They should have used the Attero device to win the war.

[talyn2k1]

Yes, and the efforts against the Asurans were quite more extensive, sending their 304s out taking out their ships one by one. The expedition didn't do that with the Wraith, while more worlds are being culled.

We had the means to track Asuran ships, know in advance where they would be, and ensure our ships got there first and blew them to hell before they could raise their shields. We don't have the same advantage over the Wraith.

The important thing to remember is that the Ancients suffered from the same problem as the Asgard, they were TOO advanced.
The Asgard needed us to help them against the Replicators because the only way they knew to fight them was to develop more and more advanced technologies, which promptly got absorbed by the Replicators, making them even stronger.

The Ancients were too advanced to think of relatively simple ideas like creating a virus to shut down the gate system, or a gene therapy to turn them into humans and/or remove their need to feed.

They could only fight the Wraith by trying to develop newer and better technologies. Unfortunately for the Ancients, they suffered from extreme short sightedness, only seeing the desired effects their technology would have and not considering the negative effects until they had wasted valuable time and resources in R&D.

When they did finally have technology that they could use against the Wraith, they were too morally righteous to use it because of the side effects. Towards the end of the war they were trying to ascend, and probably didn't think that commiting genocide would do any good for their efforts.

At the end of the day, it was the Ancients' responsibility to solve the problem of the Wraith which they were indirectly responsible for. If their moral compass had been on the same heading as ours, they would've considered sacrificing ascension to be worth saving all the humans in the galaxy.
However, as has been previously stated, we can't measure the morals of an alien race against our own ideals. From our perspective, the Ancients were selfish, cowardly, and short-sighted.
But without these flaws, we wouldn't have a show!

[ussrelativity]

They already have the means to track Wraith ships. Why they don't send their 304s out and take out hive after hive is likely a plot device meant to protect the Wraith.

[FallenAngelII]

Clearly, he has a lot of supporters. The point is that there is no reason that there can't be a healthy percent of the population which aren't all that bad.

Random speculation. The Asurans are machines, programmed. Programmable, reprogrammable, imbued with unquenchable rage. They're not the same as the Wraith. Ellia shows that Wraith can be raised to be no different than humans (except for the need to feed).

Oberoth and other Asurans show that their programming is ultimately flawed and that they were "born evil".

Free will and non-interference are two different things. Mind control is one of those lines that would generally be deemed unacceptable to cross. But it doesn't mean that they wouldn't interfere with others.

They didn't do anything about the Ori, be before or after they fled the Ori galaxy, they didn't strike down the Wraith immediately but instead allowed them to eventually become such a threat they could rival the Ancients (this did not happen overnight) and as far as we know, no Ancient ever engaged the Goa'uld in combat.

Sounds a lot like non-interference and pacifism to me.

Actually, this was said in "Before I Sleep" and it seems that they decided to be diplomatic after the Wraith were already overrunning them - Weir said that they sent a delegation with their most powerful warships guarding it and after the Wraith won that battle it was only a matter of time.

So the show contradicted itself. I doubt they waited for diplomatic relations till 'til they were losing the war. I bet they tried before.

McKAY: That’s a Wraith planet! The attack command must have been activated. (He smiles.) What do you know? It worked!

What that means we still don't know.

Wraith controlled. We've seen planets with Hives on them before. It happens. The Wraith don't fly around space all the time. But they're nomads, they don't spend much time on planets from what we've seen.

Which haven't been proven to exist.

Because your definition of a military target is heavily flawed.

What civilians? The large population of drones which blindly take orders, the queen, or the males leaders/scientists? The only Wraith that we've seen which would be considered a civilian is the female child. With how few non-drones we've seen there probably aren't many of them running around. Although, that was probably less true when their food supply wasn't running so thin. Still, attacking a military target with civilians unboard and attacking a civilian target are two different things. They can't not fight the Wraith because the Wraith insist on putting their own in harms way anymore than they can't not fight them because they have Humans in storage. The Wraith are the ones morally at fault if they put children on these ships which they send into battle. You can say they double for homes, but there is no need to raise their children on Hives (which we don't know for sure they do) when they can find a nice safe planet for them instead.

With your logic, every single Wraith ship is a military target despite the fact that most Wraith spend their entire lives on these ships which double, most of the time, as living quarters. So the Travelers are all military targets? No civilians there? It's all a bunch of soldiers? I mean, they live in ships only, after all!

And every single person on a ship is an enemy combatant by birthright? Simply for being on the ship?

