How was Haven supposed to fight the SL (Detweiler Plan)?

6 km/sec is the speed of sound in steel. That's what the shock waves moves at once they lose enough energy that they are no longer supersonic. The entire place will snap like a whip. When various things, like the deck you are standing on, flexes up one meter at several thousand meter per seond meters per second it will probably injure you. Well, if being turned into a red smear counts as injured.

In front of and trailing behind the shock wavers are the debris cloud, of the things that were too massive to melt or things like the physical structure of the station.

There is also typically about 5% of the energy release as gamma rays, neutrons, alpha particles and electrons, which are moving at the speed of light. And while there is no EMP in deep space, in the way people normally think of it, that kind of gamma and electron bombardment seems likely to be bad for electronics. And the gamma neutrons probably isn't too good for people either.

But the other issue you have, if there isn't much structure between the bomb and you, is that nuclear weapons don't explode per se, They basically are really, really intense x-ray sources. The fireball (and blast) of a nuke is created by the air around the nuke being heated to incandescence as it absorbs the x-rays. if nothing absorbs the x-rays they continue out in a straight line. Really intense x-rays are extraordinarily bad for your health.

So your life insurance agent would strongly recommend you avoid being there.

Sigs wrote:

Can you revise what you think what the 520 not working up are doing at the time Beatrice was supposed to launch (pre-Lovat planning)?

Not really, like I said, I don't care if my total is 580 SD(P)'s or 920 SD(P)'s, I would have waited an extra month to launch Beatrice for an extra 245 SD(P)'s and their accompanying CLAC's. My only explanation would be the remaining ships are concentrated around Haven just in case 8th Fleet is visiting. They may be outmatched but having 245-585 SD(P)'s around Haven would have been a problem for the 18 SD(P)'s with Apollo of 8th Fleet, but I personally would have deployed everything.

given the rates of RMN missile production, in another month Manticore might have a goodly excess of Apollo pods. They likely won't have many, if any, ships. But they might have gotten at least some of the Manticore and Sphynx defenses upgrade to handle full Apollo FTL fire control.

But even if they didn't imagine how much nastier Home Fleet would be if it's SD(P)s were lugging flat-packs of Apollo pods instead of the Mk23s they'd carried on the actual day. Now the SDs can control 8 times as many missiles per salvo, and thanks to the control computer in each 23E they can open fire on Tourville's fleet from well in excess of 70 million km. That'd wreck any attempt to use the donkey. Even a couple thousand Apollo pods that they could grab would ruin the initial part of Beatrice. If 3rd fleet still rode to the rescue (and didn't have Apollo pods of its own) it might get trapped, but it would no longer be pinned between two relatively effective Havenite fleets because Home Fleet would have trashed the first one and their SD(P)s at least could continue coming to reinforce 3rd fleet (now focusing all its fire-power out at Chin)

An extra month delay might have changed everything. It was preciously that risk that Manticore might get Apollo more widely deployed that drove the need to hit ASAP.

Jonathan_S wrote:given the rates of RMN missile production, in another month Manticore might have a goodly excess of Apollo pods. They likely won't have many, if any, ships. But they might have gotten at least some of the Manticore and Sphynx defenses upgrade to handle full Apollo FTL fire control.

But even if they didn't imagine how much nastier Home Fleet would be if it's SD(P)s were lugging flat-packs of Apollo pods instead of the Mk23s they'd carried on the actual day. Now the SDs can control 8 times as many missiles per salvo, and thanks to the control computer in each 23E they can open fire on Tourville's fleet from well in excess of 70 million km. That'd wreck any attempt to use the donkey. Even a couple thousand Apollo pods that they could grab would ruin the initial part of Beatrice. If 3rd fleet still rode to the rescue (and didn't have Apollo pods of its own) it might get trapped, but it would no longer be pinned between two relatively effective Havenite fleets because Home Fleet would have trashed the first one and their SD(P)s at least could continue coming to reinforce 3rd fleet (now focusing all its fire-power out at Chin)

An extra month delay might have changed everything. It was preciously that risk that Manticore might get Apollo more widely deployed that drove the need to hit ASAP.

