You are assuming that the base can’t move or jump. Do not assume that. Many of us think that the original asteroid base in the Darvano system is going to go to the Terran system with an oversized jump drive
I never made that assumption, I made the assumption that it will not be able to move fast at least not faster than a warship nor would it be able to jump while surrounded by thousands of asteroids of varying sizes.
How many years did the Karuzar use that asteroid as a base, even though they were being actively hunted. They managed to stay hidden.
I think the Takaran tech is better than the Jung’s and they couldn’t find it.As you point out they would be in an asteroid field, meaning the Jung can not raise their shields, go FTL, and it would be easy to hide mines. The Jung could get close to the edge of the field, they enter at their own peril
Did they have ship yards, logistic support, supplies, mining operations, leadership facilities industrial infrastructure and all the rest that is meant to support a fleet of at least 2 major jump capable war ships as well as dozens of smaller combatants? Who is to say that Casimir did not manage to get his hands on a major warship or a number of warships which further exposes the base. Maybe the author will go down that path or maybe he wont but ultimately I am stating that it does not make sense to me that the Alliance would place a major base in a system where there is no guarantee the alliance can defend successfully, now it makes sense to place a base in Sol System because it will provide for more action in the book but logically placing a base in a system that the alliance was retreating from when reinforcements arrived makes little to no sense.
Find a system to set up a base that is both far enough from the Jung as to not be in danger and also to be hidden. Set up mining operations in that system and any nearby to ensure steady flow of supplies and start setting up an orbital ship yard to initially repair alliance warships and then as it expands to produce warships. You have a secure location that the PC can send supplies to, a location which is in little danger of attack allowing for the crews to spend some down time without the ever present danger of death from Jung Forces that surprise the defenders.
A base from which you can use the new jump capable fighters to do a recce all over Jung held territory, find their home and industrial heart and you can destroy it while building up your industry and keeping it safe.
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You are assuming that the base can’t move or jump. Do not assume that. Many of us think that the original asteroid base in the Darvano system is going to go to the Terran system with an oversized jump drive
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I never made that assumption, I made the assumption that it will not be able to move fast at least not faster than a warship nor would it be able to jump while surrounded by thousands of asteroids of varying sizes.
The movie depiction of an asteroid field or the ort cloud is WAY off base. Most objects in them are many hundreds if not thousands of miles apart. From human vision point of view, you would see a tiny sun and nothing else in Sol's asteroid belt. Yes, there are thousands of objects of significant size there. The average distance of the asteroid belt is 322 million miles (just looked that up on Wolfram Alpha.) At that distance, the circumference is about 2 billion miles. Objects are listed as 179 million to 455 million miles out for circumferences of 1.12 Billion to 2.8 billion miles. The density of stuff in that belt is extremely low. Picture it as a ring that is 266 million miles wide, say, a million thick, with an average radius of about 322 million miles. The area of this disk is something like 422 Quadrillion square miles. Add thickness to get 422 sextillion cubic miles. Good luck finding things there.
In other-words, asteroid belt objects will seldom pose a navigation problem. Yes, the universe is mind numbingly big.
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You are assuming that the base can’t move or jump. Do not assume that. Many of us think that the original asteroid base in the Darvano system is going to go to the Terran system with an oversized jump drive
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I never made that assumption, I made the assumption that it will not be able to move fast at least not faster than a warship nor would it be able to jump while surrounded by thousands of asteroids of varying sizes.
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The movie depiction of an asteroid field or the ort cloud is WAY off base. Most objects in them are many hundreds if not thousands of miles apart. From human vision point of view, you would see a tiny sun and nothing else in Sol’s asteroid belt. Yes, there are thousands of objects of significant size there. The average distance of the asteroid belt is 322 million miles (just looked that up on Wolfram Alpha.) At that distance, the circumference is about 2 billion miles. Objects are listed as 179 million to 455 million miles out for circumferences of 1.12 Billion to 2.8 billion miles. The density of stuff in that belt is extremely low. Picture it as a ring that is 266 million miles wide, say, a million thick, with an average radius of about 322 million miles. The area of this disk is something like 422 Quadrillion square miles. Add thickness to get 422 sextillion cubic miles. Good luck finding things there.In other-words, asteroid belt objects will seldom pose a navigation problem. Yes, the universe is mind numbingly big.
