nBSG: why did the cylons use the virus?

[Destructionator XV]

I am working on a new blog post about space war, and I found myself digressing into a nBSG tangent that seemed interesting enough to ask here. Let my quote myself:

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A lesser concern was warships using their warp drives to make quick little jumps into and out of a battlefield. Like we see in the nBSG mini with the Cylon Raiders jumping in, nuking the civilians, and jumping out, and withdrawl from battle being trivial when Galactica and Pegasus are getting pounded, they just jump out. There is no real way to stop these attacks - indeed, the extermination of the 12 colonies could have easily been done without the computer virus bullshit (which is so fucking stupid it will get a post on its own in my software section before too long). After all, they can jump into atmospheres, drop the bombs, and jump out before Vipers could intercept them. There is no defense against such a thing as the nBSG universe protrays their FTL - the battlestars could not respond in time to instant attacks.

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The computer virus is stupid for one because it is a cliche, and for two because real military (and civil in many cases) programs have many layers of checking and quality assurance before it goes live. There are many programmers who will review all code, testers who will look for bugs, security experts who look for breeches. The idea that a program backdoor, intentionally put there by an expert or not, could make it live across the board is a fucking insult. And of course the networking stupidity is so utterly absurd; even gross incompetence, which might explain away the programming, shouldn't make networks magically so horrid.

Television writers should keep away from talking about computers.

Anyway, given what we see about Cylon jump systems in the mini and in the show, combined with the fact we see Raptors and other ships jump into and out of atmospheres (Exodus part 2 is a big shower of this), I don't feel the computer nonsense should have been there at all.

The Raiders are going against fixed targets: planets, so they should be able to sit way back out of range (which we know they are capable of as seen in the show, much longer range than Colonial jump drives), jump in to a random target, drop a bomb, jump out, repeat until they are all dead.

They would probably start with the battlestars, depending on their infiltrator spies to get their locations, like they did in the mini. Jump right on top of them and nuke them. Hit and run.

This requires no bad computer science, no technobabble: just the tech we see demonstrated in the show many times. It would have the same effect in exterminating the humans.

What could the humans have done against this? Try to counterattack the Cylon home with the battlestars maybe, which is why I would want them killed first. But do the Colonials even know where the Cylon homeworld is? I don't think they do.

The survivors then live in even more fear. They were exterminated not because of a traitor (though, Baltar could still play a part in helping them get the drop on the fleet by slipping them info on the locations (why he would know this is beyond me but then again, why he would have access to that computer system with no supervision as we saw in the show is also beyond me), allowing his character to remain intact), but because of their simple inability to do anything about it.

The civilians on the fleet would still be running scared, more than they are in the show now (like they should be), not wanting to stop anywhere since if they do, they will meet the same fate as their homes - bombed with no possible way to stop it.

The virus also may have been discovered with that plan, whereas suprise random jump-n-nuke could not. If discovered, the Colonials may have gone with a pre-emptive strike and ruined their plan.


My thought on why they used the virus has got to be that they felt it would give them a better chance against the far superior battlestars, but they could just get the drop on them and kill them one by one with the jump-n-nuke and by the time headquarters or the other fleets know what is going on, it would be too late for them.


My only counter might be that the jump isn't exact enough to jump in close enough to the battlestars to get them quickly, but we see examples of very precise jumps in the show, so I am not convinced of this.

(Or of course, since I am talking about changing the writing, they could write in the more precise jumps from the beginning if they are not there)


Any comments on this idea?

[LadyTevar]

While your idea does have merit, why attack a fully-armed target? The planets may have had some type of planetary defenses we never got to see, because they were offline due to the virus.

To me, it just seems logical. You are planning an attack. You wish to win with the least casualities to your own side, especially since your casualities would be lining up to be re-born, and thus clogging your Rebirth ships. At this point, you may not even wish to have those ships in the area, as they could be a target if the enemy is able to counter-attack.

Thus, cripple your enemy.

