The crux of Wetapega's argument is that 1) it's inevitable due to technology, 2) technology is evolving at an astonishingly rapid pace, 3) as technology -especially computer- evolves, it shifts the balance of risk, and 4) history is rampant of non-state actors forcing war onto the world even if the state actors don't really want to... and you are more or less giving such actors free reign to do whatever their ideals dictate.
Which again, says nothing about its fitness as a system. He's arguing that the means to create such a system are inevitable. That does not speak to the inevitably of the system itself; there are other challenges beyond the merely technical. (And how many perfect systems does society actually contain and use? Few, if any.) As I've already pointed out, the majority of the data that exists out there about you and I already is not collected by a single entity, but by several different ones which have good reasons not to communicate with each other lest they give away advantage. Neither you nor Wetapega have posited a reason this situation will ever change. You just ignore it. That's merely the tip of the iceberg on your problems with ignoring everything but the technical feasibility of the idea and then insisting it's true.
It's also worth noting that the first two premises contain an inherent contradiction. The evolution of technology is, indeed, incredibly rapid; too rapid for predictions such as this to hold much water. The process is not linear or entirely directed and often moves in unexpected ways.
Which again, says nothing about its fitness as a system. He's arguing that the means to create such a system are inevitable. That does not speak to the inevitably of the system itself; there are other challenges beyond the merely technical. (And how many perfect systems does society actually contain and use? Few, if any.) As I've already pointed out, the majority of the data that exists out there about you and I already is not collected by a single entity, but by several different ones which have good reasons not to communicate with each other lest they give away advantage. Neither you nor Wetapega have posited a reason this situation will ever change. You just ignore it. That's merely the tip of the iceberg on your problems with ignoring everything but the technical feasibility of the idea and then insisting it's true.
It's also worth noting that the first two premises contain an inherent contradiction. The evolution of technology is, indeed, incredibly rapid; too rapid for predictions such as this to hold much water. The process is not linear or entirely directed and often moves in unexpected ways.
Thing is, the only prediction that can hold water is computer tech improving leaps and bounds until the quantum limit hits. Given that we have computer-aided gene-manipulation tech right now (and is also improving by leaps and bounds), it's the Genocide Man scenario made manifest.
I'm a transhumanist at heart, the problem is that people are easily swayed by the mimetic ideals of the past, present, and future. These ideals are such a threat to humanity that you can't really police them through traditional means. Of all the options, the omni-present electronic panopticon is simply less monstrous than most of the available options of control. The genuine weapons of defeating these ideals -genocide and cult deprogramming- are currently out of the question due to the 'ideal' that we're better than our ancestors.
Let's just agree to disagree before we flood this thread with the entire 'privacy v security' debate thing.
A collection of possible epigraphs. Refer to my earlier post on fictional histories of the One Year War.
"Zaku Shock was a real thing. The designers at Zeonic were actually quite intelligent about how a tanker would look at a mobile suit and how they would initially try to attack it. The rounded and heavy leg armor gave them excellent frontal protection against what most tankers tried to do the first time they met a Zaku. The armor skirt over the waist would protect them against a second round aimed a bit higher and acted as spaced armor for anyone who was bright enough to load HEAT for their second shots. In the first two months most EFGF tankers who encountered a Zaku actually hit them. They simply wasted their first and only shot against a mobile suit." - The First Team: One Year War Tank Combat
"After Antarctica there were no more direct communications between Federation and Zeon leaders until the end of the war. While both sides expressed their desire not to initiate a nuclear apocalypse during that meeting, Federation High Command perceived a certain crossed-fingers air to Zeon's claims of not desiring further genocide after the gas attacks at the start of the war. The destruction of Seattle during the initial Earthdrop operations was carried out by conventional means and did not violate the letter of the Antarctic Treaty, but seemed to confirm this view. Garma Zabi's actions when his brother decided to burn New York were what actually convinced the Federation to withdraw their collective finger from the nuclear button, but they never forgot that only one of the Zabi children had proved they would abide by the spirit of the Antarctic Treaty."-Apocalypse Now, Antarctica, and Concentrated Sunshine
