A Tactical Problem for your Consideration

Hutch wrote:OK, something different. Since we won’t be seeing a new Honor Harrington book for at least a year, IMHO, and given that we’ve dissected most of the older battles, I guess the MWW won’t mind if we invent a few of our own….

A couple of comments first.

We know that first-line Manty (and for that matter, Grayson or Havenite) ships can whip anything their size (or in the SEM’s case, much larger) than the ISLN Navy can muster.

We also know from textev that the pre-Filareta’s Folly SEM is still deploying older ships in combat situations (see the reference to the old destroyer at the start of ART, or HMS Repulsethat was assigned to Mike Henke in SftS (Khumalo’s flagship counts for this, too).

And the Grand Alliance not only has to protect their systems and commerce, carry out a military campaign against the largest polity ever known, guard a multiplicity of wormholes, and oh by the way, support unknown numbers of revolts and actions out on the frontier, be they Mesan or indigenous. All with the ships they have now, plus whatever Haven has on the building slips, since Manticore and Grayson won’t be commissioning ships anytime soon.

So it is inescapable (at least to me) that the GA/SEM will have to deploy ships that, while good, are not the latest and greatest in the arsenal. I expect that they will try to support them with as many newer ships as they can—but anyway you look at it, it will be a ‘sub-optimal’ force. Because there is a finite number of ships to perform a mission that has grown much larger than even the height of the Havenite Wars.

So……

You’re a Vice Admiral of the Red and you are not a happy person. Your assignment is to defend a wormhole at the far end of the SL, well into the Shell and three wormhole jumps (and 174 LY total hyper transit between the jumps) or 874 LY in hyper from Manticore. There have been four GA task forces pass through since you arrived (all which have left on various missions elsewhere) and you have been promised major reinforcements within the next 5-8 T-days. However, right now you have the following order of battle:

Two Agamemnon BCP’s: Angus McGyver and Michael Stearns

Four CA’s, two Sag-B’s: Tarantula, Ursa and two Star Knights: Vikrant, Al-Dhafra

Two CL’s, both Flight IV Apollos”: Eugune Cernan, Al Worden

Eight DD’s, 2 Rolands: Xiong Yi, Lancaster and six Culverin’s: Bombard, Mortar, Howitzer, Parrott, Grapeshot and Carronade.

You also have 800 pods that were dropped off, split evenly between Mark 16E and Mark 23 missiles.
Your Intel briefing indicated that the nearest FF base was about 64LY away and had nothing heavier than a BC squadron. The nearest BF base was 72 LY the other direction and had only a division of Scientists with minimal support. Therefore it was felt you would have sufficient forces to meet any expected resistance, and by the time heavier forces could be concentrated, you would have been heavily reinforced yourself. And except for a few SLN destroyers that hypered in at long-range (and promptly hypered out again), you’ve been left alone.

However….

The FF commander, Vice Admiral Hiram Ulysses, and the local BF commander, Admiral Gustave Toutant, are both very smart and, unlike most BF/FF officers, work well together. They also have been watching what has been happening between the SL and Manticore and both have been ‘reshuffling’ ships from other sectors for ‘training and inter-sectional exercises’ for the past several months.

So….today, instead of a destroyer scout, 24 BC, 14 CL, and 16 DD suddenly hyper in about 13.8 Million KM from you North-North-East. And no sooner do you absorb that and begin to issue orders , when another force, this one with 36 SD’s, 12 more BC’s, and 10CA’s hypers in at 11.4 Million KM South-West-West.

So, Vice Admiral of the Red….what are your orders?

Kill them ALL, Let the Tester sort them out.

One major problem I have with your scenario: no LAC's, but lets go with your scenario: The problem is not, can all those SLN ships be destroyed. The RMN forces have more than enough missiles to blow them all away.

400 pod MK-23 = 4000
400 pod MK-16 = 5600

2BCP 360pod x 10 MK-23 or 14 MK-16 = 7200 MK-23 or 10,800 MK-16

Lets not even bother with the small fry even though the SAG-B's are not small fry with their MK-14's.

