Andermani strategic blunder in 1905 PD?

IF the Andermani come in before Barnett, the initial Podlayers and the existing CLACs are available to Manticore and that large a force plus 80 SD (and screen/support) represents a major change in dynamics.
Would the Andermani as for all of Silesia other than as an initial piece in the diplomatic dance.? Well, a free hand to start taking chunks out of the Confederacy, probably. The whole thing would have been quite a chunk to bite off. On the other hand, taking PRH out of the mix by having it defeated by the Alliance would also relive both short term and long term problems from Haven. It also would have meant that Manticore would have to be the one primarily dealing with the defeated Peeps. There is also the problem that Pritchard and Theisman face after the coup as there were all sorts of SS Admirals and Generals and others that were staking out their own little empires or scattered. Like the DD and Mars CA that show up in Talbott or the squdron over by Torch. So the formal surrender of Haven would have ended the war but not all the fighting and the cleanup took the reformed Republic a few years to accomplish- and that was the people they knew about and could get too.
So we don't know what Manticore and Aldermani diplomats etc were discussing but from what we know up through Honor's Q-Ship assignmenet, neither Mantior, the Aldermani nor their respective navies though much of the ConFed Navy nor the government. It was in constant turmoil and both wanted something better. An initial step might have been to agree the the Empire start taking varioius planitary governemnt out of the mix, particulary those in open rebelion againt the ConFed and just keeping them. That just might have had the result of solidifying the ConFed government and make then try to fix things but I wouldn't count on that.

Brigade XO wrote:IF the Andermani come in before Barnett, the initial Podlayers and the existing CLACs are available to Manticore and that large a force plus 80 SD (and screen/support) represents a major change in dynamics.
Would the Andermani as for all of Silesia other than as an initial piece in the diplomatic dance.? Well, a free hand to start taking chunks out of the Confederacy, probably. The whole thing would have been quite a chunk to bite off. On the other hand, taking PRH out of the mix by having it defeated by the Alliance would also relive both short term and long term problems from Haven. It also would have meant that Manticore would have to be the one primarily dealing with the defeated Peeps. There is also the problem that Pritchard and Theisman face after the coup as there were all sorts of SS Admirals and Generals and others that were staking out their own little empires or scattered. Like the DD and Mars CA that show up in Talbott or the squdron over by Torch. So the formal surrender of Haven would have ended the war but not all the fighting and the cleanup took the reformed Republic a few years to accomplish- and that was the people they knew about and could get too.
So we don't know what Manticore and Aldermani diplomats etc were discussing but from what we know up through Honor's Q-Ship assignmenet, neither Mantior, the Aldermani nor their respective navies though much of the ConFed Navy nor the government. It was in constant turmoil and both wanted something better. An initial step might have been to agree the the Empire start taking varioius planitary governemnt out of the mix, particulary those in open rebelion againt the ConFed and just keeping them. That just might have had the result of solidifying the ConFed government and make then try to fix things but I wouldn't count on that.

Good Thinking - a complete victory over the PRN would have left Manticore with a 2nd Silesia - but one without a central govt and which they would have not choice but to attempt to police. Unfortunately Manticore's internal, isolationist, non-expansionist politics would have again kept a complete solution from occuring, possibly requiring decades of policing and low to mid level skirmishes, with each victory just cutting off one of the hydra's heads.

Would such a situation drain the RMN sufficiently that they eventually would have to cede Silesia to the Andermani in order for it to be policed properly?

Would Manticore having to police a surendered PRH cause it to let the Andermani do what it wanted in Silesia. Good question.
At this point there is already San Martin comming in.
We know from what was being said later in the series that while were a number of systems that PRH had taken but that once the truce talks were underway a fair number which had been captured or at least occupied from space by RMN wanted to leave Haven, and go back to being at least indpendent- and the Pritichard, at least, was willing to let them go. Keeping them would have essentialy violated the principals of the restored Republic and, from the realpolitik position using them as tradeoff pieces would mean that the Republic would not have to reoccupy them and bring them back into line. That didn't mean that they would not fall into Haven's economic orbit, just that Haven wasn't going to make all the policy decisions and governing and defending.
That they would go independent and then look to formally join Manticore is a possiblity but not something that would be quite ready to start cooking. Military alliances and trade certainly but they don't have the history with Manticor that San Martin had.

