Spoiler: Question Re command and control

n7axw wrote:

EdThomas wrote:Do we have typewriters yet?

I don't think I've seen any sign of typewriters. We do have printing with letters being set up for producing the posters being tacked up on the walls of Manchyr in Corisande. Our good friend Patryk Hanrai (sp) was involved doing that.

But no typewriters yet.

Don

He was using a small printing press. I suggested in another forum about typewriters. IIRC it was non-weapons weapons of war. I suggested things like the above typewriters and sewing machines (already in use).

Yeah I don't think a command and control center has to be luxury just because it is a box connected to sleds.

Even if it had a small steel fireplace like the ones in the tents.

But I could imagine several staff officers able to work while even on the move would be a great thing.

Let alone not having to worry about setting up a HQ every time you move.

Alistair wrote:Yeah I don't think a command and control center has to be luxury just because it is a box connected to sleds.

Even if it had a small steel fireplace like the ones in the tents.

But I could imagine several staff officers able to work while even on the move would be a great thing.

Let alone not having to worry about setting up a HQ every time you move.

Work while on the move? I suggest that you watch "The Long, Long Trailer" (1953) Lucile Ball and Desi Arnez

Alistair wrote:In the last snippet DW showed in remarkable detail a field kitchen on sleds.

My question is could they build one adapted as a Divisional and Corps head quarters instead of a field Kitchen?

I could see the advantage of a division having a boxed in room on sleds that is able to act as a mobile HQ.

Thoughts?

They certainly could, and for certain limited conditions, be very useful!

The reason their limited use, is that a majority of armies are limited by the speed of their foot-powered infantry. As HQ staff are going to be typically mounted, they have the speed to be able travel for less time per day - leaving enough time for them to be able to do their staff functions.

Of course, the exception is for cavalry/mounted infantry - where such a mobile HQ is going to be useful. But as these troops are relatively small in number (in the ICA), and typically attached to foot-powered infantry armies - the need for such equipment is limited.

Yeah, somebody has clearly been watching the wrong movies.

Instead of Patton, try Vanity Fair. Or War and Peace. Then ask yourself if Wellington or Napoleon would have had any use for such a thing. Just about the only battle either ever fought where they couldn't _see_ everything that was going on was the only time they fought each other - and anything they couldn't see was out of their control. It was Wellington's good fortune that what he couldn't see was Blucher rolling up Napoleon's right.

That's the level of command-and-control that the ICA is dealing with - the attack we're watching the setup for probably wouldn't even be attempted under better conditions [better for the AoG, that is] because you can be sure that either it would be detected long before jump-off or fail miserably in the coordination department because the forces involved are too widely separated. It was planned standing around a rather large map spread out on a moderately large table [both doubtless being hauled around in a 'headquarters wagon"] and you can already see how the plan is fraying a bit given real conditions on the real ground. Once the attack starts, nobody is going to give a damn about maps until the fighting is done. That's the reality of life for divisional and corps commanders in a pre-electrical telegraph army. Fancy headquarters setups - and battles that the tactical commander can't see from the back of his horse - are a hallmark of the modern mechanised army.

Keith_w wrote:

Alistair wrote:Yeah I don't think a command and control center has to be luxury just because it is a box connected to sleds.

Even if it had a small steel fireplace like the ones in the tents.

But I could imagine several staff officers able to work while even on the move would be a great thing.

Let alone not having to worry about setting up a HQ every time you move.

Work while on the move? I suggest that you watch "The Long, Long Trailer" (1953) Lucile Ball and Desi Arnez

n7axw wrote:

EdThomas wrote:Do we have typewriters yet?

I don't think I've seen any sign of typewriters. We do have printing with letters bein set up for producing the posters being tacked up on the walls of Manchyr in Corisande. Our good friend Patryk Hamrai (sp) was involved doing that.

But no typewrters yet.

Don

Hi Don,

I whiled away most of yesterday afternoon going through the last three Safehold books because I couldn't believe typewriters hadn't been invented. A functioning typewriter was invented in our time line in 1868. RFC has leap frogged all sorts of technology to late 19th and early 20th century levels. Surely there is some visionary clerk that works for Ehdwyrd Howsmyn that hate quills, and even the new fountain pens.

James

JRM wrote:
Hi Don,

I whiled away most of yesterday afternoon going through the last three Safehold books because I couldn't believe typewriters hadn't been invented. A functioning typewriter was invented in our time line in 1868. RFC has leap frogged all sorts of technology to late 19th and early 20th century levels. Surely there is some visionary clerk that works for Ehdwyrd Howsmyn that hate quills, and even the new fountain pens.

James

It is certainly possible. There is enough stuff happening "off stage" that were it all to be published it would fill a multi-volumne encyclopedia. All we can really say at this point is that there is no sign of typewriters in the story line. No am I aware of any info dump elsewhere that addresses the subject.

But OTOH, there isn't anything to contradict speculation that typewriters exist either.

Don

EdThomas wrote:Do we have typewriters yet?

I don't think so - as movable type printers was a new thing in the novels, and in real life they were developed before typewriters.

I would have thought that with the church trying to stifle invention, that they would have tried to limit technology that is advantageous to innovation.

But that's a guess......

RE: typewriters.
I was making an obviously much too vague attempt at humor concerning the regularity of blotches and squiggles in documents created in the moving command center.

EdThomas wrote:RE: typewriters.
I was making an obviously much too vague attempt at humor concerning the regularity of blotches and squiggles in documents created in the moving command center.

I caught it...

Don