Fortress Command

Actually, the evidence is that the law-enforcement function is vested in RMN detachments, which may be _assigned_ to ACS facilities, but aren't ACS. ACS personnel aren't armed, and don't operate outside their cool, dim dens. Given how hairy Junction traffic control can be even in calm times, I'm sure that they have quite enough on their plates, thank you.

saber964 wrote:
MPARS and ACS are the equivalent of many of the Coast Guards today, take the US Coast Guard it is a civilian agency with military ranks and armed ships that does provide traffic control inside and outside major ports and conducts armed patrols in a law enforcement role along with Search and Rescue.

Right - ACS is more akin to modern Air Traffic Control than an actual police or military agency in function.

Meanwhile, the equivalent of NORAD is over in one of the armed Fortresses.

Louis R wrote:Actually, the evidence is that the law-enforcement function is vested in RMN detachments, which may be _assigned_ to ACS facilities, but aren't ACS. ACS personnel aren't armed, and don't operate outside their cool, dim dens. Given how hairy Junction traffic control can be even in calm times, I'm sure that they have quite enough on their plates, thank you.

saber964 wrote:
MPARS and ACS are the equivalent of many of the Coast Guards today, take the US Coast Guard it is a civilian agency with military ranks and armed ships that does provide traffic control inside and outside major ports and conducts armed patrols in a law enforcement role along with Search and Rescue.

Louis R wrote:Actually, the evidence is that the law-enforcement function is vested in RMN detachments, which may be _assigned_ to ACS facilities, but aren't ACS. ACS personnel aren't armed, and don't operate outside their cool, dim dens. Given how hairy Junction traffic control can be even in calm times, I'm sure that they have quite enough on their plates, thank you.

saber964 wrote:
MPARS and ACS are the equivalent of many of the Coast Guards today, take the US Coast Guard it is a civilian agency with military ranks and armed ships that does provide traffic control inside and outside major ports and conducts armed patrols in a law enforcement role along with Search and Rescue.

I said equivalent to many of the coast guards today, the USCG is one of the most heavily armed (=DD or FF) but many of of the world's coast guards are lightly armed (H/LMG) or only have side arms.

Do we know if Manticore is planning/constructing Junction Forts and scrambling pods at Sigma Draconis in lieu of Solarian reinforcements en route to Tsang's task force and possible/probable/inevitable attempt to punch out Beowulf?

If/when those forts are finished, given the discussion here, who/what kind of commander (personality and rank) would we see be given that command to cover a post as vital as the Sigma Draconis Terminus?

ChronicRder wrote:Do we know if Manticore is planning/constructing Junction Forts and scrambling pods at Sigma Draconis in lieu of Solarian reinforcements en route to Tsang's task force and possible/probable/inevitable attempt to punch out Beowulf?

If/when those forts are finished, given the discussion here, who/what kind of commander (personality and rank) would we see be given that command to cover a post as vital as the Sigma Draconis Terminus?

Given the state of Manticore's orbital manufacturing base right now, fortresses for Beowulf or its terminus are likely on Beowulf to build or relocate. The fortresses can't use the wormhole to get to Beowulf, so moving them would mean taking it apart, stuffing it in a freighter, carrying it through, unloading, and putting it back together - in the sight of League shipping and outside the hyperlimit, while the fortresses are still keenly needed at home. I don't see that happening. For that matter, Beowulf hasn't had fortresses at the terminus and they'd be better off keeping them near the planet now.

Pods, on the other hand, are easily moved and I think we can expect plenty of them to be waiting for the SLN near Beowulf. Politically, pods under BSDF control can't represent Manticoran plebiscite manipulation.

I wonder though - Supposing the SLN has to go to Sigma Draconis, if nothing else, to appear to be relevant still. There are two targets there: Beowulf and the terminus. Some of the least hopeless options the SLN has for generating wins will be attacks on Manticoran-held termini. Securing the Beowulf terminus - for the "protection" of Beowulf even, as well as to cut off a Manticoran highway into the Core - is something a larger SLN force may be prepared to do and something that won't play so badly for the Mandarins politically as muscling in on Beowulf itself. It can still read as that pressure as a subtext too while they can still plausibly deny any such intention.

JeffEngel wrote:snip...
I wonder though - Supposing the SLN has to go to Sigma Draconis, if nothing else, to appear to be relevant still. There are two targets there: Beowulf and the terminus. Some of the least hopeless options the SLN has for generating wins will be attacks on Manticoran-held termini. Securing the Beowulf terminus - for the "protection" of Beowulf even, as well as to cut off a Manticoran highway into the Core - is something a larger SLN force may be prepared to do and something that won't play so badly for the Mandarins politically as muscling in on Beowulf itself. It can still read as that pressure as a subtext too while they can still plausibly deny any such intention.

IIRC Isn't Alice Truman at the Beowulf terminus with 8th Fleet, (which has a very large percentage of Appollo enabled SDPs)? I don't think the SLN will have much luck, unless they improve their astrogation and can translate at the terminus within energy weapon range.

George J. Smith wrote:

JeffEngel wrote:snip...
I wonder though - Supposing the SLN has to go to Sigma Draconis, if nothing else, to appear to be relevant still. There are two targets there: Beowulf and the terminus. Some of the least hopeless options the SLN has for generating wins will be attacks on Manticoran-held termini. Securing the Beowulf terminus - for the "protection" of Beowulf even, as well as to cut off a Manticoran highway into the Core - is something a larger SLN force may be prepared to do and something that won't play so badly for the Mandarins politically as muscling in on Beowulf itself. It can still read as that pressure as a subtext too while they can still plausibly deny any such intention.

