So an Imperial-class Star Destroyer (Star Wars) crash lands on Earth..........

[Twickster]

Ultimately, they can probably carry out this strategy, but it would take a very long time and I don't think they would need to finish before the world powers decided to sue for peace. There are a lot of comparisons being made to people holding out against allied firebombing, but I view this is psychologically different. People can understand airplanes dropping bombs from the sky. They know their general capabilities. They understand that the bombers can be shot down by fighters. They know their own side has similar weapons they are using against the enemy. It is fundamentally different to see a single thing, roughly the size of a B-17, descend from the sky and float above the city and then rain down green energy beams that destroy whatever they touch. Watch as weapons fired at the thing have no effect and those firing are quickly destroyed. The ship floats there, implacable, blasting buildings, roads, cars, trucks, tanks, people. Destroying everything it sees with impunity. That is not going to have the same effect as waves of familiar bombers. You would have no idea where this thing came from, if it will ever leave, how many more there are just like it?

Still doesn't fly. This was the era of wonderweapons never before seen in war. Napalm was invented to destroy wooden Japanese cities. It was horrible, unable to be countered and unprecedented, and the Japanese didn't surrender. The V2 was used en-masse against the the UK. It was horrible, unable to be countered (for a while), and the UK didn't surrender. Even earlier, both sides used phosgene gas in WWI, it was unprecedented, a colorless, invisible, implacable creeping death that only killed days later after exposure. It still didn't cause the sides to surrender. You would have an arguable case in the nuclear bomb, except that a not-insignificant portion of the Japanese brass still didn't want to surrender, and there is nothing in the Empire's arsenal of a mere 100 fighters and 12 bombers approaching nukes anyway, so no, the argument is still ludicrous.

Basically, 100 TIE fighters blasting at a city for hours will not approach the damage of a single firebombing run of 1000's of B29's dropping napalm. The argument boils down that WWII people are so ignorant they would surrender immediately out of, what, a sense of awe?

[Twickster]

It is a game of attrition. If team A can make it so that each day team B is in a worse position than before and team B cannot do the same to team A, then team A's victory is inevitable, it just requires patience. If the earth forces cannot cause any attrition against the empire, they are fighting a losing battle.

Given its own resource requirements and inability to resupply or repair even the slightest wear and tear in its equipment, a single Star Destroyer is losing a war of attrition by merely existing.

[Alan2099]

I think we're also overlooking how easy it is for a person to knock out a stormtrooper, steal their armor, and sneak into important locations. The movies have shown us that the Empire is not good at identifying their own people.

[Captain Smith]

If SW electronics are anything like ours, they are going to need all kinds of exotic metals to build them. Now how are they going to find rare earth deposits, refine and mine them. Lots of them are in China?

Structural components, build the factories, staff them? While the two year clock is clicking?

I like my idea of passive resistance. Just do nothing. Let them fly around and don't cooperate. Stealth underground resistance. Poison food supplies. Mines, snipers when they leave their limited transports.

BTW - can someone provide clear evidence that the SW ships are totally immune to kinetic weaponry? That's the claim.

[Totoro Man]

that video footage of the Battle of Takodana shows us TIE fighters that are flying at extremely low altitudes and extremely low speeds. to put this in perspective, I have seen WWI-vintage aircraft fly faster than that in real life. this video footage absolutely kills the argument that TIE fighters would be flying so fast that nothing could touch them. it's proof to the contrary. there is literally nothing in the world being used in WW2 that couldn't catch and hit those things. these things are flying so low that you could probably hit them with a bazooka (if you got lucky)!

even if we pretend that TIE fighters would be immune to small arms fire and 20 mm cannons... that doesn't mean that they're immune to mid-air collisions with solid objects. they're flying so slow in this scene that literally any major aircraft type in the world could overtake them. this includes obsolete biplanes! ramming and wing-tipping are already well-established tactics at this point. if the TIE fighter pilot is fixated on destroying a ground target, what's to stop them from getting bumped into the ground by an aircraft diving on top of them? if Darth Vader and his two wingmen can get ambushed by Han Solo and lose two wingmen in the process... what's going to stop this from happening to nameless mooks?

we know for a fact, beyond all possible doubt, that TIE fighters do NOT have shields.

we also know that getting hit by large solid objects proves that kinetic energy, conducted through solid objects, can most certainly destroy them.

let's say that a 10,000 pound asteroid traveling 30 feet per second takes out a TIE fighter instantly on impact. that's 189,631 Joules.

a 1-pound anti-aircraft shell travelling at 2,800 feet per second produces 165,189 Joules. that's basically ANY standard 37 to 40 mm anti-aircraft shell at that time. they would have had thousands of these things being fired at TIE fighters constantly. most guns of this type could fire 120 to 200 rounds of this type inside of a minute.

