Out of order snippet? WHAT out of order snippet?

kzt wrote:

n7axw wrote:On that chain of explosions that happened after Mike and Lester's fleet arrived, I wonder... is there any way an examination of the blast sights could determine whether or not the bombs were emplaced rather than the result of missile strikes? Dunno... a nuke doesn't leave behind much to examine, but still...

More than most people think. The base of the tower that held the test nuke at white sands remained.

n7axw wrote:Interesting observation... Thanks!

Don
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I mentioned this in an earlier post, the pattern of destruction changes with the placement of the nuke. Any competent forensic explosive expert could deduce where an explosive where placed with a fairly good accuracy and have no problem at all to differentiate between air, in situ or buried explosions.

still leaves the fact that the experts will be manty or at least GA experts and have zero credibility with the solly public.

I suppose you could try bringing in some andermani or erwhonese experts but by the time that is done the narrative will be fixed in the solly public's mind. and that assumes that they have any more credibility then the mantys. both will be "Neo-barbs" like the rest of the GA, erewhon was a manty ally for a decade plus and a heavnite one for last several years. Andermani may have a bit more credibility then the others but i highly doubt that it is enough to convince anyone.

there will be no solly experts allowed as they simply can't be trusted not to spin the answers however the mandarins want.

Dauntless wrote:still leaves the fact that the experts will be manty or at least GA experts and have zero credibility with the solly public.

I suppose you could try bringing in some andermani or erwhonese experts but by the time that is done the narrative will be fixed in the solly public's mind. and that assumes that they have any more credibility then the mantys. both will be "Neo-barbs" like the rest of the GA, erewhon was a manty ally for a decade plus and a heavnite one for last several years. Andermani may have a bit more credibility then the others but i highly doubt that it is enough to convince anyone.

there will be no solly experts allowed as they simply can't be trusted not to spin the answers however the mandarins want.

Not everyone are in the mandarins pocket, or MAligns pocket for that matter.

And as I said, you don't have to be an expert to determine if the explosion happened in the air, in a building or underground - you just have to have a modicum of experience concerning explosives.

The crux of the matter is that ANY intelligence analyst looking at the pictures will be able to determine what type of explosion it was which will lead to some really interesting questions - no matter what their official response to it will be.

But as you say, the narrative will already be fixed in the minds of the people.

Which makes me wonder what would happen if "someone" started a rumor that the nukes where planted by agents from SL as a revenge for GA destroying Filareta and co's taskforces. I would think that explanation would be much easier to swallow than some strange conspiracy from an unknown group.

The fact that uncovering and exposing the truth won't matter to Sollies doesn't mean that it shouldn't be done and the results entered into the record.

Don

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n7axw wrote:The fact that uncovering and exposing the truth won't matter to Sollies doesn't mean that it shouldn't be done and the results entered into the record.

Don

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Exactly. And the ideal organization to do that is: the Mesan Bureau of Investigation.

GregD wrote:Oh, and if it were the GA, they've have communicated to the bombings off Mesa at 60x light speed, but I'm guessing the explosion delays were at light speed, radiating from the planet.

However if the MAlign cared, and had a little time to use, it would be trivially easy to disguise the fact that the orders to set off the nukes were lightspeed limited and originated from the planet. All you need is the ability to send each nuclear destruct device a timestamp of when to explode.

Doing that you could make it appear that an immediate execute signal propagated at any speed you like from any point in space you like - simply by customizing the delay for each nuke.

JohnRoth wrote:

n7axw wrote:The fact that uncovering and exposing the truth won't matter to Sollies doesn't mean that it shouldn't be done and the results entered into the record.

Don

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Exactly. And the ideal organization to do that is: the Mesan Bureau of Investigation.

And I'm fairly certain those guys and gals have the expertise to determine KEW strikes from missile ones, from embedded charges from surface detonated charges.

How about a forensics team from the Solarian League . . . the Maya Sector, specifically?

pappilon wrote:And I'm fairly certain those guys and gals have the expertise to determine KEW strikes from missile ones, from embedded charges from surface detonated charges.

Handing the investigation off to Mesa would be one tactic they could try. Since they were the victims they would have a really strong motive to make sure the guilty get punished, so they will be scrupulously honest! Then normal human biases will take over and they'll blame Manticore.

Or they'll be sure that Manticore did it, skip investigations and just straight up frame the Manties.

filbert wrote:How about a forensics team from the Solarian League . . . the Maya Sector, specifically?

The sector where the governor is protecting Torch? The sector allied with the people literally at war with Mesa?

Honestly, you probably could find an impartial team of investigators if you looked hard enough, but I doubt anyone would try and they probably won't uncover anything O'Hanrahan won't.

quite possibly a cat wrote:

pappilon wrote:And I'm fairly certain those guys and gals have the expertise to determine KEW strikes from missile ones, from embedded charges from surface detonated charges.

Handing the investigation off to Mesa would be one tactic they could try. Since they were the victims they would have a really strong motive to make sure the guilty get punished, so they will be scrupulously honest! Then normal human biases will take over and they'll blame Manticore.

Or they'll be sure that Manticore did it, skip investigations and just straight up frame the Manties.

filbert wrote:How about a forensics team from the Solarian League . . . the Maya Sector, specifically?

The sector where the governor is protecting Torch? The sector allied with the people literally at war with Mesa?

Honestly, you probably could find an impartial team of investigators if you looked hard enough, but I doubt anyone would try and they probably won't uncover anything O'Hanrahan won't.

You're missing the point. The reason for handing the investigation off to Mesa is to get some expertise with the ground explosions - collect evidence and find out how big they were and where they went off. It's "show your work" time.

Getting that level of evidence on the orbital explosions is going to be pretty much impossible.

Deducing from that who set them off is a quite different issue. The analysis of blast patterns, etc., goes into that latter endeavor.