Weird Harold wrote:No, the hope is that the Gbaba won't notice the difference in time to pinpoint where the switch was made and be able to track Operation Ark.
Remember this is a last ditch plan to allow a small remnant of humanity to escape the Gbaba. TF1 intends to lead the Gbaba as far, away for as long as possible; hopefully far enough and as long enough to make finding Operation Ark impossible.
True, space is big. Of course TF1 reports detection of two Gbaba fleets (one with 1000 ships and one with >1000) right after Breakaway. One can assume they managed to evade somewhat after detection, but it seems unlikely they made it very far. Maybe they got lucky and the Gbaba didn't notice the difference after all?
More importantly, I looked for the word "stealth" in the book and the Ark transports did have stealth systems. Or at least some of them did - the text describes Hamilcar as having had "multiply redundant stealth systems". If it's possible to put stealth on the transports then it would make sense for them all to have it. Which brings me back to the original question: why leave the transports exposed during the breakout and not in stealth all along?
