Last use for SL SD captured

Somtaaw wrote:The FTL comms had so many iterations, I can't imagine more than perhaps a central "system defense HQ" will have a recent FTL comm, just to check if newly arrived forces are friendlies. More of a throwback to Second Yeltsin and the very very early iteration of FTL drones, rather than all up Ghost Rider spinoff's that were developed later.

FTL communications are actually a separate issue in my mind. That technology -- minus the micro-miniaturization -- is going to be virtually universal inside a decade. There will be commercial and dedicated military equivalents of Hermes Buoys everywhere just as soon as they can be built. There will be far more effort expended in acquiring that technology than any military tech.

Manticore, Haven, Anderman, Grayson, Erewhon, and anyone else with anything close to Manticoran military bandwidth have a choice: Profit by selling installations or watch as somebody else gets rich.

Weird Harold wrote:

Sigs wrote:So you are encouraging arming potential enemies with modern weapons? Did the US supply Iraq with modern weapons and equipment in 2003 right before they invaded?

Since you persistently (intentionally?) misunderstand the point there's no point in me reiterating it again.

What is the point? You want to give some systems a classification of "ally" and give them advanced weapon systems thereby eliminating the GA's main advantage which by the way is technology.

There are at least a dozen major RF systems, what is to prevent the GA from unknowingly making an alliance with anyone of them and handing over their technology to the MA in one go?


A huge % of newly independent systems will want to be left alone to form their own one system nations or unite into multi system nations. Few if any will want to turn around, ally with the GA and fight the League. Even fewer have any means with which to assist the GA in the short to medium term even if the GA provided all the weapons.

So for the 10 years after the last book that came out, we can expect the GA to encourage one way or another the majority of systems to leave the League and declare neutrality. If some nation wants to become an ally then they can be made a minor ally and given SLN equipment and ships until they have proven their loyalty because if the GA misjudges a nation it would be easier to fix the problem if that nation is armed with SLN kit than if it is armed with GA kit.

kzt wrote:

Sigs wrote:So you are encouraging arming potential enemies with modern weapons? Did the US supply Iraq with modern weapons and equipment in 2003 right before they invaded?

No, that was the role of France.

And if I remember correctly, France did not invade Iraq.

darrell wrote:
Giving ADAQUATE PROTECTION does not mean giving the secrets to your technology. Give them manty system defence pods and mycroft means giving them MDM's, micro fusion reactors, and apollo, three very important techs. There are ways to give them Adaquate protection without that.

newly liberated systems will need protection against 2 main threats. Only sell technology that haven can build, this provides income for the GA to fund it's war effort.

The first threat is against pirates. To defend against pirates, how about haven building a couple squarons of LAC's to sell, an upgraded version of the series 282 LAC's but with enhanced automation, more CM tubes, CM's and PDLC's. Where the series 282 are 17,750 tons
, the series 393's (for lack of a better name) would be about 20K tons.

To counter the SLN trying to retake the system, build a system defense missile using ERM technology, and pair it with missile pods and the moriarity system used by haven. ERM's have about the range of the cataphract, but with warheads bigger than capital ship missiles, 5,000 pods should easily win against a force twice the size crandal hit spindle with.

By giving them better but not best technology, if the MA, RF, or SL got the technology, the GA could still out range them.

I have no problem with giving adequate protection, my issue stems from giving away the secrets that represent the biggest advantage that the GA possesses. If the GA can make export weapon systems that do not give away their main advantage then great.

darrell wrote:
You are apparently reversed on how the SL is going to come apart. it is going to disintegrate from the outside in.

First ot leave would be Beowulf's daughter colonies. I expect them to leave the SL within 3 months of Beowulf leaving.

Most of the protectorates hate the SL and will jump on any chance to succeed. When the protectorates start learning that other protectorates were successful in leaving the SL, along with beowulf and her daughter colonies, suddenly there will be many hundreds of rebellions (1,000+?) and in a few months there won't be very many protectorates.

Next to leave will be systems in the shell. A large percentage of them used to be protectorates but became full members of the SL as a matter of self protection. They will be happy to leave if given just the least excuse.

Last to leave will be core systems. As a matter of fact I expect the SL to survive in name only with just a couple hundred core systems remaining when they sue for peace against the GA.

How many protectorates, shell and core systems have their own fleets?

As I said the SLN might be impotent against the GA but they still have almost 1,900 SD's and probably in excess of 9,000 lighter combatants in service which means they can use force to keep systems in the League thereby forcing the GA to disperse their strength to free those systems one by one.

Weird Harold wrote:

Somtaaw wrote:and piddly little Zanzibar & Alizon got little to nothing from tech advancement.

Our only look at Zanzibar and Alizon's defenses were before Apollo but they both had the LAC squadrons and MDM System defense missiles. Neither side was fielding Moriarity or Mycroft at the time, so they didn't have those C3 systems. They both apparently did have FTL comms.