Do you really think it would have made much of a difference? Because waiting a month and the RHN could have deployed 14,000 LAC's with 2nd Fleet instead of 3,200. Then the extra 258 SD(P);s would have added quite the firepower, if nothing else the rest of the SD's, BC's, CA's' CL's and DD's are going to thicken the antimissile screen. It will either end with the RHN being completely destroyed in one day or they will get through.

It would have been more firepower than the original but throwing an extra 253 SD(P)'s, 300 SD's, ~11,000 LAC's and another 700 Escorts would have thickened the missile defence and I don't think that increasing by that much defensive firepower would have been offset by more Apollo pods.

But as I said there is also the fundamental risk of destroying the entire RHN in one afternoon.

Sigs wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:An extra month delay might have changed everything. It was preciously that risk that Manticore might get Apollo more widely deployed that drove the need to hit ASAP.

Do you really think it would have made much of a difference?

Yes. We don't know, actually, but neither did Theisman. The longer he waits, the more ships he can send and the better the chances of victory. But cross a certain threshold and no amount of ships will overcome an Apollo-defended system. He has to get as many ships as he can as quickly as he can there.

Because waiting a month and the RHN could have deployed 14,000 LAC's with 2nd Fleet instead of 3,200. Then the extra 258 SD(P);s would have added quite the firepower, if nothing else the rest of the SD's, BC's, CA's' CL's and DD's are going to thicken the antimissile screen. It will either end with the RHN being completely destroyed in one day or they will get through.

And if Manticore has 50,000 Apollo missile pods, those won't help. The attack in Lovat proved that sufficiently many can get through the defences to ruin the SD's day.

It would have been more firepower than the original but throwing an extra 253 SD(P)'s, 300 SD's, ~11,000 LAC's and another 700 Escorts would have thickened the missile defence and I don't think that increasing by that much defensive firepower would have been offset by more Apollo pods.

But as I said there is also the fundamental risk of destroying the entire RHN in one afternoon.

Or not. If Manticore starts lobbing Apollo-controlled missiles from 70 million km and taking SDs along, the RHN force would disengage.

Sigs wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:given the rates of RMN missile production, in another month Manticore might have a goodly excess of Apollo pods. They likely won't have many, if any, ships. But they might have gotten at least some of the Manticore and Sphynx defenses upgrade to handle full Apollo FTL fire control.

But even if they didn't imagine how much nastier Home Fleet would be if it's SD(P)s were lugging flat-packs of Apollo pods instead of the Mk23s they'd carried on the actual day. Now the SDs can control 8 times as many missiles per salvo, and thanks to the control computer in each 23E they can open fire on Tourville's fleet from well in excess of 70 million km. That'd wreck any attempt to use the donkey. Even a couple thousand Apollo pods that they could grab would ruin the initial part of Beatrice. If 3rd fleet still rode to the rescue (and didn't have Apollo pods of its own) it might get trapped, but it would no longer be pinned between two relatively effective Havenite fleets because Home Fleet would have trashed the first one and their SD(P)s at least could continue coming to reinforce 3rd fleet (now focusing all its fire-power out at Chin)

An extra month delay might have changed everything. It was preciously that risk that Manticore might get Apollo more widely deployed that drove the need to hit ASAP.

Do you really think it would have made much of a difference? Because waiting a month and the RHN could have deployed 14,000 LAC's with 2nd Fleet instead of 3,200. Then the extra 258 SD(P);s would have added quite the firepower, if nothing else the rest of the SD's, BC's, CA's' CL's and DD's are going to thicken the antimissile screen. It will either end with the RHN being completely destroyed in one day or they will get through.

It would have been more firepower than the original but throwing an extra 253 SD(P)'s, 300 SD's, ~11,000 LAC's and another 700 Escorts would have thickened the missile defence and I don't think that increasing by that much defensive firepower would have been offset by more Apollo pods.

But as I said there is also the fundamental risk of destroying the entire RHN in one afternoon.

If Apollo pods had been available to Home Fleet in quantity? Absolutely.

Home Fleet's historic Death Ride, despite getting surprised by Donkey, outright killed 40% of Tourville's historic fleet, crippled another 8% and damaged the remaining 52%. And at that they died with quite a number of pods unfired - they'd waited until well inside powered MDM range before firing in order to maximize their hit percentages; and the surprise of the pod swarms Donkey enabled obliterated them far faster than their own worst estimates.

