Fortress Command

pnakasone wrote:

Sigs wrote:

SD's don't need to be seen as "offensive" weapons. They are essentially highly mobile defensive systems. Sell it to the Liberals that instead of building 124 Forts that may cost a million(random small round number) and defend one objective you can build 200-250 SD's that will have the option to defend not just one thing(the junction) but the Home System as well. It wont be an easy fight but the fruits of that victory would give the RMN the ability to fight Haven on the assumption that those 200-250 SDs would be defending everything in the Home System instead of the Junction Alone.

Politics of such decisions will not be rational ones.

Some groups will never be convinced that the SDs will be purely defensive no matter how you try and sell to them. They will still see them as antagonizing the situation and unneeded.

If I understand it correctly, King Roger and Later Queen Elizabeth were fighting for the funding not so much for what to build, so if they build 1.9 billion tons of fortress to protect one part of the SKM without contributing to the rest of the SKM's security. They managed to build at least 1.9 billion tons of Forts and that assumes there are only 124 forts at 16,000,000 tons each which is the extreme low end and 188 SD's and 120 DN's. The government build the ships despite the opposition why should it matter what they build for the money they get, what's the opposition going to do? Cry harder?

pnakasone wrote:The problem is your trying to change the minds of politicians that are completely convinced that SDs are one hundred percent offensive weapon platforms. They will never support more SDs being built.


What is military the best option to choice may never be the one you can convince the politicians to support.

If I recall the what was said in the novels the RMN had to fight tooth and nail to get what SDs they had when Honor was sent to Basilisk Station. There was a very strong belief among some of the political parties for as long as they did not antagonize the PRH they would be left alone. They saw building more SDs as antagonizing.

So they didn't have to fight for the forts? Are you saying that the opposition would have handed out as much money as necessary for forts as long as its not for ships?

Sigs wrote:

pnakasone wrote:The problem is your trying to change the minds of politicians that are completely convinced that SDs are one hundred percent offensive weapon platforms. They will never support more SDs being built.


What is military the best option to choice may never be the one you can convince the politicians to support.

If I recall the what was said in the novels the RMN had to fight tooth and nail to get what SDs they had when Honor was sent to Basilisk Station. There was a very strong belief among some of the political parties for as long as they did not antagonize the PRH they would be left alone. They saw building more SDs as antagonizing.

So they didn't have to fight for the forts? Are you saying that the opposition would have handed out as much money as necessary for forts as long as its not for ships?

YES

A liberal or insular conservative will feel that they can justify spending on a purely defensive installation to protect against the big bad universe but will not spend a dime on offensive systems that would be dual purpose. You see the same thing now when people will buy a defensive system such as SAMs rather than a tool that could be used to project power such as a F16 or MiG 29.

Or in the 1880s where congress would fund coast defense fortifications all over the US seaboard but didn't want to fund a few battleships that could defend all of it and could project power overseas. They can spend money on pure defense but not on what could be seen as offensive tools such as the battleships.

Sigs wrote:I'm not saying leave the junction defenceless, what I am suggesting is that if the RMN had say 200 SD's and 24 Forts instead of 124 Forts they would be able to keep the Forts and half of the SD's in and around the junction while the other half defend the Home System. This presents a dual safety feature, they can take the Junction and destroy the Infrastructure but they will not be able to keep the Junction because there is another 100 SD's in system ready to kick them out and at the same time, an attack on Manticore would have the effect of knowing that there are 100 SD's in Home Fleet and another 100 SD's in Reserve for Home Fleet around the Junction.

I forget if it was in the books or a post by David, but essentially the lethality of laser heads vs Peep ships was grossly underestimated and the effectiveness of Peep countermeasures and other defenses was also overestimated. Plus the forts had been designed when energy weapons were core, so they were designed to fight a mass transit of SDs at energy range combined with ships dropping in from Hyper firing massive missile salvos. {massive for 1890 anyhow...}

Sigs wrote:Yes they were, but then again the money spend on the Maginot Line could have been spend to improve further but more importantly they might have had a more aggressive mentality if there was no "impregnable" line.

No, because any equipment purchased in place off the fortifications would have been pretty much totally obsolete by 1940. The fortresses had issues involving poor planning for the growth of weapons, but wasn't a really big deal in 1940.

The problem was they didn't cover the rest of the border, but I've seen an analysis that said they couldn't afford to do that. Their assumption was that the Belgian fortresses would be a significant obstacle that would take days to weeks to reduce. The Germans taking them in an hour via air assaulting combat engineers was totally and completely a shocking surprise to all the Allies.

