You've completely missed my point, like took the highway to the next state missed the point.
> The worst a pirate captain could do with a single ship in the 1700s was to sink a few merchant ships.
It wasn't that they sank the ships. Stede Bonnet is noted for capturing around 30 ships in under 2 years, noted in that there's a record of the ships he plundered. The money he took from this went to the ports he traded in.
> The worst a pirate captain could do with a spaceship is to destroy an entire continent.
Depending on the size of the vessel, it's a possibility, but not likely. It's going to be easy to tell if someone's approaching you at ridiculous speed. Also, this means anything you hit them with hits harder. When you're driving at a bullet at the speed of sound, it's definitely going to hurt a lot more. You're not only making yourself more obvious, but more vulnerable.
> In the 1700s, a pirate captain could hide his ship from government navies, and take merchant ships by surprise.
How? Is there some magic cloaking device that prevails the Caribbean ocean? Sorry, but the Navy can't stop drug smugglers by boat today with satellites, radar and whatever else.
They knew where they were going. Do you not think the Spanish knew that Henry Morgan was headed for Tortuga? He didn't have to hide from the British or the French, in fact he ended up an Admiral of the Royal Navy.
They took the merchants by surprise, because the merchants didn't know they were pirates, they thought they were just crossing paths with another merchant ship. Stede Bonnet captured three ships by pretending to trade with merchant ships (notable for their short crews) and rushed them with his 130 men.
> The location of a spaceship is public knowledge; it cannot take anyone by surprise, and the authorities know exactly where it is.
Again, yes and no. Just because you can see everything, doesn't mean you can watch everything. You're assuming one universal government and data sharing between governments or agencies.
Sorry, but it's eventually going to be in one nations best interest to economically harm the other and harbour privateers.
> There's a considerable incentive for any planet-side government to make sure pirate spaceships don't exist, and there's nowhere the pirate can hide.
Earth based governments, maybe. Do you think the colonies are going to turn down building materials for 1/2 the cost? Or protection for harbouring pirates? Anything that increases government revenues will be protected.
Governments will harbour pirates because they have before. The French made piracy rampant by issuing letters of marque simply to damage everyone elses economic ability.
Governments war over limited resources, but they sabotage when there's plentiful resources.
> Depending on the size of the vessel, it's a possibility, but not likely. It's going to be easy to tell if someone's approaching you at ridiculous speed.
So if you a voting citizen of Earth, you'd have complete confidence in your planetary defences, and see no reason at all to send the military after the rogue spaceship that could potentially destroy your country?
Can you imagine a national government saying today, "Yes, we know the terrorist has nuclear bombs, and yes, they're currently in a remote location within strike range of our aircraft, but no, we're not going to take them out because we're 99.9% sure they'd be unable to get those bombs into our country."
> How? Is there some magic cloaking device that prevails the Caribbean ocean?
The atmosphere, the curvature of the earth, primitive communications, and obstructing land masses are all problems 18th century ships had to deal with.
> Sorry, but the Navy can't stop drug smugglers by boat today with satellites, radar and whatever else.
And how many large, hard-to-hide pirate vessels do you see nowadays? How many pirate battleships, or pirate aircraft carriers are there?
Pirate vessels today are small, short-range craft that can be easily hidden, because communication and observation technologies are so much better today than in the 1700s.
> They took the merchants by surprise, because the merchants didn't know they were pirates, they thought they were just crossing paths with another merchant ship.
That trick would only work once. Once the pirate attacked, everyone in the solar system would see them, and their little green icon would permanently change into a little red icon.
> Sorry, but it's eventually going to be in one nations best interest to economically harm the other and harbour privateers.
Why? That doesn't happen today. The US doesn't sponsor pirate battleships to attack the French, for instance.
Privateers made sense in the 1700s, where raw materials still had a lot of worth, and war could be waged between world powers without mutual destruction.
But today, piracy doesn't make economic sense for anyone with any wealth. It's much more profitable to invest than steal.
> Do you think the colonies are going to turn down building materials for 1/2 the cost?
Yes, because everyone will see them doing it, and in a high-technology civilization, raw materials are ultimately not that valuable.
> The worst a pirate captain could do with a single ship in the 1700s was to sink a few merchant ships.
It wasn't that they sank the ships. Stede Bonnet is noted for capturing around 30 ships in under 2 years, noted in that there's a record of the ships he plundered. The money he took from this went to the ports he traded in.
> The worst a pirate captain could do with a spaceship is to destroy an entire continent.
Depending on the size of the vessel, it's a possibility, but not likely. It's going to be easy to tell if someone's approaching you at ridiculous speed. Also, this means anything you hit them with hits harder. When you're driving at a bullet at the speed of sound, it's definitely going to hurt a lot more. You're not only making yourself more obvious, but more vulnerable.
> In the 1700s, a pirate captain could hide his ship from government navies, and take merchant ships by surprise.
How? Is there some magic cloaking device that prevails the Caribbean ocean? Sorry, but the Navy can't stop drug smugglers by boat today with satellites, radar and whatever else.
They knew where they were going. Do you not think the Spanish knew that Henry Morgan was headed for Tortuga? He didn't have to hide from the British or the French, in fact he ended up an Admiral of the Royal Navy.
They took the merchants by surprise, because the merchants didn't know they were pirates, they thought they were just crossing paths with another merchant ship. Stede Bonnet captured three ships by pretending to trade with merchant ships (notable for their short crews) and rushed them with his 130 men.
> The location of a spaceship is public knowledge; it cannot take anyone by surprise, and the authorities know exactly where it is.
Again, yes and no. Just because you can see everything, doesn't mean you can watch everything. You're assuming one universal government and data sharing between governments or agencies.
Sorry, but it's eventually going to be in one nations best interest to economically harm the other and harbour privateers.
> There's a considerable incentive for any planet-side government to make sure pirate spaceships don't exist, and there's nowhere the pirate can hide.
Earth based governments, maybe. Do you think the colonies are going to turn down building materials for 1/2 the cost? Or protection for harbouring pirates? Anything that increases government revenues will be protected.
Governments will harbour pirates because they have before. The French made piracy rampant by issuing letters of marque simply to damage everyone elses economic ability.
Governments war over limited resources, but they sabotage when there's plentiful resources.