It was this core zone that was the key to state power and cohesion. It was also the state’s Achilles’ heel, as it was this zone that was likely to be squeezed first and hardest in any crisis.24 Precisely because this zone was closest at hand, most valuable, and dense with resources, it would, in a pinch, yield the most manpower and grain. An audacious ruler, one with military or monumental ambitions, one threatened by invasion or by internal enemies, would be tempted, as the line of least resistance, to draw resources from this core.
