Stutterwarp as a WMD?

[AtlanticFriend]

Curious, as I see it really the other way...

While as a military operation it would only work if situation stealmated for long, I don't believe a terrorist group could do this for years without detection, mostly if you think this must be done at 1 transit from your target, and that stutterwarp is quite easy to detect (and turning it off is not an option in this case)

Well, I was thinking modern military operations basically don't call for truly global/genocidal levels of destruction (which I imagine would be the case if a large, FTL-moving object was hurled at an enemy country even a continent away).

 

[kilemall]

I went a different direction, postulated that you could use the stutterwarp effect to warp one part of an atomic bomb's warhead into another. The big payoff would be if you were no longer dependent on fissile materials and could make the warhead much larger and not be dependent on decaying tritium fusion encasings.


Would require quite a miniaturization of the stutterwarp and enough of a power source to get that one warp done. Assuming you are using a stutterwarp missile to deliver it in the first place, just switching part of the missile drive to warhead ignition should do.

 

[McPerth]

Well, I was thinking modern military operations basically don't call for truly global/genocidal levels of destruction (which I imagine would be the case if a large, FTL-moving object was hurled at an enemy country even a continent away).

I guess military operations in 2300AD, at leat for fleet, are qute different from modern ones, if only because the lack of instant communications.

About this act in your own planet, I guess it would be suicidal ,as the effects ar likely to be planetary. I only see them usable against another planet (e.g. against a kaffer base) , and then only if you can avoid them to scout intothe nearby system where you're so accelerating your "kamikaze".

 

[McPerth]

I went a different direction, postulated that you could use the stutterwarp effect to warp one part of an atomic bomb's warhead into another. The big payoff would be if you were no longer dependent on fissile materials and could make the warhead much larger and not be dependent on decaying tritium fusion encasings.


Would require quite a miniaturization of the stutterwarp and enough of a power source to get that one warp done. Assuming you are using a stutterwarp missile to deliver it in the first place, just switching part of the missile drive to warhead ignition should do.

In 2300 AD there are no reports of ships appearing into other bodies (that they cannot see, BTW, hen moving at FTL warp), so my guess has always been there is some kind of "safety" against them, probably tied to the gravity any such body produces (even if quite low).

See that the idea of warping a bomb inside a space station (that is statoinary) has never appeared in the game... Thinking how effective it would be, I guess that means it's not posible.

 

[AtlanticFriend]

I guess military operations in 2300AD, at leat for fleet, are qute different from modern ones, if only because the lack of instant communications.

Precisely - I'm not sure any military would be comfortable with a planet-buster weapon that would have to be launched so much time in advance. If, like League of Suns stated, such an attack would necessitate several years, that becomes a rather absurd weapon as the military situation evolves. At a different scale, it would be like the US launching a secret weapon at Nazi Germany in 1942 (let's blitz the Berlin beast and stop WWII!) that would only detonate in 1946 (Oh God we blitzed Berlin and started WWIII!).

That (and the fact I'm wondering whether one could easily call off/self destruct a weapon progressively approaching FTL speeds) is why I thought it more of a terrorist weapon (and a particularly nihilist one to boot).

That being said, my military experience is actually and precisely zilch, so I may be woefully wrong about that. If I am, let me just say that, like my fellow Frenchman Clémenceau, that this the kind of weapon that would make me think war is too serious a thing to be run by the military!

 

[LeagueOfSuns]

That (and the fact I'm wondering whether one could easily call off/self destruct a weapon progressively approaching FTL speeds) is why I thought it more of a terrorist weapon (and a particularly nihilist one to boot).

The problems with it for terrorists are:

1) You're spending several years preparing for this, within 7.7 ly of your target, in a way that is bloody obvious to anybody who passes through that system. The chances are high that somebody will see you and stop you long before your attack is ready.

2) You can't realistically threaten to repeat the attack if your demands aren't met. It takes too long to set up, and won't work if the authorities sweep through systems adjacent to inhabited worlds every couple of months.

3) Even fully accelerated, the ship is far from indestructible. Assuming you've chosen the vector correctly, you can approach your target at roughly twice the speed you could manage with stutterwarp alone. An alert defender can intercept that (especially since terrorists are far more likely to have acquired a Thorez than a Kennedy). If they knock our your drive, all they then have to do is drop an empty soda can in your path to destroy you completely.