IIRC Isn't Alice Truman at the Beowulf terminus with 8th Fleet, (which has a very large percentage of Appollo enabled SDPs)? I don't think the SLN will have much luck, unless they improve their astrogation and can translate at the terminus within energy weapon range.

She was. Whether or not they will stay there remains to be seen. If the SLN thinks it can drop 200+ SD's within their powered missile range out of hyper there, they probably think they have a chance. (Energy range, of course, would be even better, but no one should be that hopeful.)

If they had some innocuous unit to scout for them near the terminus and translate up a few hyper bands, they might carefully arrange to drop down at about zero relative to the terminus and near it. That could be frustrated by GA pickets in hyper nearby, but the SLN may not figure they'll think of it. Neobarbs!

Just a bit of a nit here and I don't think that it really changes the argument. Don't think of the forts as completely stationary. They do have some capacity for movement although in comparison to a regular warship, it's limited.

I want to second the comment made earlier about the role politics plays in this. Deciding what weapons will be purchased is even more of a political decision than a military one. If you don't believe it, watch Congress or at least as graphic, think of the RMN's struggle in the Manticore Ascendant series.

Don

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I haven't finished reading the new posts in the thread as I have been busy at work.

My initial post was indented to ask the question of whether the situation would have been different if the Forts guarding the Junction were in fact SD's leaving only a handful bigger forts as fixed defences. Even if it is assumed that ton for ton the conversion is 1:.6 or .7 it would still be worthwhile because the Junction is a secondary objective in the immediate war.

So assuming at an average of 20,000,000 tons per fort for 124 forts that would translate to 177 new SD's even if we assume that the cost and manpower for 1 ton of fort equals to only half a ton of SD.

Why do I think the Junction is a secondary objective in the war? Because losing control of the Junction still leaves you with the three planets and all the industry that is in the inner system, sure it would be a heavy loss but the warfighting abilities of the SKM would have survived at least in the short term. So the motivation for starting the war for Haven was the junction, the knockout blow would not have been the junction, it would have to have been the destruction of all industry or most of it in the inner system and the subsequent capture of the capital.

During the first war with Haven, Home fleet was regularly stripped of ships of the wall, so you end up protecting your main industrial, military, manpower and political resource with a significantly smaller defensive force than you would protect a secondary resource such as the junction.

Having strong stationary defensive forces which could not offer mutual support means that they could be defeated in detail or Haven could have launched the first war with an attack on the Manticore System, destroyed Home Fleet which at the beginning of the first war was reduced to around 72 of the wall which to me means that if haven had reinforced their fleet that was to attack Grayson and instead launched against the Manticore Home system. The war would be over and Manticore would still have several hundred SD's worth of firepower around the Junction.


As for the political situation? I think that when Haven had the King assassinated, the government should have publicly and aggressively brought the traitors to trial and subsequently used that to force through stronger measures for rearmament. Keeping the assassination secret did more damage to their long term rearmament plans than bringing them to trial. The situation would most likely have been significantly better at the start of the war if the assassination had be exposed rather than covered up.

Sigs wrote:I haven't finished reading the new posts in the thread as I have been busy at work.

My initial post was indented to ask the question of whether the situation would have been different if the Forts guarding the Junction were in fact SD's leaving only a handful bigger forts as fixed defences. Even if it is assumed that ton for ton the conversion is 1:.6 or .7 it would still be worthwhile because the Junction is a secondary objective in the immediate war.

So assuming at an average of 20,000,000 tons per fort for 124 forts that would translate to 177 new SD's even if we assume that the cost and manpower for 1 ton of fort equals to only half a ton of SD.

Why do I think the Junction is a secondary objective in the war? Because losing control of the Junction still leaves you with the three planets and all the industry that is in the inner system, sure it would be a heavy loss but the warfighting abilities of the SKM would have survived at least in the short term. So the motivation for starting the war for Haven was the junction, the knockout blow would not have been the junction, it would have to have been the destruction of all industry or most of it in the inner system and the subsequent capture of the capital.

During the first war with Haven, Home fleet was regularly stripped of ships of the wall, so you end up protecting your main industrial, military, manpower and political resource with a significantly smaller defensive force than you would protect a secondary resource such as the junction.

Having strong stationary defensive forces which could not offer mutual support means that they could be defeated in detail or Haven could have launched the first war with an attack on the Manticore System, destroyed Home Fleet which at the beginning of the first war was reduced to around 72 of the wall which to me means that if haven had reinforced their fleet that was to attack Grayson and instead launched against the Manticore Home system. The war would be over and Manticore would still have several hundred SD's worth of firepower around the Junction.


As for the political situation? I think that when Haven had the King assassinated, the government should have publicly and aggressively brought the traitors to trial and subsequently used that to force through stronger measures for rearmament. Keeping the assassination secret did more damage to their long term rearmament plans than bringing them to trial. The situation would most likely have been significantly better at the start of the war if the assassination had be exposed rather than covered up.

As I recall the events surrounding Roger's assasination, the concern was the public outrage would have forced Manticore into a war for which she was not yet prepared. Hence the cover-up.

Don

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