Latest revision as of 04:04, 8 February 2013

The star sector centered around Earth. It is covered in Star Sector Atlas I. Most of the action in Space Opera took place here. Serenity Bebop is also set here. See also Galactic Crusade.

Early Colonization Of The Solar System

The first Terran space probes and manned expeditions were modest efforts, but Terran technology quickly advanced to increasingly ambitious projects. By 2001, several military and scientific bases had been planted on Luna. Both the Alliance and the SovWorld maintained manned space stations in orbit around Terra. Unmanned probes had completed the preliminary survey of the Solarian System, and plans were laid for manned voyages.

In 2011, NAF Mars Probe I sent a coded message that a damaged and abandoned alien spacecraft had been found in orbit around Mars. The hulk was a Bug stardestroyer which had been severly mauled in 1969 by elements of the StarPatrol when it had entered the Solarian System on a long-range probe mission. The vessel had not been totally vaporized, although many systems were melted and fused beyond recognition. Enough clues remained to provide the Terrans with the hints needed to spur transition into Tech/7 technology within 50 years.

Analysis of the alien vessel produced a significant leap forward in all fields of Terran physical science. By 2025, the secret of the secondary drive systems of the vessel had been determined. The resulting Markheim-Hasagawa Phased Drive (the TISA Trans-Gravitic Interphased Sub-Light Anomaly Drive) proved to be so fast and economical that Terran exploration and colonization of the star system accelerated into a frenzy.

Even as these discoveries were being made, the NAF was also involved in the greatest engineering feat attempted by mankind to that time construction of the huge L-5 colony proposed by the Terran visionary Gerard O'Neill some four decades earlier. The initial phase of the project, completed in 2015, was a large Lunar mining complex to produce great quantifies of material required for the 2 km diameter torus of the space colony. In 2028, the L-5 Colony O'Neill was completed. The benefits of the torrents of solar power microwaved down to Terra soon reduced the energy crisis. The Saharan Reclamation Project (2022-20281, for example, opened up more than 12 million hectares of land for irrigation with water distilled from the Mediterranean Sea by L-5 solar power. By 2040, 32% of all energy used on Terra was from L-5 powersats.

The first L-5 colony was a closed, fully self-sustainiing ecosystem capable of supporting some 12,000 scientists, technicians, and their families. The computerized and automated factories and smelter complexes orbiting nearby were able to process several million tons of Lunar ores per year, which were launched to the L-5 points by the Tycho linear-synchronous mass driver. The electronics and machine shops could produce many of the tools, machines, and equipment the colony required. They hydroponic farms produced all of the food required for the population of the L-5 community.

By 2100 there were 16 great cities in orbit between Terra and Luna, with populations totaling around 800,000. The colonies were largely self-sufficient once the minerals had been obtained from the Lunar mines. The L-5 factories were capable of fitting out new space colonies, powersats, ships of commerce and war, and virtually any other structure or product required for life in space.

With an increasingly advanced technology and multiple back-up systems that were continually updated to guard against any predictable contingency, the space communities became viable environments. The inhabitants came to view life in the L-5 colonies as natural, and many found their ties with the Mother Planet grew less with time. Their children became true sons and daughters of space, the first of many generations who would seek their lives among the stars.

The Lunar colonies expanded as well, growing to house a population of over 14 millions by 2100 as they provided the resources for the L-5 cities and food in abundance in their hydroponic tunnel farms.

The TISA drive enabled mankind to colonize the OutPlanets of the Solarian System. In 2029, the first domed colony was planted on Mars, and in the following year the mineral wealth of the Asteroid Belt was opened to the new mining interests based on Luna. By 2100, almost 200,000 were living in the domed cities on Ceres, Pallas, Juna, and Vesta, with another 70,000 in the outlying mining stations. The population of Mars neared two million.

In 2036, an ambitions terraforming project was initiated on Ganymede, the fourth moon of Jupiter. By 2059, that small world possessed a breathable atmosphere and boasted a promising agricultural colony that rose to almost 4 million by 2100. Similar projects were later undertaken on Titan in the Saturn moons, and then on Callisto in the Jovian system. The vast power required for heat and atmospheric conversion came from batteries of large powersats similar to the types orbiting the L-5 colonies.

At the close of the 21st century, more than 20 million were living beyond Terra's atmosphere, and close to 9% of the planetary agricultural needs were supplied by space colonies.

The Pure Earth Movement: The Amadartha Psychosis

Even as the Terrans took their first steps toward the colonization of their starsystem, the forces of reaction began to grow on Terra. By 2050, many Terran subscribed to the Pure Earth Movement. This perverted group of madmen was, to the last member, caught in the Amadathartha. They feared the Taleel and rejected it with a loathing that led them to deny the stars to others of their race.

