Long term consequences of the League's collapse

n7axw wrote:But how does all of this look long term? Historically what happens when empires come unglued isn’t pretty. Chaos, warlordism, states that don’t have the legs to last, almost pertetual war over time. The result is a decline in economic activity and the impoverishment of once prosperous areas who are conquered, perhaps repeatedly, and pillaged. One remembers Rome and the beginning of the Dark Ages. The situations are not completely congruent, of course. But they are close enough to make the comparison uncomfortable. The League’s policies in the Verge were pretty nasty and the systems in the shell were disadvantaged for the benefit of the core worlds. But the League kept the peace in areas it dominated and even though the result frequently wasn’t fair, for a substantial portion of human occupied space, peace allowed trade and prosperity to flourish.

Don, although I agree with you about the consequences of an empire's collapse, I don't think the situation vis a vis the Fall of Rome is analogous to the Solarian League.

The lands beyond Rome's European borders may be compared to the Verge - very superfluously - but that is where the comparison ends. At the time of Rome's Fall, the northern European lands were in upheaval, with entire populations migrating away from the east and northeast in a ripple effect, to get away from the advancing Huns. There were other reasons as well for the Germanic and Slavic Migrations, among them overpopulation and climate change.

The situation in the Verge is much different. We don't see huge displaced populations putting pressure on the League's borders, for instance. As for the League itself, yes, the central bureaucracy has quite a lot of authority to regulate trade and industry, and as it controls the League's armed forces, it can police the spaceways and enforce compliance with its rulings. However, unlike in Rome where ALL authority derived from the Emperor and lack of direction from the Emperor basically incapacitated local administrators, political authority in the League is vested first and foremost in the governments of the League's various member states. The collapse of central authority in the League will not have nearly as much of a disrupting effect on its member states as the collapse of central authority had for Rome's outlying territories.

HB of CJ wrote:The only way the GA has a snow balls chance in hades of winning is to quickly force some sort of negotiated settlement with the Sollies. Force a quick, victorious war?

The League is just too big for the GA to even think of engaging in a 'short, victorious war'. Even if anyone in the GA leadership was stupid enough to put credence in such a fallacy, and even if the League decided for some reason to suddenly surrender unconditionally, the GA simply does not have enough manpower or ships to enforce a complete disarmament by the League, or to take over the peacekeeping and piracy-suppressing role of the League Navy, or to prevent any rearmament by the League. Besides, as Weird Harold wrote, the GA wants the League to disintegrate - a process that has already started with Beowulf's and her daughter worlds' decision (or imminent decisions) to vote on secession from the League.

n7axw wrote:

namelessfly wrote:One change will be a drastic increase of military spending and military forces deployed. Under the SL, some 2,000 SL systems were content to depend on the SLN for their security. BF's much vaunted active 2,000 SDs and 10,000 SDs in reserve seems enormous but works out to only 1 active SD and 10 reserve SDs per star system. This is trivial by even the pre King Roger standards of the RMN. Based on what the SKM was able to build and deploy, I estimate that the SLN fleet strength required the expenditure of much less than 1% of the GDP of the SL, perhaps even only 1/10 of one percent. Given the inevitable chaos, I expect that everyone who can build and deploy a fleet and system defense forces (missile pods with MDMs make "fixed forts" extremely effective) will do so and they will be willing to spend about 1/10 of their GDP on their military. This will result in each of most populace and industrialized systems having somewhere around a dozen to a gross of SDs or SD(P)s in their fleet for a grand total of perhaps 100,000 SD class combatants roaming the human inhabited galaxy.

We also might see smaller numbers of new ship classes that dwarf the tonnage and combat power of SDs.

This is exactly the scenario that concerns me. Lots of that buildup will be valid with only defensive purposes in mind. But given human nature, there will be those who think, Wouldn't it be nice if WE could be the toughest kid on the block... So you get a scramble to develop new empires some more successful than others, but almost always someone waiting to pull down whoever the king on the hill might be... not a good situation. Dark ages indeed.

Don

This is a far more likely scenario than the 'woe, oh woe, the barbarians are coming' scenario we had with the Fall of Rome or many other ancient terrestrial empires.

I think that two words should suffice: Legislaturalist Haven. By which I mean, that is the kind of situation we're going to see in former League space, only with many little imitators of expansionist Haven under the Legislaturalists.

Some systems are going to be aggressors, others are going to do everything they can to remain neutral, and still others are going to band together either in defensive alliances or amalgamate into strong enough star nations to deter any conquistadores. Lots of chaos in the short term, maybe even resulting in true Dark Ages in some of the more remote regions of the former League.

Most of the Core and Shell worlds will, however, seize control of their local BF detachments (if they do not have their own SDFs, or even if they do), which in the short to medium terms will be sufficient for their needs, as their only possible opponents will be other systems with the same level of military technology.

