Naval genies in a bottle

If the Alignment wanted to create Naval Genies they would have to decide what they needed and wanted in the resulting people.

What traits, what physical properties, what is needed as physical and mental precursors to various skill sets? They would also need to determine what kind of programs would train these people to do what is going to be needed. Give that this is the Alignment; they could pop the infants out of the bottles and put them into some sorts of training regime as soon as they could start absorbing the information. You could look to something like Ender’s Game for that kind of program but you would also want various physical programs to develop/build hand-eye coordination, agility, the “right” kind of physical development etc.

What do you teach them for how to be Naval Officers (and one could assume Sr. NCOs as well as various tech specialties) and how do you do it? Saganami Island type of program? Probably NOT what the one the SLN is using as that is not getting the job done. Most likely very heavy on simulations at all levels but you are going to have to get these people out with real hardware and get actual experience doing what they are supposed to be doing. One of the problems is going to be teaching them to think. Not just what they are supposed to do per a set of rules and regulations, but how to think to solutions that are not covered in “training”. To evaluate what they have been taught and make decisions based on what is happening around them.

They need some combination of critical (and almost automatic) thinking about how they CAN react as well as SHOULD react to situations. And practice. Practice, practice, practice. That is something that the Alignment is missing a lot of at this point. They have some people from the Mesan SDF that have experience and know something about being in a real navy. There are some people from the RF navies (one at least) and then there are all those (not actually that many) from the OB strikes who are very well trained in their missions and now have had ONE experience but dam few people in the Alignment have the kind of practical experience that a Sr. LT or Commander in the RMN, RHN, IAN, GSN and even Erewhon’s navy has. Heck, we must have seen people from 15 or more independent systems (including some the Peeps took as prisoners) who have more practical leadership and combat experience than 99.99999% of the actual Alignment people who are crewing Alignment ships now and probably for the next 5 years.

It is not like they can take material from Harrington and 20 other successful and still living Honorverse naval officers or Sr. NCOs, mix them in a tube and start decanting a class of Harringtons- even if they start them off as infants and have them on the command decks by the time they are 18.

Brigade XO wrote:If the Alignment wanted to create Naval Genies they would have to decide what they needed and wanted in the resulting people.

What traits, what physical properties, what is needed as physical and mental precursors to various skill sets? They would also need to determine what kind of programs would train these people to do what is going to be needed. Give that this is the Alignment; they could pop the infants out of the bottles and put them into some sorts of training regime as soon as they could start absorbing the information. You could look to something like Ender’s Game for that kind of program but you would also want various physical programs to develop/build hand-eye coordination, agility, the “right” kind of physical development etc.

What do you teach them for how to be Naval Officers (and one could assume Sr. NCOs as well as various tech specialties) and how do you do it? Saganami Island type of program? Probably NOT what the one the SLN is using as that is not getting the job done. Most likely very heavy on simulations at all levels but you are going to have to get these people out with real hardware and get actual experience doing what they are supposed to be doing. One of the problems is going to be teaching them to think. Not just what they are supposed to do per a set of rules and regulations, but how to think to solutions that are not covered in “training”. To evaluate what they have been taught and make decisions based on what is happening around them.

They need some combination of critical (and almost automatic) thinking about how they CAN react as well as SHOULD react to situations. And practice. Practice, practice, practice. That is something that the Alignment is missing a lot of at this point. They have some people from the Mesan SDF that have experience and know something about being in a real navy. There are some people from the RF navies (one at least) and then there are all those (not actually that many) from the OB strikes who are very well trained in their missions and now have had ONE experience but dam few people in the Alignment have the kind of practical experience that a Sr. LT or Commander in the RMN, RHN, IAN, GSN and even Erewhon’s navy has. Heck, we must have seen people from 15 or more independent systems (including some the Peeps took as prisoners) who have more practical leadership and combat experience than 99.99999% of the actual Alignment people who are crewing Alignment ships now and probably for the next 5 years.

It is not like they can take material from Harrington and 20 other successful and still living Honorverse naval officers or Sr. NCOs, mix them in a tube and start decanting a class of Harringtons- even if they start them off as infants and have them on the command decks by the time they are 18.

I wholeheartedly agree. It is what Honor would call institional memory, rephrased, good old fashioned practical experience.


Don

n7axw wrote:

Brigade XO wrote:
<snip>
It is not like they can take material from Harrington and 20 other successful and still living Honorverse naval officers or Sr. NCOs, mix them in a tube and start decanting a class of Harringtons- even if they start them off as infants and have them on the command decks by the time they are 18.

I wholeheartedly agree. It is what Honor would call institional memory, rephrased, good old fashioned practical experience.


Don

I can't help but think of the great WWII example of the difference between a perfectly logical training regimin and what worked best in the field. Troopers out of Basic were taught NOT to shoot until they saw the enemy. Ammo, as was taught, is expensive and heavy, and should be rationed. Also, shooting will draw fire to you, so staying hidden keep you from being shot at until you were able to engage.

But in the field, experience taught maneuver warfare. A constant pressure of fire kept the oposition's heads down, allowing a flanking maneuver by another part of the team and the opposition from firing back or maneuvering on their own.

So experience taught differently than "instuitional" wisdom. There are probably a million examples like this that you will only find in the head of an experienced Sargent/Petty Officer (tactically) or Flag level oficer(strategically/logistically).

Hi Theemile,

I am sure that you are right about your main point. But the point I'm making is that the wisdom and practical experience to which you refer in those utterly invaluable noncoms eventually seeps into what I am calling institutitional memory. I would suspect that it happens as battle experienced vets come back as trainers for newbees in boot camp. Or in the Honorverse, think of Honor being brought back to teach tactics and serve as commandant for the crusher. The point is that the more varied and deeper it becomes, the better it serves the military that embraces it.

That being said, given the basic imperfection of all things human, I am sure that the process breaks down occasionally, probably even frequently. You get instructors less than capable, wed to the "old book," so to speak, or butterbars intent on the latest and greatest without any real experience of what they are trying to teach. And simply by nature of what it is, instritutional memory is always a bit out of date. Militaries tend to plan and train for the last war.

That doesn't invalidate my point. But what it does emphasize is the need to stress that learning is an ongoing process that doesn't end with boot camp or whatever training regimen one happens to be involved with. Or to put it even more bluntly, failure to engage brain is counter to one's prospect of survival.

Don