It's funny; I never thought of it before and a friend who's not a Trek fan at all and just watched BOBW (or a part of that episode) asked me if those three tiny drones were all that stands between a possible enemy thread and earth.
So what exactly is the Mars Defense Perimeter? I never thought of it. Was is just a base located on Mars that deployed those flying bombs? Or is the MDP just the planetary defense system of Mars, defending Utopia and the Mars colonies? I seriously doubt the perimeter is some sort of advanced weapons grid securing the whole inner solar system.
BTW, what exactly is earth's defense? In B5, they had the G.O.D.-defense stations and some planet-based defense, as far as I remember, and in ST they talked about planetary shielding from time to time. But in BOBW, the cube in earth's orbit wasn't even attacked, and the Breen invasion was only stopped because of the fleet they had stationed here to protect sector 001.
Or does Stafleet think it isn't even neccesary to protect a world tht far behind the borders? If so, why didn't Wolf, the second Borg incursion of '73 or the Breen attack change their minds?
Posted by The_Tom (Member # 38) on :
quote:Originally posted by Cpt. Kyle Amasov: I seriously doubt the perimeter is some sort of advanced weapons grid securing the whole inner solar system.
Geoff Mandel differs.
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
I don't think there's any reason to assume that we saw all of Earth's defenses in that episode. We didn't see the battle at Wolf 359 either.
Anyway, aside from the Breen, whose attack really wasn't all that successful as far as concrete resources go, the only things we know to have gotten all the way to Earth were from what Sternbach euphemistically termed the "unaffected races" in the DS9 tech manual. I think there may be a reference to V'Ger neutralizing planetary defenses, and of course the Probe was explicitly doing just that, despite Starfleet "launching everything we have."
So all in all, I'd say the Federation has done a fairly good job as far as defense goes.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
Well, we know for certain that the cube in BOBW was not attacked while directly in Earth orbit.
It's been a while since I saw TMP... wasn't there an orbital defense system that was mentioned (and disabled by V'Ger)?
The thing is, that Starfleet has never (that we know of) faced a truly hostile outright invasion of the core sectors of the Federation. From what we know, all of the conflicts before the first Borg invasion were border engagements. So Starfleet probably never considered it as important as providing for border defenses. Or to translate: they figured the border defenses were completely sufficient for repelling attacks. And it was only a highly superior force like the Borg that was able to puncture the outer lines and get to the interior.
Of course, the initial TNG attitude was that war was obsolete, and the Federation had the head-in-the-sand mentality anyway -- so Starfleet probably had qualitatively weaker defensives even though their technology had advanced.
This doesn't answer the question as to what the Mars Defense Perimeter is -- I guess that it's something that'd determined by the overall mentality -- for instance, Starfleet could have maintained a small number of large drones that would go into the center of an invading fleet (surviving thanks to heavy armor) and then blow up real good, decimating the invaders.
Posted by Harry (Member # 265) on :
I remember some map of Earth from DS9 with all sorts of lines and dots on them, perhaps indicating the planetary defense system.
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
quote:Originally posted by The_Tom: Geoff Mandel differs.
Who?
I personally am of the opinion that the MDP consists of a large network of attack drones covering the entire Mars orbital shell (ie. a globe with Mars's orbit around the sun as its equator). The Borg punched through a weak spot in the shell, where the MDP thins as it approaches the highly trafficed area the planet Mars itself.
Of course, when this question came up on TrekBBS, what Mr. Sternbach said didn't sound like he conceived the MDP as a solar system defense, but rather a planetary defense. Makes the MDP kinda pointless that way, if you ask me.
Earth's defenses were mentioned in DS9's "Paradise Lost", as well as one of them movies.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 24) on :
A large shell of attack drones covering the Mars orbit would be a real waste of time and effort. Talk about spreading out your forces and materials. It would make much more sense, that Starfleet with its back to the wall and its fleet destroyed at Wolf 359 would improvise and push a planetary defence system into the Borg's way.
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
I think, apart from V'Ger and the Whale Probe - which both were rather 'special' circumstances - i.e. they weren't acts of war committed by a particular race/government/group... I don't think Earth or the Sol System had been directly attacked since probably the time of Enterprise or the Romulan Wars. I think the battle drones were really obsolete, last ditch efforts at a sort of defence from the Borg.
