Let's invade an alien planet!

[Yora]

So we are an alien race that for convenience has the same environmental requirements and the same physiological strength and weaknesses as humans. We have faster than light travel for our space ships and have cultural and economical relationships with other advanced species, but the galaxy is such a big space that travel between these world still takes from several months to a few years. So it has been decided to build a permanent colony where ships can be resupplied, major repairs be performed, and crews can take a break for a few weeks.
Since we don't want to wait for 10,000 years but want to start opperation within 50 years or so, terraforming is out of the question. An underground moon base or an orbital space station would be just as cramped and highly vulnerable to equipment failure, so it has been decided to build the colony on a lift-sustaining planet. Building factories for spare parts, producing nuclear fuel, and growing food is also a lot easier.

An astronomical survey has found a number of planets that could be candidates and scout missions have found a planet that would be perfect. Based on close scans of the atmosphere and the composition of other planets and asteroids, it is all but certain that some kind of food can be gained from local plantlife and raw materials for constructions and ship repair can be found within the system in aboundance.
However, it is also inhabited and the scouts found evidence of communication sattelites and nuclear fusion, indicating that they also have computer technology and basic robotics. Based on the lights seen on the surface at night, it is estimated that the population counts at about 4 billion and we have a reasonably good map where the major population centers are. Given the similar gravity, the locals are likely to be of somewhat similar size, strength, and toughness as us. It is assumed that the scouts left entirely unnoticed.
This complicates things, but the planet has been selected as the construction site for the fully autonomous resupply and repair station. Asking the locals to lease a remote stretch of land and hoping they won't later change their minds has been ruled as being out of the question. They probably wouldn't come to a widely accepted descision anyway and there would always be some who are after our technology or just wanting to pick a fight. So we have to take full control over the whole planet and sufficiently pacify the locals before the station can go opperational.

We allready have ten capital ships with crews of 10,000 each (twice as much as an aircraft carrier), plus sufficient numbers of escort ships, scouts, and transport shuttles. On the cargo list are supplies for the two year trip plus the first two years on the planet, and we also need construction equipment and building material for the first fortified outposts, mining opperations, and food production.

Phase 1: What do we need to pack for the trip?

[smuchmuch]

First a few clarifications:
What's our great motivation to invade ? (And mostly how do we pitch it. I assume we're not going to tell our troups we're sending them to death to build a space fuel station, unless they're completly fantical, it tends to be bad form.
Are we like 'Lo, proud warior caste, let us bring honor to our great stellar empire' ,more 'economic and ecologic consideration means we have to atempt an hostile takover of our neartest competitors" or 'let us liberate their planet in the name of culture and freedom, you'll see they'll be gratefull for it" ?. How much support do we have from our home planet ?
This kind of thing will have an influence on morale on the long run.

And how much technology do we have access to (beyond FTl travel) ? You are proposing we try to invade a population of four billion peoples with a hunderd thousand people; the number are definitively not in our favor here, so any force multiplier (orbital bombardement, robotic drones, intantly miracle anomcahin cures etc...) we can scrounge up will be invaluable for what sounds pretty much like a suicide mission otherwise.

[Mx.Silver]

So we are an alien race that for convenience has the same environmental requirements and the same physiological strength and weaknesses as humans. We have faster than light travel for our space ships and have cultural and economical relationships with other advanced species,
How exactly are these other species going to react to the news that we're planning on the subjugation/genocide of a sentient culture because we can't be bothered to take the time to build a service depot somewhere else? Because that's the kind of thing that just might come across as being a little bit ethically dubious.


Ethical qualms aside, from a pragmatic standpoint the fact is that successfully invading an inhabited planet (with inhabitants whose tech level is comparable to early 21st century earth, no less) is likely to be far, far more costly - financially, materially and in human lives - than just taking the extra time to build somewhere else. Unless we somehow managed to forge some kind of military alliance with a strong local nation, or group of nations, we'll basically be going up against everyone, who will all probably go into total war mode, and they will have the mother of all home turf advantages.
Unless we have some immunity to all their weapons tech, we are going to take some casualties here, especially in a ground war. If our commanders have been stupid enough to go for full invasion as the opening move, then in regards to what we should pack we are going to want as much orbital bombardment weaponry as we can get. Because unless we can really nail 'fire from the skies' we are probably going to lose the ground war. Even if we can effectively remove their production centres from orbit it still has the potential to be a very nasty fight.
Honestly, leasing uninhabited land and fortifying it is probably the better option. At least that way if and when the locals do turn us we may have been able to create enough of a presence so that we won't end-up fighting all of them.

The best option still, however, would be just picking one of the other potential planets that isn't inhabited.

[Yora]

The main purpose of this whole exercise is "How do you make a plausible alien invasion that doesn't fall apart when you think about it for a moment?".
The whole idea seems rather implausible to me, but I think people are wondering "How must it have been for the locals when we colonized them, and what could we do different if we were in such a situation today?". This plot hook comes up a lot in entertainment, but pretty much every time humanity is saved for rediculous reasons, because the invaders made stupid mistakes that could have been avoided with very simple solutions that are obvious to the audience if you just think about it for a moment. Of course not everyone, but some people say "even I could have planned that better and I am not a professional planetary invasion planner with almost limited resources and years of preparation time".

So assumed that a planetary invasion would take place, how would it be planned and executed if you are not a hollywood script writer who has already decided that you will fail?

A lot of it depends on what you actually want to achieve with the invasion:
- Space is incredibly large. If you have the power to travel to other stars, then you must have an energy source that is abundant in your own solar system. No need to travel to other stars to get fuel.
- The basic elements are distributed relatively evenly throughout the galaxy and can be found in almost every star system. Even if you need a particularly rare one that exist in sufficient quantities only in a single system you know off, then the element would be found spread through the whole system and not just a single planet. You always could just starting to mine asteroids or frozen moons where there is no obstructing vegetation, dangerous wildlife, or dangerous germs. A mining expedition is cheaper than an invasion force.
- If you need rare complex compounds of elements, you should be able to create it artificially long before you are able to collect it from other star systems.
- If you travel to other stars, you must have advanced robots and computers, so you don't need slaves as workers.
Which to me results in the only explaination to go through all the trouble of dealing with a planets biosphere and not go somewhere else, is because you are there for this biosphere! And from what we know life supporting planets are rare and even if you find one, it's probably one that is inhospitable to your species. A hospitable environment is the only resource in the universe that is actually extremely rare and can not be manufactured industrially with technology that allows for interstelar travel.
So for the purpose of this exercise, the objective is to gain control of the planets biosphere without destroying it.
Which still leave the question why? If we are just curious about meeting another culture, we would not invade, removing the whole objective of this exercise. Relocating the entire species from a dying planet does show up occasionally but only rarely and would probably happen in a completely different way then the usual alien invasion scenarios. Which leaves using it as the site for an outpost, which would benefit greatly from an environment that allows for survival outside the base for more than a few hours in case of an emergency. I think an outpost that is not a science station only makes sense when there are other people on distant planets you have dealings with. If anyone has a better idea, we can discuss that.

Now as said, having an invasion is what this whole exercise is all about, so that is the only given aspect that needs to stay in place.
Some other variables that have been defined by the people in charge: From an ethical standpoint, I would say that subjugating the locals has alrady been cleared, but extinction is not considered desireable. But securing the planet for the opperation of a space port takes priority over their fate. Other galactic powers won't get involved and we will have no political fallout from enslaving or annihilating them. The only cocern in this issue is getting the base build, opperational, and running in the most efficient way regarding resources, time, and our own casualties. If this turns out to be impossible, the whole opperation will be canceled, the remaining forces retreat, and the planet left in whatever state it is (but all equipment left behind being destroyed, of course). However, if a permanent occupation force will be neccessary, fresh troops to replace or increase the existing forces can be transported from the homeworld once the invasion is done and the space port starts opperation. It is however one objective of the invasion to get the planet reasonable pacified by ending all organized resistance and preventing any large scale uprisings in the future. When small revolts happen later, that's not a problem.

Man, that's a lot of stuff to think about even before you start the actual planning of the invasion. No wonder scriptwriters for blockbuster movies don't bother with it. :smallbiggrin:

Regarding technology:
Faster than light travel is possible and at least economically viable enough to be used in such amounts that building the outpost is a justified expense. Through still a major infrastructure project. Like building the Panama canal or the trans-Siberian railway.
As an energy source I would propose hydrogen fusion reactors. The theoretical principle is really simple, fuel can be collected and refined in any place in the galaxy, and it is relatively safe and environmentaly friendly. Even the most catastropic accidents would probably cause damage similar to a boiler explosion. Antimatter power would be the most efficient, but it's extremely difficult to make, would probably consume more energy than you get out of it, and is the most volatile substance in the universe. Maybe use the output of several fusion reactors over long time to create very small amounts of antimatter which you then use as fuel for FTL-engines, which would probably require massive amounts of energy in a very short time. Everything else on the ship and on ground facilities, I would run with fusion power. You could also use that fusion power to charge energy cells for portable equipment and vehicles.
Also artificial gravity on the ships, be it some cool fictional technology or just having the ships rotate. You don't want to set foot on an alien planet with your whole crew suffering from muscle and bone atropy.
The fleet would also have equipment to produce spare parts for all equipment from raw material gathered on the planet or from asteroids. But getting refineries and factories running on the planet using local resources should be achieved as soon as possible to keep a steady stream of supplies in case the locals manage to put up a strong resistance and cause significant damage that needs to be repaired. Finding local plants that are suitable as food would be the best case, but if not you can build greenhouses in addition to the factories that grow food from the homeworld.
I think having service andriods, construction robots, and both ground based and airial combat drones seems sensible. Maybe even space-capable, but the locals should not have any space-worthy weapons except for possible a few ground based missiles. You can't do an occupation with robots only, you need people on the ground interacting with the locals. But for combat I would rely heavily on robots.

Everything else I would leave open to discussion, I think. If you think there are certain technologies that are neccessary and should be within the reach of a civilization that still drives around in vehicles, lives in houses, goes to work and eats plants and meat, we could assume that it either exist or gets developed in preparation of the invasion fleet. There would likely have been 20 or 30 years of planning and preoaration before the fleet starts its journey.

10 capital ships plus escort with crews of ca. 150,000 people was just a first estimate of me. Though I would add to that at least 1,000,000 combat drones with capacities to replace them and even increase their number once a permanent outpost has been established. That would be 1 drone for every 4,000 locals. You think we need more?

[Aotrs Commander]

How would you invade?

With that sort of number of forces?

You wouldn't.


10 capital ships plus escort with crews of ca. 150,000 people was just a first estimate of me. Though I would add to that at least 1,000,000 combat drones with capacities to replace them and even increase their number once a permanent outpost has been established. That would be 1 drone for every 4,000 locals. You think we need more?

Orders of magnitude more. That's not even approaching outside of Hollywood numbers.