Apollo pods, as we much later saw at Beowulf, are quite effective at extreme ranges (about 200 million km) even without any FTL fire control. Given that Home Fleet had historically launched far closer to 50 million km, and that that was the edge of really effective use of pre-Apollo MDMs, a Home Fleet opening up with salvos 8 times as large at a range over 4 times as far will just gut Tourville's force even if it's two or three times as large. Even nearly autonomously the Apollo swarm at 200 million km should be roughly as accurate as Home Fleet's historic fire was; and there are a lot missiles per salvo plus Home Fleet's got much more time to fire all the missiles they brought. And at that extreme range Tourville's return fire will be pretty ineffective; almost all his missiles having trouble even finding any target - even discounting Home Fleet's defenses.

The only question in my mind is whether the Apollo production line really had been sorted or not - but if the pods are there Home Fleet, even mostly towing those pods with legacy SDs got several times more deadly and several times more survivable.

Increasing Tourville's forces 2, 3, or 4 times doesn't mater much when you're throwing salvos 8 times as large. And their return punch is equally irrelevant when you're engaging from beyond the range their missiles are effective. Apollo is just that much of a game changer; even without the FTL control link.



In some ways Apollo was both not as bad as Theisman's fears and in others far worse. It took far longer to get the full Apollo effect retrofitted than he feared, with Keyhole II being the major bottleneck. So in an extra month he's unlikely to be facing many, if any, more ships able to bring the sniper-like precision seen at Louvat. But on the other hand the level of lethality boost a non-refitted ship can gain, simply by having access to Apollo pods, means drastic offensive improvements can spread across the entire existing fleet far faster than he would reasonable fear.

Jonathan_S wrote:In some ways Apollo was both not as bad as Theisman's fears and in others far worse. It took far longer to get the full Apollo effect retrofitted than he feared, with Keyhole II being the major bottleneck. So in an extra month he's unlikely to be facing many, if any, more ships able to bring the sniper-like precision seen at Louvat. But on the other hand the level of lethality boost a non-refitted ship can gain, simply by having access to Apollo pods, means drastic offensive improvements can spread across the entire existing fleet far faster than he would reasonable fear.

Also at some point, the bottleneck in producing the system defense Apollo pods is solved and that adds another layer for Haven.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
I don't think they could be a trailing fleet. If they are significantly separated, D'Orville, Kuzak and Honor would simply shoot around them. Missiles do not have to follow a straight line, after all. And even with trailing, it might find itself out of position for even straight-line flights.

D’Orville would be busy shooting at and being shot at by the lead fleet to worry about a trailing fleet and Kuzak and Honor would be busy getting shot at by the Trailing Fleet and 5th Fleet to worry about the point TF.

But yes, for Beatrice, I would have brought them along, unless Theisman and Tourville felt that they would actually be net negative contributions. Older software and hardware, un-drilled crews, they could do more harm than good.

Most of the navy has been fighting for the last 15 years, they should be competent enough in an emergency to be able to fight without putting their fellow ships in danger.

1) the recall order and ship movement would take too long and time was not on their side any more;

The bulk of the Fleet would be on the way to Manticore so this should not be a problem.

2) the ships' presence would be a net negative contribution; even more battle-drilled SD(P)s could be in this category, if the C&C networks become saturated (think "Mythical Man Month");

When you are desperate, a ship is a ship.

The problem with waiting a month is that you might find Manticore completely defended by Apollo system defence missiles. Which would have happened based on the conversations in AAC (see the "What's wrong with AAC" thread). Then bringing all 920 SD(P)s, 100 CLACs and 200 SDs wouldn't have helped.

By the looks of it, the RMN was oddly surprised and shocked that they were attacked, I don’t think another month would have changed much if they were so far gone to not anticipate Beatrice after Lovat.

Here's another explanation: the Octagon decided that Giscard was really good in defence, having just blunted the attack in Solon, so they swap roles compared to what Theisman told Pritchart. Giscard stays for the defence and Tourville is sent to take command of Second Fleet.

I believe Tourville and Giscard would have both been to Beatrice, two major fleets on the biggest operation of the war, I would send the best commander I have to command both fleets.

