The Principality of Zeon in Enterprise era Trekverse

[Darwin]

Is that why you're linking to irrelevant crap when you say you can turn off the life support in a giant habitat with a functioning ecosystem? Is that really why?

You moron, the space colony does not have a functioning ecosystem, because its environment is not identical to Earth's, or any planet with a functioning ecosystem! Or is 70% of the O'Neill cylinders' internal surface occupied by bodies of water, to sustain the algae needed to produce an equivalent percentage of oxygen in Earth's atmosphere?

It would just be smart design to do as much as possible with the ecosystem. It's clear that plant life is abundant inside a UC O-Neill, and much (over half I would say from a guess) of the air recycling is unassisted. The air quality would eventually go down to unbreathable without the scrubbers and farms, but that would take a long time. The colony has to be self-sufficient to really work at that scale. WE don't know the details, and it probably involves a few massive towers reaching to the spinal core, full of nothing but algae, but I'd call it functioning.

[Stark]

Don't forget the farm ring, either.

[Ford Prefect]

Ask the people who work for Sunrise. Why did the scriptwriters think you can turn off the air in an O'Neill cylinder? (Note: I think the Titans actually turned off the air recycling system, so it wouldn't simply filter out the nerve agents they introduced into the colony.)

The colonies in Mobile Suit Gundam are basically the most scientifically accurate element of the show and are depicted as behaving almost identically to how they would if they were actually built. They rotate somewhat too fast, but this is for drammatic effect. It's pretty clear that Tomino got a copy of Gerard O'Neill's work and said 'guys, read this'. They are space habitats, not space stations. They are self contained, fully functioning ecosystems in orbit. They are not identical to Earth, but they don't have to be: Jesus, this is even an element of worldbuilding in the show. Zekes on the Earth can tell the difference just by breathing.

Hm, thinking about mobile armors brings me to the I-field generator, which can completely block minovsky particle weapons, but as for its effectiveness against nadion particle weapons like phase cannon, it's a technobabble toss-up.

I-fields exploit Minovsky particle physics, so I would generally assume that if your weapons don't use it, then they will just ignore the I-field. At most, it may be able to deflect 'normal' charged particle beams as well.

[Jade Owl]

The colonies will always be extremely vulnerable, either to the array or to hit-and-run attacks. But I don't know if Starfleet is willing to attack civilian installations. If they were, they could hold the colonies hostage and force Zeon to disarm that way, but I doubt they would.

I kind of doubt Starfleet would use such a weapon on the Zeon colonies, being 'good guys' and all. As for hit and run attacks, it depends on the realspace targeting ability of the UE ships. If they have to slow down to less than a blurry white streak, a defending big zam/brawbro/elemeth could tear them apart.

This is my ignorance of Gundam talking again, so I'll ask: Are Zeon's military facilities housed in the same O'Neill cylinders occupied by their civilian population? Because if their military shipyards are housed in separate facilities, there’s no reason why the UE can’t used the verteron array to destroy them or smash them against Luna.

If phase cannon are ineffective, it could be destroyed by photon torpedoes assuming they could get through its formidable point defense. (28 AA beam guns) if all else, the i-field has a time limit of 20 minutes before having to be shut down due to heat.

Using point defense beam guns might be counterproductive. If this theory as to why nobody uses phasers as point defense against photon torpedoes is correct, then the Big Zam would be disabled anyway and be torn apart with phaser fire.

[Ford Prefect]

This is my ignorance of Gundam talking again, so I'll ask: Are Zeon's military facilities housed in the same O'Neill cylinders occupied by their civilian population? Because if their military shipyards are housed in separate facilities, there’s no reason why the UE can’t used the verteron array to destroy them or smash them against Luna.

Probably both. A Baoa Qu, Zeon's fortress asteroid, was certainly capable of producing Mobile Suits and other materiel when under the control of the New Desides in Gundam Sentinel. However, it seems likely they also produce ships at their colonies, and if I had to guess their terrestrial weapons, like tanks and IFVs are probably built within the colonies, under gravity.