A quick wiki estimate gives us approximately 73 million global army and paramilitary and reserves forces. That's just the army, not counting navies, air force or law enforcement, or civilian militia.

If we're disregarding Hollywood, conquering Earth would require an armed force at least in that order of magnitude (several tens of millions)- and more importantly, because real warfare is really all about logistics (i.e. supply chain, time in the field vrs maintenace time, tea and sandwiches etc etc), enough resources and a supply chain to be able to reinforce all those troops for an extended period of time. You have to take your tea and sandwiches with you, because even assuming you can scrounge actual human tea and sandwiches (edible for you), you're not going to be able to replace your ammo (or energy cells), fuel and mechanical components that will wear out in normal usage for Earth without your own manufacturing infrastructure. So, you'd probably need to supply something like 50-100 million troops globally for something like a YEAR (possibly more, because if you screw up, the nearest resupply dump is that far away). ON TOP OF the fuel and supplies you need to get there (though the latter might be a bit reduced by using cryosleep or something). And maybe back as well, if it all goes pear-shaped.

So, if FTL is months and years, the amount of supply (and forces) required would be (literally) astronomical. Probably far more than you'd gain for building the refuelling waypoint in the first place.

The force you suggest would probably be barely enough to take one (reasonably sized) country (the UK alone has approaching half a million potential military personell), and certainly not enough to make you immune to the attirition game. (Or likely, nuclear attacks unless you have sufficiently high tech as to be nuke-proof via shields or PD systems).



One option with such limited numbers is orbitally bombard every military installation you can find, hit every fuel site and energy source, knock out all the satelites in orbit (which could take some time) to screw communications and GPS up, and hope you can cow enough of the populace into behaving under threat of orbital annhilation to migitate the worst of the hostilities. Then you can try to establish a heavily fortified beachhead on what you consider the most tactically important areas (i.e. where your refuelling stuff will be) and be prepared for an endless round of guerilla warfare against your occupied territory.



In the end, though, to "invade" as in "conquer"you are probably going to have to commit a phenominal amount of resources, just on a numbers basis; no matter how good he is are, one dude is just one dude, and he can't be everywhere at once. The real world is much, MUCH bigger than Hollywood - and many sci-fi writers! - understand.



The solution least costly in terms of resources and personell would probably be to bombard the planet until all the humans are wiped out in their entirity (which hopefully your scanners can ascertain) - so better make sure you bring energy weapons that have a low maintainance-time-to-operational-time ratio) and don't deal to much fallout damage - and then build on the wreckage from scratch, possibily initially with pre-fab facilities.



Note: If your technological advantage is so overwhelming that you can take Earth with that small a force, you're probably high-tech enough you wouldn't need to do it.

[DeusMortuusEst]

My suggestion would probably be some kind of genetically engineered bio-weapon (air-born AIDS, or Ebola). Take out the humans (and perhaps their closest cousins) via orbital bombardment. Since they cannot fight us in space we can simply have one or two ships orbiting, firing capsules of viruses towards their major settlements until say 75% of the species is eradicated.

The ships can be rotated so that the troops doesn't grow too restless. Say two years in orbit at a time. After perhaps 5 rotations or so the human race would be too weak to seriously fight back and we can easily invade, take control of a large enough piece of land and establish a outpost to finish the invasion.

[smuchmuch]

(Technicaly (s)he never said we were envidaing earth, just a planet that happens to look a lot like it. But yes, i agrez a direct invasion seems pretty doomed witht hat kind of numbers.

...However , Earthling history (sorry to bring IRL history in this, this is just to provide an exemple, I do not wish to start any historical or political debate on this, is that alright ?), has prooved that a small number with a suficiently technological advantage CAN triumph over much larger numbers, even at a the odds of a hundred to one.
(I'll give the Battle of Omdurman, for example and stop here.) There are quite few other more moderns exemple but the ehll f i'm even going to mention them

Point is, it might be possible to conquer the planet if we're not too concerned about the methods. (Keeping it in the long term however, that's another can of worms.)

The best method: Divide and conquer.
Find some already existing conflicts, support some sides over the others by providing some limited support, make pacts even comercial deals. Build our bases while the locals are duking it out between themselves.
-The advantage: No horrible genocide on our hand (well.. not directly at least, but we're putting ethics aside here), we ddon't commit too much of our tropps in this.
-The inconvenient: We probably should keep a close eyes on our 'allies' lest we want to see our own technology turned against us twenty years later. It's a long term strategy. Eventualy (though it could quite a long time if cards are played right) we probably will be driven/have to pull back

Also, we probably want to pack along is a full medical ,sceintific and engeneering wing. It would be stupid to take the planet only to have half of our forces to die because of a local common cold, or becauqse it's got a kind of weither we never encountered before, wouldn't it ?

[Mx.Silver]

Right then.

If we're going for occupation, then the thing we need to address is communication. Since the locals have communication satellites we're going to need ways to be able to tap into them, and an adequate science division to try and get a handle on the major languages - at the very least to the point where we can issue a demand of 'Surrender or be destroyed' and understand their response. The difficulty here is getting close enough to be able to make the tap without giving away our presence (surprise is something we really want here). A small craft with as much stealth tech as we can possibly devise seems best, try and keep the main fleet hidden if possible. It may also be possible to get intelligence on national borders and capitals this way, which will help especially if we can get some idea of the location of any military headquarters. It may also give us an idea of which nations could give us the most trouble for us militarily.

That we give them the option of surrender is important because it may well reduce the odds that we have to fight every single one of them. If we make it a fight to the death then everyone is going to fight, but if we give the option of surrender we reduce the number of potential combatants, at least in the short term, because it gives them an alternative.

For the actual invasion, as I said, a lot of it will come down to what we can do from orbit. For an attack I'd say it needs to be a top-down approach. Disabling communications is an absolute must, and priority targets for orbital strike will be government centres, command centres and military bases. We will need to do everything we can to create the impression that they are not going to be able to defend themselves. Ground troops should be sent to population centres, ideally capitals, since this is where they'll be useful and the presence of civilians may reduce the likelihood of the locals deploying WMDs. Ultimatums for surrender need to be issued, and issued a lot.

Actually establishing a base should be done in a location that's easily defended and ideally within territory that's surrendered to us (or at the very least is reasonably secure from immanent retaliation). It is also very important that the locals do not realise how much they outnumber us until we've had the chance do reduce their military strength.




10 capital ships plus escort with crews of ca. 150,000 people was just a first estimate of me. Though I would add to that at least 1,000,000 combat drones with capacities to replace them and even increase their number once a permanent outpost has been established. That would be 1 drone for every 4,000 locals. You think we need more?
If our drones can be taken out by small arms or portable explosive then yes.

[Aotrs Commander]

Follow-up, as a bit of an estimate.

A wiki estimate of police force numbers indicates about another 10 million police in the quoted countries, and an estimate of 3 police per 1000 people - so one drone to 4000 people is about twelve times too low just to do the job of the police - because the drone has to do the job of twelve blokes. It could probably do a lot of the adminstrative workload, but it still has to do all the gruntwork tasks which you can't all Tech away (like interviews, emergancy calls etc etc).)

So you could need between six and twelve million drones (depending on how generous you are in terms of man-work per drone) just to maintain the local law-enforcement levels in a non-hostile environment. (You might need to double that, and then only once you've dealt with the bulk of the military forces.)

Gives us an order of magnitude in how much you might need to "control" a populace.

[Fjolnir]

Depending on the physiology of the native species and such, would a dedicated 5th column attack be out of line, resorting to disruption of supplies and guerrilla tactics vs a more numerous native population (along with infiltrating governments and politically supplanting the area of course) I guess the question is how FAST do you want the planet conquered, because honestly you basically want to turn this place into an interstellar pilot truck stop with all the fixin's if time is of the essence, you go and wag the dog. Basically you send your capitol ships, and make them look as ominous as possible to the world you are going to raid, use as much advanced tech as possible to make them as close to invulnerable to the military forces of the world as possible, then using small ships and a limited force, go and slap these "foes" down like it's going out of style and then reveal yourselves and after getting wined, dined and feted you make a request for a concession of the stripe of uninhabited land that is suitable to your purposes and you have turned the native population into a willing and grateful workforce. and with this all it costs you are some really advanced attack drones and likely 5 years of advance team work to set up.

[Scowling Dragon]

Also, if the race has nuclear bombs then it becomes a whole different pickle. I don't care how powerful your ships are a nuclear bomb (Especialy the recent ones with the explosions that level 6 cities at a time) will damage your ships. Especially thousands sent after you at a time.

They might even destroy themselves in order to hamper you.

[Lord Raziere]

A plausible one?

Well I'd find a way of shutting down or taking control of the stuff they already have before actually invading, sabotage in general really, maybe unleash a nanorobotic plague that targets only soldiers and polices forces somehow….. take control of communications….lots of stuff, and thats just pre-invasion subterfuge weakening.

the true invasion would probably involve a lot of bombarding from orbit, taking out the vital places with missiles, shutting off a lot of things down with EMP….
mostly destroying stuff from the atmosphere while shooting down the occasional missile that comes up….

and once the planet has been sufficiently weakened…. I'd come down with soldiers, and start putting in my new laws, and offering the natives jobs in help keeping the peace and such in return for sharing resources, and if they don't comply, kick them out and start building my own forts and factories over their homes…..

yea, would probably involve a lot of dirty tactics or even evil ones to succeed…

assuming we actually want to preserve stuff on said planet. if we don't, and just want to blast them all to oblivion, hack their nuclear launch codes, then let the nukes fly.

[Scowling Dragon]

Seriously though. If your already enslaving a planet (And have the capabilities of doing so) you plan would just involve killing everything on the planet.

Your already a horrible race of despicable scumbags. Might as well stop pretending that you aren't.

[Aotrs Commander]

Also, if the race has nuclear bombs then it becomes a whole different pickle. I don't care how powerful your ships are a nuclear bomb (Especialy the recent ones with the explosions that level 6 cities at a time) will damage your ships. Especially thousands sent after you at a time.

They might even destroy themselves in order to hamper you.

Whatever approach you took, knocking out nuclear weapons from the safety of orbit or further out would have to be your very first priority (hopefully you'd be able to locate them up with scanners or something, otherwise, as you say, it could get A Bit Iffy).

You might be teched-up enough to be nuke-proof (within reason), but if you were, as I say, you probably wouldn't need a planet like Earth for resources.

(If we assume Earth-like but not Earth, I suppose they might have a resource of technobabbleanium or something... Or course, in that case, the natives might have discovered how to use technobabbleanium as a weapon themselves, which might put you in a worse position than dealing with mere nukes!)




A plausible one?

Well I'd find a way of shutting down or taking control of the stuff they already have before actually invading, sabotage in general really, maybe unleash a nanorobotic plague that targets only soldiers and polices forces somehow….. take control of communications….lots of stuff, and thats just pre-invasion subterfuge weakening.

the true invasion would probably involve a lot of bombarding from orbit, taking out the vital places with missiles, shutting off a lot of things down with EMP….