100 SD(P)s and 20 CLACs in Haven, 100 SD(P)s in Bolthole, the balance of the SD((P)s and CLACs are in spread throughout the core systems and the SDs are spread further away in penny packets. The ships from Bolthole and some of the SD(P)s are Reason #1: too far away to be recalled and arrive in Manticore before the Apollo defences go up.

Probably 80-90% of the RHN was on the way to Manticore. Sending DB’s to all systems with ships concentrations with orders to leave NLT 48h from receipt of the message and meet in system x should get everyone within a week of each other. So it might delay the operation by a few days, to a week but it would be worth it.

I suppose I have to explain how this scouting could happen. A DD or CL can drop from hyperspace a light-minute or ten away from the hyper limit. Such a light ship can re-enter hyperspace within 10 minutes from arrival. Haven does have sensitive hyper emergency detection arrays to at least a light-month out and at this time they already have FTL comms. But even the ready forces, waiting in hyper, would need to be very close by in order to intercept in time. And we know that hyperspace navigation is poorer at short distances, so they might still emerge over a million km away from the scout. At that distance, a missile in sprint mode takes 47 seconds to reach the target.

I suppose I have to explain how this shouldn’t matter. If I am the First Space Lord, before launching an operation like the one in Lovat I would sit down with my brain trust and ask them some questions, if you were the RHN what would see as your options after Lovat. How would you view the situation after the revelation of the new technology?

What I should get as an answer from most of them:

1) No change. The RHN believes it was a trick/fluke etc… therefore they don’t do any major changes to their operations tempo and plans.

2) Surrender. They see this as a game changer and give up instantly.

3) Do a winner take all operation to end the war quickly. They have seen that their numerical advantage has evaporated and its only a matter of time before the MA sends 8th Fleet with 50-60 SD(P)’s with Keyhole and Apollo to capture Haven.

Since Theisman is intelligent and the RHN as whole seem to be competent and capable number one should be scratched out immediately. Number two is more likely but still the Battle of Lovat demonstrated that the MA does not have Keyhole and Apollo in great numbers so there is still a chance for victory. This leaves number 3, and that should be the obvious conclusion. You don’t just launch an operation like Sanskrit without thinking of the consequences for the enemy and how they can/will react to it. The RHN went from comfortable superiority in ships and the ability to dictate to a degree the direction of the war to having a few months before an entire Fleet of keyhole and Apollo SD(P)’s come out of the yards.

Number two should be put as least likely because the RHN has shown surprising resilience regardless of who is in charge of the republic. They have come back from behind a number of times and didn’t disintegrate even when under tremendous pressure.

Third option is the one that is most likely but also the most dangerous. Before they launched they should have made plans on how to strengthen the defences of the Manticore HS. That would have been to strip all SD(P)’s and CLAC’s with Katana’s from the minor allies, asking for reinforcements from the IAN and GSN Home Fleets and depending on construction and workup schedule wait a month or two to get some more Keyhole ships ready. Getting 40 Keyhole Capable SD(P)’s within the next 2-3 months would be reason to wait. At the same time, stripping the minor allies should get a concentrated force of 40-60 SD(P)’s as well as another 50 from the IAN/GSN Home Fleet. This gives the MA another fleet of 130-150 SD(P)’s with 40 Keyhole SD(P)’s. 8th fleet goes out on the attack, defeats 3rd Fleet ad comes back to be redeployed to Manticore with the 40 SD(P)’s with Keyhole. If they can double the Katana’s in the home system before they launch they would have been better prepared.


What it seems like happened is they didn’t bother thinking how it would look from the RHN’s side, didn’t consider the options the RHN would have and paid the price by being under prepared.

No one in history had ever seen a battle like it, and it ought to have been decisive. The walls of battle of both the Alliance and the Republic had been gutted. Yet despite Haven’s horrific losses, the loss ratio was actually in the republic’s favour in hulls, and hugely so in terms of loss of life. Had it not been for the existence of Apollo—deployed so far only abord Honor’s ships—at this moment, no power in the universe could have prevented the Republic of Haven’s remaining SD(P)’s from rolling over the Manticore home system. Yet Apollo did exist, and what Honor had done to Genevieve Chin’s fleet would serve as a lethal notice to Thomas Theisman that he cannot possible take Manticore while eighth Fleet survived.