Ok lets say that it won't have any effect on the jump drive, what happens if the jump drive is sabotaged? Oopsie start over and build a new base. Justify why a base in Sol System is good as opposed to a base that is out of reach for the enemy... give a pro and cons list that would justify its location over say something that is 75LY away from the Fringe. I know why the author might go in that direction because as I mentioned it allows for alot more action and danger in upcoming books but in reality it makes little sense.
And just to clarify, you don't think that dozens of fighters going in and out of the base as well as shuttles, transports and freighters not to mention warships would attract attention? I mean park a frigate a few light months away and watch the movement within the system, look for emissions within the system and I will bet that the asteroid base would be found really quickly. I dont need to look system wide, I need to look in the area where all those ships go for whatever reason. Or the area where all of your mining operation is ongoing, or the one asteroid where all of the communication seems to come out of...
Your killin me smalls... I mean siggie. The others make a very good argument for the asteroid base. It makes sense tactically and strategically, at least more so than a home system base as you suggest. And it makes since for the author to use concepts already introduced.
You talk about finding a system nearby to support the war effort, but far enough to be out of reach by the Jung. But the Jung only have to find it once, even if it's only scouted by a single vessel. The Jung have the time and strategic depth to gather a force and destroy a fixed base anywhere within 20 light years. It may take time but, this campaign could last weeks (head of the dragon) or months and even longer depending on where the 15 book part stops. And the amount of support your talking about would be great long term, but it is unachievable with the resources and manpower currently available to the alliance in sol. Tug and Dumar know this. They would send what they believe would have the most immediate benefit based on the intel they had, until the nobles agree to send more.
The asteroid however offers a degree of flexibility that a fixed system cannot match no matter how well endowed. The closer Aurora gets to the Jung worlds the farther they get from their base. Longer transits would be an issue for one. Alpha is already two jumps away with recharges, which is fast compared to the 6 month travel of the enemy but they have more expendable resources. The asteroid will act as a FOB, or fire base for the Aurora. It Gets to within a few light hours of a system to act as command and control, mission completes and it moves on. It already has the facility's to hold or repair the Aurora and Celestia at the same time, it could also function as the carrier for the 402s since they are long range and don't necessarily need a carrier in a traditional sense. The base can also act as a mobile mining base for material (that was its original function, and they could still do it Haven style), moving from system to system, gone before a Jung recon can make a round rip anywhere in FTL. Still gives the base months on station at a time. Even if the Jung capture a ship and it knew where the base would be ahead of time, without a jump drive it would logistically be a nightmare to catch it. The whole time the asteroid is making and storing foodstuffs, ammo, parts etc. It was even big enough to install some limited rec facilities. You talk about it breaking down, that's the same risk with any ship in their meager fleet, but if the asteroid stops in the middle of nowhere, the Aurora can still use it for a while. And you mention losing everything if it was destroyed, but that's the same risk with a planetary base, but the asteroid is tougher to find. You talk about the Jung spotting an asteroid with all that traffic, how would they? Unless they were already within several light weeks, and looking in the just right direction, or if the base was deep in system (which there is no reason to put it deep in a populated system) the Jung would never find it. Remember it took the light form the Oort Cloud several weeks or months to reach earth.
I'm sorry for the rant, but the possibilities are endless and you stubbornness was getting to me.
Michael pretty much pointed out everything on why the asteroid base would be better. Siggie, I think the biggest thing is, you are looking at the asteroid base as the major base, when really, the major base in the Sol system doesn't need to exist. Fuel, ships, and personnel will come from either Tanna (not much besides fuel so far) or PC. If it only takes a few days to two weeks with one of the new jump drives to get from PC to Earth, there is really no need to have a permanent base setup in the core worlds until the Jung are taken care of. This might change if the core worlds can contribute enough resources that they could supply their own major base themselves, but considering the bombardment they took, for the time being, they will only be able to supply personnel (angry ones at that).
Since you really don't needs that one big base, instead you would have supply ships taking personnel, supplies, food, and anything else of need to a staging point, aka the forward operating base in the area. As mentioned, the asteroid would serve as the forward operating base, and it could move to a location, service ships, receive supplies, and whatever else it needed to do, prior to jumping to a new location. Some times that location may be an asteroid belt where it could pickup raw resources that have been mined out and are ready for pick up, others it may be to jump 6 light years into the dark, where it will sit as an island between stars in which it can launch fighters, send ground troops, provide C&C for the current battle, or just receive supply ships where no one would think to look. Space is so large, that if you wanted to hide an asteroid, the likely hood that someone could find it is extremely small. So small that it would be like finding a specific grain of sand on a beach. When you can also move the asteroid light years in the blink of an eye, you would never find it. Even if someone attempted to leak its location, it would take a year or two for light to escape the solar system, not to mention the signal getting some place useful. By that time, the asteroid is gone again.
