Military science fiction book where the main character and his group lost contact with Earth long ago; they encounter another ship that is from Earth

Question

I'm looking for a military science fiction book. What I specifically remember is a certain scene. In the scene, the main character is on a ship traveling through some part of the galaxy. They encounter another ship that is from Earth. It seems that the main character and his society lost contact with Earth long ago.

The ship they encounter is very strange. The captain of the other ship is very aggressive and wearing a uniform that is very flamboyant, like what you see in North Korea, where all the generals have shirts full of medals. Also, the ship is flamboyantly decorated, and the weapons of the ship are all more decorative than functional. This ship demands they submit to them, but the main characters don't take him seriously. I may be remembering some of the details wrong.

Answer 1

This is reminiscent of Jack Campbell's Beyond the Frontier: Guardian. In that book, the hero, "Black Jack" Geary, takes his fleet back to Earth, which is far away from the Alliance he fights for, and from the Alliance's enemy (Syndicates) that Geary has defeated, and finds another fleet called "The Shield of Sol" "protecting Earth". The Shield is very arrogant with very fancily decorated military ships and very elaborate uniforms for its officers (but very little competence). Here's an excerpt from the sequel that summarizes the encounter with the Shield:

"Too bad for the Shield of Sol that we debased humans from the distant stars are a lot better at fighting battles than they were," Geary said.

Tanya grinned. "Pure bloodlines, lots of medals, and pretty ships are no substitute for smarts, lots of firepower, and experience. Anyway, the people here at Sol think what I am, what I've done, is all pretty remarkable. Once we get home to the Alliance, though, everybody there is once again going to be looking at me as just the consort of Black Jack."