They're on heavily armored and heavily gunned enemy ships. If they want nothing to do with the war, A) I don't see the other Wraith allowing them to get away with that (they're using up resources) and B) They either shouldn't be on ships if they want to remain out of it or they need to go out of their way to make sure the Ancients agree that specially marked ships are to remain neutral. In Earth history, we had a little tradition of telling the difference between ships with the type of flag they flew - If these supposed neutral Wraith insist on running around in ships that look exactly like the ones used in the war and they don't do anything to distuigish themselves, its their own fault.

Oh yes, let's assume a bunch of crazy things to support our cause. So every single Wraith were at war with the Ancients because, um, the other Wraiths would kill them if they didn't!

How is being on a ship wasting resources?! What resources, their mysterious power sources? Even if they stayed off the ships, they'd still be "wasting resources" if by resources you mean humans.

Wraith Hives double as living quarters. You cannot deny this. After the war with the Ancients, that's pretty much what they were, glorified cruiser ships.

Yes, but unless they find a way to peacefully get the Wraith to consider another solution you are not allowing any way for the Ancients to win.

They blast the Wraith out of the sky but only after first negotiating. Shoots first, ask questions later is not acceptable. Condemning an entire race without negotiations is stupid and frankly racist.

It's not okay, but it can sometimes be necessary as in war.

It's not just about winning, it's also about how you win.

Because, as I said, such plans would not help them win the war. It would only help to make the Wraith more unstoppable. Their use is to help the Wraith remain alive once you have beaten them and can control their population.

How would it make the Wraith more unstoppable? Take away their need to feed and they'd have no reason to wage war. Not everyone is war-hungry mongrel like certain American politicians who shall remain nameless. It'd take some adjustment, but even the Wraith would realize that breeding countless soldiers to go to war to die for no good reason is stupid.

Any chance you can provide a quote because I see no such reference to it saying the Ancients attacked them as they were growing in numbers?

How about the fact that the Ancients went "deeper into Wraith territory", then they got lucky and stole some ZPMs? In other words, the Wraith didn't magically spring up in the millions before the Ancients decided to take action.

No of course not. My theory is that this started with them infesting the gate network on foot and like bugs, couldn't be killed because there were always some on another planet that they didn't know about. Then they gathered Human and Ancient technology and developed their own to get into space. But, of course, since they never explained it we don't know.

Do not assume a bunch of things when debating. It is bad form.

They're bugs, it's what they do.

They're also human/Ancient.

Because they can't find the expedition unless they run into each other. If they could track Earth ships, though, I find it doubtful that they wouldn't actively go after them. Although, they have a lot of interest in getting Earth ships what with them potentially being able to lead them back to Atlantis/Earth. The Travelers are probably a better example - They don't like advanced races existing out there, so they take a proactive approach and destroy them on the assumption that they will otherwise become a threat to them because they're Human. That's the very reason they have to live on ships rather than starting a civilization on some planet.

But until such time a Wraith Hive attacks you, you cannot for sure say "It would attack me on sight, hence it's morally OK to shoot them on sight despite the fact that we might have a solution to the war".

Maybe they were offering the promise to work on one. Maybe they were just willing to let the Wraith do what they wanted so long as the Wraith stopped attacking them. Who knows.

Assumptions, assumptions, assumptions.

Interesting choice of words, if somewhat dishonest. How exactly can you consider killing and consuming someone not to be a threat to them?

Because until they actually cull your world, a specific Hive is not a threat to you. It's like calling me a threat to all animals because I eat meat.

Until a Hive attacks the Atlantis expedition, they are not a direct threat to the expedition. Until a Hive culls a specific world, they are not a threat to that specific world.

[Xaeden]

They already have the means to track Wraith ships. Why they don't send their 304s out and take out hive after hive is likely a plot device meant to protect the Wraith.

They only have the means to track the ones within a certain range of Atlantis. If they took them out not only would they draw the attention of the wider Wraith fleet, but they'd be narrowing down their search. Right now they're trying to maintain the status quo while they build up their resources, continue to explore for useful technology, and develop alliances.

Random speculation. The Asurans are machines, programmed. Programmable, reprogrammable, imbued with unquenchable rage. They're not the same as the Wraith. Ellia shows that Wraith can be raised to be no different than humans (except for the need to feed).

And Niam proves that not all replicators are the same as Oberoth's kind so why can there not be any replicators who fall into one of two extremes?

Oberoth and other Asurans show that their programming is ultimately flawed and that they were "born evil".

