what if: Periphery goons managed to make prototype SL tech pre-SL?

[Izzy193]

Disclaimer: This is a what if Scenario, thus does not impact canon in any way and is more of a thought exercise. Please take any assumptions from the OP with a grain of salt. due the likelihood of this happening assume that it does happen under the correct conditions, for the sake of this what if.

Scenario: In the periphery, some smart people get together and try out some new ideas during the age of war and early start league era. such as a weapon that uses electromagnetic propulsion based projectiles or a series of lasers that pulse instead of being one focused beam for example. these are just a couple of examples. But the basic idea is that these secure researchers are researching into what would eventually be known as SLDF-tech.

Questions:

How hard would it be?

How Hard would it be to keep this development(s) hidden from the rest of the inner sphere?

What kind of reactions would functional versions of periphery made SL-tech cause?

What kind of hurdles would these researchers and production facilities face when looking into this calibre of tech?

What would happen if the inner sphere/SLDF during the reunification war encountered this tech in the field?

this is meant to not be too serious of a topic, as more a curiosity than anything else. so this is my what if scenario I pose to you all. please keep comparisons to canon to a minimum. though at the same time I am curious of what speculation would be when these questions are posed?

[AlphaMirage]

Answers
1. Hard
2. Probably easier if its remote
3. Seizure and Conquest, even with SL tech pre-SL you still can't beat an army
4. Scale, it would likely be expensive and available in smaller numbers
5. Seizure and Reverse engineering

[BrianDavion]

Alphamirage sums it up nicely, look the tech edge was a nice thing for the star league to have, but in the end just as important is industrial base, a TINY remote periphary place hand making super advanced tech? that's just going to paint a target on their backs

[RifleMech]

At that time, difficult but not impossible.

That depends on how much they're used before the Reunification War starts.

They'd probably have to deal with spies stealing their tech and then having the SL reverse engineer anything they weren't producing.

Their biggest hurdle would be manufacturing items in significant numbers.

There would be some surprise but it would mostly come down to numbers. I don't think it would change things for the OA. For the others, if they had enough numbers the war would have lasted longer and been more costly to the SLDF and Houses. Considering by the time the war was ending support for it was eroding and SLDF desertions were increasing it's possible that that the Taurians, at least, may have won round one but it still would be costly for them. Winning a round two would be unlikely.

[Alan Grant]

I'm just going to focus on one piece of this. Ultimately the SLDF relied heavily on orbital bombardment to win in some of the toughest battles/campaigns and theaters of the Reunification War. When they hit real obstacles, such as Taurian worlds, they used orbital bombardment and WMDs on their cities, militaries and everything else.

What would some Level 2 prototype tech have been able to do against that?

Not much. If anything a tougher fight, would have meant more of that in more places as far as I can tell. On many worlds the SLDF stuck to conventional warfare if they felt like their forces could handle it. They resorted to the WMDs when they felt like their forces could not handle it. Apply that same logic, and you just see a lot more worlds getting bombarded from orbit.

One of the key tenants of that era is just how lopsided it was. It wasn't a 55/45 split, where shifting one impactful variable might have truly changed the dynamic. The gap between the SLDF/combined Great House forces and their periphery opponents was just far more dramatic than that.

The best case scenario for the periphery nations really, was making it so tough for the Star League that they gave up, they'd quit. They would lose public support and lose the desire to keep fighting and instead start negotiating an end to the war. That was especially true in space among the navies, where the SLDF was just so overwelming that the best the Taurian navy could hope for was to create some specific situations where they could gain local superiority in a specific time and place for a brief period. However in spite of how bad it got; the Star League never seemed to really falter. Sometimes SLDF leaders got replaced, sometimes there were criticism and a rethink of tactics and strategy, but they never really lost the will to keep the war going.

I don't think the periphery nations having some Level 2 tech would have changed that very much. One of the justifications for the war was the idea that the periphery nations were a threat, particularly after the Taurians thrashed the Davions around a bit. Giving them better technology just makes that case stronger, IMO. While not ultimately changing the outcome.

[RifleMech]

That's the thing, Amos Forlough committed a lot of atrocities against the Outworlds Alliance from orbit and it stiffened the Periphery's resolve against the SLDF. It made things worse.

If the Periphery had level 2 tech, their aerospace forces would be improved making it more difficult for the SLDF's fleet, especially in the OA. Also some IS Houses were on good terms with Periphery Houses, FS with OA and CC with TC. With the Periphery having level 2 tech it's possible trade agreements could have been made lessening the Terran Hegemony's power over the other Houses. It would have been in the IS House's interests to support their favored Periphery Realms with supplies and additional troops in exchange for tech. There would have been multiple Pitcairn Legions operating in multiple Periphery Realms. It would have made the Reunification War a bigger mess. All it would take would be for 1 SLDF unit to invade an IS House World, or to allow a rival to do so, and the Star League would have been over. Even if the unit was disavowed, an IS House closing their boarders to SLDF ships would have made it difficult for the SLDF to even get to the Periphery. SLDF Troops would be stranded without resupply. And if the SLDF were to attack an IS House they'd loose troops even faster as they'd leave to protect their home worlds. The end result is at least some of the Periphery winning the First Reunification War. The Second...? 

[Alan Grant]

EDIT:

Revised my post quite a bit. Decided I didn't want to get bogged down in questions of whether or not Level 2 tech could have changed the course of that war. As that is not one of the core questions the original poster is asking.

A sidebar called Tech Creep on page 165 of the Reunification War book makes it sound like some Level 2 tech did make its way into the Reunification War, and via salvage, into the hands of periphery powers who were manufacturing some of this stuff. Those factories/labs/researchers became prime targets, not just for the SL, but for the member states, who wanted that tech for themselves.

That bit sheds some interesting insight into how this would likely have gone. Sounds like the member states wanting to gobble that up for themselves would have been a serious factor.

[Jeyar123]

The TC at least sort of had 2 "advanced tech" that were military in nature - inferno rounds out of SRMs and The long ranged radium rifle.

[BrianDavion]

The TC at least sort of had 2 "advanced tech" that were military in nature - inferno rounds out of SRMs and The long ranged radium rifle.

the radium rifle was more of a meme then a serious weapon, it was only effective because the person they shot with it was in poor health IIRC

[RifleMech]

The issue is when the Periphery gets advanced tech. In cannon it's after the war starts with salvage. That made the factories fair game. In this scenario, the Periphery has advanced tech before the war starts. That gives the IS Houses other options besides the Terran Hegemony for advanced tech and removes a big reason for them joining the Star League. Those that do may not agree to a war. That makes the Reunification War far more difficult for the SLDF.

[BrianDavion]

The issue is when the Periphery gets advanced tech. In cannon it's after the war starts with salvage. That made the factories fair game. In this scenario, the Periphery has advanced tech before the war starts. That gives the IS Houses other options besides the Terran Hegemony for advanced tech and removes a big reason for them joining the Star League. Those that do may not agree to a war. That makes the Reunification War far more difficult for the SLDF.

........ are you really suggesting the houses only joined the star league for a handful of high tech weapons?