Posted by Guardian 2000 (Member # 743) on :
quote:Originally posted by MinutiaeMan: Well, we know for certain that the cube in BOBW was not attacked while directly in Earth orbit.
Judging by the dialogue and visuals, the Borg didn't quite make it to Earth orbit. Not only had they "halted their approach" to Earth when Data's link took hold, but the cube looked waaay too big to actually be in Earth orbit, assuming a ~3km cube and a ~12,000km Earth.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
I distinctly remember seeing shots of the curve of the Earth both on the viewscreen as the Enterprise-D approached the cube for the last time, and under the cube as it exploded at the end. Using that perspective, the cube definitely had to be somewhere around geosynchronous/geostationary orbit. (Pretty far out, but not THAT far.)
For example, compare the curve of the Earth as seen in BOBW to the size of the Earth as seen in images from the moon. There's a marked difference -- so the cube definitely had to be closer than lunar orbit.
Posted by Reverend (Member # 335) on :
There are two shots of the Borg cube over Earth on the viewscreen. The first is a wide shot showing the whole globe with a tiny little cube above. The second is a magnified view showing a slight curve of the earth with a screen filling cube in the foreground. The destruction scene shows no sign of earth, only a blank star field and the E-D making a sharpe exit.
VFX scaling is notoriously unreliable but it dose seam as if the cube is in high orbit. However as someone has already pointed out the Borg had just halted their approach to Earth so it's possible that they stopped just outside of range of Earth's defence systems.
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Personally I think that the Mars defense perimeter is a defense net for the entire inner solar system but a somewhat outdated one. If we assume that prior to the first Borg attack Earth hadn't been attacked for centuries then I don't belive much of it will have been updated. Those drones may be very effective against normal warships (or older vessels) but didn't stand a chance against the Borg (like the ships at Wolf). I belive the perimeter probably consists mostly of drones like this, with a few old starships to back them up. The drones had warp nacelles so presumeably they can make at least short warp hops to intercept intruders.
As for defense of Earth itself, I imagine very little (At least prior to DW). Perhaps a few mobile phaser platforms and missle intercept stations but not much really.
Posted by Nimpim (Member # 205) on :
Has anyone ever made 3d-renders of the drones? Are there any production photos of the miniatures?
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
I just remembered another specific mention -- didn't someone in the Starfleet Command control room in "Star Trek IV" mention planetary defenses (that naturally weren't working)?
If the Mars defense drones were outdated designs, I think they'd probably be no more than a hundred years old. Starfleet wasn't as "stupid" with respect to Federation defense in the TOS era -- with the Romulans, Klingons, Tholians, and others all posing major threats, they probably had a more tiered defense network back then. That could be the origin of the drones, that were kept for emergency use.
Hmmm... maybe those drones *were* from the TOS era... and had been mothballed. Starfleet started reactivating them when the cube breezed through the task force at Wolf 359, but there were only three ready by the time the cube got to Mars.
Another possibility: perhaps the "Mars Defense Perimeter" is actually an archaic term that fell out of use after the long-term direct threats to Earth faded, and there really WAS no real allotment of armaments to that now-imaginary perimeter -- and the use of that term just indicated the gravity of the situation, that no hostile invasion force had made it that far since the Earth-Romulan War (maybe).
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
I've heard there is going to be a new series:
Star Trek: Mars Defence Perimeter
!
A short-lived series. ;o)
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus: A large shell of attack drones covering the Mars orbit would be a real waste of time and effort. Talk about spreading out your forces and materials.
Hell no, what's a few thousand unmanned drone grouped into constellations in the face of Federation's industrial capacity? Drop in the bucket. And with space warfare, you need a system that covers all approach to the entire solar system. The enemy can come from above or below the ecliptic, despite ST's facination with 2D-rizing solar system travel.
quote:It would make much more sense, that Starfleet with its back to the wall and its fleet destroyed at Wolf 359 would improvise and push a planetary defence system into the Borg's way.
In that little time? After observing Borg tractor tactics? On top of the sheer chance that the Borg would pass by Mars, when the planets could be anywhere else in their orbital path besides lying between Wolf 359 and Earth? Not bloody likely.
Posted by Free ThoughtCrime America (Member # 480) on :
Hannibal ex portis. If you get past the outer solar system defenses, it's highly unlikely you can will be stopped.
