"Obsolete SDs" Waste not...

Castenea wrote:I find the likelihood of heavy subsidies and tech transfers to systems contemplating, or recently seceded from the SL to be unlikely in all but a few cases (and Beowulf already has the tech).

As I mentioned, we are discussing systems that have parity technologically with Manticore at least on civilian tech and have tremendous industrial capabilities much more than Grayson had.

Starting from Scratch, they can build enough ship yards to maintain their SD's within a couple of years and improve on them from that point or if they want to import warships they can just maintain repair facilities.

As for motivation? SLN is no longer protecting them, most systems will take whatever action and make whatever sacrifice needed to get some degree of security for themselves and grow their capabilities from there on out.

Core and shell systems may not have shipyards in place but most will have space born industry of one sort or another, what's more there is ground based industrial potential. All of that put towards building and manning shipyard shouldn't be hard to pull off. I'm not talking about yards to rival Manticore's before they were destroyed but something that can meet some of their needs and provide a core for expansion.

And more important, there are strategic reasons for the GA to keep as many core systems stable and save as they can.

Sigs wrote:Look at Grayson as an example, they went from a fleet made of obsolete cruisers and destroyers to a fleet of SD's in a relatively short time. Admittedly they had a lot of help from Manticore but they also started far behind technologically and industrially then most core and shell worlds if not all of them. Many of the core and shell worlds as mentioned by the mandarins have the means to build respectable fleets if motivated properly and what better motivation than the disintegration of the SLN and the disappearance of their security.

Those SD's are there to provide the core around which a fleet will be build and to be essentially a bicycle with training wheels, you learn how to operate the ships, learn how to operate as a force, build the infrastructure and training system etc... And to be fair Manticore has experience building up its allies from nothing to a useful and competent fleet. And most of those allies were at best a third world country compared to a core or a shell world.

Grayson was getting massive help from Manticore bootstrapping their fleet. The only reason they were ready to handle the captured SDs was because they'd been working their yards up steadily towards that goal from pretty much the minute the ink was dry on the alliance treaty with Manticore.

They had internal experience with designing, maintaining, and operating naval ships prior to that (admittedly of quite obsolete technology) - but they had their people getting Manticoran training, were receiving Manticoran industrial tooling and education, has access to Manticore's naval design expertise, received surplus Manticoran hulls - along with spares and instruction on how to maintain them. Oh, and were sending plenty of their current and upcoming naval personnel through Manticoran or Manticoran derived training schools - not to mention the significant fraction of their navy made up of loaners from the RMN.

Even getting basically turnkey Manticoran shipyard tech, and loaners and instructors show and teach their surprisingly vast number of vacuum rated construction and repair crews how to use the modern tools, it still took them 4 years to get up to home built BCs and the (relatively minor) repairs to the captured PSN SDs. And they still couldn't man their own growing fleet without all the loaners from Manticore.


I don't see any of the systems splitting off getting that kind of support from Manticore (or Haven). Yes, their basic tech base will be higher than Graysons, but on the other hand they'll probably have far less people used to construction and repair work in space, and they won't have the naval design experience. And however obsolete Grayson's naval hardware was it wasn't static - there had been major improvements in just the last 35-40 years; so while their naval designers weren't used to the latest toys they were used to working out how best to integrate a steady stream of improving capabilities into their designs. So that seems like an excellent background to get a whole new generations of improved hardware. Yes they had to learn its ins and outs (with Manticoran help) but at least they were used to designing warships, and moreover used to frequently wrestling with how to manage to apply new technology to the issues.

Most systems with SDFs will probably be closer to Erewhon, who was used to buying their ships "off the shelf" from someone else. They didn't really have a naval design tradition or experience (which is probably why it took them a decade or so longer than Grayson, and second-hand looks and the new designs, to bring up naval shipyard and start laying down podlayers). The SDFs won't even benifit from the partical tech package from Manticore.
Even the systems that do build warships are probably very much used to the couple century "plateau" of warfighting tech - the last time the League's ship design underwent a technological revolution would have been under one of the final pre-prolong generations -- so its very likely that no active warship architects in the League have any direct experience with integrating evolving tech improvements into their designs. Many of them are probably in a nice design rut; it's hard to immediately grow the mental flexibility to rethink all your assumptions given a new tech pallet. (Though the good news for them is they can copy off of others work - at least in the broad impossible to hide strokes)

Sigs wrote:As I mentioned, we are discussing systems that have parity technologically with Manticore at least on civilian tech and have tremendous industrial capabilities much more than Grayson had.

Starting from Scratch, they can build enough ship yards to maintain their SD's within a couple of years and improve on them from that point or if they want to import warships they can just maintain repair facilities.

