As the fleet was being designed, tacticians and strategists struggled for the first time with the problem of invading a planet. They analyzed the unique advantages that they had, both from a technological perspective, and also those inherent advantages that came from being the aggressor. It was clear that defending a planet against attack would be a difficult proposition at best, impossible as it is to effectively defend something so large, where all its inhabitants live on its outside, only a feeble atmosphere between them and the void.

That said, the inhabitants of Earth had one notable advantage over their attackers. It was not much, but it was inherent to the fact that the earth, though vulnerable, was the very thing that the invaders craved. For the Mobiliei, as they were called, required not only to wipe the humans out, but to do so without destroying the very world they lived on.

The analogy was drawn to an empire trying to take possession of a fortress from a weaker force. Even if the invading army possessed the artillery necessary to kill everyone in the fortress with ease, it was of no use if they destroyed the fortress itself in the process.

This would not, necessarily, have been an issue had there not been clear signs of nuclear technology under development by the current inhabitants of Earth, its telltale signs clear to the passing probes that even now still studied the planet. The technology appeared embryonic, low yield, but that would change in the years it would take for the Armada to reach them. Not enough to close the technological gap between the two races, not even close, but enough, it was deduced, to threaten the planet should they unleash it in their defense when the Armada arrived.

Though far superior to their quarry in terms of technology, the Mobiliei had found no method yet for subduing or containing the unencumbered power of a nuclear explosion, and the likelihood that humanity would resort to a nuclear conflagration as they struggled to avoid their own annihilation was far too high to be ignored. No, the foe they faced would no doubt unleash any and all of their primitive weaponry in their defense when faced with the military might that approached them.

And even if the ships of the fleet could be shielded against the onslaught, when the humans eventually, desperately launched their nuclear arsenal at their attackers, they would, in the process, irradiate much of the precious planet they were defending.

There was much debate on this. But even the most forgiving models could not eliminate the possibility. After all, Earth would have plenty of warning that the Armada was coming, the great fires of the Mobiliei’s engines as they decelerated toward their goal would announce their arrival years before they could bring their guns to bear, shining, as they would, like new stars in the sky.