Alternate history: PRH-Solarian War

I really doubt that most of the conscript crew ever changed ships under peacetime conditions. They were trained to do a task on a BB and they were assigned to a certain BB for their term of service. They might well have kept that approach.

Not every military works like the US or UK military. That doesn’t mean they are not effective.

kzt wrote:I really doubt that most of the conscript crew ever changed ships under peacetime conditions. They were trained to do a task on a BB and they were assigned to a certain BB for their term of service. They might well have kept that approach.

Not every military works like the US or UK military. That doesn’t mean they are not effective.

The conscripts that, unmotivated because of being conscripted in the first place, never learn a lot nor excel, won't be transferred. But you may find a few gems out of that; those you'd reassign to your front-line ships.

But you're probably right that the vast majority forever stayed on the same ship, unless there were external reasons.

This probably contributes to a huge problem when rapidly expanding your navy. You can't assign inexperienced crews to your front-line SDs. If the PN crews never learned to work in more than one ship and with different crew mixes, learning that while Manticore is shooting at them is the worst possible time.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
The conscripts that, unmotivated because of being conscripted in the first place, never learn a lot nor excel, won't be transferred. But you may find a few gems out of that; those you'd reassign to your front-line ships.

But you're probably right that the vast majority forever stayed on the same ship, unless there were external reasons.

This probably contributes to a huge problem when rapidly expanding your navy. You can't assign inexperienced crews to your front-line SDs. If the PN crews never learned to work in more than one ship and with different crew mixes, learning that while Manticore is shooting at them is the worst possible time.

Not as bad as being thrown into suicidal battles because the officer in charge is worried their family will be murdered if they retreat or if they fail.

Sigs wrote:
Not as bad as being thrown into suicidal battles because the officer in charge is worried their family will be murdered if they retreat or if they fail.

Don’t worry about that. Worry about how he walks about the ship and talks to all his spies about who isn’t showing revolutionary zeal or carelessness, or incompetence and then making an example of them on the spot.

To bring this back to the original post, although it is SLN policy to go after the capital of an enemy that is mainly because their doctrine is geared towards going after single system nations. In this case there are 2 multi-system nations with combined total of close to 200 systems. Few would be industrialized but even those would be in the dozens depending in what state Manticore, Grayson, Erewhon and the other MA members and forward operating bases were captured.

So the SLN would still have to consider which is the best option, go after Haven System and capturing it might mean the surrender of the People's Republic or it might mean just capturing a heavily industrialized system, 700-800 LY from the nearest major SLN base and suffering severe casualties in the process. And there would still be a major fleet presence in the region and in the Andermani Empire.

I don't know how effective forts are, but if Grayson, MAnticore and Haven are utilizing them for protection of important targets I would assume that they are at least as effective as an SD ton for ton if not in possession of more firepower and PD than an SD. So even if the SLN were to overwhelm Capital Fleet and then 200 SD's, which due to size and other factors might be equivalent to 1.5 SLN SD each, backed up by forts and pods would leave a large portion of the SLN stuck months away from nearest major base and a large % of that fleet in need of repairs. They cannot be reinforced without criminally exposing the League by stripping even more of its ships from the core. Best case scenario the SLN blows all industrial platforms in the Haven system and retreats back to League space and trashes as many systems on the way out by sending task forces out. Worst Case scenario is a large portion of the SLN fleet is stuck in Haven due to battle damage and allows the PN to gather their forces and receive reinforcements from the IAN to push out the SLN.

The Alliance is left with 250 SD’s, 150 DN’s and 300+ BB’s with the PN while the IAN has another 230 SD’s and 90 DN’s. They are still linked to each other and they can determine within reason if large portions of the SLN wall is missing aside from the ships in Haven.

The Alliance would be left with a number of objectives to defend but they would be able to gather all the dreadnaughts and battleships without exposing any critical systems and bring up some of their SD’s to retake heaven and destroy whatever is left of the SLN fleet. So this would leave 1,000 SLN SD's captured or destroyed in Haven, 200 PN SD's destroyed in the original battle and whatever is destroyed in the second battle to free the system so if its a combined force of IAN and PN ships with a strength of 200 SD's, 240 DN's and 300 BB's. It would be months before the SLN get any news of what happened with their fleet, months that the allied fleet will use to repair their damaged ships, bring new construction into service and redeploy to cover their vital systems while the SLN is now down half their fleet and they don't even know it yet and worse from their point of view is that they cannot do any follow up attack because the Alliance might have suffered more casualties but they might have suffered less casualties as well so the SLN wouldn't be sure that they aren't sending a fleet in to the Core...like say Beowulf to cut their travel time exponentially.

