>>99600Now how could I forget to include the simplest explanation of them all?
9.
Silver is right, Chrysalis is wrong. East Equestria is actually entirely ripe to be invaded now, but Changeling leadership is failing to capitalize on the opportunity in either an error in judgement, because of personal reasons that don't correspond to the broader picture, or a miscalculation of facts that seems reasonable to them, but is out of line with a fuller assessment of all of the facts.
This solution seems the least satisfying, but it's hardly without precedent in the real world.
In the Athenian expedition to Sicily in the Pelopennesian war, the general Nicias decided to withhold the Army from attacking the Sicilians shortly after the Spartans arrived because of a lunar eclipse, which he took as a bad omen. Thus what might of been a victory became the disaster for the Athenians in Sicily.
At multiple points shortly after the Turk conquest of Central Anatolia and the establishment of the "Sultanate of Rum," the Byzantines could have invaded and pushed back the Turks. They failed to do so, largely because of infighting, and thus these regions where forever lost to Christendom.
Frederick Wilhelm II of Prussia withdrew from the First Coalition in 1795 to make peace with Napoleon in the treaty of Basel, leading to Austria being defeated in that war, then Prussia being invaded and catastrophically defeated in 1807 by Napoleon.
Windrow Wilson refused to enter the United States in WW1, and also refused to ban American shipping from entering more dangerous areas of the Atlantic. Thus the war dragged on and more Americans were killed by German Submarines.
After the Nazi invasion of Poland and the French declaration of war, the German-French border was very poorly defended because something like 4/5 of German troops were sent to Poland. France could have invaded Germany and ended the second world war before it began. They did not, and the rest is history.
The entirety of the German high command, besides Eric von Mannstein and Adolf Hitler, thought that an invasion of France would be catastrophic and end as well as in WW1. They were wrong.
After the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact, everyone knew that war between Germany and the Soviet Union was inevitable. Yet Stalin ignored intelligence reports from the British that the Germans were preparing an invasion under the belief that they were trying to goad him into attacking. He even withdrew a portion of the army from the border to try to look "less threatening."
During the U.S. intervention in Vietnam, North Vietnam was not invaded nor even properly bombed until the end of the war. Supply lines in communist Laos were also not invaded by ground troops. Instead, the Communists operated from secure bases and supply lines as the US played whack-a-mole in the jungle. This failure to take the war seriously possibly contributed to the disaster of the war as a whole.
I've heard that during the Iraqi invasion of Iran, Saddam Hussein issued an order to stop, thus giving time for the Iranians to mobilize and prepare defenses. But I can't confirm this.If all of the above sounds like a testament to human stupidity (and thus to Changeling stupidity, should some or most of them make the same mistake), please remember that the list of invasions and declarations of war that failed catastrophically is far, far longer, and far more well known than the list of failures that stemmed from a failure to attack, invade, or declare war. Even half of the examples given above stem from invasions and declarations of war that didn't need to happen. When you declare war, or invade a country with most of your army, you roll the dice. And what you are gambling can be the fate of the kingdom itself. War often topples queens. Peace rarely causes the fall of an empire.
\r