Quote:
Originally Posted by RyanW
If it is going 10 mps, it isn't in GSO.
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Technically, you can be at GSO without being in GSO (GSO is a distance as well as a delta-v). In the case of the example, the spacecraft would diverge away from the planet after releasing the bombs at GSO. The momentum of the bombs would carry them over the next forty-five minutes towards their targets, and their maneuver thrusters would help them make the final approach.
As for it being an illegal manuever, ballistic attacks travel forever in space. In the case of range, I see that as maximum accurate range for specific locations, but 10 megaton bombs really do not need specific locations (until kinetic kill weapons). As long as you are within a 1 km of your target, that is all you need.
In order to counter the bombs, you would need to be able to engage and destroy 2,700 SM+0 targets in 15 3-minute combat turns. At the same time, the major batteries of the spacecraft are attacking surface targets as it does its flyby. Depending on the protocol, it may also have released its drones, which may release their own bombs. For example, a SM+4 drone with one major battery of bombs can have 15 16cm 100 kiloton antimatter bombs. With 900 such drones, that means that there would also be 13,500 SM-2 bombs to deal with. Of course, we are talking about a terror load rather than a combat load.
Now, more targeted bombardment could be done, though the strategy would likely involve engaging soft targets with 30 GJ lasers from GSO, launching drones at MEO so they can drop their 100 kiloton bombs on hard targets when they enter LEO, and then using the 10 megaton bombs to clean up everything else. If done correctly, over a billion people die in the first hour and the vast majority of the survivors die in the next month. With their infrastructure destroyed and their planet depopulated, the survivors would likely take a century to recover. Of course, any defending fleet exists to prevent that exact scenario from occurring.