Given the amount of area a drone system would have to cover to effectively guard just the planetary plane, it would make more sense to have a few older vessals coordinated at Mars than a automated defense system.
Besides...on Sept 11th, there were only 16 fighter jets covering the entire United States. Now there's over a hundred. I don't think the Federation had much of a defensive grid anyway.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 24) on :
quote:Originally posted by David Templar: And with space warfare, you need a system that covers all approach to the entire solar system. The enemy can come from above or below the ecliptic, despite ST's facination with 2D-rizing solar system travel.
Exactly, you just pointed out the problem with your extravagant idea yourself. History has shown that pratically any static defence on Earth can either be circumvented (Maginot Line) or broken through with sheer concentration of arms (Atlantic Wall). Thats why every successful generation of military technology tends to be more mobile and more flexible than before. Space just compounds the problem, actually, mathematically it would square the problem. (cube the problem?)
Read OSC for better reasoning along these lines.
As for improvising the solar defence....well yeah. Starfleet has consistently shown that it can devise new devices and even new rules of physics in the last five minutes of an episode, I hardly think that retrofitting three drones in a last ditch stand would be beyond their abilities. However, it hardly means that they expected to succeed. Last ditch, hopeless, noble stands aren't exactly foreign to human culture.
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
quote:Originally posted by Free ThoughtCrime America: Hannibal ex portis. If you get past the outer solar system defenses, it's highly unlikely you can will be stopped.
True, but I never said the MDP is for stopping. More like slowing and bleeding.
quote:Given the amount of area a drone system would have to cover to effectively guard just the planetary plane, it would make more sense to have a few older vessals coordinated at Mars than a automated defense system.
It'd make sense to have BOTH. Mobile units backed up by layered static defenses.
quote:Besides...on Sept 11th, there were only 16 fighter jets covering the entire United States. Now there's over a hundred. I don't think the Federation had much of a defensive grid anyway.
Apples and oranges. Apples and oranges.
quote:Originally posted by Mucus: Exactly, you just pointed out the problem with your extravagant idea yourself. History has shown that pratically any static defence on Earth can either be circumvented (Maginot Line) or broken through with sheer concentration of arms (Atlantic Wall). Thats why every successful generation of military technology tends to be more mobile and more flexible than before. Space just compounds the problem, actually, mathematically it would square the problem. (cube the problem?)
And ironically, you just pointed out a problem to your own argument. Maginot Line was a line, with two ends, and ultimately failed due to French short sightedness. A shell completely encircles, no ends like that. The Atlantic Wall was undermanned and under equipped, among other things, and D-Day worked only because Hitler was an idiot, and German had lost air superiority.
I didn't mean for the MDP to be an impenetrable wall, in any case. At the very least, it will attrition the enemy units attempting to enter the inner solar system, and disrupt their attempts to maintain proper battle formation and coherence by swarming them like hornets and forcing them to respond.
quote:Read OSC for better reasoning along these lines.
Huh?
quote:As for improvising the solar defence....well yeah. Starfleet has consistently shown that it can devise new devices and even new rules of physics in the last five minutes of an episode, I hardly think that retrofitting three drones in a last ditch stand would be beyond their abilities. However, it hardly means that they expected to succeed. Last ditch, hopeless, noble stands aren't exactly foreign to human culture.
They could have had swarms of shuttles and other auxiliaries packed with a hundred different types of explosives, freighters with jerry rigged armaments, towed the Spacedocks into the Borg's path, assemble half baked exotic weaponaries that they believed the Borg haven't seen before... But no, they threw three unmanned drones which were just big torpedoes at the Borg Cube... Somehow I have a hard time believing that Starfleet would act on such a limited, conventional, and utterly stupid and pointless venture. If they wanted a bang, they could have few a couple antimatter tankers into the Cube. No, the MDP has to be something pre-existing. It's way too conventional to have been a last ditch attempt to stop the Borg.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
The surface area of the Mars Sphere is 1.49E+26 km2, or 44.48 A.U.2, while the volume of this is 1.58E+25 km3, or 4.72 A.U.3.
What kind of defense system would anyone suggest placing in this volume of space?
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
It's not a question of surface area vs. volume. It's a question of cicumference vs. surface area.
