Hi Don,
Thanks for the compliment, but your talents are also appreciated.
Okay here are some of those numbers.
Back in August [chapter IV], Hanth thinks about how if all of Sumyr's men recover he'll have 23,000 when the AoJ arrives, or just 8% of their force which gives it a total of 287,500 men, 175,000+ [how much artillery?] being Desnari leaves less than 112,500 for the RDA at that time, before Rychtyr is stripped off.
Frankly given the low alliance numbers they think were at Thesmar, I'd be surprised if Rychtyr was given more than 25-30,000 men since the last thing they were expecting was Hanth to attack.
If one adds the 20,000 replacement Ahlverez received at Fort Tairys, there are only 67,500 trained troops left in all of Dohlar if the RDA totaled 200,000 troops in the first place, which I doubt; using your ~180,000 figure, they'd be down to 47,500 to cover all the rest of Dohlar, before considering the garrisons needed for internal security etc.
Then there's the border with the republic being over 900 miles long, which for even 180,000 men would be less than 200 men per mile, a pathetic figure, and 120,000 means an even more pathetic ~131 men per mile [~917 miles?] even worse.
NTM the distance they'd have to travel, ie ~1250 miles from Gorath or the rest of western Dohlar, for over a month as a response time to what happened only a 5day or two ago.
Given the suddenness of the theater reversal, I don't expect the current reinforcements to Rychtyr to be very many, given the time factor, NTM the few thousands he received the last time despite his proximity to Dohlar and the month's spent there, although I'm curious about your reference to militia backing up the army etc.
If such were the case Thirsk wouldn't be expecting them to gut his navy.
Rychtyr probably outnumbers Hanth, but not in rifles or artillery, and EHM and DE are probably also halfway there.
Without adding any additional RSA brigades or divisions DE's ~70,000 and EHM's current ~57,000 men would total 147,000+ added to Hanth's versus Rychtyr's probable 29-49,000men or odds of anywhere from 3-5 to 1, not bad odds for the alliance for a change.
However if Rychtyr has only around 16-20 infantry regiments, and they still average only 512 rifles per regiment, that's just 10,240 against at least 10 times that many, all of which are breech loaders.
Then there's the final 50,000+ ICA troops that left Port Royal at the end of September we haven't seen since.
If they follow HMS Delthak up the Seridahn [though I'm not at all convinced they will], Rychtyr will have plenty to point to, to explain why he HAD to retreat even to Clyntahn.
But I expect DE and EHM if their both headed west, to cross the Seridahn north and south of Evrytyn, as I've mentioned before, flanking Rychtyr and forcing him to retreat back down the canal to avoid being cutoff, as Thirsk suggested.
Rychtyr knows he can't fight an open battle against the ICA at anything like even odds [ie Hanth], and that he doesn't have the numbers against what DE and EHM are probably sending his way, nor what ICA artillery can do on the offensive, especially with new high explosive fillers, so his only rational course is to withdraw when faced by 147-200,000 alliance troops.
Speaking of picric acid, I wonder if a ceramic, resin or 'plastic' liner such as Bakelite, or as a very thin 'jar' to contain it, might eliminate most of the corrosion or instability problems, since the 'jar' or liner breaking after the shell is fired is immaterial to the long term storage problem.
Interesting times indeed.
Timing, of course may be everything.
Regarding the Harchong, they're around 1600 miles from Dairnyth, or 40 days minimum, assuming they can move immediately in Gwynt or Doman, because I suspect the canals and rivers are still frozen so they may have to wait a few 5days, enabling EHM to fortify it, while the last 50,000+ ICA might be more profitably used taking Silkiah, enabling a flanking maneuver from the south to further wreck Dohlar's defense plans that I've mentioned before, while Zhwaigair's other project might be naval mines which might limit any ICN raids or invasions.
But if the Salthar Canal is seized intact soon, the new ironclads could bottle up Thirsk, and blockade the Bay of Bess; preventing the MHoGatA from being supplied by sea, river or canal, the only way it can be, forcing it to retreat from Dairnyth, and effectively abandoning not just Dohlar but Silkiah and all of Howard, which Dohlar's then new leaders would secretly prefer.
Quite a coup for the alliance, don't you think!
L
n7axw wrote:lyonheart wrote:Hi Don,
Thanks for your concern.
Family and a few other duties have taken up my usual time, I'm way behind reading some other threads.
Where are you getting 120,000 men left in the RDA?
Ahlverez started for Fort Tairys with an army about half the size of Harless's [88-90K] and added some 20,000 replacements, yet now has less than 35,000 left.
Rychtyr had close to 40,000 before combining with Ahlverez when he had almost 50,000 after Alykberg, but before their assault on Thesmar, but we have no details on the size of Rychtyr's after the assault, but best guess would be 20,000+ before adding any replacements.
Even with the almost 13,000+ Desnari infantry that attached themselves to Ahlverez, he had less than 48,000 men, and he was still halfway to Thesmar, as last we read in LaMA.
I'd want Fyguera to have at least close to 10,000 men to garrison Thesmar while Hanth took ~20,000 men to roll the AoJ's supply tail up.
L
Hi Lyonheart,
You are a lot better at the numbers thing than I am.
I didn't count all the reinforcements sent forward. We know that roughly half of the Dohlaran Army crossed the border into Siddamark under Ahlvarez, including Rychtyr. IIRC the number given for that was 95,000. Rychtar's force was about 40,000 and about 55,000 were under Ahlvarez himself.
That would leave about 90,000 at home. We know that reinforcements were sent for Rychtyr and replacements sent to Ahlvarez while he was at Ft Tairys. There is a logic that would suggest that this would reduce that 90,000 figure by the number sent forward.
But I think not. Dohlar has a system of militias that can be called up to supplement the main army. In addition, recruiting has been going on, perhaps under a draft. So while the quality of the replacements probably aren't as good, I suspect that the 90,000 fugure has held up pretty well. Then assuming that either Rychtar or Ahlvarez or perhaps both get their people out--figure 30-35,000 men-- that 120,000 figure men for the defense of Dohlar starts to look pretty reasonable.
I have no doubt that while the ICA and the Siddamarkians can still reduce Dohlar by land, it looks to me that it would cost less in blood to do it by sea, striking directly at the capital.
The countervailing risk here would be being caught between a still dangerous Dohlaran army and the Harchongese moving south. That would put an allied army in the position of needing to deal with each in detail or be trapped.
That could be a bad thing.
Don