Heavily Armed Battleship

* See also Flying_Battleship-Yeah_Right <<< Pictures Of Interest 
* See also Columbia%27s_Doom
* See also Infinite BS
* See also Foes_Of_Columbia
* See also The_Quantum_Revolution
"It was a Heavily Armed Battleship" (Columbia)
Those words were an attempt ( by the game writers ) to give the ( by 1912 Anachronistic ) flying Columbia some kind of relevance to the World, and to add menace to the Comstock prophesied vision of the Future.
The Reality is : a 'Battleship' also has to have Armor. Thick Armor. Columbia is a Soon-To-Be-Ruin in a World full of Artillery, as evident in any picture of a shelled town in WW1 - Also a flying Pyre-To-Be, as we saw in-game when a few Vox have a few gallons of kerosene and some matches.
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==SORRY, NO==
In reality, Columbia was a Flying Fustercluck : A concretion of half-arsed bits, which looks to be the result of that quantumz parallel universe 'MERGINIZING', which the writers created and made such a fuss over in the game.
( NOTE - 'Merging' was a mostly-abandoned 'Infinite' game Plot Concept originally designed to provide Splicer-like mutant/warped targets for the Players to slaughter - versus having only 'normal' inhabitants to kill wholesale -- Something being a 'less' "Politically Correct" Target ).
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Here's a real Dreadnought ( 'Battleship' was more a generalized term at the time ... )
HMS Dreadnought, launched 1906 ( plenty of time to be equipped and deployed to blow Columbia out of the air ).
Those 12-inch guns with a range of 25000 yards -- Their shells could easily reach a 15000/20000 foot altitude ( above which would have Columbianites Asphyxiating ) IF the pirate city came anywhere near Britain's Territory.
In any reality, Columbia had few places to hide when facing the existing weapons of the time.
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High explosive shells had little problem destroying whole sections of plaster and chicken wire Columbia, and putting an end to Comstock's minions. When the Marines went in, there was little left to do but mop up the remaining miscreants and raise the flag and then hang Comstock. ( And that would be by the French !! )
Just strike Columbia in a few key places, and that whole nest of flying cultists would be hurtling to their doom towards the ground. 
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==REALITY==
ColumbiasDoom.jpg|Battleship type guns were mounted on railway carriages too
Realbattleshippp.jpg|Imagine how big a chunk of Columbia this shell could obliterate
Realbattleship4.jpg|This is a REAL Battleship.
Predreadnought1893.jpg|Earlier ships had plenty of firepower too
ColumbiaMk1.jpg|Balloons do kinda make it look pathetic ( but then FANTASY floating is far worse )
Vs1912World.jpg
USS_Wyoming_BB-32_1911.jpg
RailwayGuns4U.jpg|All subsequent decades had these.
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IF (or rather WHEN) the quantum float technology was available to the rest of the world ( as it most likely WOULD have been by nearly 20 years after Columbia's debut - if not FAR sooner ), the things pictured above WOULD have also been flying, and Columbia truly would be 'dead meat', no matter what Comstock did.
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Armor from a WW2 Japanese battleship pierced by a shell from a 16-inch gun used on a US battleship. This is 30+years later, but THIS is what damage a REAL battleship could do. At Columbia's time, there were plenty of large powerful guns which could do similar damage ( Railway Guns, Coastal Defense Guns, Cruisers, Battleships, Fortress guns ).
A Infinite BS promotional trailer showed a 3 inch gun on Columbia which was a popgun by comparison. Imagine what a gun which caused the damage in this picture could do to mostly unarmored Columbia. Actually for that work, much smaller ( and more common ) and numerous guns could do just as well when they got in range.
Best that you hide, Oh Columbia. Hide from the US Government, which wanted the taxpayer's investment back, and the traitors hung. Teddy Roosevelt would be gunning for you. HE would get you.
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Period Guns Vs Columbia :
Imaging THIS kind of Real World massive artillery firepower striking brick and wood, chickenwire and plaster ...
A simple matter to use the period's large guns with modified gun carriages (maximizing elevation), able to reach any likely altitude ( altitude which would not asphyxiate Columbia's inhabitants ), and Columbia could be Blown to Flinders. Columbia likely did NOT crisscross the USA anymore after Comstock stole the floating city.
Columbia hides ? It is kinda hard to hide something so large that it still sticks out an end of a big cloud. In Real Life, you can actually see ( with common binoculars, if you know where to look ) tiny yards-across satellites 100 miles up when lit up by the sun glinting off them. It is more the problem getting the artillery(s) positioned. But if you look at a Railroad System map of the USA in 1902, you will see an extensive network of railroads crisscrossing much of America.
At Sea, in Coastal areas, the Navy's well-armed ships had many such large guns. Sea ports had Forts with similar large long-ranged 'coastal' guns.
SO basically, Columbia wasn't safe near America when the US Government was 'gunning for them'. 
(( NOTE - THIS ALL is assuming ( because of stolen technology from Columbia in the earlier time, 1893 ) that Columbia really had NOT ACTUALLY (already) become a backward anachronism, after the WHOLE WORLD was changed with that 'Quantum' Technology ( and Comstock's little Cult Fiefdom merely became a bad joke, and was largely ignored by the New Wondrous World ). ))
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Commissioned 1908 - much inferior to the Dreadnought Class ships circa 1906. 
4 - 11-inch guns -- 626 pound HE shell, range 28,040 yd (16 miles) and goes 5 miles up ( well above the altitude that would have everyone in Columbia asphyxiated ).
14 - 6.7-inch quick fire guns - Fires a 140 lb shell ( can reach all Columbia's non-asphyxiating altitudes )
22 - 3.5-inch rapid fire guns ( This is about the size of that popgun shown in the early Infinite BS Promo Trailer showing scenes on Columbia )
4 inch steel belt armor ( upto 11 inches thick elsewhere )
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In a firefight with Columbia, who do YOU think would win ?? 
Result : The Pirate ('Der Pirat') City of Columbia should not enter the German Empire. The Germans who had 'a chip on their shoulders' Imperial Germany - Being late into Imperialism, and Colonization of the World would 'take no shit' from Columbia. THAT would be a Alternate Story : How Imperial Germany TOOK Columbia ... at that time would make a point of blowing Columbia apart if it came near their territory.
BTW - The "Schleswig Holstein" was actually the ship which later started off W W 2 in Europe, firing into a City in Poland in 1939.
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It doesn't even take a "Flying Battleship" to 'do in' Columbia ( The Russian "Aurora" was a 'Cruiser' - circa 1900 ). Russian Cruiser "Aurora" : One of the first incidents of the 1917 October Revolution in Russia took place on the cruiser Aurora, which reportedly fired the first shot which signaled the beginning of the attack on the Czar's Winter Palace. Even guns of this ships size could blast Columbia into plaster-dust.
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== Face it Fanbois - INFINITE-BS/Columbia was F#$%^ed Up - Not Anything Other Than BAD Magic Fantasy ==
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== Teddy Roosevelt with 3 Marines could have taken the place. ==
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