Orbital Defense Platforms

In science fiction we often see immense starships attacking planets, crushing or besieging them, but in our own future we may deploy powerful orbital fortresses to defend our world.
Watch my exclusive video The Fermi Paradox Hermit Shoplifter Hypothesis: nebula.tv/vide...
Get Nebula using my link for 40% off an annual subscription: go.nebula.tv/i...
Get a Lifetime Membership to Nebula for only $300: go.nebula.tv/l...
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @isaacarthursfia
Visit our Website: www.isaacarthur...
Join Nebula: go.nebula.tv/i...
Support us on Patreon: / isaacarthur
Support us on Subscribestar: www.subscribes...
Facebook Group: / 1583992725237264
Reddit: / isaacarthur
Twitter: / isaac_a_arthur on Twitter and RT our future content.
SFIA Discord Server: / discord
Credits:
Orbital Defense Platforms
Episode 423b; December 3, 2023
Produced, Written & Narrated by: Isaac Arthur
Graphics:
Fishy Tree
Jarred Eagley
Jeremy Jozwik
Ken York/YD Visual
Legiontech Studios
Rapid Thrash
Sergio Botero
SpaceResourcesCGI
Udo Schroeter
Music Courtesy of:
Epidemic Sound epidemicsound.c...
Stellardrone, "Red Giant", "Ultra Deep Field"
Sergey Cheremisinov, "Labyrinth", "Forgotten Stars"
Taras Harkavyi, "Alpha and ..."
Miguel Johnson, "So Many Stars"

[@Thaumogenesis]

Nothing takes the fight out of someone faster than seeing a cannon larger than their whole spaceship.

[@DavidEvans_dle]

It does generate a brief pause.

[@pougetguillaume4632]

"I don't care how high tech you are, a BFG is a BFG" -some unsc commander probably

[@Peoples_Republic_of_Cotati]

"The Last Argument of Kings"

[@SoloRenegade]

and since they can't dodge, you just lob projectiles at it from teh edge of the solar system and destroy it.

[@Revan41411]

Or bigger then there home planet 😂

[@BastiatC]

The crippling problem with these sorts of stations is that you can't put a grate over the exhaust port.

[@MrSimonw58]

Something that will stop a banana

[@SoloRenegade]

the problem is they can't dodge long range projectiles. their orbital condition makes them extremely easy to destroy.

[@mattstorm360]

Well that would look awful, we got to think about resale.

[@RCAvhstape]

@@SoloRenegade It's not long range projectiles you need to worry about, it's keeping X-wings away from the equatorial trench.

[@SoloRenegade]

@@RCAvhstape It's absolutely about long range projectiles. I defeated the X-wings by removing the trench.

[@iainballas]

Just as long as the enemy doesn't infiltrate with a bomb. If they do though, make sure you have a supersoldier on hand to give it back.

[@RipOffProductionsLLC]

UNSC super MACs are the best.

[@mattstorm360]

So long as they ask for permission, first.

[@patrickkenyon2326]

That is what Marines are for.

[@iainballas]

@@patrickkenyon2326 The thing I love about Halo: While spartans were awesome, it was the UNSC marines that put the boot to alien necks for 20 years while the navy folded like tissue paper.

[@patrickkenyon2326]

@@iainballas Marines are tough as nails. Ask the Japanese. Or Iraqis.

[@marsar1775]

The SDS system in battletech is an excellent example of a orbital defense. ground based batteries supporting orbital drone warships, which are in turn stationed at orbiting battle stations when not in use. inflicted apocalyptic losses during the last few years of the Star League

[@TheRezro]

Yup. That sound reasonably.

[@Wildgamer2205]

Same with Super MACs from Halo

[@StacheMan26]

Nothing cools the desire to assault a planet quite like a constellation of orbital forts, each of which masses significantly more than the entire attacking fleet.

[@TheRezro]

But arguably spending that cash on interceptor fleets nay be better investment.

[@icecold9511]

​@@TheRezro Not really. Anything meant to be deployed away from home has to have much better propulsion and internal supply storage. In a defense platform, more that mass can become weapon mass.

[@Dang_Near_Fed_Up]

@@TheRezro You are thinking about a single purpose defense platform, I would posit that those would not exist. I would think that those platforms would instead be multipurpose platforms. For instance a 0 or near 0 G manufacturing platform, think of how many special materials could be produced without the disruption of gravity, or even atmosphere, on the manufacturing process. Or just the opposite an ultra high G, immense pressure, or specialized atmosphere manufacturing plant that produces materials with densities that make diamonds look like tissue paper. Orbital refineries for raw materials harvested from asteroids are also a possibility. The materials shipped to the refinery as a mass packet, requiring no transport ship to get to the platform I might add. Orbital solar collectors could send power down to the planet below, making the planet completely solar powered. Think of the advantages of free power for an entire planet. Orbital shades could also protect the planet and allow for planetary climate control or even terraforming. Then any or all of those manufacturing platforms are also the base from which the defenses for the planet are incorporated into. This not only makes the system cost effective, it should in theory turn a profit as well as providing special materials and resources otherwise unavailable to the planet as well as providing protection / defense.

[@boobah5643]

@@icecold9511 This is especially important because, since at _SFIA_ FTL is considered impossible unless stated otherwise, a 'mobile' fleet is centuries away from any other star... and you've probably got decades to react to an incoming fleet.

[@icecold9511]

@@boobah5643 Even with FTL, the issue remains a defender advantage. A mobile fleet trades mission capability for versatility and offensive use.

[@jayburn00]

Reminds me of super Macs from halo, the orbital weapon stations that have rail guns bigger than most ships. They talk about them in the fall of reach and halo 2.

