I notice I’m confused by what Anders says about the offence-defence balance.
The argument, as I understand it, is that in the far future there’ll be a lot of space—lightyears, perhaps—between warring factions/civilizations. Offensive attacks therefore won’t work well because, with all the distance the offensive weapons need to cover, the defenders will have plenty of time to block or move out of the way.
But… this relies on the defenders seeing the weapons approaching, no? And I would expect weapons of the far future to travel at or very close to the speed of light,[1] making it impossible to see them coming until they’ve already hit you. (Which would mean that the balance favours offence, not defence.)
This seems like a basic enough point, though, that I’m sure it’s part of Anders’ thinking already; I expect I’m missing something.
I notice I’m confused by what Anders says about the offence-defence balance.
The argument, as I understand it, is that in the far future there’ll be a lot of space—lightyears, perhaps—between warring factions/civilizations. Offensive attacks therefore won’t work well because, with all the distance the offensive weapons need to cover, the defenders will have plenty of time to block or move out of the way.
But… this relies on the defenders seeing the weapons approaching, no? And I would expect weapons of the far future to travel at or very close to the speed of light,[1] making it impossible to see them coming until they’ve already hit you. (Which would mean that the balance favours offence, not defence.)
This seems like a basic enough point, though, that I’m sure it’s part of Anders’ thinking already; I expect I’m missing something.
e.g., high-powered lasers, other types of directed-energy weapons, projectiles accelerated via thermonuclear reaction, pion drive, or artificial black hole