If the enemy has located your base, you just jump to another location. If you jumped 6 light years out and the Jung knew the instant it took place, with the current tech that we know of, it would still take the Jung around 3 and half months to fly there to do something about it...Not to mention it would only take 60 seconds or less for a comm drone to jump the same 6 light years, notify the fleet that the Jung found the base, and for the ships to jump back to defend the base. Until the Jung have jump drives and ways to track jump distances, if they found the asteroid base, then it was purely luck.
If you were going for cool factor, you would just put a jump drive on a death star. Just make sure you fix the ventilation issue first though.
Your killin me smalls… I mean siggie. The others make a very good argument for the asteroid base. It makes sense tactically and strategically, at least more so than a home system base as you suggest. And it makes since for the author to use concepts already introduced.
No arguments were made that actually make sense. Yes it could go with the ships in question to combat operations but the chance of destruction is significantly larger than if it were stationary well behind the frontline in this case at the assumed top speed of the Jung somewhere around 7 or more years round trip if it is 75LY+ of their border.
The author has introduced the concept for the Asteroid base but the entity that used said base was a small organization with the largest unit no larger than gunboats, and not many of them either. Great you have a handful of gunboats but the EDF at the moment has two major warships, dozens of fighters and potentially one or more new major warships are coming as well.It's like suggesting that the US should use the Phalanx because it worked out well for the Ancient Greeks fully ignoring all of the possibilities that technology has given. The Jump drive is a strategic weapon, if a base is placed 75LY from the enemy's border then the Aurora and the other ships can get to the base in 2 days, 4 days round trip while significantly less for the fighters and shuttles.
You talk about finding a system nearby to support the war effort, but far enough to be out of reach by the Jung. But the Jung only have to find it once, even if it’s only scouted by a single vessel.
You are 100% right, if they knew which direction the PC is in relation to the Solar system and then they need to search thousands of systems if not tens of thousands of systems to find the right one. If they don't know which direction the PC is in relation to the Solar system then we see the search area going up to hundreds of thousands of systems. Now even if they are the luckiest bad guys in the history of humanity and they send a scout ship 75 LY to the right system, well a recce would at lest be a 7 and a half light year round trip if they hit the right system from the get go and then even if they managed to double their speed it would still be a year and a half to two years to get a task force in place to hit the system, which means that the earliest attack could be expected 9 years from the launching of the scout. Realistically looking at this stage it would take several years for them to even think to start looking and at least as long to build up a sufficient scouting force then launch them and if they have to go through each and every system within that 75LY zone assuming they know the direction it will take them decades to scout if not more assuming the alliance doesn't go out and ambush the scout units to stop the process cold. That is decades that they can build up the base, their forces and the defences of the base in question and at that point it would be a major base but the alliance would have a rebuild Earth, as well as Tanna and any number of other liberated systems as forward bases and industrial support. For the Jung to find and then destroy the base it means they have to divert sufficient forces from their defence for 7 or more years.
The asteroid however offers a degree of flexibility that a fixed system cannot match no matter how well endowed. The closer Aurora gets to the Jung worlds the farther they get from their base.
True, but we are talking about hours longer to reach the Jung not years longer to reach the jung... how much difference does it make if your base is 48h away as opposed to say in the target system? I would much prefer the jump drive and any engines, power source, environmental system and shields to go towards a major warship that can hit the enemy rather than for a mobile base that has no say in the combat other than to resupply the attacking/defending forces immediately after combat.
The asteroid will act as a FOB, or fire base for the Aurora.
How do you propose they do that without risking their entire support structure? Lose the jump drive and you lose the base if it is anywhere near combat which ultimately means you end up in exactly the same place they are right now, if not worse off.
It Gets to within a few light hours of a system to act as command and control, mission completes and it moves on.
Exactly what type of command and control do you envision here? The likely hood of another planatery assault is low for the moment and even if it were a possibility the ability could easily be matched by a couple of shuttles and a few containers, I mean that concept has been introduced before right?