[@Bornst3ll3r]

Rail guns bigger than most ships? No

[@animo9050]

"Cortana, you have the MAC" I mean imagine trying to invade a planet that has possibly thousands of cannons firing projectiles that travel at an appreciable portion of the speed of light

[@ASpaceOstrich]

I've been idly working on a post apocalyptic sci-fi setting and I've known I wanted orbital infrastructure to exist in some form. This one got me thinking. Theres some really powerful imagery and fun narrative to be found in orbital defence platforms constantly shooting down *something* out there in the solar system that keeps trying to hit Earth. The question of what keeps attacking, and what happens if something slips through are fun ones.

[@SecularMentat]

It seems like instead of firing a single large laser at a jittering target, firing an array of considerably less powerful lasers at a target. That is conveniently spaced so it hits every other meter at the engagement range. You'd do less damage, but you'd be MUCH more likely to score a hit. And a hit in space can be detrimental real fast.

[@boobah5643]

Sure, but you're talking about lasers. You're basically turning the laser into a search light, one effectively closer than the platform firing it, then trying to hurt someone with it by shining it on them. So, you hit the target, and it heats up a bit... but space ships already deal with heat, and you've already spent most of your energy trying to heat up ships that aren't actually there; is it enough to do any damage before the ship radiates it away? Not saying it can't work, but there's very much a tradeoff here; split your output too many ways (multiple lasers, moving mirrors, whatever) and you've done little more than announce that you're firing your laser to your target.

[@palehorseman8386]

In Miami, there is a statue of the man who invented air conditioning. I expect there will be several to the man who can efficiently remove space debris

[@stubbornspaceman7201]

One of my personal favorite ODPs from sci-fi is the Necklace of Artemis from Legend of the Galactic Heroes. Those things were so effective that one of the main characters Yang Weng-Li had to launch massive multi km long chunks of ice moving a near light speed in order to destroy them.

[@Mr1995Musicman]

For an RKM, even if you manage to intercept it with a cloud of small mass objects, if it's already on target you aren't changing its momentum enough to knock it off target. You may have even made it worse by turning it into a beam of plasma headed toward your planet instead of a chunk of titanium or whatever. That still transfers 10^21 joules into your planet. Severe, rapid atmospheric warming. You need to intercept it with something big enough to substantially change its momentum, or hit it with your own RKM, an anti-RKM if you will. Both defensive approaches are much harder than the initial RKM approach.

[@boobah5643]

It somewhat depends on where you drop the small mass objects; further away means more of the RKM debris will be deflected enough to miss. And if you're shooting into/through a busy orbital space then that debris likely just became someone else's Very Bad Day. Which is why stories where it's against the rules to bombard planets are _very_ careful when it comes to orbital infrastructure; even if you're not worried about an accidental colony drop, an RKM (or fraction thereof) that misses an orbital station can do Bad Things to the planet it's orbiting.

[@jerryandersson4873]

Ah the old it is better to be hit by a shotgun slug then shotgun pellets debate. I never understood why tho, as a soft ish defence like kevlar cloth have better time with pellets, as do our atmosphere against small stuff that is left. And defenders could no doubt soften it up even further with man made obstacles at the least.

[@DanielMontgomery-l2z]

To be fair you should fire a few thousand RKMs to show them your serious. That would ignite the atmosphere…

[@jerryandersson4873]

@@DanielMontgomery-l2z yeah, the danger is probably not ONE RKM indeed. I dunno how the debries and energy released during intercepting them will affect both the defence or ofence. Defence sensors detecting them, and stuff getting left to possibly foul the following RKMs guidance, and possibly even collision with the debris. If the RkM are so spread out as to not affect one another, or be cowered by the same defence/debris cloud. They may lose some of the point of overwhelming a spot on the defence. Still, with good enough guidance and planning I can see a focused attack on one "point" of a defence grid always being best way to get past any defence. Space is huge, and a simple diverse angles would be way enough to both saturate and hopefully not make it more difficult for oneself. Timing and WHERE any defence, and how deep it is, is always a factor.

[@DanielMontgomery-l2z]

@@jerryandersson4873 well the coin WOULDNT release its full energy. Most of its energy will be turned to plasma. A big hunk of led can take that heat. Also the mass of the RKM is still very much headed your way. Some of it is not plasma. Some of it is fragments. Most of the RKMs are still on track. And I would think of them as more like a long ranged weapon system instead of a close in weapon system. Think 3000rpm And track an enemy ship about as well, but from insane distances. At those distances, it would be like a huge shotgun and you would shoot a whole area of space in hopes of a couple near hits. Like depth charges

[@cannonfodder4376]

Another informative Sci-Fi Sunday episode Isaac. Now if only more Sci-Fi implemented the tech well as you described...

[@MonarchRigel]

look, some of us aspiring authors are working on it.

[@edstoutenburg3990]

BabV! "-it was the last-of the Babylon Stations..." The series pioneered some of the eRly CGI effects loke you said, even some before DS9. The show won some awards for its effects also.

[@arcadiaberger9204]

"When I saw the target planet's orbital forts had cannons with a muzzle big enough that I could fly my ship into it . . . I knew exactly where I needed to aim my ship, didn't I?" -- Warpilot Junior Grade Zack Zodgers

[@asvarien]

Regarding the winch idea, space fighters in Brandon Sanderson's Skyward series of books sometimes have energy lassos that they use for free manoeuvring or grabbing enemies to pull them into a kill slot.

