Point of View: Wishes and Likes

cthia wrote:More of the following POV would be most welcome. Or if someone could be so kindly to point me to the archives if've just misplaced my copy of the memo.

What was the name of the planet? What is the final resolution of said planet? What percentage of the population was the seven billion? What two navies were fighting?

The Eridani Edict is a significant part of the series, ever looming in the background or in a cloud. As a reader, I've always wanted to know more. We are given much of the what and even more of the cure, but little of the cause - the history.

The Epsilon Eridani Incident was the incident that led to the creation of the Eridani Edict.

During a military conflict in the middle of the 2nd Millenium PD, a Solarian League-member world in the Epsilon Eridani System suffered a massive planetary bombardment by enemy forces which resulted in the death of over seven billion people. As a consequence, the Solarian League ruled that any star nation bombarding civilians on planetary surfaces without warning and military reason would face severe punishment through the Solarian Navy. (HH8) -wiki

Georg J. Smith wrote:Not only that, but which were systems that were punished by the SLN for Eridani Edict violations?

Yes, what he said.

Can we assume that the bombardments were not nuclear?

cthia wrote:

Georg J. Smith wrote:Not only that, but which were systems that were punished by the SLN for Eridani Edict violations?

Yes, what he said.

Can we assume that the bombardments were not nuclear?

No, we can't assume that. Masada, for example, nuked Grayson in past wars -- technically an Eridani Edict violation, but Grayson and Masada were isolated Verge systems and presumably got very little news coverage.

cthia wrote:Yes, what he said.

Can we assume that the bombardments were not nuclear?

You could use expensive nuclear missiles which can do up to 200 megaton of damage from a careful launch path plotted from low orbit or a block of scrap metal released at .10c relative towards the target from the other side of the system which will do about a million megatons upon impact.

In the honorverse, it's trivially easy to inflict far greater damage upon planets than nuclear weapons can ever dream of. Never mind that block of metal, how about an entire starship massing one to eight million tons slamming into a planet at .6 or .8c?

Speed really does kill.

But those inclined to shock and terror tactics might prefer to deploy that distinctive mushroom cloud on top of their enemy's capital as some kind of statement. Or they might choose to use a radiation bomb designed to kill the inhabitants of a city and then dissipate within a few months or years, ready for their colonists to move into.

I wouldn't be surprised if biological attacks were done too.

munroburton wrote:

cthia wrote:Yes, what he said.

Can we assume that the bombardments were not nuclear?

You could use expensive nuclear missiles which can do up to 200 megaton of damage from a careful launch path plotted from low orbit or a block of scrap metal released at .10c relative towards the target from the other side of the system which will do about a million megatons upon impact.

In the honorverse, it's trivially easy to inflict far greater damage upon planets than nuclear weapons can ever dream of. Never mind that block of metal, how about an entire starship massing one to eight million tons slamming into a planet at .6 or .8c?

Speed really does kill.

But those inclined to shock and terror tactics might prefer to deploy that distinctive mushroom cloud on top of their enemy's capital as some kind of statement. Or they might choose to use a radiation bomb designed to kill the inhabitants of a city and then dissipate within a few months or years, ready for their colonists to move into.

I wouldn't be surprised if biological attacks were done too.

Of course, I could be wrong. But I would expect nuclear weapons to be even less humane.

cthia wrote:Of course, I could be wrong. But I would expect nuclear weapons to be even less humane.

The only difference between a multi-megaton level kinetic strike and a similar nuclear weapon would be the level of radiation. That would only really be of interest to the survivors along with access to anti-rad medications.

Honorverse nukes seem to be, in general, "clean" without any persistent radiation effects.

Kinetic Bombardment is cheaper and cleaner, but nukes would be more available to a military invasion force. Given that the Nukes would have to be removed to use missiles as (purely) Kinetic weapons, Nukes would probably involved whether the strike was Nuclear or Kinetic -- A missile at a significant fraction of C will do more damage through Kinetic energy than through detonating its warhead.

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:Of course, I could be wrong. But I would expect nuclear weapons to be even less humane.

The only difference between a multi-megaton level kinetic strike and a similar nuclear weapon would be the level of radiation. That would only really be of interest to the survivors along with access to anti-rad medications.

Honorverse nukes seem to be, in general, "clean" without any persistent radiation effects.

Kinetic Bombardment is cheaper and cleaner, but nukes would be more available to a military invasion force. Given that the Nukes would have to be removed to use missiles as (purely) Kinetic weapons, Nukes would probably involved whether the strike was Nuclear or Kinetic -- A missile at a significant fraction of C will do more damage through Kinetic energy than through detonating its warhead.

:scratches head&arse:
Didn't know the nuclear weapons were "clean."

cthia wrote:Didn't know the nuclear weapons were "clean."

I don't know that for a fact; hence "seem to be" clean. Explicit notice is taken in textev about "dirty nukes" and various other hints suggest that they are, but "clean" is a relative term when it comes to nukes.

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:Didn't know the nuclear weapons were "clean."

I don't know that for a fact; hence "seem to be" clean. Explicit notice is taken in textev about "dirty nukes" and various other hints suggest that they are, but "clean" is a relative term when it comes to nukes.

Aha! I'd totally forgotten that I had a question about these "dirty nukes." What the hell is in those Old Tilmans RFC guzzles? lol

Thanks for reminding me of how lost I am Harold.

Weird Harold wrote:
The only difference between a multi-megaton level kinetic strike and a similar nuclear weapon would be the level of radiation. That would only really be of interest to the survivors along with access to anti-rad medications.

Honorverse nukes seem to be, in general, "clean" without any persistent radiation effects.

Unless an attacker deliberately went the other way with something like a neutron bomb; to kill people without tearing up so much of the countryside or infrastructure. (But then it you want to take over you've still got to deal with irradiated land/infrastructure - so the relative lack of physical damage isn't a pure win)

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:Didn't know the nuclear weapons were "clean."

I don't know that for a fact; hence "seem to be" clean. Explicit notice is taken in textev about "dirty nukes" and various other hints suggest that they are, but "clean" is a relative term when it comes to nukes.

There's a tidbit from the armor essay in IFF that indicates that the nukes used on anti-ship missiles should be fairly clean.

In Fire Forged: An Introduction to Modern Starship Armor Design wrote:Their introduction made possible the long sought after pure fusion warhead in the 1650s. This was a nuclear bomb whose only fuels were relatively common light elements like hydrogen and its isotopes. Cheap gravitic implosion made it economical to fit devices with previously unheard of yields into a missile body. The pure fuel made it possible to predict the output radiation of the bomb explosion precisely and ultimately control (to a small degree) the spectrum and duration of the explosion’s radiation.

Without the uranium or plutonium fission component an pure-fusion airburst should have relatively little fallout. A ground burst is still going to kick up, and irradiate, a lot of dust creating some nasty fallout.
So as nukes go a pure fusion grav-implosion device should be quite clean.

I'd like to have the complete POV of the entire civilian component of the SL regarding the GA.