It is no secret to anyone that this stage of the war is lost. This stage of the war involved the defense of Insmother, the Chinese having broken their NIP with us, hindering our efforts to successfully defend the necessary timers. Finally, it involved defending against our main opponent whose task it was to take Insmother.

This coalition update is tinged, to me, with notes of nostalgia, as it reminds me of that time, six years ago, when I held my first coalition update: back then, I announced that we had been evicted from the Drone Regions and were about to evacuate into NPC space, similarly losing in an all-out war. This was a long time ago, and I am sure most of you who are present now will not know or remember those times.

Back then it seemed that all is finished and lost, and I would like to remind all those of you whose spirits are falling today, that when we were evacuated from the Drone Regions, one of the most interesting and attractive phases of this game began for us. Fleets with the remainder of thirty or so pilots in Drakes, fights around moons in Venal, clashes with a Black Legion that had only just begun to gather its forces, only later becoming the galactic superstar it went on to become. That time defined who we were, and was a very interesting one. But I am not going to dwell on parallels too much here, since the current situation is quite different after all.

Our situation is much better now. If in 2012 alliances were stagnating, right now we are simply exhausted from the war, nothing more. This current war started in July 2017, and now summer 2018 is approaching. For those of you who haven’t noticed - the trees outside have started turning green again. Yes, this marks a period of almost ten months of uninterrupted warfare across the entire Eastern edge of the map, on three fronts with varying adversaries.

The total CTA count for the entire war is 863 fleets, which amounts to almost three CTA fleets per day. One third of those was in the middle of the night for us, that is, in USTZ. Such an achievement on our part cannot but inspire the utmost pride, and there is no way you could give this achievement a negative spin, since these are the facts. As far as the final result is concerned, of course, the sum total of our efforts is negative, and that is a fact. However, as we managed to learn from our mistakes in 2012, I am certain that this year, too, we will be able to learn from them.

Most of all, what’s going to be involved in this is firstly, a consolidation of our relations with our coalition partners, and secondly, a consolidation and concentration of internal control mechanisms within the alliance. The current stage of the war will be concluded, which will give us time to go through this consolidation effort. I can’t give you too many details with regard to our plans for the near future, but the decision has been made to consolidate all Russian-speaking alliances into one alliance.

Among these, I will note Infinity Space, CyberSphere, Starpeer., Patriots and others. For the consolidation, we chose the X.I.X (Legion of xXDeathXx) alliance. For a long time, leadership discussed the possible variants, but we decided to go for the recognisable and historical ticker and alliance name. The majority of corporations in the other alliances were in favour of this move, especially in Infinity Space. The integration of those alliances into X.I.X will be a communal effort. We want to counter the division within the Russian-speaking community, which has drifted apart too far now. Consolidating now will be a very important step.

Our goal has always been to unify Russian-speaking alliances to achieve greater results in EVE than has been possible so far. I will note here especially the toxicity and infighting among different groups. To be a Russian-speaking alliance is a medal and an honor, and it is wrong for Russian corps to be in non-Russian speaking alliances. This is not about the ‘Russian idea’, but has been a historical failing of Russian-speaking alliances in EVE, hindering them from achieving greater things, and should have been rectified much earlier.

The next stage will be to evacuate Insmother and relocate to a new area where we will regroup. This will last for a couple of weeks. Thanks to our agreement with TEST, those who need to replenish their wallets will be able to do so in a couple of constellations that will be allocated to us. That does not mean that we are going to settle in TEST space. What we’re talking about is a small part of space for use during a little vacation. There will be roaming, drops, blopsing for entertainment during that vacation period.

At the end of this vacation period, a new war awaits us, in which we will conquer our new home with the help of TEST and LegacyCo. Revenge is a dish best served cold, and it will kept to the end of that new stage of conquest. Most members of GemiCo have withstood the attempts of TRI to woo them into staying on in Insmother as renters, and they will stay with us for the new stages: apart from those I mentioned above, we’re talking about Synergy, RAZOR, Invictum and Blue Interstellar. My favorite response to TRI’s unsuccessful attempts was from RAZOR, we laughed about it tonight for a long time: “after careful consideration and much thought on the part of our High Command, ministers of intelligence, priests, monkeys and medical men, we are informing you that you may shove your proposal up your behind.”

Our coalition will not form part of TEST’s coalition, and our relations may be characterised as ‘allied coalition’. There will be no requirement to attend their CTAs or any other of their operations. We will be coordinating in our efforts to firstly go on a period of vacation, then engage in warfare for our new home.