Posted by Woodside Kid (Member # 699) on :
I think you've overestimated the area of the Mars sphere, Ritten. With a mean radius of 1.524 AU, the area should be closer to 6.5 E+17 square kilometers, or 29.186 square AUs (even at Mars' maximum distance from the sun, the area is only about 7.8E+17 square klicks). I did a little ballpark figuring with fixed outposts on the mean radius sphere's perimeter, each able to cover out to a radius of phaser range (1 light-second). I came up with more than 578,000 outposts needed to cover the whole area.
Posted by Free ThoughtCrime America (Member # 480) on :
quote: Apples and oranges. Apples and oranges.
Not from the perspective that there wasn't a defensive perimeter in place. When was the last time something nearly got to Earth before the cube, anyway? Why would they waste the expense of having more than a couple of ships guarding Earth?
Posted by Reverend (Member # 335) on :
No money = no expence
Seriously though, if nothing else then the MDP would be made up largely of sensor monitoring stations and long ranged weapons platforms. Presumably larger, fixed phaser banks and torpedo launchers could conceivably have a longer effective range than the smaller less powerful ship mounted weapons. Similar in a sense to the huge artillery guns that could fire shells clear across the English channel during WWII.
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Personally I would think that any weapons platforms would be in planetary orbit for ease of maintainance etc. The rest would be sensor platforms and mobile defences scattered around the sphere. When an enemy is detected, the mobile defenses (drones, second line starships) converge on the threat. And hopefully destroy it.
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
Ok, assuming that each MDP drone can do 0.92c for 10 minutes, and are grouped into tight constellations, each covering the area of their endurence, how many constellations are needed to cover 85% of the orbital shell?
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
Actually, if one non-Federation space staion facing imminent attack can churn out a few thousand cloaked self-replicating mines in a few hours. . .
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
"No money = no expence"
Of course it doesn't.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
"Expense" doesn't just mean money. Expense also means raw materials and energy which go into producing the stuff. It's just that in today's society we use money as a standard form of exchange for the work, resources, time, and energy that we put in.
Posted by Cpt. Kyle Amasov (Member # 742) on :
Why do you defend empty space? Planetary defense, OK, but we know that the inner planets are not the only ones inhabitated (Jupiter station, probably moon colonies, and we heard of either Neptune or Pluto having some research facilities, too). If the enemy entered the system, you can only try to concentrate your force to protect the planets or you try to protect the areas around the relative position around the planet (several small spheres instead of one large sphere covering the inner system).
Even if the MDP is/was supposed to be the "large sphere" type of thing I still doubt there are any weapon platforms, even sensors of ships, out there. The drones were stationed and launched from Mars or the Mars-orbit (probably the latter; allthough we don't know exactly how populated the red planet is or how powerful the warheads are, I wouldn't wanna have one of those things parked in my backyard). And sensors are advanced enough to cover whole sectors of space. The close net of stations we use to have in mind when thinking about sensor grids doesn't apply on Trek. So why would anyone place an immense amount of battlestations out there (what's the maximum attack range of phasers? 300,000 kilometers?) if a learger fleet would shoot them down without any problem? Even if they could cover the whole area (surface, I'm not talking about the volume of the sphere) what could they do to "defend" (destroy or seriously harm the enemy thread) the solar system?
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
Having a defensive spere coving the whole of Mars' orbit around the sun is rather silly. No-one is going to attack empty space. They are going to attack Utopia Planitia on Mars, Starfleet Command on Earth, or Tim's porn collection on Mercury. To quote Douglas Adams, Space is big. Really big. If you are seriously going to try and defend a sperical shape as far out as Mars' orbit, then the number of defenses and the cost of maintaining them would seem to be fairly astronomical.
Of couse, I've always thought the same thing about the Neutral Zone, but they only have sensor nets there, which are always shown to have a greater range than weapons.
quote: Not only had they "halted their approach" to Earth when Data's link took hold, but the cube looked waaay too big to actually be in Earth orbit, assuming a ~3km cube and a ~12,000km Earth.
The Earth is 17,000km according to the encyclopedia.
Sorry.
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
Gah, the point is not to defend empty space, but to deny the enemy easy access of the inner solar system. It's not like all star systems and empires are lined up into a neatly 2D plane, you're going to get someone coming at you from above or below the ecliptic no matter what. That's why you have a defensive shell, instead of a flat line.
