Build a Fleet!

Relax wrote:In short, W. H.'s position is the the entire galaxy is going to hold hands and sing kum-ba-ah

Yea, that is human nature in a nut shell.

History totally backs him up.

Dang, I need to go read more history and inform myself of how stupid all this bickering war talk is.

Could look at it as if we're roleplaying the fights between the jeune ecole and the historical school.

Who's right? Nobody knows until the opposing doctrines, technology and tactics go head to head. Until proven otherwise, many concepts could be valid.

One point I'd like to make is that the jeune ecoles seem to be wrong most of the time(or right at the wrong time), but they did create the conditions for Operation Buttercup to succeed and then pulled Apollo out of their bag of tricks when the other side caught up.

The thing is, no weapon system can't be copied when the necessary time, resources and motivation is given. In 1946, people thought the USSR would need 20 years to build their own atomic bomb. It took them three years.

In 1914 PD, the Manticoran admiralty believed it would take Haven twenty years of R&D to equalise and rebuild. They didn't quite equalise, but they got close enough and did it within five years and came up with a few tricks of their own along the way.

If the secrets of the spider drive are known to enough navies, quite a few might experiment with those. Even if they have no plans to use them in action(CL Fearless was never intended to fight after her refit), they would still be useful for war games, detector testing and practicing recon sweeps. Just because the Alignment's scientists can't do it well enough yet doesn't mean no one won't ever manage it, nor that there aren't any effective anti-spider doctrine which can be created with existing hardware.

Of course, I'm prepared to be proven wrong. Maybe there's something else to the Detweilers that makes them a viable long-term warship. We'll have to wait a few more years to find that out, however.

Weird Harold wrote:Appropriate for Manticore in 1844 PD, not necessarily Manticore's practice in 1922 PD. The Mk-25/Apollo system defense MDM wasn't available, nor were Shrike-class LACs.

SDMDMs and LACs are available in 1922 PD and Manticore is using (and sharing) them for System Defense with far less reliance on a Wall of Battle in a defensive role. Manticore hasn't completely abandoned Capital Ships, because they still need counter-strike capability to take the war to their enemies.

My New Star Nation has brought together twenty systems that followed Manticore's 1922 strategy for System Defense -- e.g. SDMDMs and LACs in sufficient quantity to make a system more costly than all but the most determined attacker would be willing to spend.

Zanzibar called, and would like to remind you what happened to them in the post-Thunderbolt era, when Manticore (and her allies) were moving into the heavy SDMDM's and LAC mentality.... didn't work out so well for them. And IIRC, Republican forces only committed about 2 squadrons of wallers, and a CLAC squadron worth of LACs. Hardly a "more costly than all but the most determined" attacker would send, compared to their total fleet size.

Edit: Correction, it was 3 squadrons of SDP's, and only 6 CLACs, with only 16 BC's for a screen. Still very very light, compared to the size of fleets that were hammering around pre-Buttercup, and at Thunderbolt.


To address another point, about spider-LACs being better armed than conventional LACs (Katana's, Shrikes and Cimettere's) only applies to their first punch. If you don't achieve catastrophic kill ratios with that sucker punch (assuming nobody learns to detect spider drives prior to attacks anyways), spider-LACs are essentially the Empire of Man's "one-shot" anti-armor holdout weapons. You know, the ones that nearly killed Prince Roger, did kill his Marine Captain, and nearly killed him again facing his father.

Spider-LACs approach in stealth, blow their wad of pods, and then pray they can kill the LACs, because otherwise they cannot run away, they can't fight at long range (pods are one-shot, non-reloadable after all), can't fight at short range (no wedge to take hits with, or speed to stay behind Shrikes), and middle-range buys them the worst of everything.



And lastly.... saw some mention of a single-system entity being able to build large amounts of SD's. We only know of one system that managed to do that, being Manticore, and that's purely due to the "astrographic accident" known as the Manticoran Wormhole Junction. And that's also due to it being more than just one or two wormholes, otherwise it'd be just like any of the other hick systems that OFS casually backhanded around. No other star system, that we've ever seen managed to keep even one or two SD's functioning, and usually have difficulties just keeping cruisers working.

Haven had hundreds of systems prior to the First Haven War, and they could just barely "maintain" 412 SD's, 48 DN's, 374 BB's with 81 BC's. Another 200 CA's, 350 CLs and 600+ destroyers.