[RedImperator]

The colonies will always be extremely vulnerable, either to the array or to hit-and-run attacks. But I don't know if Starfleet is willing to attack civilian installations. If they were, they could hold the colonies hostage and force Zeon to disarm that way, but I doubt they would.

I kind of doubt Starfleet would use such a weapon on the Zeon colonies, being 'good guys' and all.

If the array is capable of gentle nudges, then it should be possible to push the colonies into solar orbit. The people inside will be fine, but now the Zeon fleet approaching or at Earth is cut off from its logistics base. And of course, they'd have no problem using it to blast Zeon fortresses.

As for hit and run attacks, it depends on the realspace targeting ability of the UE ships. If they have to slow down to less than a blurry white streak, a defending big zam/brawbro/elemeth could tear them apart.

Trek canon is pretty consistent about ships having to drop out of warp to engage STL targets (there's some ambiguity in TOS, but not in TNG+ onward, nor in Enterprise). However, as has been discussed before, the units defending the colony will have absolutely no warning an attack is incoming. From their point of view, Starfleet ships will simply appear within weapons range of the colony. Starfleet can fire as soon as it drops out of warp, then get the hell out of there. There's not a lot of reaction time for the defenders, and even at impulse, Starfleet ships move faster than anything Zeon weapons have been designed to hit.

[Redleader34]

The big deal is Zeon CANNOT and WILL NOT win this war. Half the reason for Zeon's invasion of Earth was resources. M'Quve explicitly states in the battle of Odessa that they "had taken enough supplies to keep the war going for 10 years", but with no Earth bases, Zeon can ONLY try a colony drop, or they will loose, but as another poster said, Char will more likely than not start his rebellion sooner anyway, leading to internal chaos. Zeon looses either way, its just a matter of when and where. As long as the Enterprise can warp out before the Zaku IIs and other MS can lock onto it, it wins

Destructionator XIII The Jupiter Energy Fleet takes 5 years to go between Earth and Jupiter, its a known number in UC. Zeon cannot win this without destroying itself by removing enough people/sacrificing a colony, and even if it is as destructive as the impact that destroyed the midwest, it won't be the worst disaster Earth has seen. Although it would pretty much make Zeon a target for every federation ally in space. This is a hard loose for Zeon.

[avatarxprime]

Time favors UE, not Zeon. The Romulan War is going to bring a military buildup and a military alliance with the Andorians and Tellarites (as well as militarizing Vulcan). After that, Earth will be the capital of the Federation; even if Zeon took Earth at that point, they couldn't keep it.

I agree that militarily time favors UE, but even as it stands right now a military win for Zeon is dubious. However Zeon does have politicians who know how to run the common masses. The founding of the Federation will create opportunities for Zeon to enter galactic politics and gain some power. That is of course dependent on them following a good diplomatic approach because as we've seen in TNG and DS9 it is possible for a small, but highly placed group of people to exercise a great deal of control over the Federation and Starfleet. Whether the Zabis would be willing to give up on any kind of direct "Har, Har. I dominate you" type of win or not is something I'm not entirely sure on.

At any rate, disarming or at least docking, locking down, and allowing UE inspectors to board their ships is going to be condition one for any diplomatic negotiations if UE behaves anything at all like any other human state which has ever existed. Zeon isn't out in the boonies somewhere. They're less than a million kilometers from Earth. They're deep inside sovereign UE territory. It's a hostile act to maintain that much active military hardware inside another nation's borders.

Except Zeon is also a sovereign nation that has been placed into UE territory by some unknown force. It can't be seen as a directly hostile act considering they were uprooted and brought here, nothing has been by their choice. UE and Zeon would have to talk about territory and the most likely direction would be Zeon wanting to remain independent while UE wants to absorb them. Considering all the Temporal Cold War nonsense that went on during Enterprise it's likely Archer would advocate a gentle touch with Zeon. He'd probably think they are some poor alternate timeline humans (given their tech level) and try to show them the benefits membership to the UE will grant them.