"The briefing we got from the veterans of the first drop was mostly silent on the subject of Federation tanks. But it emphasized repeatedly that the Federation had spent the last two decades doing counterinsurgency, and their infantry were rolling in rockets; 'pocket artillery' for mouseholing walls and killing weapons teams out of rifle range, enough for every infantryman to have one. The briefing wasn't wrong." - Gunnery Sergeant Willem Falkenhayen, quoted in The Official History of the Zeon Marines
"Take for example The Daggerstar, Alphonse Rivera. His early death prevented any official confirmation he was actually a Newtype, but several Zeon soldiers who were confirmed to be Newtypes later reported that with his presence came the pressure associated with a powerful Newtype even if they didn't know what it meant. He gassed a colony, was one of the most prolific killers of Federation fighters during Operation British and Loum, and was killed while his unit was burning down New York City. This was not what Deikun had promised us." - Deikun's Dream In Flames
...we're not having a privacy vs. security argument. I mean, we could if you wanted, but that's never been my point. My point has always been that the system's technical feasibility, even if true, does not automatically imply its feasibility in any other sense. It has nothing to do with privacy as such and everything to do with human behavior in relation to power. The only people who would be willing to invest in this system are those who are sure that it would be to their benefit (and work against their enemies); exactly the sort of thing the system proposed would be attempting to crush. (The old social darwinism problem.) Everyone else would be rightly afraid that it might end up targeting them. Your own faith in its superiority over other systems is also exactly the kind of thing it should be stamping out.
In addition, the transhuman solution fails to the human reality; the tactical utility in an argument of this sort of appeal is far too useful for an intelligent person in a position of political power to want to deny themselves the option. Thus, they would never implement this system as it would make them less powerful. Remember how we had a whole forum devoted to the idea of purely logical arguments on SV for awhile? Remember how it eventually went away because Logos without Pathos wasn't appealing like the staff thought?
I was actually considering writing something on the MAD situation going on during the OYW; pretty heavily AU, to the point that it could almost be considered original (with a little more serial-number-filing), but very definitely taking inspiration from Gundam, among other things. More quotes from "Apocalypse Now, Antarctica, and Concentrated Sunshine" would be great - especially on the colony drops and other kinetic attacks. I mean, you don't need nukes to do tons of damage when you can drop colonies on people. And you don't need nukes to kill everyone in a colony - a missile at sufficient velocity will do it, and you don't need radar guidance system to simply slam a missile into an O'Neill Cylinder at dozens of kilometers per second.
So, a request for Gundam fans here: are there military science fiction stories in the Gundam universe that center around the space navy rather than mobile suits / gundams? Especially any that have a more realistic bent?
I actually find the basics of the Gundam setting - the war between Earth and her colonies at the Lagrange points - pretty interesting, but I'm usually looking at the problem from the perspective of the rocketry challenges involved in waging war across such vast distances and the extreme velocity differences that such a conflict would almost necessarily entail. Giant robots (and psychic powers) aside, the technology and aesthetics of Gundam are very hard-sf of the kind I usually like. I was wondering if there were any stories that focused on things from that angle? Or, to put it another way, are there any Atomic Rockets Gundam fics?
Trying to make Gundam more realistic means you have a very hard time justifying the "giant robots" and they're kinda the main attraction. I considered trying my hand at such thing, but quickly realized that t would immediately alienate the majority of gundam fans.
Trying to make Gundam more realistic means you have a very hard time justifying the "giant robots" and they're kinda the main attraction. I considered trying my hand at such thing, but quickly realized that t would immediately alienate the majority of gundam fans.
The funny thing is, the stuff that I want to focus on isn't actually that much more realistic than the giant robots; while I specified a "realistic bent", I meant more in tone and genre than strict physics and engineering realism. I like the giant tank carriers and mega-planes as much or more than the mobile suits, and think they don't get enough love. Same with the spacecraft and habitat focused parts of the setting.
(The giant land carriers and supersized planes suggest an interesting comparison; who's up for Mobile Suit Gundam: Deserts of Kharak?)
I'd rather play Wargame: One Year War, but I'm not exactly going to be crying if this happens...