Need # missiles to destroy SLN forces: SLN has no effective missile defense. So far, they knock down about 1:7 missiles.

36 SLN SD x 200 MK-23 = 7200 MK-23 needed to destroy
36 SLN BC x 60-100 MK-16 needed to destroy = 2160-3600

Don't bother with the small fry. As one can see above, RMN has more than enough MK-23 and MK-16 to blow away these SLN forces. The 2 BC'Ps alone have nearly enough.

The question becomes: Does the RMN have enough control links to fire all those inventoried pods/missiles before the SLN forces can fire in retaliation assuming no Cataphracts.

SD's closer. Distance is given of 11.4Mkm.
Assume SD's crash translation and carry 5000km/s with them over the alpha wall. Their Missiles have 7.75Mkm range with no initial velocity. With their initial velocity assuming no acceleration, they will be in range in a whopping 11,726s.

MK-23 or MK-16 flight time is a whopping 160s or so at max. Assume they use up all 3 stage MDM first before going to 2 stage DDM. Total max control link salvos = 1300/150s = 9 salvos.

Total missiles need controled before SLN forces reach their designated point = 11,000 minimum

11,000/9 salvos = only 1200 control links needed to obliterate the SLN forces before the SLN forces range on them.

I think it is safe to say, each BC'P alone has 150 control links each. Each Roland had 36 for 72 additional control links before adding the CA's. The 2 SAG-B probably have nearly 100 control links each themselves. Each Star Knight should have around 30 each. Each Apollo/Culverin should have around 15-20 each.

Total
2*150 = 300
2*100 = 200
2*36 = 72
2*30 = 60
8*20 = 160
Total = ~~800

800 x 9 salvos = 7200 = SD's are blown away, but now 12BC and 10 CA are in range and their friends with another 24BC and happy fries are will be ranging on you in another crudely 6 minutes. So, during those 6 minutes you get off another 2.5 full control link salvos at 800 a piece for a total of 2000 missiles against 22 targets = 22 dead targets, but they also launched roughly 1500 missiles with CA type warheads at you.

RMN vessels have roughly
BCP 60CM = 120
SAG-B 44CM = 88
CA SK 13->26 = 26->52
RLD 20 = 40
CL APP 8->16 = 16-32
DD CULV 7-14 = 42-84
*Note I assumed old classes can fire at least fire one broadside and one stern at same time.
Total CM's per 10s, since mix of ships = 332-> 416 = 4 or 5 salvos for 1:1 ratio of CM's. Have enough time easily for 10 salvos. Leaves at least half of their CM inventory for the next batch of customers.

So, those 12BC/10CA were dealt with and now we are up against 24 BC 14CL and 16 DD. They are firing approx 758 missiles every 30s or so. You are firing back at them 800 every 150s or so. Even this out and it becomes 800 to 3750. Not a good ratio.

Of course if the RMN can finally start shooting at max missile tube cycle capacity instead of being artificially limited by their control links, the balance automatically switches. ALA what happens in SoSAG at Monica verses what happens at Spindle. Which is now cannon? Personally I think it bloody stupid to design a ship that cannot rapid fire its missile tubes... But I digress. Back to:

Anyways: The good guys are gonna take it in the shorts if the Sollies are suicidal. The Sollies all commit suicide if RMN ships are allowed to actually fire their missiles in a rational universe.

Of course we have not seen any Manty force at any junction without LAC's, so honestly I think the whole scenario is fatally flawed from the start, but it WAS a very interesting trip down memory lane. Though not that flawed as we have not seen LAC's using their control links with pods. I do not see any reason they could or should not be able to do so. This reality would tip the scales firmly into the manties hip pocket even if one assumed that those SD's required more than 200 capital missile graser hits.

A much more dangerous situation is the same force jumping in directly on top of the RMN force, or as close as they can manage. To maximize this, assume the SLN ships are in a 3D formation with 100,000 km separation from each other and ship attitudes tuned to ensure maximum energy weapon coverage. This should result in a everyone in SDM range and quite a few in energy range, and nobody can hyper out before missile impact.

