David Genovese

David Genovese
Character Profile
Died 2293
Affiliation Stewart Confederacy
Title(s) Dictator

From 2288 to 2293, David Genovese was an early ruler of the Stewart Confederacy. His five-year reign would be quite literally cut off at the head by order of Juliano Marik.[1]

Overview[edit]

An apparent outsider to the Earlship of Stewart, David Genovese came to power in an era of decline. The Stewart Commonality—known also under the labels of Confederacy and Confederation—had formed in the wake of the Demarcation Declaration of 2242, formalized in 2259, and become one of many nascent nations and proto-states.[2]

Under the apparent direction of the preceding Earl (or Earls) of Stewart, the Confederacy had unfortunately weathered hard times poorly. Cut off from the authority and supply lines once afforded by the Terran Alliance, it is said that hardships were such that even simple replacements for factory machinery had been nigh impossible to obtain. Five worlds made up the Confederacy by 2271, and they would number six within the next twenty years.

2288 is the year Dictator Genovese began his administration. Four and a half decades after Demarcation is when he began to fix things, and under the rule of the nascent dictator, the trains ran on time, so to speak. An impoverished nation in decline was turned around. Productivity rose, efficiency increased—freedoms were suppressed, but interplanetary communications grew streamlined and the farms yielded more. Agricultural output rose amidst a cleaner, leaner state.[1]

It is noted by some that the Stewart Confederacy was one of the few instances of an efficiently functional dictatorship. Dictator David Genovese took pride in his work — great pride, in fact. His efforts led him to look down on democracy and personal freedom, believing them to be inefficient and incoherent in a time of interplanetary nation-states. Such was his pride and his belief in this that when another burgeoning power in the region invited the Confederation to join, he rebuffed them. He refused. Dictator David Genovese didn't believe that a democratic foundation could possibly function coherently enough to pose a threat to his rule.

David Genovese rebuked the Free Worlds League.[3]

Come 2293, and Juliano Marik was named the first Captain-General of the Free Worlds League Military with the intention of sharply disabusing Genovese of his prideful obstinance.

As the Captain-General led an invasion of the Confederacy, Dictator Genovese decided to exert his control not just over his government, but over his military as well. Insistent on commanding Stewart troops directly, David, working with neither experience nor ability as a strategist and across vast areas of space, would receive his command. Then, in what is a military blunder chalked up to garbled communications, the Dictator would end up dispatching the bulk of his forces on Stewart to dig into the muck of swampland wracked by three days of torrential monsoon. They would face three to one odds, and face them fiercely.

Ferocity, however, is no replacement for poor positioning. Dictator Dave's forces fared poorly.

Against eight FWLM regiments, a mere two battalions would survive.[4] Free Worlds League would reap an easy victory sown by garbled arrogance.[1] Confidence in the Dictator's rule was shaken to the core by this blunder; likewise, morale in the Confederate military plummeted accordingly. It would take four months of further campaigning for the League to conquer the Confederacy, and by the end, Genovese was the captive of Juliano Marik.

The Captain-General would then ensure Genoveses's last words were a public apology for having inconvenienced the Free Worlds League Military. Then, Dictator Genovese was beheaded.[1]

David Genovese would then be succeeded by the reestablished Earl of Stewart, and the Stewart Commonality would become a loyal province of the FWL two years later in 2295.

References[edit]

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 House Marik (The Free Worlds League), p. 10: "A Fool And His Kingdom"
  2. Handbook: House Marik, pp. 73, 92: "Stewart"
  3. House Marik (The Free Worlds League), p. 11: "The Rule of 75"
  4. Field Manual: Free Worlds League, p. 99: "Home Guard"

Bibliography[edit]