The Pure Earthers were a fanatical brotherhood committed to solving all of the problems of their overcrowded planet. It must be said in their defense that they were, at first, motivated by high ideals and wished to better the lot of the more than 15 billions who populated Terra 2050. The programs to control population growth were not successful, and desperate measures were perhaps required. But instead of turning to the limitless abundance of the Universe, the Pure Earthers chose to rely on the ever more meager resources of their own planet.

As conditions became increasingly more difficult on Terra, with shortages and ever more severe rationing imposed on the people by the UP government, the Pure Earth Movement gained followers. Finally, in 2064, they gained a majority in the UP Assembly. From that point on, Terra was forced to turn aside from the stars, and it remained for the space colonies to carry on the drive of humanity to embrace the Taleel.

The Pure Earthers were incapable, philosophically and psychologically, of understanding that the only direction in which a technological race can continue to grow and prosper lies toward the stars. Theirs was an ancient argument, and the galaxy is littered by a host of dead and barren planets that attest to the falsehood of their shrill outcry: 'As long as there is poverty, disease, and injustice on our world, we cannot afford to dream of setting foot on distant planets. There are not enough resources as it is to accomplish all that must be done here. We must not waste our precious natural resources and wealth on mere pinpoints of light in the sky. We were born here on this world, and here we shall live.

And there they were doomed to die! Sheer madness! The Taleel called to them, and they averted their eyes to the dirt! They would not unlock the gates of their planetary prison and step forth to fly amongst the stars, free in the joy of the Taleel. They faltered, and they fell in the Nar of the Great Testing. By their loss of will, they lost forever the opportunity to be one with the Cosmos. Thus, their breed was condemned to fade forgotten into the dust of their planet.

Fortunately for humanity, there were those who were strong in the Taleel, and their will to gain the stars prevailed. But - oh! the cost that was paid by the pitiful billions of Terra.

The social engineering programs instituted by the Pure Earthers imposed an increasingly repressive socialism that eventually dominated every facet of Terran life by 2100. Paternalistic and inflexible, the Pure Earth administration of the UP government regarded itself as heavensent and uniquely fitted to decide what was best for everyone. They crushed individual thought and initiative, punishing nonconformity with a savagery that belied their avowed commitment to humanitarian principles. The productive members of society were called upon to make greater and still greater efforts to provide for their disadvantaged, unproductive brothers.

There were many disadvantaged people to provide for, as the vast majority of Terrans had not the intelligence, skills, and education to fit into the highly specialized and technological industries of the PostIndustrial Age. The simple fact was that 80% of the population was untrainable and unemployable.

Every Terran citizen was granted entitlement to a Basic Share of the economic wealth of the planet. Thus, the most unproductive received an income sufficient to sustain him. Those actually drafted or born into the work force or the administration were awarded Preferred Shares for their contributions to the public good. Vocations became largely inherited, and social mobility disappeared by 2100 as a rigid class structure evolved. With social responsibility - meaning authority in the bureaucratic structure of government, industry, or the professions - came privilege and power. But rank and power were hereditary and depended no at all on personal merit and competence.

The masses or 'Proles’ were controlled and pacified by a well orchestrated program of propaganda and bread and circus. Government psycho-sociologists manipulated public attitudes and opinions through the immensely popular mass media Tri-Vee. Euphorics and tranquilizing drugs were dispensed freely to keep the Proles from considering the warren-like Community Urban Complexes or ComUrbs that came to cover tens of thousands of square kilometers of the planetary surface. Spectacles of immense proportions were staged to impress them. Always were they praised for their non-existent virtues, and shortages were invariably blamed on the social irresponsibility of shirkers and social malcontents amongst the working forces. As the general population spiralled down toward a brutish level, ever more spectacular and violent diversions were invented to entertain them.

What was worse, they were allowed to breed. Brutish parents raised their children in ignorance, perpetuating and increasing the unproductive, drugged, moronic masses who consumed the substance of Terra. Thus, the UP government was forced to import raw materials and food from the OutPlanets of the Solarian System to shore up the image of the All-Benevolent, All-Providing, Government. But basic resources were in chronically precarious supply, and the best of what was available went to the privileged leadership classes. This fact was not overlooked by the Militant Dissidents who began to arise among the lower echelons of the productive classes.

The Militant Dissidents tended to come from the lowest ranks of government, the industrial/agricultural complex, and the professional and service sector. They were reasonably intelligent, educated, and often law-abiding individuals deserous of improving conditions. However, to do so, they had to challenge the authority of the incompetent leadership classes. But the leaders soon realized that Luna provided an especially safe place to exile troublemakers who dared to voice criticism of the new order. By 2075, transportation was a standard penalty for any form of political agitation. By 2100, almost 6 million political offenders, common criminals, and loyal producers who had only attempted to convince their superiors that some policies needed revision had been sentenced to life exile on Luna.

