SLN Logistics

kzt wrote:

SYED wrote:Just the league and tramstellar a are blocked from the terminii, the verge merchant ships are potentially free to travel.

Great news government of Fiji, we have banned all European,US, Japanese, Australian, Chinese and Russian airlines, but you can get service from Ariana Afghan Airways, and Nepal Airlines.

They haven't banned Manticore, Haven, other Andermani ships, so there could be a significant amount of traffic to other than the league.

fallsfromtrees wrote:They haven't banned Manticore, Haven, other Andermani ships, so there could be a significant amount of traffic to other than the league.

They banned manticoran traffic to the SL a few books ago.

To take this bit seriously for a second or two, Singapore Airlines, Air India & Thai International would be salivating if this happened. KAL wouldn't be far behind them. Air New Zealand already flies into Nandi daily, for that matter, and I really doubt that anyone would even notice the banning of the Russians or Chinese.

kzt wrote:

SYED wrote:Just the league and tramstellar a are blocked from the terminii, the verge merchant ships are potentially free to travel.

Great news government of Fiji, we have banned all European,US, Japanese, Australian, Chinese and Russian airlines, but you can get service from Ariana Afghan Airways, and Nepal Airlines.

Weird Harold wrote:

Louis R wrote:Whose plane needed that strut?

I really don't recall. I was in Red section and the strut was for yellow or blue section. We just had a plane due to rotate stateside to carry the adapter so its replacement could ferry the strut back.

I think I can top your story, (although not in terms of distance).

During the Second World War my Uncle Pete was in the Fleet Air Arm. His mum, my grandma, waved goodbye to him when he was due to report for duty. Twenty four hours later there was a knock on the door & she was amazed to find Uncle Peter standing there. When he had reported for duty at his new station he happened to mention that he played the saxophone. When they asked him if he had brought it with him he said he had left it at his Mum's house. They then laid a plane on for him to fly from RNAS Machrihanish in Argyle, Scotland to RNAS Stretton near Warrington, (in wartime, remember) & then laid a car on to take him from Stretton to his Mum's house in Sale near Manchester just so he could collect his saxophone & then fly him all the way back up to Machrihanish: (For anybody who doesn't know where these places are look them up & you will get an idea of the effort involved just so one new recruit could collect his saxophone).

I think the logistics couLd be the death knell of the league. This whol conflict has shown and widened cracks in the league, the inbuilt corruption worsening the situation. We suspect Mesa has set it up so not only is the league going to have to fight the manties, but they will face internal rebellion. Those secreting to be free of league abuses, while others attempt to seize power for themselves.
The cost to attempt to not. Only go on the offensive on multiple frontiers will not be sustainable. The sheer lack of shipping and denied access to the termini will be huge obstacles. The league has little or no experience on working on an extended logistical line. So they would attempt to build on their existing system. This would mean depots and warehouses will become priority targets. Deny them this, and the field forces would shrivel and die.

Rincewind wrote:
I think I can top your story, (although not in terms of distance).

During the Second World War my Uncle Pete was in the Fleet Air Arm. His mum, my grandma, waved goodbye to him when he was due to report for duty. Twenty four hours later there was a knock on the door & she was amazed to find Uncle Peter standing there. When he had reported for duty at his new station he happened to mention that he played the saxophone. When they asked him if he had brought it with him he said he had left it at his Mum's house. They then laid a plane on for him to fly from RNAS Machrihanish in Argyle, Scotland to RNAS Stretton near Warrington, (in wartime, remember) & then laid a car on to take him from Stretton to his Mum's house in Sale near Manchester just so he could collect his saxophone & then fly him all the way back up to Machrihanish: (For anybody who doesn't know where these places are look them up & you will get an idea of the effort involved just so one new recruit could collect his saxophone).

Yeah, but that is an example of wasting resources for one little thing... try supplying an infantry platoon of 30 soldiers with an F-16... Can it be done? Probably... under some circumstances but I doubt anyone will go ahead and deploy an infantry platoon to Afghanistan and use an F-16 to keep them supplied with rations, ammunition, medical supplies, batteries for the radios etc etc etc...



Using a fighter to move a piece of equipment when nothing else is available is one thing, continuously supplying a combat unit in combat is completely different. Can the SLN use SD's to support and supply BC's? For a short time maybe but how much cargo space do you think does an SD have, and what kind of capabilities does it have to transfer those same supplies?

Sigs wrote:try supplying an infantry platoon of 30 soldiers with an F-16... Can it be done? Probably... under some circumstances but I doubt anyone will go ahead and deploy an infantry platoon to Afghanistan and use an F-16 to keep them supplied with rations, ammunition, medical supplies, batteries for the radios etc etc etc...