 

[AtlanticFriend]

The problems with it for terrorists are:

1) You're spending several years preparing for this, within 7.7 ly of your target, in a way that is bloody obvious to anybody who passes through that system. The chances are high that somebody will see you and stop you long before your attack is ready.

True that, I hadn't thought of that problem. Indeed that's a problem that would not be raised in case of an official military strike.

2) You can't realistically threaten to repeat the attack if your demands aren't met. It takes too long to set up, and won't work if the authorities sweep through systems adjacent to inhabited worlds every couple of months.

Oh I agree there. I can only see that kind of weapons used by someone hell-bent on causing hypermassive destruction, not by someone trying to exert some kind of blackmail.

3) Even fully accelerated, the ship is far from indestructible. Assuming you've chosen the vector correctly, you can approach your target at roughly twice the speed you could manage with stutterwarp alone. An alert defender can intercept that (especially since terrorists are far more likely to have acquired a Thorez than a Kennedy). If they knock our your drive, all they then have to do is drop an empty soda can in your path to destroy you completely.

That would probably mean it's not usable for military use either then, I suppose.

 

[McPerth]

The problems with it for terrorists are:

1) You're spending several years preparing for this, within 7.7 ly of your target, in a way that is bloody obvious to anybody who passes through that system. The chances are high that somebody will see you and stop you long before your attack is ready.

2) You can't realistically threaten to repeat the attack if your demands aren't met. It takes too long to set up, and won't work if the authorities sweep through systems adjacent to inhabited worlds every couple of months.

Fully a greed, and that's why I said I don't see it or terrorists, as adjacent systems will be patroled.

3) Even fully accelerated, the ship is far from indestructible. Assuming you've chosen the vector correctly, you can approach your target at roughly twice the speed you could manage with stutterwarp alone. An alert defender can intercept that (especially since terrorists are far more likely to have acquired a Thorez than a Kennedy). If they knock our your drive, all they then have to do is drop an empty soda can in your path to destroy you completely.

Not so agreement here. Even if you destroy a ship coming at near-c speed, all you would obtain would be a ship-sized plasma bolt or many ship parts still closing the planet at near-c speed.

If it is a plasma bolt, the effects would be similar to the ship's impact. If there are several ship parts so falling on the world, the effects will probably be lessenes, but more dispered.

In any case, efect would be equally disastrous...

 

[LeagueOfSuns]

Fully a greed, and that's why I said I don't see it or terrorists, as adjacent systems will be patroled.


Not so agreement here. Even if you destroy a ship coming at near-c speed, all you would obtain would be a ship-sized plasma bolt or many ship parts still closing the planet at near-c speed.

If it is a plasma bolt, the effects would be similar to the ship's impact. If there are several ship parts so falling on the world, the effects will probably be lessenes, but more dispered.

In any case, efect would be equally disastrous...

There would be no parts; a collision with a 15g empty soda can at even 1% of C would release 6.75 x 10^10 joules. That's enough energy to completely convert a starship into ionized gas. And ionized gas without enough gravity to hold itself together flies apart immediately.

 

[McPerth]

Even so, if the ship was warping (and so probably inmune to this can) to near the planet, so that it would not miss, even if the can hit it, I guess the explosión would be strong enough as to produce disaster, and even if only a small part of those exploding gases reach atmosphere, effects would be far from pelasant.

I don't say it would be easy, but it would be posible (if politically accepted)...

 

[LeagueOfSuns]

Even so, if the ship was warping (and so probably inmune to this can) to near the planet, so that it would not miss, even if the can hit it, I guess the explosión would be strong enough as to produce disaster, and even if only a small part of those exploding gases reach atmosphere, effects would be far from pelasant.

I don't say it would be easy, but it would be posible (if politically accepted)...

The collision energy of the empty soda can (6.75 x 10^10 joules) is about equal to a small tactical nuke exploding in contact with the hull. Realistically the defenders would probably use something a little bigger, say the equivalent of a large tactical nuke.

I agree that the defenders certainly can't hit the ship with any size object unless they can stop it's stutterwarp drive first, so it's regular 2300 space combat up until that point. The attacking ship is stoppable, but not certain to be stopped. If it's a military operation, it could have escorts as well. Terrorists would probably only be able to commit the one ship. Given the constraints on accelerating the ship, however, this would be a fairly extreme Hail Mary operation, and one that's not likely to be practical in an actual conflict.