Colonies are relatively fragile, but not that fragile on the other hand; Char's Musai was able to wreck one, over the course of something like a couple hours, but ran itself out of weapons in the process. Using nuclear weapons is more about probability-of-kill per hit, not probability-of-hit per weapon. Gundam doesn't accelerate things to significant fractions of C for another fifty years or so, so attacks on them can be intercepted. I do have other ideas in mind, so more will come eventually, especially regarding the Solar Ray/Solar System attempts to get around the Antarctic Treaty's prohibitions on nuclear and large kinetic strikes.
I'd rather play Wargame: One Year War, but I'm not exactly going to be crying if this happens...
Colonies are relatively fragile, but not that fragile on the other hand; Char's Musai was able to wreck one, over the course of something like a couple hours, but ran itself out of weapons in the process. Using nuclear weapons is more about probability-of-kill per hit, not probability-of-hit per weapon. Gundam doesn't accelerate things to significant fractions of C for another fifty years or so, so attacks on them can be intercepted. I do have other ideas in mind, so more will come eventually, especially regarding the Solar Ray/Solar System attempts to get around the Antarctic Treaty's prohibitions on nuclear and large kinetic strikes.
Yeah, RKKVs are distinctly not a thing in UC gundam. otherwise why bother with colony drops?
I still don't get why the type 61 has two main guns - it honestly bothers me way more than the magic technology that makes giant robots a thing. If i ever write fic, that's getting tossed.
Yeah, RKKVs are distinctly not a thing in UC gundam. otherwise why bother with colony drops?
I still don't get why the type 61 has two main guns - it honestly bothers me way more than the magic technology that makes giant robots a thing. If i ever write fic, that's getting tossed.
Anti-Shield tactics, maybe? Bit of a retcon answer, but then again you design weapons to defeat your own capabilities too; Since GM Proliferation concreted the idea of every mobile suit having a Full shield...
Load one barrel with AP-He to frag the Shield, and the other with APFSDS to deal with the remaining armour and Kill the mobile suit?
I'm guessing that having two barrels is a countermeasure against reactive armor: aim both barrels at the same spot and fire with a split-second time difference. The first shell to hit triggers the reactive armor, then the second shell hits the now-undefended spot before the target has time to turn and point a still-defended part towards the tank.
I'm guessing that having two barrels is a countermeasure against reactive armor: aim both barrels at the same spot and fire with a split-second time difference. The first shell to hit triggers the reactive armor, then the second shell hits the now-undefended spot before the target has time to turn and point a still-defended part towards the tank.
Colony drops make sense as an anti-planet weapon; all that mass in a nice convenient package and orbit, with the only impulse needed to deorbit - and you need a ton of energy to cause mass death on a planet, via shockwave and such. But you don't need a relativistic weapon to poke some very big holes in a colony and kill everyone. Massed fragmentation missiles at decent velocity will do the job, and there's nothing that suggests extensive anti-missile defenses are possible.
If the Federation wants to turn Side 3 into an orbital graveyard, they can, pretty much whenever. They just can't prevent retaliation in kind via colony drops and possibly the end of humanity.
If the Federation wants to turn Side 3 into an orbital graveyard, they can, pretty much whenever. They just can't prevent retaliation in kind via colony drops and possibly the end of humanity.
Colonies are really, really big. 6.4km wide, 36km long, massive internal volume. Letting the air out of the people locker rapidly enough to ensure mass casualties is not as easy as it sounds. Remember it took a couple of hours of sustained fire from Char's Musai to render one uninhabitable, and a significant number of people lived through that. (Even people who didn't flee on White Base, like Amuro's dad.) The missiles are probably fairly large in their boost phases, and both sides are capable of doing basic orbital mechanics. The downside of engaging a roughly fixed target like a Lagrangian colony is that your approach is fairly predictable.
Thus why I reject most of the proffered explanations for the dual gun 61-Shiki.
You don't need two 150mms for anti-insurgency work.
My idea was that it was misreporting by journalists who were not exactly experts in military equipment.