[@isaacarthurSFIA]

Figures, one of the few books by him I haven't read yet :)

[@ravenvoid3463]

Which is funny because I finished the last book and looked up to this notification. Totally on topic

[@cosmic_cupcake]

one way to make lasers "guided" could be reflector drones. just stick a mirror to a high speed drone and launch it towards the enemy. The evasion routines of the drone could be syncronized with the mothership so it can keep the beam on the drone from.far away even when said drone is pulling some absurd evasive maneuvers. the drone can then reflect the beam on target.

[@smoore6461]

Babylon 5 is my all-time favorite Science Fiction series. When i saw the Orbital defense plaftorms title i thought about B5 as well and the president turning the platforms in on the planet.

[@dragoninthewest1]

The Exforce Series by Craig Alanson has pretty good depictions of near world space combat, including the extensive use of ODNs (Orbital Defense Networks) by all space faring species. One of my favorite parts is when the Jeraptha used shaped nuclear devices attached to STO missiles to create single use GRASER weapons. Honestly, all of the space combat is solidly done. Things like momentum, distance and the speed of light are constantly mentioned. Makes me wonder if he's a fan of the show.

[@jakekidd6431]

Feels like the "First rule of warfare don't get hit." Was missed.

[@Dang_Near_Fed_Up]

Take a look at the space based defense of Earth in the pilot of Buck Rogers (1980's TV series), it basically was a planetary minefield with only a few safe paths to reach Earth known only to the Terran Defense Forces. Paths which could be changed by altering the minefield. Now imagine trying to navigate this while being fired upon by tens of thousands of projectile and energy weapons (not in the TV show). You would never stand a chance as the attacker, as you would be wrecked by weapons fire on well known and pre-plotted firing solutions.

[@pauledge1621]

The Lost Fleet series does a great job of describing practicle space combat.

[@BrentHollett]

The Honor Harrington series has a lot of work on this sort of thing, and ships don't start to outweigh orbital defenses until they can build missile range outside the platform's reach, and throw weight can swamp the platform's defenses.

[@kennyburkamp4054]

Or just the accuracy of kinetics just get that good keeping in mind that stations aren't that mobile in specially those that are connected to the planet that requires them to stay synchronize with the rotation of the planet it makes them fish in a berral if you can somehow out effective range them and hit them with something that they can't defend against like a bunch of targets to small and fast to shoot in space the speed and direction of projectiles stay the same so they will hit a full force at any range it just a matter of the targeting computer speed of projectiles and the distance and mobility of the target and size is what decides the effective range in in that aspect railgun that can shoot stuff at the fraction of the speed of light is king

[@TheRezro]

One detail a lot of people miss is that Nuclear Pump Laser and Casaba-Howitzers (plasma) would work excellently as warheads for the long range missiles. They are possible way to counter point defense weapons. As those do not exactly work against ray weapons. With of course a option for fragmentation rounds or kill vehicle. Depending what work best. Beside near Earth space combat, I see no point in attempt of directly hitting the target.

[@boobah5643]

Unless they've read an Honor Harrington book, since in that setting missiles (admittedly, gravitic propulsion there) with bomb-pumped laser warheads are the primary weapons for warships. And maybe a lot of people do miss this, but I'd thought it was a pretty well-known series.

[@peterpan4038]

What a refreshing topic! Everyone LOVES to debate over how to destroy earth/ planets/ stuff all the time. In contrast defending against such attacks mostly boils down to "striking first" or "energy shields". I'm convinced there is a lot more room to explore on the topic of defending against space based weaponry.

[@DavidEvans_dle]

Remember a book by David Campbell Hill - "Invasion" were the approaching invasion fleet was attacked by a Gamma Ray Beam from an united Soviet & USA weapon project. Basically they were dead "Men"(more rodent, marsupials like) flying after that. still the book didn't address what a fatally irradiated ship crew would do on final approach. I guess the only viable strategy are kamikaze attacks. It was written in the 80s so.

[@francoiseeduard303]

Orbital Defense Platforms will be awesome additions to my planet Swarms along with thin film shields in the direction of enemy system(s), armed space habitats, & early warning array immediately outside my Oort Cloud! They will never be able to kill us all off!

[@innerstrengthcheck]

a new IA released right on bedtime is a great coincidence every time 💗

[@JosephHarner]

@14:25 this is an area where real world "phasers", or "Phased Array Lasers" shine. While less power efficient than a monolithic laser optic, phased arrays (already popular in modern radar and radio communications, such as Starlink) can steer a beam onto target without any moving mechanical parts.

[@lonjohnson5161]

Given that structures using active support sit atop a long tube firing mass up the tube, a final shot by a dying structure could be to release its support material in the direction of the attackers.

[@peasant8246]

Before watching this video, let me take a shot at this topic: stationary military objects in orbit around a planet are a terrible idea. No reasonable amount of armor will help them survive a volley of multi ton Kinetic Kill Vehicles approaching them at 10 - 100km/s, and even if you were to blow some up with nuclear missiles the fragments will still keep moving in your direction due to immense inertia. And each KKV is likely much cheaper than a nuclear missile. Even if we want to give these orbital platforms some limited mobility, it's gonna work against their main strength as you'd have to greatly reduce their armour mass in order to give them acceptable delta V with reasonably sized propellant tanks.

[@atlanciaza]

I just thought about this, but the way to really screw with orbital defenses is to send relativistic kill missiles, and use a laser weapon of relatively weak effectiveness, so that the beam of the laser arrives just before the kill missiles, blinding sensors on these platforms with the laser, and then bang, no more platform. Also any light that is blocked by the missiles, will only appear as if the collimation of the laser is beginning to fade.

[@sgt6826]

Has anyone seen Legend of the Galactic Heroes? They have some truly massive space fortresses covered in a liquid metal ocean. It might not be practical but it's an interesting idea.

