Night_stalker
Slava Ukraini!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Let's also assume they don't just go "Congrats Hive Blocks 17 through 20, your brave choice to volunteer as the new colonists on some distant world has been met with applause"
To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)
- Thread starter OneirosTheWriter
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
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- Tags
- star trek exploration fully automated luxury gay space communism top level canon (canon) #hashtagcontent all-encompassing space amoeba cardassian boy bands cardassian magical girls darkest bureaucracy debate makes the qm cackle like palpatine hoh is an empire quest it has to be foreign infiltrators more ships ship happens singers delenda est starfleet this is not an empire quest ur waifu is collective?
- Location
- Patriarchova
Which also solves the problem, really.
Either way, the Cardassian Union could feed all its people with little more difficulty than the Federation if it really wanted to.
Night_stalker
Slava Ukraini!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Well it reduces the issue, in the sense you're not shipping buttloads of food to one planet.
If you spread them out though, and start running out of worlds that are worth dumping people on.... It gets bad. Especially since their neighbors are us and the Tzenkethi.
- Location
- Patriarchova
Tzenkethi may or may not be a thing in this version.
Regardless, we know from both the show and this quest that the Cardassian Union 1. Overspends on military, and 2. emphasizes Kinder, Küche, Kirche. Encouraging your people to have more kinder and taking foot shortages seriously are not in any way compatible, especially when you're investing more in military growth than in civilian infrastructure.
Okay fine I settle for less than nearly all but we should give some assets to the clients that don't know us thus freeing them and bringing them to our orbit, not the ones that hate us.
Its not like we going to demand reparations if they lose most of their forces and some space assets, I don't mind adjusting how much we can take from them on account of their economy and food supply but I want to break their client system so they don't have resources and allies they can draw up for round two.
Our trade would ease their economic problems.
- Location
- USA
For me resource wise if we can still build all the Rennies we want when they are available and do not have to keep berths idle based on lack of resources Centaur-A are better thanks to the additional S, D and 2 P, but if we do not have the resources to build our wave of Rennies if we build Centaur-A then going for Miranda-A is better.
Miranda-A is a solid escort, but its biggest selling point is that it is very cheap in terms of resources and crew, Centaur-A is a bit better in sector response and dealing with events but is more expensive. If we could order ships and not have to worry about costs though then I would never vote for another Miranda-A.
- Location
- Earth
Alright. Since I obviously missed that, do you happen to recall where Oneiros mentioned that? (don't need a page number, just a general location)
Well ok. Seeing as how prior to around 4 and a half hours ago it would've been impossible for me to know that, I was making my conclusion from the escorts and cruisers we've actually built or are building and thus the sort of costs and stat totals that Oneiros seemed to want. (not one of them is a custom design so he's responsible for all their stats)
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
My take on it is that the Cardassians choose not to develop agricultural infrastructure on their capital world, even though they could. Because centralizing heavy industry on the homeworld while "outsourcing" farming to isolated colony planets creates an inherent mechanism of political control. Like a demented version of checks and balances.
The homeworld population is numerically dominant and none of the colonies is economically sustainable without them, making a frontier colonial rebellion nearly impossible.
Conversely, the homeworld population starves without the flow of provisions and resources from the frontier- and this flow is susceptible to whoever controls the navy and the merchant marine. So a large scale popular uprising on Cardassia Prime is also nearly impossible, because it would start to run out of food in short order.
The ground forces and the Obsidian Order, meanwhile, can seize the highly centralized economic and industrial infrastructure that supports the fleet, neutralizing the fleet as a long-term threat in the hypothetical event of a large scale fleet uprising. Sure, it'd mean a lot of starvation on the homeworld, but the army and secret police don't have to worry about that directly as long as they can confiscate enough of the food to feed themselves.
So the homeworld population has its hand on the colonies' neck, the navy has its hand on the homeworld population's neck, and the army and Obsidian Order have their hands on the navy's neck.
...
However, as a side effect, the Cardassians actually have a real economic problem. In that they've got a relatively inefficient mechanism for feeding their homeworld, and one that leads to disaster in case anything really bad happens to the Cardassian infrastructure.
To make matters worse, they can't fix the problem without finding a governmental structure that runs on something other than rule by terror and autocracy. Because right now, suppose they make the attempt to solve this problem (by bringing more food production to the homeworld, by decentralizing industry, and so on). That would destabilize the system of 'checks and balances' by which any of the state's major power blocs can exert force against the other power blocs.