The Type-61 Tank was in many ways, a departure from classical Main Battle Tank doctrine. Buillt with counterinsurgency and low intensity warfare in mind, it was designed to counter enemy infantry and light vehicles, not fight off heavy armor. Unlike older MBT designs with main guns meant to kill their peers, the Type 61's main gun was mostly meant to fire high explosive rounds in in infantry support role, fitting the tank's use as mobile strongpoints and counters to enemy fixed positions. In the rare event that an enemy was equipped with armored vehicles of their own, the 150mm gun also had a dual purpose missile capability, firing a ATGM with downward-angled self-forging projectile warheads, meant to overfly enemy ground vehicles and kill them through their less armored roofs and rears. This would, unfortunately, turn out to be a poor weapon with which to face Mobile Suits. Though often reported to have two main guns, this is an error - one likely due to confusing over the dual gun/missile system and the 25 mm cannon. Unlike previous designs with the main gun centerline in the turret, the Type 6's improved recoil management systems allowed the designers to offset the main gun somewhat, to better accommodate the 25 mm vulcan, incorporated due to much feedback from frontline troops that suppressive fire from their supporting vehicles was in high demand. Previous designs had boasted co-axial 7.67 machine guns, but it was felt that something heavier was in order. Machine guns continued to be incorporated in the design and in fact grew from 2 to 3 mountings, but anything big enough to warrant swinging the turret around instead of just the pintle-mount now had rather more to worry about. Despite much post war criticism of the Type-61 design, it seems to have served well enough in it's intended role, which was certainly not to fight mobile suits. Even when pressed into action against MS, it should be noted that the type-61's effectiveness increase noticeably once the enemy threat was better understood and HESH rounds hastily designed for anti-MS work began to be used in bulk.
I always figured it was a demand for a doubled rate of fire and the autoloader system couldn't handle working twice as fast.
Then again I also figure the Type 61 is actually a fairly old design, dating back at least two or three decades, and has gone through multiple iterations, explaining its various canon appearances and the changes in gun caliber and the like. The version in MS IGLOO is described as an M61A5; I chose to assign the version in MS Gundam as the A4 and the version in 08th MS Team is the A3.
From there, write up a bunch of other stuff to make the differences interesting. When the war kicked off the Federation reactivated all their existing tank production lines, so all three models were being built during the war. A3 has three crew and a coaxial machinegun; A4 and A5 have two crew and depended on "smart" canister rounds to make up for their lack of coaxial gun. A5 used 155mm guns to standardize with the SPGs on some rounds and reduce costs because it was the budget model after the EFSF ate all the funding; it also has weaker armor with composite only the front hull and the front/sides of the turret, making it vulnerable to light HEAT warheads from the sides and rear. The two-crew tanks depended on networked battle gear to make up for the commander having to split their attention, which didn't help them in a Minovsky environment. A4 had slightly shorter guns than the other two, trying to make up for it with a gun-missile system and used a special "high turret" design to make it easier to go hull-down and economize on hull armor; it was designed around the time funding was starting to be diverted to the new EFSF but wasn't nearly as much a compromise as A5. A3 had the best armor with sufficient composite on all sides to render it basically immune to even the best RPG-type weapons and was the only one with a turbine engine, but was considered too expensive once funding started to be diverted to the space forces. All three were built in different places; the A3 in Western Europe, North America, and India, the A4 in Eastern Europe and South America, and the A5 in Southern Africa and China.
Well the last snippet for my 'Venus IOST into SEED' idea or at least for a while, this time it's after the war between the Terran Republic and the Earth Alliance...
January 22nd, CE 0071; The Hague, Eurasian Federation
Muruta Azrael was hauled into the courtroom in chains, not the usual ones either. His neck chafed as the shaped charge collar sat ominously, ready to literally explode his head at a moment's notice in case he tried to do anything stupid like escaping. Law enforcement was everywhere, armored in exo-skeletal hard-suits, and ready to keep order in the court if any Blue COSMOS shenanigans ensue. Outside there was enough military equipment to shatter an Earth Alliance division as the initial defense. The city itself is defended by a complex field network of defenses supported by helicopters, quick reaction forces, and even naval support. However, it is unlikely that any of the remaining forces of the Earth Alliance were able to even rise up, let alone assault the hardened target. The entire city's populous was forcibly evacuated, just in case the dragnets didn't catch the grunts of Blue COSMOS.