Why would it, exactly? Starfleet has months to harass and destroy any Zeon expedition to the asteroids, and thanks to FTL, they can do it with near-impunity. And even if UE happily lets them, what is Zeon's economy going to do while they're waiting for the supply ships to get back?

I mean it would end badly because such actions would prompt Zeon to take hostile actions against Earth. It's already been discussed in this thread how that would be a bad thing.

First, Starfleet has more than the NX class available. Second, why would Starfleet assault Zeon at its point of maximum strength when it has the ability to dictate the time, place, and terms of every engagement? If it did come to hostilities, Starfleet can ignore any ship at the colonies until it starts to move, and then Starfleet has days to consider what to do about it.

I know Starfleet has more than the NX ships. In my first post in this thread I listed a couple of them and asked if anyone knew if they were Intrepid class or not. However, the NX class are their big bad ships. They are the fastest, biggest and most heavily armed ships Starfleet has. The lost of either one would be significant.

*snip about advantages of FTL against a strictly STL race*

I know that this gives Starfleet a major advantage, but as of the start of this scenario they have 4 or 5 ships in system, with the rest apparently far enough out that they never bothered recalling them while Enterprise went to deal with the Xindi. Of those ships only the NX class seems to carry heavy armament considering the way Archer and Forrest were talking about the Columbia in The Expanse. The Intrepid class should be able to do decent damage and certainly enough to kill a Zeon ship. The Sarajevo class is an unknown. Still, those ships can only do so much damage and if Zeon makes a push for Earth they will force them into a stand-up fight. Given the most recent calcs for Zeon weapons, they can certainly dish out enough damage to take down those ships. There is also the factor of Minovsky particle which will mess with UE equipment, although to an admittedly unknown level.

Also, you mention the Vulcans coming to assist Earth. I don't exactly see that as likely. Throughout Enterprise the Vulcans repeatedly showed little interest in helping Starfleet during conflicts as noted by Shran multiple times. They might even view any conflict between Zeon and UE as an entirely human issue where they should not intervene in the slightest.

The only other way they could probably convince Zeon to disarm is to trade warp tech directly as Zeon would probably be willing to reduce arms in exchange for that.

Warp tech? Try iron. Zeon has no resources except what it has stockpiled or can recycle. Even if they capture the moon, the heaviest metal there is aluminum. The colonies are self-sufficient in food, water, and breathing oxygen, but most industry necessary to support a modern economy (and space fleet) is going to grind to a halt. Given what's been said in this thread about Zeonic propulsion, I don't think they could get to the asteroids and back in time to avoid an economic catastrophe even if there was no Starfleet interference at all.

Agreed, for some reason I was thinking they got their towed in resource asteroids as well.

Oh lord. You sound like one of those Trekkies claiming the Federation can reverse-engineer a hyperdrive, duplicate it, and install them on all their ships in time to affect the outcome of a war against the Empire. By all means, please, show me the proof that Zeon can retrofit their ships with an engine whose technology they don't understand, based on physical principals they haven't discovered, built with an industrial infrastructure they don't have (even if they did have access to the raw materials), running on an extremely dangeroous power system with which they have no experience, using fuel they don't have and can't manufacture. This is before we talk about the ludicrous infeasiblity of them actually acquiring warp technology to begin with. The Vulcans won't give it to them. UE only will if they're catastrophically stupid or Zeon makes huge concessions. Nobody else has access to them and would risk conflict with UE and the Vulcans if they tried to sell them warp technology.

A basic warp 1.0 engine seems easy enough to put together. Zefram Cochrane did it in a post-apocalyptic setting with minimal resources and using a converted Titan missile that could be found in 2063. Given what we see in First Contact their Earth's tech level at that time is not so high that Zeon should not be able to replicate warp 1 engines. At that stage at least warp plasma coils were just simple copper pipe (or at least they could be used in place of whatever Cochrane had originally) and they still used relatively normal things like titanium. Based on some earlier drafts of the script the Phoenix was even nuclear powered. I don't think its been stated whether the final power source for the Pheonix was M-AM or not. I don't intend to mean anything about Zeon magically developing a Warp 5 engine or anything even close.