A lot of that is really Hollywood sort of tactics, though. (EMP, in particular, is not as unilaterally lethal as Hollywood would have you believe - even modern tech can be EP shielded. It's certainly screw a lot of things up, don't me wrong, but it's not quite an "I win" button against technology!)

Your nanorobotic plague would take a shocking amount of resources - and time - to deploy, if we're using real-world scales. You'd have to seed the entire atmosphere (not too mention the nanorobots would have to like, telepathic or something to know how to attack soldiers and not people). Heck, the tonnage of that amount of stuff would be at that-point, very much non-trivial. (Before anyone says "self-replicating nanorobots" I will remind you if you had that level of tech, you shouldn't need a low-tech planet's resources, since you're getting into molecular alteration-level engineering!) It'd probably easier just to level the civilisastion and start again, to be honest!

[Selrahc]

If we're disregarding Hollywood, conquering Earth would require an armed force at least in that order of magnitude (several tens of millions)-

Of course it wouldn't. Invasions outsource the vast majority of the day to day running of things to locals. If you are capable of crushing opposition completely and easily, you can smash local governments and force a surrender.

If your military forces are sitting in orbit, or some other place they *can't* be attacked by locals then you can just wait. Destroy any organized group that resists your demands. Force the locals to give whatever you wanted under threat of destruction.

If the objective is to create a stable and lasting peace, or make a country/planet a better place, this is a pretty horrible method. But if you don't give a toss and are just engaging in a naked war of aggression, it works fine. Keeping order is only important if you need order.

And if all we want is the real estate? Forget war and troops. Just bomb the entire site from orbit until everything stops moving.


I don't care how powerful your ships are a nuclear bomb will damage your ships.

Ships can move. Anti-missile defences can knock down missiles.
Plus, this is sci-fi. A nuke does not necessarily prove a threat to a ship.

[Lord Raziere]

The only other I can see any alien invasion succeeding, is if you turn the nations against each other before hand, so that they are all caught up in the own war, so that when you come in they are weakened and such and already busy fighting each other, so you can exploit that to take over.

still a very evil tactic, and has a chance of backfiring with the now war-focused world teaming up and attacking you instead.

[Yora]

Also, if the race has nuclear bombs then it becomes a whole different pickle. I don't care how powerful your ships are a nuclear bomb (Especialy the recent ones with the explosions that level 6 cities at a time) will damage your ships. Especially thousands sent after you at a time.

They might even destroy themselves in order to hamper you.
Warheads of that capacity do exist on earth. However, I don't think there is currently any dilivery system to aim them at specific points in space, which means you'd have to aim them roughly into the direction of some capital ships and hope you catch a few in the blast.
Since ICBMs can't leave earths gravity, you'd still have to deal with the earths magnetic field. Which means massive EMP over entire continents, possibly destroying the vast majority of all electronics and destroying power grids. Probably taking out some of your own satelites as well. And what have you achieved? A cloud of radioactive particles hanging in orbit, and a short blast of radiation.
But these ships are made to travel through outer space and would not just jump from orbit around one planet to orbit around another planet through hyperspace. That means they would be exposed to cosmic rays and sun storms on a frequent basis. If they happen to visit a planet or meteor close to the sun or just try to get close to a gas giant to refuel gases, they would need considerable shielding against radiation. So I don't think nukes would do a lot of damage as they don't create blast waves outside the atmosphere. On top of that, shoting an ICBM from space should be childs play, as they are not build to stand up against hits by rail guns or lasers and can't perform evasive maneuvers.

I think that really would just be shting yourself in the foot. Or the heart.

[Scowling Dragon]

Then this means this is just an unfair fight. Its like one of those VS threads where their like:

"Plush kings 15 person army VS Omega ultra gods infiniteXgoogleplex legion of indestructible plush people insta omega forever destroyers"

This is just kinda a pointless question to ask.

If were already taking into account that all they need is a base to refuel then they just bomb the place and set up shop.

[Aotrs Commander]

Of course it wouldn't. Invasions outsource the vast majority of the day to day running of things to locals. If you are capable of crushing opposition completely and easily, you can smash local governments and force a surrender.

If your military forces are sitting in orbit, or some other place they *can't* be attacked by locals then you can just wait. Destroy any organized group that resists your demands. Force the locals to give whatever you wanted under threat of destruction.

If the objective is to create a stable and lasting peace, or make a country/planet a better place, this is a pretty horrible method. But if you don't give a toss and are just engaging in a naked war of aggression, it works fine. Keeping order is only important if you need order.

It's never quite that simple. You're talking about a whole planet of people, not just occupying one country. Just look at the amount of hassle you get from guerilla and resistance slash terrorist forces even in places like Iraq, which are nominally under the control of an allied government. There's been a lot of soldier blokes there for several years now, and they still have trouble.

(Some elements of the populace might prefer to die than be be subjugated - as Earth's current history sadly shows, so you're going to get guerilla/terrorist attacks unless you have enough blokes to keep a lid on it, as the latter might not care if you wipe a city to get them. And such actions might backfire and succeed in making as many martyrs willing to die for the cause as people terrified into submission. It's difficult to say, and would likely vary by region and culture to boot.)

That tactic will certainly work in the short term (and indeed, is probably the best way of dealing with a hostile planet that you only want strategically important chunks of), but you can't control ground without people actually on the ground. Air and even space power doesn't let you control land (obliterate it, yes, control it, no.) In the (very) long term, eventually some snotty little dude is going to manage to get hold of some of your kit and back-work it. Even if it takes a decade or three, somebody will get lucky eventually; so you either have to really, really win the hearts and minds in the interim, or you have to have serious long-term garrison forces to minimise the damage.


Then this means this is just an unfair fight. Its like one of those VS threads where their like:

"Plush kings 15 person army VS Omega ultra gods infiniteXgoogleplex legion of indestructible plush people insta omega forever destroyers"

This is just kinda a pointless question to ask.

If were already taking into account that all they need is a base to refuel then they just bomb the place and set up shop.

Wars aren't won by weapons (though they are critical to waging war), at the end of the day, they're won by logistics - don't matter how good your gun is if you've run out of ammo/energy cells/parts to make it work, and tea and sandwiches for the blokes using and/or repairing it. The main defense of the victory is not the fact Earth or not-Earth would have nukes, it's the sheer scale of such an operation would take.

Non-Hollywood Earth or equivilent would simply not be able to deal with alien starships by weapon attacks, unless they convieniantly gave them slow moving targets in the atmosphere to attack (because ICBMs are not anti-aircraft weapons in the real world, unlike in Hollywood.)


And if all we want is the real estate? Forget war and troops. Just bomb the entire site from orbit until everything stops moving.

Yes, that's probably the best option. If you only need the planet's mineral resources and biosphere, and not the planet's infrastruture or populace, you simply don't fight over it. Level and rebuild yourself.

[Fjolnir]

So wag the dog or annihilate everyone seems to be the best two options, with a close third being "foment more conflict and attempt to destabilize the governments"

[Selrahc]

It's never quite that simple. You're talking about a whole planet of people, not just occupying one country. Just look at the amount of hassle you get from guerilla and resistance slash terrorist forces even in places like Iraq, which are nominally under the control of an allied government. There's been a lot of soldier blokes there for several years now, and they still have trouble.

Yes, but if all your troops are sitting in orbital command, insurgencies are just going to hit your puppet governments and the local populace with their offensives. Your invasion might not draw up resources terribly efficiently, and personnel sent to the ground for extended periods will be at risk(so do most things via radio), but the war will not really be in danger of loss.

[Forum Explorer]

Well first you need to target one nation exclusively for the initial attack. Preferably a relatively isolated one. At the same time you take out all orbital communications. But before that tap in and grab all publicly available information about the species in general and that nation in particular. When you strike you hit all the military bases you learned about and begin destroying all of the infanstructure. Once you've taken control of this one nation begin deporting the native population cause you don't need them. Some of that nation's allies likely will declare war on you so you just bombard them from orbit and use your own machines to get air supremacy. Take care to change your fleet's orbit every once in a while.

If the planet is Earth I imagine the place you would be conquering would be Australia.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Soras' all purpose guide to planetary invasions:

1) Don't Bother Ever: If you can at all cross the cosmos you will have long since worked out the difficulties of surviving in space so why wast energy on gravity wells when any system with habitable planets should have all the ingredients you need scattered about in debris like asteroids and comets. In greater quantities and more accessable qualities then you will find on a planet. Build O'neill Cylinders and hollow out asteroids as needed.

...if for some reason you cannot just do this...

2) Don't Bother With Civilized Planets: While we of course cannot confirm for any habitable planet dominated by a sentient civilized species there must be far more that are uninhabited by anything more complex then hunter-gatherer bands.

...if for some reason you cannot just do this...

3) Don't Bother Seizing Territory, Just Collect Tribute: Assuming a modern Earthlike civilization you shouldn't bother with the nations, just cut the strings that connect them. Seize control of all satellites (or destroy them) first but even more importantly: close the oceans. The global economy is centered around shipping, and container ships and tankers are bigger then the USA's super carriers so they should be easy targets. Port cities are likewise easy targets.

Demonstrate your ability to do this and then demand capitulation from the native governments. The global economy will be allowed to continue as long as you get your cut. Exert no control beyond what you need, including select slices of territory to be your enclaves.

Should a nation resist cripple its economy and let it collapse. A few case like that and the world will fold like a house of cards. Easier to pay then to futilely fight an untouchable enemy that just rains from above. (Oh overland shipping is similarly vulnerable too if the world tries to soldier on with it

...if for some reason you cannot just do this...

4) Don't Bother With All of It, Just The Best: If you must engage in a land conflict then select the most suitable real estate and seize that instead. On Earth this is North America, in particular the Continental States. Of course the best geography probably has a reasonably powerful nation behind it. So you will need good intel to make your initial strikes as powerful as possible. Of course since this is going to be a death from above strike this should actually be pretty obtainable from public information. And don't shirk on force of the initial strike. The idea is to take out as much of the political and senior military leadership as possible. (I could detail decapitating the USA but I won't)

While you are doing this you proceed to implement a variation of approach 4) which will prevent any allies from crossing the seas in force and stopping you. Power is worthless if it cannot be projected. And you widely broadcast your intentions calling for surrender. You accept any that wisely take the offer.

From there you finally start deploying ground forces while using heavy air support to continually harass the opposition until the organized military resistance collapses. Focus on cutting lines of transit with your presumably superior mobility. Bridges, railways, highways. Send messages to local authority offer them the safety of themselves and the populace if they surrender. Make an example of a few that resist with by annihilating them from above. You can afford some strategically scorched earth, you need resources not population centers.