Rebellion: The High Republic

Terran rule of the space colonies was performed with a heavy hand once the Pure Earthers came to power. The colonies were regarded as an expensive luxury borne on the backs of the suffering peoples of Terra. The fact was ignored that all of the L-5 colonies, the Lunar colonies, and the new colonies on Ganymede, Callisto, Titan, and Mars were self-supporting and also exported substantial quantities of food and resources to Terra. In their fear and hatred of space and the freedom it promised, the narrow men of the Pure Earth leadership waged a vicious propaganda war against the colonies to win favor from the masses at home on Terra.

Relations between Terra and the colonies became strained. If the typical Groundhog resented and reviled the colonies, the colonials harbored little love for Pure Earthist Terra. Many colonials were political exiles. Others were fortunate individuals who had been able to emigrate and thus made their escape from the worst features of restrictive Terran society. There were also many who simply heard the siren lure of the High Frontier. Those were the most courageous and adventuresome of all, among the most capable men and women that the race had to offer.

Space gave a person room to grow, unhindered by mindless and officious prohibitions, bureaucratic ret tape, and petty restrictions that were typical of daily Terran life. Discipline was self-imposed for strictly functional reasons. Space dwellers instinctively recognized that any irresponsible and careless behavior endangered everyone. Those who did not understand this fact of life soon died. Thus, the colonials became bound together by the threat of a common enemy - the menace of space.

The colonials had little patience with the self-important little men sent up from Terra to govern them. They laughed at the grandiose and often hypocritical social development programs of the Pure Earthers, which sacrificed individual rights to their narrow vision of the greater good. They nurtured deep and bitter resentment toward policies which bled away their hard won surpluses at prices that constituted robbery, while the government berated them for failing in their duty to meet ever higher production quotas and for complaining about the outrageously exorbitant price charged for Terran goods. It was with outraged feelings that the colonials saw the Lunar Administration formed in 2075 to oversee the implementation of the correctional system for transportees exiled from Terra. For the Administration threatened the rights of free citizens of Luna as well.

In 2068, the Lunar Administration evolved a plan to turn the hydroponics farms of Luna into high-yield complexes to grow food for the hungry billions of Terra. By 2080, life of Luna was so circumscribed by unfair laws and regulations that it was no more than a 21st century Botany Bay. By 2090, free citizens were reduced to mere clients of the Lunar Administration, bound :o produce and sell grain and produce to the Administration at prices set by the Administration.

The L-5 colonies fared lettle better. Terran bureaucrats replaced the competent leaders previously appointed from the best men available in the colonies. These administrators hated the duty and ruled the L-5 communities with ignorance of conditions to such an extent that they often threatened the very safety of the colonies. The same was true in the domed cities of Mars, whose industries were converted to virtual slave labor camps.

Only on the OutPlanets of the Jovian and Saturn colonies and in the mining camps of the Asteroid Belt was there a degree of freedom unparalleled in the rest of the Solarian System. Land was available on the terraformed moons, while the Belt was wide, so one could move far enough away from the few centers under the direct administration of the colonial bureaucrats from Terra. Even in these regions the sheer unfairness of Terran policies created smoldering fury in colonial hearts.

Rebellion was inevitable. It cam in 2136, with the institution of the infamous Air Tax on Luna and in the other domed colonies. Transportees, who now numbered almost 15 million, and free citizens of Luna alike, arose to overpower the Lunar Governors and the Peace Keepers based at Tycho City. When a large strikeforce of Peace Keepers was gathered on Terra to invade Luna to punish the rebels, the L-5 Colony Alliance refused to provide the required shipping, spaced its Terran Governor and hie henchmen, and joined the revolt. Alliance was quickly followed by the other L-5 colonies.

As word of the revolt spread, the Martian colonists rose up to lynch their Terran masters. The OutPlanets followed in turn. By August of 2136, no vestige of Pure Earther influence remained outside the Terran atmosphere. Representatives of the colonies met on September 5, 2136, to declare the High Republic from the Assembly Hall in Tycho City.

Terra discovered that it was unable to wage war against the High Republic. After 2045, all spacecraft were constructed in the L-5 colonies. After the Pure Earth rise to power, Terran involvement in the operation of spacecraft declined and colonial crews became the rule. By 2100, the Turning Inward had deprived Terra of the technologies and skills required to construct and man spacecraft on the planet itself. Generations of closed thinking and official stupidity had so stifled Terran science and channeled it into socially useful pursuits that aerospace science and technology on 22nd century Terra scarcely equalled that possessed in the 1980s.

