Really quick question. From what I heard, you can not get RIPS from an expedition, but is it possible to get EC, LG, and all of the new ships in the Generals server???
Thanks in advance.
Just thought about it and is sort of annoying unanswered.

Yes. (valid in all universes)

What is the real life reasoning behind expeditions and finding empty ships in the middle of nowhere or somehow not hostile ships? Recruitment?

a fallen empire

After the thousands of LCs and hundreds of bombers I lost to expeditions, you could just be finding those.

You know, maybe, the reason you lose ships during expeditions is because it's so lonely for that one or two or four hours, and with no real freedom except in those hours, your subordinates decide that they can't take being virtual electrical data in a database, subject to random people around the world. They decide to go rogue and leverage their temporary freedom to move from one directory of the database to the /rogue directory, with all the other "in" ships, those rebellious punks.