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Would the Iron Bank support two enemy parties at the same time?


Greywater-Watch

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It came to me when reading threads on the Mercy chapter. There were two main theories about Arya's killing of Raff the Sweetling:

1) The FM (and thus probably the Iron Bank) ordered her to do this (or something comparable) in order to sabotage Harys Swyft's mission.

2) There has been no such order and Arya did it on her own.

If Theory 1 is true, the question is, why would the IB want this?

One important point is then:

Would the IB support two enemy parties at the same time?

Or (in case the timeline is correct, that Tycho Nestoris went to Stannis before Harys Swyft came to Braavos),

once the IB decided to support an enemy party to the Iron Throne, this would mean the IB would stop all support to the Iron Throne from then on?

I think if Theory 1 is true, it would make sense that the IB stops all support of the Iron Throne at once.

But not openly, as the commonly known threat, that angering the IB could turn out in the support of ennemies by the IB is in my opinion stronger, as long as it remains a threat.

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15 hours ago, Greywater-Watch said:

It came to me when reading threads on the Mercy chapter. There were two main theories about Arya's killing of Raff the Sweetling:

1) The FM (and thus probably the Iron Bank) ordered her to do this (or something comparable) in order to sabotage Harys Swyft's mission.

2) There has been no such order and Arya did it on her own.

If Theory 1 is true, the question is, why would the IB want this?

One important point is then:

Would the IB support two enemy parties at the same time?

Or (in case the timeline is correct, that Tycho Nestoris went to Stannis before Harys Swyft came to Braavos),

once the IB decided to support an enemy party to the Iron Throne, this would mean the IB would stop all support to the Iron Throne from then on?

I think if Theory 1 is true, it would make sense that the IB stops all support of the Iron Throne at once.

But not openly, as the commonly known threat, that angering the IB could turn out in the support of ennemies by the IB is in my opinion stronger, as long as it remains a threat.

I got the impression that Stannis is the IBs contingency plan and a threat than an actual preference.  I expect that they will be willing to support any and all contenders, provided that they expect to get paid back, or don't have to expend much money in front in the first place.

I expect that their preferred option is to get paid back by the Crown, meaning they want the negotiations with Swyft to succeed.  This is supported by the fact that they have rolled out the red carpet.  Swyft is getting treated to a play that demonizes his patron's main enemy, with the best seat in the house, and accompanied by one of the top courtesans in Braavos.

For the record, I do not believe that Arya is working for anyone.  I doubt that the FM would give such an important operation to an unsupervised apprentice, and her planning and preparation (or total lack thereof) isn't consistent with a professional organization like the FM.

 

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On 10/2/2019 at 4:18 AM, Greywater-Watch said:

snip

Raff has been on Arya's kill list for quite a while, so I think this is another rogue killing on her part. The question is what the FM will do about it. She is no longer a novice but a full FM at this point, so this might be a bigger deal than she realizes.

Ultimately, I think this is what will drive her back to Westeros and quite possibly lead to her ultimate demise -- after she's gotten a good way through the rest of her list, of course.

On the IB, I personally think they have over-leveraged themselves to the point that someone (Illyrio?) could orchestrate a run on the bank and drive it into insolvency. This would crash the Braavosi economy and allow Pentos to shred the peace treaty that has been hampering their trade and ability to defend themselves for so long. I think this is Illyrio's true motive, and he is using the Iron Throne (through Littlefinger) as a patsy in this larger plan.

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