A system defense missile production line and improved LAC production yards would take less time and be as, or more, effective at defending against the SLN. Even the monster System Defense Missiles and Pods Technodyne deployed in Monica would be a superior defense against an SLN task force.

If any system can't or won't build its own defensive systems, there are numerous extra-solarian polities that would be willing to sell them whatever they want -- system defense missiles and advanced-LACs are the cheapest option and what the taxpayers are most willing to pay for.

No system needs hyper-capable ships for defense. Multi-planet star-nations need Hyper-capable navies to reduce travel time between components of the star-nation, but single-planet nations can't actually use hyperspace in defending their territory since most of it is going to be inside the hyper-limit.

For the most part, the only thing a Navy needs hyper-capable ships for is offensive action.

NB: there is a world of difference between "Want" and "Need."

Jonathan_S wrote:Grayson was getting massive help from Manticore bootstrapping their fleet. The only reason they were ready to handle the captured SDs was because they'd been working their yards up steadily towards that goal from pretty much the minute the ink was dry on the alliance treaty with Manticore.

Agree with you 100%. But in real world terms Grayson would be Tanzania and Canada would be a core world. They might have similar populations but their industrial capabilities are significantly different.

Grayson needed help across the board, not just building up their shipyards and military but also civilian technology, medical technology etc... they also used only 1/4 or less of their population in their antiquated industry on top of that. A core world that treats men and women equally would right there have access to 100% of their potential workforce.

Second, I suspect a core world would have pretty high % of it's population with prolong while Grayson had none.

What is more, core worlds would likely be well represented in the SLN, meaning that anyone that the GA captured or captures can be convinced to go home as the League starts to disintegrate and it becomes easier when they start seeing the League lashing out against their home systems. After all we know that the league does not seem to expect primary loyalty to itself even in it's armed forces.

Jonathan_S wrote:They had internal experience with designing, maintaining, and operating naval ships prior to that (admittedly of quite obsolete technology) - but they had their people getting Manticoran training, were receiving Manticoran industrial tooling and education, has access to Manticore's naval design expertise, received surplus Manticoran hulls - along with spares and instruction on how to maintain them. Oh, and were sending plenty of their current and upcoming naval personnel through Manticoran or Manticoran derived training schools - not to mention the significant fraction of their navy made up of loaners from the RMN.

I am not suggesting that the SEM and the GA throw some core world a few SD's and leave them to their own devices, what I am suggesting is creating a template for setting up a military from A-Z, what needs to be done, how it needs to be done etc...

GA moves into a core world that has asked for peace after seceding from the League and sets up a training academy for that nation and its immediate neighbours. They deploy a training cadre to set up those schools and set up a crash course for officers, enlisted etc... and since the merchant marine was recalled they can safely mobilize a good chunk of the reserve. At the same time Haven starts designing ships for export, SD's, DN's, BB's, BC's etc...and invite newly independent nations to observe and participate. Haven benefits because the first batch of ships will be built in Haven. What's more, they have all of their infrastructure and manpower still alive which means they can set up advisory teams to help set up the necessary infrastructure.

Jonathan_S wrote:Even getting basically turnkey Manticoran shipyard tech, and loaners and instructors show and teach their surprisingly vast number of vacuum rated construction and repair crews how to use the modern tools, it still took them 4 years to get up to home built BCs and the (relatively minor) repairs to the captured PSN SDs. And they still couldn't man their own growing fleet without all the loaners from Manticore.

And many of the core worlds would have space born industry so they would also have construction crews and technicians. Plus the GA would still have to provide some loaners to the newly created navies but that's a fact of life and more importantly it allows them to influence those navies and their views from the inside.

Jonathan_S wrote:I don't see any of the systems splitting off getting that kind of support from Manticore (or Haven). Yes, their basic tech base will be higher than Graysons, but on the other hand they'll probably have far less people used to construction and repair work in space, and they won't have the naval design experience. And however obsolete Grayson's naval hardware was it wasn't static - there had been major improvements in just the last 35-40 years; so while their naval designers weren't used to the latest toys they were used to working out how best to integrate a steady stream of improving capabilities into their designs. So that seems like an excellent background to get a whole new generations of improved hardware. Yes they had to learn its ins and outs (with Manticoran help) but at least they were used to designing warships, and moreover used to frequently wrestling with how to manage to apply new technology to the issues.

If I remember correctly, it was mentioned somewhere that the SLN had somewhere in the neighbourhood of half a dozen to a dozen ship yards with maintenance and ship building capabilities plus the reserve etc... if the GA could secure as many of those yards as they can it would keep the capabilities from the League, provide them with more captured SLN ships to give out and what's more it might even give them more SLN personnel willing to ditch the SLN and go to their home worlds. Now you have places where the ships are build so you have solved the immediate infrastructure and supply problems and you have a place to concentrate designing and training of construction crews.