Essentially, Zanzibar and Alizon are the template for what I consider minimum defenses.

But if I am not mistaken most of the fixed and heavy mobile defences in Alizon and Zanzibar were manned by Manticore or Grayson.

Sigs wrote:But if I am not mistaken most of the fixed and heavy mobile defences in Alizon and Zanzibar were manned by Manticore or Grayson.

Under the direct command of the ranking local naval officer...

Which is another aspect of Manticore's historic behavior with those who it makes treaties with that you choose to ignore.

Alizon and Zanzibar also got technical assistance in the form of shipyard improvements and contracts to build light combatants. A feature that may or may not be part of treaties with former League members.

FWIW, you'd fit right in with the High Ridge administration and Janecek admiralty....

Weird Harold wrote:

Sigs wrote:But if I am not mistaken most of the fixed and heavy mobile defences in Alizon and Zanzibar were manned by Manticore or Grayson.

Under the direct command of the ranking local naval officer...

Which is another aspect of Manticore's historic behavior with those who it makes treaties with that you choose to ignore.

Note that Zanzibar and Alizon were both *full members of the manticoran alliance*, i.e. signed on to actively fight haven under manticore's leadership. That doesn't strike me as anywhere near the same sort of relationship as the alliance would have with random systems they've managed to pry away from the league. IMO, systems that want actual manty tech are going to have to do more than just sign a mutual defense treaty. A moriarty hub, ERM pods, and some havenite-grade-tech LACs (as darrell suggested), maybe, but not actual MDMs, FTL com, microfusion missiles/drones, fully modern LACs, etc.

FWIW, you'd fit right in with the High Ridge administration and Janecek admiralty....

That's rather uncalled for.

MuonNeutrino wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:FWIW, you'd [Sigs would] fit right in with the High Ridge administration and Janecek admiralty....

That's rather uncalled for.

Why? Is Sigs too paranoid even for Janacek's Admiralty?

MuonNeutrino wrote:IMO, systems that want actual manty tech are going to have to do more than just sign a mutual defense treaty.

What exactly would they have to do? Signing a mutual defense treaty is how Alizon and Zanzibar became "full members of the MA" What more is one of Beowulf's daughter colonies, for example, going to have to do to get Manticoran Tech?

What are you offering to a potential ally that they can't buy from the Andermani or Erewhon?

In some cases, surplus RHN Cimmeterre A and a Moriarty C3 set will be adequate -- although almost everyone is going to demand at least dual drive system defense missiles.

In other cases, something closer to Beowulf's defensive systems is going to be the minimum acceptable package to get someone to sign a mutual defense treaty.

The GA needs those mutual defense treaties to build a stable peace, or at least block the formation of a large treaty organization to replace the league.

Storm From The Shadows
Chapter Forty-four
Honor Alexander-Harrington speaking: wrote:And once we have those peace treaties, we have to not only honor them, but step beyond them. We need to use trade incentives, mutual defense pacts, educational assistance, every single thing we can think of to show them that we are—and to really be, not just pretend to be—the sort of neighbor and ally they'll want around. In other words, once we break the League militarily, once we splinter it into multiple, mutually independent star nations, we have to see to it that none of those star nations have any motive to fuse themselves back together and gang up on us all over again."

Weird Harold wrote:

MuonNeutrino wrote:That's rather uncalled for.

Why? Is Sigs too paranoid even for Janacek's Admiralty?

It's uncalled for because we're having a discussion here, and we're all at least theoretically having it in good faith. There's no call to start tossing around insults.

What exactly would they have to do? Signing a mutual defense treaty is how Alizon and Zanzibar became "full members of the MA" What more is one of Beowulf's daughter colonies, for example, going to have to do to get Manticoran Tech?

I think we're somewhat talking past each other here. At least in my mind, a mutual defense treaty between two star nations both in the path of the oncoming peep juggernaut, who both know that war is coming and coming soon, and that by signing such a treaty they're effectively signing on as full co-defendants in an imminent hot shooting war, is not the same thing as *just* a mutual defense treaty between recent enemies still feeling their way into a non-antagonistic relationship, and the junior partner of which is not actually actively at war. (Note that, for example, Erewhon had a mutual defense treaty with Haven during the second war, but was still not a participant.)

But it feels to me that you're regarding a mutual defense treaty as a significantly closer relationship that I am, which is why I think we're talking past each other. Definitely anyone who is actually signing on as an ally (e.g. your example of one of Beowulf's daughter colonies, who presumably would be eager to follow their mother world in going after the alignment) would justifiably get manty tech in relatively short order.

Basically, to me *just* having a mutual defense treaty with a SL successor world/state doesn't imply the sort of close relationship it seems to me that it does to you. (To me it basically translates to 'we're at peace now and we'll come help if someone screws with you', not 'we're allies'.) I certainly agree that any SL successor state that shows signs of wanting to be an actual *ally* deserves protection, and if that's the sort of thing you meant then we're not actually in disagreement.