[RedImperator]

Time favors UE, not Zeon. The Romulan War is going to bring a military buildup and a military alliance with the Andorians and Tellarites (as well as militarizing Vulcan). After that, Earth will be the capital of the Federation; even if Zeon took Earth at that point, they couldn't keep it.

I agree that militarily time favors UE, but even as it stands right now a military win for Zeon is dubious. However Zeon does have politicians who know how to run the common masses. The founding of the Federation will create opportunities for Zeon to enter galactic politics and gain some power. That is of course dependent on them following a good diplomatic approach because as we've seen in TNG and DS9 it is possible for a small, but highly placed group of people to exercise a great deal of control over the Federation and Starfleet. Whether the Zabis would be willing to give up on any kind of direct "Har, Har. I dominate you" type of win or not is something I'm not entirely sure on.

This is probably Zeon's smartest play. If they play their cards right, they can join the Federation as founding members alongside Earth. And since they don't depend on habitable planets, they can settle anywhere in Federation space. Long term, they can be a major player in the Federation. Of course, they don't know the Federation is coming, but really, all they need to do is not be belligerent, contribute troops and crewmen to the Romulan War, and they're in.

At any rate, disarming or at least docking, locking down, and allowing UE inspectors to board their ships is going to be condition one for any diplomatic negotiations if UE behaves anything at all like any other human state which has ever existed. Zeon isn't out in the boonies somewhere. They're less than a million kilometers from Earth. They're deep inside sovereign UE territory. It's a hostile act to maintain that much active military hardware inside another nation's borders.

Except Zeon is also a sovereign nation that has been placed into UE territory by some unknown force. It can't be seen as a directly hostile act considering they were uprooted and brought here, nothing has been by their choice.

That's why I said "maintaining" that much hardware. It's obviously not a hostile act if they just show up against their will. But they can't keep a warfleet that size active and expect anything but tension and hostility from UE. At the very least, they'd have to allow inspectors on board.

UE and Zeon would have to talk about territory and the most likely direction would be Zeon wanting to remain independent while UE wants to absorb them. Considering all the Temporal Cold War nonsense that went on during Enterprise it's likely Archer would advocate a gentle touch with Zeon. He'd probably think they are some poor alternate timeline humans (given their tech level) and try to show them the benefits membership to the UE will grant them.

A light touch would be smart on the part of UE, because Zeon's sheer numbers do allow it to threaten Earth even with their technological disadvantage. However, it's politically impossible for UE to allow Zeon to retain full independence. Internal autonomy? Not a problem. But full independence means that, for example, Zeon could invite the Klingons to use their colonies as a port of call. Or that Zeon could harbor criminals from Earth. Or that, yes, Zeon could build a military that could threaten Earth. Whatever agreement Zeon and UE come to, it's going to involve concessions on Zeon's part.

Why would it, exactly? Starfleet has months to harass and destroy any Zeon expedition to the asteroids, and thanks to FTL, they can do it with near-impunity. And even if UE happily lets them, what is Zeon's economy going to do while they're waiting for the supply ships to get back?

I mean it would end badly because such actions would prompt Zeon to take hostile actions against Earth. It's already been discussed in this thread how that would be a bad thing.

If relations have broken down to the point that Starfleet is firing on Zeonic expeditions to the asteroids, Zeon's probably already made a move on Earth already, or is preparing to make a move, or the situation is bad enough that Zeon is likely to make a move.