[@ynraider]

"Iserlohn Fortress", IIIRC...a practical 'meta-planet as a mobile defense platform'... And they had several different types! Masterpiece Scifi anime!

[@Itssmial_Ova]

Hey Issac, Do you upload these episodes to a Podcast platform? I am trying to spend less time on KZbin and I'd love to keep updated with your channel.

[@isaacarthurSFIA]

Yep, we’re on every major podcast platform

[@miltenignis1017]

Very nice episode, as always. Regarding this topic, for an interesting take on it I can recommend taking a read at the setup of defense stations protecting the sol system in the sci-fi novel series Perry Rhodan, at least around the time they are attacked by the "Time Police" (I think at least, it's been a while since I read that cycle). Overall it's a (while not terribly realistic) great sci-fi series to read imo, at least the first few (15 or so) cycles (story arcs).

[@stcredzero]

One of the better bits of military Sci-fi I've watched in the past year.

[@fudalefu1]

In ww2, sometines a battleship would fire a volley from their main guns with each turret at a slightly different elevation, in hopes that one shell would hit (after getting the range of the target). I would think laser weapons could do the same. A ship could be outfitted with 5 separate laser weapons, capable of aiming in the same direction. The ship could range the target, and fire once at where the target is now, visually, and the 4 other lasers could fire to the top, bottom, left, and right of the target. The ship could triangulate and estimate how far away from the target to ask the other 4 lasers. It’s basically a shotgun blast of laser weapons.

[@ilejovcevski79]

Arguably on of the best episode thus far.

[@thejuggernautofspades9453]

They dont need the self destruction codes, just go to the reactors and make them inoperable Even back ups , batteries, anypower source

[@Phil-D83]

Stargate atlantis startek ds9, babylon 5, etc used these. The earth defenses in babylon 5 that president clark turned towards the planet were awesome. Planetary sheilds and surface mounted weapons would work wonders as well.

[@midnight8341]

Stargate Atlantis used a single orbital defense weapon if I remember correctly? And I truly love that series to bits, but the logistics of that episode were also kinda bad in a the-script-needs-this-to-happen kind of way. That orbital cannon wasn't in planetary orbit, it was in stellar orbit around the outskirts of that solar system (it took them what 10h, 14h to go there by puddle jumper?) and the Wraith ships just left hyperspace right next to them? Why exactly? Because the Wraith knew it was there, just that it had been dead since 10000 years. And yes, hybris and all, but if I want to attack and eradicate someone, I'm going to do my darndest not to fall out of hyperspace next to the only, very obvious defense force left in the entire system (except the city itself). Now, just from a writing perspective, it would have been a great opener for the battle if they had moved the platform from its orbit (maybe it got de-orbited during the battle 10000 years ago and has been drifting through the solar system ever since) above Atlantis (you know, where the Wraith had to show up eventually) the ships were greated with an active defense platform upon falling out of hyperspace, immediatedly opening fire and destroying one of them with debris falling from the sky around the city during the battle. Then it could have been destroyed just as it was in the series. And yes, moving it would have probably been hard, but the Ancients had to do it and I doubt they would build anything without engines anyway, so if they hinted at the platform in an earlier episode and started that episode a few weeks earler to allow enough time for maneuvering with partly-damaged engines... that would have made more sense in my opinion.

[@icecold9511]

The B5 one was ridiculously overpowered. Could wipe out the eastern seaboard of North America in one hit. Going to war with God?

[@Phil-D83]

True. As you know, the wraith are among those alien races too stupid to actually exist in reality for said reasons.

[@edward3190]

Defending a planet is pretty absurd when you really think about it. A few nuclear missiles and a few thousands decoy missiles would destroy cities, and they are very hard to stop because a planet is so huge that defending very possible direction is practically impossible. A good idea is: not living a planet, nuclear explosion is not very effective in vacuum of space

[@rayceeya8659]

Man I love Babylon 5!

[@TheRealCatCatCat]

In the X series of videogames and associated books, humanity builds a giant ring around the Earth as a defensive platform against a fleet of AI ships, that they had sent out centuries before. In fact, the construction was considered a necessity to prevent those ships from destroying Earth's surface (and ecosystems) further. Ironically, after it was destroyed through an act of sabotage, sections of the ring fell down on Earth causing huge devastation.

[@fudalefu1]

I read in a book, “he Last Ship”, that the most effective weapons are not huge bases, large naval ships, or large ICBM missiles. The most effective weapons platform is a small platform that can deal a large amount of damage, and can be replicated and prod use in high qualities. A nuclear Cruise Missile from a destroyer is more dangerous than an ICBM fire from a fixed position far from impact, and traveling in high orbit. A nuclear cruise missile is one of hundreds on a single destroyer. That destroyer is one of hundreds of destroyers. That cruise missile can be fired from very close to the post of impact. That cruise missile flies low, and fast, hugging the terrain, nearly untraceable untill it’s too late. The lesson is that the best orbital defense would be hundreds of small platforms with high powered laser cannons, or missiles, places far apart. That way the loss of one hardly affects the planets defense. And the strike can hit the enemy from any direction.

[@BigZebraCom]

Will drinks and snacks be served on these Orbital Defence Platforms?

[@mill2712]

Of course! Got to make sure your personnel are well taken care of. Along with tourist if offered, inspection teams, and meeting top brass. That's the first rule of warfare.

