I'd like to say a couple things here (in perhaps a level headed way), take it or leave it I suppose.

For one thing, I want to reiterate Steve's point. The Alliance didn't undermine any of the Hudson targets successfully, but it seems some people are claiming "we went to the alliance with peace and they ignored us! this means war!" or some such thing along those lines. Leaving aside the whole impossible ability of people or groups acting as reps for their powers, I'd venture to state that Alliance not fully undermining any Hudson systems tells you no inclination for war.

The second point -- and the most important -- is that I cannot blame you guys for taking the actions you did, because from your standpoint Mahon is encroaching and encircling your space. The biggest thing to note here is that it's not the Alliance as a whole but a subfaction of ours. Unfortunately we're entangled with them, and there are those among us who dislike that fact but need to deal with it. Part of that dislike arises from what you Hudson supporters have already seen: grabbing systems far from HQ, aggressively expanding in areas not advantageous to Mahon and straining power relations in the process.

You can overlook this point is you wish and label that as an excuse, I can't stop you. You can shrug and state "well they're a part of your power, you need to take care of it internally" and I'd understand. Just wanted to explain this to those who may not know it yet. Personally, I wanted Leesti, and a few systems in the Lave cluster. Those systems "below" it, however, I never wanted the Alliance to expand to -- in fact, three of those systems are ones that are undermined are ones I didn't think the Alliance should have taken, period. However, it's not entirely feasible to stop an autonomous subfaction within your power aside from attempting to outdo them somewhere else, and unfortunately the real Alliance is far too large and spread too thin to fully accomplish such a feat.