Friday, July 26, 2013

CHAPTER 25

TACTICS: COMMAND STRUCTURE

What is the smallest unit of your army? Who commands these units? What’s the quality of these commanders? How much initiative are they allowed? How much initiative are they capable of? Dronn was pretty much gluthon meat after the Earthlings blew up his command craft. His subordinates couldn’t even carry out simple commands like, “Don’t fire the main weapon! The Earthlings know it’s our weak point!”

And it is not just Dronn. Looking at past invasions, I didn’t see any units capable of operating as small squads. Everything was always centrally located and controlled. All communications were routed through one enormous base, and a handful of commanders made all the decisions, right down to the smallest detail.

It proved a poor decision every time. The Earthlings only had to take out one installation for the whole damn invasion force to grind to a halt.

Command structure is pretty basic stuff. It’s one of the most fundamental concepts in a professional military. It was only in late antiquity that armies were commanded by a single autocratic ruler. In the history of warfare, it soon became apparent that a corps of professional officers was necessary to command an army more complex than a few hundred. Even modern dictatorships need a professional corps. In fact, that’s one of the main reasons total dictatorships have such a lousy track record in modern warfare; they deliberately discourage officers from becoming too competent so they don’t pose a serious threat to the autocrat running the show. Most of you are dictators, and most of you do have a lousy track record when it comes to warfare, and this was before you were routed on Earth. And the reason is you all discourage your professional officer corps from becoming too competent.

Most of you don’t have any chains of command. You have masters, and you have slaves with guns. That’s not an army. That’s a disaster waiting to happen. If you knew anything about military professionals, you’d know they weren’t a real threat. There are a handful of autocrats in the galaxy who have lasted quite a long time because they trust their officers to lead their armies.

First thing you learn as a soldier, whether you’re a lowly recruit in basic training or a wannabe officer in the academy, is that there’s always somebody that you have to salute. If you’re any good, people will salute you, but there’s always going to be somebody above you until you get to be supreme leader. Or me. I never salute anyone, but hell, most of my clients know what they’re getting ahead of time.

Individual troops answer to a corporal or sergeant who answers to an officer, and so on up the line. But the beauty of it is, there’s always somebody in control, always somebody responsible for a unit, a general leading a brigade, a captain leading a company, a corporal leading a squad, or the senior man in a fire team. That means, even if the big headquarters gets blown up, the army is not totally leaderless. The army can still fight, and it will, because that’s what they’ve been trained to do. Or that’s what they should have been trained to do.

I talked about initiative when it comes to troop selection. Here’s where it pays off. If just one guy is making the decisions, the army is inflexible. It can’t react to fast changing situations. The supreme leader can only issue so many orders in a day. He can only read so many reports. It’s impossible for him to be making decisions on every individual firefight in a campaign that spans an entire damn planet!

The supreme commander should be focused on the big picture. Believe me, there’s enough happening at the top levels that he won’t have time for anything else. The supreme headquarters sets the objectives, but the armies have to be able to manage themselves. And in those armies, the individual units have to handle themselves. Let the guys actually in the firefight take care of things.

As such, the supreme HQ is always, always in a secure area. Most of the time that’s going to mean in orbit or on the planet’s moon or maybe further out. Someplace where the commanders can observe and receive reports in complete safety.

But having a safe HQ is just the first step. From that distance, you can’t make day-to-day decisions concerning your forces. Believe me, that’s a good thing.

The Munificent Drog of Carras Four was one of the worst examples of a dictator it was ever my displeasure to meet. He kept everything under his control. I mean, down to the smallest detail. So what happened was pretty predictable. The Scarmans launched an attack right when he was asleep and he wasn’t available to release several reserve armor units to contain the beachhead. The beachhead expanded, and pretty soon the Scarmans had a huge numerical superiority. Old Drog wouldn’t see sense. He insisted his armies would not retreat, and forbade even minor tactical withdrawals. So what happened? His forces were crushed or surrounded and cut off. Shockingly, his own men tried to kill him. Too bad they failed.

