The Lost Scrolls: Uber Firepower calculated for Star Wars

[Mr. Oragahn]

I'm getting tired of hearing the same old disc.
Every once in a while, in discussions where Star Wars firepower plays a central role, when people contest the ICS figures, certain die-hard warsies jump in and say that even in the past, there were calcs which were giving Star Destroyers firepower levels in the mid to high gigaton, but they didn't insist too much because there supposedly was a majority of debaters who wouldn't accept them, so they settled on moderate calcs.
What a noble attitude to avoid stirring trouble, when you see the kind of ruckuss they make nowadays!

But that's it. Where are those freaking mystical calcs they all talk about, but no one can find?

And I expect to see something based on the movies, by the way.

[Mike DiCenso]

Usually in the past, certain pro-Wars people tried to either hyper-inflate firepower or ship numbers by making comparisions with involving the Death Star superlaser. They would make the claim that SW ships had tremendous firepower by dividing the oft-quoted 25,000 ISD number into the (assumed) DET superlaser of 1e36 J, or they would conversely assume that there were literally billions of captial ships in the Galactic Empire, again going on the basis that the SL was a DET weapon.

It's probably thinking like this that has brought the Versus debate to the point that it is, and I suspect is what helped to influence Saxton into the belief that an ISD can melt the crust of an Earth-like planet in less than a day.

Of course all of this is predicated on the False Dilemma arguement that there is only one thing or the other, and that the DS SL can only be a DET-based weapon, not CR.
-Mike

[2046]

Some of the scrolls are not so lost. Here's a link I found to Marina "Commander Thelea" O'Leary's Imperial Fleet Size Calculations:

http://foobar.homelinux.net/asvsaa/essays/impfleet.txt

The earliest reference I can find to the use of the word "gigatons" on ASVS is in 1999 by Michael January (a guy whose webpages I've archived):

link to long and ugly URL

The term does appear earlier at ASVS, based on the "gigatons of recoil" line about turbolasers from one of the EU novels (Slave Ship). Of course, that was from 1998, a year before another EU novel (X-Wing: Isard's Revenge) suggested that "terajoules of coherent light" spread amongst fifty cannons were fired from two ~700m long New Republic warships in a fight to the death against a battlestation. The same book stated that an ISD poured terajoules of energy into enemy shields in broadsides, suggesting that terajoules was the consisent level.

Even by the time of my arrival at ASVS, the "gigatons of recoil" line was the one you were told by the pro-Wars bloc, not "terajoules of coherent light".

In any case, January used the old Brian Young Turbolaser Commentaries as basis for his statement about gigatons. Reviewing Young's work via the earliest available page on archive.org, we find that Young reaches as high as 1.6 megatons (7000 terajoules) for a "medium" turbolaser bolt.

However, he includes reference to Saxton's faulty Base Delta Zero claims, thereby noting the possibility of an average per-shot firepower for light-to-heavy guns (of which they estimated either 60 or 200) of almost 600 megatons.

So January asserts that an ISD broadside would constitute some 14,000 megatons of energy, or 14 gigatons. He also asserts that a heavy ISD gun could yield up to 17 gigatons, though he doesn't address the oddity of that figure compared to his earlier broadside estimation.

For January, light turbolasers were no less than 3 megatons, with 138 megatons for a light gun also being a "CONSERVATIVELY" derived figure.

Meaning, overall, that the myth of uber-firepower for Star Wars vessels largely began with Saxton, and his 1997 claims of uber-fied BDZ firepower. After all, Brian Young didn't come close to such figures.

(And no, I don't think it purely coincidental that 1997 was also the era of Saxton's involvement in Trek/Wars debates. But that's outside the scope of this thread.)

[Mr. Oragahn]

Usually in the past, certain pro-Wars people tried to either hyper-inflate firepower or ship numbers by making comparisions with involving the Death Star superlaser. They would make the claim that SW ships had tremendous firepower by dividing the oft-quoted 25,000 ISD number into the (assumed) DET superlaser of 1e36 J, or they would conversely assume that there were literally billions of captial ships in the Galactic Empire, again going on the basis that the SL was a DET weapon.

