Post-Isolation Sol Politics

[Snail]

What do you think happened in Sol after the isolation? Would the GTA collapse and reform as the highly militaristic Earth Alliance, or reach spiritual enlightenment under the Ubuntu ideology ? Would Sol devolve into anarchy and chaos without its colonies? (just a few examples)

[General Battuta]

The Earth Alliance being Inferno's take on it, Ubuntu being Blue Planet's, for those not familiar with one or the other.

[Snail]

Yeah, those were just examples to get the discussion going...

[MatthewPapa]

Whatever you think happens has to be pretty speculative because the game doesn't really comment on much about the societal situation at the time. But that can make it more interesting though IMO.

Here is what I think would happen:
This is assuming several background conditions, that I have deduced throughout playing the FS1 and FS2 campaign many times


that earth was somewhat if not entirely dependent on the colonies for food and natural resources
that the GTVI was present in earth's ranks, if not more so than average
there were a great many military vessels stuck in earthspace due to the impending battle with the Lucifer
Earth was the center for most Terran R&D as well as manufacturing
Potentially Earth could find replacement sources for the resources that were formerly provided by the colonies within their own system, they would just be harder to get and take longer to utilize
People of Earth outnumbered or came very close to outnumbering people in the colonies all put together


I believe that right after the Lucifer was destroyed there would be massive celebrations. However that celebration would be short lived because of of impending supply shortages. As soon as the notion set in that they were trapped in the sol system chaos would ensue.

I think that there would be a power struggle and elements that were a part of the GTVI would come out on top, putting themselves in leadership positions all over. The recovery for earth would be slow at first, but like all humans do they would adapt to the environment. I think that all of this would take somewhere around 3-7 years for earth to be in a stable state again. After this happens earth resumes research and production of new technologies and weapons because for all they know the war is still going on and the shivans could return at any moment.

10-20 years later the reality would set in that the war was most likely over or all life outside of earth has been destroyed. Then they realize that they CANNOT leave the sol system unless they do something to fix their jump node. Sol then begins a new gate project (parallel to the GTVA's.) I believe that the the people of earth would easily be able to come up with a technology that would make that possible. They would presumably have more manpower and their infrastructure was still intact and not touched by the Great War.

After that it would be anyone's guess as to who would finish the jump gate first. It doesnt matter either way. I believe the first encounter with the GTVA would be a friendly one and no one would really want to attack the other. Inevitably tensions would rub everyone the wrong way and there would be some kind of conflict, most likely a crusade against the vasudans.

I think that technologically the earth would easily have the upper hand and would overtake a wounded GTVA if it came to that. After all, earth had pieces of the Lucifer.

Thats my 2 cents

[karajorma]

Personally I loved MindGames take on it. I just need to find the time to actually FRED and release it. :)

[General Battuta]

You really should, MindGames was very interesting.

[Snail]

Personally I loved MindGames take on it. I just need to find the time to actually FRED and release it. :)
EVIL OMNIPRESENT SUN CREATURES CAUSING WARS!

gasp! :P ;)

[General Battuta]

They're not evil, they're just...playful.

[Snail]

They're not evil, they're just...playful.
Yeah, killing gajillions of sentients for fun is playful, I agree. :P

[ngtm1r]

They're not evil, they're just...playful.

For a certain pulling wings off of butterflies as a pastime definition of playful.

[Novachen]

It is a very interesting discussion.

I've never heard of Ubuntu, where can i read it? And i didn't know that BP's Earth Forces are completely different than Inferno's. For me it was until now the same. A war between the Galactic Terran Vasudan Alliance and Earth. ;)

24th Century is not too far in the future, so there should be still enough resources on the planets to prevent that Sol fell into anarchy and chaos. A few centuries later and that would be a complete different situation. But we don't know anything about sol's population. I don't think that planets like earth are so overcrowed than today (systems with class m planets like capella have "only" a population of 200 million). Also i can not believe that there was a great power struggle, but i think it's possible that the vasudans was blamed for the lost connection ("without |the war/them| the shivans never appeared" et cetera) and also i think that the GTA changed in their organisation. But i don't think, that there was something like a war between the colonies. Everybody have the same goal, to reopen the node to Delta Serpentis and i think that is the primary concern of Sol-GTA. It is a unspectacular solution, but i see my only reason for a conflict with the GTVA is that Sol-GTA changed into a Faction that remembers to the Neo-Terran Front. Against vasudans :)

[Kiwi]

The Earth Alliance being Inferno's take on it, Ubuntu being Blue Planet's, for those not familiar with one or the other.