Manticore, even with it's galactic accident junction, barely had 188 SD's, 121 DN's, and no BBs, with 200 BCs. Then had their 300+ CA's, 300 CL's, and 500 DD's. Again, the only way they could afford this at all, was the multi-wormhole Junction, otherwise Manticore probably would have had very little (no need for their massive cruiser fleet, no merchant marine shipping for the Sollies, and no ability to pay for the waller)

kzt wrote:

Sigs wrote:Oh but your systems are alone, if the mobile portion of your defenses is destroyed, you cannot move large quantities of your defenses to reinforce threatened systems. It would be like having 20 Islands that are heavily fortified but are far enough away to not be able to support each other with reinforcements or fire support.

How did that work out for Japan in WW2?

Not that well, the American's just by passed the islands they did not want to deal with and attacked the once they wanted, and all of that fortification that the nearby Islands had was not able to do a damn thing.

Weird Harold wrote:
Everything is in orbit. AFAIK, there is no permanent presence on the planet.

Masada is an anomaly, anyway. I doubt that there is any SL Successor that is as rabidly religious that will require a permanent military picket.

I am pretty sure for a long while there was an army presence on the, and a picket force in the system.

Weird Harold wrote:
Does your "realism" encompass the Marshall Plan? The Harrington Doctrine bears a very strong resemblance to the Marshall Plan. I expect similar results in converting former enemies into allies.

Sure worked out well to prevent the cold war didn't it? Made the US and the Soviet Union the best of friends right?

Weird Harold wrote: There will undoubtedly be chaos and civil wars as the League collapses, but we're talking about circa thirty years after the League collapse; any such civil war should have long ago been resolved, including any exported chaos.

And what makes you think that in 30 years they would become peaceful? It’s been something like 50+ years since the European powers started freeing their colonies in Africa and look how peaceful they all are...

Weird Harold wrote: IOW, any sector or group that self-identifies as "Solarian" is going to get pounded until it breaks up into small enough polities that they won't be considered threats. Then tender the carrot of trade incentives and everything else to make a revanchist war unpalatable if not unlikely.

So for the sake of argument, if 100 systems decided to remain in the League and fight for it’s survival, Manticore and the GA will pound them in to the ground and if necessary occupy them in order to prevent them from becoming enemies?

Weird Harold wrote: They've survived thirty years as isolated, independent systems. Why should they suddenly be more vulnerable because they are adding hyper-capable warships and joining with nineteen other systems with similar defenses?

They are not more vulnerable after “uniting” than they were before hand, but they are definitely not stronger either. The second they hear of your mobile fleet being destroyed in combat they will pull out, make peace if they can and build a real navy to protect themselves. And that is assuming that those 20 systems survived for those 30 years without being swallowed up by someone bigger. And assuming that they want to give up whatever mobile units they have managed to build or purchase before joining your “nation”.

Weird Harold wrote: How many of your SDs are my systems worth to you? You might be able to assemble sufficient force to take one or even two systems, but I guarantee you won't have 500 SDs when you reach the high orbitals.

So you are saying that without some solid intelligence and forethought I wont be able to destroy your fixed defenses? If I send some scouts in to get some intelligence I would be able to destroy your command and control network well in advance or even as the battle is starting? You know how they did it in Lovat?

Weird Harold wrote: No, I assume that the GA is NOT going to resort to Eridani Edict violations to defeat the MAlign. The only alternative to "regime change" in the RF is genocide.

Their alternative is very, very small pieces left over after the war, no multi system nations that were part of the MA, no military owned by said nations until the GA is satisfied all traces of the MA are gone, no capability to build any major warships by those small nations for same period of time, no reunification by those systems etc...

Weird Harold wrote: You have strongly implied that you don't consider military cooperation as "waiting for some one else to protect me." You've said participation in a multi-national Defense Force is "defending those who aren't willing to defend themselves."

There is a difference between having a dozen allies that will come to your defense but you are still able to take care of yourself by yourself, and not building a proper fleet because you depend on those dozen allies to protect you from everything.

And there is a difference between someone who cannot build/support SD’s or even a proper fleet and might require my protection vs. someone who has similar industrial, economic and population resources as me but refuses to build a proper fleet because they expect I will protect them.

Weird Harold wrote: You have constantly implied that Manticore or the GA would be providing all of the "defense" with treaty partners only providing token screening elements.

