Like Berbers said, you allied people who knowingly wanted MI6. And TOP. I don't recall any effort to show they didn't want to come at MI6. Maybe it did happen and it just never got through Chim to the membership /shrug. From the membership perspective before all that went down, we'd have chosen Umb over any of our allies at that point because of our similarities and activity.
MI6 grew at a ridiculous rate. An easy war + 8 months of growth certainly wouldn't have equaled us to you guys, but it would've put us as a top 6 or 7 AA in score, and probably only behind IRON, GPA, NPO, and you guys for tech. We were a tough matchup for big AA's when we were mid tier, like you said. Would've been a nightmare if we gained traction more stats. Not like this line of conversation matters anymore though lol