Conjecture on a hypothetical human invasion of Equestria?

[Akemi Homura 7,680]

So anyway I'm not so sure who would win. Humans have thousands of years of battle expirence under our belt not to mention the greatest tools of war ever

 

Inb4 we change our collective designation to "Sontarans".

Edited June 23, 2012 by Devin McCourty

[The Awesome One 1,314]

We've got Chuck Norris.

[Starshine 16,330]

Outside unicorns' magic, I don't see a lot of ways the ponies can fight against severe weapons like assault rifles, tanks, etc. So to me the real argument comes down to what extent of magic and of what types can and will be used against the invading humans.

 

Let'seeeee...

 

They got Pegasi' weather manipulation, the Earth ponies make quite a good meat shield, and don't forget they got a pair of literal "love-bomb" that just got married months ago, plus the famed Elements of Harmony

 

That's all I could think of, other than Unicorns' usual magic

[Typhoid Libby 1,265]

Inb4 we change our collective designation to "Sontarans".

 

Kohr-Ah.

Sontarans are such idiots who refuse to die and always vote for the most stupid things in the senate.

[Akemi Homura 7,680]

Outside unicorns' magic, I don't see a lot of ways the ponies can fight against severe weapons like assault rifles, tanks, etc. So to me the real argument comes down to what extent of magic and of what types can and will be used against the invading humans.

 

Watch as Celestia just sits back and does nothing, like usual.

[KakeiTheWolf 652]

We've got Chuck Norris.

 

Okay, never mind. Ponies would lose.

[Akemi Homura 7,680]

Kohr-Ah.

Sontarans are such idiots who refuse to die and always vote for the most stupid things in the senate.

 

The uncanny resemblance isn't lost on me.

[Krystal 1,468]

If all beings in Equestria (dragons especially) teamed up then the humans wouldn't stand a chance

[The Awesome One 1,314]

Besides Rainbow Dash, none of the other Pegasi can go crazy fast. I doubt it if any of them can outrun a bullet that comes out from an Ak-47 or an M60.

 

This is humans vs ponies. I'm guessing that means all the human countries in the world team-up? When we fight each other, we cause a lot of chaos. Imagine what happens when we all put our resources into one big army and let it rip loose on the ponies.

[Starshine 16,330]

If all beings in Equestria (dragons especially) teamed up then the humans wouldn't stand a chance

 

Fifty buck said that the ponies will be too scared to fight with dragons on their side and proceed to turn tail, while the dragons got some tasty snacks

 

Besides, the dragons in FiM weren't even that dangerous, smart, or even hostile. The one who was sleepy as hell didn't even do anything when the ponies walked inside his lair! He was supposed to chew them down! What kind of dragon was that!?

[Krystal 1,468]

Fifty buck said that the ponies will be too scared to fight with dragons on their side and proceed to turn tail, while the dragons got some tasty snacks

 

Besides, the dragons in FiM weren't even that dangerous, smart, or even hostile. The one who was sleepy as hell didn't even do anything when the ponies walked inside his lair! He was supposed to chew them down! What kind of dragon was that!?

 

It doesn't matter, they're still dragons. And if dragon rules still apply then they have bulletproof scales and breathe fire hot enough to melt anything they need to. Plus there were THOUSANDS of them in the dragon migration episode. With numbers like that they can't loose Edited June 23, 2012 by Jarrettlicious

[The Awesome One 1,314]

It don't matter if all the Zebra's, Griffons, and Dragons join forces with the Ponies, one large nuclear blast will wipe out at least 50% of Equestria's population.

[Starshine 16,330]

It doesn't matter, they're still dragons. And if dragon rules still apply then they have bulletproof scales and breathe fire hot enough to melt anything they need to. Plus there were THOUSANDS of them in the dragon migration episode. With numbers like that they can't loose

 

Thousands?

 

Seems like a thousand of bulky, huge, adult dragons could sit together on one volcano while leaving so much vacant space I could park my TARDIS on the top of it unseen.

 

As The Awesome Invader said before me, just give me a moment to get this thing working and I'll show you Dragon Meat

Edited June 23, 2012 by Dreamwalker

[KakeiTheWolf 652]

1. Nuke falls

2. Build stables

3. Profit

[Krystal 1,468]

Well dragons are immune to radiation duh. And here's the thousands of dragons I was talking about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isVnIqsMJOw

Well maybe it was hundreds idk.