If the homeworld becomes self-sufficient in food, that signals to the fleet that the rest of the government may be preparing for some sort of purge of the fleet, and is taking precautions to prevent the fleet from having the power to retaliate in self-defense.
If industry is decentralized, it looks like a bid by the fleet to turn the colonies (currently tightly dominated from Cardassia Prime) into a looser network of frontier satrapies... Which the fleet can then 'spin off' into independent political entities.
And so on.
Again, don't bet on the Federation actually being willing to go that far. In canon, the only reason the Cardassian Union broke up was because its government had already been crushed by the weight of the Dominion. The Federation simply moved into a power vacuum.
There's no reason to expect that to change. So expecting us to be able to break up the Union, when everyone we know of who has the power to negotiate is themselves a Union official, would require far more willingness to punish the Cardassian people and occupy their territory than I'd expect.
Quite frankly, I'm not sure we should even want this. A war fought with Cardassia over colony worlds, the independence of affiliates, and the relative strength of the fleets... There'll be dying, but with any luck at all the dying will involve the military and relatively lightly populated planets. By contrast, actually breaking up the Union will require wars of occupation on multiple planets, with heavy ground combat.
I'd rather fight a war that kills two million people every twenty years for the next century, than fight ONE war that kills fifty million people right now.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You're right, which is why I said if.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
That's true, but I do think that ideally we should aim to eliminate or alter the Union as a state for the sake of its citizens, who as in any fascist regime are among its favored victims.
- Location
- madison
The union might not survive losing a war with us. We've already identified their shipping as a strategic weak point, so a lost war will likely involve a lot of lost shipping capacity, on top of weakening the fleet and putting the pressure of a failed war on high command. The union could well tear itself apart if it gets it's teeth kicked in hard enough.
For those advocating smashing/stealing the Cardie infrastructure - these are genuine war targets and hence those facilities will have stationary defenses to match.
You don't think UP is sitting over Mars all by itself do you? No, it will have it's own little cloud of phase and torpedo platforms, sensor nets etc. A constant stream of sub-light vessels ferrying material, doing patrols etc.
The Cardassian Prime ship yards will be just as defended, if not more so.
Just because we can theoretically smash their warp fleet, doesn't mean we can just waltz over everything else they have without requiring fleets and taking losses.
You don't think UP is sitting over Mars all by itself do you? No, it will have it's own little cloud of phase and torpedo platforms, sensor nets etc. A constant stream of sub-light vessels ferrying material, doing patrols etc.
The Cardassian Prime ship yards will be just as defended, if not more so.
Just because we can theoretically smash their warp fleet, doesn't mean we can just waltz over everything else they have without requiring fleets and taking losses.
- Location
- Patriarchova
Fortunately, we won't need to.
The Cardassian economy is extremely reliant on interstellar shipping. If the Cardassian Union were a Nintendo boss, it's freighters would be the glowing yellow bits you need to hit to do damage.
If we can get some apiata economy raiders behind the front line, we can probably force a surrender in short order. Without directly attacking any shipyards or starbases.
- Location
- madison
keep in mind they know that as well as we do. They likely spend a lot of time running escort drills, and may have made building up a stockpile a long term goal. It's a weak point, but it's such an obvious on that we can be confident they are trying to mitigate it to at least some extent. Of corse, the more ships they have gurading there shipping the less they have to deal with our larger fleet.
pheonix89
Wants to be Seven Of Nine
- Location
- North American Plaguelands
- Pronouns
- She/Her
That protects their orbital infrastructure. It does nothing to stop the EC from going commerce raiding.
- Location
- Canada
Eh, if it comes down to war, I don't doubt that blowing up a big chunk of their orbital infrastructure will be a part of our plans.
That said, I do find it rather curious that people are seriously talking about war plans at this point, since they're responding with diplomacy instead of aggression. We wanted three years, and if they're talking instead of shooting, we might have them. Our economy is clearly better than theirs, so if they want to stall, let's stall. We can beat the crap out of them later, if and when it becomes necessary.
