McKenna invoked the spirit of the original SLDF in uniting the assets of the Clans more, opening up enclaves on most conquered worlds to other Clans to allow for better logistics and deployment. Even weaker Clans were given specific tasks within the Clan military organization, often garrison or pacification. By the end of the Truce of Tukayyid, all front-line Galaxies of the Clans were sitting ready on various worlds to restart the fight for Terra while Provisional Galaxies were guarding the rear and training the next wave of soldiers.

Edicts of the Free Guilds

The Free Guilds are a cornerstone of the Clan society, even though they are technically “outside” Clan society itself. Many Free Guilders followed “old ways” rather than Kerensky’s vision for a new society, which made them more flexible than the Clans themselves to absorbing “new blood”. The Free Guilds numbers were also always underreported, meaning that there were far more of them than most of individual Clans thought. IlKhan McKenna requested a full census of the Free Guilds early and got a better understanding of just how massive they really were.

Through discussions with Ulric Kerensky and Bjorn Jorgensson, ilKhan McKenna understood that the Inner Sphere population would never accept “Clan culture” without massive changes on both sides. The Clan culture was not meant to be as flexible as would be required for this and the more hardcore traditionalists would refuse these changes, leading to damaging the Clans as a whole. After studying the situation, the ilKhan Council invited multiple Free Guilds leader to discuss the situation.

While the Clan’s capitals in the sphere would be fully under control of their owners, the other worlds which were arguably shared by the entire Clan still had significant population. This population was generally not supportive of the Clan way of life, and it became difficult for the Clan’s to maintain control over them without strong military presence. Discussion with the Free Guilds opened the idea that this population could be absorbed within the more liberal and flexible Free Guilds system, alleviating the culture shock of the Inner Sphere towards the Clan society. Free Guilds officials were sent to various Inner Sphere worlds to take the pulse of the population and see what could be done to help make things easier.

Basic issues were the first things to come up on all sides involved, but of course there were difference between worlds formerly owned by House Kurita, House Steiner and the Rasalhague Republic. The importance of families came up quite often as the Free Guilds asked around, with the sibko and creche system being outright refused by all Inner Sphere parties. As the Free Guilds did not use these systems, this was an easy recommendation that they brought to the ilKhan Council.

Job security and job flexibility came as a strong second in the surveys done by the Free Guilds. The Clan Caste system did not allow for much flexibility in terms of employment, especially upwards mobility. The Inner Sphere was still built mostly around entrepreneurial spirit, and small business owners were not incentivized in the Clan system to keep working. “For profit” work was not hard coded in the Clan mentality, which caused major friction with some of the more influential local leaders. Free Guilds leadership was still anchored in the Clan structure of central planning and subsistence trading, which was the opposite of many Inner Sphere worlds. Market liberalization was not something most Clan leaders were truly eager to allow, but basic concessions were done in the Inner Sphere after the Guilds noted how this would help morale and productivity. Jade Falcon bank branches were opened on many worlds and private saving and trading accounts were allowed to be opened by normal citizens. Consumer goods production was incentivized through grants and trade concessions by the various Clans, which led to an increase in the quality of many of those goods in Clan space as well.

Curtailing basic freedoms was not as much a major point of contention in former Combine space, not used to those freedoms, but was a major issue in Rasalhague and Commonwealth space. Freedom of speech, travel, religion, assembly, all those things had been things the Rasalhagian had fought for just 20 years prior while they were hard coded into the Commonwealth Constitution since its inception. Those were all things which were more difficult for the Free Guilds to negotiate around and for the ilKhan Council to understand. Local Inner Sphere leaders were taken to discuss these points with the Council directly, with the more liberal Clan leaders acting as the advocates for their demands. Ulric Kerensky was very critical of the way the Clans had treated those Inner Sphere civilians and helped draft new laws allowing more flexibility in personal freedoms for the Inner Sphere citizens, which in turn affected the Free Guilds and even the lower Castes of the Clans.

Freedom of Opportunity was then brought up, as the Caste system was seen as too restrictive amongst the Inner Sphere population. For new populations, various forms of testings were introduced by the Free Guilds, following their own way of doing things. This allowed many Inner Sphere civilians to “test in” other castes than Laborer or Merchant, especially after apprenticeship and education. Over time, this even extended to the Warrior caste as some locals decided they wanted to serve “the Clans” as a whole and leading to impromptu Trials of Position for combined arms positions, conventional infantry and paramilitary police.

The Free Guilds did notice that there was also an undercurrent of people who would never accept the Clan way of life for a variety of reasons. Rather than waste resources and potentially even force dangerous repression, the Free Guilds recommended these elements simply be removed from Clan space, as their neighbors in the Sphere were responsible for this. As things progressed, the ilKhan Council decided that all of these would be sent to Wolcott as refugees on diplomatic ships. After warning the Combine leadership of this, they started bringing DropShips to Wolcott once or twice a month and unloading these malcontents there.