They could have been stopped. Force of arms is probably not the best way, but there was certainly scope for things to have gone very differently. The difference between what happened in Terran and Barca, and say what nearly happened in Iashalur and Kabrinskia should show that there are ways to resolve things even after the Zuma start to gear up.
Except they don't really gear up they just attack and you are like "what the hell is going on?". And it doesn't matter if the root of the problem is them attacking for absolutely awful reasons. Terran has been talking about how the don't like the Zuma, but a huge common theme among all the letters is we totally don't want them to attack us. So what was said before somewhere that they are only attack if provoked is fine if it worked that way. Terran is trying to play where they don't want to fight the Zuma, and yet they do.
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