Azrael is only one of thousands of men and women -almost half of them Blue COSMOS card holders- from the now-former Earth Alliance on trail today. His charges were many, from leading a genocidal ideology and a group hellbent on genocide to waging a war of genocide and the unlawful use of biological, chemical, and nuclear ordinance on civilian targets. If convicted, then the best he had was execution just like the hundred or so before him. Azrael no longer had any friends, at least alive. Blue COSMOS had been thoroughly exterminated by the Terrans and the Terrans made painstaking effort to rehabilitate/deprogram entire families while exterminating those who couldn't be rehabilitated. The various Earth Alliance power blocks had their power shattered in the war; the Atlantic Federation -the core of Blue COSMOS's political and military power- had been depopulated extensively due to the war and the insurgency between the Terrans and the remaining Blue COSMOS cells, the Eurasian Federation and Republic of East Asia had lost significant portions of two generations due to their incredible willingness to go 'WW2 USSR' on the Terrans thanks to Blue COSMOS propaganda, South Africa had been devastated by the fighting, and South America was subjugated to scorched earth tactics done by the Atlantic Federation thus leaving it with practically nothing.
Azrael was announced into the courtroom, dragged along by four officers. He had been forced to wear the prison garments that all prisoners of the Terrans were forced to wear, and during processing he had been subjected to the most through medical examination to check if he had any suicide implements on him. He had no escape, and the numerous TV crews was going to televise the trials in their entirety. That was when Azrael remembered what one of the guards said: 'We assume that the rule of law is applied via two methods, being an example, or making examples...'. He was being set up as an example.
He was forcibly seated as the trial started... forcing Azrael to go through a grinding eight hour trial. Evidence was brought up and thoroughly examined by the judges, witnesses -quite a few of them traitors to the cause, which made Azrael's blood boil- were called up to give their dissertations, Terran intelligence reports were brought up be from the analyst division or the numerous field teams, and in the end there was more than enough evidence to send him to death row.
As the hours winded down, the judges called for a recess to calm the nerves of those watching and those in the courtroom.
Azrael wasn't calm when the court reconvened. He believed that he wasn't going to live after this... as the punishment for his crimes was death. It was then that the lead judge -some sort of animorphic jackal- had a Joker-esque grin on her snout. She then laid down the sentence.
"It has been unanimously agreed by this panel of judges that Muruta Azrael would not be executed, due to evidence that his death would be making him a martyr. However, due to the grave nature of his crimes, he can't be simply left in a jail cell for the rest of his natural life as it will cause unrest to the survivors who wouldn't believe it to be justice. As such, he is to be plugged into the Tranquility Lane virtual reality prison, where he will live -while being inflicted by the same atrocities he had had unleashed on humanity- until the end of time for penance of his crimes. If his natural body expires, he will become an upload to continue this sentence."
The observers were in an uproar while the Republic peace officers raised eyebrows. This sort of sentence is incredibly rare, as the last time it was handed down was against a Drakka-esque succession movement's leadership four centuries ago. Those who go to Tranquility Lane have the sentence until the prisoner's body couldn't take it anymore. To add insult to injury, if Azrael's body expires, then he would live as one of the abominations he hated.
To say Azrael was undergoing a panic meltdown would be an understatement for the last eight centuries. He tried to fight the officers as he was literally dragged out of court, spouting profanity-laced curses along the way...
I still think Azrael's best moment of comeuppance was being called a little kid by Domon Kasshu in SRW J. For someone whose only power is influence, Azrael hearing someone just plain not impressed by him was hilarious.
I still think Azrael's best moment of comeuppance was being called a little kid by Domon Kasshu in SRW J. For someone whose only power is influence, Azrael hearing someone just plain not impressed by him was hilarious.
While hilarious, it didn't really fit "if Azrael is captured alive and sent to a war crimes tribunal as an 'enemy against humanity'" thing I had going on.
Gundam SEED has Blue COSMOS -and through them Earth Alliance if in lesser degrees depending who you ask- being extremely anti-transhuman and genocidal. The ones that aren't going to inspire martyrs are going to be executed anyway if they can't be deprogrammed.
