|
[META] [RFC] Militarization around the 2022 period
|
 HRogge Wrote:The "only at an authorized Shipyard" would make this an absolute "when hell freeze over" thing for CI.Even if Jenga is named as one of those half-dozen other shipyards? -- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012 
It would still need to have some guidelines for what will make us Come Over There (I suggest it be around the ballpark of sapient rights violations or stockpiling weapons while exhibiting antisocial behavior) and what precisely You Won't Like (say, taking away the dangerous toys & putting meanies in time-out, possibly including a visit to scenic Azkaban for the worse sort.)
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows 
The idea that anyone has the authority to tell them that their shipyard is "authorized" or "not authorized" is going to be anathema to a lot of fen, I think.
-- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
"If you want to make stuff with weaponry sufficient to start killing people enmasse and wrecking ships, you have to sign some conditions, because there's no completely legitimate rationale for you to have stuff of that grade outside of operations that GJ would be doing anyway."
Look, if you guys want a resolution to the 'number of forces' issue, then you're gonna have to create a simple system that covers all the angles.
For one, set a realistic maximum tonnage per capita for each faction. The more boomsticks they have, the greater the percentage they must contribute to Great Justice. Second, set realistic limits on the maximum number of vessels within certain classifications, again per capita of given faction. Note that these numbers include ships contributed to Great Justice. Finally, weaponry is in a classification all its own. It does not count towards the tonnage for ships. It does depends on the maximum allowed tonnage for given faction. Properly handled, this should permit ships to be properly armed while controlling the arms race. But, if things show that they're getting out of hand, we can always classify weapons by the amount of damage they inflict, and limit by those classifications instead.
As an example, do the possible dual-use consequences of anti-matter mean that comes under heavy restriction?
As a hard-tech power source, if you can deal with the gamma radiation issues, and have solved the handling safety issues, Iain M. Banks "Culture" series show how it can be so very useful... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimatter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matter_%28novel%29 Yes, no matter what system is come up with, someone is going to be unhappy about it. -- "It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
You can kill a person with a liter of water, and (if McGuyver is to be believed) you can use practically anything to save somebody's life. Intent is going to have to be a factor in classifying items as "tools" or "weapons."
-- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012 ECSNorway Wrote:The idea that anyone has the authority to tell them that their shipyard is "authorized" or "not authorized" is going to be anathema to a lot of fen, I think.As I understand it, the Convention has jurisdiction in the Solar System, not including Earth. People who want to live away from its rules can move to another system, just like they moved to another planet before the Convention was formed. See The Notebooks of Lazarus Long for an appropriate quote here. (We were looking for some in-setting rules to get some interstellar colonies going, weren't we?) -- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Highly restrictive laws are quite useless, because fenspace is a very high tech (worse, a magic high tech) system, so weaponizing peaceful tech is not that hard. Someone who would be a danger would simply ignore the laws anyway and go for all the loopholes.
Probably the best is just some basic restrictions (weapons of mass destructin and the like) and peer pressure -plus arming Great Justice with all the newest toys, for those which simply cannot get along.  Quote:can move to another system This is a dangerous thought. Not everyone is going to want to give up their lifestyle and life they've spent the last few years building up. And not everyone is going to quietly shuffle off into an out-system colony because it's inconvenient for the rest. So What will the convention's response be to someone who answers the demand from GJ to disarm with 'This is my Home'. I think the response to that may well say a lot about what sort of society the Convention will become. Far better to spread the meme that overarming is bad, and let reputation and people's opinions do the talking. It's far more in keeping with the Convention's ethics. ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
And then there's the ones who'll say, "this is my body," like WC, AC, Jet, a crapton of AIs and other Cybers metal enough to take on SC class or bigger ships as they are... do they have to downgrade or get listed among the tons of weaponry? 'Cause that is not likely to go down well.
Also, if you force the people who want to keep all their cool toys to move away, you are simultaneously disarming and creating an unfreindly foreign group who are more heavily armed per capita than you started out... -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
One final thought - Irving and Myrtle Rosenberg left Germany in 1938 because "your kind isn't wanted here." They were marooned off Earth in 2008(? 9?) because "your kind isn't wanted here," as were many others. Even if they aren't exactly "those types" this time, even if they're pushing their 90s by 2020, they and others like them are going to have quite a bit to say about telling anyone who just wants to live in their own way "your kind isn't wanted here."
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows 
*tweet!* Unnecessary Godwin! Five yard penalty!