Manticore would have it's hands full with cleaning up former Peep commanders and empire building but they could have insisted that their allies help in that.

Manticore is also heavenly invested in Silesia from the standpoint of trade and various relationships. Perhaps not going to do anything with the ConFed government at this point but strengthening relations with individual systems. That would not trigger the Liberals reactions for "just" trade etc.
I'll leave it at that rather than try to create a whole differnt time-line.

Brigade XO wrote:Would Manticore having to police a surendered PRH cause it to let the Andermani do what it wanted in Silesia. Good question.

My answer is "no." The Andermani would have to assume part of the cost and burden of policing the surrendered PRH. That means the available Andermani forces for Silesia are lesser and the Manticoran ones greater than what your question assumes.

At this point there is already San Martin comming in.
We know from what was being said later in the series that while were a number of systems that PRH had taken but that once the truce talks were underway a fair number which had been captured or at least occupied from space by RMN wanted to leave Haven, and go back to being at least indpendent- and the Pritichard, at least, was willing to let them go. Keeping them would have essentialy violated the principals of the restored Republic and, from the realpolitik position using them as tradeoff pieces would mean that the Republic would not have to reoccupy them and bring them back into line. That didn't mean that they would not fall into Haven's economic orbit, just that Haven wasn't going to make all the policy decisions and governing and defending.
That they would go independent and then look to formally join Manticore is a possiblity but not something that would be quite ready to start cooking. Military alliances and trade certainly but they don't have the history with Manticor that San Martin had.

I've been meaning to start a thread on this very subject...

Manticore would have it's hands full with cleaning up former Peep commanders and empire building but they could have insisted that their allies help in that.

Manticore and the Andermani would have their hands full with [...]

Theemile wrote:Another point - we probably would not see podlayers, CLACS, super LACs, and MDMs if the Andermani joined early.

As you wrote in a later reply, some of the tech would show up, just probably in less advanced form. But I think you're underselling Sonja here. Or overestimating Honor's contributions.

The LACs were ready for Honor to take to Silesia in 1910, so they must have been in development for some time. Probably as soon as Grayson fission tech made the power requirements of a modern combatant possible in such a small ship. And if LACs exist, so do CLACs. I suspect the reason why HMS Minotaur was so late is because the RMN simply couldn't devote yard resources for an untested prototype that early in the war. So if having the Andermani along frees yard time for some more speculative projects, the Minnie might have shown up earlier.

As you said, pods already existed in SVW and they had probably existed for a long time. They just became far more important because missile combat was far more decisive, as laser heads actually proved their worth. This was a learning from the war and would have happened with the Andermani or not.

They're also a consequence of MDMs, which permitted much longer stand-off range. MDMs had been in research for some time in Project Gram. So we'd see MDMs eventually. And with that we'd also get pod layers, though it's possible they'd stop at the Medusa stage: missiles from both pods and tubes, instead of devoting broadsides exclusively for energy mounts and defence.

It's possible that the Andermani joining as early as 1906 resolves the war before any of those get into production. If they join closer to 1910, they'd also wait for the new tech. What certainly changes is that there is no second war and thus no second crunch to get new tech out. We'd eventually see some of the tech, because the RMN would not stop the R&D (RFC explained that when he explained High Ridge's continued funding), but possibly at some later dates. And we wouldn't see the Roland class and possibly not the Nike class.

I think those LACS were fusion powered. The shrikes were the first fission LACs and they were some time later.

Theemile wrote:The increased, continual pressure on Haven and polite relations with the Andermani means a "peaceful" Silesia, requiring no Wayfarer testbeds to fight piracy without using escorts. Winning, overwhelming conventional forces means no research in breakthrough technologies with long payoffs, which in turn means no podlayers in 1913 - because the war would probably be over and they are not needed. Post-war? Tech funding would be dropped and any upgrades would be coming in fits and spurts - not a flow of slowly modernizing tech. No peace dividend to research the wormhole. No Talbot annexation. No Losses to Byng. No war with the SLN.