His scenario is feasible. LACs require carriers to move them from system to system, and the SEM/GA doesn't have enough CLACs or LACs to deploy them to every wormhole junction and maintain a large number to keep with the fleets. The CLACs and most of the LACs are likely being held in the Manticore system and ready to go out with the main fleets to help defend them, not scattered about in penny-packet stations all over. If the system has an inhabitable planet, there -might- be some LACs stationed there, but unlikely without a carrier nearby to support them. If no planet, the odds are even more unlikely to have LACs there. Unless the SEM intends to retain control of the wormhole for a long time.

kzt wrote:A much more dangerous situation is the same force jumping in directly on top of the RMN force, or as close as they can manage. To maximize this, assume the SLN ships are in a 3D formation with 100,000 km separation from each other. This should result in a everyone in SDM range and quite a few in energy range, and nobody can hyper out before missile impact.

Not to mention that, as bad as it would be for the SLN to lose the ships, they can afford the losses if the SEM force is totally or mostly destroyed. Right now the SLN can replace the ships faster than the SEM can (they have intact shipyards).

Hutch wrote:OK, something different. Since we won’t be seeing a new Honor Harrington book for at least a year, IMHO, and given that we’ve dissected most of the older battles, I guess the MWW won’t mind if we invent a few of our own….

A couple of comments first.

We know that first-line Manty (and for that matter, Grayson or Havenite) ships can whip anything their size (or in the SEM’s case, much larger) than the ISLN Navy can muster.

We also know from textev that the pre-Filareta’s Folly SEM is still deploying older ships in combat situations (see the reference to the old destroyer at the start of ART, or HMS Repulsethat was assigned to Mike Henke in SftS (Khumalo’s flagship counts for this, too).

And the Grand Alliance not only has to protect their systems and commerce, carry out a military campaign against the largest polity ever known, guard a multiplicity of wormholes, and oh by the way, support unknown numbers of revolts and actions out on the frontier, be they Mesan or indigenous. All with the ships they have now, plus whatever Haven has on the building slips, since Manticore and Grayson won’t be commissioning ships anytime soon.

So it is inescapable (at least to me) that the GA/SEM will have to deploy ships that, while good, are not the latest and greatest in the arsenal. I expect that they will try to support them with as many newer ships as they can—but anyway you look at it, it will be a ‘sub-optimal’ force. Because there is a finite number of ships to perform a mission that has grown much larger than even the height of the Havenite Wars.

So……

You’re a Vice Admiral of the Red and you are not a happy person. Your assignment is to defend a wormhole at the far end of the SL, well into the Shell and three wormhole jumps (and 174 LY total hyper transit between the jumps) or 874 LY in hyper from Manticore. There have been four GA task forces pass through since you arrived (all which have left on various missions elsewhere) and you have been promised major reinforcements within the next 5-8 T-days. However, right now you have the following order of battle:

Two Agamemnon BCP’s: Angus McGyver and Michael Stearns

Four CA’s, two Sag-B’s: Tarantula, Ursa and two Star Knights: Vikrant, Al-Dhafra

Two CL’s, both Flight IV Apollos”: Eugune Cernan, Al Worden

Eight DD’s, 2 Rolands: Xiong Yi, Lancaster and six Culverin’s: Bombard, Mortar, Howitzer, Parrott, Grapeshot and Carronade.

You also have 800 pods that were dropped off, split evenly between Mark 16E and Mark 23 missiles.
Your Intel briefing indicated that the nearest FF base was about 64LY away and had nothing heavier than a BC squadron. The nearest BF base was 72 LY the other direction and had only a division of Scientists with minimal support. Therefore it was felt you would have sufficient forces to meet any expected resistance, and by the time heavier forces could be concentrated, you would have been heavily reinforced yourself. And except for a few SLN destroyers that hypered in at long-range (and promptly hypered out again), you’ve been left alone.

However….

The FF commander, Vice Admiral Hiram Ulysses, and the local BF commander, Admiral Gustave Toutant, are both very smart and, unlike most BF/FF officers, work well together. They also have been watching what has been happening between the SL and Manticore and both have been ‘reshuffling’ ships from other sectors for ‘training and inter-sectional exercises’ for the past several months.

