"Cloudsdale is being relocated to near Manehatten, and Ponyville has nothing the Mareitanians want or need, except to deny us food supplies, but we can get those from at lot of other places. Canterlot is a target, yes, but that place is far too defensible for them to take without serious losses, which is why they need to eliminate our ability to fight first, meaning capturing Manehatten, Baltimare, and Fillydelphia. Thankfully using trains to move around stops them heading straight to the east coast through the north, as most of the trains go through Canterlot, and they ruined their own ability to go up through by the Empire. On hoof wouldn't work for them either as that's a lot of open ground for us to attack them over."