Having a strong, professional chain of command is vital for success. It’s the mark of a strong, competent force.

Now that we established the principle of a chain of command, how do you execute it? At the squad level, it’s easy. You have the NCOs or experienced troopers handle the responsibility. When you get to larger units, you need an actual headquarters unit. From the theater command down to army group, army, division, regiment, battalion, each will have a dedicated headquarters unit. Sometimes individual companies or platoons will have headquarters units. These can be nothing more than a communications operator attached to the company or platoon leader. At the division, regiment, and battalion levels you need Headquarters or Command and Control Units. You may even need multiple CNC units. One acts as the main CNC that will be stationed back from the frontlines, and have most of the formation’s long-range artillery support under its command. The second CNC will be toward the front, though still far enough back that it can observe the conditions and progress of the battle. The final CNC might be a reserve command in the rear area in charge of training replacements, repairs to equipment and vehicles, soldiers on leave. The third CNC could also be a forward command in the field if the front covers a lot of area.

The main CNC will have secure communications with the next level in the chain of command and secure communications with their subordinate units. They’ll have troops to act as runners just in case communications go down. Maps and battle plans are kept here so the commander can monitor and keep track of the situation. The commander will have the supporting elements for his formation either under his direct control, or will be in constant communication with them. Obviously, if this unit is destroyed, captured, or compromised it’s a big freaking problem for the formation. Which is why some armies have three of them in every large unit. If one is captured or destroyed, the assistant commanders can take over and the entire formation isn’t utterly wiped out with one lucky strike.

Most wireless communications devices use low-level radiation or energy to transmit signals. This is very effective, but the problem is the humans are capable of listening in if they discover the right frequency. During the first invasions of Earth, there wasn’t much danger of communications being decoded. The Earthlings had never before encountered extraterrestrial languages. But after numerous failed invasions, they’ve learned quite a bit. Most of us speak a version of Galactic Common. By now, the Earth has heard enough that they pose a real eavesdropping threat. There are ways to communicate that can’t be intercepted, such as between two entangled electrons. But that’s a complex set up, and it would be cost prohibitive to have more than one such apparatus, which should be dedicated to home world communications. There are ESPers and telepaths, but Earth has their own telepaths, and has started using them; another reason to rethink any future invasion plans you may have.

You’re going to have to accept that your communicators can be intercepted by the humans. That’s why you have to practice communications safety. The signals should be scrambled, but the messages should also be encoded. And keep a steady stream of dummy broadcasts going. It becomes a lot harder to pick out the one important message in a sea of fakes.

That’s what command and control is really all about; communications. It’s about making sure that the orders from up top are delivered quickly and efficiently to the rest of the army. But the most vital thing to remember, and here’s where you make your biggest mistake, is that communication flows the other way. Information from the battlefield has to make its way back to you, the commander. Your squad leaders, NCOs, and officers are all feeding you vital information because the battle is constantly changing. If your unit leaders are any good at all, they will be adapting with it. Sooner or later, you the commander will have to adapt, because no plan is perfect. That’s where most people mess up.

In too many cases, your communications only flow in one direction. You never listen to the guys in the field, probably because they tell you things you don’t want to hear. You tell the troops to attack, and they attack even if the situation dictates otherwise. And you wonder why things go down the crapper the second your communications are cut off. If your troops weren’t already mindless drones, all your nonsensical orders and micromanaging sucked them dry of whatever initiative they might have possessed.

Command and control is about a lot more than blind obedience. It’s about making sure things run smoothly when you’re not there to look over everyone’s shoulder. It’s about making sure that you as commander know the real situation at all times, even if that situation isn’t pleasant. Finally, it’s about being a professional and allowing those under you to be professionals. Give them space so they do their jobs. If you do, it will make your job go a whole lot smoother.

