One reason for strange AI attack behavior

[Alpha Kodiak]

I was doing some testing on the AI for a new race I am working on (coming soon to a forum near you!) and I finally figured out why in the past I have seen large AI fleets show up to threaten me, only to have the fleet disappear and then I get attacked by one or two ships.

I watched my race put together a fleet of 18 ships to attack another AI it was at war with. They moved through a couple of systems, got to the target system, and were within a couple of sectors of a key planet. Then the resupply minister kicked in and decided that all those ships needed to go back to the nearest resupply point. The next turn, a single straggler showed up that had been sent from a closer system, and was now the loner in the target system.

The problem is that a human will realize that it is ok for the fleet to drop a little low on supplies, since a colonizer can be sent in to set up a resupply base after combat is over, but the AI doesn't think that far ahead. It doesn't want to strand its ships in enemy territory, so it pulls them out.

Can anyone think of a way to mod this behavior? I can't think of a way to tell the AI to ignore supply needs under certain circumstances.