The Great Martian War 1913 -1917.

[Gotham Central]

I saw it. For a fictional docu-drama it was good. It takes one whopper of a suspension of disbelief for anyone to believe that early 20th century weaponry could successfully repel aliens who had mastered interstellar travel. Shit most scientists today think our modern military would be crushed by invading aliens.


Oh and the magic metal liquid which they reverse engineer at a time when electricity was barely available to the general public - forget the name - plus infected horses wins the war. [roll eyes]

Outside of that, was OK.

There is no suggestion that the invaders had mastered interstellar travel. If in fact they were from Mars, they only needed limited interplanetary travel. Admittedly it is left a bit vague where the aliens actually originated. Humans took to calling them Martians only because they noticed an explosion on Mars shortly before the arrival of the meteor that hit Germany. Of course, even at high speed it actually takes months for something other than light to reah Earth from Mars...so who knows.


My only real quibble with the docudrama was the fact that 2013, as presented, looked nearly identical to our own. Yet, even ignoring the technological advances that should have come from reverse engineering alien technology...politically the world should look very different without a defeated Germany and no justifiable reason for the mass revolt in Russia that led to the creation of the Soviet Union.

Additionally, it made little sense that the US stayed out of the war for several years. While the US in 1913 was not the power that it would be later in the century, it was still a great power by any reasonable measure. European powers warring with eachother, though tragic, has happened before and thus it was reasonable for the US to consider being "neutral" in WWI. An alien invasion is an existential threat to everyone equally. What possible reason would the US have for saying, lets sit back and wait for the world's first line of defense to fall so that we can face the possibility of facing the threat alone?

 

[Admiral2]

Finally caught this on BBCA. It was good for WotW movie, but I'm at a loss as to why they felt the need to make a WWI AU out of it.

 

[DarthTom]

Additionally, it made little sense that the US stayed out of the war for several years. While the US in 1913 was not the power that it would be later in the century, it was still a great power by any reasonable measure. European powers warring with eachother, though tragic, has happened before and thus it was reasonable for the US to consider being "neutral" in WWI. An alien invasion is an existential threat to everyone equally. What possible reason would the US have for saying, lets sit back and wait for the world's first line of defense to fall so that we can face the possibility of facing the threat alone?

I think they attempted to create some historical parallels and paradoxes about the US reluctantly entering the real World War I, and the paradox that Wilson was an advocate IRL for entering the war whereas in the docudrama he was opposed to it.

 

[Gotham Central]

Additionally, it made little sense that the US stayed out of the war for several years. While the US in 1913 was not the power that it would be later in the century, it was still a great power by any reasonable measure. European powers warring with eachother, though tragic, has happened before and thus it was reasonable for the US to consider being "neutral" in WWI. An alien invasion is an existential threat to everyone equally. What possible reason would the US have for saying, lets sit back and wait for the world's first line of defense to fall so that we can face the possibility of facing the threat alone?

I think they attempted to create some historical parallels and paradoxes about the US reluctantly entering the real World War I, and the paradox that Wilson was an advocate IRL for entering the war whereas in the docudrama he was opposed to it.

Oh I got what they were going for, it just didn't make any sense. A war between countries for very human and terrestrial objectives is one thing, and alien invasion is quite another.

Wilson was not an advocate for the war. Had he been so, he would have had numerous opportunities to gin up public support for intervention. He preferred to sit on the side lines, help the bankers make lots of money, and pontificate about how awful it was that the Europeans were killing each other again.

 

[DarthTom]

A war between countries for very human and terrestrial objectives is one thing, and alien invasion is quite another.

Yes, logically an alien invasion would unite humanity in ways heretofore in human history we haven't seen - the obvious being a global effort to defeat them from day 1.

Again, I can even suspend my disbelief related to America sitting it out at first, but that early 20th century weapons could repel an alien army is a far more of a stretch.

Any invading alien army would take the path of least reistance you'd think and either one:

1. Unleash a biological weapon that kills only humans

or

2. Bomb the shit out of us from orbit and than mop up using a ground assault.

 

[Owain Taggart]

It takes one whopper of a suspension of disbelief for anyone to believe that early 20th century weaponry could successfully repel aliens...