By the Treaty of Tycho, 2137, Terra grudgingly agreed to recognize the new sovereignty of the High Republic. Colonists would be provided in return for the restoration of vital food and resource shipments to the crowded planet. The 'volunteers' sent to the colonies were often the worst of the incorrigibles the planetary government could find - the hard cases who refused to conform to the perfect world the Pure Earthers believed they were fashioning. The High Republic accepted the enforced immigrants under protest, demanding that only legitimate volunteers be sent. Secretly, there was much satisfaction. The New Chums were just the kind of people the High Republic was seeking. The cast-offs of Terra had the very traits which marked the High Republic itself - independence of spirit, personal courage, questioning minds, and an unquenchable determination to resist tyranny of any kind.

The Terran government also attempted to introduce spies into the colonies. Suffice it to say that space is a very unforgiving environment, and numerous 'accidents’ occured among the inexperienced.

The High Frontier: The Exodus

In 2048, Ortega, Balckwell, and Charenkov discovered the principle of the hyper-warp drive, and faster-than-light travel became possible.

In 2056, a 100,000t TISA vessel had been converted into the first of the Pathfinders. The engines were woefully primitive, and the round trip to Alpha Centauri required almost two years. In the interval, three more Pathfinders were fitted out and were dispatched on deep space exploration missions.

The FTL technology of Humanity developed quickly after that. By 2100, there were 22 of the huge 500,000t Connestoga class colonization ships in regular service carrying interstellar colonists to Alpha Centauri, Vega, Sirius, Procyon, and other near stars with habitable planets. Voyage times were greatly reduced as the space colonies began to develop a strong Tech/7 industrial and technical capacity. The Great Exodus had begun.

The interstellar colonies planted in the period of the Exodus (2065-2190)

The Penal Colonies were established by the Free Earth government of Terra between 2075 and 2136. Some of Terra’s worst political dissidents and incorrigible criminals (including citizens guilty of such infractions as hoarding, wasting, and black marketeering, as well as murderers, arsonists, rapists and thieves) were transported to marginal Class B and C worlds to develop mines or exotic resources. Many of these colonies failed because of the harsh conditions prevailing on the planetary surfaces, but some survived in spite of the minimal support received from Terra and then virtual abandonment after 2136. Everything about this despicable colonization program was marginal. Colonists were shipped in primitive cyrogenic capsules with a 20°/ failure rate. Equipment and supplies were kept to an economically bare minimum. No thought was given to providing any balance in skills that would be needed on the new worlds. Contact with most was lost after the Revolt in 2136, but a number were later found and incorporated into the Terran Union. A few turned to sinister activities like space piracy and colony raiding, apparently obtaining their first starships by seizing unsuspecting Free Traders. Many devolved into savagery.

The Dissident Colonies were established by restive nationalistic groups on Terra whose political and cultural values clashed with those of the dominant Free Earth Movement. To rid itself of these potential troublemakers, the UP government allowed immigration particularly from WestEurope and the SovWorld. Most of the WestEurope colonists settled in the Azuriach Cluster, which became the Azuriach Imperium in 2178. SovWorld colonists largely settled in the region which became the Galactic Peoples Republic in 2159. These two groups were to give the near galaxy around Terra many difficulties in later years.

The Lost Colonies were established by religious and ethnic minorities of Terra who had suffered restriction or repression at the hands of the Free Earth government and wished to practice their beliefs in peace. Provided they could finance the expedition themselves, and paying confiscatory premiums to the UP government for the privilege of emigrating, they chartered or bought decrepit starships and launched themselves toward what they hoped would be the new Jerusalem. Many simply disappeared. Others found new worlds and settled them. Few were able to maintain industrialized technologies and devolved into Tech/1-4 pre-industrial societies. By 2190, over 600 such expeditions had departed Terra, sprinkling humanity far into the galaxy. In future years, these enclaves became among the first customers of the Free Traders of the Mercantile League, who jealously guarded their locations from their competitors to protect their monopolies.

The Sponsored Colonies were settled under the direct support of the High Republic and its successor, the Union of Planets (2138 onward). Carefully selected teams of volunteers were chosen to establish Base Colonies on premium Class A Earth-Type planets. When preparations were completed, waves of colonists were dispatched according to a long-range development plan. Each colony thus became a strong and viable planetary-state, with a solid balance of scientific, technical, professional, agricultural, military, and administrative expertise provided to insure the maximum chance of success. Contact was maintained between them and the Solarian System through a regular system of commercial shipping. The moment a sponsored colony became self sufficient, it was admitted to the growing confederation that evolved into the Union of Planets by 2145. These worlds were the logical extension of the main steam of Solarian starculture, and they remained steadfastly loyal to the federal structures that developed over the centuries.