Yep. Those elements have been revised since then. Even the EU has incorporated weird physical phenomenoms relative to the Death Stars to create stories (Dart Vader's gauntlet sent through a watzizit anomaly resulting from the DSII's explosion).
People have identified out the visual evidence and outlined extracts from the novelisation that do offer a whole new different perspective on the mechanisms of the Death Star. Too bad an old EU source didn't think beyond "scaled up Turbolaser" (which is still used by some warsies nowadays), nevermind superior evidence which lets us know that it's nothing of the sort.
At best, if you really want to insist that the Death Star destroys planets through a majority of DET principles, and that there was a planetary shield around Endor then, the secondary explosion is enough to allow room to suggest that the second explosion was fuled by Alderaanian power plants.
See, it goes both ways. If they claim the existence of the convenient powerful hypermatter that can shatter a planet, and yet be contained inside the core of a Death Star, they also have to acknowledge its use to power up the shield on Alderaan. For a comparative purpose, look at the huge explosion from the destruction of the shield emitter on Endor, only due to a bunch of explosives; think about the size of the battle station it was protecting, and then think about what would happen with a power plant powering a shield encompassing a whole planet, which now would have to cope with the power of a planet-destroying beam.

As for the numbers derived from Dodonna's quote, a recent thread at Spacebattles (Connie vs ISD) helped us to refresh a couple of memories.

Or you can look at those threads, from SB:

Dodonna quote, january 2002. It predates the publishing of AOTC: ICS by a few months, and this might explain the relative sanity of the comments made back then. It also has a nice reference about previous superlaser platforms from ANH's novelisation.
The stances of certain members also surprise me.
Episoce II ICS, april 2002. A big speculation thread about the new ICS written by Curtis Saxton.
Funny to notice that among those who appeared to be identified as Trekkies, a couple of them got banned. Yet I can spot names in that thread who behaved like trolls in the past, but guess what?
They're still present. We can also see how the most virulent warsies were kinda nice with E1701 back then. He was a mod, no?
Ah, I've found something. Someone's tried to calc the Nar Shamdaayaadaaaaa (there's not enough vowels in the world I'm afraid) BDZ:
Itsa me!

The stats for the Acclamator were those:

Acclamator class military transport ship:
Lenght: 752 meters.
Power output: 2e23 watts.
Shield strenght: 7e22 watts.
Weaponry:
-12 quad TLs - 200 gt per shot.
-24 laser cannons - 6 megatons per shot.

And, of course, the Slave-I had 190 MT concussion missiles, and 12 GT mines. And beam weapons generating gigatons of recoil. :|

Two interesting replies from CoF: 1, 2 (this one contains a quote from the TFN interview).

Still scanning the thread, another quote. I'm derailing a bit, but I take it as an occasion to place bits of info from EU sources as well, to see what comes from where:

"The resulting energy beam had more firepower than half the Imperial starfleet and could instantly reduce a world to asteroid fragments. Each amplification crystal required a seperate gunnery station, where a crew of fourteen soldiers had to precisely adjust and modulate the turbolaser pulses to allow the focus lens to create a stable energy beam. Four reserve amplification crystals could be brought on line."

(ref: The Essential Guide to Weapons and Technology)

Coupled more quotes fom 2005 where even E1701 was pointing out the flawed reasonings behind all those extrapolations (again - but I can't find the other thread from 2005 where he abundantly talked on Dodonna's quote), we can definitely see that basically, it's just nonsense.
And considering that some die-hard warsies still don't get the point of the complete uselessness of a briefing that would totally exclude what's more relevant to the rebel pilots, the defense turbolasers, we understand how absurd certain conclusions come to be.
But that's nothing new.

What really bothered me was all those stories about super uber calcs that seem to be dated as "pre-Saxton". There's more to say on that below.

It's probably thinking like this that has brought the Versus debate to the point that it is, and I suspect is what helped to influence Saxton into the belief that an ISD can melt the crust of an Earth-like planet in less than a day.