And the AA gun you posted is mounted on ships. Most of the important battles will be inland where we haven't set up AA guns and probblay won't have time to.

[Starshine 16,330]

Radiation? That's way too slow. Better give that dragon a milk bath as well

 

And the AA gun you posted is mounted on ships. Most of the important battles will be inland where we haven't set up AA guns and probblay won't have time to.

 

Even the older models of battleship's gun turret can easily reach 20 miles. The Iowa class's even carried an armor-piercing round that I'm pretty sure as sorrel hell it can easily penetrate a dragon's hide from miles away. Wanna look? It's the grey thingy on the top, but it was rather long in the inside

 

Not something you want to get lodged under your scales

Edited June 23, 2012 by Dreamwalker

[Krystal 1,468]

Yea I've seen them before. Those aren't the AA guns' ammo. Those are for ship to ship or ship to land engagements. Sure you could try to hit a moving dragon (who could probably dodge it if he/she knew it was coming) twenty miles away (past the horizon) with no targeting system, but I don't think you'd have much luck with that.

Edited June 23, 2012 by Jarrettlicious

[KakeiTheWolf 652]

Radiation? That's way too slow. Better give that dragon a milk bath as well

 

 

 

Even the older models of battleship's gun turret can easily reach 20 miles. The Iowa class's even carried an armor-piercing round that I'm pretty sure as sorrel hell it can easily penetrate a dragon's hide from miles away. Wanna look? It's the grey thingy on the top, but it was rather long in the inside

 

Not something you want to get lodged under your scales

 

If you are going to try to impressive with distance, wouldn't the guns that shot 92 miles be a better example?

[Starshine 16,330]

If you are going to try to impressive with distance, wouldn't the guns that shot 92 miles be a better example?

 

Couldn't find any trusted link about that in a short time, sorry

 

Yea I've seen them before. Those aren't the AA guns' ammo. Those are for ship to ship or ship to land engagements. Sure you could try to hit a moving dragon (who could probably dodge it if he/she knew it was coming) twenty miles away (past the horizon) with no targeting system, but I don't think you'd have much luck with that.

 

The ship can still easily bombard the holy-living star out of any nearby town

Even if the dragon could get close, the CIWS can make a cheesecake out of them.

 

That, if the battlefield is on earth. But judging from the various places suggested by the OP, I'm not pretty sure.

[Rainbow Sparkle 70]

They got horns, we got extra hot lead with grenades on top

 

 

God I love the Military

 

As for what would happen in a war between ponies and humans, there are a number of things to consider. The first thing that comes to my mind is the comic book series Fable, and how they portrayed a war between the world of Earth and the Empire ruling the Fable worlds would go. The conclusion in the Fable series of comics was that, with the help of the Fables hiding on Earth of course, that modern Earth would curbstomp the magical evil empire (of course, it was also hinted that afterwards, Earth politics would get very interesting).

 

With that thought in mind, lets take some things into consideration. For now, we're going to assume that, regardless of where Equestria is, we are capable of invading it.

 

Firstly, lets start with Population. We have no real idea of how many ponies there actually are in Equestria, or for that matter, how big Equestria really is (damn you show mechanics >_<) So, if a United Earth (United being debatable) is invading Equestria, we can win theoretically by sheer numbers.

 

Another thing to consider is the technological gap. From what we've seen, the most we can assume Equestria's military capabilities to be is between 15th century to possibly 17th century. The modern weapons of Earth will be something that they are quite unfamiliar with, especially when you add in that our aircraft (Rainbow Dash is probably the ONLY Pegasus who could keep up with some of our fighters, the wonderbolts being a close second) So, weapon wise, we got them beat, even without nukes.

 

There's also the psychological aspect to consider. Have the ponies known of us for a while, and we of them, and we're only now deciding to invade, or is this a case of First Contact gone horribly wrong? Despite the Diamond Dogs, I think the ponies would likely find us to be very alien, especially considering our aggressive tendencies. There's also the question of how seeing some of our technology would make them think. You don't necessarily need to wage a war if your opponent thinks they have no chance of winning against your weapons.