The lower level the authorities, the less you should screw with them once they capitulate to form the core of the collaborator government you will establish. Treat well any that surrender to you, particularly military forces. Heck let armed forces keep their weapons, just their first and most important task will be to inventory them. Often and thoroughly. Rule as well as you can and brace for a long insurgency that will cause you considerable annoyance.

[dehro]

{Scrubbed}

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Hack into all the news media on the planet. Find out who's who and how to speak their languages (at bare minimum the lingua franca). Make clear and direct contact with the most powerful nations of the world (or just the most in the event of an ongoing cold war). Tell them exactly what we want and need. Explain that by trading resources with us the people of the planet will benefit from our technological superiority.

In short, we uplift them. They become a partner. We offer technology that they will no doubt desperately need (advanced space-medicine, advanced building materials and concepts, environmental technologies in the event of an out-of-control greenhouse effect, etc), and ask only for their friendship and use of their orbit for our ships to park. Offer to help them build their own ships, or offer positions on our own to see the universe.

If a portion of the natives dislike this arrangement (I can imagine a few nations will balk if they think we could provide weapon tech to their rivals), then we offer to bring a multinational group chosen by the local governments up to our ships, complete with full news crews and cameras (or their equivalents) and show them around. Let them see and understand that we are genuinely decent and only interested in a full and equal interplanetary partnership.

If that doesn't convince them, we leave and never look back. But just to prevent anyone from saying this plan is unrealistic and I'm naive, or that this isn't in the spirit of the original question, then I give you Plan B:

If the natives say no, redirect asteroids to an intercept course with the planet. Don't set one boot on the surface until every man, woman and child is dead.

[Tvtyrant]

My suggestion would be to use nuclear HEMPs all over the planet, disrupting all electrical systems and destroying their computer network (yes, you can protect against this. However, we largely don't.) The military would have the majority of its systems still active, but it would take considerable losses from the attack.

At the same time as you effectively turn off the power, you blow up every satellite. No more GPS and most of the long range communications are shot.

Instead of making a direct invasion, you follow this with a protracted series of strikes meant to prevent government's from reestablishing control of their territories. Destroy government centers, shell attempts by the armies/national guards to put down food riots, etc. Let the population do the heavy lifting for you, and work towards destabilizing the planet rather than towards conquering it. Once it is sufficiently destabilized, begin conquering the most fertile or industrial areas and convert them into resource bases. Then comes the long and arduous process of conquering it piece by piece.

[TSGames]

Phase 1: What do we need to pack for the trip?

I'm going to go out ona limb here and say "nothing". We've already mastered FTL and have rich trade with other members of the galaxy. Our technology is so far beyond anything that the locales could comprehend that planetary subjagation is simple and systematic. Childhood's End featured an alien race race that pacified humanity within twenty years and completely subjagated them by the third generation; all with one ship using technology that is far from infeasible for a race capable of regular intergalactic travel. Additionally, a twenty year pacification time fits in very nicely with the schedule; since we have ample forces and ships at our disposal we will be able to begin construction and harvesting immeadiately.

Further, the actual number of troops that the locals have is largely irrelevant; our technology will be so far beyond them that our tactical capabilities can not be matched by them in any reasonable scenario. To use an Earth example, even one that does not begin to describe the differences in tech level between modern Earth and a galaxy travelling civlization: If a modern earth carrier, through a set of peculiar cicrumstances, ended up fighting against a fort/castle/hold from the bronze age, it wouldn't make a difference how many defendes were in the fort as long as the carrier had enough supplies modern guns, planes, training, and weaponry would guarantee victory.

If we are truly invading another world, we just need to make sure pack our standard medica supplies and enough ammo and energy to get the job done. Pacifying the humans could be done quickly and easily, but not without a display of power and our refuel station could be built quickly and easily.

[McNum]

You need what all great military campaigns need: Intelligence, the more, the better. Then a plan.

As the goal here is, if I understand correctly, to establish a permanent base on the planet, and to make sure that the locals do not oppose it in an organized way, you really, really want to know as much as you can about the planet and the locals.

I'd say that with the numbers you have, a conventional strike and occupy attack just isn't feasible at all. There's simply not enough manpower to hold the land, even if you can take it. Especially when you consider that keeping the base site secure will be your top priority. And since you want to keep the biosphere relatively intact, most weapons of mass destruction are out, too, so a genocidal plan becomes drawn out and troublesome.

So, what you want to do, is find out exactly where you want the spaceport base, find out the culture of the locals in that area, see who their immediate allies are, and basically, how much trouble they could cause. An ideal area is sparsely populated on an isolated part of the world. As mentioned, if it was Earth, a shiny new Australia would be what you'd want. Or at least just part of it.

So as a roundabout way to get to this point, what do you pack? Spies and Infiltrators. Bonus points if you can get locals to spy for you, as you don't want to tip your hand just yet.

And only when you know exactly where to build, and how the locals most likely will react, do you even consider setting foot on the planet. If you don't have enough intelligence before attacking, you might as well end up as the next Space-Hollywood movie.

[Fjolnir]

Any space detectable intelligence will likely be beaming some sort of transmission signal out into space, and while there would likely be some difficulties in this, you would find out a great deal from monitoring these transmissions and at least determine what the natives look like and the values systems of the major nations.

[Radar]

One option with such limited numbers is orbitally bombard every military installation you can find, hit every fuel site and energy source, knock out all the satelites in orbit (which could take some time) to screw communications and GPS up, and hope you can cow enough of the populace into behaving under threat of orbital annhilation to migitate the worst of the hostilities. Then you can try to establish a heavily fortified beachhead on what you consider the most tactically important areas (i.e. where your refuelling stuff will be) and be prepared for an endless round of guerilla warfare against your occupied territory.

(...)

The solution least costly in terms of resources and personell would probably be to bombard the planet until all the humans are wiped out in their entirity (which hopefully your scanners can ascertain) - so better make sure you bring energy weapons that have a low maintainance-time-to-operational-time ratio) and don't deal to much fallout damage - and then build on the wreckage from scratch, possibily initially with pre-fab facilities.
My thoughts exactly. Travel the galaxy, meet fascinating life-forms and kill them. (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2000-06-12) :smallamused:
It still is doable with small armed force to secure an outpost. Take full advantage of orbital superiority. This (http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2004-06/rods-god) might be too costly, if you have to lift the instalation into orbit, but it's stupidly cheap, if you're already there and haul materials from an asteroid belt.

1. Prepare a solid batch of high yield thermonuclear bombs both as a panic switch and for high altitude detonations - this should be your first move during the invasion (fry communication and power lines, damage steel structures and generaly cripple almost every aspect of human civilization without contaminating the surface).
2. Have a solid batch of surveillance satelites in as wide range of sensor types as possible - hook it up to a supercomputer to track human movements. If you combine it with aforementioned tungsten rods and some other orbital weapons, you are almost set. Since our satelites have good enough resolution to spot cars and even smaller objects, you should be safe from any surprises.
3. If the scouts didn't do it, do a very throughout biological survey - edible food and dangerous microbes are your main priority along with anything that might be poisonous, halucinogenic etc. You don't want to end up like thise guys with the tripods.
4. Find a place for an outpost and start cleaning the terrain throughoutly. Preferably have two or three outpost just in case something happens to any one of them. Big open spaces would probably work the best. Whatever you use on the planet's surface should have a few independent self-destruct mechanisms - you don't want to give your technology to the natives.

Then, there is only one thing (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75V4ClJZME4) left to deal with.

The general point is, you don't need to establish your superiority through ground troops - orbital instalations would work much better for most situations.

[Lothston]

1. Implausible premise:

If we know FTL, then our tech is probably sufficient enough to build a Dyson sphere for all our energy and population needs, and the raw materials can be recovered from uninhabited planets.

2. If we still want to do it for the lulz:

I say biological warfare. Secretly disseminate several strains of powerful virii aimed at annihilating the indigenous sentients, sit back and watch the fireworks.

3. If we want to subjugate rather than destroy:

Orbital bombardment of greatest population centers and total annihilation of any space and nuclear capability. Then the population will bow to their new overlords. If anything goes wrong, fall back to Plan 2.

[Hopeless]

So we are an alien race that for convenience has the same environmental requirements and the same physiological strength and weaknesses as humans. We have faster than light travel for our space ships and have cultural and economical relationships with other advanced species, but the galaxy is such a big space that travel between these world still takes from several months to a few years. So it has been decided to build a permanent colony where ships can be resupplied, major repairs be performed, and crews can take a break for a few weeks.

By that justification it can also serve as your new colony


Since we don't want to wait for 10,000 years but want to start opperation within 50 years or so, terraforming is out of the question. An underground moon base or an orbital space station would be just as cramped and highly vulnerable to equipment failure, so it has been decided to build the colony on a lift-sustaining planet. Building factories for spare parts, producing nuclear fuel, and growing food is also a lot easier.

Would be easier to have the factories offworld to preserve the environment and have them mine the asteroid or other satellites of this system


An astronomical survey has found a number of planets that could be candidates and scout missions have found a planet that would be perfect. Based on close scans of the atmosphere and the composition of other planets and asteroids, it is all but certain that some kind of food can be gained from local plantlife and raw materials for constructions and ship repair can be found within the system in aboundance.
However, it is also inhabited and the scouts found evidence of communication sattelites and nuclear fusion, indicating that they also have computer technology and basic robotics. Based on the lights seen on the surface at night, it is estimated that the population counts at about 4 billion and we have a reasonably good map where the major population centers are. Given the similar gravity, the locals are likely to be of somewhat similar size, strength, and toughness as us. It is assumed that the scouts left entirely unnoticed.

Would have left a few scouts to keep it under observation if they thought they had remained undiscovered this would have helped reveal if the environment held any nasty undiscovered surprises or whether your species could walk among the natives and remain undiscovered.


This complicates things, but the planet has been selected as the construction site for the fully autonomous resupply and repair station. Asking the locals to lease a remote stretch of land and hoping they won't later change their minds has been ruled as being out of the question. They probably wouldn't come to a widely accepted descision anyway and there would always be some who are after our technology or just wanting to pick a fight. So we have to take full control over the whole planet and sufficiently pacify the locals before the station can go operational.

Given the population this would require the use of biological weapons and no nuclear or potentially lethal environmental hazards, ideally infiltration and having their agents work to assume a command post in preparation for the eventual arrival this could allow for a peaceful alnding and if not subvert the military response so it can be conquered with as little damage as possible to the environment or your incoming soldiers'.
Sounds pointless, wouldn't it make more sense to keep your base on this populated world small and unobtrusive as possible so you can limit the possibility of exposure and avoid military action since your comment indicates this isn't intended as your new colony but a stop off point and that doesn't need a large and obvious military target for the locals.
There's nothing you've described as requiring a large base if you want to avoid unnecessary violence, if your intent is violence then you may as well admit this is your intended target as your new colony world and stop making excuses that its only a stop off point.
Sorry to be blunt but what you described isn't what your inclinations are revealing, the locals may not be friendly but unless they have the means to detect you are they really any threat?


