I thought it was just the title of a song, but I’ve heard it a couple of times in other places and wonder if it’s an actual order given by someone.
Anyone have any idea?
A line in Blade Runner when Roy Batty is telling Dekard all the things he has seen:
“Attack ships on fire of the shoals of Orion” (IIRC)
Also a song by the Revolting Cocks
off, not of
The line is “Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion”.
Well, also it was a real wooden navy tactic; fire a ship and send it into the harbor.
I guess having a single or multiple soldiers sneak into the harbor and set fire to the ships was out of the question?
“I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t even believe:
Attack ships on fire, off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter at the Tenhauser gate.
All these moments, lost…in time…like tears in rain.
Time to die.”
Classic.
Stranger
I believe it was the Tannhauser Gate. And the speech is utter gibberish. Still a great scene, though.
I think the OP is parsing the phrase wrongly. “Attack” is an adjective here, not a verb or command.
(The) attack ships (that I saw were) on fire.
Ah, so it is. I was thinking of the aforementioned RevCo song and I’d long since lost the case with the track listing.
I do have to say, a) as nice as the quote from Blade Runner was, I’m never going to even try to watch that movie again and b) I kind of like my version better.
Thanks for letting me know where it came from though (as well as the actual nameof the song).
Sure, but the best results are to be had if you get one moving in the direction of the other ships, on fire. It would be very embarassing to have one burn out in the middle of the harbor, near nothing else, although maybe you’d block the harbor.
Also I imagine it’s very intimidating to see a flaming hulk coming right at you.
Royce Banner. Not Bruce Banner.
There’s a Hornblower novel (Hornblower and the Atropos if I recall correctly) which features a scene in which a flaming “attack ship” is piloted by the French or Spanish into a British harbor at Gibraltar during Hornblower’s lieutenant examination. The description (as with all of Forrester’s prose) is very visceral and detailed, with the board captains each fearing for their (very flammible) ships, and Hornblower boarding the attack vessel and guiding it through the moorings. It’s a great read and gives you some idea of what it would be like to be in the path of an oncoming fire ship.
Boarding parties were sometimes sent in to capture or sabotage ships by night, but if you have a vessel which isn’t worth prize, or not enough crew to man a prize vessel, it was just less risky to send in the ship on fire rather than risk crew and Marines on a boarding expedition.
Stranger
I would just like to say:
" I Are Burning Your Ship!, like I Are burning Your Dog!
David Banner. I screwed up that joke, didn’t I?
Don’t think you did, until you tried to fix it. 
AFAIK, it was Bruce in the comics and David on the show. The reason they switched it to David is because I believe they thought Bruce was too “gay”. So your joke, or the thought behind it, might be ironic or something.
Do you like our Owl?
I understood the lingo. Every good cop did.
The Mad Magazine parody played with this, including a panel where David Banner explains the name change while in the background, a television plays footage of the 1976 Olympics and Bruce Jenner winning the Decathlon.
In the TV series, “Bruce” became the character’s middle name, referenced on the fake headstone seen during the show’s opening theme, with the world believing David Banner is dead, and must continue to believe until he can control the rage within him, dun-dun-dunnnnnn…
That’s precisely what I was thinking of; not that Forester is historical fact, but it’s a very memorable scene. He still didn’t get a free pass on his examinations, either, as I recall.