Department of Social Discipline
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The Department of Social Discipline (Japanese: 社会秩序維持局) was a secret police agency part of the Galactic Empire's Ministry of the Interior. It was established by Rudolf von Goldenbaum in 310 UC (1 IC / 3110 CE) following the dissolution of the Imperial Senate, and the first director of the department was Ernst Falstrong. The Social Discipline Office played an important role in enforcing Kaiser Rudolf's policies and cementing the rule of the Goldenbaum Dynasty.
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Role
An extralegal body, the Department of Social Discipline acted as a secret-police: there were no formal death sentences: only secret executions. Trials, too, were unnecessary. Many of those prosecuted simply disappeared after being exiled to barren frontier worlds. Prisoners were used as test-subjects for medical experiments, forced to undergo lobotomies: many died in prison of illness, or due to suicide. Roughly 4 billion citizens died due to Department of Social Discipline purges in its first year alone. (LOGH: 'Julian's Journey, Mankind's Journey')
History
The Social Discipline Department was formed to enforce the new policies of Kaiser Rudolf and protect the state from republican revolutionaries. Countless citizens were arrested, tortured, and executed for opposing the regime while even more were sent to labour camps. The first director, Count Falstrong, was killed in a republican bombing. In the years following the reign of Rudolf the department continued its tasks, including the censoring and destruction of pro-democracy propaganda. (LOGH: 'Julian's Journey, Mankind's Journey', SL: 'The Journey in Search of the Exit')
The father of Martin Otto von Siegmeister, an Imperial defector to the Alliance and Year 730 Mafia associate, Baron Siegmeister, worked in the department. Years later Yang Wen-li theorized that Siegmeister came into possession of republican propaganda that was confiscated by his father, the Baron Siegmeiseter, which turned him against the Imperial system. (SL: 'The Journey in Search of the Exit')
Feared and despised by the populace of the Empire, the department became synonymous with the excesses of the Goldenbaum Dynasty and was dissolved by Reinhard von Lohengramm after he established the New Galactic Empire in June 799 UC (1 NIC / 490 IC / 3599 CE). However, Reinhard allowed Paul von Oberstein to create a replacement for the department and that became known as the Internal Security Department, with its first director being Heydrich Lang, the last director of the Department of Social Discipline. (LOGH: 'Operation: Ragnarök')
Appendices
Alternate names
- Bureau for the Maintenance of Public Order (Novels)