We allready have ten capital ships with crews of 10,000 each (twice as much as an aircraft carrier), plus sufficient numbers of escort ships, scouts, and transport shuttles. On the cargo list are supplies for the two year trip plus the first two years on the planet, and we also need construction equipment and building material for the first fortified outposts, mining opperations, and food production.

Phase 1: What do we need to pack for the trip?

Don't bother with the civilian side such as mining and the other stuff until the area is secured, keep any operations to the moon or other satellites so you can build up the materials you need when your military has secured the planet.
If this isn't your intended new colony world any military intervention wouldn't help you later, infiltration would help insure you have covered all your bases before having to resort to violence but such a mission would take decades at least even if you could find friendly help within the natives government.

[Selrahc]

If we know FTL, then our tech is probably sufficient enough to build a Dyson sphere for all our energy and population needs, and the raw materials can be recovered from uninhabited planets.


That's a rather hoopy statement. Both Dyson Spheres and FTL have serious issues as a barrier to creation, but the engineering challenges involved are almost totally different.

A dyson sphere requires the ability to move objects around in space on a massive scale, and it requires a super tensile solid beyond anything we can manufacture. We have some conception of the things we would need to do to get it underway, and we also know that it is incredibly impractical with the tools we have.

FTL requires breaking our current understanding of physics entirely. Which means it might be really easy!

[Soras Teva Gee]

A dyson sphere requires the ability to move objects around in space on a massive scale, and it requires a super tensile solid beyond anything we can manufacture. We have some conception of the things we would need to do to get it underway, and we also know that it is incredibly impractical with the tools we have.


An actual Dyson sphere concept is different. Its actually a series of satellites not a solid shell so while its very resource intensive to manufacture it isn't quite so fundamentally anything we haven't done.

There is a core of a point though that even with FTL we would have to master long term survival in space.

[dehro]

There is a core of a point though that even with FTL we would have to master long term survival in space.

nuh-uh... no need
cloning facilities and cryogenics.
have the ship follow the course in autopilot and start unfreezing the crew who then proceed to cloning the army when the ship is about to get in sensor range.

[SoC175]

If their population is distributed on their planet like ours (aka most people close to the coast), just attack the sea close to the cost and watch huge tsunamis washing away most inhabitants.

You wouldn't even need bombs, just throwing giant rocks from orbit would suffice

[Radar]

nuh-uh... no need
cloning facilities and cryogenics.
have the ship follow the course in autopilot and start unfreezing the crew who then proceed to cloning the army when the ship is about to get in sensor range.
If cryogenics somehow makes people immune to cosmic radiation which I doubt. In fact, stoping the natural body regeneration would make you even more vulnerable - it would feel like a strong, short pulse.

[Soras Teva Gee]

nuh-uh... no need
cloning facilities and cryogenics.
have the ship follow the course in autopilot and start unfreezing the crew who then proceed to cloning the army when the ship is about to get in sensor range.

Umm yes it would.

You think starships build themselves? That will require facilities in space and take several years. To say nothing of needing to maintain an environment for the periodic maintenance performed by the caretaker crew, who will have a presence 24/7 for the duration of the trip. No cycling crewmembers does not void this requirement.

Also you understand that cloning does not produce trained adults right.

[Fjolnir]

wouldn't the easiest way to deal with the problem be to strap one of these FTL drives to a medium sized asteroid, and use some sort of probe or satellite to guide the killer rock into the atmosphere and cause a mass extinction event, then drop in your troops to enslave the survivors once your soldiers that left on a confirmed hit to ensure that the chaos is pretty much over and all you need is to land and do cleanup and conscription...

[SlyGuyMcFly]

wouldn't the easiest way to deal with the problem be to strap one of these FTL drives to a medium sized asteroid, and use some sort of probe or satellite to guide the killer rock into the atmosphere and cause a mass extinction event, then drop in your troops to enslave the survivors once your soldiers that left on a confirmed hit to ensure that the chaos is pretty much over and all you need is to land and do cleanup and conscription...

Global-level ecological catastophes are out of the question if we want to actually colonise in a sane timeframe. The only point to taking a planet is a conveniently usable biosphere (otherwise you just use moons/asteroids/stations). Kinetic bombardment to the degree required to effectively wipe out the locals would leave the biosphere in a right mess for a good while. (http://users.tpg.com.au/horsts/climate.htm)

[Tvtyrant]

That's a rather hoopy statement. Both Dyson Spheres and FTL have serious issues as a barrier to creation, but the engineering challenges involved are almost totally different.

A dyson sphere requires the ability to move objects around in space on a massive scale, and it requires a super tensile solid beyond anything we can manufacture. We have some conception of the things we would need to do to get it underway, and we also know that it is incredibly impractical with the tools we have.

FTL requires breaking our current understanding of physics entirely. Which means it might be really easy!
I stuck a screwdriver into this toaster and it leapt out of my hands and into the ground. I lost my right hand and left foot, but now we know how to make FTL ships (the backs are giant toasters!)

[pendell]

I'm going to answer the OP's original question without getting into the morality of interstellar conquest.

What do we pack ?

Recall that since home base is light-years away, the invasion force must be self-sustaining. "make war support war". Consequently, we either bring it along or do without. But I'm going to assume it's implausible to get reinforcements or spare parts from home.

So what do we need?

1) A source of power that is sustainable and powerful. I suggest nuclear fusion generators. More than one.

2) A prefab automated factory something like this (http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Space_Transport_and_Engineering_Methods/Advanced_Manufacturing#Seed_Factory_Prototypes). Fire it into an asteroid field, allow it and its robots to start mining minerals for production and water. The factory should reproduce itself. Factories/miners/et al spread through the asteroid field, providing us with a self-sustaining industrial base. This will manufacture our war machines and our spare parts.

3) Lots of soldiers and others in suspended animation.
Remember that it is not practicable to get reinforcements from earth, so we should have bazillions of soldiers in suspended animation to replace the inevitable losses. If there is some way of growing people quickly , we should ship them as fertilized ova rather than as full-grown soldiers, because we can carry more of them that way.

4) Cultivate local allies.

I've read many of the posts upthread about the impossibility of a small minority conquering a larger majority. I remind the reader that this has been done frequently in history, from Cortes in Mexico to the British Raj.

How is it done?

Simple: By cultivating and using local allies. The army that eventually conquered Tenochitlan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Tenochtitlan) had a minimum of 80,000 soldiers, of whom a maximum of 1300 were Spanish. The others were local indigenous people who had more than enough of the Aztecs.

The raj (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_raj#Princely_states), likewise, ruled only a portion of India directly. There were 565 client states and kings who were part of the system, though they were nominally independent, they put a local face on alien rule, not only making the Raj more tolerable but ruling more effectively than aliens who couldn't speak the language. When it all blew up in 1857 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_mutiny), the rebellion was suppressed not by an army of British soldiers all the way from the UK, but by a Raj-loyal army of Sikh, Pashtun, et al as well as a core of British soldiers.

If we are to have any hope of holding the planet for any length of time, we must do so with the willing cooperation of local allies. If the planet is inhabited by a hive mind or by some other people that is wholly united, we cannot win. But if they are anything like us, then we can trade technology and military alliance with local leaders, who will provide us with intelligence, provide the bulk of our soldiery, do the day-to-day policing and governing of the local people.

Which brings us to :

5) how do we fight?

Even if we have billions of soldiers who can be fast-grown from fertilized ova, it's a finite resource compared to the immensity that is a populated planet. Consequently no matter how many soldiers we have we must spend them carefully. Locals will do the bulk of the ground fighting, backed up by space-support from us. We can use rocks as kinetic energy weapons anything from small tank-killers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Thor#Project_Thor) up to dinosaur-killing Extinction Level Events. We can support local troops much as modern US forces use drones to support their own operations. We must also, of course, entirely dominate space and allow no other to contest it with us. Thus possessing the high ground, we cannot directly conquer the planet but we CAN "pick winners" in any local war. Play our diplomatic cards right, and we will have no end of local nations, tribes, rebellions, anxious to have the fire of destruction rain down on our enemies.

Which brings us, to the final point:

1) The ultimate goal is less military conquest than it is economic dominance.

As Sun Tzu explained, the acme of skill is to get your way without having to fight a single battle. So rather than showing up in orbit with a 'submit or die' ultimatum. A better choice would be to trade technology and things we can get in space that they cannot make on the ground. Play our cards right, and the more they trade with us for things they cannot make the more dependent they are on us, the more we bring them into our system, the more they come under our control without a shot being fired. A man who must work for the money you pay him to provide the things you want at the terms you set is every bit as much a slave as if you held him at gunpoint. Of course, it's immeasurably cheaper because now you're using his self-interest against him -- he will hold HIMSELF prisoner far more effectively than guards with whips and guns and chains.

So -- come not as military conquerors but as traders. That's how the Raj got it's start , after all, as the East India Company (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_East_India_Company). Trade with those you choose, and set conditions under which that trade takes place. If those who trade with you enjoy an immense economic or military advantage compared to those who are not, then you're in a position to set conditions on those whom you have 'addicted' to your goods. As a creditor owns a debtor, you will then be in a position to impose changes on their society. As well as military and political alliances, which closely follow economic interest in any case.

Ideally, you set up this trading system throughout the entire world and within a few decades the entire planet is part of your system of economic dominance. But if they're anything like us, the planet will have stubborn people and proud people who for one reason or another will resist this system, to the point of military force. These outlaws and rebels will be dealt with by your local allies -- cultivated by your trade and dependent on it -- backed by 'rocks from the sky' and even special operations teams of your own , when they are absolutely necessary.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fjolnir]

Global-level ecological catastophes are out of the question if we want to actually colonise in a sane timeframe. The only point to taking a planet is a conveniently usable biosphere (otherwise you just use moons/asteroids/stations). Kinetic bombardment to the degree required to effectively wipe out the locals would leave the biosphere in a right mess for a good while. (http://users.tpg.com.au/horsts/climate.htm)

well remember, the ship, even at ftl, will take several months, if not a little longer to get there, it appears that a 2km asteroid would do the trick of removing the majority of the indigenous species, which would give you the foothold you need. Especially if you decelerate the asteroid and make it look like a local rogue event, that way when you show up as a species, you can appear benevolent; offering aid rather than the enslavement you really bring to the huddled masses of survivors.

[Flickerdart]

We put rockets on our planet and them move it to where we need it.

[Caesar]

Sorry I got stuck in the very first premise:

a) We have FTL travel
b) It takes a few months to a few years to travel between worlds

Pick one. Time is not linear. For the traveller, if you hit c, all perceived time is instantaneous. For an outside observer, if you want to break the upper boundary of space-time which necessarily implies a physical singularity, you might as well do so in a way that preserves the singularity; ie observation of instantaneous travel speeds.

It just curdles my physics nerves to think of "twice the speed of light" and then equate that to "halving the travel time between systems."