That isn't much to go on, actually. Remember, everything is in a fluid state, and people here come and go, including recent joins, without any history of familarity with any of the Freespace-related web sites.

OK, in between paragraphs, I paused and looked at the lists of forums / mods at Hard Light. Both of those are mods for FS2 . .

But since I'm only just on the verge of a first, stock game, play test of one or another (or maybe even both) of two period hardware systems using the original game, so I haven't spent a lot of time looking at those other forums over there, sorry.

[shiv]

Soon you'll see Earth Coalition in action in a new mod that's coming to you...

[Rodo]

I never understood why no one even thinks about other possible subspace corridors out of Sol, they could be found by earth people you know, I mean they have plenty of time to search for them, and no.. I don't care about canon and non-canon thinking... a good story is still a good story no matter if it's based on canon info or not ^^

[Novachen]

I never understood why no one even thinks about other possible subspace corridors out of Sol, they could be found by earth people you know, I mean they have plenty of time to search for them, and no.. I don't care about canon and non-canon thinking... a good story is still a good story no matter if it's based on canon info or not ^^

As the same reason due that neither the GTVA nor the Sol-GTA have the idea to send messages from/to Alpha Centauri which is really close to Sol. *g*

Also none of the factions have the idea to build a long-range ship which can travel the five lightyears. With more research in the jump-drive and engine technology i'm sure the GTVA or maybe even the Sol-GTA were able to reduce the travel time up to many months, if not years :)

[Rodo]

As the same reason due that neither the GTVA nor the Sol-GTA have the idea to send messages from/to Alpha Centauri which is really close to Sol. *g*

Also none of the factions have the idea to build a long-range ship which can travel the five lightyears. With more research in the jump-drive and engine technology i'm sure the GTVA or maybe even the Sol-GTA were able to reduce the travel time up to many months, if not years :)

on the first one... true

on the second one... also true ^^

can't think about nothing else right now :S

[Snail]

Subspace travel beyond the outer rim of a system is impossible without the use of inter-system jump nodes.

[Novachen]

Subspace travel beyond the outer rim of a system is impossible without the use of inter-system jump nodes.

yes, i know. :)

But how far away from the sun is subspace travel still possible? Where is the border?
And it is impossible to create an own gravitation source to still use the intra-system jump-drive? So that you can jump in smaller steps towards sol?

[ngtm1r]

Okay, I'm going to make a terrible assumption here.

First Fleet's competent.

The GTA will not collapse. First Fleet has control of all the combat hulls in Sol and, knowing as well as anyone what's going to happen, establishes control of the main production facilities as well. The means to mount an effective armed resistence to the GTA will not exist. First Fleet is in ur factories, keeping ur guns. There will be great privitation, or maybe not. But the GTA will remain in control and if ousted it will have to be done through purely political means. There's really no reason to assume First Fleet is not competent and that its officers haven't studied previous insurgency problems and will not realize what is to come. They also have the unique advantage of being the first to know.

(Yes, I just crapped all over INFA and S:AH, and who knows what else. I realize that. Doesn't change the fact S:AH is a good campaign...it's just not as logical. :P)

[Rodo]

well... could be possible indeed, but an all mighty GTA is not the dreamed resolution, in fact I guess beign part of GTVA on FS2 has made most FS fans think that GTA was actually not going to have a bright future, something like that an only terran coalition would not conquer the entire galaxy alone, thus making an alliance with the vasudans the logical next step in the human expansion.

[ngtm1r]

I'm pretty sure you didn't read the thread's title.

[Mobius]

Judging from that post of yours, you haven't read the topic's title either. Politics and military are connected, but not necessarily glued.