Oberoth seems more a product of his environment. He feels hurt by his parents and is lashing out. There's nothing to say he can't change or that all must have had the same reaction to what the Ancients did to them. The only flaw is that their programming is so much like a Human's brain.

Wraith controlled. We've seen planets with Hives on them before. It happens. The Wraith don't fly around space all the time. But they're nomads, they don't spend much time on planets from what we've seen.

While that may be true, we can't be sure and since it's never been said one way or another I'm taking a wait and see approach on that one. As Todd said, there's much we don't know about Wraith.

With your logic, every single Wraith ship is a military target despite the fact that most Wraith spend their entire lives on these ships which double, most of the time, as living quarters. So the Travelers are all military targets? No civilians there? It's all a bunch of soldiers? I mean, they live in ships only, after all!

To be clear. The Wraith are not all military targets today. They were during the Ancient war. The difference is that they declared war on the Ancients and sent these ships into battle despite the fact that they double as homes. If the Travelers declared war on an enemy and went into battle repeatedly with civilians unboard then they are military targets. If they want they can move all civilians over to some of their ships, mark them, and ask their enemy not to go after them. If their enemy refuses then it is a war crime. But if the Travelers don't make any effort to not involve their civilians in the war then there's nothing that can be done but than to assume that any and all of their ships are your enemy.

Oh yes, let's assume a bunch of crazy things to support our cause. So every single Wraith were at war with the Ancients because, um, the other Wraiths would kill them if they didn't!

Actually, I'm more inclined to think it's simply because the Wraith have shown no signs of having that kind of attitude that you described. They were all raised to grow up with this same kind of attitude and even Michael said that the perspective that he was given by his time on Atlantis was rare among the Wraith.

How is being on a ship wasting resources?! What resources, their mysterious power sources? Even if they stayed off the ships, they'd still be "wasting resources" if by resources you mean humans.

Both the ship itself and the Humans they eat are resources. If a large population of Wraith existed that went after food without the use of ships and no intention of fighting the Ancients I'd think they'd do the same thing to them.

How would it make the Wraith more unstoppable? Take away their need to feed and they'd have no reason to wage war. Not everyone is war-hungry mongrel like certain American politicians who shall remain nameless. It'd take some adjustment, but even the Wraith would realize that breeding countless soldiers to go to war to die for no good reason is stupid.

I'm not going to continue to argue this point as I'd be repeating myself so I think it's better to just leave this at we agree to disagree. I'll just say that I believe the Wraith have lived with this war-like mentality for so long that it's who they are and I doubt they'll just go off into the sunset and build a civilian of peace and understanding if they don't have to feed on Humans, and I'll leave it at that.

Do not assume a bunch of things when debating. It is bad form.

Who's assuming? The part you quoted was clearly listed as a theory at the start of the point and then was ended by saying we have no way of knowing. The point of which was to illustrate that there are several possibilities and your idea was not necessarily the right one (which you were assuming was true btw). Since we have no way of proving either and there isn't the slightest bit of evidence to hint at what might of happened at that period of time I'd prefer to drop it.

Assumptions, assumptions, assumptions.

Yes, assumptions that I ended with a "who knows." Again, the point was to illustrate that there were many possibilities and that we can not begin to know for sure. Why do you not get that and why do you blast others for assumptions that are clearly marked as such when you have repeatedly passed assumptions off as fact?

Because until they actually cull your world, a specific Hive is not a threat to you. It's like calling me a threat to all animals because I eat meat.

So a wolf isn't a threat to all deer? Why then do the deer run when they see the wolf instead of trying to reason with the wolf? It's a silly anology, I admit, but it has some truth to it. If you know someone is a predator that likes to eat your kind, you're going to do whatever you again to protect yourself. With two sentient beings that range in levels of predatory nature this, unfortunately, has to take on a new level as the same tactics that animals use are extremely less successful.

[jenks]

Because until they actually cull your world, a specific Hive is not a threat to you. It's like calling me a threat to all animals because I eat meat.

No it's not, it's the people who do the killing that are the threat to animals, not the eating. So really it's like saying that an abattoir is a threat to cows, which of course it is!

Until a Hive attacks the Atlantis expedition, they are not a direct threat to the expedition. Until a Hive culls a specific world, they are not a threat to that specific world.

No, they're a constant threat, the fact that their life depends on attacking worlds sees to that.