That way or the other. Maybe he's responsible, somehow, of the degradation and credibility of the arguments thrown by the same bunch of people.
For that, I'll look at 2046's post, because the info he reports is rather telling.

Some of the scrolls are not so lost. Here's a link I found to Marina "Commander Thelea" O'Leary's Imperial Fleet Size Calculations:

http://foobar.homelinux.net/asvsaa/essays/impfleet.txt

There's a thing to notice though.

Many cite the construction of the second Death Star as a record. And it is. It's a secret project, and it's achieved within, what? two to three years approximatively.
This figure is often cited to bolster the super industrial state of Star Wars. Well, looking at Coruscant, for example, is enough to acknowledge this.

That said, let's look at it from another perspective. Isn't it funny that at the same time as the Empire focuses its ressources on another bigger Death Star project, for a much more tightened timeframe, for a very near schedule, the rebel also spectacularily grow in power and size?
It's easy to suggest that all what is secret about this project is that the Emperor simply diverted many bucks towards that project without telling what he was doing, not even to the Moffs.
With the senate long dismantled, and the public kept in ignorance, it's no wonder how this project can be considered secret.

That said, a well spread belief is that if the Empire can build battle stations of that size, then they can do the same for fleets of ships at the same time. And thus we see those calcs where people divide the mass or volume of the Death Star (and we see with ease why a 900 km wide Death Star is much more interesting to them than a 160 km wide Death Star), and go forth to find the equivalent in capital ships, without actually thinking that if the Empire actually built a Death Star, it may not have been able to build as many ships at the same time, and spend bucks on other parts of the military in other sectors, to enforce imperial rule, which then seems responsible, to an extent, to the rise of the rebellion as a real and powerful menace to the Emperor.



As said earlier on, it's worth the observation as to how the rebellion seems only able to spare one blockade runner for the most important mission ever, and how they're stuck in a temple without any form of visible defense, and how later on, they literally grow bases with theater shields, ion cannons, have many atmospheric fighters, cargos, starfighters and bombers (with two new models such as the B-Wing and the A-Wing) and a fleet of capital ships which, at the Battle of Endor, can actually stand a chance against the Empire's elite forces in a head to head battle.

The earliest reference I can find to the use of the word "gigatons" on ASVS is in 1999 by Michael January (a guy whose webpages I've archived):

link to long and ugly URL

The term does appear earlier at ASVS, based on the "gigatons of recoil" line about turbolasers from one of the EU novels (Slave Ship).

Yeah, gigatons of recoil. We wonder if there's been a Special-Special Super Edition of the trilogy that only a few select people, this EU author counted, actually know to exist.
Last time I checked, the starfighters, no matter the era, never struck me fighting with anything superior to gigajoule level weaponry, neither were they destroyed by anything superior to subkiloton weaponry.

Of course, that was from 1998, a year before another EU novel (X-Wing: Isard's Revenge) suggested that "terajoules of coherent light" spread amongst fifty cannons were fired from two ~700m long New Republic warships in a fight to the death against a battlestation. The same book stated that an ISD poured terajoules of energy into enemy shields in broadsides, suggesting that terajoules was the consisent level.

Even by the time of my arrival at ASVS, the "gigatons of recoil" line was the one you were told by the pro-Wars bloc, not "terajoules of coherent light".

Nevermind if terajoules figures are much faithful to what happens on screen.
Even nowadays, the ICS Church doesn't dare to pretend that fighters or bombers, especially designed for war, can ditch that amount of firepower with their laser cannons.
Yet, they used it back then. The amount of blatant lying with a straight face, and mocking of the opposition's intelligence and patience, helps to explain the absurd situation that exists now.
It is comedy, really, that the figure they hid behind, back then, is even absurdly over what they dare to claim nowadays for ships of the tonnage of a Slave I.

In any case, January used the old Brian Young Turbolaser Commentaries as basis for his statement about gigatons. Reviewing Young's work via the earliest available page on archive.org, we find that Young reaches as high as 1.6 megatons (7000 terajoules) for a "medium" turbolaser bolt.