Even if the Alliance had reinforced Capital Fleet to the strength I posted about a few pages ago and defeat the SLN fleet, they would be able to replace their losses a lot faster than the SLN, they can repair their damaged ships while the SLN will have to wait a long time to find out if any of their ships made it back at all and worst from the point of view of the SLN, the other side knows exactly how many SD's you have left so they will know how weak they are.

But if the SLN went out after the Manticore WHJ the story would be completely different even if the the forts around the junction were captured intact and are at that point are fully manned and operational. Even if completely manned and operational, a force of 1,000 SD’s would overwhelm them and gain control of the Junction. With control of the junction the SLN can bring all of their damaged ships through back to SLN space, and more importantly they can bring fresh wallers into the system. At this point they have effectively split the alliance in 3, the Andermani Empire is all on their own, whatever forces are deployed in Erewhon are all on their own and then there is Haven, whatever Haven has in the republic and in Manticore is all that they can muster. Once the fleet is reinforced with SD’s they can either attack the inner system fleet or the inner system fleet has already gone out to meet them. Once secured the Manticore system gives the SLN time and a base of operations to repair their ships and strengthen their beach head but more importantly its right in the middle of the alliance so neither member of the alliance will be willing to send wallers into the League knowing they will be facing the wallers real soon.

So basically the SLN leadership with encouragement of the mandarins will go to the junction first, secure it reinforce their fleet and then go after Haven, Erewhon and Andermani Empire individually without allowing the fleet in those regions to mutually support each other or threaten the league.

To bring this back to the original post, although it is SLN policy to go after the capital of an enemy that is mainly because their doctrine is geared towards going after single system nations.

No, it was SLN policy to go for the capital because they the largest fleet in space and they see no need to beat around the bush. System by system advances were the norm if you couldn’t achieve meaningful superiority, like the early phases of the First Havenite War. When the SLN’s fleet has an order of magnitude more supedreadnoughts than the next biggest fleet, they don’t have to mess around - going straight for the capital means the war is over in an afternoon.

I can’t remember if David mentioned how many forts were at the Manticor WHJ, but early war it was a LOT of forts. It was enough that later analysis showed that they could safely defeat any concevable threat. So no, attacking the single most heavily defended point in the inhabited galexy is probably not a good idea. Those planets 12 light hours away will probably make your life diffcult.

Of course, you could just go direct to Manticore as liberators. If Haven has their entire fleet at haven they don’t have a fleet at Manticore. Then you bribe the junction garrison to surrender. It’s also worth considering that if there is a Manticore government in exile it has access to Manticore off-planet funds. Which are apparently several years GSP. You can buy a lot of warships and politicians or PRHN COs with that kind of money.

If you want to attack something other than Haven directly you plan your big attack on Haven semi-publically and then once you pull out of your base you set course for the Andermani Empire. As much of their navy is busy supporting Haven (and several months away) this should be a romp.

You could also have the various SDFs busy carrying out raids. Beowulf’s couple of dozen SDs should crush most any local defense.

Duckk wrote:
No, it was SLN policy to go for the capital because they the largest fleet in space and they see no need to beat around the bush. System by system advances were the norm if you couldn’t achieve meaningful superiority, like the early phases of the First Havenite War. When the SLN’s fleet has an order of magnitude more supedreadnoughts than the next biggest fleet, they don’t have to mess around - going straight for the capital means the war is over in an afternoon.

And I would think their biggest goals would be to eliminate the immediate threat to the League by getting your fleet in enemy territory and the ultimate goal the junction. Ultimately their priority would be the junction, part of it would be military necessity and part of it would be to get the junction under League control ASAP.


They attacked Manticore in 1922 because there wasn't all that many options but most of all because they wanted the junction. If they captured Manticore they would capture the junction and take destroy the biggest fleet in the RMN...or so they though, anywhere else they attacked out have been a waste of time.

In this scenario the Junction is theirs for the taking, but more importantly I know that the SLN as a whole is presented as a few million drooling idiots who couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag but they must have some intelligence to realise that hitting Haven is not the best way to go about it.

Say that they fought Capital Fleet, destroyed it and still have 500-600 functioning SD's, what now? They have an unknown number of enemy capital ships in the region, their nearest support is the next best thing to 800 LY, the SLN is light on support ships so they probably did not bring enough with them for an extended campaign, one battle or two might be fine but if Haven doesn't surrender after their capital is captured then what?


Scenario 1: Capture Manticore, bring back your damaged ships for repairs and send reinforcements in Manticore for further action. You have destroyed a large % of the PN's wall plus a lot of forts and you might have captured some of the SKM's industry intact. Once ready you hit Haven and destroy an even bigger % of the PN. Occupy both systems and clear in between when you have the time and resources.

