Alright, I think Sheridan is finally doing the right thing in attacking Clark's forces, but he would be scaring me if he didn't make it so clear that this is a very serious undertaking. The "this isn't a victory; both sides lost too much line" helped too.

I felt sorry for Londo, and glad when G'Kar finally gave in.

Ruminations:
- The whole IFF deal is clarified in this episode. Ivanova gives a lot of exposition regarding the whole IFF making it sound like this is the first time they're resetting the IFF. As such, I think that this episode backs up my statement I made when I mentioned that I doubted they reset the IFF when EarthForce was attacking B5 in that other episode.

Not really.

If the IFF system does include information as to where fighters are based - and there is evidence that this is the case, as they always seemed able to tell where Starfuries came from - then back in 'Shattered dreams' they only had the Churchill, Alexander and Babylon five. This meant that they could safely list every other Earthforce ship or fighter who's IFF didn't identify these ships as their base as hostile.

Here the situation is very different. While they can list any Earthforce ship not part of the B5 fleet as hostile, they do seem to be getting new ships joining all the time. This would mean that the IFF system would need to be continually updated to include the new ships. If they didn't then in a large battle a fighter or ship could be incorrectly identified as being hostile and shot at.

Updating the IFF system, or re-setting it, may not mean changing the signals to much - they can use the same signal but on a different frequency and a different encryption - just telling the computer which ships are hostile or friendly.

- The whole IFF deal is clarified in this episode. Ivanova gives a lot of exposition regarding the whole IFF making it sound like this is the first time they're resetting the IFF. As such, I think that this episode backs up my statement I made when I mentioned that I doubted they reset the IFF when EarthForce was attacking B5 in that other episode.

I think that the whole IFF thing was only inserted in order to answer people online who asked questions about it after episodes like "Severed Dreams." JMS has certainly inserted what The Chief used to call "cabbagisms" into plot and dialogue to answer online fans who didn't understand a situation.

Here the situation is very different. While they can list any Earthforce ship not part of the B5 fleet as hostile, they do seem to be getting new ships joining all the time. This would mean that the IFF system would need to be continually updated to include the new ships. If they didn't then in a large battle a fighter or ship could be incorrectly identified as being hostile and shot at.

All they would need to do is designate known allies' ships as "friendly" and everything else as either "hostile" or at the very least "unknown." It would require real time updates, epically in this case where you have ships defecting, switching sides and showing up in the middle of a battle. But even on today's battlefield we have systems where fighters, bombers, helicopters, tanks and even ground soldiers get real time computer relays of known friendly, hostile and unknown positions from AWACS aircraft or satellite data.

Perhaps it just never seemed an issue for me because I played so much X-Wing & Tie Fighter as a teen. Those game often featured situations where the storyline involved warlords who would switch sides/double cross in the middle of battle or where otherwise neutral craft would turn hostile should you accidentally hit one of theirs in the cross fire. In those cases your onboard computer would change their designation from friendly or neutral to enemy.

I'd imagine that the job of one (or a few) of those nameless techs in B5's Command & Control center was to keep real time updates on such data updates & transmit it to the forces under their command. It's similar to how today our military has people who constantly take in data from AWACS, satellites, ground soldiers and pilots; turns that info into a more complete picture of the current battlefield and retransmits the whole thing back to the various commanders, solders & pilots on that battlefield.