[@fudalefu1]

Kinetic weapons are so often overlooked in sci fi. We forget Force = mass x acceleration. You don’t need a large explosive. All it takes is a small object moving incredibly fast to cause massive damage on Impact. There have been media that explored the idea of dropping a telephone size tungsten pole from orbit onto a location, causing destruction equal to a nuclear bomb. So, how about creating a creating kinetic ammunition, fired by rail gun from small maneuverable craft, like a destroyer? That would be extremely dangerous to a large enemy spacecraft.

[@wallyhiggens5369]

I love the way this dude talks! Reminds me of one of my favorite people back in the navy! Great video!!

[@Mike5Brown]

It is kind of interesting to hear that space combat is actually only one dimensional when it comes down to it.

[@egoalter1276]

Well, from a certain fidelity of simulation, yes. But facing definitepy does matter a lot, as ships are a lot more likely to be tapered cylindrical than spheroid, making armour significantly weaker, and target cross section greater from flanking shots. But there's also the fact you are largely limited to linear orbital paths. All on all its a very unique combat environment, best approximated perhaps by submarine combat, with information lightlag being replaced with sonar bearing uncertainty.

[@RealCodreX]

Now it is official! There are NO excuses anymore! Planetary Cannons video when!?

[@stevelux9854]

One thing that is always left out of such presentations, books, movies etc. is that all rail guns, slugs and other ballistic weapons require force compensation during use and reorientation because as we know for every vector action there is an equal and opposite reaction that must be compensated for.

[@johnnycampbell3422]

Without magical shields, mobility is better than mass at solar distances. A ship could spend any amout of time propelling asteroids with optimal timing of collision. With a light hour of distance, nothing could hit you.

[@thatravendude]

I hereby steal the term "automated killamajig" for all of time. Perhaps the greatest thing I have ever heard!

[@JustCallMeCrow]

In Supreme Commander 2, one of the best methods of destroying an opponents very heavily defended base is to send your massive and relatively cheap flying super units over the base and let the defenders own anti air defenses shoot it down and crush everything underneath it. This tactic is called 'flopping' and can be devastating if you aren't able to bring it down before it reaches the base

[@AdamantineAxe]

Seems like carrier-launched fast-attack craft armed with long-range two-stage cruise torpedoes with multi-kinetic-warheads launched in synch-fired waves would be better than charging your capitals into engagement range

[@umbraelegios4130]

When it comes to physical slug ammo. Think of the "Gyro Jet" ammo only the size of the rounds used in Naval Guns.

[@SIrL0bster]

Another thing worth bringing up, planets are BIG. You can have a shitload of missile silos and other ground based defenses that just overwhelm an enemy fleet by sheer numbers.

[@emilsinclair4190]

Problem with that is that space is even bigger.

[@realcawnflakes]

Colony drops are a very concerning thing.

[@barryon8706]

Vet the designers for Goa'uld influence before the paltforms go to orbit, though.

[@zutzun8230]

I love your long ones. I often go to sleep listening to your stuff and dream of space scifi stuff. Its amazing lol!

[@jymcaballero5748]

i love how you arrange 19 century strategy to space combat, 1) an enemy just need to be on orbit at the other side of the planet, the defense platforms cant be omnipresent while the defense could never reach the atacker the atacker just need to bombard the surface or even better just drop some biological poision on the atmosphere and the planet is gone ;D 2) since aceleration laws still work on space, an aproaching atacker just need to drop some misiles from far and sincronize them to arrive at the same time , so the defenses will be overhelmed in the second they can detect the atack., considering the aceleration of the space ships could be near light, the atack would be the start and the finish of the defense on the same second. still i love your tryes ;D

[@emilsinclair4190]

1 does not work for missiles that can fly around the planet.

[@rharris22222]

Honor Harrington fan glad to see this episode!

[@rharris22222]

I should probably add a shout out to Tyler Alexander Vernon for creating Troy.

[@UpperDarbyDetailing]

@@rharris22222you have great taste

[@rharris22222]

@@UpperDarbyDetailingThanks. I think it's more like I have been captured. I saw John Ringo on TV once, read "Live Free or Die," found David Weber through searching for more Ringo, started listening to HH on Audible, and absolutely could not stop listening to either author. I start sweating and shaking if I go too long without a fix of Ringo, Weber, or Kratman or one of the other "Hard science fiction" authors. I especially like how both authors seem to ask ahead of time "How little cheating of physics can I do and still tell the story?" And often they tell you exactly where the cheats are create a rational fiction to cover the new physics. HH in particular seems to have started by Weber asking himself how much cheating was required to transport Horatio Hornblower into space.

[@patrickkenyon2326]

​@@rharris22222There is a Weber- White book series that is very similar to Honor Harrington. David Weber and Steve White. The first book is called " Crusade"

[@6point8esspcee68]

I imagine that it will be the same then as now. A constant battle between offense and defense.

[@topdog5252]

You have touched on the possibility that science could come to an end one day, when we have discovered all there is to discover. That made me wonder if math would be the same. In a sense math doesn’t really exist, like the laws of physics do, but will mathematicians always have more theorems to prove, as each new theorem can be used to logically prove more theorems, or is it possible there is some limit to math?

[@luigivercotti6410]

Goedel's incompleteness theorem covers that actually. No system can be simultaneously consistent (ie a statement can only be exactly true or exactly false and nothing else) and complete, (ie every conjecture can be proven or disproven from a finite base of axioms). That is my understanding at least In essence, while every theorem can be used to prove more theorems generally, there are times when no matter what you do you just go in circles. The famous example is the 5th postulate. Mathematicians had toiled for so many centuries to either prove it or disprove it, but it turned out that it could not be done. The base of axioms (axioms are the statements you accept to be true in order to build your first theorems) of math at the time simply did not cover it. So, axioms must be completely _independent_ statements, and the fact that there's already examples of many only obviates the trickery of Goedel's theorem. It was just silly to assume that the bunch of axioms we'd identified already would somehow be special and the only ones in existence, and, ultimately, _not_ as infinite as the primes

[@topdog5252]

@@luigivercotti6410So if there is potential for an infinitude of axioms, there is a lot for mathematicians to do. Unless many results are all trivially similar when you choose some different axioms.