Friday, July 19, 2013

CHAPTER 24

TACTICS: PERSONAL WEAPONS AND EQUIPMENT

Before we get into depth, I have to address the Vuralans and their invasion. For a while, I almost didn’t put them on my list of real invasions. I almost lumped them with the Gryphonians, or the Kr’rk, and the others who failed to even get started. But Vuralans did make it to Earth. They did set up shop, and they did conduct a number of aggressive acts. Most of those included killing and eating several teenage humans. We’ll get into why that’s a bad idea later. For now just look at this footage.

(The 3D footage this time is off a brutish Vuralan chasing a scantily dressed girl through a dark woods.)

Are the Vuralans here? Just arrived? Good. Can you guys tell me something? Why are you running around without any clothes?

This is why I have a hard time even putting this in the invasion category. It’s like you’re here for exhibitionism. And it makes no sense. The Earthlings don’t even know that you’re wiggling your privates as you chase after them.

(The hologram now shows a close up of the Vuralan and indeed he is wearing nothing but his slimy hide.)

But we do. Hold on a moment.

(Thankfully at this point the image pixilates all five of the Vuralan’s exposed genitalia. There is much snickering from the Vuralans section.)

That’s better. With that, let’s jump into weapons and equipment. Because uniforms count as equipment.

All joking aside, what equipment do you use? This section covers personal weapons issued to all troops and standard equipment. Communications are covered under Command and Control in the next chapter.

So what are the weapons of your army? I mean the basic stuff. Here’s where you guys make a huge mistake. In the invasions I’ve reviewed, you’ve given each individual trooper an energy weapon capable of knocking down an entire building. Have you never heard of freaking overkill?

As we’ll discuss later in the ground fighting tactics chapter, you don’t need to be knocking down a building with every shot. This is especially true if your men are in the damn building. That’s not what you want with a personal weapon, anyway. The purpose of a main weapon is to engage individual targets. It should do enough damage to incapacitate or kill an enemy soldier. It might be able to penetrate terran armor units. It might be able to shoot down their fighter aircraft. That would be nice, but it’s not essential. You want your soldiers first to be able to kill enemy soldiers, because that will be their main job. Yes, you want your foot soldiers to be able to take on all kinds of targets, but their primary job is to engage other infantry. You can issue heavier weapons for other targets; we’ll discuss those later.

The weapon should have a good rate of fire, and should be capable of firing bursts. Bursts are useful for keeping the heads of opposing forces down while other troops get position on them. Also, if the enemy is dumb enough to charge at you en masse, you can mow them down. The guns could be directed energy weapons like plasma or lasers, magnetic projectile weapons like needle or bolt guns, or even chemically powered slug throwers not unlike what the Earthlings use.

It also should be easy to use and simple to maintain. If you need the services of a trained physicist every time your weapon jams, you’ve got a problem.

Speaking of simple to use, I want to talk about sights. I’ve seen a lot of invaders use advanced targeting systems on everything, including personal weapons. I appreciate what targeting systems can do. I’m not against improved accuracy. But what happens if the targeting system fails or is damaged? Can your guy still fire his weapon? Are these weapons even made to be aimed manually? I’ve seen some that look like remote wands. How are you supposed to get a sight picture with those things? If you can provide all your troopers with targeting systems, more power to you. But in an emergency they have to be able to manually aim their weapons. It should be designed for that. Sights aren’t that hard to put on a weapon. You just need two dots on the weapon, between any two points is a straight line. You hold these up to your eyeball and you see if your gun barrel is lined up or not. The targeting system should be fitted over the manual sights, and can be removed if it’s damaged.

Also, don’t depend on targeting systems during training. Have the soldiers first train aiming manually first. If they get used to firing with targeting assistance, they tend to get sloppy. And sloppiness leads to troops getting killed.