The Terran Republic in this instance really, really, really, REALLY hates genocide (two billion people died due to this during the Dark Century* alone) more than anything except going 'full Drakka**'. However, due to how influential Azrael and how widespread Blue COSMOS is, simply killing him would make him a martyr and simply jailing him would be resource inefficient given that he's more or less unable to be deprogrammed.
So, how would you take care of such a person? Simple: put him in a Matrix-style VR prison and inflict him with every atrocity his organization -and himself if applicable- inflicted on the victims. Given that his organization would try not only to kill the Terrans but also anyone they seem to be accomplices... and likely with biological weapons as well. If his body expires? Well make him an upload for that little bit of irony of becoming the very thing he hated.
*This is why I called the backstory of the Terran Republic 'a sick lovechild of several bits of fiction including Genocide Man'. In Genocide Man, within a span of a century humanity had 8 billion people culled, it was especially brutal at the beginning of this span as any two-bit idiot threw synthetic plagues out their ass, the GENOCIDE project is comparatively angels even if their body counts number in the hundreds of millions.
**If you read the novel series known as 'Drakka-verse', you'll know why...
Thing is, the only prediction that can hold water is computer tech improving leaps and bounds until the quantum limit hits. Given that we have computer-aided gene-manipulation tech right now (and is also improving by leaps and bounds), it's the Genocide Man scenario made manifest.
I'm a transhumanist at heart, the problem is that people are easily swayed by the mimetic ideals of the past, present, and future. These ideals are such a threat to humanity that you can't really police them through traditional means. Of all the options, the omni-present electronic panopticon is simply less monstrous than most of the available options of control. The genuine weapons of defeating these ideals -genocide and cult deprogramming- are currently out of the question due to the 'ideal' that we're better than our ancestors.
Let's just agree to disagree before we flood this thread with the entire 'privacy v security' debate thing.
@DuoChar Probably, but I would rather not have any discussion related to that particular topic, OK? I know I'm not an admin, but they just decided to leave it alone, and I think the rest of the people involved in this thread would like it that way.
Given that historically humanity has a tendency to exterminate anyone of the 'other' category and it only petered out because of the resources needed and the fact that the Nazis carried it to it's most logical conclusion...
I'm of the camp of 'Genocide Man is a warning', but I've stated that we're not going to continue with that line.
"One of the great paradoxes of the Zeon war effort was that the colony drop was even necessary. Jaburo was a major command and logistical target and had been before the war. Everyone knew that in the event of war the Federation leadership would withdraw to it and run the war from there. Developing a capability to at least threaten Jaburo was important to maintaining the strategic balance of power, as Zeon's own leadership on Side Three was not nearly so well-protected. No project to develop such a weapon was undertaken until after the Antarctic Treaty was signed though, and the most effective tools for digging out hardened installations, nuclear weapons, were off the table by then. In retrospect it is tempting to ascribe this to the general unpreparedness of Zeon for waging war on a planetary body. But it bears repeating: this was a strategic target of vast importance long before invading Earth was decided on. As it was, only the Federation's own unwillingness to escalate to nuclear arms allowed Operation British to get as far as it did."-Apocalypse Now, Antarctica, and Concentrated Sunshine
"Zeon's advance on Earth was breakneck paced; but it reached its maximum extents on most continents inside a couple of months. The terrain of Southeast Asia defeated their efforts to eliminate the Federation presence much as it had defeated Federation efforts to pacify the last rebel groups for decades, while they penetrated the more urbanized sections of the Indian subcontinent and Europe. It was then that 8th Territorial Army from Germany, given a month to prepare by the sacrifices of the Russian territorial units and regular army, crashed into 21st Integrated Division east of Berlin and succeeded in destroying a battalion of mobile suits and a regiment of infantry, as well as forcing the rest to give up a hundred kilometers of ground. It was the first battle that the Earth Federation's tank forces had unequivocally won. With the loss of half its mobile suits forces, 21st Integrated Division in turn had to finally parry the blow with its armored regiment." - The First Team: One Year War Tank Combat
