[Woolie Wool]

Question is, of course, what could an Orion do against the Terrorists? Orbit them threateningly? Seeing as it doesn't have weapons that have the range to engage targets on a planetary surface....

The question is of course, what could Terrorists do against an Orion? Crash a plane into it? "Oh noes, something collided with our hull captain, hull strength down to 99%!"

How the hell can a kamikaze plane crash even do 1000 damage? 500 FreeSpace damage is probably equal to the blast force of an atom bomb!

The kamikaze fighters in Tenderizer are essentially flying bombs ("they're loaded with warheads!"). Even Command notices this. That's why they explode differently. A kamikaze attack from modern aircraft would be beneath the notice of an Orion.

[General Battuta]

Though, amusingly, the Orion would also be pretty much worthless against terrorists.

Oh, asymmetric warfare.

[Snail]

Though, amusingly, the Orion would also be pretty much worthless against terrorists.

Oh, asymmetric warfare.

Deploy it to Pandora.

[Woolie Wool]

Though, amusingly, the Orion would also be pretty much worthless against terrorists.

Oh, asymmetric warfare.

Well, if you're ruthless enough you can just blow up the terrorists and everything for miles around with weapons of mass destruction.

Oh, FreeSpace armaments.

Also don't underestimate the Orion's value as a flying, invincible airbase.

[General Battuta]

Yes, but it doesn't help you with the tricky part, which is telling them apart from the innocent civilians they live amongst and frequently mutate from.

[Colonol Dekker]

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. I swear, people are so lucky i'm not in charge of national defense. Nukes would have flown by now. . . . The Falklands. Northern Ireland. . . . I mean Southern.
Ummm the Arctic where Nukes satanic Penguins are massing.

[Dragon]

Maybe a way of resolving this problem would be sending a fleet of airplanes in there, telling people that if they want to survive, they have to get onboard, ferry them away to some temporary settelment, then search the place for anything that might have belonged to terrorists (killing everyone in sight, as anybody who would stay would most likely be a terrorist, as they won't like to cooperate with americans) and then send people back. No Orion needed, just be carefull to bring enough planes and inform everyone (though better state that an area will be saturated with chemical weaponary or something that will kill everyone who stays, this doesn't have to be true, but people have to be convinced that stay=die. Terrorists would die or get hunted in a settelment, which would be monitored and everyone would inspected carefully, not to mention that in case of potential terrorist passing the procedure, he will find himself with no equipment, as everything would be carefully searched and secured, later monitored.). This would ensure that everybody who dies suffered this fate at his own fault.
Colonel is riget, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, so a few ignorant civilians would get killed in process, but the benefits would be far greater (and it would be their own fault anyway).

[The E]

Could we please get a split?

[General Battuta]

Split and unstickied.

[Colonol Dekker]

Substitue the district 9 mothership for an Orion. That'd be nice.

[IronBeer]

Maybe a way of resolving this problem would be sending a fleet of airplanes in there, telling people that if they want to survive, they have to get onboard, ferry them away to some temporary settelment, then search the place for anything that might have belonged to terrorists (killing everyone in sight, as anybody who would stay would most likely be a terrorist, as they won't like to cooperate with americans) and then send people back. No Orion needed, just be carefull to bring enough planes and inform everyone (though better state that an area will be saturated with chemical weaponary or something that will kill everyone who stays, this doesn't have to be true, but people have to be convinced that stay=die. Terrorists would die or get hunted in a settelment, which would be monitored and everyone would inspected carefully, not to mention that in case of potential terrorist passing the procedure, he will find himself with no equipment, as everything would be carefully searched and secured, later monitored.). This would ensure that everybody who dies suffered this fate at his own fault.
Colonel is riget, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, so a few ignorant civilians would get killed in process, but the benefits would be far greater (and it would be their own fault anyway).

Negative. They'd simply masquerade as civvies until the mass destruction was over. Then they'd recruit more operatives from the now-traumatized civilians.

[General Battuta]

Yeah.

Basically, anything you do that makes people unhappy creates more terrorists.