That's kind of the point though. That's essentially what the original War of the Worlds was like, and they all die off due to their own doing in the end. It's a classic riff on David & Goliath, up against insurmountable odds and I feel the story only gets better the wider the technological gap. "Bob, we're totally going to take the Martians down with these pea-shooters. They're the best we've got!" Half the fun is watching them try and then watching the horror fall upon their faces as realization dawns upon them that their tactics simply aren't enough. Kind of like Germany vs Brazil at the World Cup

As for why WWI? Well, I've always believed that a Civil War setting would be ideal if set in the U.S as a parallel to the events happening in the UK in the original story, but the WWI setting is the next best thing, and if people come out of it researching WW1, then it's a win.

 

[DarthTom]

That's kind of the point though. That's essentially what the original War of the Worlds was like, and they all die off due to their own doing in the end. It's a classic riff on David & Goliath, up against insurmountable odds and I feel the story only gets better the wider the technological gap.

Maybe, the USS Ronald Reagan should pull up on the shores of Rome say in the year 33 in docudrama format and buzz the capital of the most powerful empire of the time and - in that case the Romans win against jet fighters. Because you know - they can reverse engineer and F35 after knocking it out of the sky with catapults.

 

[Gotham Central]

A war between countries for very human and terrestrial objectives is one thing, and alien invasion is quite another.

Yes, logically an alien invasion would unite humanity in ways heretofore in human history we haven't seen - the obvious being a global effort to defeat them from day 1.

Again, I can even suspend my disbelief related to America sitting it out at first, but that early 20th century weapons could repel an alien army is a far more of a stretch.

Any invading alien army would take the path of least reistance you'd think and either one:

1. Unleash a biological weapon that kills only humans

or

2. Bomb the shit out of us from orbit and than mop up using a ground assault.

I think that you're overstating the level of technological sophistication of the "Martians" as depicted in this film.

Lets reveiw what was actually shown. If we assume that the invaders actually were from Mars, their technology was not that advanced. They did not "arrive" in a traditional space craft. By the looks of things it appears that they hurled a single large object at the earth containing their entire invasion force. It crash landed in Germany. On top of that, it did not even contain all of the machines that was necessary to fight the war. They built most of their own war machines here on earth using scrounged materials. Remember, they did not even have air power. All of their weapons were ground based.The movie even suggests that the naval attack against the US might have been faked by the allies....which makes sense if you think about...why would beings living on a desert world know anything about developing naval weaponry.

So the aliens are not necessarily all that advanced. It looks like their only advancements were the direct result of the victicite.

 

[Guy Gardener]

And they wanted to seem to lose until they had collected/been given a few million million tons of "metal" by Earth's Military.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Yes, logically an alien invasion would unite humanity in ways heretofore in human history we haven't seen - the obvious being a global effort to defeat them from day 1.

Again, I can even suspend my disbelief related to America sitting it out at first, but that early 20th century weapons could repel an alien army is a far more of a stretch.

Try Harry Turtledove's World War series -- Earth is invaded by reptilian aliens from (I think) Tau Ceti mid-1942. Humanity... doesn't exactly unite. Despite the greater threat, each of the major powers retains their own agenda.

I seem to remember that Turtledove picked that point in history because it's the point where humanity could have held its own, at least for a time, against an alien invader who had limited resources (like a few ships) due to no FTL. EMP weapons would be ineffective against human military technology of the time because electronics hadn't been developed yet. Nor could they use nuclear weapons because they wanted to settle the planet.

Bomb the shit out of us from orbit and than mop up using a ground assault.

That's what the Race tries in Turtledove. It doesn't work across the board.

It even happens in Niven and Pournelle's Footfall; the fithp drop rocks on Earth, taking out infrastructure.

In both cases -- World War and Footfall -- the invaders are surprised that humanity doesn't roll over and surrender. Humanity's behavior was outside the invaders' comprehension. Across interstellar distances they could only bring a small force, and neither were prepared for (or could even imagine) a war of attrition.

Damn, now I want a sequel to Footfall. What does Earth look like invasion plus thirty or forty years?

 

[RJDiogenes]

Unsurprisingly, I love the aliens in Footfall.

The Great Martian War is essentially Steampunk, so I'm not worried about the level of alien technology.