[@luigivercotti6410]

@@topdog5252Yes, you could say there is "a lot", I guess infinity counts as "a lot". As for what happens, taking different axioms can lead you to _wild_ places if you go far enough. Some of the craziest mathematical constructs we've had so far, like Non-Euclidean space, and the Banach-Tarski theorem all stem from taking an alternative position on key axioms, namely the 5th postulate and axiom of choice respectively. I'm sure there'll be things that don't change all that much or at all if you flip one axiom off or another on, stuff that's either completely or mostly covered by other axioms in your base, but if you push it, eventually, it's gonna go bananas somewhere. It has to, it's like if two identical ships started off from the same point with just the slightest misalignment in direction, eventually they'll find themselves in opposite ends of the world. The real question for me is the motive. Like I always said, math is just logic, they're one and the same, and all logic, ultimately, is just an advanced form of tautology. Yes, some people can always go forth and keep deriving seas of theorems across a whole galaxy of axiomatic worlds, just for the fun of it, and to see what might lie next; But that sort of wanderlust can't fuel an entire civilisation with some vested interest in practicality. Obviously every avenue must be explored, because you never know for sure just where the tools for the next technological/scientific breakthrough might be hiding, but when the options are literally infinite, and your time and resources, whether on the planet, in your astral system, in your galaxy, or even to the heat death of the universe, are all very much not, priorities have to be considered. What might happen to the math of a civilisation at the end of time? If they, like us humans surely would, still always look up, and still struggle to find any escape, any loophole, any tool to cheat their death, but all the "obviously practical" kind of math has either run out, or more likely the terms "practical" and "obvious" are things that you and I today can't even begin to comprehend how they might apply to a race of intergalactic gods; Well, what then? Do you take shots in the dark and just hope your salvation, if there ever was one, waits round the next corner? Maybe, most likely now that I think about it, there's advanced fields of meta-math, math that you can use to predict where the math you need to do is hiding, and meta-meta-math too, and so on and so forth, but what if your program "returns 0", so to speak? What if your equations tell you that no, you can't escape, that even though the realm of tautology is infinite, still nowhere in it lurks anything that will give you ftl, time-travel, the power to defy entropy or anything else? What then? I suppose you could always make more advanced theories of meta-meta-meta-meta times a billion-trillion -math, but it's not like there _has_ to be some solution there, and seeing as you're running out of time, is this really how you want to spend what will probably be your last moments? In a black, empty world, delving madly into ever more obscure and abstract math, divorced from all physicality and intuition, logic on logic on logic that describes logic on the subject of logic, surrounded by nothing except your buzzing thoughts, like an ant fallen in the middle of the Pacific trying to swim its way to shore, not even knowing in what direction or if at all there's land anywhere? Anyways, good night

[@jdmjesus6103]

Really enjoyed this episode, thanks! Changed a lot of ideas i had about the subject with your usual sharp intellect.

[@tonyorobsky]

Like most things in military, a single type of unit won't get you far. Orbital defenses won't be enough on their own to defend a planet. It will have help from a defensive fleet and planetary defense. If you assume that you and the enemy have energy weapons, then you can assume that the plateform can have enrgy shielding as well, reducing the amount of armor and need to dodge

[@emilsinclair4190]

The biggest problem with such stations is that space is so big that creating them would cost to much in most situation. Spread out a few deactivated missiles waiting for a single to get a better result

[@virutech32]

Granted when you are defending a planet how much space you have to defend is rather limited. Also large-aperture lasers, relativistic kinetics, & especially relativistic sails can use very little mass to sweep very large volumes. Soace is big, but it's not like we're short on mass. We have a whole moon up there. More than enough to litter earth's orbital space with hundreds of billions of orbital stations.

[@emilsinclair4190]

@virutech32 you underestimate how big space is. And while objects like planets van indeed servearly limit the ammount of simmultanious attacks they run into the problem that the enemy van be literally lightyears away hile firering at the planet since the orbist can be calculated. So while defending might be possible attacking the enemy that attacks you is basically impossible. And si ce this is the case the enemy just needs to evade your fleets until they have ammased enough ships to fire so long that they overwhelm your defenses. Remember each station is one ship less that could hunt them down before they have this critical mass. And with bio weapons/nanoviruses they just need to get a very small putting into the atmosphere

[@virutech32]

@@emilsinclair4190 Assuming a defense envelope with a radius of 185.9 light seconds/(minimum distance between earth & mars) & stations with a 1 light second radius kill envelope it would take approximately 6.4 million stations. A pittance.

[@virutech32]

@@emilsinclair4190 in other words good luck assembling a big enough fleet to overwhelm the orbital deffences of a whole planet & its moon

[@emilsinclair4190]

@virutech32 The density is to low. Let me explain. To transport a Virus that would destroy earth you would need something like a tennisball. Now tell me how many tenisball size objects could enter the defended area at once? The numerous is unimaginable. If we assume that they travel at basically the speed of light each station would need to shoot down trillions of tennisball sized objects in just 2 seconds. And even if they would be able to do so directly behind them could be trillions of additional waves of projectiles. Overwhelming the defences would be extremly easy. This is already a problem for modern air defense systems. They are so expensive that jo country has a full ballistic defense shield. And those systems that exist can easily be overwhelmed.