Keep the Nazi allusions to yourselves, people. If you can't discuss the topic without throwing Hitler everywhere, I will close this thread. Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information "I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!" robkelk Wrote:Yes, even then...Quote:The "only at an authorized Shipyard" would make this an absolute "when hell freeze over" thing for CI.Even if Jenga is named as one of those half-dozen other shipyards? first of course, at the time when this "authorized shipyards" are chosen, Jenga is a floating building site of a few metal containers... second, CI would say that Handwavium has always been a way to make a dream come through... and now you want to say people "dream somewhere else please?" third, mandatory shipyards will just push all kinds of Mads, Sparks and engineers to build hidden shipyards. If we go through the "control visits by trusted other parties", GJ can get a look at the "shipyards" of everyone anyways... and might even give a few tips how to make them more secure against accidents and robbery (which is more important for military construction). Ace Dreamer Wrote:As an example, do the possible dual-use consequences of anti-matter mean that comes under heavy restriction?I don't think there is a reasonable way for civil use of antimatter... the dangers and overhead (for containing it) is just too large... just go "fusion bomb" if you need to. robkelk Wrote:As I understand it, the Convention has jurisdiction in the Solar System, not including Earth. People who want to live away from its rules can move to another system, just like they moved to another planet before the Convention was formed. See The Notebooks of Lazarus Long for an appropriate quote here.I disagree with this... the Convention forms a larger consensus about things that concern every Fen... a persons freedom hits a barrier the moment it begins to endanger the freedom of other people. Still, this "Conventions owns the solar system" sounds like a reason for an eternal guerilla war. There will be tons of Fen that will say "this rock is MY home". Lets focus on some social engineering and peer pressure, not on hard rules and cops/military kicking down doors...  I think most Fen are reasonable to see the advantage to keep the military stuff from going out of control.
Okay, let's pause here. Are people playing devil's advocate, or is there a legitimate misunderstanding, on a meta level, about what we're talking about? Because I'm getting a headache, and I want to establish something before it gets too much worse.
Jet and AC and anyone else humanshaped are, if somehow loaded down with as many gunpods as they could carry, fitted with jetpacks, etc, roughly fighter-scale in terms of power. Someone on WC's scale, again if someone built a giant cannons and crap, still probably wouldn't qualify unless someone tried very very hard and so on. In which case he would be probably be politely asked to register his nukular bomm gun. We're talking about severely antisocial equipment here. Strategic bombers, warships armed correspondingly, large scale anti-ship and anti-structure missiles or guns or whatever, weapons of mass destruction, and things like that. We're talking about scary MAD crap, on a scale such that left in rogue hands and unopposed by similar grade stuff, there's a reasonable capability to depopulate the non-Earth portions of the setting. Stuff that would require a substantial investment of time and effort to create, stuff that would essentially not have any legitimate usage. Do any of us *really* *actually* want individuals or individual factions without adult supervision to have their hands on crap of that scale? Does anyone think it's a remotely good idea to have all the rest of the Convention members have to be armsracing to deal with the possibility of someone going off the rails and trying to kill all the rest of us? Because I mean, seriously, that's not the setting I was writing in.
I think we were already pretty good with this "little control visits", "no weapons of mass destruction for single factions" and "limit of large combat ships outside GJ".
A lot of this will still be based on consensus and trust, but I think it fits Fenspace well. The good guys will agree (after a lot of complaining and negotiation ), the bad guys will not follow the laws anyways... but the good guys are much better in working together and pooling their resources if necessary.
Okay. And by "authorized shipyards" what I at least have in mind is "filed paperwork agreeing to little control visits and the rest of the terms" not "zomg, you weren't there when we drafted this, no way!". So, Jenga as an example, coming online, would be something on the order of "Hey, we want to expand to build stuff that's probably above the 'warship' line." "Cool, thanks for letting us know. Here's some paperwork talking about commitments everyone else doing so have agreed to; visits to see how and what you're up to, coming under GJ chain of command, technical crap about communications standards, etc. We look forwards to seeing what you come up with."