The Protectorates and Verge will be the only regions where 'warlordism' will become a real problem, as most of the systems there don't have the deeply-entrenched political traditions and strong, prosperous economies that exist in the Core and Shell - except for those systems that are located close enough to the relative few Verge systems that are stable and prosperous enough to survive the coming upheavals relatively unscathed.

Remember, the Haven sector's star nations are not the ONLY Verge polities that are prosperous and stable - there has to be others, but since the series focuses on the Haven sector for the most part, we know little of the other stable Verge polities out there.

Hi Hanuman,

Agreed about the difference between Rome's situation and the League. The parallels I was interested in was the impact of corruption and the consequence of the League no longer around to enforce order.

The GA doesn't have to conquer the League in the sense of taking and holding territory. They merely have to split it up by demonstrating that the League can no longer provide the protection and order previously taken for granted.

Don

n7axw wrote:Hi Hanuman,

Agreed about the difference between Rome's situation and the League. The parallels I was interested in was the impact of corruption and the consequence of the League no longer around to enforce order.

The GA doesn't have to conquer the League in the sense of taking and holding territory. They merely have to split it up by demonstrating that the League can no longer provide the protection and order previously taken for granted.

Don

Thank you for clarifying that.

Yeah,their plan is to break it up into factions named after periods of earth history. Not many are going to sign up for the "Dark Ages Faction", but I think there might be some potential there with some others.

Hi All,

I apologise in advance for getting my figures wrong.

Just 90 nodal stations, not 180 would suffice to put all of the SL within ~40 LY of such GA pickets.

The 180 nodal stations was for a 32 LY radius 4 day response time.

Granted having that many would be beneficial to the host system like Marsh near the ex-SC, but 90 is certainly more feasible and faster to set up, before reducing that number by the various proximity of the wormhole bridges.

The nominal 90 stations should have 4 SDP's each as previously listed, probably with a BC squadron, plus one each of cruisers and perhaps a couple of destroyer squadrons as well NTM eventually up to 4 CLAC's, to patrol and protect almost 30 systems, so each BC pair would have only 7-8 systems to visit, while the cruisers might have 3-4, for fairly frequent 'checkups'; though some would consider this a very 'rich' resource allocation, arguing the stations need only half as many or it will be very boring story wise.

Of course, the purpose is to prevent EE violations, warlords, piracy etc.

The 360 SDP's would only be 30% of the soon-to-be GA SDP force, before Bolthole begins production of its new and improved series, and we might expect the GA's SDP force to double in 3-4 years, making such nodal pickets even more affordable in terms of resources.

Initially, liberating the protectorates might take only a couple hundred TG's, if the GA wants to do it that quickly, with a BC or two leading the handful of cruisers and destroyers.

So technically the GA has the capability already to rapidly replace the SLN in its supposed peace keeping duties so many are worried about.

I suspect once we have an updated wormhole map, the time and numbers needed could be reduced considerably.

L


**quote="lyonheart"**Hi Hutch,

Just catching up on threads I've missed.

I'll try to finish further comments on Monday.

Something to keep in mind is that id the SL is around 50-50 150 to 200 LY in radius, the volume is some 23.83 million cubic LY's.

Depending on how many nodal pickets you think the GA can set up soon, given another 400 RHN SDP's completing this fall to winter for around 1200 before Bolthole begins its new construction series, aside from the wormhole network we still know very little about [there were only 5 termini in the SL before Idaho, but there are apparently lots more now] but 180 such pickets with 4 SDP's each, so one division could handle a violation while the other was still in reserve, would be roughly within 40 LY of the entire former SL.

Therefore available in about 5 days to reign retribution if no one else can for a EE violation, although given a third of the SL has hyper warships, and I suspect many of those are sympathetic with Beowulf if not the GA in general, there should be quite a police force even without the aforementioned pickets.

We need a updated wormhole map because what we do know seems to imply a lot more hyper bridges than there were when the series began so the gaps between them or the volume each termini serves could be much smaller than we've previously thought, permitting closer communication and reaction time.

Given the rate things are happening, I suspect the GA with something like 5000 warships to start with, ie far larger than the RF's combined SDF's [ruining the appeal the MAlign was counting on], will be once the SLN's reserves and bases have been destroyed, be able to liberate the protectorates rather handily, and provide the police force some fear won't be there.

So there might be less to worry about.

L

Hutch wrote:

SNIPPED 4 SPACE REASONS


I tend to cut SYED some slack, as I am of the opinion that he is not a native English speaker (Tester knows I make enough errors on my own and I've been using English all of my 61 years). Still, SYED, slowing down a bit and getting it right does help--because I for one usually find your points cogent and well-taken.