Thinking more about this and I do not believe the highlighted lines are correct. It is my understanding that the research on the possibility of another terminus had been ongoing. What the High Ridge government did was to pull the search into a specially created agency so they could claim credit for work started more than a decade before. From the prologue to War of Honor:

because in his opinion the entire program he'd been tapped to command had been authorized only because High Ridge and his stooges saw it as one more PR-rich boondoggle.
Be fair, he scolded himself. They may be padding the budget, and they're certainly playing their brainchild for all it's worth politically, but it really is about time someone got behind Kare and pushed. I just hate all the hoopla.
--- snip---
The admiral stood behind his desk, smiling and holding out his hand, as Trixie shepherded in the man whose work was at the core of the grandiosely titled Royal Manticoran Astrophysics Investigation Agency's current endeavors.
--- snip---
And much as Reynaud hated to admit it, in choosing him to head the scientific side of the RMAIA when they split the agency off from Astro Control, the High Ridge Government had found exactly the right man for the job.
--- snip---
Reynaud started to say something else, then changed his mind. He could hardly tell Kare he was wrong when he was convinced the physicist was exactly right. That was the main reason Reynaud objected so strenuously to the government's involvement in RMAIA. The work itself was important, even vital, and the funding level required for the dozen or so research ships, not to mention the lab and computer time, certainly left it with a price tag very few private concerns could have afforded. But the entire thing was one huge PR opportunity as far as the current Government was concerned. That was the entire reason they'd created the agency in the first place instead of simply increasing the funding for the Astro Control's Survey Command, which had been quietly pursuing the same research for decades. The RMAIA had been launched with huge fanfare as one of the "long overdue peaceful initiatives" which had been delayed by the war against Haven, but the reality was just a little different from the shiny facade the Government worked so hard to project.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:As you wrote in a later reply, some of the tech would show up, just probably in less advanced form. But I think you're underselling Sonja here. Or overestimating Honor's contributions.

The LACs were ready for Honor to take to Silesia in 1910, so they must have been in development for some time. Probably as soon as Grayson fission tech made the power requirements of a modern combatant possible in such a small ship. And if LACs exist, so do CLACs. I suspect the reason why HMS Minotaur was so late is because the RMN simply couldn't devote yard resources for an untested prototype that early in the war.

I agree that the design work on the Shrikes, and on HMS Minotaur was probably underway before Honor took Wayfarer to Silesia. But the LACs she took were still fusion powered, and didn't have the bow walls of the Shrikes, nor the beta-squared nodes. However as one of the final pre-Shrike evolution of "the new LACs the Star Kingdom had been laying down over the last four T-years" [EoH] they did have Grayson derived compensators and far more powerful impellers than classic LACs. So they had stronger sidewalls and about 200g more acceleration (roughly 50% more) than a pre-war LAC. They also has slightly heavier energy batteries; but those were still broadside mounts and their missiles were still carried in single shot box launchers.
A Shrike would eat one for breakfast.

The results they showed in Silesia would have provided additional confidence that pursuing even more capable LACs was a worthwhile capability, as was the ability to deploy them from a mothership. But I suspect that we'd have gotten something quite like a Shrike eventually. And certainly the other fruits of Project Gram had been under R&D for decades - so MDMs, improved FTL, and even eventually FTL fire control were all in the development pipeline; and eventually would be likely to get introduced even if the war ended before they were ready.

But circling back to LACs / CLACs I'd actually say 2nd Hancock might have had a larger impact than Honor or her deployment to Silesia. That provided a real world proof that LACs could be devastating - even if much of that had to be chalked up to initial surprise and poor reactions on the part of the Peep forces. If the IAN had joined with the RMN and GSN before that point I have to think Operation Icarus would have likely have been preempted because McQueen wouldn't have had the RMN/GSN operational lull during which she was able to pull the operation together. Even if Truman had been able to expose how the ref had stacked the deck in the final test the delay in real combat might have slowed production and acceptance of the LAC/CLAC combo. (And if they did get into combat before the end of the war it might well be without the lessons learned that led to Ferrits to provided ECM/Decoy missile cover to the Shrikes)

Jonathan_S wrote:I agree that the design work on the Shrikes, and on HMS Minotaur was probably underway before Honor took Wayfarer to Silesia. But the LACs she took were still fusion powered, and didn't have the bow walls of the Shrikes, nor the beta-squared nodes. However as one of the final pre-Shrike evolution of "the new LACs the Star Kingdom had been laying down over the last four T-years" [EoH] they did have Grayson derived compensators and far more powerful impellers than classic LACs. So they had stronger sidewalls and about 200g more acceleration (roughly 50% more) than a pre-war LAC. They also has slightly heavier energy batteries; but those were still broadside mounts and their missiles were still carried in single shot box launchers.
A Shrike would eat one for breakfast.

