Honor awakened a sleeping GIANT

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

tlb wrote:The Malign wanted Haven and the Solarian League to fight each other, because that is what their plan said should happen. However their plan was out of date, because Manticore had already developed world beating technology in the Apollo missile system. Oyster Bay was a panic reaction to both Apollo and the success in the Talbot Quandrant. It actually might be better for that plan if the Solarian League had conquered Manticore, because the SLN would be slower in implementing that technology which the Malign dominated corporations would be gobbling up.

Right, I was just debating whether they may have tried, simply because the plan had said this was the plan. I'm sure some analyst did propose it. But I agree it wouldn't have been ideal, so it was probably tossed out.

Indeed.

Since that was the original plan, Oyster Bay could have been implemented against either party to pull both parties into a war.

The MA are experts in instigating wars. One problem with Oyster Bay is it wasn't suggested and implied who pulled off the attack. If it had been made to appear as if Haven did it -- or if Haven had been the target of Oyster Bay and it had been clearly made to appear as if Manticore did it -- instead of leaving the perpetrator unclear, then it might have worked out better. Haven and Manticore would have begun to fight more viciously, with no chance of an alliance.

But it would have been a piece of cake to utilize Oyster Bay in the Sol System and incriminate the Havenites. The SLN already proved to be easily duped.

Oyster Bay didn't work because the MA didn't point the blame. Like Green Pines. And the Byng Incident.

cthia wrote:Indeed.

Since that was the original plan, Oyster Bay could have been implemented against either party to pull both parties into a war.

The MA are experts in instigating wars. One problem with Oyster Bay is it wasn't suggested and implied who pulled off the attack. If it had been made to appear as if Haven did it -- or if Haven had been the target of Oyster Bay and it had been clearly made to appear as if Manticore did it -- instead of leaving the perpetrator unclear, then it might have worked out better. Haven and Manticore would have begun to fight more viciously, with no chance of an alliance.

But it would have been a piece of cake to utilize Oyster Bay in the Sol System and incriminate the Havenites. The SLN already proved to be easily duped.

Oyster Bay didn't work because the MA didn't point the blame. Like Green Pines. And the Byng Incident.

The two parties were ALREADY at war, so Oyster Bay couldn't have made them more at war. The only way to suggest to one that the other was responsible would be to attack with conventional forces, because neither side had the technology that was actually used. So that attack was not even sufficient to break up the peace talks, Haven was already in a position that surrender was almost the only option. Put together with the information from Herlander Simões (which the Malign had no way to anticipate), that resulted in the Alliance.

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:Indeed.

Since that was the original plan, Oyster Bay could have been implemented against either party to pull both parties into a war.

The MA are experts in instigating wars. One problem with Oyster Bay is it wasn't suggested and implied who pulled off the attack. If it had been made to appear as if Haven did it -- or if Haven had been the target of Oyster Bay and it had been clearly made to appear as if Manticore did it -- instead of leaving the perpetrator unclear, then it might have worked out better. Haven and Manticore would have begun to fight more viciously, with no chance of an alliance.

But it would have been a piece of cake to utilize Oyster Bay in the Sol System and incriminate the Havenites. The SLN already proved to be easily duped.

Oyster Bay didn't work because the MA didn't point the blame. Like Green Pines. And the Byng Incident.

The two parties were ALREADY at war, so Oyster Bay couldn't have made them more at war. The only way to suggest to one that the other was responsible would be to attack with conventional forces, because neither side had the technology that was actually used. So that attack was not even sufficient to break up the peace talks, Haven was already in a position that surrender was almost the only option. Put together with the information from Herlander Simões (which the Malign had no way to anticipate), that resulted in the Alliance.

Perhaps. But, "more at war" would be so blind with rage that an alliance is not an option. Talking would not be an option.

If used against Haven, OB perhaps could have been successfully blamed on Manticore, since new technologies are always being produced there.

cthia wrote:Perhaps. But, "more at war" would be so blind with rage that an alliance is not an option. Talking would not be an option.

If used against Haven, OB perhaps could have been successfully blamed on Manticore, since new technologies are always being produced there.

Two problems with using it against Haven:

1) The location of Haven's biggest single production facility (Bolthole) was unknown.

2) Haven was already at the point where it would have to surrender, the only question was the terms. Yes, an attack might inflame passions, but Manticore would adjust the terms (knowing that a unknown party was interfering) and offer to help rebuild all the damage that Haven had suffered: a Marshall Plan.

tlb wrote:2) Haven was already at the point where it would have to surrender, the only question was the terms. Yes, an attack might inflame passions, but Manticore would adjust the terms (knowing that a unknown party was interfering) and offer to help rebuild all the damage that Haven had suffered: a Marshall Plan.

Agreed, it would have equally backfired.