How would your military cooperation differ from Manticore's? (Other than Manticore/GA having a 30 year head start on you?)

It would be in my interest to keep my neighborhood quiet, so if there is a failed state where it affects me I will take action to either help fix their problems, or outright annexation to fix their problems(Like Silesia). If there is a neighbor who cannot protect themselves, or prevent piracy I will step in and help.The difference is that I will cooperate based on my national interests, protect my neighbors, trade partners, keep my trade routes open, if necessary provide escorts in to pirate infested space and clean up pirate infested space when it becomes a problem directly to me or my interests. I wont be helping someone on the other side of the galaxy with hundreds or thousands of warships funded by my nation, and manned by my people out of altruism.

Weird Harold wrote: Sounds a lot like the USSR and the Warsaw Pact.
How many billions did NATO spend matching the USSR and Warsaw Pact? How many billions the they spend trying to intimidate NATO?

Actually sounds like NATO... After all didn't the Warsaw Pact come to existence as a result of NATO? So, how many billions did the Warsaw Pact spend matching the US and NATO? How many billions the they spend trying to intimidate the Warsaw Pact?

Weird Harold wrote: Without a clear and present enemy, you'll appear to be building an invasion fleet.

When your enemy is present, it is likely a little too late to be thinking about building a military.Just because you might have never had a fire in your neighborhood and one is not likely anytime soon doesn't mean you shouldn't have a fire department, because it would be a little too late to start to think about building one when a fire breaks out.

Weird Harold wrote: The PRN and Anderman Empire built invasion fleets, the RMN built a commerce protection fleet until Haven lined up in their direction.

You keep using Manticore as an example, and you keep ignoring that at different times in their history the same argument have been made that you are making and they were proven false. At one point there was a movement to disband the navy because there was no threat, then there was the move to stop building capital ships because it might provoke the PRH to invade...

Weird Harold wrote: Your SDF isn't built for commerce protection, it's built for all-out war. Since you've built such a big hammer, I would expect your neighbors to worry that you're looking for a nail to use it on.

Sigs wrote:
Strategic Assumptions
My strategic Assumptions are that this new nation is a portion of the now defunct Solarian League. Surrounded by a thousand or more single system nations and multi-system nations, many of them are in economic trouble after the collapse of the League. Some of those nations will turn to isolation, others will turn to form larger and powerful alliances as a means to defend themselves and yet others will be looking to expand and create empires or will unleash pirate raids on anyone who is deemed to be worth attacking. I am going to assume that there is no major power that is willing or able to play Galactic Policeman and as such there is no cavalry to be called upon. Technologically I am equal or superior to all of my neighbors and potential targets for the moment but I am assuming that any number of potential empire builders are trying to get the technological edge. My industrial muscle on the large side as I have over a dozen heavily industrialized systems and another 10-15 light to medium industry as such I have the ability to build, maintain and man anything up to and including SDs. As for wormhole terminals and junctions, I will assume that my nation has some but are not central to the economic wellbeing of the nation as a whole and its survival.


Strategic Goals

Defense and Security of the territory of my nation with emphasis placed on fortifying and defending the most industrial systems.
Protect Merchant Marine from pirates and in times of war.
Provide intelligence and scouting for all systems within my territory including those that are unoccupied by people to prevent enemies from establishing bases.
Enforce any and all foreign commitments made by my government.


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Due to the general fluidity of the situation post League collapse the fleet in question would have to be ready to fight on the defensive in home territory as well as on the offensive in enemy territory anywhere from single unit action to fleet action as well as convoy escort and unrestricted warfare against merchant ships of our enemies as such the fleet has to be versatile in order to be able to accomplish all of those missions.

Harold and Sigs:

You are both taking this argument too personally. It was sort of amusing before, but it is getting too pointed. Just let it go. Too much real world argument for a work of fiction.

You seem to be arguing from different basic premises, both in the political and the hypothetical scenario. Neither of you is willing to compromise your own view of how that scenario works, but it is getting past the point of sarcasm to insult. Just agree to disagree.

The major thing history shows is that people, being people, screw up. Must be genetic.

Regards, Rob

Somtaaw wrote:To address another point, about spider-LACs being better armed than conventional LACs (Katana's, Shrikes and Cimettere's) only applies to their first punch. If you don't achieve catastrophic kill ratios with that sucker punch (assuming nobody learns to detect spider drives prior to attacks anyways), spider-LACs are essentially the Empire of Man's "one-shot" anti-armor holdout weapons. You know, the ones that nearly killed Prince Roger, did kill his Marine Captain, and nearly killed him again facing his father.