One thing that gets overlooked all the time is a sling or a holster to carry the weapon. For example, the Scythian ground troops carried their weapons inside their battle suits.

What happened during the battle is that a lot of these systems were damaged or malfunctioned. As a result, several Bloodlords went into battle unarmed!

It’s a perfect example of what happens when you overthink a problem. Straps, pockets, combat webbing, and holsters have no moving parts. They don’t need an energy source to function. They’re also easy to adjust. If a trooper likes carrying his weapon in a certain way, he can do so. Take me, for example. In the field, I like to loop a gun belt with a side holster over one arm and wear it like a shoulder holster.

My new lady friend says I look like a slob when I do that. Maybe, but for whatever reason my hand likes to draw my gun from that position. And I wouldn’t be able to draw like that if tweaking my weapon harness involved rearranging several armor plates and a couple of servo motors.

Speaking of keeping things simple, grenades are still very effective, be they fragmentation, stun, smoke, EMC, thermal, wire tangle, or what have you. Every trooper should learn how to use and throw one.

An alternative is the gyroc launcher. A gyroc is a miniature missile. It’s fired from magnetic tube. The magnetic force propels the gyroc forward several meters. Once it’s a safe distance away, the rocket kicks in and speeds to the target. A gyroc launcher can be mounted beneath a rifle for a potent two-in-one combination.

Bladed weapons may seem like the ultimate anachronism, but they have a place. Most species evolved with a distinct fear of being stabbed with sharp, pointy things, and the humans are no exception. Blades are an excellent weapon during a charge. Better than any other weapon, they convince people to retreat. There’s no mistaking a blade. The humans aren’t going to stand their ground out of sheer curiosity, wondering what that thing in your hand is. They know what a blade can do. That’s the point.

On Earth, they call that a pun.

But the problem is blades are a great weapon so long as they aren’t used. They’re good for discouraging hand-to-hand combat. If it breaks down to melee fighting, then all the rules go out the window. You can have every advantage in the book, but up close and personal a lot of those vanish.

With our tech level, we can make blades out of alloys and compounds far stronger than terran steel. Please note, however, that just because a blade is made out of a metal stronger than steel, that doesn’t mean you can go hacking through Earth tank armor like it was tissue paper. The hardness and strength of the blade is one thing; you still have to have the physical power to drive it through the metal. Otherwise, you’re just making a lot of scratches.

Technology can help that along. You can install micro motors inside the blade so that it saws through the metal.

You can place an inertial control inside the blade to exponentially increase the power of each swing.

You can pipe glowing hot plasma through the blade.

But when using these, you need plenty of protection. Plasma gives off a lot of heat, and you can burn your own face off just by bringing the blade to a guard position.

Speaking of blades, your troopers should also be carrying a multi-purpose bladed tool like this one.

Soldiering involves a lot more than just shooting stuff up. Your troops will find they have a million little jobs to do every step of the way. And they’re going to want the tools to do them. Why bother sending laser cutters and force levitators with every patrol? Even if you can afford it, that’s more energy packs the troops have to carry, more items that can break down. They should be carrying some simple all-purpose tools. Unless they want to dig holes with their bare hands.

Some vision aids are helpful. Light sources, telescopic devices, full range visual scanners. You want troops to be able to see.

Where do your guys sleep? What do they eat? What do they drink? When I look at past invasions, I see guys carrying around big ass blasters and nothing else. I wonder how long these guys can go before they drop dead of hunger.

Rations, people! Your troopers should be carrying enough food and drinking liquid to keep them supplied for at least two to three days. They’re going to need some kind of shelter, and a bedroll. Then there’s also an emergency medical pack, plus direction finding equipment. Some personal hygiene articles are needed. I don’t know about you, but creatures that wallow in their own filth tend to get diseases. A change of clothing may be required, depending on how resistant your race is to skin rashes.