Jonathan_S wrote:Even the systems that do build warships are probably very much used to the couple century "plateau" of warfighting tech - the last time the League's ship design underwent a technological revolution would have been under one of the final pre-prolong generations -- so its very likely that no active warship architects in the League have any direct experience with integrating evolving tech improvements into their designs. Many of them are probably in a nice design rut; it's hard to immediately grow the mental flexibility to rethink all your assumptions given a new tech pallet. (Though the good news for them is they can copy off of others work - at least in the broad impossible to hide strokes)

But as I mentioned earlier, if those systems are captured they could be guided by the GA specifically. Give them designs from 1900 Manticore and an export version of Haven's LAC's to jumpstart their designing. And better yet, the GA can guide and monitor their progress and could cut off anyone who presents a problem.


A lot of your points are valid, but whether they are valid or not many of the core worlds if not all will have a tough decision to make and at the end of the day necessity is the mother of invention. They will need to build a military anyway, Manticore might help them out and get some degree of loyalty from them or leave them be but wither way hundreds if not thousands of new navies will be popping up. So if they don't have access to warships they will convert freighters, shuttles or space stations into their armed forces.


Just because you might be right in many of your points does not mean they wont have to do it, nor does it mean they wont find a way to get around a lot of the problems.

Weird Harold wrote:
A system defense missile production line and improved LAC production yards would take less time and be as, or more, effective at defending against the SLN. Even the monster System Defense Missiles and Pods Technodyne deployed in Monica would be a superior defense against an SLN task force.

And you are still faced with exactly the same problems:
-Setting up the infrastructure to supply those defences
-Setting infrastructure to maintain those defences
-Training the crews
etc etc etc

Weird Harold wrote:If any system can't or won't build its own defensive systems, there are numerous extra-solarian polities that would be willing to sell them whatever they want -- system defense missiles and advanced-LACs are the cheapest option and what the taxpayers are most willing to pay for

I disagree on this one, I doubt the GA would be willing to let them have modern LAC's except in a dumbed down export version. And more importantly, tax payers will be willing to pay for whatever it takes to ensure their security. Convincing your tax payers to build, man and maintain a dozen SD's while the SLN is the big bad wolf might be hard, convincing them to build a serious fleet when the SLN is not so invincible, the League is disintegrating and your neighbours might be in an empire building mode seems like it would be easy... you wont even have to convince them to do it, they would demand it from their own government.

Weird Harold wrote:
No system needs hyper-capable ships for defense. Multi-planet star-nations need Hyper-capable navies to reduce travel time between components of the star-nation, but single-planet nations can't actually use hyperspace in defending their territory since most of it is going to be inside the hyper-limit.

For the most part, the only thing a Navy needs hyper-capable ships for is offensive action.

NB: there is a world of difference between "Want" and "Need."

1) In some cases they would be working with their neighbours and forging alliances, it would be pretty hard to form an alliance if none of the members can come to each others aid.

2)The best defence is a good offence. If you don't have offensive weapons to come after me I can do any number of things that would leave you virtually defenceless. If I have the means to build hyper capable ships and you don't you will be at my mercy and your defence infrastructure would be open for attack while mine would be quite safe because you cannot actually come at me.

But in a certain situation want and need might reverse places. Queen Elizabeth and the RMN probably didn't WANT to have nearly 300 of the wall in service in 1905 but they needed to because the situation called for it.

The US probably didn't want to have in excess of 12,000,000 servicemen in World War 2 but they sure as hell needed them.



As for most of the arguments about training and trained manpower:

The US Army numbers:
1939-189,000
1945-8,267,000
The US army increase by ~43 times in a span of 6 years


US Navy:
1939-125,000
1945-3,380,000
The US Navy increase by ~27 times in the same time frame.

Between 1930 and 1941 the USN build 5 Carriers and 1 Battleship but in 1941 they had 10 Battleships and 11 Carriers under construction.

Between 1941 and 1945 the US navy build 141 carriers that is 25 times as many carriers in 4 years as they build in the previous 11.

They build 10 BB's, that's 10 times as many BB's as they build in the previous 11 years.


The US did exactly what everyone seems to be suggesting is impossible. Granted they had a powerful fleet and limited shipbuilding before the war but the massive expansion is such a short amount of time shows us that if it is necessary it will happen no matter what.


So to recap, the US Navy increased:
-their manpower by over 27 times in the span 6 years
-Their carriers strength by 20 times in the span of 6 years


if they can do it in 1939-1945 why cant someone do it 2000 years in the future and they would be in actual danger to boot.