That said, I do find it rather curious that people are seriously talking about war plans at this point, since they're responding with diplomacy instead of aggression. We wanted three years, and if they're talking instead of shooting, we might have them. Our economy is clearly better than theirs, so if they want to stall, let's stall. We can beat the crap out of them later, if and when it becomes necessary.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
I don't disagree, I just don't think we can realistically make that one of our war aims unless things go way, WAY better than we expect. So if the choice becomes "wage multiple campaigns of planetary occupation against Cardassian planets" or "accept a peace treaty where the Cardassians make some border concessions and agree to normalize relations with us..."
I think we should very seriously consider the 'make peace' option rather than trying to grimly fight this thing to the finish.
The flip side of that is that WE might not survive winning a war with them, if it doesn't turn out to be quick and easy.
If we find ourselves getting drawn into a Cardassian civil war to go with the Orion civil war, the resulting political disputes may well fragment the Federation.
And if we don't find ourselves getting drawn into a Cardassian civil war, the thing to remember is that every faction within the civil war is going to be in some way descended from existing Cardassian institutions. That means respect for individual rights and peaceful government isn't going to be high on the priority list of any of the factions. And ALL of the factions will be in a knock-down, drag-out struggle for survival against enemies who've read the Obsidian Order playbook very thoroughly.
It is highly likely that whoever finally wins the war will be just as brutal as the old Cardassian Union government, if not more so... only they'll have a massive grudge against us.
So I'm not sure I consider "the Cardassian Union breaks up into civil war" to be a win condition for us. It might destabilize us, and it could very easily mean we end up fighting an even more vicious and hateful version of the Cardassian empire several decades down the road.
I recommend you read Mahan on this.
If their mobile fleets are defeated, we are much more free to concentrate our forces and pick off fortified locations one on one. Cardassian outpost/starbase fortifications might stop a lone explorer, or a couple of Apiata Stingers, or a squadron of Klingon Birds-of-Prey. But they won't stop large fleets specifically mustered and organized to go after key targets and put them out of action.
Most of what's being discussed right now is the stuff we'd need to think about if we ever end up fighting the Cardassians. Stuff like:
1) What are their strategic weaknesses? How can we defeat them with minimum risk and damage to our own forces?
2) If we find ourselves at war with them, what do we want? What are we going to have to force the Cardassians to agree to?
3) At what point will it be not worth the price of continuing to fight Cardassia in order to secure greater concessions from them?
4) What happens if we win? Will the Cardassian Union continue to exist, or will it fragment? If so, what will be the consequences of it fragmenting?
Given that we still don't believe the Cardassians themselves are going to voluntarily avoid war on a lasting basis, as opposed to just relying on us to avoid war with them... We still need to at least have a clear idea of the answers to these questions.
- Location
- Patriarchova
I don't think their fleet is big enough to defend their supply lines from anything worse than pirates while simultaneously giving the Federation a serious fight.
If I were them, and I lacked the time or resources to build 20 more takaakis, I'd focus my countermeasure efforts on listening posts along the border. Hopefully, I can detect the raiders as they enter my space and intercept them before they can start destroying my freighters.
Meanwhile, just as we both know that supply lines are the cardassians' weakness, we also both know that size is the Federation's. Our space is too vast and our homeworlds too spread out to defend from multiple directions at once, which is exactly why they've been prepping the Sydraxians and Orion Syndicate.
AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yeah, this.
Even Gul Penelya, "Secret Literal Xenophile Defector" Miran had spent time trying to figure out what we're "really up to. And after defection still seems to not entirely understand the Federation.
Also Bear in mind that her Defection was more out of love of Cardassia and avoiding that "50 million die" war due to the way the High Command wanted to start the war with an aggressive first Strike than any love of Federation (And, yes, the influence of Ajam) I suspect that if the Cardassians had been planning little cabinet wars Miran would have been far less likely to defect. She (and, yes, Ajam) had wanted to remove a tool from the Cardassian arsenal that would have led to them biting off more than they could chew.
As far as "Demented checks and Balances" go; I really like that idea. Though remember that in canon that once the Obsidian Order dumbed itself to death in the Omarion Nebula the homeworld almost instantly flipped over to civilian control with (apparently grudging) military support rather than just instantly moving to Military control.
Though the Military was probably suffering from a string of humiliations. The Cardassian people probably hated that treaty as much as everyone else did (Remember that our first look at them literally was the High Command getting ready to break the treaty) and coming from a war where by all rights the soft Federation should have been smothered in rapid order. Then the Bajor withdrawal.