[@GoranXII]

A few high-gigawatt output power-plants, at the base of some space-elevators, and you can put some _really_ beefy lasers up there, maybe big enough to one-shot smaller enemy ships. Not only would you _not_ need space for a reactor (some capacitors might be useful though, in case the elevator gets damaged), but the enemy can turn the station into something approaching Swiss cheese and still not fully disable it.

[@midnight8341]

Okay, but why not put a giant field of solar arrays in space around the elevator station? That way you get 100% power output all the time, because there's no wheather, you don't need to worry about making room on the ground in what I'd assume is one of your busiest economic hubs on the entire planet with truly insane real estate prices, but you wouldn't even need to worry about getting the power up there without major losses (assuming convenient superconductors don't exist, because then that argument is mute). But also, you'd have an enormous solar power plant during peace times (so 99% of time that's not plot related), driving down the insane cost of orbital defense. Oh and in case the elevator cable gets snapped (people on the ground might not see this as a win, though) the elevator station will simply turn into an autonomous weapons platform instead of a dead counterweight with just a few rounds of ammo (energy in supercapacitors) left. Yes, I see the problem with making your station about 1000 times larger in diameter with those solar arrays, but if you run the cabling right, even if they turn those arrays into swiss cheese, you will probably only loose a few % of power output. It would still be way more economic to target the actual station where all the connections run together and that does the shooting anyway.

[@GoranXII]

@@midnight8341 How well do solar panels work after being peppered with buckshot?

[@midnight8341]

@@GoranXII pretty irrelevant at orbital velocities, because even heavy armour isn't gonna safe you then. Or how well do you think your giant lasing lens is going to work after that (hint: it has to point directly at the enemy/oncoming rounds to fire).

[@GoranXII]

@@midnight8341 Such weapons are also useful against the attacker. as for lasers, other than at firing, they can have lens caps.

[@andrewharbin8062]

I’ve always envisioned six platforms around a planet (2 polar, 4 equatorial) for full coverage of a planet. However you could do it with less but you’d need to have them further away from the planet.

[@andyf4292]

i dont know how the orbits would work

[@midnight8341]

@@andyf4292 if you place three or four of them around the equator, far enough for their fields of view to overlap, the other two or three could orbit in polar orbits that take them along a meridian from pole to pole. Like that solar probe that took pictures of the suns poles for the first time?

[@mesoanto1031]

So orbital system won

[@michaeltyance]

Morning everyone!

[@alamos8]

6:00 If your beam emitter could be orientated while firing, and you are able to sustain a beam during some seconds, you could create a movement pattern to sweep the uncertainty window and greatly increase the chances of hitting tne target

[@fudalefu1]

A major technology in space combat would be stealth technology, able to get a small craft like a destroyer, close enough to an enemy craft, to fire kinetic weapons by rail gun, without having to account for movement of the enemy.

[@Micromancer85]

I liked the repurposed astroids in John Ringos Troy Rising , multi kilometer nickel iron armor and lots of missiles.

[@DavidEvans_dle]

One of Carl von Clausewitz - "Principles Of War" is used the terain. Wondering if an attacking fleet could introduce a directional magnetic field near the sun causing a solar flare. The premise was done on DS9 to destroy a Dominion Ship yard. While not destroying the orbiting platforms outright, EMP would be a Carrington Event on steroids!!

[@midnight8341]

The Prime did that in Peter F. Hamiltons Commonwealth Saga. Solar flare bombs that, when deployed would create an enormous exotic matter vortex in the stars coronasphere and just pump plasma from there in the direction of where the planet will be. They sterilized an entire planet with a week-long mega flare.

[@clanpsi]

This entire episode was just an essay on the defenses of Calth.

[@thesaturdaytechchannelwith553]

3:20 I'd always recommend ensuring that any orbital defences are always manually controlled as any wireless system always risks getting hacked and turned off or the inevitable risk of the defences being used against your own ships, non-hackable defences or the planet itself is too high of a risk. I've got a feeling that when planetary defences will alarm the general public that can shoot ammo that will more than likely do similar damage to that of a small nuclear bomb if any the ammo hits the planet that it's supposedly there to defend which is a why any plantary defences must fire rounds that rapidly burn up in the planets atmosphere and cannot hit the Earth's surface as there will be times when the plantary defence crews are are practising and they would accidentally fire a round at Earth and that would be an obvious tragedy for an entire city or bit of Earth to wiped off the face of the Earth... because of an accidental misfire... It's also probably a good idea for any rounds being fired to have an inbuilt means of dissolving itself after being fired over a particular distance so that we can reduce the amount of dangerous, fast flying space debate debris that exists in outer space.

[@midnight8341]

Just ignoring terrorism, rogue AI and such for this specific scenario, how exactly would you accidentally shoot a piece of dangerous ammunition towards earth? Because point defense rounds would be small enough to burn off in the atmosphere, just like miniature meteors do. And you're not going to have a lot of cannons for anti-ship weaponry on that station because of their incredibly energy consumption. So it should be pretty difficult to not only point that thing towards the planet, as you most likely would need to rotate the entire station (for safety reasons to MAKE this as hard as possible), but to also fire it... with all target uplink systems NOT telling you, you know, that there's a planet in the way?

[@grapy83]

How good the defense platforms (specifically beam weapons) could be against relativistic kill missiles RKM or close to RKM that were launched in a partially sneaky way(nothing can be totally sneaky in space, i have been told :)).