Chapter 69 At All Costs

Had it not been for the existence of Apollo—deployed so far only abord Honor’s ships—at this moment, no power in the universe could have prevented the Republic of Haven’s remaining SD(P)’s from rolling over the Manticore home system. Yet Apollo did exist, and what Honor had done to Genevieve Chin’s fleet would serve as a lethal notice to Thomas Theisman that he cannot possible take Manticore while eighth Fleet survived.

The Allied SD(P) strength post BoM should be around 240-260 SD(P)’s total. The RHN SD(P) strength should be 269 SD(P)’s. The Allied SD(P)’s were ~30% more capable than their RHN opponents. The RHN had ~300 SD’s in service post BoM while the Allied SD(P)’s would be equivalent to 325 RHN SD(P)’s if we took the middle ground and assumed that 250 Remain. Now, if no power in the universe could prevent the RHN’s remaining SD(P)’s from rolling over Manticore HS what the hell are the fixed defences and the 250 MA SD(P)’s going to do?

Post BoM the Allied SD/SD(P) strength was
-~250 SD(P)’s
-~400 SD’s
Post BoM the RHN SD/SD(P) strength was
-~269 SD(P)’s
-~300 SD’s

With Apollo the RHN is finished, without Apollo the RHN is still finished. I get that post BoM they may abandon the idea of defending bolthole and hope that it’s safe enough just by being hidden but they will still need to provide protection to Haven itself so they wont be able to launch another Fleet against Manticore that would be able to get through the defences because post BoM I would be recalling every SD(P) from the minor allies, rushing every refit and redeploying SD(P)’s from New Berlin and Grayson to rebuild a fleet to defend Manticore and Trevor’s Star. Without Apollo there wont be a time crunch for the RoH and that wont justify them stripping the rest of the navy from Haven and the yards for another offensive on Manticore. So why did Honor think there nothing to prevent the RHN’s remaining SD(P)’s from rolling over the defences at Manticore. They would be in a worse position, the MA is inside their republic and can conduct operations in any vital system and be back into Trevor’s Star and Manticore before the RHN can react, even if the RHN had a means to react. Any new construction would be negated by the new construction from the MA which means that the war would be prolonged for another few years at least while the RHN rebuild their numerical advantage if they lasts that long.

So either there were ~600 SD(P)’s remaining in the RHN, or Honor does not know what she is talking about. There is no way no how that the RHN would have send their remaining SD(P)’s to attack Manticore even IF Apollo didn’t exist. The only way that she would be right is if there was a large fleet remaining in the RoH and the only reason they weren’t trying for round two is because they know that there is likely no chance of success if 8th Fleet is sitting in Manticore because they will be destroyed well before they get into range.

tlb wrote:Also at some point, the bottleneck in producing the system defense Apollo pods is solved and that adds another layer for Haven.

The RMN didn't forsee a basic reaction to their offensive, would they really be in that much of a rush to strengthen the defences of the Home System? It seems to me they were almost surprised that the RoH reacted in anyway other than surrender or stick their head in the sand.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:And if Manticore has 50,000 Apollo missile pods, those won't help. The attack in Lovat proved that sufficiently many can get through the defences to ruin the SD's day.

Where would they deploy them first? Manticore or Trevor's Star? I mean they were surprised by Beatrice and they had no right to be so I would argue they wouldn't have been in too much of a rush to get them deployed because they were high on victory... or something along those lines.

Or not. If Manticore starts lobbing Apollo-controlled missiles from 70 million km and taking SDs along, the RHN force would disengage.

Remember you were the one to tell me to take the worst case scenario? How can they disengage here but on an unsuspecting Home Fleet during essentially peacetime where they outnumber the enemy dramatically they wont be able to disengage?

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
Or not. If Manticore starts lobbing Apollo-controlled missiles from 70 million km and taking SDs along, the RHN force would disengage.

They couldn't easily disengage, they were trapped by the resonance zone and hyper limit. Yes, they could have changed course an tried to build a vector out system, but Home Fleet could follow and continue to launch Apollo missiles from beyond the range the RHN could effectively respond.