One F-16, probably not. A four-ship or full squadron in rotation, probably. A duffle-bag and parachute on each weapons pylon (or three or six on each pylon with TER or MER adapters) and an amazing amount of materiel could be moved and dropped with reasonable accuracy (more accurately than a C-130 air-drop.) Definitely an inefficient way of supporting ground troops, but theoretically feasible.

I don't recall an F-16's Max weight/weapons load, but an F-4 could lift around four tons on the weapons pylons -- more if the wing-tanks are dropped and outboard pylons are installed.

An A-10 can lift more -- 15 weapons stations, most of which can accommodate a MER (Multiple Ejection Rack -- six bombs/weapons station.)

Attack Helicopters would be even more useful in supporting ground troop's logistics, if a bit less capable of moving large quantities.

Sigs wrote:Can the SLN use SD's to support and supply BC's? For a short time maybe but how much cargo space do you think does an SD have, and what kind of capabilities does it have to transfer those same supplies?

A SD -- specifically Scientist-class -- has a lot of magazine space and normally carries enough other supplies for extended cruises. If one were to load up with its normal magazine capacity full of BC-sized (or smaller) missiles and its normal maximum load of other supplies, plus stacking extra supplies in corridors and flag deck (presumably any flag officer(s) would pass on the opportunity to be glorified cargo handlers) they could off-load two-thirds (or three-quarters) of the load to a squadron of raiders and have enough to return for another load.

If it has the capability to load and store supplies, it has the capability to off-load those supplies. Probably not as efficiently as a dedicated cargo handler, but efficiently enough to be better than not delivering supplies at all.

For logistics within the boundaries of the League, parts and such could completely (or nearly completely) replace missiles in the magazines.

Scientist-class SDs have a LOT of wasted space, judging from the textev descriptions of the interiors. Depending on the size of the packaging and supplies, a lot of that wasted space could be recovered and used for storage.

The thing is The league SD and other ships of the wall, while huge, we're not built to carry large numbers of missiles or LACs, they are built for energy projection combat. So their internal capacity while not tiny, would be more limited than equivalent naval ships.
Most of these ships are in the ship yards, and even put into service, could their engines deal with the long term strain on them. Aldo, they would be huge unprotected targets really.

Weird Harold wrote:One F-16, probably not. A four-ship or full squadron in rotation, probably. A duffle-bag and parachute on each weapons pylon (or three or six on each pylon with TER or MER adapters) and an amazing amount of materiel could be moved and dropped with reasonable accuracy (more accurately than a C-130 air-drop.) Definitely an inefficient way of supporting ground troops, but theoretically feasible.

Again, can it be done? Probably... should it be done? Probably not...

Weird Harold wrote:
A SD -- specifically Scientist-class -- has a lot of magazine space and normally carries enough other supplies for extended cruises. If one were to load up with its normal magazine capacity full of BC-sized (or smaller) missiles and its normal maximum load of other supplies, plus stacking extra supplies in corridors and flag deck (presumably any flag officer(s) would pass on the opportunity to be glorified cargo handlers) they could off-load two-thirds (or three-quarters) of the load to a squadron of raiders and have enough to return for another load.

I doubt that the designers of any warship envisioned a situation like that... again could it be done? Probably yes... but can the SD's load up BC sized missiles and distribute them to the BC's when needed? I don't know...

So essentially you would have 1 or more SD supporting 1 BC. Because there is a long transit time and you would need a constant supply to your frontline units. So if you are tying down your useless SD's anyway why not use them instead of sending out BC's?

Weird Harold wrote:If it has the capability to load and store supplies, it has the capability to off-load those supplies. Probably not as efficiently as a dedicated cargo handler, but efficiently enough to be better than not delivering supplies at all.

So you would tie down 1,000 SD's to support 250-500 BC's?

Weird Harold wrote:For logistics within the boundaries of the League, parts and such could completely (or nearly completely) replace missiles in the magazines.

Meaning what? The crew's would get the missiles with some assembly required?

Weird Harold wrote:Scientist-class SDs have a LOT of wasted space, judging from the textev descriptions of the interiors. Depending on the size of the packaging and supplies, a lot of that wasted space could be recovered and used for storage.

The wasted space is just that, wasted space. Just because there is a lot of it does not mean you can use it. If we were talking about transporting people yes you could put a lot of the wasted space to use but when you are talking about storing munitions and other supplies of all sorts of odd sizes.


How many Leopard 2 tanks can you store in your house if you looked simply at its area? And how many tanks can you store when you account for the rooms in your house and the fact that those tanks may not be able to fit in through those rooms etc...?

Since a great number of these giant ships are stuck in ship yards, could they be refitted to support fleet element and logistics?