However, he includes reference to Saxton's faulty Base Delta Zero claims, thereby noting the possibility of an average per-shot firepower for light-to-heavy guns (of which they estimated either 60 or 200) of almost 600 megatons.

So January asserts that an ISD broadside would constitute some 14,000 megatons of energy, or 14 gigatons. He also asserts that a heavy ISD gun could yield up to 17 gigatons, though he doesn't address the oddity of that figure compared to his earlier broadside estimation.

For January, light turbolasers were no less than 3 megatons, with 138 megatons for a light gun also being a "CONSERVATIVELY" derived figure.

Meaning, overall, that the myth of uber-firepower for Star Wars vessels largely began with Saxton, and his 1997 claims of uber-fied BDZ firepower. After all, Brian Young didn't come close to such figures.

(And no, I don't think it purely coincidental that 1997 was also the era of Saxton's involvement in Trek/Wars debates. But that's outside the scope of this thread.)

Indeed, while we can be led to think that the the gigaton figures were actually predating any influence or work from Saxton, those crazy numbers are actually the direct result of Saxton's unreasonable claims and load of misinformation.

But maybe there truly are "calcs", somewhere. ;)

[Mr. Oragahn]

Since Poe, despite conceding that he invented so many asteroid vapourizations necessary to the wank him and his pals admire so much, has decided to open another joke thread, called this time Mythbusters: 200GT Turbolasers, 100% Phaser Accuracy, and since the turbolaser part is relevant to the thread I started (I leave the Trek stuff to others, as I'm not qualified to deal with that), let's see what he says:

The Claim:

The 200 GT turbolaser claim was invented by the ICS! Before the ICS was published, Warsies never claimed 200 GT! Waaaaa!!

Well, breaking news: even if it predated the ICS, it doesn't change much to the nature of the claim. Poe's logic is as much absurd as one claiming that one religion is just better because it's 100 years older or so.

In the end, it's still the same BS.

From: Marti...@aol.com (SirNitram)
Newsgroups: alt.startrek.vs.starwars
Subject: Re: Sixty SSD's VS 100 Borg Cubes and 200 Sovren class ships
Date: 13 Jul 2001

Yea, I suppose it's debatable how many orders of magnitude more effective a single HTL bolt is than a full Phaser blast from a GCS. We have the calc's. A single HTL blast is measured in gigatons, and is NOT dependent on the target. So, while Phaser's drop their efficiency to a few megawatt laser on armor, the TL is still going strong.

At that point, you notice that gigatons is still pretty much vague.
Not trying to debunk the idea that the super duper gigaton claim is old, but just showing that minor gigaton claims are different than 200 GT or more.

From: "Kynes" <ky...@choam.org>
Subject: Re: [calc] Alternate Turbolaser calcs
Date: 1999/07/04

No arguments here. After all:

1e38 J for DS blast x 2 for Imperial starfleet: 2e38 J / 1e7 for each ship: 1e31 J / 200 for each weapon: 5e28 J / 4e9 for TNT tons: 1.25e13 MT / 1e12 for exatons: 12.5 ET

Thus, even if the recoil from a TL bolt was 999 gigatons (the max it could be before being in the "teraton range") it would still deliver less than 0.000008% of its energy as KE. Obviously, other warships would worry far more about the thermal/ray properties of the bolt than the inconsequential gigatons of KE, thus naming the shield that protects against them a "ray shield."

Nothing new here, this is the same extremely disputable interpretation of one of the film's bits of dialogue, mixed to the everlasting superlaser downscaling argument.

Moving on.

From: x...@iafrica.com (Michael January)
Subject: [calcs] Further to BDZ
Date: 1999/07/11

Edam has been insisting that a significant portion of the energy required in a BDZ comes from an ISD's fighter and bomber complement, and missiles launched from the ISD, rather than the ISD's 'beam weapons' or turbolasers.
In an earlier post, I pointed out that if current power assumptions are used:-

10 MT for a proton torpedo
60 gigajoules for a fighters laser-cannons
500 megatons for a capital ships concussion missiles

and these weapons were fired continuously for a 24 hour period, they would contribute less than 0.001% of the energy required to do what a BDZ operation demands.