The base can also act as a mobile mining base for material (that was its original function, and they could still do it Haven style)
Which also means that the enemy will know exactly where the super secret base is after all.
It already has the facility’s to hold or repair the Aurora and Celestia at the same time, it could also function as the carrier for the 402s since they are long range and don’t necessarily need a carrier in a traditional sense.
That could very well be, but when you end up with more than two warships you need a new base, you cannot have infinite expansion on an asteroid especially considering all that has been suggested( Political leadership HQ, Military HQ, Ship repair facilities, fire repair facilities, industrial capabilities, mining facilities as well as storage of supplies etc...) Aren't the Jung battleships a little larger than the Aurora? Could you fit one in an asteroid if you need to?
moving from system to system, gone before a Jung recon can make a round rip anywhere in FTL.
Nice concept but where are the PC portion of the alliance supposed to send the reinforcements and supplies? Are they to guess where the base is going to be or do they flip a coin?
Even if the Jung capture a ship and it knew where the base would be ahead of time, without a jump drive it would logistically be a nightmare to catch it.
Unless there was a nice schedule to maintain the supplies from the PC, set up an ambush etc... But even that aside, you need to be good/lucky 100% of the time while they need to get lucky only once and your entire strategy and war effort goes up in smoke.
The whole time the asteroid is making and storing foodstuffs, ammo, parts etc. It was even big enough to install some limited rec facilities.
How many people can it support while still providing all other needs? 100? 1,000? 50,000? And where do you get the food for the base? Can Tanna supply it? If you lose Tanna do you depend on the PC? Every single ship carrying food from the PC to the base is a ship not carrying vital supplies and equipment.
You talk about it breaking down, that’s the same risk with any ship in their meager fleet, but if the asteroid stops in the middle of nowhere, the Aurora can still use it for a while.
If it fails while not in contact it is not a big deal, it can be repaired at their leisure, but if it is under attack and the jump system is damaged/sabotaged/malfunctions and the base is destroyed or worse captured. You lose a ship you still have the infrastructure and logistics for the next one when it comes, while should you lose the base you lose the ability to wage the war until you get a new base, which might not be too easy as you will lose all repair facilities, R&D, fabricators, supply and the technical manpower that makes it all work. No base no mining.
And you mention losing everything if it was destroyed, but that’s the same risk with a planetary base, but the asteroid is tougher to find.
How is an asteroid that travels from system to system with the fleet tougher to find than a planetary base in one of thousands, or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of star systems which require decades for a round trip? Even if they knew the exact location it would still take 5 or 6 years to gather the necessary forces and for them to arrive at the base, 5 years for the allies to fight the Jung with a large portion of the Jung Fleet gone, 5 years to build defences or if push comes to shove and you cannot face them move... It is harder to destroy something that is out of your reach and you don't quite know where it is than for something that keeps coming near you.
Remember it took the light form the Oort Cloud several weeks or months to reach earth.
So? A base 75 LY away will be visible in what 75 years... whats your point?
I’m sorry for the rant, but the possibilities are endless and you stubbornness was getting to me.
Funny I was thinking the same thing... There is the right way and the wrong way, and just because its been done before does not make it the right way... My suggestion would place the alliance in a position to win the war, your would place them in a position to survive the next few months always on the verge of collapse should they lose the base and in a few months or a year they would still require the base I am suggesting.
Michael pretty much pointed out everything on why the asteroid base would be better. Siggie, I think the biggest thing is, you are looking at the asteroid base as the major base, when really, the major base in the Sol system doesn’t need to exist. Fuel, ships, and personnel will come from either Tanna (not much besides fuel so far) or PC. If it only takes a few days to two weeks with one of the new jump drives to get from PC to Earth, there is really no need to have a permanent base setup in the core worlds until the Jung are taken care of.
I am looking at the asteroid base as nothing but a support base for 2 warships, once it becomes 3 or 4 it is irrelevant. Yeah it would be great if new ships can do the repetitive jumps without recharge but thats up to the author to decide. If a major base is not needed because it is only a few days to a week to get to the PC then an asteroid base is irrelevant as well better use the jump drive and all other components on a warship rather than a base that is not needed.
Since you really don’t needs that one big base, instead you would have supply ships taking personnel, supplies, food, and anything else of need to a staging point, aka the forward operating base in the area. As mentioned, the asteroid would serve as the forward operating base, and it could move to a location, service ships, receive supplies, and whatever else it needed to do, prior to jumping to a new location.
