Dark Empire, NAAM, TOR

I have had no chance to consult before responding to this, so best take this as a personal view and in no way an "alliance" statement.

Having been an avid reader of the forums but only a very occasional contributor I know the way this thread is likely to deteriorate but can only ask those who have been on the other side of this conflict to accept that what I am going to write is a sincere attempt to explain one or two aspects of NAAM that have clearly been a source of irritation to some of our adversaries.

First our name, which as things have turned out was far from accurate and in hindsight should have been reconsidered when we took on an "in game" identity.  The Non Alligned Alliance Movement was an attempt by Janosch to bring together some of the most able players from a number of small and medium alliances to meet what she saw as a threat from Night Crusaders. Now we could argue for weeks about whether the threat was real or not, the fact is that she felt threatened and whether TOR, Alizes or anyone else was ever on Sir Bradleys "to do" list, only he can say.

The thinking was genuinely to steer a middle course between the games two power blocks and be able to take on NC on its own.  In theory and our forum NAAM was very much bigger, the sad thing is that some people who she (Janosch) thought were committed to support this effort sat on their hands when push came to shove and either did not join or went to bigger alliances where they no doubt felt safer.  Also as events around the Roman Empire - Celtic Knights - Night Crusaders situation developed two things became clear -

1. That NC had other alliances standing behind them who had no intention of allowing NAAM to win a straight fight (which we almost certainly could not have done anyway)*.

2. That there was something much bigger forming in the wings and as a matter of survival we had better be part of it.

I think some people have thought that NAAM was central to the formation of what became known as the Grand Alliance.  Sorry, we were very much on the edge and were only guessing who else was involved and what parts they would play.  NAAM was told that some alliances would be too busy to attack us and that was about it.

Once we actually started to try to fight NC, we found that several things happened, NC armies would regularly shelter in H? cities and we would find that when we attacked NC cities they were garrisoned by H? armies, also alliances we were not at war with and didn't want to fight would attempt to break sieges.  I can now see that H? would feel this to be totally fair and justified but I can also say that at the time NAAM had no intention of fighting H?, T-O, Dlord or anyone else, (apart from NC) and tried hard not to do so right up to the time that they started to siege our cities.

By the time H? decided to come clean and declare war on NAAM we were pretty integrated into the GA organisation, not because that was the original intention but because that is where the actions of others forced us to be.

Non-Alligned? That was the original ideal,  it is certainly no longer true but we make no apology for that.

*Another fact, we were all peaceful players and as far as I know none of us had ever participated in an Illy war.  Only two or three out of thirty odd accounts were in any sense battle ready and we did not even know how to sov for decent military production.