Any what if moments?

Weird Harold wrote:There had to be an opposition force -- i.e. not an exercise.

AND

Filareta had to be on the verge of surrendering.

Quite. I don't think the Solarian League Navy has a habit of practicing surrenders or planning to do so. Heck, the Solly who surrendered at Spindle made a remark about not having a sword to hand over.

That'd be interesting, though. What if Daniels' nannies were accidentally triggered during the exercises 11th Fleet did before going to Manticore?

The flag bridge blows up, killing 11th Fleet's command team, but since the fleet is still at Tasmania... Obviously, there's no shortage of Solarian flag officers to assume command, but how would such an event influence the Mandarins?

munroburton wrote:Quite. I don't think the Solarian League Navy has a habit of practicing surrenders or planning to do so. Heck, the Solly who surrendered at Spindle made a remark about not having a sword to hand over.

That'd be interesting, though. What if Daniels' nannies were accidentally triggered during the exercises 11th Fleet did before going to Manticore?

The chance of that happening is one over some astronomical number -- probably at least a dozen zeros between the decimal and the first significant digit.

Weird Harold wrote:
In the specific case of Filareta's Ops Officer:

The Cataphract pods had to be deployed; there would be no "GTH" option in place otherwise.

AND

There had to be an opposition force -- i.e. not an exercise.

AND

Filareta had to be on the verge of surrendering.

When those three conditions were met, the OPs officer triggered his "GTH" "Use 'em or lose 'em" option, which was keyed to a single "Big Red Button." The bomb was also wired to the same single "BRB" he was nano-programmed to press.


Other nano-programmed assassinations or suicides had similar complex Boolean conditions that had to be met that would be extremely unlikely to happen randomly.

You are right that they are likely to be specific enough to not get activated accidently, but that does not eliminate the possibility of any number of other situations going wrong.

Daniels is in some sort of an accident, gets hurt or removed from duty for one reason or another. Filareta could be the one to strike the wedge himself thus eliminating the instructions that would set off the nano's. Or the bomb is improperly installed, discovered or not installed at all for any number of reasons. Do you think the MA has an agent that is capable of administering the Nano's and orchestrating all of the moving parts on board the capital ship? Especially knowing that there is also a chance of capture?

Under the conditions that obtained? 99.999% BuPers refuses to prosecute. If by some bizarre route it does go to trial? Guaranteed acquittal: the actions were justified by the circumstances, and there would be several senior officers to testify to that.

jdtinIA wrote:What if : Instead of Young being court-martialed his family had managed to get Honor court-martialed?
IIRC ( and I admit I need to reread the series again ) a comment was made by Janecek that some people were sure the wrong captain was being tried.

How does this change the dynamics if Honor is found guilty?
Or after a long and bitterly fought trial not guilty?

Louis R wrote:Under the conditions that obtained? 99.999% BuPers refuses to prosecute. If by some bizarre route it does go to trial? Guaranteed acquittal: the actions were justified by the circumstances, and there would be several senior officers to testify to that.

jdtinIA wrote:What if : Instead of Young being court-martialed his family had managed to get Honor court-martialed?
IIRC ( and I admit I need to reread the series again ) a comment was made by Janecek that some people were sure the wrong captain was being tried.

How does this change the dynamics if Honor is found guilty?
Or after a long and bitterly fought trial not guilty?

If Honor would have been court martialed and found guilty, the Grayson third of the alliance would have crumbled. The Grayson half of the alliance at that point, rather.

Louis R wrote:Under the conditions that obtained? 99.999% BuPers refuses to prosecute. If by some bizarre route it does go to trial? Guaranteed acquittal: the actions were justified by the circumstances, and there would be several senior officers to testify to that.

jdtinIA wrote:What if : Instead of Young being court-martialed his family had managed to get Honor court-martialed?
IIRC ( and I admit I need to reread the series again ) a comment was made by Janecek that some people were sure the wrong captain was being tried.

How does this change the dynamics if Honor is found guilty?
Or after a long and bitterly fought trial not guilty?

Not going to happen, the entire chain of command endorsed her decision. Even if they had tried to do so the navy would have come close to a mutiny over it. Honor would've had the ultimate legal defense that no court would get around, that of extenuating and exceptional circumstance.

saber964 wrote:
Not going to happen, the entire chain of command endorsed her decision. Even if they had tried to do so the navy would have come close to a mutiny over it. Honor would've had the ultimate legal defense that no court would get around, that of extenuating and exceptional circumstance.

IIRC correctly there is also lots of precedence for what Honor did and being cleared of any wrong doing if they where not rewarded .

cthia wrote:
If Honor would have been court martialed and found guilty, the Grayson third of the alliance would have crumbled. The Grayson half of the alliance at that point, rather.

At that point, the Grayson half of the alliance was not really all that relevant or even in any position to argue. They had a handful of modern ships in service some more being built and a navy unable to meet the demand for crews for all of their current ships let alone the new construction. If they had withdrawn from the Alliance Haven would have swallowed them up quickly without even noticing.

Sigs wrote:

cthia wrote:
If Honor would have been court martialed and found guilty, the Grayson third of the alliance would have crumbled. The Grayson half of the alliance at that point, rather.

At that point, the Grayson half of the alliance was not really all that relevant or even in any position to argue. They had a handful of modern ships in service some more being built and a navy unable to meet the demand for crews for all of their current ships let alone the new construction. If they had withdrawn from the Alliance Haven would have swallowed them up quickly without even noticing.

IF we are assuming that a fair bit of fleet Admirals cvsn overcome the objection of the Queen + several of the lords of the admialty. She is convicted stripped of he rank, retires to Grayson and becomes whatever she wants with Michael's blessing. Takes the Grayson navy farther-faster than it is already going. with her total fortune to power Grayson economy and Harrington Steading ... SKM loss Grayson gain.

WeirdlyWired wrote:

Sigs wrote:

At that point, the Grayson half of the alliance was not really all that relevant or even in any position to argue. They had a handful of modern ships in service some more being built and a navy unable to meet the demand for crews for all of their current ships let alone the new construction. If they had withdrawn from the Alliance Haven would have swallowed them up quickly without even noticing.

IF we are assuming that a fair bit of fleet Admirals cvsn overcome the objection of the Queen + several of the lords of the admialty. She is convicted stripped of he rank, retires to Grayson and becomes whatever she wants with Michael's blessing. Takes the Grayson navy farther-faster than it is already going. with her total fortune to power Grayson economy and Harrington Steading ... SKM loss Grayson gain.

But my point stands, the alliance does not fall due to this one event. There may very well be strains on it but Grayson has no choice but to stand with Manticore, granted they may benefit from Manticore's loss especially if Captain Tankersley decides to request to be assigned to the GSN for a while. She doesn't lose years to the depression of losing Paul and Grayson gets her in the GSN from the beginning. But ultimately Manticore and Grayson are still Allies no matter what happens even by some contamination of the drinking water all of the RMN went insane and convicted her and sentenced her to death, I doubt that Grayson would have walked.