Taking them from where? The PC? Can you coordinate such supply between the PC and a mobile base that may or may not be in the location it is supposed to be at?
Even if someone attempted to leak its location, it would take a year or two for light to escape the solar system, not to mention the signal getting some place useful. By that time, the asteroid is gone again.
Great, what about a Jung Recce stopping a few light months from the sol system or the system in question and looking and listening? Creeping in towards the system and you can pinpoint the general area of the asteroid if not the specific one from transmissions and well all the nice shiny ships going in and out of the asteroid. You need one Jung sympathizer and the base becomes a sitting duck.
My position is that the Alliance needs a major base near the Sol System, but near is a relative term meaning that what is near for the alliance is not near for the Jung. If the PC cannot or does not give the Sol Sector the necessary aid? Then what? What if another threat pops up in the PC making their continuing assistance unlikely?
A Base in a system that is 75LY or more from the Jung border allows for the setting up of a small repair and supply base with the possibility to to expand the base with the resources on hand. You have billions of people on Earth and Tanna, carefully selecting people and transporting them to a newly established base gives you the necessary manpower. Set up a mining operation that you expand on by the use of Personnel from the PC, Tanna and Earth and you can ensure substantial raw materials for your fabricators. Imagine 100 or 500 or 1,000 fabricators all working to build weapons or establish a ship yard and factories that produce fighters, shuttles and anything else you need. Setting up a new academy for officers and schools for NCMs allows you to crew the new ships coming in to service so that even if the PC can't or won't assist you can still wage war on the Jung with hopes of winning.
Siggie, we understand all of your points and you are right. No one denies that long term, a large base with ample repair and refit facilities is the way to go. I just don't believe a mobile base is at any more risk than a planetary one. Your right that it couldn't stand up to any kind of assault, but realistically if that came to pass Nathan would scuttle it anyway. And your right that it would be a huge risk if the bases jump drive broke down, it would be almost useless then. But even if the Jung found it, they would be 10+ LYs away by the time a force was mobilized. But what if the Aurora or celestial drives break? As long as they could clear the immediate danger they could conceivably bring the repar station to them. According to book three the base is quite large, easily capable of supporting multiple ships of war even if they can't all dock inside simutaneously. And food will have to be shuttled in no matter where their base is. They would have to colonize a system which takes time to provide the sort of infrastructure your suggesting. Again great idea for long term but unrealistic given current support. Heck they could just take over the moon base on Tanna start there with a huge head start for the home base your suggesting. And your right that the Jung could park outside a system and look for traffic around an asteroid, and that's a risk. But it is one that good strategy can at least mitigate. At the moment the alliance does not have the resources to do what your suggesting. The asteroid base is a short term fix for a small task force, since there is no alliance fleet to speak of. The purpose of the thread was conjecture on what tug would send from darvano, and the asteroid and some locally available, also off the Takar books ships, fits the bill. Long term a base 75 LYs away is ideal, but it's not a realistic short term goal for Nathan. When his resources change absolutely but until then karuzara fits perfectly.
Siggie, you've made a lot of suggestions here, but none that I would recommend to the author. Your suggestions seem to be well thought out but not beneficial to the series. Why not wait for Ryk to move the story along according to his plan.
Let's not forget the 16 functional 402s (Falcons, hope the pilots come up with a really cool squadron patch)
Loki and Josh did some really good recon with just 1 Falcon.
With 16 on line and more on the way, there's no way the Jung can get any where near either earth, the asteroid, or Tanna without the Alliance knowing well in advance. (and hopefully preparing a proper greeting 😉 )
Siggie, we understand all of your points and you are right. No one denies that long term, a large base with ample repair and refit facilities is the way to go. I just don’t believe a mobile base is at any more risk than a planetary one.
It is at risk BECAUSE it is mobile, sabotage, malfunction and most of all the enemy stumbling on the base wether by accident or design. The fact that it also would not add any abilities over a stationary base while having significant shortcomings but what bugs me most of all is that the resources spend on making it move(engines, Jump Drive and emitters) and the resources to provide reactors and environmental systems to support a larger crew could be spend on a new major combatant which will increase the combat capabilities of the Alliance much more than a mobile asteroid base could.
Your right that it couldn’t stand up to any kind of assault, but realistically if that came to pass Nathan would scuttle it anyway.