[Selrahc]

Pick one. Time is not linear. For the traveller, if you hit c, all perceived time is instantaneous. For an outside observer, if you want to break the upper boundary of space-time which necessarily implies a physical singularity, you might as well do so in a way that preserves the singularity; ie observation of instantaneous travel speeds.

It just curdles my physics nerves to think of "twice the speed of light" and then equate that to "halving the travel time between systems."

Only if the physics system by which FTL travel is acheived is relatavisitic. Which it almost definitionally is not.

If a ship moves through a series of wormholes or parallel dimensions at a speed that never approaches C as measured in MPH, but gets to a destination far faster... what is the problem with describing it as FTL travel?

[Fjolnir]

Well even if you were going "Faster Than Light", as long as you are traversing the physical distance, time is spent in travel for example it takes light about four years to reach the nearest star outside our solar system, if it took a ship 2 years to get there from the perspective of an outside observer, it would still be faster than light.

[The Glyphstone]

What if, when we get there, it turns out the planet has a plant whose sap, when properly harvested and distilled by skilled workers, is an incredibly potent intoxicant that we can market to the galaxy at large for ridiculous profits? The complication, of course, being that said plant grows only in a small region of its surface, can only be harvested during a small portion of their yearly cycle, and the workers skilled in its collection are members of a tribe with deep-rooted traditions in defying coercion or force by outsiders?

[pendell]

What if, when we get there, it turns out the planet has a plant whose sap, when properly harvested and distilled by skilled workers, is an incredibly potent intoxicant that we can market to the galaxy at large for ridiculous profits? The complication, of course, being that said plant grows only in a small region of its surface, can only be harvested during a small portion of their yearly cycle, and the workers skilled in its collection are members of a tribe with deep-rooted traditions in defying coercion or force by outsiders?

That's easy. Sell them alcohol and sell them axes. Find members and chiefs who are more interested in economic progress than they are in living in a jungle in stone age conditions. Have them provide the workers and keep discipline in exchange for manufactured goods as well as medical/technical/cultural assistance.

I would choose to base my policy on actual history instead of poorly-thought-out hollywood movies. And for every one heroic never-say-die hero in the history of , say , North America you can find dozens of other people who had their price. As strange as it may sound, when humans are offered the choice between following the old tribal ways and playstations, cars, wealth, and opportunities denied them in the tribal framework, there are many who would take that deal.

Of course, that's humans. Whether an alien species would have our psychology and motives is another question. But if they are anything like humans, we can find those who have their price and the vast, passive majority who will follow them. There will be heroes who resist us, of course. And in future generations they'll make hollywood movies about their great heroes and talk about how wonderful they were, ignoring the fact that they *lost*, completely and unequivocally.



Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Saph]

I'm going to go with pendell's plan.

You have a huge list of things that the inhabitants of this planet desperately want. You don't need to stage an invasion. All you need is a base, and if you play your cards right the inhabitants will fall over themselves to give you one.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Sorry I got stuck in the very first premise:

a) We have FTL travel
b) It takes a few months to a few years to travel between worlds

Pick one. Time is not linear. For the traveller, if you hit c, all perceived time is instantaneous. For an outside observer, if you want to break the upper boundary of space-time which necessarily implies a physical singularity, you might as well do so in a way that preserves the singularity; ie observation of instantaneous travel speeds.

It just curdles my physics nerves to think of "twice the speed of light" and then equate that to "halving the travel time between systems."

See here's the thing, as far as I've encountered there is no system of FTL that takes itself seriously and actually exceeds 3x108 m/s locally. Various hyperspaces go into another dimension with different properties, the jump/fold/stargate approach of basically creating a wormhole is also popular. Basically though ships themselves rarely travel FTL themselves, its only an illusion because they took a much shorter path.

Even Star Trek where ships have visually "normal" flight through space actually are compressing the space in front of them putting the warp in Warp Drive. Making allowance for how the ST writers often don't listen to their own technobabble. Which amusingly enough there is at least a semi-serious mathematical model to achieve that while it requires things not observed by science (imaginary mass I believe) and might never be practical to power is quite remarkable.

So since you seem to actually know about the physics above my merely casual knowledge can you try to explain what the problem with relative FTL is where c is not exceeded locally?

Preferably at a practical level, a la something like [Ship 1] is traveling from [Point A] to [Point B] which are [X] lightyears apart and only takes say a month.

I've posed questions like this before and have yet to get an answer.

[Mistral]

That's easy. Sell them alcohol and sell them axes. Find members and chiefs who are more interested in economic progress than they are in living in a jungle in stone age conditions. Have them provide the workers and keep discipline in exchange for manufactured goods as well as medical/technical/cultural assistance.

I would choose to base my policy on actual history instead of poorly-thought-out hollywood movies. And for every one heroic never-say-die hero in the history of , say , North America you can find dozens of other people who had their price. As strange as it may sound, when humans are offered the choice between following the old tribal ways and playstations, cars, wealth, and opportunities denied them in the tribal framework, there are many who would take that deal.

Of course, that's humans. Whether an alien species would have our psychology and motives is another question. But if they are anything like humans, we can find those who have their price and the vast, passive majority who will follow them. There will be heroes who resist us, of course. And in future generations they'll make hollywood movies about their great heroes and talk about how wonderful they were, ignoring the fact that they *lost*, completely and unequivocally.



Respectfully,

Brian P.

This, and you don't even need to deal directly with the xenophobic tribe to do it. Just find someone nearby that they annoyed somewhat recently with their deep-rooted traditions (which presumably exist for a reason) or that you can bribe, supply them with highly-advanced weapons, have them eliminate or displace the tribe, then deal with them. Compare the Beaver Wars, where the Dutch and English encouraged the Iroquois to war with the various French-backed Algonquian tribes in order to monopolize the fur trade after they had almost extinguished the beaver populations in their own lands. The ultimate end result of that was a massive population displacement in the Old Northwest and Upper Canada regions as the Iroquois systematically crushed the Erie, Huron, the Neutrals (<_<), and the Shawnee through superior firepower and tactics.

[Tavar]

Regarding the original situation presented, well here's my thoughts:

Okay, have you ever read Out of the Dark by David Weber? It actually gives a good example of how a race would go about doing it: take the orbitals, and then use Rods From God to eliminate major pockets of resistance. In the story, the invaders are helped because they are able to hack essentially all the military databases, and thus are able to target all military installations and forces.

Now, they fall down a bit due to their actual goals, as well as sub-par technology in several areas. Namely, due to the way galactic Civilization has advanced, planets generally unify around WW2 level technology, and when they get to space they don't have to worry about fighting their peers on the ground: if the orbitals are taken, it's over. Their ground forces are instead used to pacify the pre-industrial societies that are chosen for colonization, so their ground equipment and tactics are optimized against such enemies, rather than their peers or against modern militarys. This isn't to say they aren't advanced: they are, it's just their planetary combat units offensive capabilities are generally sub-par to our own.

In addition, they do want to use humanity, both as aids to research and effectively as troops. Thus they don't want to wipe us out initially, which limits their options. If they decided to not go that route, well, the destruction of every major city could be done pretty easily, and since you aren't using nuclear warheads, the environment wouldn't be too disrupted. So, population centers are gone, which if they're like our society (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AonYZs4MzlZbdFk3R1R1aXZPTlROdW9jZUpLZS1xV Gc#gid=0), is easily upwards of 70% of the population, at least in developed countries. Non-developed countries could be a problem, but in that case they generally lack the reach to attack outside of their local area. So, start setting up shop in the more depopulated areas, while striking at other areas if a centralized authority emerges, and to keep industry(the really threatening thing) starts up.

As for the population that isn't part of the ones you eradicated, well, you can either try to pacify them, or you can simply eradicate them.

Note, I'm not making moral judgements here, just giving the likely easiest path to take over a colonizable planet without doing irreparable harm to said planet's environment. This of course depends on the level of technology and centralization- if you're attacking a pre-industrial society, it would likely be much easier to go with Pendell's plan. I'm just not sure how workable such a plan would be against modern counties, like USA, China, India, Europe(not a country, I know, but pretty much all the European countries qualify), etc.

[Emmerask]

FTL requires breaking our current understanding of physics entirely. Which means it might be really easy!

:smallbiggrin: true ^^


We put rockets on our planet and them move it to where we need it.

Problem with that is that putting rockets with enough thrust on the planet will more then likely burn away the whole atmosphere ^^

[hamishspence]

What if, when we get there, it turns out the planet has a plant whose sap, when properly harvested and distilled by skilled workers, is an incredibly potent intoxicant that we can market to the galaxy at large for ridiculous profits? The complication, of course, being that said plant grows only in a small region of its surface, can only be harvested during a small portion of their yearly cycle, and the workers skilled in its collection are members of a tribe with deep-rooted traditions in defying coercion or force by outsiders?

Ah- John Ringo's Troy Rising.

The villains in that weren't that much more advanced than the people they were invading though.

[The Glyphstone]

Ah- John Ringo's Troy Rising.

The villains in that weren't that much more advanced than the people they were invading though.

Yup. Found it in a used bookstore yesterday and wondered if anyone would recognize it.:smallcool:

They weren't much more advanced, true, but they had what mattered in this situation - control of the high orbitals, and they were perfectly willing to drop KEWs on major cities for demonstrations. They wanted mineral resources without the trouble of digging it out themselves, and lacked the manpower to subjugate the planet by force (it was only a matter of a greater degree as to how much).

[hamishspence]

Yup.

While there might be expected to be collaborators, it doesn't necessarily follow that the defenders will lose long-term- sufficiently determined defenders may be able to hold out until they can get support from outsiders, or until the occupation group gets complacent.

[Karoht]

The main purpose of this whole exercise is "How do you make a plausible alien invasion that doesn't fall apart when you think about it for a moment?".
This is why I rather like 'bad guy' aliens in the vein of the Tyranids in 40K and the Zerg. Their purpose is to consume bio-matter and assimilate it and learn from it and adapt.

Why Invade?
Easy. More bio-matter and life forms to consume and adapt from. The more populated with more advanced creatures, the more there is to learn. Other planets with just vegitation and basic animal life is, for the lack of a better word, boring.

How Do They Invade?
If you pay attention to the 40K Tyranids, they invade by first sending in spores and eggs and creatures like Genestealers, who infiltrate the public, and begin learning from them already. Months or even decades later, when the Genestealers have infiltrated important military and infrastructure installations is when they move in with the bigger guns.

Reinforcements
The Zerg and the Tyranids breed their own reinforcements, rapidly, on the planets surface or underground. They only need to arrive with a few, and can assault with many.


As for humans? We generally have no need to invade anyone. And aside from an attack from something like the Zerg and the Tyranids or anything of the like, there is really no need for anything to attack us.
Even if we were a Gen1 or even a Gen2 race, we would still be largely insignificant to a Gen3 or higher.

The situation in a film such as Avatar is a bit closer. Humans encroaching on an ecosystem without regard for anything but the spoils is a bit more of our style.

