Deep Space Wandering Fleet-Chapter 631 - 627 Human War Power

Seeing the host look a bit puzzled, the expert threw in another question. "First, a core issue: how much loss can we sustain?"

"Is it 5% losses? 15%? Or 30%? If we suffer heavy casualties, will our civilization collapse into disorder? Would we choose to retreat, or would we retain our fighting spirit and continue to battle?"

The female host couldn’t help but ask, "General Wang, modern warfare is intelligent and information-based, meaning it’s conducted through drones. Humans’ combat abilities are far inferior to machines; why discuss human losses first?"

This was also what many viewers were thinking. What good are numbers?

Humans can’t react as quickly as machines, their accuracy can’t match that of robots, not to mention their strength is much less—and isn’t it ultimately about who has the higher technology anyway?

We’re all Fourth-level Civilizations. The gap shouldn’t be too large, right...

On the television program, General Wang smiled and said, "Everyone seems to overestimate the importance of equipment and underestimate the role of people."

"What does war strike at? Drones go back and forth, inflicting damage on each other—what’s the point? Even if our spaceships suffer greater losses or are inferior in performance, does that mean we’ve lost? Of course not!"

"War isn’t just about the numbers on paper. When it truly breaks out, it targets the core strength of the enemy, their population, management, and confidence!"

"Do you really think that there wouldn’t be human casualties in an actual war? The enemy’s primary targets are likely to be the population, the common people! Don’t assume the enemy will abide by compassion and morality!"

"We have six mother ships; the destruction of any one of them could lead to massive population losses... Would our society immediately collapse? Everyone must not overestimate their will. Confronted with the death of our kind, the first reaction should be fear followed by anger and counterattack."

"So, we must be psychologically prepared for this."

The host fell silent. Upon reflection, what the other party said made sense.

General Wang continued, "According to current cases, an interstellar war can’t harness everything. Often, when halfway through the battle, once a certain level of casualties is reached, one side starts to run away in a disorderly retreat."

"This shows that the vast majority of aliens, like us, fear death..."

The screen began to play a scene of two Fourth-level Civilizations in conflict.

Under normal circumstances, civilizations of the Fourth-level wouldn’t engage in combat, because with Warp Speed, both parties can easily escape or retreat.

But in the current situation, where there is an intent to eliminate the other, everyone is gathered near the Dyson Sphere, and war is imminent.

Human reconnaissance spaceships didn’t dare to get too close and could only watch from a distance. When war broke out, many spaceships were "invisible"; radar couldn’t detect these super-high-speed moving ships.

They could only be detected through infrared sensors when they launched various weapons.

The occasional flickering lights indicated that some battleships had already been destroyed.

What followed was a multitude of fleets panicking and initiating Superluminal escape without even a semblance of a counterattack.

"Judging by the scale of the fleeing forces, if they organized a counterattack, it wouldn’t be impossible to defeat the enemy, but they chose to run instead."

"The battles of interstellar civilizations often make extensive use of unmanned drone swarms, so humans are often just the commanders. The frontlines are all drone losses. However, the frontlines need resupplies, drones need docking stations, and a high-capacity command center is required—all operated by humans."

"If we were to face such a surprise attack, could we organize a reasonable counterattack, and how much loss could we withstand?"

"Thus, weapons and equipment are important, but so is the combat will of the personnel. Ah... The Milky Way has been peaceful for so long; not just us, these aliens have forgotten how to wage war as well."

The female host asked again, "Is this still merely proxy warfare?"

"Yes, proxy wars."

"They are merely tentative skirmishes, with controllable scales of warfare. Both sides are testing each other’s spaceship performance, the destructive power of their weapons, and the mobilization capacity of their personnel. If one side crumbles upon first contact, they’re essentially just a larger block of tofu dregs, quickly to be devoured by the enemy."

These war videos were making people anxious.

War inevitably leads to death; there is no logic where no one dies.

Everyone was questioning whether humans had the level of military capability to protect themselves in such conflicts.

The expert on the TV wasn’t asserting with absolute certainty that New Human Civilization could win a war of this scale under the same conditions. Even if they did say so, it might not be believed.

Fortunately, the militia training had been ongoing for several years... theoretically, it should not be too bad.

When it came to this area, only the top echelons had some confidence; even experts like them were merely speculating.

The next video played was a bit more light-hearted, depicting a Fourth-level Civilization thrashing a Third-level Civilization. In a desperate situation, the poor Third-level Civilization attempted to trigger the massive gravity of a Cosmic String.

Massive gravity could interfere with Curvature Navigation, narrowing the mobility gap between the two parties.

However, this act was deemed a "serious interference with safe conduct" by the Dyson Sphere, as massive gravity could also disrupt the motion of Constant Stars and Dyson Spheres.

In that instant, a high-yield Antimatter Missile exceeded superluminal speed and obliterated the Third-level Civilization’s spaceship in one fell swoop!

A hundred-colored brilliance erupted in the starry sky, and after the annihilation of antimatter and matter, violent gamma-rays were produced, causing the entire screen to flicker with static.

This was also the only time the Dyson Sphere took action...

Such superluminal observation methods, and attacks faster than the speed of light, were completely beyond the war capabilities of a Fourth-level Civilization.

One level higher in technology really means a complete outclassing, and that’s no idle boast.

"This was also a recent war. After this, that patch of the starry sky has quieted down some, with no further conflicts, for now."

In fact, the videos weren’t carelessly broadcasted; they were carefully selected before being shown to the public.

The public needed to be mentally prepared for such frightening scenarios. If a war broke out before everyone was properly mobilized, that would be truly disastrous. Anticipating a less than wonderful future, it was better to get the groundwork done earlier.

The host said, "...I have another question, can we use the Dyson Sphere’s automatic counterattack capabilities to eliminate the enemy?"

"Like tricking it..."

Engineer Wang spread his hands open, "That’s difficult, it has never happened before. Although we still don’t understand whether Omega is a Strong Artificial Intelligence, civilizations commonly believe its logical capabilities surpass those of Fourth-level Civilization lifeforms by an order of magnitude."

"What does that mean? It’s like a monkey trying to deceive humans, no matter what the monkey does, it’s very unlikely to fool humans... Of course, this is just an analogy, but we still have to be cautious of the possibility of being accidentally harmed by the Dyson Sphere. We must also try to develop a way to deceive the Dyson Sphere’s automatic counter-attack. Whether we can actually achieve that is another matter."

In essence, the current strategy involves two-handed preparation—one hand mobilizing personnel; on the other hand, the development of the Planet Curvature Engine is underway urgently, currently at 64% completion.

The engineers are working overtime, pushing the construction rate to the limit.

It is expected that in about seven or eight more years, the project will be successfully completed, which is somewhat faster than initially anticipated... freёnovelkiss-com

It must be noted that the original time estimate was carefully calculated to be at its limit, but now it was even being accelerated, indicating the engineering teams have been working exceptionally hard these years. Every worker knew the weight on their shoulders and was fully fired up.