Now, back to the Honorverse...


As for the warlord cycle, that is going to happen and what happens after that depends a lot on said warlord. Barregos and Roczak are one example, planning well ahead and knowing what they want to accomplish. We have never seen the 'leaders' of the Maya Sector planets and I wonder if they know what is going on behind the curtain, but that hasn't been revealed by RFC.

I can see some systems in the Core or Shell that know each other (and more importantly, trust each other) band together and co-opt part of BF/FF, be they as mercanaries or because the crews are primarily from the region.

Out in the Verge is where warlordism is most likely, and Warnecke-types may have their moment, but areas of stability like Talbott and Maya among others will suddenly find themselves very popular with systems needing new friends.

We shall see, evenually.

**quote**

lyonheart wrote:Hi All,

I apologise in advance for getting my figures wrong.

Just 90 nodal stations, not 180 would suffice to put all of the SL within ~40 LY of such GA pickets.

The 180 nodal stations was for a 32 LY radius 4 day response time.

Granted having that many would be beneficial to the host system like Marsh near the ex-SC, but 90 is certainly more feasible and faster to set up, before reducing that number by the various proximity of the wormhole bridges.

The nominal 90 stations should have 4 SDP's each as previously listed, probably with a BC squadron, plus one each of cruisers and perhaps a couple of destroyer squadrons as well NTM eventually up to 4 CLAC's, to patrol and protect almost 30 systems, so each BC pair would have only 7-8 systems to visit, while the cruisers might have 3-4, for fairly frequent 'checkups'; though some would consider this a very 'rich' resource allocation, arguing the stations need only half as many or it will be very boring story wise.

Of course, the purpose is to prevent EE violations, warlords, piracy etc.

The 360 SDP's would only be 30% of the soon-to-be GA SDP force, before Bolthole begins production of its new and improved series, and we might expect the GA's SDP force to double in 3-4 years, making such nodal pickets even more affordable in terms of resources.

Initially, liberating the protectorates might take only a couple hundred TG's, if the GA wants to do it that quickly, with a BC or two leading the handful of cruisers and destroyers.

So technically the GA has the capability already to rapidly replace the SLN in its supposed peace keeping duties so many are worried about.

I suspect once we have an updated wormhole map, the time and numbers needed could be reduced considerably.

L

Lyonheart, math was never my favorite subject (I managed to avoid it in College), but if we have a SL about 400 LY in diameter (using your 150-200 LY radius) and making it a cube (easier on my math than a sphere, we have a total of 1,000 40^3 sections, divided by 8 (putting the nodal force at a point where 8 cubes all meet) gives me about 120 task forces.

4 SD)P)'s are still doable, IMHO (480 ships), but I think CLAC's will be needed for other purposes, so I can't see more than 1-2 per task Force. And the smaller ships may also have more pressing duties, as long as the SL lasts.

And I don't know that we need ships visting in quite the quantity and numbers you show. I see this as a three-step process...

Step 1 is the GA comes to visit the system with appropriate force (depending on knowledge gleaned from the MMM) to take out any BF/FF ships and installations (hopefully with minimal casulties. If the system has a SDF, the GA ships do not engage them unless they fire first. Instead, they make it a point that they are only after Solarian League
assets and are willing to negotiate (by the diplomats that just happened to be along for the ride...) an amiable relationship without blowing the systems commerce and SDF into atoms....as long as they renounce the SL actions and enter into trade and peace agreements.

Step 2 is the Nodal forces, with the smaller ships doing 'visits' (spy patrols, but let's be diplomatic and guard the systems' dignity). Each planet will have a dispatch boat or two (local or Manite) who can get messages to the Nodal forces if needed.

Step 3 is 'encouraging' systems that have stepped off the deep end into independence to make new arrangements with their neighbors (and hopefully friends) for trade, protection and guarding their independence themselves. That is the province of the diplomats, and one can hope that there are a few Jame Retief's out there to mitigate all the Houseman's and Deborah Frasaers' out there....

Can it be pulled off? That is what I am looking to see in the next couple of books.

RFC has said that there will be a radical change in direction in the next book or two - at least, that's what I remember. I keep thinking of what it would be like to be a fly on the wall when the GA's strategists talk to Zack and Gail about the MAlign's goals and strategies.

Are they even going to see breaking up the SL as desirable after that conversation?

Hutch wrote:Lyonheart, math was never my favorite subject (I managed to avoid it in College), but if we have a SL about 400 LY in diameter (using your 150-200 LY radius) and making it a cube (easier on my math than a sphere, we have a total of 1,000 40^3 sections, divided by 8 (putting the nodal force at a point where 8 cubes all meet) gives me about 120 task forces.

