What is the |value| of captured enemy systems?

Forward Bases

Looking at the maps, I realize the RMNs most forward bases are represented by terminating ends of the MWJ in both Peep, Solarian and Andermani space. Well, duh.

What's interesting, is even though Trevor's Star represents a forward base - a beach head - into Peep space, if you look at the maps, the Havenites had planets surrounding the Eastern fringe of Manty space. Sun Yat, Madras, Corrigan, Mathias, Treadway and Solway. Stepping stones into Manty space. Perfect for Halsey's and MacArthur's Island Hopping campaign if we liken planets unto strategic islands. It seems like these territories would be the first attacked by the RMN, and it seems like they'd be the most defended by the Peeps, being so close to Manty space. And being so close to Manty space they would lead any thrust or offensives against the Manties. Akin to the chessboard, the Manties would have to occupy themselves with and respect the advance of these pawns. Though I can't believe any significant population would want to actually live between a rock and a hard place.

Another bit of clarity the maps allow is the significance of Peep penetration into Manty space by capturing Candor and Minette. Reading the book and hearing how deeply the Peeps were operating into Manty rear areas does not do justice nearly as well as the maps . . .

My God, the Peeps were close enough to hear the parties going on at Mount Royal Palace, with the capture of Candor and Minette, especially Candor!

I also can't understand why the Andermani didn't fight for the Gregor Terminus. It doesn't seem like them to let that one ride, being as paranoid as they are. I mean, like, with the Manties occupying Gregor, puts them almost in the Emperor's lap. Well, way too close for comfort for an overly paranoid military, anyway.

cthia wrote:I also can't understand why the Andermani didn't fight for the Gregor Terminus. It doesn't seem like them to let that one ride, being as paranoid as they are. I mean, like, with the Manties occupying Gregor, puts them almost in the Emperor's lap. Well, way too close for comfort for an overly paranoid military, anyway.

Because as mentioned in Honor Among Enemies Manticore had an agreement with the Gregor Republic granting them effective control of the (uninhabited) Gregor-A system and it's nearby terminus (which presumably Manticore had discovered exploring through their junction) which predated that Republic (inhabitable planet(s) only in Gregor-B) joining the Andies 40 years earlier prior to HAE.


The Andies don't love it, but interstellar practice (and IIRC law) is that a terminus discovered outside of a star system's territorial space (as virtually all of them are) belongs to the discovered. Plus Manticore had position for years before the Andies were involved. (And there are no recognized interstellar boarders in hyperspace, only in normal space around their star systems, so you can fly across someone's space without any issues - so they can't legally, or practically, object to Manticoran ships even warships traveling from the terminus to Silesia or other points outside the Andie's empire)

So what could they do about it? They'd basically have to risk a war to take possession and if they did Manticore would just close the Junction to their ships (like they did to Haven after it took Trevor's Star). That gives the Andies a marginal military defensive advantage (in that any hostile Manticoran ships would have to come through Basilisk and across Silesia instead of through Gregor) but at the cost of massive economic impact and making Manticore an enemy. Not worth it!
They play real-politic and there is no upside to them disputing Manticore's pre-existing control of the Gregor terminus that's worth the very real downsides.

cthia wrote:The reason the US Navy changed their plans and began bypassing places was because of the discovery of a Japanese airfield that was nearing completion. The Navy could ill afford the Japanese to have that airfield.

They began bypassing places out of necessity, it wasn't a conscious adoption of a new strategy. Keep in mind the losses because of that. Ground troops were commandeered. IINM, 13,000 men. That was on Halsey's authority, but I agree a necessity.

To be sure, Halsey commandeered the 13,000 men that were slated for the support of seizing the airstrip.

Halsey said, "If we lose this island, that airstrip won't matter."

My father-in-law was on PT Boats starting in New Guinea and moving closer to Japan through the end of the War up into the . One of the stories he told was being based for a while on some island (never gave the name) where the whole intent was to grab a harbor and enough of the surrounding land to have a stable and defensive perimeter to keep the Japanese out of the base and far enough back on the island that they couldn't shell the base. At one point the Japanese were sending light tanks down out of the hills to try and break into the captured area. The 1st one got stopped by a light field gun. Next day there were a couple of US tanks that stopped the attempt, the third try was obliterated by heavy artillery, after that the organized attacks stopped. He said he had no idea how many troops were still on the island but the heaviest things they could throw against the perimeter was those light tanks. The Navy didn't need the whole island, just the harbor. He didn't mention any aircraft but his boat didn't get there till the base was established. At various times, the Boats -from whichever places they would be based- were sent out to interdict Japanese re-supply attempts and all they were supposed to do was destroy anything they spotted and report back on what was moving. Sometimes doing stuff like motoring along very slowly and quietly between an island's reef and beaches and watching for activity. When they saw something they would call it out by radio to a Destroyer pacing them just outside the reef and then start shooting into the target area with tracers on the beach or road.. At that point the DD would illuminate the beach with it's spotlights and open up with the 5" guns and whatever elce it had.
Since it was the closest target off the beach, the PT would firwall the three engines and run like hell out of the way of Japanese return fire and possilbly getting in the way of the incomming fire from the Navy. You didn't have to take the islands, just keep the soldiers bottle up and ineffective.

Brigade XO wrote:

cthia wrote:The reason the US Navy changed their plans and began bypassing places was because of the discovery of a Japanese airfield that was nearing completion. The Navy could ill afford the Japanese to have that airfield.

They began bypassing places out of necessity, it wasn't a conscious adoption of a new strategy. Keep in mind the losses because of that. Ground troops were commandeered. IINM, 13,000 men. That was on Halsey's authority, but I agree a necessity.

To be sure, Halsey commandeered the 13,000 men that were slated for the support of seizing the airstrip.