We know that the Cylon Inflitrators were in place for a number of years before the attack. They might even have been behind some of the troubles we see in Roslyn's flashback to her conversation with the then-President. They may have been aiding Zarek's little insurrection. We do see where at least two BattleStars had Cylon infiltrators onboard, so there is a good chance there were more, possibly one or more on each suit, in each fleet. We see in the miniseries that one of Roslyn's hanger-ons was a Cylon, the one Baltar got lucky when he outed. How many infiltration units could have been in the government? What could they have accomplished from these positions?

Then, 'Caprica Six' manages to hook up with Gaius Baltar, who had just gotten the approval to create the new computer system. We know the Cylons are adaptive, changing plans to suit circumstances. Now, they have full access to the computer program that would be installed upon every ship, battlestar, and defensive platform across the Colonies.

Were I a general about to hit my enemies, that would be all the edge I need. It's the perfect war, a 'bloodless victory' for my troops, s my enemy is nearly unable to fight back. Considering the Galatica is able to stand against two BaseStars with relative ease, and escape with minor damage to herself and her support fighters, I can understand the Cylon's wish for an easy solution. Thus, the backdoor into the computer systems, and the virus to throw them offline and give the Cylons the advantage they needed to win.


As Adam said, comments and discussion please.

[frigidmagi]

. Considering the Galatica is able to stand against two BaseStars with relative ease, and escape with minor damage to herself and her support fighters, I can understand the Cylon's wish for an easy solution

Galatica is able to take on 2 of the enemies heavy units alone and win without crippling damage. Galatica is also so obsolete that it's going to be retired into musuem ship!

Consider that right there.

A modern battlestar without the virus is likely to be anywhere from two to ten times more effective in combat. Heavy Casualties are going to happen, in fact it may be that the Cylons do not have the numbers to ensure victory without crippling the enemy's ability to shot back. Remember that the Cyclons goal is not to merely destory the colonies military but to destory the human population on the planets themselves.

This means their military needs to be intact enough to not only nuke the planet but hunt down and round up the surviviors.

[Batman]

But that's it, the Colonials don't have the ability to shoot back. Regardless of their theoretical one-on-one superiority and the theoretical effectiveness of their planetary defenses, they wouldn't have the time to engage the Cylon forces. Jump in, drop bomb/launch missile, jump out. Repeat until the Colonial fleet and the colonies are history.
They didn't need the virus which as Destro pointed out would be the next best thing to impossible to work in a realistic military IT environment.

[LadyTevar]

You forget one thing: Jump Points are unstable. They have to be re-calculated for every jump.

[Batman]

You forget one thing: Jump Points are unstable. They have to be re-calculated for every jump.

I'm working from a) the mini and s1 and b) memory so I might be wrong but from what I remember the Cylons at least could jump wherever they damned wanted to.

[LadyTevar]

Adama himself says that jump points are unstable in the series, Batman.

[Batman]

Not in this thread he doesn't.

[LadyTevar]

Not in this thread he doesn't.

This thread is to answer a question about why the Virus was used. This doesn't mean we cannot use information revealed in the Series, as there are many things in the series that are either flashbacks, or clarifications on how the Colonial Fleet is run.

Therefore, the fact that the Series states that Jump Points are unstable, and you have to Re-Cordinate them each time does have bearing on why the Cylons may not have been able to jump like you suggest.

I will also point out that the Cylon Raider that was hopping about was doing this all within a certain radius of the Galatica, inside area covered by the fleet. Such radius was certainly not the length of a solar system, which the Cylons would have needed to cover in order to do the attack you and Adam are suggesting.

[Destructionator XV]

Such radius was certainly not the length of a solar system, which the Cylons would have needed to cover in order to do the attack you and Adam are suggesting.

Would it really have to be that big? If they could make a small jump behind them to buy a few more seconds they would use to then recalculate for the long range jump away. The recalculations don't seem to take a very long time.

On the other hand, they could just make a long blind jump, but there might be something about the jump drives that make this impossible even though it mathematically shouldn't be a problem. Then again, perhaps the Raider's organic brains [?] can't do the calculations to recover from getting lost which may ruin that plan for them.

And on the gripping hand, there is a third option: an unmanned, disposable drone jumping in, firing, then being abandoned, but we never see them doing this, so is is possible they cannot do this (which seems absurd, but it is TV).