The Free Colonies were established over the period 2140-2190 by special interest groups in the so-called Mercantilist Dispersion. Backed by wealthy individuals and corporations of the High Republic seeking to expand their commercial activities to the stars, the Free Colonies were set up as business operations. Often blocs of companies combined to finance the colonies, as the cost of establishing a viable, productive colony of this type was considerable. A number became the nucleii for the Mercantile League, founded in 2190, although others remained loyal to the Union of Planets.

It is estimated that over 1000 planets were colonized in the 125 years of the Exodus, with more than 485,000,000 people leaving the Solarian System to find new homes on distant worlds.

In all that time, the human race did not meet with a single advanced sentient race, for this arm of the galaxy had been denuded of high level starcultures some 9000 years earlier by the great series of wars between the mighty Galactic Empires of the Starkaad and the Korelians. The whole region constituted a huge Neutral Zone between the still vast remnants of these two starcultures, a void to be filled by the young races now evolving to starfaring status. It would not be until 2232 that contact would be made with an alien race of interstellar stature.

The Crazy Years: Sociodynamic Collapse On Terra

By 2125, Terra was entering the second phase of its inevitable decline. The population had exceeded 20 billions and was beginning to accelerate in growth. The average intelligence quotient was 84, planetary literacy had fallen to 14% of the population, and less than 10% were productively employed in the automated factories and hydroponics complexes. The masses contributed nothing to Terran economy or society, and industrial and agricultural facilities were strained to the failure point as the numbers of technicians required to maintain and operate them continued to fall.

Those who had the intelligence to perceive the impending catastrophe chose emigration to the High Republic and the stars. But in 2138, the UP government banned emigration of all essential personnel. Forced to remain on a crowded and slowly dying planet choked by pollution and staggered by massive shortages of food, power, raw resources, and manufactured goods of all types, such men and women came to bitterly resent the Pure Earth philosophy and all it stood for.

The Covenanters arose among the lower echelon members of the technocracy and bureaucratic classes. Because the rigidly hereditary nature of the stratified Terran social and political structure barred them from any chance of advancement to posts from which they might be able to avert the worst of the coming disaster, they felt hopeless and frustrated. They also recognized that they were partially responsible for the dead end to which Terran society had come. For they were members of the establishment, many of them were former Pure Earthers.

Cells of Covenanters formed, and plans were laid to fortify and arm vital industrial and agricultural complexes safely removed from the population centers of the ComUrbs. There was no chance of stopping the general collapse of society. All that could reasonably be done was to provide for a few enclaves of sanity and civilization in a world that would go mail in its last days. Since some Brothers were members of the government bureaucracy and lower management levels of the industrial/agricultural sectors of Terran society, they were able to arrange for the needed transfers of personnel and diversions of equipment and supplies to the designated enclaves. Such tampering with the operations of the vast organization that constituted the Terran bureaucracy went entirely unnoticed.

Even as the Covenanters prepared their refuges and moved their people to places of safety, a new and destructive religious cult sprang up to occupy the minds of the ignorant masses. Indeed, the Creationist cult was the largest single factor to spur the growth of the Covenantist movement among the techno-bureaucratic classes. For it marked the end of sanity and any possibility of forestalling or averting planet-wide devolution.

Thaddeus D. Struther, the self-styled Prophet of Creationism, proclaimed that the Milennium promised by the Pure Earthers was at hand. If the people of Terra would only renounce entirely the sacrilege of trespassing in the Lords High Kingdom, He would rain his bounty down upon the needy of Terra. He would perform His miracles, and manna would fall from the skies to feed everyone. The factories would pour out an abundance of goods without end. No one would want for anything. But, the most terrifying aspect of his illogical babble was a call to cease all birth control measures. The Lord would provide for all his children, Struther said, and the ignorant masses believed him. So did the inbred fools who controlled Terra, and they withdrew all restrictions on parentage in 2146.

As intelligent men realized that the doom was upon them, a new and massive wave of emigration ensued between 2140 and 2165. While prevented from emigrating themselves, for most were in the essential services, Covenanters assisted their fellows to escape to the stars. If they could not save their planet, and likely not even themselves, they could try to save the race.

In 2165, Terran population approached 35 billions, and the instability index reached crisis levels. All means of production and distribution no longer could maintain the supply of food, power, and vital services. As the systems faltered, then collapsed completely in ComUrb after ComUrb, panic and riot raged through the darkened warrens as the Proles were gripped by superstitious fear. Blaming the technos for sabotaging the Coming of the Milennium, the masses ran amok. The technical specialists, who alone could repair the damaged life support systems, were torn apart, vital facilities were smashed and burned, and all sanitation, medical and power services were lost. As hunger turned to famine, the mobs turned on each other, and cannibalism broke out in the megacities. Plagues soon followed.