Sigs wrote:So to recap, the US Navy increased:
-their manpower by over 27 times in the span 6 years
-Their carriers strength by 20 times in the span of 6 years


if they can do it in 1939-1945 why cant someone do it 2000 years in the future and they would be in actual danger to boot.

Well, because reasons!

Like how it's impossible to put more than a trivial percentage of your population in uniform because if you put say 10% of the population in uniform, like the US in WW2, your economy would immediately collapse, just like the US economy in WW2 did. See, it's all perfectly clear.

Sigs wrote:if they can do it in 1939-1945 why cant someone do it 2000 years in the future and they would be in actual danger to boot.

Because the Honorverse doesn't work that way (yes, this doesn't seem to make much sense to 21st century sensibilities, but we don't make the rules for the Honorverse, David Weber does)? The ~1% of its population under arms that Manticore topped out at late in the 1st war is far higher than any other polity in the Honorverse even came close to except possibly Grayson, which is a very special case.

Sigs wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:
A system defense missile production line and improved LAC production yards would take less time and be as, or more, effective at defending against the SLN. Even the monster System Defense Missiles and Pods Technodyne deployed in Monica would be a superior defense against an SLN task force.

And you are still faced with exactly the same problems:
-Setting up the infrastructure to supply those defences
-Setting infrastructure to maintain those defences
-Training the crews
etc etc etc

Yes, the same problems, but on a much smaller scale. Missiles can be built in numerous small factories. Warships require a lot more infrastructure and space.

Missiles can be maintained in the equivalent of a small barn, warships require a multi-megaton sized dock.

Training a crew of ten for one LAC gives you cadre to teach ten more crews, etc, ad nauseum.

LACs are 20-thousand tons, Scientist-class SDs are around 4-Million Tons. (Shrike-class) LACs require a crew of ten, Scientist-Class SDs can't even move without a thousand-man ferry crew. Normal Crew is 6,000 and that doesn't account for the necessary OJT students in every department.

Sigs wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:If any system can't or won't build its own defensive systems, there are numerous extra-solarian polities that would be willing to sell them whatever they want -- system defense missiles and advanced-LACs are the cheapest option and what the taxpayers are most willing to pay for

I disagree on this one, I doubt the GA would be willing to let them have modern LAC's except in a dumbed down export version. And more importantly, tax payers will be willing to pay for whatever it takes to ensure their security.

I did NOT say the GA would provide, I said "numerous extra-solarian polities." That would include the Andermani, Erewhon, Zanzibar, Alizon, Maya, and several others we only have names or hints of.

A "dumbed down" export version of any GA LAC would be sufficient for most systems. Once the basic layout of a modern Haven-sector LAC is known or deduced, they aren't that difficult to copy -- as the RHN has shown. Getting the same performance as front-line Shrike, Ferrets and Katana's might take a decade or two, but the first generation Cimmeterre performance should be doable by any reasonably technological society.

As for the rest of your arguments, I don't share your paranoia and we've already hashed out our respective positions; I see no point in repeating myself.

kzt wrote:

Sigs wrote:So to recap, the US Navy increased:
-their manpower by over 27 times in the span 6 years
-Their carriers strength by 20 times in the span of 6 years


if they can do it in 1939-1945 why cant someone do it 2000 years in the future and they would be in actual danger to boot.

Well, because reasons!

Like how it's impossible to put more than a trivial percentage of your population in uniform because if you put say 10% of the population in uniform, like the US in WW2, your economy would immediately collapse, just like the US economy in WW2 did. See, it's all perfectly clear.

I don't think Manticore's concern was a collapse of it's economy. Their concern at least in the books was that if you go over the 1-1.5% mark it would start changing the face of the economy. Just like WW2 US economy changed from a peacetime economy to geared almost exclusively for war while the US economy during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan did not feel the same impact. Think how much different the war would have felt for the citizens of the US if the US Armed Forces were say doubled or tripled by 2005-2007? Instead of having 3 million in uniform total there would have been 6-9 million in uniform and the economy would have definitely changed.

drothgery wrote:

Sigs wrote:if they can do it in 1939-1945 why cant someone do it 2000 years in the future and they would be in actual danger to boot.

Because the Honorverse doesn't work that way (yes, this doesn't seem to make much sense to 21st century sensibilities, but we don't make the rules for the Honorverse, David Weber does)? The ~1% of its population under arms that Manticore topped out at late in the 1st war is far higher than any other polity in the Honorverse even came close to except possibly Grayson, which is a very special case.

Because I would imagine there are limitations. Having 100,000,000 people in naval uniform means nothing if you don't have the ships for those people to man. But more importantly, what Nation had the need to have that many people in uniform? Aside from Grayson, Manticore, Haven and their minor allies we haven't seen anybody at a protracted war.