If however, we accept Edam's position that these weapons contribute a significant portion of the energy, then we can do the following. A BDZ demands a minimum of about 5.3e27 Joules to be injected. This will raise the temperature of 30% of a 20km crust to the melting point of Iron, but not enough to melt it, let alone to melt rock, not iron.

If proton torpedoes (or other bombs fired by TIE bombers) contributed 10% of this energy (5.3e26 Joules), then the 12 TIE bombers would have to fire TWO MILLION missiles of about 122 gigatons each during the BDZ operation.
If the laser cannons on the 72 fighters (including the bombers) contributed a further 10%, then this would require 12.5 MILLION weapons firings of 5100 megatons per shot.

If an ISD carried 1000 missiles, and these contributed 10% to the BDZ, then each missile would have to have a warhead yield of 126 TERATONS.

That still leaves the turbolasers to do 70% of the job, which means that individually, each turbolaser is still 146 GIGATONS, and an ISD would have to have 200 of them fire continuously for 24 hours to finish the job.

Personally, I am quite happy to accept that a TIE delivers 5.1 gigatons per shot of it's laser cannons, and that a proton torpedo is 122 gigatons, and 12 TIE Bombers between them carry two million such missiles.

This also seems to balance out nicely

Turbolaser 146 Gigatons
One fighter, per shot 5.1 Gigatons
Proton Torp 122 Gigatons
Concussion Torp 126 Teratons

Puts all the weapons in pretty much the same power class, except for concussion missiles, which are MUCH more powerful than turbolasers

Ok. That was what I was asking for, somehow. That is, since when absurd claims were made.
However, remember that I also asked on evidence based on the movies (read OP).

Let's take another take at it, bit by bit now.

From: x...@iafrica.com (Michael January)
Subject: [calcs] Further to BDZ
Date: 1999/07/11

Edam has been insisting that a significant portion of the energy required in a BDZ comes from an ISD's fighter and bomber complement, and missiles launched from the ISD, rather than the ISD's 'beam weapons' or turbolasers.

Even back then, I'd have been siding with January, on the point that missiles would not be the most efficient and destructive weapons. Their yield might exceed that of a single heavy bolt, but their limited numbers would likely be their downfall.

In an earlier post, I pointed out that if current power assumptions are used:-

10 MT for a proton torpedo
60 gigajoules for a fighters laser-cannons

Let's notice that since then, AOTC has finely shown that even the top notch ship of the most appraised bounty hunter of the moment had weapons barely reaching the gigajoule range (high end), and actually pretty much sitting in the megajoule range.

Yes, by the way, that is movie evidence.
Scale this up, bitch. ;)

500 megatons for a capital ships concussion missiles

and these weapons were fired continuously for a 24 hour period, they would contribute less than 0.001% of the energy required to do what a BDZ operation demands.

Ah, yes. We pretty much understand that even back then, so funny gigaton claims were already based on a fallacious interpretation of the BDZ order, and clearly not on movie evidence.

If however, we accept Edam's position that these weapons contribute a significant portion of the energy, then we can do the following. A BDZ demands a minimum of about 5.3e27 Joules to be injected. This will raise the temperature of 30% of a 20km crust to the melting point of Iron, but not enough to melt it, let alone to melt rock, not iron.

If proton torpedoes (or other bombs fired by TIE bombers) contributed 10% of this energy (5.3e26 Joules), then the 12 TIE bombers would have to fire TWO MILLION missiles of about 122 gigatons each during the BDZ operation.
If the laser cannons on the 72 fighters (including the bombers) contributed a further 10%, then this would require 12.5 MILLION weapons firings of 5100 megatons per shot.

If an ISD carried 1000 missiles, and these contributed 10% to the BDZ, then each missile would have to have a warhead yield of 126 TERATONS.