Okay, I'm going to make a terrible assumption here.

First Fleet's competent.

The GTA will not collapse. First Fleet has control of all the combat hulls in Sol and, knowing as well as anyone what's going to happen, establishes control of the main production facilities as well. The means to mount an effective armed resistence to the GTA will not exist. First Fleet is in ur factories, keeping ur guns. There will be great privitation, or maybe not. But the GTA will remain in control and if ousted it will have to be done through purely political means. There's really no reason to assume First Fleet is not competent and that its officers haven't studied previous insurgency problems and will not realize what is to come. They also have the unique advantage of being the first to know.

(Yes, I just crapped all over INFA and S:AH, and who knows what else. I realize that. Doesn't change the fact S:AH is a good campaign...it's just not as logical. :P)

You're basically giving for sure that the First Fleet will remain loyal to the GTA authorities. What you're completing ignoring is the fact that the vast majority of the 1st Fleet itself may cause the downfall of the GTA in Sol.

[General Battuta]

Both scenarios are plausible. As long as you can justify it for your story, it works.

[Snail]

I'd like a campaign where utter anarchy ensues in Sol. Not because it's plausible, but because it'd be awesome.

[ngtm1r]

Judging from that post of yours, you haven't read the topic's title either. Politics and military are connected, but not necessarily glued.
You're basically giving for sure that the First Fleet will remain loyal to the GTA authorities. What you're completing ignoring is the fact that the vast majority of the 1st Fleet itself may cause the downfall of the GTA in Sol.

Power, as Mao said, grows from the barrel of a gun. First Fleet has all the guns, and thus has all the power.

A little late to the party, aren't we?

But okay, I'll bite.

Why? We've got no precedent for this kind of massive-scale disloyalty. What kind of cause can you give them for it?

The only reasonable explanation I can come up with, really, is units becoming too attached to their posts and not enough to First Fleet, and that can be remedied by contracting First Fleet to Luna/Earth (assuming it's not already all based there anyways, which it may well be), or frequent rotation.

[karajorma]

Why? We've got no precedent for this kind of massive-scale disloyalty.

Ummm, Silent Threat? The NTF?

While I don't believe the entire 1st Fleet would defect a civil war would actually do a much better job of reducing Sol to the kind of anarchy where pretty much any of the Sol based campaigns became much more likely.

Similarly I can't see that happening immediately but after a year or two with the economy in ruins due to the sudden collapse in interstellar trade it's definitely a possibility.

[ngtm1r]

Silent Threat happened because they had a shot: the Hades. More importantly, they were also a totally seperate organization from the normal command structure and not subject to it, making it much easier to conceal their activies and much easier for the whole defection idea to get into their heads in the first place.

The NTF had an ideal to fight for, that of the lost Earth (doesn't quite work here), but more importantly, it had a manufactured external enemy, the Vasudans. Who were in fact geniunely alien and therefore vastly easier to stir up resentment against then other humans.

First Fleet is an entity of unified command structure, whose only existing ideals are to uphold and protect the GTA, with no external enemy since there aren't terribly many Vasudans around Sol, no giant superweapon to provide a breakaway attempt any hope of a sucessful campaign.

So we're talking a minimum of five years, more probably ten, before any resistance movement of meaningful strength (for a campaign to be based on, in other words) springs up. Probably fifteen until there's a reasonable chance they seize actual control of anything.

[karajorma]

Silent Threat happened because they had a shot: the Hades. More importantly, they were also a totally seperate organization from the normal command structure and not subject to it, making it much easier to conceal their activies and much easier for the whole defection idea to get into their heads in the first place.

They were also an organisation almost certainly founded in Sol and probably based there too. We don't know for certain that the orders for the Hades Rebellion didn't originate from Sol before the end of the Great War (possibly even before the start of it since it takes time to build a ship the size of the Hades and it's a fairly good bet that the GTI had some contact with Shivans before the rest of the GTVA military were aware of them).

In other words we don't know how connected the GTI are in Sol. I certainly wouldn't put organising a coup in Sol past them considering how good a job they managed to do of it so far away from the system that is likely their power base.