15-pound shell traveling 3,000 feet per second would have 1,975,318 Joules. that's only about 10x as much energy being packed into the hit as what we've seen instantly destroy a TIE fighter. this means that just about any 75 mm gun used by any major combatant SHOULD have the ability to cripple a TIE fighter with a single direct hit. we're talking about tanks, light field guns, and anti-aircraft guns. there would have been hundreds, if not thousands of these sorts of guns operating on the battlefield.

if we have definitive evidence that the bridge of a Star Destroyer can be crippled by asteroids and crashing A-wings... why would we then assume that TIE fighters, with no shields at all, would somehow be impervious to cannon fire?

[Totoro Man]

I think we're also overlooking how easy it is for a person to knock out a stormtrooper, steal their armor, and sneak into important locations. The movies have shown us that the Empire is not good at identifying their own people.

there is also nothing to prevent humanity from attempting to replicate the Stormtrooper armor using plastics and other materials. since we already know that the armor is basically useless anyways... the main thing is to LOOK like the enemy.

[Totoro Man]

if people noticed those maps I posted on page 7... those maps were created by hundreds of hours of labor by collecting data from multiple sources. they were assembled using aerial photographs that were composited together to make a map.

it's "easy enough" for TIE fighters to destroy those red Xs and blue stars if they already know what they're looking for. if they have ready-made maps just handed to them... of course it's easy. but they won't have access to ANY of that information automatically by just sitting inside the Star Destroyer.

the "sensors" of the Star Destroyer and it's various aircraft do NOT have access to this ready-made information. no, they'll have to fly out to the target and reconnoiter it to figure out what their priority targets are. once they've decided on what their primary targets are they have to REMEMBER where these things are. the alternative is that they have to relay the data back to the Star Destroyer, have the data saved, and then have the vessel crew flag and mark each target for safe-keeping. if the pilot only works alone, and doesn't relay that information back, then there is only one pilot in a single aircraft who has the required information.

the Empire isn't getting access to this information without getting it themselves. their sensors can't detect two droids wandering in the desert on foot, remember? how are their sensors supposed to know that there are 45 critical bridges required to isolate the city of Arras for about a week?

additionally, if their sensors can't pinpoint two droids in the desert effectively... all evidence from the film suggests that they simply followed the launch trajectory of the shuttle and followed it to the ground. not exactly sophisticated stuff! how are these super-sensors supposed to be able to differentiate between normal road traffic and a construction part over 100 miles away.

and if the sensor arrays of these spaceships were so amazing... why do they even have windows!?!?

no, the Empire would still have to conduct basic visual recon flights before establishing what their priority targets are.

for example, if the sensors were that spectacular the Rebellion wouldn't have needed to steal the plans for the Death Star to begin with, right? their sensors could have simply told them exactly where and how to hit the reactor. if their sensors were so fantastic how did Stormtroopers even get ambushed to begin with? how did Darth Vader NOT notice Han Solo ambushing him with the Millenium Falcon? why didn't his wingmen say something, or do something?

now, before we argue that was PIS. I think we have a pretty compelling case that there is a LOT of Character Induced Stupidity in Stormtroopers that can't be ignored.

[Captain Smith]

Great analysis. I like the COS play attack.

Just for grins, anyone think that if the ship landed in the 1990's days of Cold War European force levels with tens of thousands of nukes, even countries like Switzerland and Sweden having hundreds of jet fighters and tanks, let alone W. Germany and France - it would have the slightest success.

[StupidMoniker]

that video footage of the Battle of Takodana shows us TIE fighters that are flying at extremely low altitudes and extremely low speeds. to put this in perspective, I have seen WWI-vintage aircraft fly faster than that in real life. this video footage absolutely kills the argument that TIE fighters would be flying so fast that nothing could touch them. it's proof to the contrary. there is literally nothing in the world being used in WW2 that couldn't catch and hit those things. these things are flying so low that you could probably hit them with a bazooka (if you got lucky)!

even if we pretend that TIE fighters would be immune to small arms fire and 20 mm cannons... that doesn't mean that they're immune to mid-air collisions with solid objects. they're flying so slow in this scene that literally any major aircraft type in the world could overtake them. this includes obsolete biplanes! ramming and wing-tipping are already well-established tactics at this point. if the TIE fighter pilot is fixated on destroying a ground target, what's to stop them from getting bumped into the ground by an aircraft diving on top of them? if Darth Vader and his two wingmen can get ambushed by Han Solo and lose two wingmen in the process... what's going to stop this from happening to nameless mooks?

we know for a fact, beyond all possible doubt, that TIE fighters do NOT have shields.

we also know that getting hit by large solid objects proves that kinetic energy, conducted through solid objects, can most certainly destroy them.

let's say that a 10,000 pound asteroid traveling 30 feet per second takes out a TIE fighter instantly on impact. that's 189,631 Joules.

a 1-pound anti-aircraft shell travelling at 2,800 feet per second produces 165,189 Joules. that's basically ANY standard 37 to 40 mm anti-aircraft shell at that time. they would have had thousands of these things being fired at TIE fighters constantly. most guns of this type could fire 120 to 200 rounds of this type inside of a minute.

