Rebuilding Blackbird for the GSN

We have seen a lot of text on how the RMN is building its industrial platforms quickly with help from Beowulf but little on how the GSN is doing. How quickly are they rebuilding? Where are they getting there new workforce? How are there people taking losing so many women to a sneak attack?

Does this spell the end of the GSN being a powerhouse of shipbuilding for the near to mid term do we think or can they rebuild just as fast as the RMN or even faster?

wholf359 wrote:We have seen a lot of text on how the RMN is building its industrial platforms quickly with help from Beowulf but little on how the GSN is doing. How quickly are they rebuilding? Where are they getting there new workforce? How are there people taking losing so many women to a sneak attack?

Does this spell the end of the GSN being a powerhouse of shipbuilding for the near to mid term do we think or can they rebuild just as fast as the RMN or even faster?

I would like to say they are rebuilding along with Manticore - but we havn't seen any text on Grayson IIRC. There has been little focus on the rebuilding and nothing on Grayson.

However, they have a MASSIVE fleet, one the 10-15 largest fleets in the Galaxy, they almost have to rebuild 50% of the infrastructure they had at Blackbird just to continue to maintain their fleet.

Theemile wrote:

wholf359 wrote:We have seen a lot of text on how the RMN is building its industrial platforms quickly with help from Beowulf but little on how the GSN is doing. How quickly are they rebuilding? Where are they getting there new workforce? How are there people taking losing so many women to a sneak attack?

Does this spell the end of the GSN being a powerhouse of shipbuilding for the near to mid term do we think or can they rebuild just as fast as the RMN or even faster?

I would like to say they are rebuilding along with Manticore - but we havn't seen any text on Grayson IIRC. There has been little focus on the rebuilding and nothing on Grayson.

However, they have a MASSIVE fleet, one the 10-15 largest fleets in the Galaxy, they almost have to rebuild 50% of the infrastructure they had at Blackbird just to continue to maintain their fleet.

The thing that really hurts is Grayson is probably far less capable than Manticore of attracting replacement workers.

They don't have as broad an industrial workforce to draw from, aren't as attractive to immigration, and don't have a pool of former shipyard workers who've (thanks to prolong) taken up 2nd or 3rd careers elsewhere and can be brought back to help start-up and run the new stations.

I'm assuming their economy is going to be able to support some significant level of rebuilding, but how well they'll be able to staff the new shipyards / repair yards...

They also don't have the ability to have people push a 100 million ton module through a wormhole at them either.

I would expect Manticore to assist Grayson with the sourcing of equipment for their rebuilding. After all, this is NOT the High Ridge Government we are talking about here and Grayson continues to be both a major partner and provider of military support.

Grayson will have the same kind of problems replacing the workforce but they will approch it the same what they approach everything like this: it is a Test. While there are some internal problems (and they aren't going to be happy taking on the SL) the leadership are realists in that reguard. Grayson would not fare will at the hands of OFS. The Graysons are (I think for the most part) going to be a driven to replace their capacity and remove the source of the attack that crippled their spaceborn industry.

It would be nice to get more about what is going on with Grayson and where they are (and how in relation to Manticore) progressing with the recovery. There is Grayson politics of course but also the changes to their culture that continues to build.

Haven is also probably going to be a tremendous help. Given the pre-existing relationship between the two - by which I mean all the Cerberus escapees and People's Republic defectors, like Yu, Caslet, etc. - I can see the Pritchart Administration capitalizing on that and sending as much help as possible to help with Blackbird. All three Alliance navies are a bit stretched for personnel, of course, but I would not at all be surprised to see Havenite shipyard workers as loaners on the new Blackbird as well as helping out in the GSN (which would free up Manticoran loaners for service elsewhere).

Jonathan_S wrote:The thing that really hurts is Grayson is probably far less capable than Manticore of attracting replacement workers.

They don't have as broad an industrial workforce to draw from, aren't as attractive to immigration, and don't have a pool of former shipyard workers who've (thanks to prolong) taken up 2nd or 3rd careers elsewhere and can be brought back to help start-up and run the new stations.

I'm assuming their economy is going to be able to support some significant level of rebuilding, but how well they'll be able to staff the new shipyards / repair yards...

I would say this bodes ill for the conservatives on Grayson. Benjamin isn't going to sit down, throw his hands up and say "We're done. Let's chill out." No, the women are desperately needed, either to supply those workers or to replace the men who are re-tasked.

They won't be able to rebuild as quickly as Manticore, but I recall a mention that more of Blackbird may be salvageable than the MBS trinity, relatively. That might not help much, as any replacement equipment shipped in will have to come further away than any devolved manufacturing in Trevor's Star, Basilisk, Beowulf or Gregor.

munroburton wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:The thing that really hurts is Grayson is probably far less capable than Manticore of attracting replacement workers.

They don't have as broad an industrial workforce to draw from, aren't as attractive to immigration, and don't have a pool of former shipyard workers who've (thanks to prolong) taken up 2nd or 3rd careers elsewhere and can be brought back to help start-up and run the new stations.

I'm assuming their economy is going to be able to support some significant level of rebuilding, but how well they'll be able to staff the new shipyards / repair yards...

I would say this bodes ill for the conservatives on Grayson. Benjamin isn't going to sit down, throw his hands up and say "We're done. Let's chill out." No, the women are desperately needed, either to supply those workers or to replace the men who are re-tasked.

They won't be able to rebuild as quickly as Manticore, but I recall a mention that more of Blackbird may be salvageable than the MBS trinity, relatively. That might not help much, as any replacement equipment shipped in will have to come further away than any devolved manufacturing in Trevor's Star, Basilisk, Beowulf or Gregor.

They'd already tapped non-trivially into their women as workers in the Blackbird yards; but most of those trained female workers were lost in the attack.

Yes, they can continue tapping into their female population and train them for the work. But that's a more long term solution. Short term I'm worried about their lack of access to trained / skilled workers to do the actual rebuilding and work to train the new hires.


Manticore seems much better positioned to have, or attract, skilled station construction and shipyard workers.

The mysterious vanishing of the entire orbital infrastructure of Grayson still puzzles historians decades later....

kzt wrote:The mysterious vanishing of the entire orbital infrastructure of Grayson still puzzles historians decades later....

An obvious solution is that it was moved out to Blackbird, even at teeny tiny fractions of a gravity continuous accelerations soon add up making moving space stations around in the same system entirely possible with Honorverse tech