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It’s begun. Armor, artillery, air power, they are all going to be involved, on both sides. Will the Martians have what it takes to win, or will WestHem overcome the odds? Enjoy!
Several emails have come in asking why the Martians, after ripping through the WestHem fighters, haven’t gone after the orbiting fleet. I discussed it with Al, mentioning the issues people were citing. Here was part of his reply:
“There are multiple reasons why the Martians can't/won't attack orbital platforms of their enemies in orbit, and this was established back in Greenies as one of the lessons of the Jupiter War. Fighter aircraft are easily slaughtered by fixed laser defenses when trying to go up against space stations like Triad or heavily armed warships in orbit. They get potted out of space easily before they can get close enough to engage. And the fighters are not stealth craft since their engines have to burn very hot to maneuver them. In addition, you cannot detonate nuclear weapons in orbit of a planet like Mars or Earth without frying all of your satellites and creating those huge, dangerous debris fields you were talking about. They can go after satellites and attack squadrons of small orbital or orbit to surface craft, but anything bigger than a stealth ship is pretty much invulnerable once orbit is established.”
The master has spoken! I think that pretty much explains it. There was a reason that the nuclear limpet mine attack was conducted after the convoy was beyond lunar orbit.
Interesting question the other day. Why aren’t the Martian aircraft shooting down the WestHem landers? Maybe because they can’t. Let’s go back to Greenies. In Chapter 12, a pair of Mosquitoes shoot down an unarmed and unarmored medevac shuttle. In Chapter 13, there is an interesting line - “…a one-hundred-thousand-ton landing ship was a bit more difficult to destroy than a two-hundred-ton shuttlecraft.” Later it is specified that the landers are heavily armed and armored and have anti-aircraft capability. Anyway, there was a reason the F-22s weren’t attacking the landers.
Regardless, here is Chapter 23. Enjoy!
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