15-pound shell traveling 3,000 feet per second would have 1,975,318 Joules. that's only about 10x as much energy being packed into the hit as what we've seen instantly destroy a TIE fighter. this means that just about any 75 mm gun used by any major combatant SHOULD have the ability to cripple a TIE fighter with a single direct hit. we're talking about tanks, light field guns, and anti-aircraft guns. there would have been hundreds, if not thousands of these sorts of guns operating on the battlefield.

if we have definitive evidence that the bridge of a Star Destroyer can be crippled by asteroids and crashing A-wings... why would we then assume that TIE fighters, with no shields at all, would somehow be impervious to cannon fire?

Who said anything about TIE fighters being immune to anything, let alone cannon fire?

[Twickster]

Who said anything about TIE fighters being immune to anything, let alone cannon fire?

Sooo... Is the *real* claim now that 12 bombers are somehow going to take over the world? Because it sure looks like it now.

[StupidMoniker]

if people noticed those maps I posted on page 7... those maps were created by hundreds of hours of labor by collecting data from multiple sources. they were assembled using aerial photographs that were composited together to make a map.

it's "easy enough" for TIE fighters to destroy those red Xs and blue stars if they already know what they're looking for. if they have ready-made maps just handed to them... of course it's easy. but they won't have access to ANY of that information automatically by just sitting inside the Star Destroyer.

the "sensors" of the Star Destroyer and it's various aircraft do NOT have access to this ready-made information. no, they'll have to fly out to the target and reconnoiter it to figure out what their priority targets are. once they've decided on what their primary targets are they have to REMEMBER where these things are. the alternative is that they have to relay the data back to the Star Destroyer, have the data saved, and then have the vessel crew flag and mark each target for safe-keeping. if the pilot only works alone, and doesn't relay that information back, then there is only one pilot in a single aircraft who has the required information.

the Empire isn't getting access to this information without getting it themselves. their sensors can't detect two droids wandering in the desert on foot, remember? how are their sensors supposed to know that there are 45 critical bridges required to isolate the city of Arras for about a week?

additionally, if their sensors can't pinpoint two droids in the desert effectively... all evidence from the film suggests that they simply followed the launch trajectory of the shuttle and followed it to the ground. not exactly sophisticated stuff! how are these super-sensors supposed to be able to differentiate between normal road traffic and a construction part over 100 miles away.

and if the sensor arrays of these spaceships were so amazing... why do they even have windows!?!?

no, the Empire would still have to conduct basic visual recon flights before establishing what their priority targets are.

for example, if the sensors were that spectacular the Rebellion wouldn't have needed to steal the plans for the Death Star to begin with, right? their sensors could have simply told them exactly where and how to hit the reactor. if their sensors were so fantastic how did Stormtroopers even get ambushed to begin with? how did Darth Vader NOT notice Han Solo ambushing him with the Millenium Falcon? why didn't his wingmen say something, or do something?

now, before we argue that was PIS. I think we have a pretty compelling case that there is a LOT of Character Induced Stupidity in Stormtroopers that can't be ignored.

Those are low showings and PIS. Their sensors were able to instantaneously scan an escape pod launched from an enemy ship and determine that there were no life forms aboard. Based on that, you think they cannot see bridges across a river? They can't figure out which buildings are homes, which are power plants, and which are factories? We have radar that can detect aircraft, but people in a dogfight a) still have a see through cockpit, b) still visually acquire targets, and c) can still be surprised by enemy planes when they are focused on the one they are trying to shoot down. Vader also has the force and that didn't tip him off to Han Solo either, does that mean Jedi can't block blaster fire with their lightsabers since clearly the force didn't give Vader any warning about the Falcon swooping in? If the Empire just swooped down in a shuttle and grabbed C3PO and R2D2 before the jawas picked them up, there would be no movie.

[StupidMoniker]

Sooo... Is the *real* claim now that 12 bombers are somehow going to take over the world? Because it sure looks like it now.

I think it is 8 Lambda class shuttles. And that is what I have said from the beginning. I don't know what this "real claim" and "Looks like now" is all about.

