Hutch wrote:Draken wrote:Also we have Beowulf which has rather small navy which couldn't have problems with rapid expansion.
Draken, you obviously feel strongly about this (you'll find most of us do about certain topics.....DO NOT get kzt starterd on the Battle of Manticore from At All Costs...
), but while the Sphinx and Gryphons are still powerful combatants, they are much like the battleships of 1905 AD, still powerful but suddenly rendered obsolete to stand in the line of battle with the commissioning in 1906 of HMS
Dreadnought.
Bluntly put, they are old technology, despite being relatively young for warships. Upgrading them will probalby cost nearly as much as building new ones, and all ths spaces that are available are going to be building the next generation of SD's.
Plus I wonder exactly how many are available. According to House of Steel, the Gryphon went into service in 1895PD and 67 were built; the Gryphon first appeared in 1900 and 163 were constructed. Given that they bore the brunt of the First Havenite War and a number of them were with Home Fleet at the Battle of Manticore, I expect the numbers in mothballs are not all that great...maybe no more than 30-40 ships.
So is it worth it to man those ships or to work up and train personnel to man new ships coming off the line?
That all said, we know some of the older ships are still in commission (see Admiral Khumalo's flagship) and the need for ships
right now, especially given that instead of the hundreds of systems to consider in the Havenite Wars, we now have litterally thousands of systems all over known space to contend with.
So I wouldn't be surprised to see an old Gryphon or two wnadering about--I just don't see them being pulled out of mothballs unless there is no other option.
We shall see, eventually.
Hutch, we do know roughly how many existing SDs there are - the Fleet list as of ~May 1st 1920 lists 250 Manticorian SDs in service between the active and reserve lists. We know the remaining King Williams and Andurils were sold to Erewhon and the Victories and former Havenite classes were sold to Grayson - thus leaving the Samothraces, Sphinx and Gryphons make up that 250. We also know that fewer than 30 died at BoMA 1 and have a list of <30 others lost after may 1st 1920, leaving >190 tube SDs remaining in Manticorian service prior to OB. We also know that ~15 Grayson SDs were lost in BoMA 1, so Grayson still has >45 former Manty SDs left, plus ~30 native builds/rebuilds, giving >265 SDs left between the two of them.
Manticore still had 6 DN in thr active fleet in 1920, but HoS Mentions the remaining Bellerophons and Gladiators as being in the reserve, though the earlier 1920 fleet list does not, so I'd assume that if both are correct, the DNs are not mothballed in place, but are being used as parts birds, and thus are not readily available for use, if at all.
As for 1st war losses, I assume that proportionally, the majority of the losses were in earlier designs and DNs - the DNs were always the weaker of the 2 vessels, even though, pound for pound, they had the same defenses, they just had less pounds. They were considered even more dangerous for crews in the MDM era than SDs, so obviously their greater vulnerability was shown in their greater loss numbers proportionally. Ditto with the older SDs.
This all being said, The SDs activated earlier in the 2nd war were being placed back in reserve to provide crews for new construction. So it is possible many were destroyed while being mothballed or while undergoing routine maintenance, by the OB strike. How many - only the Gods of the Honorverse know...
Every thing above being said - though I myself advcated upgrading tube SDs to Mk 16s back in Dec 2005, What we have found since makes that upgrade almost as difficult as the mk 23 upgrade - you just don't need to mess with the exterior armor. Given the complexity, time and cost, and the end product, manufacturing a new ship would be preferrable. And without construction shipyards, neither option is available anyway.