That still leaves the turbolasers to do 70% of the job, which means that individually, each turbolaser is still 146 GIGATONS, and an ISD would have to have 200 of them fire continuously for 24 hours to finish the job.

Personally, I am quite happy to accept that a TIE delivers 5.1 gigatons per shot of it's laser cannons, and that a proton torpedo is 122 gigatons, and 12 TIE Bombers between them carry two million such missiles.

This also seems to balance out nicely

Turbolaser 146 Gigatons
One fighter, per shot 5.1 Gigatons
Proton Torp 122 Gigatons
Concussion Torp 126 Teratons

Puts all the weapons in pretty much the same power class, except for concussion missiles, which are MUCH more powerful than turbolasers

Well, there's nothing else to add to that, since it's just the same erroneous numbers based on inflated interpretations.

So, huh, nothing new. That's still not evidence from the movies that would be predating the ICS, safe for the superlaser downscaled argument (but one could argue that this stance could be held since the day ANH first aired).

[Who is like God arbour]

Many cite the construction of the second Death Star as a record. And it is. It's a secret project, and it's achieved within, what? two to three years approximatively. [...]

Does the movie really confirm that?

As far as I can remember, it was not said, when the construction on the second Death Star has begun or how much time they have needed.

To me, it seems plausible to assume, that - because the Emperor wanted more than only one single Death Star - they have begun to build another Death Star while still building the first Death Star.

That the Emperor wanted more than only one single Death Star is very propably, especialy in an Empire that allegedly is stretched across a whole galaxy. One single Death Star would be insignificant.

• After many long years of secretive construction this station has become the decisive force in this part of the universe. Events in this region of the galaxy will no longer be determined by fate, by decree, or by any other agency. They will be decided by this station!”

  Interestingly, the first use of the most powerful destructive machine ever constructed had seemingly had no influence at all on that map, which in itself represented only a tiny fraction of this section of one modest-sized galaxy.

That they would have build another Death Star while still building the first Death Star is not implausible.

Real life shows, that often, when a new ship class is build, several ships are build simultaneously and that they don't wait to finish a prototype.

• (And the EU state, that there was a prototype befor the first Death Star was build. Insofar it would be more plausible than ever that they could have started to build the second Death Star long before they have finished the first Death Star.)

[Mr. Oragahn]

As far as I can remember, it was not said, when the construction on the second Death Star has begun or how much time they have needed.

To me, it seems plausible to assume, that - because the Emperor wanted more than only one single Death Star - they have begun to build another Death Star while still building the first Death Star.

That the Emperor wanted more than only one single Death Star is very propably, especialy in an Empire that allegedly is stretched across a whole galaxy. One single Death Star would be insignificant.

Err, remember the yellow letters?

On the other hand, the EU had a prototype built aside. Maybe two.

Who knows. Lucas said something like it was stretching it a bit, but the first one took so much time to build because of bureaucrats and other stupid things, mixed to ressources management.

He also said that the second one, unfinished as it was, was of the same size as the first.

[Who is like God arbour]

• • • • Luke Skywalker has returned to
        his home planet of Tatooine in
        an attempt to rescue his
        friend Han Solo from the
        clutches of the vile gangster
        Jabba the Hutt.
        
        Little does Luke know that the
        GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly
        begun construction on a new
        armored space station even
        more powerful than the first
        dreaded Death Star.
        
        When completed, this ultimate
        weapon will spell certain doom
        for the small band of rebels
        struggling to restore freedom
        to the galaxy…

[...] the GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly begun construction on a new armored space station [...]

What does this say about the beginning of the construction?

It's indisputable that they have begun to construct it. If not, there wouldn't have been a second Death Star at all.

And it is indisputable that the beginning of the construction was secret. The first Death Star was secret too.