Ten years later, less than 900 million humans remained alive on Terra.

Renaissance: The Rise Of Socio-Technic Society On Terra

The shocked space communities placed Terra under strict quarantine in 2167 to prevent the virulent diseases loosed upon the planet from ravaging their own environments.

Civilization still existed in the armed enclaves of the Covenant. Able to protect their production complexes and hydroponic facilities from the crazed Proles, the Covenanters survival was guaranteed. Their medical teams also prevented the plagues from seriously damaging the personnel of the enclaves and their families.

However, most of the planet contained dazed survivors who quickly devolved to barbarism and even more primitive levels of existence. Urban survivors were rarely more than small family or clan groups reduced to animal savagery. The rural barbarians tended to appear more organized, developing nomadic tribal cultures based on hunting or herding.

In the decades following the collapse, the Terran ecosphere slowly healed itself from the multiple ravages of over-exploitation, pollution, and general destruction of the natural environment. Vegetation and animals began to reclaim the desolate ruins that dotted the countryside.

The planetary population stabilized at one billion, but finally reached five times that by 2550. The Covenant enclaves maintained contact with each other, and a plan was formulated to restore the devolved barbarians of the hinterland to a civilized level of existence. To this end, the enclaves used intensive education to prepare their own people to act as cadres to lead their lost breathren into the fold.

At first, the barbarian tribes living around the fortified enclaves were induced with bribes and arguments to send some of their children to the enclave schools. These became the first converts to the new order, and they eagerly returned to the countryside to teach their tribesmen. In some instances the tribes reacted violently and lynched the troublemakers, necessitating punitive expeditions from the enclaves. Soon, it was clear that the Teachers were not to be harmed without inviting punishment.

As the regions bordering the enclaves were won over, operations were extended to the more distant tribal areas. Special contact teams were formed to reconnoiter the barbarians, typically disguised as shamen, seers, and visiting hunters. The brightest candidates were marked for deep hypnosis to overcome their barbarian conditioning. The contact teams then suggested new ideas and attitudes which were accepted by the sensitized individuals judged to be the most influential members of their tribal groups. In time, contact with the enclaves was opened and re-education of the tribes was begun in earnest.

This process of reconstruction lasted for several centuries. Meanwhile, the enclaves of civilization themselves re-entered the mainstream of human culture. In 2238, the OutPlanets of the Solarian System reopened relations with Terra, and five years later Terra was admitted to the High Republic as a full member. Thus it was that, even as Terra contained vast tracts of wilderland populated by savage tribesmen, it also was part of an expanding starculture characterized by high technology and advanced science.

The Covenant

The Covenantist Movement was born out of a realization that the Pure Earth philosophy had totally failed. Indeed, the Brothers of the Covenant had recognized that they were the inheritors and direct intellectual descendants of those who had set Terra on its destructive course. Thus, they accepted on a personal level, their own responsibility for the consequences. As Terran society collapsed around them, they learned to detest the simplistic belief that social engineering could ever produce a society worth supporting. No form of manipulation of individuals and masses of people was justified. So they aimed at developing a responsible social ethic that could guide each citizen to act in a constructive and respectful manner toward his fellows.

Founded on the principle that each and every citizen was personally and totally responsible for all his acts, the Covenant established a binding social contract between each citizen and every other citizen. A citizen was sovereign unto himself, free to act responsibly in his own interest. It could not be otherwise, for it was recognized that each sentient being was able to act in any manner he chose before others could move to prevent it. The only safeguard against deliberate wrongdoing and infringement of the rights of others was the personal conscience.

The Covenant held that each citizen was free. It also held that each citizen was also free to be called to account for actions of a nature harmful to the rights of any other citizen. There could be no hiding behind position in society, no protection afforded to institutional authority, no appeals to considerations of necessity or expediency. As members of a highly organized and repressive bureaucratic system themselves, the Covenantists knew the danger of allowing men to justify their personal conduct in terms of their administrative duties. There would be no more of that. Either a citizen lived as a sentient being in society with other sentient beings, or he was a rabid beast unfit to associate with reasonable beings. The choice was freely his: Accept the Covenant, respect others, and enjoy the benefits of a society of reasonable men - or choose exile.

The Covenant protected only those who accepted and lived by the Covenant. Deny the Covenant, and those joined in the Covenant would cast you out.

