Yarlen, I hate to disagree with a dev.
However, I sent a 50k pirate raid at my son. The pirate's fleet strength took up the entire bar on the planetary enemy status bar.
Yet I can still only send a "weak" fleet after that of less than 25 ships.
And this was three hours into the game.
Really, Yarlen? How long must the game go on before one can send a severe raid? Days?