 

Now yes, we reach the question of magic, but I have to question how effective this would be. Magic seems to thus far be fairly subjective depending on the pony and their special talent (it should be noted that Rarity was stopping pillows, not bullets, which would be moving MUCH faster) There is also the simplest facet that tends to be mentioned in Modern world vs Fantasy World, which is that magic takes time to learn, whereas any idiot can pick up a gun and shoot it. (whether they can hit the broad side of a barn is debatable, but they don't need to spend years learning how to use it) We must remember that Twilight's special talent IS magic, and she is therefore going to be far better at it than other unicorns.

 

There is also the question of whether or not Celestia and Luna actually raise and set the sun. I know some bronies who theorize it's all smoke and mirror's on the part of the alicorn sisters (and previously, the unicorns. In fact, Hearth's Warming Eve actually made them feel validated in that idea) and there's also some bronies who believe its more a case of them simply controlling their world's rotation. I personally like my theory that Equestria is part of a Dyson Sphere. Anyways, this is important because if they can't actually raise the sun and moon, then they are far less powerful then they seem and the possibility of defeating them becomes higher.

 

Of course, it should be recognized that a Human invasion of Equestria would release so much Discord and Chaos that Discord would be out in a flash, and then we'd have to deal with him (although, if all he does is simply illusions, he may easier to beat as well)

 

More could probably be said, but I think that's the crux of it. Suffice it to say, I think humanity would curbstomp Equestria if we were deadset on taking over. Obviously things might not be as easy in the occupation, but that's another story.

[Typhoid Libby 1,265]

Dudes and dudettes.

Air Threats are left to the Air assets.

No-one in their right mind would try to Anti-Air Artillery offensively during an invasion.

 

And I wan't to see the "Bulletproof" Dragon which can take a LRAAM to the wing and still fly.

CIWS

 

"Special-Auto" and it's seagull steaks to everyone.

That's close range deterrent. Nothing get's with in 12 nautical miles of a Destroyer Group.

Air cover and fifteen different weapon systems will drop ANYTHING within a 10 mile radius.

There is no Air War in this scenario, only a turkey shoot.

[Scritches 91]

We need to establish a few things first...

 

How do we get there?

 

Any way you can get there

 

Why are we invading?

 

refer to Blue's post on the subject.

Who's invading?

 

The invading force is a multinational expeditionary force serving under a hypothetical unified earth government.

 

Those questions will determine what the human have, which will decide whether or not we win.

 

Indeed, that is the main purpose of this thread.

If we assume we're dead-set on invasion for some reason, then chances are we'll go there, fight, be shocked by how effective they are - never expecting how powerful their magic is - then get authorization for "hammer-down", at which point Equestria would become a radioactive wasteland, unless Celestia unveils some new spell or cuts off Equestria from our world.

 

Interesting analysis, there are many who agree with you.

 

But once again, it all depends on those three questions I asked. They need to be answered...

 

I've actually run the math, because I was curious to see if Twilight could stop bullets.

 

First, I assume magic works by conversion of thermal potential energy into kinetic energy. Since it's an energy conversion, and not a force vector, then that means unicorns have a certain amount of power. Literally, power, in watts, as to how much energy they can convert at rate. This leads to an acceleration.

 

I found the size of the water tower by comparing it to the Wonderbolts in "Secret of my Excess", and from that got an estimate of it's mass. I found it's acceleration when Twilight lifted it in "Boast Busters", and found out how much power that took.

 

I applied that to a standard shotgun round - travelling only 1,500 feet per second - and the results weren't good. It would take a few seconds for the bullet to come to a full stop. In those few seconds, it could easily travel a few football fields.

 

And kinetic energy goes up by the square of the velocity. A standard issue M-16 has a muzzle velocity of ~3,200 fps. Most rifles are around 2,700.

 

It really doesn't look good for stopping bullets.

 

This is some great information, kudos for it. One thing to consider is that it might also be one part being able to have enough time to focus telekinetic/magical energy on it. Conjecturally their moon by itself can move at speeds far faster than any bullet or missle and it is moved by magic on a daily basis.