Halsey said, "If we lose this island, that airstrip won't matter."

My father-in-law was on PT Boats starting in New Guinea and moving closer to Japan through the end of the War up into the . One of the stories he told was being based for a while on some island (never gave the name) where the whole intent was to grab a harbor and enough of the surrounding land to have a stable and defensive perimeter to keep the Japanese out of the base and far enough back on the island that they couldn't shell the base. At one point the Japanese were sending light tanks down out of the hills to try and break into the captured area. The 1st one got stopped by a light field gun. Next day there were a couple of US tanks that stopped the attempt, the third try was obliterated by heavy artillery, after that the organized attacks stopped. He said he had no idea how many troops were still on the island but the heaviest things they could throw against the perimeter was those light tanks. The Navy didn't need the whole island, just the harbor. He didn't mention any aircraft but his boat didn't get there till the base was established. At various times, the Boats -from whichever places they would be based- were sent out to interdict Japanese re-supply attempts and all they were supposed to do was destroy anything they spotted and report back on what was moving. Sometimes doing stuff like motoring along very slowly and quietly between an island's reef and beaches and watching for activity. When they saw something they would call it out by radio to a Destroyer pacing them just outside the reef and then start shooting into the target area with tracers on the beach or road.. At that point the DD would illuminate the beach with it's spotlights and open up with the 5" guns and whatever elce it had.
Since it was the closest target off the beach, the PT would firwall the three engines and run like hell out of the way of Japanese return fire and possilbly getting in the way of the incomming fire from the Navy. You didn't have to take the islands, just keep the soldiers bottle up and ineffective.

As I read your post, I come to a couple of conclusions. The two most likely spots your father in law was stationed were Empress Augusta Bay Bouganville Solomon Islands and Cape Gloucester New Britain Is.

One other note to the value of captured enemy systems: Grav Wave cartography.

We get the impression a lot of more stable grav waves run from or to star system hyper limits. Given the speed advantage of a ship under sail over one under conventional wedge propulsion, that makes systems at the confluence of critical grav waves important even without a wormhole terminius since supply lines will naturally flow through them and give nodal forces protecting a beneficial cluster of grav waves a speed advantage over any force trying to mimic their movements on the "other side of the border".

There is no speed advantage. Just an acceleration advantage. It’s like “if both obey the speed limit, how much faster will an F1 car arrrive before a Peterbuilt if they race between NYC and LA.” Hint, it’s less than 1% difference. As the F1 hits the speed limit in like 2 seconds and the truck in like 30, but there is still days of driving.

kzt wrote:There is no speed advantage. Just an acceleration advantage. It’s like “if both obey the speed limit, how much faster will an F1 car arrrive before a Peterbuilt if they race between NYC and LA.” Hint, it’s less than 1% difference. As the F1 hits the speed limit in like 2 seconds and the truck in like 30, but there is still days of driving.

Actually that specific example is probable worse because even if the F1 car held up to a few days of constant use without maintenance it probably needs to fuel up more often than the Peterbuilt and fuel stops kill your average speed.

But yeah, in a grav wave a given freighter will reach it's top speed in hyper in about 1/10th the time. But you're taking about a savings of hours on a weeks long trip. (A notional freighter capable of safely accelerating at 250 gees under wedge would reach it's 0.5c max velocity in 17 hours, in a grav wave that's more like 2 hours. A 15 hours savings isn't nothing, but it's a small percentage of an average journey) [I'm assuming you don't really need to consider time spent slowing down on the other end because leaving hyper would to take care of that for you, instantly]

Jonathan_S wrote:[I'm assuming you don't really need to consider time spent slowing down on the other end because leaving hyper would to take care of that for you, instantly]

Merchant ships almost never "crash translate" due to wear on the ship. They spend the few hours decelerating rather than pay higher maintenance.

You're also ignoring the need to switch grav waves along the route, as well as stretches where they'd need to use impellers between waves.

Galactic Sapper wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:[I'm assuming you don't really need to consider time spent slowing down on the other end because leaving hyper would to take care of that for you, instantly]

Merchant ships almost never "crash translate" due to wear on the ship. They spend the few hours decelerating rather than pay higher maintenance.

You're also ignoring the need to switch grav waves along the route, as well as stretches where they'd need to use impellers between waves.

The part in SoS where Helen is given the task of astrogating the best path from the Lynx terminus to Spindle with the Hexapuma, is probably the best window into the issues of plotting a course in hyperspace that we have seen in the series.

Galactic Sapper wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:[I'm assuming you don't really need to consider time spent slowing down on the other end because leaving hyper would to take care of that for you, instantly]

Merchant ships almost never "crash translate" due to wear on the ship. They spend the few hours decelerating rather than pay higher maintenance.

You're also ignoring the need to switch grav waves along the route, as well as stretches where they'd need to use impellers between waves.

I'll grant you the no crash translations (though I'm not sure how rough it is to drop just one hyper band while at 0.5c, which would scrub off a lot of their velocity) - but even so slowing down to nearly nothing is no more than another 15 hours.


If you're chasing grav waves you usually would need to accelerate to alter your vector to pick up the next wave, but you don't lose velocity entering or exiting the wave, so you can use the 10x accel advantage to build up the necessary side vector before you exit your original wave.

If changing your course significantly while under impeller power you don't get that accel boost. On the other hand baring the rare rogue wave you need to detour around if you're traveling under impellers there's little reason to be making drastic course alterations -- you're either aiming straight at your destination or straight at the next grav wave

I don't think anybody disputes that travel by grav wave is better for the freighter than travel through the rifts. But it's not amazing decreases in transit time. Certainly not enough to somehow be economic reason to capture a star system like locarno24 suggested.