No doubt. This is what I had meant: LACs were in development. Those Honor took to Silesia didn't spring up from nothing the day before, nor was the design of a pod launcher new either. Clearly those LACs were just an evolutionary step, proving that LACs had a role as attack craft instead of purely defensive, before the technology that was in development could be put into them.

But circling back to LACs / CLACs I'd actually say 2nd Hancock might have had a larger impact than Honor or her deployment to Silesia. That provided a real world proof that LACs could be devastating - even if much of that had to be chalked up to initial surprise and poor reactions on the part of the Peep forces. If the IAN had joined with the RMN and GSN before that point I have to think Operation Icarus would have likely have been preempted because McQueen wouldn't have had the RMN/GSN operational lull during which she was able to pull the operation together. Even if Truman had been able to expose how the ref had stacked the deck in the final test the delay in real combat might have slowed production and acceptance of the LAC/CLAC combo. (And if they did get into combat before the end of the war it might well be without the lessons learned that led to Ferrits to provided ECM/Decoy missile cover to the Shrikes)

Now that's a very good point I hadn't considered. If the war had turned or even ended before Second Hancock, the concept of CLACs might never have taken off and got as relevant as it did. The MDMs would take care of any enemy that didn't have their own MDMs or at least pods, but against those that do and can produce a sufficient volume of fire, you need the LACs to thicken your defence.

Or it might have been the opposite: if Second Hancock hadn't proven that LACs could actually go on the offensive up against warships, they may have remained a defensive asset.

tlb wrote:

Theemile wrote:The increased, continual pressure on Haven and polite relations with the Andermani means a "peaceful" Silesia, requiring no Wayfarer testbeds to fight piracy without using escorts. Winning, overwhelming conventional forces means no research in breakthrough technologies with long payoffs, which in turn means no podlayers in 1913 - because the war would probably be over and they are not needed. Post-war? Tech funding would be dropped and any upgrades would be coming in fits and spurts - not a flow of slowly modernizing tech. No peace dividend to research the wormhole. No Talbot annexation. No Losses to Byng. No war with the SLN.

Thinking more about this and I do not believe the highlighted lines are correct. It is my understanding that the research on the possibility of another terminus had been ongoing. What the High Ridge government did was to pull the search into a specially created agency so they could claim credit for work started more than a decade before. From the prologue to War of Honor:

because in his opinion the entire program he'd been tapped to command had been authorized only because High Ridge and his stooges saw it as one more PR-rich boondoggle.
Be fair, he scolded himself. They may be padding the budget, and they're certainly playing their brainchild for all it's worth politically, but it really is about time someone got behind Kare and pushed. I just hate all the hoopla.
--- snip---
The admiral stood behind his desk, smiling and holding out his hand, as Trixie shepherded in the man whose work was at the core of the grandiosely titled Royal Manticoran Astrophysics Investigation Agency's current endeavors.
--- snip---
And much as Reynaud hated to admit it, in choosing him to head the scientific side of the RMAIA when they split the agency off from Astro Control, the High Ridge Government had found exactly the right man for the job.
--- snip---
Reynaud started to say something else, then changed his mind. He could hardly tell Kare he was wrong when he was convinced the physicist was exactly right. That was the main reason Reynaud objected so strenuously to the government's involvement in RMAIA. The work itself was important, even vital, and the funding level required for the dozen or so research ships, not to mention the lab and computer time, certainly left it with a price tag very few private concerns could have afforded. But the entire thing was one huge PR opportunity as far as the current Government was concerned. That was the entire reason they'd created the agency in the first place instead of simply increasing the funding for the Astro Control's Survey Command, which had been quietly pursuing the same research for decades. The RMAIA had been launched with huge fanfare as one of the "long overdue peaceful initiatives" which had been delayed by the war against Haven, but the reality was just a little different from the shiny facade the Government worked so hard to project.

Going in the other direction, I wonder whether Brooks' law was at work. The increased bureaucratic inefficiencies and political interference may have more than offset the additional resources - but even Reynaud admits the search for the seventh terminus had been under-resourced.