 

As for shields -

 

we saw Shining Armor's shield broken by a bunch of oversized insects headbutting it and that was some serious, heavy duty shield!

So... Yeah.

 

 

 

Right, 'cause that's far-future stuff... Right?

 

 

Well, no.

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7qrGyvZPEU

 

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3zxxogDRIw&feature=related

 

 

And railguns:

 

Here's what the beauty looks like standalone:

 

IIRC, the DoD projected a range in the hundreds of miles.

 

 

That post of mine was to stop people from trying to get some of the more sci-fi weapons in, hand-held rail guns(the smallest ones are small enough to be used as small arms weapons due to power issues) and hand-held beam weapons. Vehicular mounted weapons were never a no go. I think it's interesting that you dragged up alot of that kind of stuff and I am surprised more haven't referenced that stuff.

 

Thermonuclear warheads. The Tsar bomb actually did "Glass" the immediate target site, and it was tested at half it's design yield. Reason: at full 100 megaton yield, the carrying aircraft could not escape.

 

My complaint with the previous poster was that he proposed a death ray destroying everything. I know very well how powerful the Tsar Bomba is, there are videos and information on it all over the place. But thank you for the information none the less.

 

Maybe if it's mid-term future we might use something like this rifle. It's an old design, but nonetheless the type of thing that I'd expect to win the "Advanced Combat Rifle" competition one day. here's the link

 

I hope so as well, I remember reading at least a couple of articles int the Marine Corps Times about the Marine Corps considerations for fielding the weapon.

And you've got the M-16 totally wrong, buddy.

 

The older M16A1 and A2 weren't great. Those were the ones that earned a horrible reputation in Vietnam. The A4, on the other hand, the one currently fielded, is an entirely different animal. Soldiers report never experiencing any issue despite being in a "dustbowl" of a desert, and all kinds of sand getting on the rifle. For one thing, it's aircraft-grade aluminum and titanium instead of plastic.

 

No...no I don't have it wrong. I've fired the thing(M-16A2 in boot and the M-16A4 in the fleet) out there in the sandbox, it still jams up pretty quickly and must be maintined meticulously on a daily basis. Sometimes twice a day even with minimal use. As for troops not having any issues with it, you might want to actually talk to the troops themselves instead of just reading an official military report on them. Both of my brothers(who are fellow Marines), ever Marine grunt that I have talked to, every soldier that I have talked to, everyone in my platoon, and myself have all complained about the rifle. It's biggest flaw comes down to the simple fact that it vents the gases from the round back into the upper receiver and cakes the area around the bolt with carbon residue which in the sandbox quickly leads to jamming. After 50+ years of that series of rifle they still have not gotten rid of that one flaw which is it's biggest flaw. I do hope that they will either replace the M-16 or that in the very least that any future iteration of the rifle has that flaw removed.

 

Also, it has such precision that it's been successfully adapted to longer ranged purposes as the "designated marksman rifle" - the intermediate role in-between assualt rifle and sniper rifle, that can engage at less than 1,000 yards.

 

And the smaller ammunition is an advantage - it really doesn't make much of a difference - two 5.56 mm rounds will work as well, better, in fact, than a single 7 mm - and you'll land two 5.56's on the target because of less recoil, whereas a 7mm, what the ak47 uses, offers awful recoil that will gauruntee you miss after the first shot. 5.56 also requires less logistics, lighter magazines, and allows a soldier to carry more.

 

I haven't shot an Ak-47, but I do know 7mm rifles are not suitable for automatic! But I have held one (awful weighting, btw, all the weight is in the front!), and I've shot M16's - they shoot like a dream, may I note. They live up to their precision and have almost no recoil.

 

Higher muzzle velocity, which will offer better penatration, longer ranger, far more precise, less recoil, and 3-shot burst are the advantages the M-16 has over the AK. What does the AK have? It's cheap. It's the perfect weapon for an army that doesn't value the lives of it's individual soldiers. It's as disposable as their soldiers are. The AK, by nature of being so simple and cheap, is also slightly more rugged than modern M16's (and far, far more than older ones)... Maybe. That one's debatable.

 

The AK-47 truly is a bit more rugged, but the M16A4 is just as good if you take care of it. Key is, that requires more soldier training, which for an army that has a "disposable soldier, win by numbers" warfighting doctrine, isn't a good thing, so they choose the rifle that takes less training.