So….today, instead of a destroyer scout, 24 BC, 14 CL, and 16 DD suddenly hyper in about 13.8 Million KM from you North-North-East. And no sooner do you absorb that and begin to issue orders , when another force, this one with 36 SD’s, 12 more BC’s, and 10CA’s hypers in at 11.4 Million KM South-West-West.

So, Vice Admiral of the Red….what are your orders?

The biggest problem I have with this scenario (there are others as well, but this is biggest) is this part:

Hutch wrote:The FF commander, Vice Admiral Hiram Ulysses, and the local BF commander, Admiral Gustave Toutant, are both very smart and, unlike most BF/FF officers, work well together. They also have been watching what has been happening between the SL and Manticore and both have been ‘reshuffling’ ships from other sectors for ‘training and inter-sectional exercises’ for the past several months.

The boldface text violates the chain of command (within each division). A sector admiral (either FF or BF) will have missions (defense, commerce protection, etc.) and resources (ships, bases, etc.) to carry those missions out within their designated command area (their sector).

Each can coordinate and carry out joint operations with other forces who have missions and resources within their assigned command area (i.e., FF with BF, FF with SDFs, BF with FF, BF with SDFs.)

What they will not have is the authority to 'borrow' or 'reshuffle' ships from other sectors, because just as they have their missions and resources, so do those other sector admirals. The decision to reassign missions and resources across sectors rests solely with the command levels above the sector admirals.

For an Honorverse example of how it is done, consider what Yancey Parks did when he redeployed his forces in the face of the threat to his sector. He did not borrow resources from other sectors. Instead he redeployed his own forces to meet what he thought was the threat. Additional resources were sent from the Admiralty (Danislav's dreadnoughts) who had the authority and responsibility for assigning missions and managing the allocation of resources for the sector commanders to meet those missions.

And looking at the problem in the Honorverse from the top down, consider the decision to reinforce Grayson. Again, the decision to reinforce D'Orville at Yeltsin's Star was made by the Admiralty, not D'Orville as the sector commander borrowing from other sectors.

Even the option for Admiral Crandall (BF) to tap Commodore Thurgood's forces (FF) to reinforce her screen prior to heading off to Spindle (the decision was made by Crandall not to use the FF forces assigned to the Madras sector, but to take along the squadron of FF BCs [and any DDs that went with them] that were deployed to the Madras sector under Admiral Byng that were not lost at 2nd New Tuscany) was within Admiral Crandall's command authority (standing orders) to defend the Solarian League and its protectorates as the senior officer from the senior branch of the SLN present (and deployed into the sector), if she had stood on the defensive. She exceeded her authority by attacking the Star Empire at Spindle.

Hutch wrote:OK, something different. Since we won’t be seeing a new Honor Harrington book for at least a year, IMHO, and given that we’ve dissected most of the older battles, I guess the MWW won’t mind if we invent a few of our own….

A couple of comments first.

We know that first-line Manty (and for that matter, Grayson or Havenite) ships can whip anything their size (or in the SEM’s case, much larger) than the ISLN Navy can muster.

We also know from textev that the pre-Filareta’s Folly SEM is still deploying older ships in combat situations (see the reference to the old destroyer at the start of ART, or HMS Repulsethat was assigned to Mike Henke in SftS (Khumalo’s flagship counts for this, too).

And the Grand Alliance not only has to protect their systems and commerce, carry out a military campaign against the largest polity ever known, guard a multiplicity of wormholes, and oh by the way, support unknown numbers of revolts and actions out on the frontier, be they Mesan or indigenous. All with the ships they have now, plus whatever Haven has on the building slips, since Manticore and Grayson won’t be commissioning ships anytime soon.

So it is inescapable (at least to me) that the GA/SEM will have to deploy ships that, while good, are not the latest and greatest in the arsenal. I expect that they will try to support them with as many newer ships as they can—but anyway you look at it, it will be a ‘sub-optimal’ force. Because there is a finite number of ships to perform a mission that has grown much larger than even the height of the Havenite Wars.

