Haflinger's Blog

Wholeheartedly agree.

The charge of "bandwagoning" is downright silly/puerile. The presence or absence of a treaty is immaterial to whether or not any given war may or may not involve the interests of any sovereign alliance.

I think the key here is that a nation or alliance that involves themselves in a war where the outcome is already decided by virtue of the available statistical data, and they "choose" the winning side. This is more accurately referred to as gross opportunism.

Surely no one coming to NpO's aid during the last war would be considered a bandwaggoner.

But I whole heartedly agree. Treaties are not a prerequisite to involvement. I believe that OBR has been banging this drum (unsuccessfully) for some time.

I fully agree, which is why we don't typically sign things with optional defence clauses in them. The 'MDoAP' (i.e., MDP) has come to be the standard form of defence treaty throughout CN, though ... and of course you are right, that optional aggression clause means nothing. As I tend to say, 'We have the option to aggress against whoever we like anyway'.

I can see - and somewhat support - the use of the term bandwagoning to describe alliances completely disconnected from the current conflict joining in late solely for the purpose of trying to gain cred with the winning side.

On the other hand, the term is definitely used far too often, and usually in cases where it doesn't (or shouldn't apply). Whether it be an alliance that feels so strongly about a cause that they're willing to choose sides without a treaty forcing them to do so, or one that is willing to enter immediately but is asked by allies to wait until later rounds for tactical advantage, or joining a war late due to an inability to get the war machine moving in the span of 20 minutes, or so on. Essentially, I'm willing to accept almost any justification that doesn't boil down to "we jumped in late, at little risk to ourselves, in hopes of reaping great rewards".

CN politics in general has gotten far too rules lawyer-y, to the point where the legalize absolutely tends to trump common sense, to the point of stupidity.

Surely no one coming to NpO's aid during the last war would be considered a bandwaggoner.

Chefjoe made a lot of hay out of claiming that STA launched an aggressive war against Valhalla in that war.

Also, OIN was accused of bandwagoning in GWIII (they entered in support of a PIAT). I'm sure there are other examples, but I'm too lazy to do research given that those two examples off the top of my head are pretty damning.