The UIT are merchants... and merchants are expansionists. Just not in the typical fashion, they seek to expand operations. They conquer financially.

The Itani and Serco trade with them. Pick a pew systems in both Serco and Itani space, probably capitol systems as (theoretically) those would be the busiest.

Maybe even a TPG station.

It would give the UIT something unique as well as giving the appearance of actually being an economic super power.

Economic superpowers don't matter when the economy doesn't matter.

+1, I think it would make sense for UIT and the minor factions to have stations within nation space, and it could add some nice dynamics. Capital system is probably not a good idea since a UIT station would make an ideal base to troll noobs as an opposing nationalist.

Serco drove UIT out of their space, they would never allow UIT station in their sovereign territory and neither would Itani since they are a very closed society.

It's like North Korea asking US to establish their military base in Wisconsin.

-1

Embassy, not military base. And North Korea is a terrible example. The UIT are not enemies of the other nations; they are trade partners. They may not like each other, and there may have been some antagonism centuries ago between the UIT and the Serco, but that's still rather different from the relationship between the USA and North Korea (who we had outright military action against and only decades ago, and who are not exactly our biggest trade partner ever).

So RP-wise, I see no problem with the UIT having embassies in Serco and Itani space, and vice versa.

Ok my analogy was a bit over the top, I agree.

Now, let's put aside current international relations in 21st century and try to look at this from the VO perspective through the VO backstory.

We have 2 major nations that are in perpetual conflict/war, 1 nation that is 'neutral' and a bunch of independent yet loosely connected corporations.

Would Serco and Itani allow some kind of trade 'chamber of commerce' representatives from the third nation and corporations to reside in their space?

For the sake of the argument, let's say they would.
They would give them a house in the nation capital, stick a sign on it saying UIT, TPG, Xang, Axia, etc. 'Chamber of Commerce office' and that's it.

Nobody in their right mind would give them a sector in their sovereign nation space to put up their own station that locally produces goods, mines the asteroids in the sector it's located, sells all available ships and equipment including all military ships and hardware, have it's own defenses and strike forces, etc, etc.

A full station is not an Embassy, it's a fucking military base inside your nation space that can serve as a your enemies trojan horse.

-1000

You're creating strawmen. The OP says nothing about selling military ships and hardware, nor about mining local resources. My assumption would be that any materials are either purchased from the locals, or else shipped in from the UIT via convoys.

Furthermore, as the embassies would be in capital systems, they would not be terribly helpful to hostile parties -- unlike most systems, capital systems apply the no-docking penalty to all stations within the system when in poor standing with the local nation. So nobody who is KOS with the Itani would be able to dock with a UIT station in Itan. At most, visiting the station sector might offer them a respite from the strike force (with the current AI, the SF would follow them in but then they'd turn around and leave immediately -- I have no objection to changing this behavior to be more aggressive). They would not be safe from convoys that originated from the local nation and terminated at the UIT embassy, however. Those would still treat the KOS player as hostile and do their best to kill him.

But all that said, yes I agree that giving them an entire sector is overkill. However, the devs have said that they eventually want to be able to have multiple stations in the same sector. When that happens, it could then be possible to give the UIT a small station in a capital sector that would also be occupied by a much bigger native station as well as native defense turrets.

There are already too many UIT in this game.

I say, give them a separate dock at Itani/Serco capitol stations with a sign 'UIT ENTER HERE FOR CUSTOMS INSPECTION'.
When they enter station they are held by customs officials for 30 min and cannot leave the station.
If they try to undock before hold time elapses, they are considered smugglers and shot by station guards and SF.

There, this will make them special.

Yes! But the sign needs to be in GTS.

Agreed :)