The Cardassian story in Star Trek is the constant removal of social pillars until in the end, with Damar's death, even the most basic pillar of "we know this name" is gone.
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All good. But that's why I said "from a design perspective".
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
To be fair, Oneiros said that at like the very beginning of the entire quest. He may have somewhat changed his thinking, although it's still a safe bet that if we design dedicated warships, they'll count against us in terms of militarization one way or another.
@AKuz , you make a good point. Although we're looking at Cardassia circa fifty years before the canon events involving it, so more of those social pillars may be in place, or some of the pillars may have shifted around a bit. Maybe the Obsidian Order isn't quite as powerful now as it 'was' in 2365. Maybe the civilian bureaucracy becomes more influential over time. Who knows? I'm content with the idea that I started with- that any economic weirdness we see in Cardassia, any "illogic" to the way they govern themselves, is probably an adaptation to the nature of their tyrannical form of government.
So like, why do they even bother with conscription into the space forces, which we know they do from Oneiros's intel reports? Probably because they want to make sure certain kinds of people are in the space forces. Why do they have penal colonies? Probably because they need to be seen to have such colonies as a mechanism of social control, regardless of whether they're economically efficient compared to, say, a heavily automated Federation mining operation. And so on.
@AKuz , you make a good point. Although we're looking at Cardassia circa fifty years before the canon events involving it, so more of those social pillars may be in place, or some of the pillars may have shifted around a bit. Maybe the Obsidian Order isn't quite as powerful now as it 'was' in 2365. Maybe the civilian bureaucracy becomes more influential over time. Who knows? I'm content with the idea that I started with- that any economic weirdness we see in Cardassia, any "illogic" to the way they govern themselves, is probably an adaptation to the nature of their tyrannical form of government.
So like, why do they even bother with conscription into the space forces, which we know they do from Oneiros's intel reports? Probably because they want to make sure certain kinds of people are in the space forces. Why do they have penal colonies? Probably because they need to be seen to have such colonies as a mechanism of social control, regardless of whether they're economically efficient compared to, say, a heavily automated Federation mining operation. And so on.
- Location
- Earth
Huh, page 2.
Oddly, that page doesn't turn up as a result on a google search for "Militarisation point" on SV.
- Location
- Nova Scotia, Canada
Honestly, while it's kind of hard to see, I think this is the best point for the Cardassians to open diplomatic channels with us we can hope for. We know they'll only start talking to us from a position of strength so that they can make demands for concessions.
Right now their diplomatic position would look strong from their point of view but is in fact very weak from our point of view. In their eyes we are in a civil war in the Orion Union and they have us surrounded by the Dawiar and Sydraxians. In truth we've almost put down the rebellion, likely talked the Dawiar into neutrality and are working on the Sydraxians.
They want to talk about Celos? Sure, then lets talk about Bajor. They want to complain about us moving into the Gabriel Expanse? We can talk about Cardassian raiding against the Apiata. Syndraxians want reparations? So do the Indorians and Apiata. They want to support the Syndicate? We consider them domestic terrorists because of the bomb on Amarkia.
Diplomacy is our game. The only way they win is if they don't play. And then we out-build them and win anyways.
Right now their diplomatic position would look strong from their point of view but is in fact very weak from our point of view. In their eyes we are in a civil war in the Orion Union and they have us surrounded by the Dawiar and Sydraxians. In truth we've almost put down the rebellion, likely talked the Dawiar into neutrality and are working on the Sydraxians.
They want to talk about Celos? Sure, then lets talk about Bajor. They want to complain about us moving into the Gabriel Expanse? We can talk about Cardassian raiding against the Apiata. Syndraxians want reparations? So do the Indorians and Apiata. They want to support the Syndicate? We consider them domestic terrorists because of the bomb on Amarkia.
Diplomacy is our game. The only way they win is if they don't play. And then we out-build them and win anyways.
That's all very positive, but the fact right now is that they are the ones making a move. They wouldn't be doing this 'diplomacy' if they didn't see a way to come out of it on top.
What worries me now is that they're going to propose a deal that the Federation Council can live with, but that leaves the player base apoplectic with rage.
- Location
- Patriarchova
This kind of lose/lose situation is probably exactly what they hoped to prevent with the kadak-tor. A surprise decapitation strike before we ever got to start the diplomacy game OR massively outbuilding their fleet.
/me might just be going scaley for Penelope
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