If our enemy was the Zerg/Tyranids? Well that changes things.

Part 1: Study our Enemy
Find out how they move, where they seem to be moving to and from. Identify supply systems (as they would not be something we can just spot with the naked eye) and what counts as infrastructure for them. Hopefully learn something of their strategy and tactics as well.
IE-They use Melee to pin while using Range to shred our guys with no regard to theirs. Ensure to keep distance, use weaponry with longer reach, avoid engaging melee at all costs.

Part 2: Root out Infiltrators
Testing testing testing, need a foolproof way to ensure that person X is in fact not a creature in disguise. This relates intensely to Part 1.
This is where Tech Need #1 comes in. Diagnostic equipment. This is hugely important.

Part 3: Containment
Treat them like a disease and go for containment first. Seeing as they likely wouldn't have a homeworld per se (yes, the Zerg have Char, I know), merely just places of high population and low population, you would treat it kind of like treating a tumor. Cut it off as much as possible, prevent it from spreading as much as possible, fight it where you need to fight it.
(Yes, I am also aware that containment wouldn't work with the Tyranids as we don't even know the full extent of their reach)
With any luck, their air forces and capital ships will suck, making it easy to blockade them.
But don't count on it.
Tech Need #2 is solid capital ships and transportation capacity in order to blockade/contain.

Part 4: Scrubbing
This is where you start to push. Start isolating worlds and then burn them. Orbital bombardment followed up with joint efforts of orbital strike and ground forces.
Tech Need #3-99
Space and Atmospheric craft. Lots of it. Stuff that can go from a capital ship to ground and back again without refueling or major reconfiguration. Preferably craft that can operate well in both types of environment. Variable to the types of planets we would be seeing, but lets assume for now as per the OP that they have similar atmospheric conditions, and we will assume this for every world they are capable of inhabiting.
Weaponry suitable to the terrain and the enemy. No sense bringing short range machine guns when long range hit and run tactics are needed. No sense bringing long rifles to dense brush and urban combat. Plus, these weapons have to work in the atmosphere given.
Weaponry tailored to killing these things. If you need long range and high penetration, bring it. If you need short range and stopping power, bring it. Etc.


Just some speculation on the subject. It's largely silly to invade another race's planet for reason the OP already mentioned. It can be done, but the effort and energy and materials involved is just insane.

Cheers.

[Tavar]

If you don't care about inflicting truly enormous casualties, it isn't that bad, actually. It helps that, with complete orbital coverage, you have a massive advantage for operations.

[Qwertystop]

Hmmm...

Is it odd that my default image for FTL travel is a KK drive and space-plus?



On-topic:

First, stage an invasion of what appears to be a different alien species. Then stage your defeat of it. I think you can see where it goes from there.

[Fjolnir]

I suggested wag the dog on the first page, it seems to be an effective plan.

[RobotPerfomance]

I am in agreement with pendell's plan. Technologically superior minorities have been conquering local majorities for most of human history. I would add that we will have no shortage of our own equivalent to the maxim machine gun. Not just limited to our orbital superiority.

To compare: What if we took a modern carrier battle group and sent it 100 years in the past, to the turn of the century. No navy it the world could stand against it. In all likely hood this hypothetical planet is more than 100 years from reliable interstellar travel so the differences will be even greater.

The locals could maybe overwhelm us with raw numbers, but I find that to be an unlikely prospect. What is more likely that a worldwide alliance whose forces will fight to the death and keep coming in wave after wave, or that after the strongest challenger is beaten handily that everyone else will rush to get out of the way and look after themselves. Plenty of people and nations will take a deal rather than throw thousands of their own under the bus to kill one of us.

[Tavar]

The locals could maybe overwhelm us with raw numbers, but I find that to be an unlikely prospect.

No, they can't. It's called using orbital strikes to take out any concentrations of troops. Having the Orbitals basically means that you win, if you don't care about enemy civilian casualties.

[The Glyphstone]

I am in agreement with pendell's plan. Technologically superior minorities have been conquering local majorities for most of human history. I would add that we will have no shortage of our own equivalent to the maxim machine gun. Not just limited to our orbital superiority.

To compare: What if we took a modern carrier battle group and sent it 100 years in the past, to the turn of the century. No navy it the world could stand against it. In all likely hood this hypothetical planet is more than 100 years from reliable interstellar travel so the differences will be even greater.

The locals could maybe overwhelm us with raw numbers, but I find that to be an unlikely prospect. What is more likely that a worldwide alliance whose forces will fight to the death and keep coming in wave after wave, or that after the strongest challenger is beaten handily that everyone else will rush to get out of the way and look after themselves. Plenty of people and nations will take a deal rather than throw thousands of their own under the bus to kill one of us.

On the other hand, there are also notable examples of the technological minority being unable to achieve lasting control over a conquered territory. We will win any straight-up battle via orbital bombardment, air support, etc. (though the flaw in the carrier analogy is our hypothetical aliens have a supply line). What we need to worry about is the indigenous population resorting to guerilla warfare and tactics, using what they know about their home that we don't while terrorizing collaborators into rejecting us if we can't protect them.

[Aotrs Commander]

It's not about how much better the military is - being able to orbitally bombard the planet to dust means nothing if you run out of tea and sandwiches - so either you have to bring 'em with you (which is a lot of tea and sandwiches if you want to stay there for a while) or you have to fetch 'em from the surface. Which leaves you open for guerilla tactics.

(Unless you have teleporters, and scanners that can flawlessly detect potential problems (because even if the majority cows, they'll always be that lunatic fringe who'd prefer to die than obey that will try and sabotage you) - though again that raises the question of what need does a civilisation that advanced need from a planet that they need to conquer it. Heck, at that point, you just show up with a couple of freighters, teleport whatever you need up and bugger off.)

[DigoDragon]

I've been writing a story on this concept, and the invading aliens had packed a large supply of all the animals, insects, and plants they could find on their own homeworld. The "cargo" was shipped to the target planet and released all over. This introduced lots of new diseases and predator free creatures, making a mess of the planet's local biosphere. Since the aliens were accustomed to these things back home, it didn't bother them so much.

From here there are two choice I could see possible-
1. Continue to disrupt the indigenous biosphere which will eventually disrupt the food supply for the higher life forms.

2. Offer your extermination services to remove the alien creatures in exchange for whatever it is you want. :smallbiggrin:

[Tavar]

On the other hand, there are also notable examples of the technological minority being unable to achieve lasting control over a conquered territory. We will win any straight-up battle via orbital bombardment, air support, etc. (though the flaw in the carrier analogy is our hypothetical aliens have a supply line). What we need to worry about is the indigenous population resorting to guerilla warfare and tactics, using what they know about their home that we don't while terrorizing collaborators into rejecting us if we can't protect them.

There's a very simple method to eliminate guerrillas: kill everyone. The Orbital bombardments are simply a means to an end. Heck, you don't even have to kill everyone, really. You need to take out the militaries of all 1st, and maybe 2nd, world countries. This is helped by the fact that such militaries need quite a bit of logistical support, making them gather in certain locations. After that, pick a first world area, and strike every major city in it. In the US, that's about 82.3 percent of the population, and in the UK that's about 90.1 percent. Yes, not everyone will die, but by destroying the infrastructure, you basically doom them because in our society food needs to be transported and then distributed. Guess what's not going to happen now? So after writing off most of the survivors, you can then clean out the rest. Any time groups gather above a certain number? Take them out from orbit.

It's monstrous, but it's probably the one tactic that will always work. Hell, the Mongols showed that it did: if everyone's dead, no one can resist you.

[Aotrs Commander]

There's a very simple method to eliminate guerrillas: kill everyone. The Orbital bombardments are simply a means to an end. Heck, you don't even have to kill everyone, really. You need to take out the militaries of all 1st, and maybe 2nd, world countries. This is helped by the fact that such militaries need quite a bit of logistical support, making them gather in certain locations. After that, pick a first world area, and strike every major city in it. In the US, that's about 82.3 percent of the population, and in the UK that's about 90.1 percent. Yes, not everyone will die, but by destroying the infrastructure, you basically doom them because in our society food needs to be transported and then distributed. Guess what's not going to happen now? So after writing off most of the survivors, you can then clean out the rest. Any time groups gather above a certain number? Take them out from orbit.

It's monstrous, but it's probably the one tactic that will always work. Hell, the Mongols showed that it did: if everyone's dead, no one can resist you.

Which was why I suggested it earlier. Far more efficient than trying to invade a heavily populated planet that would require a massive investment of time and effort (because of your own supply lines), and still probably a better prospect than taking and holding bits of the planet. If you don't want to rule the people (why you invade a planet for conquest) and just want the planet's biosphere and resources, why bother with dealing with the native civilisation at all?

[The Glyphstone]

Which was why I suggested it earlier. Far more efficient than trying to invade a heavily populated planet that would require a massive investment of time and effort (because of your own supply lines), and still probably a better prospect than taking and holding bits of the planet. If you don't want to rule the people (why you invade a planet for conquest) and just want the planet's biosphere and resources, why bother with dealing with the native civilisation at all?

Exactly. In the long run, attempting to subjugate and rule a hostile population by force will eventually cost you more than you're getting out of it. Either make them your friends, kill them all, or take what you want and go home.

[Lord Raziere]

I'm going to take a different perspective on this:
If your alien race has figured out how to go faster than the speed of light, build ships with advanced engineering to safely transport everything inside, and is generally advanced enough to consider invading a planet as a viable option, chances are anything on said planet is no threat at all and will fail at any attempt at rebellion due to how advanced said alien race is.

after all, FTL travel in itself implies a vast mastery of energy, matter and technology. If we were invaded by anything with that kind of power over the universe, I don't think we would stand any chance against anything they have.
That and the alien civilization likely has colonized many planets before this. They could probably come up with the numbers to invade and hold it easily and fight on a scale we can't even imagine. They would probably out number us, easily.

[TheDyingTitan]

I'm reading what you're posting here and here is my thoughts:

1. If a race has FTL drives than there probably to the point where their avarge computer is more powerful than any of the race you invading

2. even if the invading race has an advanced computer with trinary (three digit code) an binary code of any lower civilisation will still work

3. you have two years to take over before having to head back so I would spend one year gathering intel on every last bit of infastructer, military, and governmental information so you know where to hit. I would do that by releasing probes to hack into all satilites in orbit and after that have tham depoly a passive information colecting computer virus

4. after the year of survalance I would try to make it so they depend on you, but if that does not work knock out all instalations on the planet that inclued military, government, infastructer, and capital cities. Kentic impactors would work quit nicely. I would still use the occasional nuke to take out hardend facilities like or norad

5. after thats done I would use arial combat drones to destroy any remaining military and other fighting capable forces

6. if said fleet is capable of atmospheric flight then I would do a low level flyby to scare the rest of the population into submition

7. then I would buld base on planets austrailia equalivant

[Elemental]

Why invade or sign treaties or anything?
Couldn't we just buy the land we need?
We choose an otherwise unneeded stretch of land, purchase it with truckloads of otherwise priceless gemstones that we can manufacture on a massive scale, and then construct our port facilities.
There are few on Earth who would object to truckloads of diamonds and sapphires and emeralds, etc. It is safe to assume that people on other planets are just as greedy.