The NTF had an ideal to fight for, that of the lost Earth (doesn't quite work here), but more importantly, it had a manufactured external enemy, the Vasudans. Who were in fact geniunely alien and therefore vastly easier to stir up resentment against then other humans.

Fair point. But it's not hard to stir up resentment at all if you really want to. And we have no idea what civilian politics are like in Sol. It could be that relations between Mars and Earth have always been a powder keg for instance. With the rest of the GTA systems gone, squabbling between those two could quickly result in all kinds of unrest and violence. If 1st fleet intervenes that is very quickly going to make the situation worse.

First Fleet is an entity of unified command structure, whose only existing ideals are to uphold and protect the GTA, with no external enemy since there aren't terribly many Vasudans around Sol, no giant superweapon to provide a breakaway attempt any hope of a sucessful campaign.

I've already pointed out that it is easy to generate an external enemy. And we've already seen from the NTF how quickly that can cause an entire fleet to defect.

So we're talking a minimum of five years, more probably ten, before any resistance movement of meaningful strength (for a campaign to be based on, in other words) springs up. Probably fifteen until there's a reasonable chance they seize actual control of anything.

Even if I bought those figures, which I don't, you've basically said that an armed rebellion can seize control of Sol (which was my main objection to your post).

[ngtm1r]

They were also an organisation almost certainly founded in Sol and probably based there too. We don't know for certain that the orders for the Hades Rebellion didn't originate from Sol before the end of the Great War (possibly even before the start of it since it takes time to build a ship the size of the Hades and it's a fairly good bet that the GTI had some contact with Shivans before the rest of the GTVA military were aware of them).

In other words we don't know how connected the GTI are in Sol. I certainly wouldn't put organising a coup in Sol past them considering how good a job they managed to do of it so far away from the system that is likely their power base.


And who's to say the Hades Rebellion wasn't a direct result of losing contact with Sol, instead? Rampant speculation cuts both ways. However, in this case we're also assuming GTI is still not crazy, and their combat forces would clearly have been out deployed towards or in the fighting. Perhaps there is a great GTI bureaucracy in Sol, but that does not a successful revolt create. This would require a subversion of regular GTA combat forces, something they specifically did not on the exterior and there is no reason they would do on the interior when most of them are probably just trying to find a new job.


Fair point. But it's not hard to stir up resentment at all if you really want to. And we have no idea what civilian politics are like in Sol. It could be that relations between Mars and Earth have always been a powder keg for instance. With the rest of the GTA systems gone, squabbling between those two could quickly result in all kinds of unrest and violence. If 1st fleet intervenes that is very quickly going to make the situation worse.


That's missing my point. First Fleet has seized control of all combat-capable spacecraft in Sol and the means to produce more. You can't have a shooting war between the colonies now. First Fleet has shielded fightercraft armed with Disruptors to deal with your fleets of Elysiums and Chronoseseses nonlethally if they wish, or Prometheus and Banshees if they don't. The situation is now basically analogous to what would happen if Micronesia's police force was the US Navy. Nobody is resisting because there is no possible way to do so.

Their primary objective would be to maintain that state of affairs to prevent deterioration of Solar politics and the inevitable humanitarian disasters that will come with that. This is a thankless task, probably, but it is imminently doable when you're the only guy with guns.


I've already pointed out that it is easy to generate an external enemy. And we've already seen from the NTF how quickly that can cause an entire fleet to defect.


Which ignores two important facts; Earth is still going to be overwhelmingly represented in the recruiting base, and you can base all your ships in one particular spot thanks to the subspace drive and the best spot is probably Earth from a logistical standpoint. The NTF succeeded in subverting the regional fleet. In this case, there is only one fleet and it's based in only one region. Anyone else up a creek without a paddle.

In fact tying in with the objective to maintain control above, if they really percieve a danger, First Fleet might simply restrict their recruiting efforts to one venue, thereby locking everyone else out, and their basing at another, thereby locking the recruiting venue out while simulatanously frustrating the efforts of the basing venue to subvert the fleet.


Even if I bought those figures, which I don't, you've basically said that an armed rebellion can seize control of Sol (which was my main objection to your post).