And I don't think, that someone would try to argue that "the GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly begun construction on a new armored space station even more powerful than the first dreaded Death Star " after "Luke Skywalker has returned to his home planet of Tatooine in an attempt to rescue his friend Han Solo from the clutches of the vile gangster Jabba the Hutt. "

Insofar, the "yellow letters" don't answer the question, when the construction of the second Death Star has begun.

• Look for example at the Nimitz class aircraft carriers: The first ship of that class, the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) was laid down June 22, 1968 and launched May 13, 1972 (but commissioned not until 3 May 1975). But the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69), the second ship of that class was laid down already August 15, 1970. At this time, the construction of the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) was still not finished for nearly two years.

[Praeothmin]

While I agree, W.I.L.G.A, that we really don't know when the second Death Star's construction began, I'm really not convinced that the Empire felt it needed a second one.

Remember that the Death Star was able to travel through Hyperspace.
I would't feel safe, knowing that such a weapon existed and was capable of wiping out my world, even if such a weapon was on the far side of the Galaxy.
Knowing that this weapon would be able to cross that distance in a few weeks at most, I would fear that weapon very much.

That being said, I reiterate that I agree that it is plausible that the second Death Star had been in construction before the second one was finished.
We really don`t have enough info to disagree...

[Mr. Oragahn]

• • • • Luke Skywalker has returned to
        his home planet of Tatooine in
        an attempt to rescue his
        friend Han Solo from the
        clutches of the vile gangster
        Jabba the Hutt.
        
        Little does Luke know that the
        GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly
        begun construction on a new
        armored space station even
        more powerful than the first
        dreaded Death Star.
        
        When completed, this ultimate
        weapon will spell certain doom
        for the small band of rebels
        struggling to restore freedom
        to the galaxy…

[...] the GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly begun construction on a new armored space station [...]

What does this say about the beginning of the construction?

It's indisputable that they have begun to construct it. If not, there wouldn't have been a second Death Star at all.

And it is indisputable that the beginning of the construction was secret. The first Death Star was secret too.

And I don't think, that someone would try to argue that "the GALACTIC EMPIRE has secretly begun construction on a new armored space station even more powerful than the first dreaded Death Star " after "Luke Skywalker has returned to his home planet of Tatooine in an attempt to rescue his friend Han Solo from the clutches of the vile gangster Jabba the Hutt. "

Insofar, the "yellow letters" don't answer the question, when the construction of the second Death Star has begun.

• Look for example at the Nimitz class aircraft carriers: The first ship of that class, the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) was laid down June 22, 1968 and launched May 13, 1972 (but commissioned not until 3 May 1975). But the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69), the second ship of that class was laid down already August 15, 1970. At this time, the construction of the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) was still not finished for nearly two years.

The formulation makes it quite clear that the construction begun very recently.
Otherwise, a more proper wording like "was already under construction since a while" and any variant, shorter or not, would have been more appropriate.

I did think about that possibility as well, but the formulation is simply too close to present time to assert that the construction begun much sooner.

[Who is like God arbour]

I'm really not convinced that the Empire felt it needed a second one.

Remember that the Death Star was able to travel through Hyperspace.
I would't feel safe, knowing that such a weapon existed and was capable of wiping out my world, even if such a weapon was on the far side of the Galaxy.
Knowing that this weapon would be able to cross that distance in a few weeks at most, I would fear that weapon very much.

Understandable. But that's why I have already given the quotes:

• After many long years of secretive construction this station has become the decisive force in this part of the universe. Events in this region of the galaxy will no longer be determined by fate, by decree, or by any other agency. They will be decided by this station!”

  Interestingly, the first use of the most powerful destructive machine ever constructed had seemingly had no influence at all on that map, which in itself represented only a tiny fraction of this section of one modest-sized galaxy.

The range or speed of the Death Star seems to be limited. Tarkin attributes decisive force to the Death Star only in this region of the galaxy. Either the Death Star is not able to reach other regions of the galaxy or it is to slow to reach them in an acceptable time. Another Death Star could watch over another region of the galaxy.

