[geeks] engage your cloaking devices!

[Charles Shannon Hendrix]

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 @ 16:11 -0400, Phil Stracchino said:

> Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:
> > Even if you stick strictly within the idea of concealment in warfare, it
> > would still be useful because while you could tell there was an object,
> > you would likely not know what it was.
> 
> In which case you'd fire on it on spec, and destroy it using a shell
> that probably cost a hundredth to a thousandth of the cost of the
> cloaking device, just to be sure.  The enemy would go broke trying to
> decoy you with false cloaks.

You don't just fire on everything you cannot identify. 

We have been using decoys for millenia, and until recently they were all
physical, and it certainly didn't bankupt those who used them. Closer to
the opposite.  

Just a note: the stealth fighter has been using decoys for 20 years now,
and we've not gone bankrupt because of it. At the same time, some of our
enemies did waste a lot of SAMs trying to figure out which target was
the real one.

> > Any enemy has to decide: "Is this a real target, or a projection, a
> > mirage, a decoy, or is it maybe one of my own units the enemy has
> > cloaked to trigger friendly fire?"
> 
> If the enemy has the ability to cloak one of your own units without you
> ever becoming aware that they've done so, you are *SO* screwed your only
> hope is to surrender right now.

That's an assumption you don't have enough information to make.



-- 
shannon "AT" widomaker.com -- ["Tara is grass, and behold how Troy lieth
low--And even the English, perchance their hour will come!"]