JeffEngel wrote:I'm not reading through all of this too carefully, but it looks like a key point has been missed (or rather, made in a ink Duckk posted but left buried in there): The manpower at least and probably the price does not translate nicely ton for ton.

Even if you assume all of them are no more than 16,000,000 tons which they specifically said applied only to the smallest of them and then assumed that 1 fort at 16,000,000 tons equal 1.5 SD’s that still doubles your SD’s. I don’t see why the forts should be that far off in crew requirements since the 124 forts once released millions of members for service with mobile fleet units once Trevor’s Star was captured.

JeffEngel wrote:You can spend a relatively small amount of dollars, build time, ongoing expense, and manpower with good fortresses for things you will not ever reasonably leave uncovered, which thereby frees up the funds, time, and people to build and support the larger mobile fleet. Manticore could have traded in all those fortresses for a fairly small number of SD's - which would then, as a strategic imperative, have had to remain covering the Junction inadequately anyway.

Granted those SD’s would have to remain in the Home System but they would defend the Planets, the yards and the junction while the forts represent tremendous amount of firepower that is fixed in one location and which cannot in a timely manner reinforce or even threaten an enemy that attacks the Capital planet. Do you think there would be more danger of a direct attack on Manticore if Haven knows there are 80 SD’s and DN’s Guarding the system plus 124 forts at the junction which wont be able to interfere or if there are 80 SD’s and DN’s in Home Fleet plus another 150 or 200 SD’s at the junction that can reinforce Home Fleet in a pinch. Leaving that firepower fixed to protect a secondary objective seems like a waste of resources to me.

Silverwall wrote:

YES

A liberal or insular conservative will feel that they can justify spending on a purely defensive installation to protect against the big bad universe but will not spend a dime on offensive systems that would be dual purpose. You see the same thing now when people will buy a defensive system such as SAMs rather than a tool that could be used to project power such as a F16 or MiG 29.

Or in the 1880s where congress would fund coast defense fortifications all over the US seaboard but didn't want to fund a few battleships that could defend all of it and could project power overseas. They can spend money on pure defense but not on what could be seen as offensive tools such as the battleships.

And if it was made clear that the forts were not an option? Just because some people have blinders on doesn't mean the majority of the population can be blind knowing that their major source of income is unprotected and they themselves are unprotected.

They already had 300 Ships of the wall build, building another 150 or 200 instead of the forts would not be that much of a problem.

kzt wrote:

Sigs wrote:Yes they were, but then again the money spend on the Maginot Line could have been spend to improve further but more importantly they might have had a more aggressive mentality if there was no "impregnable" line.

No, because any equipment purchased in place off the fortifications would have been pretty much totally obsolete by 1940. The fortresses had issues involving poor planning for the growth of weapons, but wasn't a really big deal in 1940.

The problem was they didn't cover the rest of the border, but I've seen an analysis that said they couldn't afford to do that. Their assumption was that the Belgian fortresses would be a significant obstacle that would take days to weeks to reduce. The Germans taking them in an hour via air assaulting combat engineers was totally and completely a shocking surprise to all the Allies.

The allies already had pretty much parity with the Germans in 1940, the money, resources and manpower from the Maginot line might have tipped the balance further in their favour.

It was their leadership and motivation that was lacking, the French had the Maginot Line which was supposed to be impregnable and their thinking was defensive, when the Germans were attacking Poland they had at one point something like 25-30 division guarding the west if the Maginot line did not exist the French Might have been more offensive minded.

Sigs wrote:They already had 300 Ships of the wall build, building another 150 or 200 instead of the forts would not be that much of a problem.

The forts were built well before the war, probably during the 1880s as they were primarily energy weapon based. If they were SDs the would have been pretty much obsolete at the star of the war.

Sigs wrote:

Silverwall wrote:

YES

A liberal or insular conservative will feel that they can justify spending on a purely defensive installation to protect against the big bad universe but will not spend a dime on offensive systems that would be dual purpose. You see the same thing now when people will buy a defensive system such as SAMs rather than a tool that could be used to project power such as a F16 or MiG 29.

Or in the 1880s where congress would fund coast defense fortifications all over the US seaboard but didn't want to fund a few battleships that could defend all of it and could project power overseas. They can spend money on pure defense but not on what could be seen as offensive tools such as the battleships.

And if it was made clear that the forts were not an option? Just because some people have blinders on doesn't mean the majority of the population can be blind knowing that their major source of income is unprotected and they themselves are unprotected.

They already had 300 Ships of the wall build, building another 150 or 200 instead of the forts would not be that much of a problem.

Ah but remember that until the fall of the High Ridge government that in the SKM the House of Lords controlled the purse strings it had more then enough "liberal or insular conservative" members to severely limit the spending on more SDs.