[Twickster]

This thread is nothing but the gradual dismantling of any notion of imperial victory. At the start it was all about the overwhelming power of the Star Destroyer, then it was established that being limited to line of sight fire they would have uncontested control over a radius of 30-odd miles at most and they would all starve due to lack of resources. Then it was about stormtroopers and AT-ATs being unstoppable in the battlefield, until it was established that there simply wasn't enough of them to maintain a logistics train, hold territory or collect resources, nor could they move around fast enough to project enough numbers to matter. Then it was about Imperial air power and the TIE fighters laying waste to cities, until it was established that 120 ships and their demonstrable firepower are simply unable to lay down enough destruction to rival the aerial bombings that we know didn't cause the combatants to cave in WWII.

So here we are, reduced to 12... no, my mistake, 8 shuttles to take over the world.

[Darth Drizzle]

Just popping in to say after many pages writing about scenarios that will never take place and disregarding every Imperial advantage and severely understanding or outright misunderstanding everything about the Star Wars capabilities/abilities/vehicles there is still nothing put forward that would cause the Imperials to lose this scenario.

It's been clear stated how and why they win, and countering their obvious and insurmountable advantages with scenarios and limitations that they dont have and never will occur doesn't change anything.

The Allies still can't stop any Aerial Craft from going to space, scanning all their targets, then dropping down anywhere in the world at anytime day or night and taking them out(starting with any Artillery or defenses which is basic warfare). Their weaponry from TIEs to Lambada cannons will absolutely destroy any/everything WW2 Earth has built easily.

The Allies still cant force the Imperials to do ANYTHING. Not on Day 1, not on Day 10, not on Day 100. The Allies simply cannot force them into a single battle or battlefield of their choosing. The only thing the Allies can do is try to attack the Star Destroyer and fail Hard. Every single bate/engagement happens when the where the Imperials choose to.

Before claiming victory talking about supply lines, moving thousands of Stormtroopers for NO reason and what not, just prove how you can stop them from doing what has been stated sin e the beginning of the thread, aka the Imperials dropping from space after scanning their targets and taking out all their targets before a counter attack can even begin. 1 Lambada and 10 TIEs attacking simultaneously 8 targets across the globe in Allied countries with Impunity and leaving without losing a single vehicle. Happening multiple times a day, every day, and the allies have nothing they can do about it since they dont have radar/scanners to track when and where the Imperials are at anytime.

[Totoro Man]

Who said anything about TIE fighters being immune to anything, let alone cannon fire?

Hiromi, Darth Drizzle, The Drunkard Kid, Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh have all argued that the Star Destroyer would not be taking ANY casualties (which would imply that all of their assets are immune to WW2 weaponry based on speed or superior durability)

so, then you can admit that pretty much any cannon armed fighter in the world could dive on these TIE fighters while they're strafing buildings and shoot them down? if you're admitting this much then you would have to admit that ALL of the TIE fighters would get destroyed inside of a week. they are outnumbered over 20-to-1. if they typically make ground attacks at the speeds we are shown in the Battle of Takodana then they would all get wiped out inside of a week.

just take a look at Jagdgeschwader 26. by the time D-Day took place this squadron had shot down roughly 2,000 enemy aircraft and established itself as one of the best active fighter squadrons in Western Europe at that time. between June 3rd and July 1st they claimed about 95 victories and suffered 41 losses attained through aerial combat. that's just ONE squadron with an official strength of 260 or so aircraft. in practice their true number of available aircraft was significantly lower, perhaps 130. by June 30th they only had 69 aircraft left. only 34 of those were operational (combat losses, lack of parts, replacements, fuel, etc).

and that is discussing the status of a high quality fighter group against overwhelming odds. it is also just one of a hundred or more active fighter groups actively involved in this area.

it's not enough to enjoy technological superiority if you employ inexperienced pilots that use inferior tactics. most TIE fighters (and Imperial aircraft in general) use pure pursuit tactics and VERY POOR teamwork. Darth Vader has the best kill record for Imperial pilots... and his showings only put him in an area where he would be competitive with most experienced flight commanders in Europe at this time. in other words, he's nothing special. the only pilot in the SW universe I've seen that might be compared to the exceptional top-tier aces accomplished in WW2 would be Poe Dameron. and he's still just one guy, and not part of this rumble.

Imperial pilots that are lost can't be replaced. it takes a long time to properly train a pilot. an isolated and stranded Star Destroyer will not have access to these training resources.

in the real world ships tend to operate only with the bare minimum number of people needed. they don't have room to house three or four shifts of people. typically, they would have people operating in shifts. half of the crew would work for 8 hours while the other half slept. then they would switch places. there would be no back up pilots for all of those 144 aircraft. ships just don't have that kind of room to spare. especially not with two years worth of provisions crammed inside of that thing!