Between 2100 and 2185, Covenantist philosophers wrestled with the many ethical difficulties inherent in the code of conduct they were proposing. It was clear that this was a most idealistic philosophy. It could easily be perverted to demand conformity, oppressing those who exercised the very freedom granted by the Covenant if they offended the majority.

Tolerance of difference thus became the prime tenet of Covenantist thinking. A code of social conduct was evolved which disapproved of ethnocentric and class-oriented thinking. To assist the average man to analyze situations requiring ethical conduct, the Science of Ethical Logic was developed. All citizens were required to acquire proficiency in this logical discipline. For, in a society of individualists committed to sustaining a social order in which no one would ever again have the right to impose his unquestioned will on others, belief in the intrinsic rightness of ethically responsible behavior had to be supported by a means of arriving at the truth.

As the enclaves refined their educational procedures, most citizens became multi-lingual. Faced with uniting a fractured global culture, everyone was encouraged to acquire an understanding and respect for ethnic, cultural, and linguistic differences. Respect for other customs was made the highest form of etiquette. As this program developed, a salutary discovery was made. The new forms of immersion learning did not involve translation of one language into another. Rather, thinking was done in the new language alone as one used it. Multilingual persons trained in this way soon found they were able to enter into the mental set of the new language. Thus, they could comprehend attitudes and values embodied in that language. To use an ancient Terran saying, it became possible to walk in another` s shoes and see the world as he saw it.

The Covenantists evolved a truly admirable ethic. Tolerance of cultural differences would be practiced until understanding could be achieved. When dealing with strangers, one should follow the old truth: When in Korelia, it is wise to do as the Korelians. To show or even think that one culture or race was in any way superior to any other was held to be the depth of intellectual dishonesty, ethical turpitude, and uncivilized behavior. This fundamental belief explains the remarkable success of the enclave contact teams during the reconstruction and reunification of Terra. In later years, it made Terran personnel the most effective first contact specialists of all humans in the galaxy.

Using the Telon Socio-Technic Mathematics, the Terran Covenantists also devised the first of the Tests. These Tests were given to all prospective political leaders and high-level bureaucratic candidates to determine their ethical conduct indices, and therefore, their fitness to represent free individuals in a free society. Over the years, the Tests were refined until they yielded the same high levels of dependability as those employed by the IRSOL to identify those who should take command when required. By 2401, no Terran leader was allowed to exercise great authority over his fellows unless he had demonstrated that he possessed the tolerance, the stability of personality, and the skill to make ethical decisions which would respect the rights of those over whom he held power.

The Fragmentation Of The Terran Starcolonies

Even before Terra collapsed, there was little sense of unity among the far-flung colonies beyond the Solarian System.

The many dissident groups had all departed Terra with an intention to form their own versions of the perfect society. The minority groups of the Lost Colonies scattered in all directions, often voyaging many hundreds and even thousands of light years from Terra. Some attempted to maintain contact with the other colonies and with the Mother Planet, usually to continue trade or to obtain needed supplies and equipment, but contact was lost at one point or another in time. Others desired to sever all lies with the rest of humanity and simply disappeared into the vastness of the galaxy.

The Galactic Peoples Republic was founded in 2159 by the 27 worlds that were settled from the SovWorld during the Exodus. Unlike the minority dissidents, there never was an intention to sever the Terran connection entirely. Rather, the SovWorld leaders hoped to establish a new base of power from which their long-range goals of dominating the human race under a communistic system could be pursued, However, it was well over a century since the planting of the first colony of Lenin III in 2083 that the G.P.R. was in an industrial and military position to implement an imperialist policy.

The Azuriach Cluster was settled by WestEurope (and South American) dissidents for much the same reasons as the G.P.R. In 2178, the 25 worlds formed the Azuriach Common Market of Worlds, which in turn evolved into the Azuriach Imperium by 2210. An unexplained anomaly was that most of the financing for this group of colonies came from South America.

The Free Colonies again developed into a loose grouping independent of Terra, which resembled the city-states of the ancient Terrain Hanseatic League. Linked largely by trading considerations, the 32 Free Worlds eventually formed the Mercantile League of Planets in 2190.

By the 23rd century, the G.P.R., the Azuriach Imperium, and the Mercantile League were all entering into an expansionist period, while the High Republic remained more or less static. The new human starcultures aimed at increasing the number of planets under their control or influence, but for differing reasons. The G.P.R. was gripped by an ideological fervor to bring the Truth of the Marxist system to all worlds, as well as a need to develop a sound resource base upon which a military-industrial complex could be founded. The Azuriach Imperium had similar aims, but a more sinister element intruded in the form of an extreme xenophobia which led to the genocide of entire races of non-humans encountered by Imperial interstellar survey vessels seeking the Lost Colonies. As for the Mercantile League, new markets were sought. The Lost Colonies again became prized worlds, but non-human races were also contacted. Each League World staked out its claim over such worlds and defended its trade monopoly against all competitors.