[General Yogi Bear]

After much consideration, I think the Ancients should have used the Attero device to defeat the Wraith. I mean before discovering the "side effect" I thought that the Wraith can still cull using darts and stargates. After seeing the side effect I admit that it is pretty devastating but it dawned on me that the Ancients should have disabled the gate system with a virus like Avenger. They hit every stargate except those in Ancient control. This will prevent the Stargates from exploding and prevent collateral damage and paralyze the Wraith completely.

They keep the device active at random and intermittent intervals it will keep the Wraith off balance and prime for the final take down.

Thats a pretty good idea. But if the Wraith learned how to turn the gate system back on that would be a problem. But its still worth trying.

[Integrabyte]

Yes, and the math doesn't add up. Maybe if you strategically placed 12 Stargates throughout a single galaxy. Stargates light years apart will not affect each other. It will just be single Stargates exploding and taking parts of planets with them.

The math does add up. Gates and subspace being screwed. From what I've seen in this episode, both the Wraith subspace level and the wormholes through subspace seem to be connected ....

Did you miss the last minutes of the episode?

38:38-->Rodney: "You and I are safe its just the rest of the galaxy that is going to have a problem, including Atlantis"

[FallenAngelII]

The math does add up. Gates and subspace being screwed. From what I've seen in this episode, both the Wraith subspace level and the wormholes through subspace seem to be connected ....

Did you miss the last minutes of the episode?

38:38-->Rodney: "You and I are safe its just the rest of the galaxy that is going to have a problem, including Atlantis"

The math adds up to what I said it'll add up to:
Single Stargates exploding when turned on.

The Stargates won't randomly blow up entire or parts of solar systems. Because they do not have the power to.

[YutheGreat]

The explosion of an active fully charge stargate will render the planet uninhabitable will it not? In the SG-1 episode Redemption. So if you nuke all the stargate in Pegasus everyone will be extinct.

[Jeffala]

The explosion of an active fully charge stargate will render the planet uninhabitable will it not? In the SG-1 episode Redemption. So if you nuke all the stargate in Pegasus everyone will be extinct.

It depends.

If it works the same way that the weapon in Redemption worked, then yeah. Redemption passed so much energy into the gate that it overloaded. Did this one work the same way? I can't remember.

[Infinatus]

It depends.

If it works the same way that the weapon in Redemption worked, then yeah. Redemption passed so much energy into the gate that it overloaded. Did this one work the same way? I can't remember.

It seemed that way. Though it's still only each time someone dials the gate, so it shouldn't happen everywhere. I'm thinking the Genii would be hit pretty hard by this weapon.

[YutheGreat]

It depends.

If it works the same way that the weapon in Redemption worked, then yeah. Redemption passed so much energy into the gate that it overloaded. Did this one work the same way? I can't remember.

The Attero makes gates go bang. 12 nukes is a big bang. The very short time lag could be because of the power generated by the Attero I mean. The Attero can flood the entire galaxy with enough static to destroy every hive.

[kymeric]

If the ancients wouldnt even use a brainwashing device on their enemies to save themselves theyre certainly not going to trap/kill an entire species. One that they are as responsible for creating just as much as humans. Its been well documented that Ancients were not a militaristically minded society and when faced with a solution that violates their ethics they would rather run.

[YutheGreat]

If the ancients wouldnt even use a brainwashing device on their enemies to save themselves theyre certainly not going to trap/kill an entire species. One that they are as responsible for creating just as much as humans. Its been well documented that Ancients were not a militaristically minded society and when faced with a solution that violates their ethics they would rather run.

I've been thinking. There are a few good reasons why the Ancients didn't use the Attero. I grossly overestimated the effectivity of the Attero device. Yes the Attero would have caused massive cassualties on the Wraith forces in the beginning but I forgot to factor in Wraith Physiology and Mentality.

Physiology: The Wraith could survive hundreds of years in hybernation thats hundreds of years of keeping the Attero device on and a hundred years of no gate travel between Ancient homeworlds.

Mentality: If the Wraith realize they cannot retreat. They can't surrender either they need to eat. They would hit every ancient planet within range with everything they got hoping to destroy the Attero device along with it.

In the Art of War it is called Desperate Ground. After few months bombarding ancient homeworlds with bullets. When they run out of bullets they would crash asteroids. WHen they run out of Asteroids They will eventually start crashing their darts into the shields a few months after that the Wraith would start crashing their cruisers a few months after that they will crash their Hiveships into Ancient planets. I know the Ancients are tough but I don't think Atlantis' shields can survive several hives crashing into it.