And yes, uniforms are a must. They create a sense of unit identity. That is one of the psychological keys to creating a professional fighting force. But beyond the symbolic nature, uniforms and battle attire are necessary for basic hygiene. They keep dirt, mud, insects, and other stuff off your flesh. They provide some much needed warmth and protection from the elements. All these things can lead to disease. Think about that the next time you want to chase Earth girls in the altogether.

A word about special forces equipment. One of the main purposes of special forces is to operate behind enemy lines for extended periods of time. This is pretty damn difficult when you’re on your own planet or a world with a compatible biosphere. But things get even more complicated on a place like Earth.

Finally, the troopers are going to need something to carry all this, whether that’s a good, old-fashioned pack, a carrying vest, or a miniature transdimensional portal. I wouldn’t recommend that last choice. One slip up, and find yourself reaching into a black hole to get your toothpaste.

When you add it up, personal equipment can be a big freaking load. Now you know why you practiced marching your troops. And expect that load to increase. You never can tell when you need to include even more. There’s always something else the guys need when they’re in the field. If you’re smart and efficient you’ll listen to them. Which brings us to the next topic.

Friday, July 12, 2013

CHAPTER 23

TACTICS: THE TROOPS

Let’s start with the most basic unit of the invasion force, the individual trooper or soldier. These men, women, or whatevers are the backbone of a military force. In every large-scale invasion scenario, the emphasis was on big attack craft.

Big fancy machines may look impressive, but that doesn’t matter if the pilots are substandard. Half the time, the invasion troops can’t even fight without their machines. Why is that a problem? Doesn’t advanced technology eliminate the need for such primitive work?

In a word – no.

Something always goes wrong. When it does, you have to rely on the individual trooper to see you through the day. But you bucketheads don’t seem to understand that. The damn troop quality I see on a typical Earth invasion is pathetic. They’re crazy, undisciplined thugs who just run around attacking everything that moves, or they’re frail little bugs stuffed into battle suits or fighter craft. Either way, that’s a losing combination.

No one has figured out how to do the job of infantry without infantry. Individual soldiers can spread out over rough terrain, enter buildings, and conduct area searches; they can dig in and defend an area. Here’s an example during the Gorgonian invasion.

A team of three tripods attacked a city block of London. The battle moved out of the immediate area so the Gorgonians sent two tripods to the battle and left one tripod to secure the flank. But this was a huge mistake. It weakened the attack unnecessarily. And the absent tripod failed to secure the area because that’s not what it was designed to do. It can’t search and clear rubble, buildings or underground tunnels. It didn’t even have remote drones that could at least search these areas.

This was just one of a series of small defeats that added up to a big catastrophe for the Gorgonians. And it’s one that could have been avoided if they possessed some kind of infantry capability.

The main strengths of infantry are they are flexible, and they come with a low price tag. Some androids have the AI to execute all of the different problems infantry face. But you’re telling me it’s cheaper to make a million androids with sophisticated AI than it is to recruit and train a million foot soldiers? Don’t make me laugh. Androids may look cooler, but regular infantry is a winner in the all-important category of cost efficiency. Remember that numbers matter, and so does time and money.

The Sondrak were thinking about using clones, but that was a non-starter. Clones? Really? I’ve been to cloning facilities. They are expensive. How much would they have cost per man? And that’s without a uniform or a weapon? This is the same problem with androids. You’re adding the cost of producing the soldier to your list of other expenses. It’s like real estate; why build when you can rent? Here’s an idea: instead of building your troops, or growing them, you just let ordinary, everyday, doesn’t-cost-you-a-damn-thing fornication create your manpower pool, and you concentrate on recruiting, training, and weapons.