Posted by E. Cartman (Member # 256) on :
The point is that it doesn't matter where the enemies are coming from, as their targets will be the same: planetary installations, shipyards, orbital defenses, the works. If you want to deny 'm easy access, you send in your own fleet of starships.
Posted by Reverend (Member # 335) on :
Which in this case had already been wiped out at Wolf 359.
As someone has already said, the MDP is most likely meant to slow an invading force and discourage piracy so close the Earth.
You would actually need quite a few sensor platforms floating around the place, in order to cover the areas that can't be seen directly from Earth or Mars. Behind one of the gas giants or the sun for example, indeed with a little bit of fancy flying a fleet could probably slip in behind Mercury without anyone knowing until it was too late. That is unless you have a large network of overlapping sensor and weapons platforms around the Martian perimeter.
Oh and that little jibb about expense; it was a poor attempt at humour.
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
Would it really matter if the enemy slipped in, though, as long as the insystem targets themselves were protected? Like, by a Martian defense perimeter around Mars.
We've seen in DS9 how assaults on a starbase or a planetary base require getting close and personal. There seems to be little danger of the enemy sitting between Mars and Earth and lobbing long-range torps in their way. Whatever comes within firing range of insystem targets also enters the firing range of planetary defenses. Like the Martian defense perimeter around Mars.
As for the enemy mounting a siege or sniping at traffic between the planets and their compact defense perimeters... You need actively moving defenses to deal with those in any case, and there's little sense in forcing those mobile defenses to hang around in empty space between planets when not engaged in combat. Sure, a few sensor platforms sprinkled here and there are a good idea, but weapons platforms should be highly centralized. Like, into a Martian defense perimeter around Mars.
You catch my drift?
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
A better question is: What the HELL happened to the Spacedock in Earth's orbit!?! I mean, come on! That thing's HUGE !!!!!! If anything could have detered the Borg, that would have been it. If Starfleet can arm DS9 to the teeth, I shudder to think what they should have been able to do to Spacedock. ......the only explanation that makes sense to me is that the entire spacedock was slowly towed tothe Utopia Shipyards to protect them.
Posted by E. Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Well, see, there's this thing about Spacedock that prevents it from being in the same place all the time.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Would that thing be sloppy writing?
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Actually I rather suspect it's the laws of gravity...
Posted by EdipisReks (Member # 510) on :
*zing*
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
Well, since Spacedock is a space STATION (station as in STATIONARY ), then maybe it was in orbit on the far side of the planet when the Borg approached.
Posted by Nimpim (Member # 205) on :
Yeah, good thing they exploded just before Tarkin fired that superphaser.
Posted by Siwiak (Member # 842) on :
Geoff Mandel's latest book "Star Trek: Star Charts" shows a view of the entire Sol Star System, and there's a series of lines forming a spherical shape and labeled the MDP.
In defense of automated facilities, is anyone forgetting how relatively easy it was for the Dominion to deploy countless Orbital Weapons Platforms in Chin'toka, and that they covered a very big area and took out quite a few ships?
In terms of plot, you have to remember that no matter what, the Borg will make it all the way to Earth. It's all about the drama of seeing it linger on our doorstep, then have one of the Enterprises nearby and blow the thing out of the heavens. They're supposed to be the biggest threat the galaxy has known, and I doubt the writers were going to throw in more lines saying "Oh no, the Borg are cutting across the system... they've chewed up the MDP, now they're swinging over to to disable any chance of it launching fighters... oh no, they're now in Earth orbit, and have somehow destroyed/disabled all planetary defenses, and Spacedock's orbit has put it on the other side of the planet!"
I think it's safe to assume that the defenses in the Terran solar system are enough to stop all but the Borg or a mighty invasion force.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 24) on :
Unless its cloaked...
Posted by David Templar (Member # 580) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus: Unless its cloaked...
Tachyon detection grid: don't build a home without one.
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
quote:Originally posted by Reverend: indeed with a little bit of fancy flying a fleet could probably slip in behind Mercury without anyone knowing until it was too late.
A fleet hiding behind Mercury so that it can't be seen from Earth or Mars?
Good thing those three planets have the decency to put themselves in a straight line so often, isn't it?
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