[Sushi]

Maybe a way of resolving this problem would be sending a fleet of airplanes in there, telling people that if they want to survive, they have to get onboard, ferry them away to some temporary settelment, then search the place for anything that might have belonged to terrorists (killing everyone in sight, as anybody who would stay would most likely be a terrorist, as they won't like to cooperate with americans) and then send people back. No Orion needed, just be carefull to bring enough planes and inform everyone (though better state that an area will be saturated with chemical weaponary or something that will kill everyone who stays, this doesn't have to be true, but people have to be convinced that stay=die. Terrorists would die or get hunted in a settelment, which would be monitored and everyone would inspected carefully, not to mention that in case of potential terrorist passing the procedure, he will find himself with no equipment, as everything would be carefully searched and secured, later monitored.). This would ensure that everybody who dies suffered this fate at his own fault.
Colonel is riget, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, so a few ignorant civilians would get killed in process, but the benefits would be far greater (and it would be their own fault anyway).

Yikes. So you're saying that we should relocate whole cities and countries full of innocent civilians, completely disrupting their lives, on the off chance that we could catch a terrorist or two in the process? And expect that anyone who doesn't meekly comply is a terrorist deserving to die? I hope that you simply didn't think through the ramifications of what you're saying.

[The E]

Yeah, seriously. When you have a population that, while not actively hostile against you, is at best indifferent to your needs, the very last thing you would want to do is to antagonize them further by acting like that.

Shooting at innocent bystanders is one sure way to turn those people into active combatants. And the assumption that "anyone left behind must be a terrorist" just doesn't fly. I certainly wouldn't leave my home just because the British Army (the nearest occupation force to where I live) told me to.

[Colonol Dekker]

Nukes would fly

Remove the whole city.

[NGTM-1R]

Yikes. So you're saying that we should relocate whole cities and countries full of innocent civilians, completely disrupting their lives, on the off chance that we could catch a terrorist or two in the process? And expect that anyone who doesn't meekly comply is a terrorist deserving to die? I hope that you simply didn't think through the ramifications of what you're saying.

It worked for Stalin, unfortunately. The plan's not so much effectiveness impossible as it is politically impossible.

[headdie]

not to mention in order to do it would require the kind of army numbers only seen in North Korea or the red arm at its prime

[Nuclear1]

Colonel is riget, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, so a few ignorant civilians would get killed in process, but the benefits would be far greater (and it would be their own fault anyway).

How about the needs of the many, many innocent people whose lives you just disrupted and treated like animals?

Why bother look for a needle in the haystack when we can just burn down the whole barn huh?

[TrashMan]

Deploy it to Pandora.

"Sir, the smurfycats are revolting! We've lost contact with one of our platoons!"
"Order all of our troops to fall back....and warm up the beam cannons."
"Sir?"
"EXTERMINATUS!!!!"

[Liberator]

This, oddly enough, has been a recurring daydream of mine.  An Orion drops out of subspace and proceeds to blow the top off of a couple of mountains as a means to provide defeat to the enemy and victory for whoever deployed the Orion.

I fully expect to be silenced by deletion or at least heavily edited since my speech isn't free because it is in opposition to the opinion of the ones with the power.

The problem with asymmetric warfare is that it's usually not asymmetric enough.  In order to have victory in a conflict, you either have to have a set of well defined rules that are universally agreed upon and enforceable on all parties or the enemy, whether it's true or not, has to believe that you will do whatever it takes to gain victory.  You can't fight a war against an enemy that won't fight you himself but instead manipulates others(usually the ones that will suffer if they win) to fight for him and have a hope of victory.

The problem with "The War" is that the people running it on both sides don't want victory, they want political capital they can use to gain power.  This is worsened by the fact that we, by and large, don't live in a society that understands the concept of victory or individual exceptionalism.  We live in a society that seems to think that everyone can "win".  This flies in the face of the reality that for any party to gain victory that has to be someone on the other side who doesn't.

This is true in every facet of life including work, play and relationships.  If you get a raise at work, let's say it's mandatory in your union contract, then someone somewhere is a little closer to losing they're job.  If you are having a go at some footie or chess or whatever, when the game is over someone will have lost.  When and if you get married or what have you, you and your spouse can be said to have gained victory in your relationship, however, someone else, possibly close to either or both of you who was secretly carrying a torch for you or your spouse can be considered to have lost.

I'm babbling a little bit I know, but conflict MUST end in victory for one side or the other, otherwise there's no point to it.