The rule against strategic secessions is specifically because of the local recruitment advantage it grants. There is nothing else (that I can think of offhand) that making Iato the capital of a tiny realm allows Riombara + IVF to do that keeping it as part of Riombara allows Riombara to do.
That advantage will only be enjoyed by the nobles within IVF, which will never be more than a tiny fraction of those in Riombara, certainly not during the time frame the war is likely to represent.
None of that is relevant. There's no requirement that a strategic secession has to be a spur-of-the-moment decision, a short-term proposition, or a secret deal. Just because you publicly declare that you will do something does not mean that the action, and specifically the method and timing of the execution of that action, are automatically legitimate.
No, but the rule
does care about intent, when intent can be reasonably determined. Surely the fact that the creation of this realm has been declared as a goal for so long—and the fact that it would have been founded regardless of the war—is a strong indication of intent.
Otherwise it's a stupidly bypass of the rule, anyone can just declare they'll make a colony out of every strategic enemy city before declaring war, suddenly making it all okay?
Not unless they can manage to come up with plans to secede the city years in advance, when the city is not even held by the realm they would eventually have to go to war with to take it.
To equate the situation in this case with one where Realm A says, "We wish to create a realm out of Keplerville! Therefore, we must declare war on Realm B to take Keplerville!", and immediately declares war on Realm B, is little short of absurd.
If the rule against strategic secessions simply forbid any secession while a realm is at war, that could be easily prevented in code. It is not, because that is not the purpose of the rule.
One cannot argue that it isn't a strategic secession just because it could have been "more" strategic.
This is also true. However, when the strategic gains involved, in practice, will be quite minimal (if not negative), and there is a long public documented history of the realm in question stating the fully IC reasons for the secession, the label of "strategic secession" must start to come into doubt.
Again: If the rule were a simple, unqualified, "No secessions during wartime," there wouldn't be much doubt that this violated it, and your points would be valid. But that's not what the rule is, and your arguments seem to simply
assume that a secession during a war of a city near the front will, ipso facto, grant strategic benefits significant enough to turn the tide in a war, rather than look at the actual facts of the case at hand.