Mathematically, a total radius of 200 ly divided by a cruising radius of 40 ly gives 125 nodes, while a total radius of 150 ly divided by the cruising radius of 40 ly gives 52 nodes. The mean of 125 and 52 is 88.8, or essentially the 90 that Lyonheart gave.

JohnRoth wrote:RFC has said that there will be a radical change in direction in the next book or two - at least, that's what I remember. I keep thinking of what it would be like to be a fly on the wall when the GA's strategists talk to Zack and Gail about the MAlign's goals and strategies.

Are they even going to see breaking up the SL as desirable after that conversation?

Manticore has already figured out that the Alignment is deliberately trying to break up the League. That doesn't change Manticore's own survival strategy.

Hi Hutch,

I have no quarrels with your listed procedures, they are exactly what I had in mind, even if I didn't delineate them, but then I'm so wordy as it is.

FYI, the volume of a sphere is 4/3 X pi X r^3 [4/3piXr cubed], the surface area being 4 X pi X r^2 [4piXr squared].

The initial visits by a SDP, BC or Sag-C or two, should follow the warning sent to all those sympathetic to Beowulf or the GA after the SLN attack on Beowulf to alert the SL members as to just how far off the rails the mandarins are willing to go to hold onto their power.

If half or even a quarter decide to join the GA, that's 150-300 more systems before adding the protectorates, of which some no doubt will be quite eager to have the GA choose them to be the picket station system.

L

Hutch wrote:

lyonheart wrote:Hi All,

I apologise in advance for getting my figures wrong.

Just 90 nodal stations, not 180 would suffice to put all of the SL within ~40 LY of such GA pickets.

The 180 nodal stations was for a 32 LY radius 4 day response time.

Granted having that many would be beneficial to the host system like Marsh near the ex-SC, but 90 is certainly more feasible and faster to set up, before reducing that number by the various proximity of the wormhole bridges.

The nominal 90 stations should have 4 SDP's each as previously listed, probably with a BC squadron, plus one each of cruisers and perhaps a couple of destroyer squadrons as well NTM eventually up to 4 CLAC's, to patrol and protect almost 30 systems, so each BC pair would have only 7-8 systems to visit, while the cruisers might have 3-4, for fairly frequent 'checkups'; though some would consider this a very 'rich' resource allocation, arguing the stations need only half as many or it will be very boring story wise.

Of course, the purpose is to prevent EE violations, warlords, piracy etc.

The 360 SDP's would only be 30% of the soon-to-be GA SDP force, before Bolthole begins production of its new and improved series, and we might expect the GA's SDP force to double in 3-4 years, making such nodal pickets even more affordable in terms of resources.

Initially, liberating the protectorates might take only a couple hundred TG's, if the GA wants to do it that quickly, with a BC or two leading the handful of cruisers and destroyers.

So technically the GA has the capability already to rapidly replace the SLN in its supposed peace keeping duties so many are worried about.

I suspect once we have an updated wormhole map, the time and numbers needed could be reduced considerably.

L

Lyonheart, math was never my favorite subject (I managed to avoid it in College), but if we have a SL about 400 LY in diameter (using your 150-200 LY radius) and making it a cube (easier on my math than a sphere, we have a total of 1,000 40^3 sections, divided by 8 (putting the nodal force at a point where 8 cubes all meet) gives me about 120 task forces.

4 SD)P)'s are still doable, IMHO (480 ships), but I think CLAC's will be needed for other purposes, so I can't see more than 1-2 per task Force. And the smaller ships may also have more pressing duties, as long as the SL lasts.

And I don't know that we need ships visting in quite the quantity and numbers you show. I see this as a three-step process...

Step 1 is the GA comes to visit the system with appropriate force (depending on knowledge gleaned from the MMM) to take out any BF/FF ships and installations (hopefully with minimal casulties. If the system has a SDF, the GA ships do not engage them unless they fire first. Instead, they make it a point that they are only after Solarian League
assets and are willing to negotiate (by the diplomats that just happened to be along for the ride...) an amiable relationship without blowing the systems commerce and SDF into atoms....as long as they renounce the SL actions and enter into trade and peace agreements.

Step 2 is the Nodal forces, with the smaller ships doing 'visits' (spy patrols, but let's be diplomatic and guard the systems' dignity). Each planet will have a dispatch boat or two (local or Manite) who can get messages to the Nodal forces if needed.

Step 3 is 'encouraging' systems that have stepped off the deep end into independence to make new arrangements with their neighbors (and hopefully friends) for trade, protection and guarding their independence themselves. That is the province of the diplomats, and one can hope that there are a few Jame Retief's out there to mitigate all the Houseman's and Deborah Frasaers' out there....

Can it be pulled off? That is what I am looking to see in the next couple of books.