Well, sure. I'm looking at this from a purely spaceborne perspective. Anything's possible on the ground, but as far as a shooting war in space goes, it's pretty much out of the question if First Fleet is competent. Even a marginally effective insurgency is not going to possible for at least ten years while you put together some ships to actually conduct it without somehow calling down upon your head the wrath of an Ursa wing.

[General Battuta]

BP made the assumption that the great upheavals in Sol would be political, not military.

[karajorma]

And who's to say the Hades Rebellion wasn't a direct result of losing contact with Sol, instead?

Exactly. Who can call it in either direction?

Seems pretty foolish to attempt to do it on the back of next to no data on the subject.

Rampant speculation cuts both ways. However, in this case we're also assuming GTI is still not crazy, and their combat forces would clearly have been out deployed towards or in the fighting.

Or were held back together with 1st fleet for a last ditch attack on the Lucifer should the destruction of the Lucifer in subspace fail.

Again, who knows?

Pretty much every single mod based in Sol is rampant speculation anyway since we have no data beyond the mysterious silence of the system so I see little point in trying to definitively claim something couldn't happen when it's quite clear that you can set up the backstory so that it could.

That's missing my point. First Fleet has seized control of all combat-capable spacecraft in Sol and the means to produce more. You can't have a shooting war between the colonies now. First Fleet has shielded fightercraft armed with Disruptors to deal with your fleets of Elysiums and Chronoseseses nonlethally if they wish, or Prometheus and Banshees if they don't. The situation is now basically analogous to what would happen if Micronesia's police force was the US Navy. Nobody is resisting because there is no possible way to do so.

I got your point. You missed mine. Can you state the make up of 1st fleet? I can't see the captain of a Destroyer from Mars supporting any actions he feels are overly draconian.

Bosch managed to subvert the majority of his fleet without anyone getting a whiff of it until it was too late. I can easily see GTI or someone else doing it too. Hell, subverting first fleet might have been part of the plan for the Hades Rebellion all along.

[ngtm1r]

Or were held back together with 1st fleet for a last ditch attack on the Lucifer should the destruction of the Lucifer in subspace fail.


Which doesn't work, as the forward deployment predicates on a condition predating the Great War: the Terran-Vasudan conflict. The Great War also offers plenty of places for GTI's combat forces to be deployed, such as Ross 128 and points slightly closer in. The GTA made no effort to redeploy forces for a massive showdown with the Lucifer that we know of, so why exactly would they be in Sol?


Pretty much every single mod based in Sol is rampant speculation anyway since we have no data beyond the mysterious silence of the system so I see little point in trying to definitively claim something couldn't happen when it's quite clear that you can set up the backstory so that it could.


Sure, yeah, you can say First Fleet was commanded by Donald Rumsfield and all, even though that's pretty insulting considering the GTA's general level of apparent competence. I'll buy that, I suppose. And there is of course not letting logic get too heavily in the way of a good story.

But everyone and their dog (except BP) has posited some kind of fragmentation and war, which is basically the least-likely outcome if we assume all participants are not idiots.


I got your point. You missed mine. Can you state the make up of 1st fleet? I can't see the captain of a Destroyer from Mars supporting any actions he feels are overly draconian.


No, you're still missing mine. No draconian actions are required for the scenario I describe. Seizing control of all combat spacecraft is probably a natural consequence of a last-ditch defense against the Lucifer. After that, it's not even much of a question. First Fleet will look out for the interests of First Fleet, which involve not blowing each other up and not letting other people blow them up. And if in the process they manage to avoid a lot of civilian suffering and extra economic dislocation, that's just extra. It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian mission, not active combat operations.

Besides. A career officer like that will also undoubtedly identify more strongly with his service than his birthplace. The GTA is his country.


Bosch managed to subvert the majority of his fleet without anyone getting a whiff of it until it was too late. I can easily see GTI or someone else doing it too. Hell, subverting first fleet might have been part of the plan for the Hades Rebellion all along.

They had the Hades. They didn't think they needed anyone else. Without the Hades, the rebellion would never have gone forward. With the Hades, there was no reason to want outside assistance.