Of course... We'd need to follow local laws in order to prevent problems, which in most countries means submitting our building plans for approval...

[Ashen Lilies]

You'd be able to sell off about one truckload of emeralds before the market for emeralds crashes and they become as worthless to the natives as they are for you.

[Elemental]

Then we'll just keep giving them stuff until their economy collapses.

[CapnRedBeard]

I'd launch asteroids at the planet. Just so happens to be a very abundant supply of said projectiles within the same solar system. Our intel tells us that they would be unable to stop an attack from that distance too. Doing the math in atmospheric burn rates of asteroids we have determined the ideal size to launch at said planet in order to completely destroy their infrastructure yet maintain a hospitable condition once the nations have been decimated.

I'd launch hundreds of asteroids of the correct size at the planet. If we have the tech to travel faster than light...we probably have the mathmatics needed to hit specific targets even from such a vast distance.

Once all of their electrical power was down on a planetary scale...all of their major cities in rubble...it's a matter of establishing a firm foothold and reproducing to increase our numbers.

[Tavar]

Then we'll just keep giving them stuff until their economy collapses.

Problem: if they use the US example, the money is only backed by trust in the government, not an outside good. So you can't really crash the economy in that manner.

Plus, if you started to do that, governments would wise up and pass heavy tariff laws.

[Ravens_cry]

If the good is desirable enough, that won't stop things. If anything it could create a black market and encourage smuggling.

[dehro]

Problem: if they use the US example, the money is only backed by trust in the government, not an outside good. So you can't really crash the economy in that manner.

Plus, if you started to do that, governments would wise up and pass heavy tariff laws.

according to a christmas movie I once saw, it's also based in a trust in god..
so there's your answer.. with their superior technology the aliens could just play god, be adored by the masses and have anything they want showered upon them as gifts.
hey..it worked for Cortes!.. and I figure there are at least a few sects and religions who build their core beliefs around aliens anyway.. plus half the tech people in the world would gladly sell their little siblings for the kind of technology the aliens could show :smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin:

[Elemental]

Problem: if they use the US example, the money is only backed by trust in the government, not an outside good. So you can't really crash the economy in that manner.

Plus, if you started to do that, governments would wise up and pass heavy tariff laws.

Oh well... I suppose you're right...

Anyway... Why are we invading again when we can get what we want through the simple expediency of a treaty? Find some country on the verge of economic collapse, and make diamonds rain from the sky* in exchange for the land we need.

*Just an over the top example. In reality, we'd probably just hand over some bars of platinum or something.

[Hopeless]

So what would happen if say you dropped something worth a heck of a lot but its been manufactured so that once refined it will degrade and pass on this effect to anything based on the same compound for example uranium but how about gold or a variation of oil.

This tactic depends on knowing what the natives value and more importantly is vital to their infrastructure or even power systems.

The important detail is to make this surplus look perfectly innocent, unlikely I know but if you cripple say their fuel production facilities or go so far as to introduce a superior form of silicate/graphene or whatever that they'll rush to use to improve their computer systems and then by adding the other part of the formulae it'll be rendered useless.

Could you orbitally target oil supplies so eventually you'll render them desperate for unspoiled resources and they'll subsequently fight over it once it becomes clear they can't afford to buy it and during this strife just judiciously eliminate the stronger foes until whats left is too weak to resist your invasion...

Oh and this could be done by meteor showering, it doesn't have to be in one just spread out so eventually one will do the job you just need to make sure they have no reason to suspect its the Daleks (or whatever you call yourself!)



I hope my meaning is clear (and not garbled as usual!!)

[Tvtyrant]

So what would happen if say you dropped something worth a heck of a lot but its been manufactured so that once refined it will degrade and pass on this effect to anything based on the same compound for example uranium but how about gold or a variation of oil.

This tactic depends on knowing what the natives value and more importantly is vital to their infrastructure or even power systems.

The important detail is to make this surplus look perfectly innocent, unlikely I know but if you cripple say their fuel production facilities or go so far as to introduce a superior form of silicate/graphene or whatever that they'll rush to use to improve their computer systems and then by adding the other part of the formulae it'll be rendered useless.

Could you robitally target oil supplies so eventually you'll render them desperate for unspoiled resources and they'll subsequently fight over it once it becomes clear they can't afford to buy it and during this strife just judiciously eliminate the stronger foes until whats left is too weak to resist your invasion...

I hope my meaning is clear (and not garbled as usual!!)

Like selling them dirt cheap piping for oil rigs, and then have the piping all come apart at one time? That would actually be pretty awesome, although I am not sure it would be very effective at getting rid of the local resistance bands.

Unless you made it so all the bullets broke down at once :D

[Hopeless]

Like selling them dirt cheap piping for oil rigs, and then have the piping all come apart at one time? That would actually be pretty awesome, although I am not sure it would be very effective at getting rid of the local resistance bands.

Unless you made it so all the bullets broke down at once :D

Or pulled a Sontaran trick or two (causes the bullet to fuse inside the gun rendering it useless or something like that!)

[pendell]

I'd launch asteroids at the planet. Just so happens to be a very abundant supply of said projectiles within the same solar system. Our intel tells us that they would be unable to stop an attack from that distance too. Doing the math in atmospheric burn rates of asteroids we have determined the ideal size to launch at said planet in order to completely destroy their infrastructure yet maintain a hospitable condition once the nations have been decimated.

I'd launch hundreds of asteroids of the correct size at the planet. If we have the tech to travel faster than light...we probably have the mathmatics needed to hit specific targets even from such a vast distance.

Once all of their electrical power was down on a planetary scale...all of their major cities in rubble...it's a matter of establishing a firm foothold and reproducing to increase our numbers.

One minor issue is if you still want the planet to be useable afterwards. I'm not exactly sure what an assault on the scale would do, but IIRC the one dinosaur killer that landed on earth so altered the climate that it became unlivable for whole ecologies.

If all you care about is a bare rock to mine for resources, that's one thing. But if you're harvesting live plants for medicine or what not you could destroy the very thing you came to the planet for in the first place.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Tavar]

One minor issue is if you still want the planet to be useable afterwards. I'm not exactly sure what an assault on the scale would do, but IIRC the one dinosaur killer that landed on earth so altered the climate that it became unlivable for whole ecologies.

If all you care about is a bare rock to mine for resources, that's one thing. But if you're harvesting live plants for medicine or what not you could destroy the very thing you came to the planet for in the first place.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Yeah, asteroids aren't the best method of doing it. It'd be much easier to just make/have the ammunition to have a better shape, and then do precision strikes. You don't have to hit all that many places before the first world militaries(the ones that are the real threats) are eliminated, and that leaves much less chance for massive environmental shifts. Assuming, of course, you're willing to go the kill em all route.

[CapnRedBeard]

One minor issue is if you still want the planet to be useable afterwards. I'm not exactly sure what an assault on the scale would do, but IIRC the one dinosaur killer that landed on earth so altered the climate that it became unlivable for whole ecologies.

If all you care about is a bare rock to mine for resources, that's one thing. But if you're harvesting live plants for medicine or what not you could destroy the very thing you came to the planet for in the first place.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

It was never described...what kind of creatures are we exactly? Similar to the dominant species...but how similar? Also I've read that the asteroid theory might have a few holes in it and might be a coincidence. (dinosaurs dying off due to impact) But that's neither here nor there in regards to efficient destruction of the dominant species. Knowing the burn rates of asteroids and the mass of asteroids that were not over kill was my premise. I want to eliminate only a city at a time...and I know exactly the size asteroid that takes. By all accounts the asteroid that presumably killed off the dinosaurs was overkill. Even with that overkill...

A good deal of water species for example lived through the collision.

Farming the oceans is very possible even with limited light due to atmospheric debris. Who is to say that we do not have the tech to clean the air either?

Asteroids are abundant, relatively local to the target, extremely effective and the dominant species has no way to stop a barrage that can last as long as it needs to.

And mining btw is speculated as the first economically feasible venture for deep space travel. Nothing else pays enough to make the trip worthwhile. Discovery is a loss leader at best.

[CapnRedBeard]

All that being said?

We are a carbon based life form...carbon being the single most abundant thing in our known universe. We are less than worthless as a species. We would be vastly inferior in technology and not a unique food source either. I cannot imagine why a alien society would want us alive at all if they desired anything from our planet.

I also cannot imagine them being unable to find a similar planet that offered even less threat.

Long and short of it is this: I really don't think we are near unique enough in any way to warrant any attention whatsoever. Unless they do not know how to make plastic...everything else can be gotten elsewhere with less effort.

If somehow ours is the only inhabitable planet in the whole of the universe for them...and they need everything to stay very similar to how it is now...spread disease. Inoculate your species...unleash the disease upon the enemy species. Have multiple strains ready to go in quick succession.

We have no chance whatsoever against any species with FTL tech. NONE.

[Tavar]

If somehow ours is the only inhabitable planet in the whole of the universe for them...and they need everything to stay very similar to how it is now...spread disease. Inoculate your species...unleash the disease upon the enemy species. Have multiple strains ready to go in quick succession.

We have no chance whatsoever against any species with FTL tech. NONE.

There are reasons to want earth even if you have some form of FTL. If instead of freetravel it instead uses something like wormholes or anything else that connects one point to another, then the Sol system might be a strategic one, and in that case if they have similar requirements then Earth might well be needed as a place to live.

But, yeah, against most reasonable FTL methods, we don't have a chance at our current level.

[pendell]

There are reasons to want earth even if you have some form of FTL. If instead of freetravel it instead uses something like wormholes or anything else that connects one point to another, then the Sol system might be a strategic one, and in that case if they have similar requirements then Earth might well be needed as a place to live.

But, yeah, against most reasonable FTL methods, we don't have a chance at our current level.

The solution to alien invasion of this scope is: Promptly surrender, play by their rules, be good little subjects, learn everything there is to learn about them. If at all possible, volunteer for their wars to get a firsthand education in their methods of fighting.

Then wait for a couple of different possible outcomes:

1) The Empire gets old or goes into decline. Wait for our chance, then make our bid for independence.

2) If the Empire allows it, get our people into positions of power so that the Empire becomes *our* Empire -- at least, as much as it is anyone else's.

This assumes, of course, they want to rule and not simply kill us all. If the latter, retire underground to shelters and become like "the little people" in Ireland. Stay out of sight and wait for our chance.

If they decide to do something really crazy like de-orbit the moon on our heads or drop the earth into the sun, well, there's nothing we can do about it so no sense worrying about it.

Respectfully,

Brian P.