And they end up in the exact same place if not worse off. You destroy all of your repair facilities, resources, fabricators and any new training facilities that you have set up which gets them exactly nowhere but gets them there really fast.
But what if the Aurora or celestial drives break?
You blow the ship up and move on, big difference between losing a warship and losing all of your repair facilities, raw material stockpiles etc... if you lose a ship you can build another one if you continue expanding the base, if you lose the base...well it becomes harder to build a base if most of your infrastructure was in that base.
As long as they could clear the immediate danger they could conceivably bring the repar station to them. According to book three the base is quite large, easily capable of supporting multiple ships of war even if they can’t all dock inside simutaneously.
They need a base for far more than simply repairs. You move the base and you disrupt everything else, plus as large as it is it cannot be expanded beyond a certain point which means that you cannot fit everything you need the base to do.
And food will have to be shuttled in no matter where their base is.
Not if you set up a base to grow the food, yes it will take time to set up and get the initial supply of food but eventually it would be able to support not only the war effort but Earth as well to a degree anyway. IF an inhabitable planet is found, bringing in farmers from Tanna and Earth should start off food self-sufficiency at least after the the first year or two.
They would have to colonize a system which takes time to provide the sort of infrastructure your suggesting.
Thats why starting the process now(At or a little after end of book 11). Start off with bringing farmers from Tanna and anyone who survives from Earth, fabricators for machinery they require and over a few years they should start exporting food.
Again great idea for long term but unrealistic given current support.
Small steps, at the end of book 11 they need a base to put fabricators and set up a mining operation that cannot be disrupted by the Jung. What that base gives you is the ability to expand a few months down the road and again a few months after that etc... Set up fabricators to build more fabricators and with a steady flow of raw materials from miners and manpower from Earth and Tanna you get a larger base without requiring much from the PC, and even if you lose Earth and/or Tanna you still continue the war because you can set up a population to draw from for the war.
Heck they could just take over the moon base on Tanna start there with a huge head start for the home base your suggesting.
Yeah but when it comes down to it, Tanna is close to or in Jung Territory and it means that should they can be attacked and the base can be destroyed while the Alliance cannot defend the base yet. The best defence is distance and secrecy, a base in the Solar System or Tanna system is neither far nor secret.
The asteroid base is a short term fix for a small task force, since there is no alliance fleet to speak of.
But they don't need a short term fix, what is needed is to set the ground work for the war. What is needed now is to set up the logistics so that once a ship becomes available to them they can immediately utilize it for offensive operations rather than having to start a base, the Aurora and Celestia are going nowhere because there are only two ships and cannot be risked in unnecessary combat. Remove all but the minimum number of fabricators, set up a base with all of the remaining fabricators, build more fabricators and set up facilities to build fighters, shuttles and small warships such as Gunships and Frigates all without the PC.
Long term a base 75 LYs away is ideal, but it’s not a realistic short term goal for Nathan. When his resources change absolutely but until then karuzara fits perfectly.
His resources will not Change until he changes them. But the way that the Author has set the situation, the PC might send him aid in the form of an asteroid base and it does not change the balance of power in any positive fashion, what it does is force Nathan to crew a base which adds no combat power and protect a base which provides no power other than the fighters which he could run off of the Aurora since all of his were most likely destroyed.
Let’s not forget the 16 functional 402s (Falcons, hope the pilots come up with a really cool squadron patch)
Loki and Josh did some really good recon with just 1 Falcon.
With 16 on line and more on the way, there’s no way the Jung can get any where near either earth, the asteroid, or Tanna without the Alliance knowing well in advance. (and hopefully preparing a proper greeting)
Yes, but there is a lot of space to cover with only 16(so far) jump fighters. If I remember correctly, they said that Earth was essentially the centre of human occupied territory, which means that they can be coming from 360 degrees. Add to that the fact that they would be needed for recce's of Jung territory and that early warning ability goes out the window, you need a portion for Defence of Tanna, a portion for defence of Earth and a portion for recce of Jung space to be able to bring the war to them as opposed to being constantly on the defensive.
A permanent base can't flee WHEN not IF it gets discovered. An asteroid can easily do that.
The initial conditions meant that Nathan had no real commitment to defend Tanna. Now he has not only the ability (sort of) but the desire, since 100,000 Terrans have been transplanted there. That should stiffen his spine somewhat.