It never struck me as *that* sort of arm's race. No
It's more a 'bragging rights' race, trying to out-cool each other to sell the civilian models rather than trying to out-kill and out-defend each other.. Who's got the biggest gun? Who's the fastest accelerating? Who's closest to the source material or has the most entertaining gimmick. And once having the biggest or fastest warplane stops generating reputation, people will stop building them and concentrating on other things. There comes a point when the majority of fen will start to naturally backlash as it gets just a bit too silly and goes beyond good-natured competition and into something worrying. There's no need for laws, and any laws might be troublesome to enforce. I don't see a lot of this as 'militarization' as such.... it's just another group of people who want to play at being gundam pilots or fighter pilots in the same way some like playing at being magical girls or whatever. And it may be a waste of money or resource but.... some good will always come of it. There're always trickle down benefits. And having a whole bunch of spacecraft with decent sensor arrays can be rather useful for things other than making space-stations go away. That said, even the true warriors who've made combat a way of life are trying to find things to do with themselves that doesn't involve violence. ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig? KJ Wrote:Okay. And by "authorized shipyards" what I at least have in mind is "filed paperwork agreeing to little control visits and the rest of the terms" not "zomg, you weren't there when we drafted this, no way!". So, Jenga as an example, coming online, would be something on the order of "Hey, we want to expand to build stuff that's probably above the 'warship' line." "Cool, thanks for letting us know. Here's some paperwork talking about commitments everyone else doing so have agreed to; visits to see how and what you're up to, coming under GJ chain of command, technical crap about communications standards, etc. We look forwards to seeing what you come up with." "Authorized shipyards" sounded like a pretty limited and finite set for me, something like "build it in a shipyard of one of the big factions"... thats where we derailed your suggestion. Maybe instead of fixing everything with a set of rules, there could be some small contract involved between factions/groups that want to try to build "big stuff" and the Convention... if people cannot agree and stay unreasonable, this can be talked about on the next convention. But I do not think that most people will be unreasonable. HRogge Wrote:This is the sort of approach that makes sense to me, and seems much more in the spirit of Fenspace than throwing bureaucracy at the problem.KJ Wrote:Okay. And by "authorized shipyards" what I at least have in mind is "filed paperwork agreeing to little control visits and the rest of the terms" not "zomg, you weren't there when we drafted this, no way!". So, Jenga as an example, coming online, would be something on the order of "Hey, we want to expand to build stuff that's probably above the 'warship' line." "Cool, thanks for letting us know. Here's some paperwork talking about commitments everyone else doing so have agreed to; visits to see how and what you're up to, coming under GJ chain of command, technical crap about communications standards, etc. We look forwards to seeing what you come up with.""Authorized shipyards" sounded like a pretty limited and finite set for me, something like "build it in a shipyard of one of the big factions"... thats where we derailed your suggestion. -- "It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
Oh, and ALL of these contracts between GJ and the factions should be public...
so people can gain and loose bragging points with them.
I think some thought should also go to WMH (Weapons of Mass Humiliation) which handwavium is almost certainly willing to let you build.
The mass anvil summoning gun, that just does *Bonk* damage to anyone in the area hit (the anvils soon evaporate) The gender inversion cannon (I'm unsure if you can build this with handwavium) that also affects the gunner and all in a moderate radius, as well as all in the target area (those biomodded are immune, as are products of the Catgirling Machine) The Tasp Cannon which induces a period of (non-addictive) ecstacy in all in the target area And I am sure people could come up with many others... -- "It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
Okay, right, step five yards back and breathe. Yes, a bit of legitimate misunderstanding since people were saying "Whoa! What?" when BA, ECSNorway and me were talking about fighter squdrons, yeah. I have no problem with keeping wmd's few and tightly controlled, and I'll say again that the proper place for regular weapons is a secured armory or display case/rack tended by people who know what they're doing. It's just when notions of 'do it our way or leave' start floating around that I get itchy.
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
Has anyone considered if the A-10 Thunderbolt II (AKA the Warthog) would have been retired by 2022, with the Air Force finally getting rid of it, only to have Great Justice swoop in and scoop up the lot? Properly 'waved, it could be hellaciously tough, though Great Justice would only haul them out on ground missions.
In the OTL, the Air Force didn't even want the A-10 in the first place, but they've been forced to take it by Congress. They only keep it out of a combination of territorial defensiveness, and refusal to give up ANY role to the Marine Corps or, heaven forbid, the Army. KJ Wrote:Someone on WC's scale, again if someone built a giant cannons and crap, still probably wouldn't qualify unless someone tried very very hard and so on. In which case he would be probably be politely asked to register his nukular bomm gun.Or, if catgirls were involved, his Nuku-Nukular bomm gun... -- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012 |
|
« Next Oldest | Next Newest »
|
