Re: [FT]USA in Full Thrust...

On Thu, 15 Apr 1999, Donald Hosford wrote:

> Brian Burger wrote: 
> > On Thu, 15 Apr 1999, Donald Hosford wrote:
> > > I have put my "American Time Line" on Thomas Anderson's  FTP site.
> > > Here is the URL:	http://members.xoom.com/gzg_l/usa/
> > > The file is called: USATL.ASC.   It is an ascii file.
> > >
> > > This file is my take on the United States.  (They secretly build
> > > starships, and leave the solar system in 2053.  They later return
in
> > > 2188.)
> > > Any comments are welcome!
> Sometimes it gets difficult to stop adding on..     :-)

Tell me about it...that damned website of mine has more bits and pieces
to
keep track of every time I turn around...never mind timelines!

> > You lay out half a dozen options for the 'American'-NAC conflict
after the
> > 'Americans' re-emerge from deepest space. I think you left out
option 'C',
> > however:
> > 'Americans' pop their fifty ships out of Jump, and begin to make
> > outrageous demands of the NAC. NAC Battlegroups deploy with NSL and
UN
> > support, and order the 'Americans' to act civilized. Failing that,
they
> > get trashed. Fast scout squadrons fan out, from many powers, all
concerned
> > about these unbalanced, unknown humans.
> >
> Opps!  Missed one!   Good idea though.  In spite of what I think,
(Flatten the
> NAC!	Revenge!  But, there are probably two things against that:  One
it has
> been 135 years...who could keep a grudge that long?  

Really, really strange people? Maybe these deepspace 'Americans' have
twisted patriotism into some sort of fundamentalist religion? The
thought
occured to me as I was reading your timeline...esp. with the Catholic
Church involved somehow - maybe some sort of strange fusion of
Catholicism
and patriotism has evolved? With a healthy dose of government-sponsered
zenophobia thrown in. (the Non-Contact laws...)

> And second, as I pointed
> out, the Kra'Vak are coming in like gang busters...The Nac, ect will
have
> their hands full.)  It would make for an interesting number of
battles...

What about 'American' vs Kra'vak battles? Maybe have the Kra'vak beating
up on the 'Americans', who decide to lift their age-old ban on contact
to
see about getting some help?

> > The NAC has several billion people, by the most conservative
rekoning of
> > listmembers. Naval lists have been estimated at 2000+ ships by some
> > listmembers. It's going to take more than a deepspace colony with a
bad
> > attitude to do in the NAC. 
> Well, I have yet to estimate the final population size/number of
colonies,
> ect.	I have desided that there shouldn't be more than twenty or
thirty
> worlds, and time limits the population size...

Majorly...I was unpleasantly shocked when I ran population figures
through
the various formulas provided by listmembers. The population of my NAC
colony suddenly fell by about 60%! (My initial SWAG pop. figures had
been
more Wildassed Guess than Scientific...)

I've still got those population formulas around, if you want them.

> > Most likely, is that some sort of alliance is worked out, if the
> > 'Americans' can be made to see reason. Trash the Kra'vak, then sort
out
> > human-vs-human problems...
> Yes, my first probability.  It seems unlikely that the NAC would say
no, or
> the Americans to be that angry after all those years...

I can't see the NAC agreeing to give up territory on Terra, though. They
didn't conquer it, they have a fairly solid claim to be the successor to
a
legit American govt - plus they've been in control of the whole ex-US
for
140 years or something like that. 9/10ths of the law...

Help, new allies, the NAC will probably accept. The deepspace Yank's are
going to have to get used to the idea of the Duke of Memphis, Tenn.,
however! (The citizens of Memphis, Tenn. probably are!)

> > One good thing about a group as isolated as these 'American's :
really
> > different naval design philosophy! Isolated from the whole
mainstream for
> > ages - a good excuse to try out some _really_ different designs, in
> > quantities!
> 
> One of the reasons I dreamed them up!  8-D 
>  This way, I could bend the daylights out of FT/FB1!	(Within limits,
of
> course...wouldn't want to be a munchkin...I plan to have the Americans
> advanced in some ways, and limited in others.)

Bend it 'til it creaks...I doubt it'll break entirely, but you might get
some strange results. (Speaking from DS2 vehicle designing here, having
explored the outer limits of Dirtside design with some damned silly
vehicles...Ogres, mostly...thus re-proving the maxim about "The bigger
they are, the harder they fall")
 
> Earth History is a hobby of mine, and Future Timelines are one of my
favorite
> things...

Earth history's all we've got, here and now... :)  Except for Alternate
History stuff, but that's Earth too, and off-topic.

Brian (burger00@camosun.bc.ca)			-DS2/SG2/FR!/HOTT-
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