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Name: Captain (O-6) Yang
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Lore Background: Raised by a liberal family, Yang joined the Navy after finishing college in history. Over time, Yang proved himself by working up from torpedo boats to shore installations, but was denied further career advancement due to having a “lax” demeanor, despite his loyalty to the CCP and the military. Due to his calculated and methodical perspective, he proved capable of caution and empathy, which wasn’t regarded highly among his officer peers.
With deep connections and a stroke of luck, Yang was invited to participate in the PLAN’s ctistes program. Coupled with visits to Europe, Yang turned out to become a strong, if safe, candidate for the international JTF. Emphasis on safe.
Story Application: With his experience, and due to disagreements between the US and the Soviet Union, Yang was deemed the best “neutral” candidate to manage the JTF as its first leader.
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Relationship to Home Nation: Yang has family and academic connections in both the military and history academia. He has a background in China’s ctistes program and despite his support by Admiral Liu, is relatively disliked by his peers due to his different, potentially radical, perspectives.
Connections and Relationships: Yang had been supported by Admiral Liu since attracting his attention in the early 1990s. Liu was the person who pushed Yang to follow in his footsteps, by seeking out foreign relations and gaining experience in international cooperation.
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Concerning character change, Yang might grow to adopt international cultures as he has to work with people all over the world
Rick's Take:
Attache to the JTF, provisional and then standing CO of the then flotilla-sized unit
(very much inspired by Admiral Yang from Legends of the Galactic Heroes, but different in a few key characteristics)
Born from a naval family background but also coming into contact with relatively liberal ideas during his education, Yang has seen both sides of the coin from an early age. He developed a strong interest in history, especially naval history and joined the navy after finishing college (which was quite a feat during early 1980s). He worked up the ranks, went from torpedo boats to shore installations, and almost came close to becoming a commissar, but his relatively “lax” attitude, despite his well established faith with the party and the military, derived from his objectivism, kept him from being viewed as “stern and pure enough” to qualify for that type of positions.
One would argue Yang is better qualified as a general staff than commanding officer, because he’s more interested in analyzing the whole picture and optimizing courses of actions, than taking decisions and issuing set commands. He’s also content to hear both sides of the arguments and seldomly make sensational commentaries, to allies and enemies alike. This has made him a figure not so welcomed among more “traditional” officers.
Yang had once been invited to one of the task groups involving academic and theoretical analysis on Ctistes adoption during early 1990s, due to his family connections with retired senior officers and rich knowledge about naval history (essential in dealing with Ctistes issues), and had attracted attention from Admiral Liu, then strong advocate for military innovation and international cooperation, who also later recommended putting him through a visiting trip to Europe, during which he had earned praise from local naval officers. By mid-to-late 1990s, he was among the first candidates for foreign attaches.
Because the JTF was then viewed as a less prominent, and more symbolic unit, plus the PLAN was reluctant to release so many of its promising members with international sight away amongst the beginning of a large scale preparation for personnel and equipment expansion, Yang was considered a favorable candidate due to not enjoying a very ideal reputation within the ranks, him volunteering for the position only helped speed up this process. With Admiral Liu greenlighting his departure and placing great hope on him, Yang began his trip towards the other side of the Pacific Ocean.
COMMENTS:
[Rick]: *In retrospective, that decision against him becoming commissar made more sense than at first glance, as he was also reluctant to take strict and decisive action at that time, as objective and rational commissars were not very rare among the ranks, some of whom are friends with Yang himself, however they often had a much harder approach when dealing with commissar stuff; also commissar, being more politically affiliated, will have much less freedom when it comes to positions like attachés to the JTF as that was considered sensitive.
[Rick]: *The PLAN favored more to have such officers sent on mid-term exchange or visiting programs abroad, or to let them take command of units participating in international exercises, or to put them in command of training courses for newer cadets. JTF’s relatively complicated, restrictive and somewhat chaotic command structure at that time amongst turbulent times, was not considered a “safe” position for them to entrust their personnel to.
