I have been wrong before and likely will be again but this tends to hold up as there was no reference that humans had found any systems occupied by the Ghaba before the first human system was attacked.
Just my two cents
Charlie
HamsterDesTodes wrote:n7axw wrote:
[snip]
So far as we know, the Ghaba do not go looking for races to extiminate. That's from RFC in the Pearls, I think. What happens is that they respond to intruders in what they regard as their sphere of interest. So if the ark expedition got away clean, there would be no pursuit. However, to be on the safe side, the colonists were to "go bush" for 500 years to be sure that if there were any scout ships looking for the escapees, they would have time to pass Safehold and then to return home without detecting any emissions. The argument amongst the command crew was that Langhorne wanted to bury the colonists in deepest hole possible and stay buried. The proscriptions were to ensure that humanity never developed the tech necessary to return to space. Shan-wei and her followers, on the other hand, felt that no matter how deeply the Safehold colony was buried, that eventually the pattern imposed by Langhorne would deteriorate and humanity would return to space. Far better that the colonists be forewarned about the Ghaba and the level of tech required to survive against them than to once again be caught without adequate preparation. Thus the recovery of tech was to begin at the 500 year mark, assisted by those enclaves where it had been preserved. That was in accord with the original mission plan. Accordingly, Pei Kauyung set the timer on the awakening of Nimue's PICA at the 750 year mark to provide an additional 250 year safety margin against discovery by the Ghaba. So at this point, humanity should be able to redevelop its tech and return to space without undue concern about the Ghaba, provided reasonable caution is exercised. That is the theory Merlin is operating on anyway.
Don
I checked the pearls and didnt find anything about the Gbaba except in passing. Certainly not that they didnt go looking for victims. Do you have a Weber quote somewhere? Because IMHO the idea of passive Gbaba flies in the face of most of the in-book information.