And the Death Star is a threat for each single planet. But if there would be a real rebellion in the Empire with tenthousands of planets - similar to the Separatist movement before the clone wars - a single Death Star would be overstrained. If one assumes that the Death Star would be able to destroy only one planet a day (including travel time and recharging), the Empire could be defeated long before the Death Star could destroy all the planets of such a separatist movement. And if so many planets join such a movement, the risk for each planet to get destroyed, is very small. After all, the alleged ability of the imperial fleet to destroy the surface of a planet with only one Star Destroyer in less than an hour hasn't hold off other planets from joining the rebels.

You simply have to think in bigger dimensions. A whole galaxy with 200 billion habitable planets, 20 billion planets with life and 20 million planets with sentient life, the destruction of a planet each day is insignificant.

[Who is like God arbour]

The formulation makes it quite clear that the construction begun very recently.
Otherwise, a more proper wording like "was already under construction since a while" and any variant, shorter or not, would have been more appropriate.

I did think about that possibility as well, but the formulation is simply too close to present time to assert that the construction begun much sooner.

Please elaborate this.

Maybe my English is not good enough. But "has secretly begun construction" is - as far as I know - past tense. I don't see anything that suggest that they have begun very recently.

That they could have used other wordings - maybe wordings that would be more exact - doesn't countermand the semantic of that quote. And - as I see it - the semantic doesn't support the notion that they have begun very recently.

[Praeothmin]

You simply have to think in bigger dimensions. A whole galaxy with 200 billion habitable planets, 20 billion planets with life and 20 million planets with sentient life, the destruction of a planet each day is insignificant.

Agreed... :)

Although as of ANH, the Empire was only spread on 1 million worlds, more then probably including colonies, small settlements like Hoth, andof course hugely populated planets like Coruscant...

[Who is like God arbour]

Although as of ANH, the Empire was only spread on 1 million worlds, more then probably including colonies, small settlements like Hoth, andof course hugely populated planets like Coruscant...

Not really. I assume that you have in mind these quotes:

Page 111:

• The tridimensional solid screen filled one wall of the vast chamber from floor to ceiling. It showed a million star systems. A tiny portion of the galaxy, but an impressive display nonetheless when exhibited in such a fashion.

Page 163:

• Vader stared at the motley array of stars displayed on the conference-room map while Tarkin and Admiral Motti conferred nearby. Interestingly, the first use of the most powerful destructive machine ever constructed had seemingly had no influence at all on that map, which in itself represented only a tiny fraction of this section of one modest-sized galaxy.

But from these, we learn only that the STAR WARS Galaxy is only a modest-sized galaxy and that a tiny portion of the galaxy has only a million star systems.
That doesn't mean, that the Empire has only a million star systems. It could be larger than the tiny fraction of the modest-sized galaxy, that was displayed.
If that tiny fraction would be one percent of the galaxy and all other parts have similar many stars, the galaxy would have 100 million star systems. If the Empire would be 10 percent of the galaxy, it would still have 10 million star systems.

But if you have another quote in mind which proves that the Empire was only spread on 1 million worlds, please remind me. I have not learned each word from Star Wars by heart.

And I agree, that the Empire is smaller than many Star Wars debaters wish it to be. The numbers I have given, are the numbers from them [1]. I don't believe these absurd numbers [2].

[Mr. Oragahn]

The formulation makes it quite clear that the construction begun very recently.
Otherwise, a more proper wording like "was already under construction since a while" and any variant, shorter or not, would have been more appropriate.

I did think about that possibility as well, but the formulation is simply too close to present time to assert that the construction begun much sooner.

Please elaborate this.

Maybe my English is not good enough. But "has secretly begun construction" is - as far as I know - past tense. I don't see anything that suggest that they have begun very recently.

That they could have used other wordings - maybe wordings that would be more exact - doesn't countermand the semantic of that quote. And - as I see it - the semantic doesn't support the notion that they have begun very recently.

If the whole DS2 project was quite advanced, they would have simply not used the verb begin, under a specific grammatical tense.

This is present perfect, often used, notably in English, to describe a recent past.
The use of the verb begin just emphasizes just how new this is.