Scenario 2: Go after Haven, if you capture them you might suffer enough losses to prevent you from going after Manticore, so you are still 800 LY away from support. You might take the system but in the end you might anchor yourself to the system if you take enough damage during the battle, afterall you wouldn't want to leave dozens or hundreds of damaged ships behind to be picked off so you have to make field repairs before you send them home or wait until the SLN sends support to fix them.


Scenario 1 gets you both targets quick, destroys the biggest force that can oppose you and disperses the rest of the alliance to be hunted down at a later date.

Scenario 2 potentially ties down your forces to the Haven system because now you have to send someone 800 LY to ask for help and reinforcements, wait for that help and reinforcements to be gathered and do the 800 LY trek to reinforce the fleet and start repairs.


Whatever the SLN is presented as, they are still professional officers. They may be inexperienced, exceptionally arrogant and might never have been challenged but I doubt they are the complete irredeemable idiots they were presented as in the books. Especially considering that the Junction will be high on their list of wants... they can crush Haven later but they want the junction now.

kzt wrote:I can’t remember if David mentioned how many forts were at the Manticor WHJ, but early war it was a LOT of forts. It was enough that later analysis showed that they could safely defeat any concevable threat. So no, attacking the single most heavily defended point in the inhabited galexy is probably not a good idea. Those planets 12 light hours away will probably make your life diffcult.

So if Manticore had that many forts, and Haven has been in the bisness of conquest for quite some time at that point wouldn't it be reasonable assumption that they too have forts...and a lot of them.

Of course, you could just go direct to Manticore as liberators. If Haven has their entire fleet at haven they don’t have a fleet at Manticore. Then you bribe the junction garrison to surrender. It’s also worth considering that if there is a Manticore government in exile it has access to Manticore off-planet funds. Which are apparently several years GSP. You can buy a lot of warships and politicians or PRHN COs with that kind of money.

Problem is that you will be negotiating with a lot of people simultaneously who may not be particularly interested or even trust Manticore and the League to keep the money and then kill or ship them off to the nearest system under control of Haven when they stand down. You cant leave with your forts, which means that you have to surrender the only trump card you have, the second you let the SLN/RMN capture the forts they can either turn their guns on you or tell you to f**k off because you wont be able to do much about it and its not like you can go back home to complain either.

If you want to attack something other than Haven directly you plan your big attack on Haven semi-publically and then once you pull out of your base you set course for the Andermani Empire. As much of their navy is busy supporting Haven (and several months away) this should be a romp.

Which now leaves a large part of the IAN supporting Haven. The threat is Haven not the Andermani, Haven is the one that has fought a 5 year war with Manticore and has built a lot of shipbuilding infrastructure to fight the war in the decades leading up to the war and during the war itself, they are the once with probably a few hundred SD's under construction. You defeat the Empire, you end up cutting their obligations in half but adding whatever ships the IAN send to support Haven to the defence of the Haven Sector.

You could also have the various SDFs busy carrying out raids. Beowulf’s couple of dozen SDs should crush most any local defense.

Problem is that most of those SDF's are probably not equipped and trained to operate that far from home. How long can a ship go without needing resupply? And aside from Beowulf how many SDF's are actually ready and able to operate many hundreds of LY from home? While doing that you also cannot use any of the ports in the region for repairs and ressuplly.

kzt wrote:I can’t remember if David mentioned how many forts were at the Manticor WHJ, but early war it was a LOT of forts. It was enough that later analysis showed that they could safely defeat any concevable threat. So no, attacking the single most heavily defended point in the inhabited galexy is probably not a good idea. Those planets 12 light hours away will probably make your life diffcult.

Of course, you could just go direct to Manticore as liberators. If Haven has their entire fleet at haven they don’t have a fleet at Manticore. Then you bribe the junction garrison to surrender. It’s also worth considering that if there is a Manticore government in exile it has access to Manticore off-planet funds. Which are apparently several years GSP. You can buy a lot of warships and politicians or PRHN COs with that kind of money.

If you want to attack something other than Haven directly you plan your big attack on Haven semi-publically and then once you pull out of your base you set course for the Andermani Empire. As much of their navy is busy supporting Haven (and several months away) this should be a romp.

You could also have the various SDFs busy carrying out raids. Beowulf’s couple of dozen SDs should crush most any local defense.

Prior to the capture of Trevor's star, the Junction defenses had grown to ~120 Forts. The older ~1/2 were decommissioned post Trevor's Star. Between the wars, virtually all older designs were replaced with modern designs focused on Pod warfare and modern LACS. How many exactly, we have not been told. I would guess there are 40-80 modern Forts, each at least as capable as each of the dozen forts at Lynx.