I know Starfleet has more than the NX ships. In my first post in this thread I listed a couple of them and asked if anyone knew if they were Intrepid class or not. However, the NX class are their big bad ships. They are the fastest, biggest and most heavily armed ships Starfleet has. The lost of either one would be significant....I know that this gives Starfleet a major advantage, but as of the start of this scenario they have 4 or 5 ships in system, with the rest apparently far enough out that they never bothered recalling them while Enterprise went to deal with the Xindi. Of those ships only the NX class seems to carry heavy armament considering the way Archer and Forrest were talking about the Columbia in The Expanse. The Intrepid class should be able to do decent damage and certainly enough to kill a Zeon ship. The Sarajevo class is an unknown. Still, those ships can only do so much damage and if Zeon makes a push for Earth they will force them into a stand-up fight. Given the most recent calcs for Zeon weapons, they can certainly dish out enough damage to take down those ships. There is also the factor of Minovsky particle which will mess with UE equipment, although to an admittedly unknown level.

They really can't force Starfleet into anything. Zeon is so slow that Starfleet can evacuate Earth's military and political leadership before Zeon gets there, at which point Starfleet has no reason to stand and fight. They can't save Earth in a stand-up fight, so why would they stick around and lose their fleet? Even if they did intend to contest Zeon's landing, they have better options than sitting in LEO and slugging it out; they can, for example, keep up their hit-and-run tactics.

Also, you mention the Vulcans coming to assist Earth. I don't exactly see that as likely. Throughout Enterprise the Vulcans repeatedly showed little interest in helping Starfleet during conflicts as noted by Shran multiple times. They might even view any conflict between Zeon and UE as an entirely human issue where they should not intervene in the slightest.

True enough on this one. Stupid writing on the part of the Killer B's (your client is threatened by a planet-killing superweapon and the most you're willing to offer is to evacuate the pitiful handful of survivors?), but you make do with what you have.

Warp tech? Try iron. Zeon has no resources except what it has stockpiled or can recycle. Even if they capture the moon, the heaviest metal there is aluminum. The colonies are self-sufficient in food, water, and breathing oxygen, but most industry necessary to support a modern economy (and space fleet) is going to grind to a halt. Given what's been said in this thread about Zeonic propulsion, I don't think they could get to the asteroids and back in time to avoid an economic catastrophe even if there was no Starfleet interference at all.

Agreed, for some reason I was thinking they got their towed in resource asteroids as well.

Even if they do, as Destructionator noted, Zeon depends on He3, the nearest readily available supply of which is even further than the main asteroid belt--five years round-trip, and that's assuming Zeon has tankers and harvesters.

UE has Zeon by the balls for exactly this reason. Even if Starfleet can't keep them from invading Earth, they can strangle Zeon economically. If Starfleet can hit their existing fuel stores, it's only going to get worse. Those battleships aren't worth a damn if they can't power their fusion reactors.

A basic warp 1.0 engine seems easy enough to put together. Zefram Cochrane did it in a post-apocalyptic setting with minimal resources and using a converted Titan missile that could be found in 2063. Given what we see in First Contact their Earth's tech level at that time is not so high that Zeon should not be able to replicate warp 1 engines. At that stage at least warp plasma coils were just simple copper pipe (or at least they could be used in place of whatever Cochrane had originally) and they still used relatively normal things like titanium. Based on some earlier drafts of the script the Phoenix was even nuclear powered. I don't think its been stated whether the final power source for the Pheonix was M-AM or not. I don't intend to mean anything about Zeon magically developing a Warp 5 engine or anything even close.

Phoenix massed what? A few tons on the outside? And the warp drive only operated on-screen for a few seconds. And Phoenix was a custom-built warp capable ship. And Cochrane understood the physics underlying the warp drive. And no matter how primitive Cochrane's complex seemed, they had the technology and the know-how to build a functioning spacecraft (with complex moving parts), maintain a Minuteman missile in operational shape, modify that missile to reach LEO, and actually build the warp drive itself, including whatever powered it. And just because you have a warp drive doesn't mean you've figured out subspace sensors or comms, which are critical to Zeon's disadvantage against Starfleet.

Bottom line, just because Cochrane was able to build a three-man Warp 1 pod with mid-21st century technology and a nuclear missile, doesn't mean Zeon will be able to adapt their battleships to go to warp.