[@jaymikevillanueva1212]

Hmm. ODPs are a good idea but it's gonna have to be in two flavors: manned and automated. Manned ones ought to have the dual purpose as a fortress and a space station of sorts. It could coodinate defenses with automated OPDs and a defense fleet or whatever local naval assets assigned to defend the planet. Good topic, though!

[@sarcasmo57]

Need to defend from big natural incoming big rocks at the very least.

[@kayakMike1000]

well... first thing I would expect is an electron beam spanking the hull. That's going to make x-rays and make the platform very warm... so magnetic shielding to bend the ion beam around would be a good idea... bending an ion beam still might make some x-rays but depending on how its bent, so the crew isn't irradiated... furthermore, that ion beam could be used as an energy source for more magnetic fields, at least until the entire platform gets too hot.

[@dansmith1661]

Imagine having a fleet get defeated because it went through an asteroid belt that was a secret weapon.

[@songhan1586]

problem with interstellar warfare is what is to prevent your enemies from launching asteroids at your planet at c fractional speeds? Very hard to stop and they can launch them at distances beyond your reach

[@baldassarealessi1007]

Thank you video brilliant compliment

[@notprovided1131]

I hope in the future, humanity will be more enlightened and we won't have wars, let alone in space, so hopefully the only need for these platforms will be defence from natural threats

[@MinedMaker]

I think a blatant massive orbital defence station is great for fiction, but makes no sense in reality. A small, hidden, and distributed defence grid all over orbit, the moon, or the wider solar system makes way more sense. If you think about it, that's exactly how defence installations work in modern military doctrine too. Star-Trek-esque mega-stations are redicilous.

[@es4583]

Bigger station equals more power output, which equals longer ranged directed energy weapons. The weapon range from a station that masses 100000 tons is not equal to that of a station that masses 100000000 tons.

[@jutau]

Always love to watch your videos.

[@sambojinbojin-sam6550]

Would things like Venus's or Titan's atmosphere be considered an orbital defence? Not so much a platform, but a widely dispersed shield of sorts, that either ablates, disperses, fries or freezes many types of potential kill vehicles or beams.

[@matthewthompson6455]

Ok we definitely need a video on this. Atmospheric planetology in regards to planetary defense

[@tristanbackup2536]

"Something not right. The fleet that destroyed Reach was 50 times this size." "Sir, additional contacts. Boarding craft & and lots of 'em!" "They're going to try to take our MAC guns offline, give their capital ships a straight shot at Earth, Master Chief, defend this station!" 😁

[@death13a]

You really DO NOT need multiple orbital Fortresses. All you need is 1 Battle Moon. Using missiles or railgun (by skating on planet's atmosphere to curve trajectory) can cover 90% of planet and that can be covered by fleet. Those battle moons would require very reggit command structure as not to use against the planet.

[@RLCO-ko7ur]

Just seen it on my feed and tapped just to like the video and comment but will watch later!

[@MrBradWilliams]

Surface: Army, Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard, Marines. Orbit: NASA Can we create a new "Orbit" department led by Issac Arthur? Sorry to be US-centric on this comment. It worked for the bit.

[@Blaxjax21]

What about the spread of a beam, at what range would it loose effective power?

[@pokeface119]

Its probably easier to bypass random junk and mines by using solid metal slugs as an attack because if you make it go fast enough then whatever it hits will also follow a similar path.. But theres a lot of variables that go into it so it all depends

[@midnight8341]

Not if you go fast enough to vapourize it on impact. Also, don't forget transfer of momentum. A single chip of paint hitting a solid tungsten-steel projectile head-on with interplanetary speed would probably rip the entire thing apart due to this weird semi-liquifying effect of high velocity impacts on solid metals. But if you hit it not head-on but at a slight angle, all the energy of that impact will generate a force vector in the opposite direction. And depending on how far out that happens, you could miss an orbital target, the city on the ground or the entire planet whatsoever.

[@boobah5643]

@@midnight8341 Does it really matter whether your biggajoules of kinetic energy are carried by a vapor rather than a slug? It's worth pointing out that, since planets are doing the whole orbital dance thing, just slowing down the RKM would be sufficient to make it miss its target. Depending on how tight the targeting was supposed to be, of course.

[@midnight8341]

@boobah5643 yes it does? Because particles will always spread out, meaning you can either hit an area of a square meter or the cross section of an entire planet with that energy. But that's not what I meant. By vapourize I meant that yes, junk will follow the path of whatever hit it by transfer of momentum, but not if said junk vapourized into an omnidirectional cloud of charged particles on impact. And yes, that's also what I was talking about. If you hit the RKM with anything, the resulting blast will either likely completely destroy it (if the RKM is hit head-on) or will knock it of course if ever so slightly angled. That's exactly what I said...? "Slowing down" is completely relative in space, because any push will accelerate a target and depending on your view, if that vector is negative, it's slowing down.

[@rustymustard7798]

The best armor to have in any sci-fi space battle is plot armor.

[@eman54132]

Thank you

[@atlanciaza]

Liked, checked notifications, gathered necessary supplies, namely a snack and a big drink. All items checked, let's have an Arthurday, on sunday...

[@phdupont2500]

Spare Change is gonna be the name of my orbital defense shotgun.

[@logosmaxima2775]

On subject, "Artemis Necklace" from "Legend of Galactic Heroes"

[@paxdriver]

TLDR - in interplanetary space warfare, a planet is closer to an armoured vehicle than a residential ecology lol

[@RandomGuyOnYoutube601]

So, what is stopping the defender from deploying 100 guns with each having 1% probability of a hit and make a grid with 100% probability of hitting?

[@isaacarthurSFIA]

The same thing stopping the other guy from deploying 100 drones probably. I think we can assume both are fielding as many assets as they can