What kind of a soldier should you be looking for? Let’s start with a soldier’s mental makeup. Contrary to what some people may think, soldiers aren’t stupid. They have to be at least smart enough to work their equipment. They have to have some aggression in their nature, but not so much that they go berserk in the middle of an operation. They have to be disciplined. They have to carry out orders. But they can’t be so rigid that they won’t even crap without permission. They need some initiative. If they’re cut off, or if the situation changes, and they don’t have orders, your troops still have to act. So what you need is the right balance of toughness, aggression, smarts, discipline, and initiative. Yeah, what you really need are balanced individuals. I know what you’re thinking – people like Jek and me, we’re pretty damn unbalanced. Maybe. But I tell you the last thing I’d want is an army of me’s or an army of Jeks. We’d all kill each other.

Then there is the physical aspect of war. This can vary from species to species. High gravity worlds produce denser and stronger troopers. But, ironically, they’re going to be smaller and more compact. The really big aliens, at least comparable to the humans, probably come from a world with less gravity. Despite looking like badasses, they are actually a lot weaker.

But it doesn’t really matter whether your race is naturally stronger or weaker than the humans. What matters is they are trained to use the strength they do have.

Your troops should all be put through a rigorous training regimen. This training should emphasize endurance and hand-to-hand combat. Again, what we’re really looking for is to develop the proper mental attitude. We don’t run troops up and down a mountainside just to improve their marching speed. We do it to push them to their limits and see which ones give up and which ones press on. Sometimes it’s the ability to not give up that makes all the difference.

In hand-to-hand combat, we’re not just training people to fight, we’re training them to be aggressive. Hand-to-hand training should be rough. It should teach the trainees not to shy away from physical contact. It should also teach them that the best way to not get hit is to hit first.

There should be good group cohesion between troops. Camaraderie. These guys may not fight for you, but they should at least fight for each other. That comes from living and drilling – and later fighting – together.

After basic, you need to separate your troops into the specialized branches of your force. A good supply sergeant or commissary officer isn’t the same as a good special forces operator. But you’re going to need all of the above, plus a lot more. If you have a proper training program you’ll be able to separate out troops more easily.

Sometimes you can’t control troop quality. If you’re running an insurgency campaign, or your manpower is severely limited, you have to take what you can get. But if you are planning a major invasion of a planet with six billion people, then you can’t have that as an excuse. If you’re in that position at all, you shouldn’t have been mounting an invasion to begin with.

There is no army without soldiers, and the quality of those soldiers determines the quality of the army. An army can have the best equipment in the galaxy, but if that equipment is operated and maintained by a bunch of lazy, slackjawed, stupid ass crapheads, then you’re not going to have a fun time invading the Earth.

PART THREE: TACTICS

This next part looks at what happens when you actually come to grips with the Earthlings. Strategy covers the grand scope of the invasion. When we get to the actual fighting, we’re in the realm of tactics.

This will cover most of you. That’s because while each of your individual invasions strategies were flawed in their own ways, your tactical failings were nearly identical. Don’t bother protesting. I know what you’re going to say. “We kicked ass once the fight started. You can’t argue with that. Right?”

Wrong!

I don’t get tired of saying that.

You caused massive devastation in your attacks, but that was because of your technology and your weapons. Tactics is about how to use that technology and those weapons to achieve a victory. Do your troops ever do the following:

Identify vital objectives?

Maintain good force concentration?

Exploit weak enemy positions?

Maintain a strategic reserve?

Protect themselves from counter attacks?

If you answered “Yes” to any of the above, you’re a liar. I’ve studied your invasions, and I know your troops never did any of these things.

In addition to specific tactics when fighting on land, sea, and in the air, this section will also talk about the troops themselves, the kind of equipment you need to bring along, command and control issues. Tactical blunders usually start by not bringing the right kind of troops and weapons.

Then we’ll talk about logistics, intelligence, cyberspace, issues which are almost completely ignored but which are vital for determining the outcome of a conflict.

That’s a lot. But, guess what? This is a damned complicated business.

Friday, July 5, 2013

CHAPTER 22

ALTERNATIVE STRATEGIES: ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING

This is the most interesting alternative strategy I came across; bioengineering the planet in secret. Changing the planet’s environment from one type to another. It was attempted by Kr’rk in the Earth year 1996.