The Sponsored Colonies of the High Republic always maintained contact with each other, but no concerted efforts were made to develop any form of close political union, unlike the G.P.R. and Azuriach Imperium. Concerned with establishing their own planetary economies, and provided with ready markets with the other Sponsored Colonies, no expansionist pressures developed throughout the 22nd century.

Thus, the human race was fragmented into-at least four large groups, and a multitude of tint' single-planet sub-cultures isolated from the rest. This fragmentation contained the seeds of interstellar conflict.

The Terran Union Of Planets (2275-2500)

In the years between 2178 and 2243, Terran society and technology underwent rapid and dramatic evolution. Some of the socio-political events have been described. But of all these, it was the concentration of the Covenantists upon attaining high levels of education amongst the people which had the most profound effects. By the lime Terra was admitted to the High Republic in 2243, ils technology was fully the equal of that of the OutPlanets.

By 2275, Terran expertise began to outstrip the others, and continued emphasis upon education had resulted in a population with a level of education and technical training unparalleled in the rest of humanity. In 2275, the OutPlanet communities of the Solarian System joined with Terra to form the tiny Union of Planets. The Terran Union never formed the intention to found an interstellar empire. But the reputation of Terran culture, government, diplomacy, and industrial-technological competence and production capacity soon established the Union as the leader of the High Republic formed by the old Sponsored Colonies and the Solarian System.

In 2289 the Congress of the Republic agreed to a new constitution, based on Covenant principles recognizing the right of sentient beings of all races and the sovereign rights of the people of each planet to exercise full control over their internal affairs. Under the moral example of Terra, which again became revered by many as the Mother Planet of the human race, the Republic achieved high standards of conduct toward indigenous alien races. The Contact Service was established in 2293 to safeguard aboriginal and developing peoples from cultural shock and the often ruthless exploitation of some members of the technologically more advanced starcultures. This policy increasingly brought the Republic into friction with the economic imperialism of the Mercantile League and the outright political imperialism of the G.P.R. and the Azuriach Imperium. The name of Terra became synonymous with championship of the oppressed minorities and races of the near galaxy, and anathema to the exploitationists and imperialists of the other human starcultures.

Interstellar war became inevitable. Not only contact with inimical alien races like the Bugs, the Klackons, and the Ranan Horde, but conflict with the starcultures settled from Terra itself forced the Republic to defend itself. But it was populous Terra, with her great industrial capacity and technological supremacy, which had developed the mass of the powerful space and ground forces needed to protect the Republic and the many planetary protectorates under the watchful eye of the Union Contact Service. In the 225 years of the Terran Union, the courage and fighting skill of the elite Union Guard became legendary.

All this is not to minimize the contributions of the 59 other planets of the High Republic, for they too had a major part to play in the history of the starculture. But Terra alone surpassed their combined populations and industrial capacity. Thus, it was one starsystem alone that stands out as the undoubted leader of the mainstream in human evolution into a major starculture, and the enemies of the Republic entertained no doubt as to who the real enemy was - Terra and the Terran Union of the Solarian Planets alone. It was the bastion of Civilization, the champion and the arsenal of free peoples everywhere. Alone, it could stand against all of its enemies combined.

But Terra acquired staunch allies. Not only other human-inhabited worlds appealed to the Terran Union for assistance and support, but numerous alien races as well. The Rauwoof Worlds, caught between the warring G.P.R. and the Azuriach Imperium, became 'friends and valued allies’ of Terra in 2316. The Lords of the MekPurr, hard pressed in the terrible Bug invasions, discovered that not all humans were vicious pelt-hunters when the great BattleFleets of the Guard arrived to relieve Alcyone V in 2328. And in 2395, the embattled StarKingdom of the Blarad welcomed Terran support when the crack squadrons of the Imperial Azuriach StarNavy had shattered the Royal StarFleet in the Battles of Deneb. There were many other minor races, humanoid and pithecine, and others with starkly alien shapes and cultures, who all knew the strength of the Terran Union was arrayed in their defense.

The Terran Union Of Planets, Today

On January 1, 2501, the 26th century began with the formation of the United Federation of Planets, an interstellar nation which incorporated the Terran Union of Planets, the High Republic, and a number of non-human starcultures who had been allied with the Terran Union in the century of conflict which had just passed. Representatives of 378 worlds met in the Chamber of Deputies in NuYork Complex on Terra to approve the Constitution of the Federation. Nineteen different races, comprising almost 14 billion sentient beings, were represented at this august gathering.