So……

You’re a Vice Admiral of the Red and you are not a happy person. Your assignment is to defend a wormhole at the far end of the SL, well into the Shell and three wormhole jumps (and 174 LY total hyper transit between the jumps) or 874 LY in hyper from Manticore. There have been four GA task forces pass through since you arrived (all which have left on various missions elsewhere) and you have been promised major reinforcements within the next 5-8 T-days. However, right now you have the following order of battle:

Two Agamemnon BCP’s: Angus McGyver and Michael Stearns

Four CA’s, two Sag-B’s: Tarantula, Ursa and two Star Knights: Vikrant, Al-Dhafra

Two CL’s, both Flight IV Apollos”: Eugune Cernan, Al Worden

Eight DD’s, 2 Rolands: Xiong Yi, Lancaster and six Culverin’s: Bombard, Mortar, Howitzer, Parrott, Grapeshot and Carronade.

You also have 800 pods that were dropped off, split evenly between Mark 16E and Mark 23 missiles.
Your Intel briefing indicated that the nearest FF base was about 64LY away and had nothing heavier than a BC squadron. The nearest BF base was 72 LY the other direction and had only a division of Scientists with minimal support. Therefore it was felt you would have sufficient forces to meet any expected resistance, and by the time heavier forces could be concentrated, you would have been heavily reinforced yourself. And except for a few SLN destroyers that hypered in at long-range (and promptly hypered out again), you’ve been left alone.

However….

The FF commander, Vice Admiral Hiram Ulysses, and the local BF commander, Admiral Gustave Toutant, are both very smart and, unlike most BF/FF officers, work well together. They also have been watching what has been happening between the SL and Manticore and both have been ‘reshuffling’ ships from other sectors for ‘training and inter-sectional exercises’ for the past several months.

So….today, instead of a destroyer scout, 24 BC, 14 CL, and 16 DD suddenly hyper in about 13.8 Million KM from you North-North-East. And no sooner do you absorb that and begin to issue orders , when another force, this one with 36 SD’s, 12 more BC’s, and 10CA’s hypers in at 11.4 Million KM South-West-West.

So, Vice Admiral of the Red….what are your orders?

1 - laugh to your self as both bases (the targets of the other task groups) have just been blown to dust bunnies with no loses (as the defenders are here).
2 - Order the DD to high tail it through the wormhole to pass on the message of an attack underway
3 - Once the SLN units have committed, stop silent running from 30 million KM out (you though that those DD visits looked a bit like surveillance operations prior to an attack) and open fire
4 - wipe out the SLN ships who are still locked on to Ghost Rider Drones (the DDs where they only real ships present)
5 - have a nap.

Send a direct communication to Admiral Harrington for reinforcements, then...

delay the SOllies for as long as possible and pray I can think of a better answer before Honor gets there!!!!

"chain of command"...adequate bribes were paid. See, no problem.

Why is the GA defending on top of the wormhole? Is the senior strategist playing Space Empires minefield? Perhaps one ship stays there at battle stations...you rotate every few hours...in case someone tries to hyper in close and jump.

Other people should be well off from the point, but in *GA* missile range, in formations that change very regularly and fairly rapidly.

phillies wrote:"chain of command"...adequate bribes were paid. See, no problem.

Why is the GA defending on top of the wormhole? Is the senior strategist playing Space Empires minefield? Perhaps one ship stays there at battle stations...you rotate every few hours...in case someone tries to hyper in close and jump.

Other people should be well off from the point, but in *GA* missile range, in formations that change very regularly and fairly rapidly.

One of the problems with the whole GA WH strategy is that it depends on squadrons at GQ for months. This tends to end badly.

phillies wrote:"chain of command"...adequate bribes were paid. See, no problem.

Given the size of the egos of the SLN admirals involved, do you really think they will give up any of their toys to any of their rivals to play with?*

Byng was an exception in taking a Frontier Fleet task force because of his hatred of Manticore.

*Yes, if the SLN admirals are not spoiled children, they certainly act like they are.