Spider-LACs approach in stealth, blow their wad of pods, and then pray they can kill the LACs, because otherwise they cannot run away, they can't fight at long range (pods are one-shot, non-reloadable after all), can't fight at short range (no wedge to take hits with, or speed to stay behind Shrikes), and middle-range buys them the worst of everything.

Yeah, I'm also having trouble understanding the tactical advantage of having some large MDM equipped spider corvettes in the same system already containing vast numbers of FTL controlled MDMs.

The system defense MDMs can already cover the entire inner system (area within the hyper limit). And any MDM fired at beyond SDM range had long enough runtimes that missile defenses have plenty of time to come online and establish tracking against them.
I don't see it making the missile defense's job significantly harder than just firing those additional MDMs from (cheaper) system defense installations instead of from spider corvettes.


Now, while it'd be very hard on the corvettes, but I could see a use for very stealthy ships that mounted heavy warhead CM-drive missiles. Sneak in close enough and land a surprise punch, ideally to coincide with arriving system defense missiles. Having only 60 seconds or less to react to an attack could potentially throw the missile defenses into some disarray - especially if they'd been tracking and refining fixes against the system defense MDMs for several minutes already. But you'd be so close the corvettes would likely get creamed trying to slip away afterwards.


Alternatively, if you had MDMs but not FTL fire control I could see the advantage of an integrated system defense where you have very stealthy Corvettes, or spider-DDs, acting as forward fire control. They wouldn't have to use onboard weapons at all, but instead would slip into positions where the 3 or 4 drive system defense missiles could be fired past them at the enemy and then the (oversized) tactical sections on the spider ships takes control so there is relatively low latency light-speed fire control for the terminal attack maneuvers.

But given both system spanning range and relayed system spanning FTL firecontrol a missile heavy very slow corvette seems redundant.

Jonathan_S wrote:But given both system spanning range and relayed system spanning FTL firecontrol a missile heavy very slow corvette seems redundant.

The Spider-LACs can theoretically repel scouting level incursions without revealing the exact locations of the fixed defenses -- they won't be in the same place on any two visits by scouts.

Sigs does have a point about the vulnerability of fixed defenses. That's why the Huacha is primarily moon/asteroid based; where each installation can be dug in and armored against proximity kills.

Jonathan_S wrote:Now, while it'd be very hard on the corvettes, but I could see a use for very stealthy ships that mounted heavy warhead CM-drive missiles. Sneak in close enough and land a surprise punch, ideally to coincide with arriving system defense missiles. Having only 60 seconds or less to react to an attack could potentially throw the missile defenses into some disarray - especially if they'd been tracking and refining fixes against the system defense MDMs for several minutes already. But you'd be so close the corvettes would likely get creamed trying to slip away afterwards.

This is much my take on it too. Think about what happened with CL Fearless - enormously successful in the first round of the war games, but immediately followed by being killed in subsequent rounds and only occasionally scoring a kill.

Also similar to the Havenite's Triple Ripple technique - very effective in Thunderbolt, because it was used simultaneously, but was easily countered afterwards.

Weird Harold wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:But given both system spanning range and relayed system spanning FTL firecontrol a missile heavy very slow corvette seems redundant.

The Spider-LACs can theoretically repel scouting level incursions without revealing the exact locations of the fixed defenses -- they won't be in the same place on any two visits by scouts.

Sigs does have a point about the vulnerability of fixed defenses. That's why the Huacha is primarily moon/asteroid based; where each installation can be dug in and armored against proximity kills.

Uh, how deep of a hole does a c fractional missile strike create.... Try many kilometers deep.

Might have noticed, but surface exploding nukes create holes kilometers wide and hundreds of meters deep.

There is no such thing as "asteroid armor" deep enough against Honorverse tech.

munroburton wrote:

Relax wrote:In short, W. H.'s position is the the entire galaxy is going to hold hands and sing kum-ba-ah

Yea, that is human nature in a nut shell.

History totally backs him up.

Dang, I need to go read more history and inform myself of how stupid all this bickering war talk is.

Could look at it as if we're roleplaying the fights between the jeune ecole and the historical school.

No dude. It has everything to do with HUMAN NATURE. Take the panacea utopian blinkers off.