Like the Gryphonians, this one never really got off the ground, so I didn’t include it in my list of failed invasions. It seems the Kr’rk were discovered by a lone human scientist.

They trailed him to his home. And I honestly have no idea what happened next.

All I know for sure is that the scientist is still under house arrest, and the surviving Kr’rk abandoned Earth and checked themselves into a sanatorium.

Getting back to the original strategy, it’s interesting. In some cases, the humans are doing a hell of job themselves of changing their environment. They pump all kinds of chemicals into the water and atmosphere.

This strategy fulfills a definite need, and does it in a way that’s not totally crap stupid. There are the usual weaknesses in a plan like this. The set-up is very, very fragile, and the operation has to be carried out in total secrecy, or else the game is completely ruined.

But there’s just one huge problem with the whole idea. Namely, that planetary bioengineering can take a long, long time. While it certainly makes things unpleasant for the humans, that’s not the same thing as making it livable for another species.

Just as an example, say the Kr’rk had introduced a biologic that fed on sulfur, which is abundant in Earth’s industrial waste. The organism would have excreted sulfuric acid, causing widespread damage and destruction to all life on the planet. It would have spread pretty quickly, and the humans would have had a very hard time containing it. It might have done enough damage to the biosphere to end all human civilization before they could find an effective countermeasure. Sounds like a great strategy, and all you have to do, aside from being able to breathe sulfuric acid, is release one tiny microbe next to a smog-spewing factory.

But we run into the problem: what’s bad news for the Earthlings isn’t necessarily good news for you. Going back to our example, yes, the sulfur-eating/acid-pissing microbe would have caused a tremendous amount of damage. But would it have done enough to utterly change the biosphere of the entire planet? Is there even enough sulfur on the planet’s surface to do that? Maybe. Even if there is, life is very, very complicated. And I’m not talking your girlfriend left because she needed to find herself “complicated.” I mean, life very quickly adapts to environmental pressures. That’s kind of why we didn’t remain single celled organisms ourselves and actually grew legs and stuff. The same process that made us would have unmade the Kr’rk’s perfect little plan. Had they introduced a microbe that turned industrial waste into a rain of sulfuric acid that would have been fine. But how would they prevent some terran lifeform from adapting to eat that microbe? You can’t predict when something like that will or won’t happen. That’s just what evolution does.

And here’s where the strategy really falls apart. The Kr’rk weren’t just taking on the humans with this attack, but the entire biosphere of planet Earth. And, no disrespect to the humans, but the biosphere is a lot tougher than they could ever hope to be. It’s been around for billions of years longer, and has already weathered severe changes. Chances are, the Kr’rk attack would have fallen short of decimating the biosphere. And they had to defeat it in order to introduce their own biosphere. Getting rid of the humans, increasing the level sulfur or whatever in the atmosphere, those are only the beginning stages. They would still have had to introduce all the life forms that made up the Kr’rk biosphere and those organism would have to have been successful. Otherwise, the environment would be similar to, but not an exact match, for the Kr’rk species. Maybe it would have been close enough for them to start colonizing, but you’d be shocked to learn just how unbearable life can be without certain animals, plants, even microbes.

In the meantime, while the Kr’rk were doing this, they could have been creating hundreds of space habs with the perfect environment for their people. Which brings up a good point; why were the Kr’rk wasting time slowly transforming the environment of the Earth when they could have created perfect environments from scratch out in space?

Let me point out that creating space habs has no risk, near one hundred percent chance of success, and can be completed very quickly. Environmental engineering does none of that. Totally transforming a planet’s biosphere is a long process that has a high risk of failure. Even if the humans don’t discover the invasion base, there’s still a sizable chance that this gambit won’t deliver a viable biosphere for your people.

I take back what I said about this strategy not being completely crap stupid.