 

But we are willing, able, and care more to spend more on each soldier. Few militaries in the world would do the things we do to keep everyone alive - I even recall stories of U.S. medics caring for enemy soldiers that were shot by U.S. soldiers. So we're willing to pay that extra to train the soldiers more, so that the M16A4 is just as durable as the AK. More expensive, for a higher-quality non-disposable soldier, that's the U.S. warfighting doctrine, and that's why we choose the M-16 over the AK.

 

As for how well trained soldiers(speaking US Army) there is no consistent training across their various units/MOS's that train them sufficiently in that. Remember Jessica Lynch? She was captured because her rifle jammed due to it not being properly cleaned on top of the fact that she had no idea how to fix the jam. US Marine Corps on the otherhand is anal rententive about such things regardless of MOS. You do not make it through boot camp without training on how to maintain your rifle to near perfection and how to fix any jam except for when a casing/round gets caught over the bolt. I still assert that the DOD as a whole needs to either improve the main flaw(as detailed above) or replace it with a weapon that lacks it's flaws.

 

 

Well, in Vietnam, we actually had a kill ratio around 10:1, with us in the lead. They only won because we relied on infantry too much, fought in a jungle they were used to (see: Never go to war with Russia in Siberia in the Winter), were vastly outnumbered, and we had ridiculous rules of engagement that didn't make it legal to shoot, practically, unless you were already dead. All things considered, we performed excellently there. And we didn't actually lose - we just lost the will and didn't see the point to keep fighting. I wonder if done correctly - continuous air campaign, heavy armor support, real war-time rules of engagement - fought more like Iraq than Vietnam - we could've saved a lot of lives and won the war.

I need to introduce you to the many works of H.John Poole, a former US Marine and Vietnam veteran who serve 28 years. The last ten of his years he was the Marine Corps' "go to" guy for ground warefare and advanced infantry tactics. He proposes and explains the reasons why even though we had a high kill ratio, the overall conflict in Vietnam was lost.

 

But on the other hand, our problem has always been China. They have half the world's population , and conscript soldiers! We have 20% world population, and the vast majority of the time work with a volunteer force.

A slight correction, China has around 2 billion people living in it which is roughly 1/3rd of the world population.

When the Chinese entered Korea, we drew the DMZ and left (technically that war has never ended).

I can't quiet remember, but I suspect it was something similar for when we left Vietnam.

 

For the record, the Corps as a whole wanted to finish the fight.

 

It's their sheer numbers.

 

 

The situation would be reversed in Equestria - at a pre-industrial period, their world population would be extremely low compared to ours.

 

Compare it to our world population history. They have probably around 500 million.

We will have more than an entire order of magnitude more than that. That's a much, much bigger number advantage than the Chinese had on NATO in Korea.

 

You have to remember that 1 pony does not equal 1 human. Ponies are faster on their hooves than we are on our feet. They can carry more(Dash by herself can carry 4 ponies at once let alone what a male earth pony could muster up), roughly a third of them can fly in such ways that they can outmanuever and even outrun some of our fastest aircraft(Dash has been calculated as being able to fly up to mach10 and pull zero point turns with 5 times her normal weight). These flying ones can also use their wings as blades if they need to(seen twice in the show). Yet another third can use skills beyond human ability, a well trained unicorn team could, with the proper technique and tactics, disable an entire tank battalion simply by flipping them over and turn humans weapons against their users. Edited June 23, 2012 by Leatherneck

[KakeiTheWolf 652]

Couldn't find any trusted link about that in a short time, sorry

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Gun

 

According to the 1955 Guinness Book of Records, it had a maximum range of 92 miles and fired a 94 kilo projectile.

[Krystal 1,468]

Missles won't be that effective either since there's nothing for them to lock on to. Most missles lock on with radio and radar, last time I checked dragons don't emit radio signals.

[Typhoid Libby 1,265]

Missles won't be that effective either since there's nothing for them to lock on to. Most missles lock on with radio and radar, last time I checked dragons don't emit radio signals.

 

Neither do last jets since mid 90's during combat.

70 of AAM's are Heat seeking just for that purpose.