Timing also applied in both cases. By the time Oyster Bay's punch was delivered, Eighth Fleet was in the Haven system. If Honor thought that Haven was responsible, she'd have ended the war then and there. There was zero chance of Haven taking back the initiative and crushing Manticore. Oh, the production facilities and fleets not in the system would survive, but not Capital Fleet, not the industrial components of Haven; the Senate, President and the entire Octagon leadership would have been captured.

Similarly, the Alliance wouldn't have used such a tactic because they had already won. For Oyster Bay to have any possibility of being blamed on Manticore, it would have had to be delivered before Apollo was disclosed... but couldn't because it was Apollo's use that caused the MAlign to launch the plan early.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

tlb wrote:2) Haven was already at the point where it would have to surrender, the only question was the terms. Yes, an attack might inflame passions, but Manticore would adjust the terms (knowing that a unknown party was interfering) and offer to help rebuild all the damage that Haven had suffered: a Marshall Plan.

Agreed, it would have equally backfired.

Timing also applied in both cases. By the time Oyster Bay's punch was delivered, Eighth Fleet was in the Haven system. If Honor thought that Haven was responsible, she'd have ended the war then and there. There was zero chance of Haven taking back the initiative and crushing Manticore. Oh, the production facilities and fleets not in the system would survive, but not Capital Fleet, not the industrial components of Haven; the Senate, President and the entire Octagon leadership would have been captured.

Similarly, the Alliance wouldn't have used such a tactic because they had already won. For Oyster Bay to have any possibility of being blamed on Manticore, it would have had to be delivered before Apollo was disclosed... but couldn't because it was Apollo's use that caused the MAlign to launch the plan early.

I'd quibble and say it could still have been believable in the interval between the disclosure of Apollo and the Battle of Manticore.

An Oyster Bay style attack from Haven then would have just looked like Haven's actual BoM Beatrice plan writ even larger -- a last ditch gamble to try to kill Manticore's yards and production before they can get enough of a likely war winning weapon into the field.


It was OB striking after the BoM that would have made it hard to convince anyone Haven had committed it. If they'd had that capability why'd they thrown away so many SDs in a more conventional attack during the BoM? And if they didn't have the capability then how could they possible have acquired and deployed it in just the half year since? (And don't forget it's about 2.5 months just to move from Haven to Manticore via the Theta bands; shortening that timeline further)

We see Oyster Bay being used against Manticore and Grayson. We were told that the use of "Oyster Bay" was rushed and are shown that it was done with the small fleet of essentialy "proof of concept" an testbed/training ships for the delivery of the G-torps and all those ballistic packages with Spider Drive--and the Ghost scout ships.

My opinion is that it was rushed to try and get The Plan back on track with Haven as the premier power in the Haven Quadrant and the Alignment was figuring that eventually Haven would go back to being the force that took on the League as it was starting to splinter,
Why? Because not only were (or are) the initial flight(s) ofLenny Dets not yet complete nor operational but they didn't have enough OB type ships to go after enough of the Haven construction/orbital manufacturing that they knew about, let alone the "new" one at Bolt Hole. My guess is that the Alignment presumed that Manticore would blame Haven by default AND that Haven would (making the same error that SLN did) think that whomever carried out OB also took out the majority of the Home Fleets of both Manticore and Grayson. Yeah, I know, the actual deployed fleets in MBS or Yeltson's Star were not engaged, only ships in Dock/ under construction or otherwise in long-term parking obits.

There is the fact that Harrington was actually at the Haven System and in "discussion" with Pritchard about resolution of the war when the news arrived that the attacks on MBS had happened. It was probably clear to Harrington that there were not enough "missing" of the ROH fleet- given who was there- to have done something like OB and, of course, the descriptions of effects of some of the weapons were way outside of what either side could deliver.

If Haven -not already being faced with Harrington's Apollo equipped fleet and being fairly deep into discussion of what Manticore wanted for a Treaty to end the war (which was actually quite a good offer even considering it was backed up with Harrington as the hammer ready to fall- had rushed an attack at the reeling MBS (also hitting Grayson would have diluted what was nessisary) then Haven MIGHT have forced MBS to surrender though they still would have ripped the Haven force a new one with the INTACT Home Fleet (at least the HF) Having taken MBS and acquired all that new tech detail, it would have taken them time to add said tech to the RHN before being in any way able to go after SLN and the League.

And why would Haven gone after the League at that point? At the point of OB, Manticore does NOT YET have Talbot included and I don't think that Haven would be ready to try and digest adding that pending lobe of the SEM, particularly since they will have quite enough difficulty with what they would face in Silesia. The Anderman Empire "probably" would not try to swoop on and grab all those systems newley acquired by Manticore, mostly because they would already have their hands full with their share of Silesia.
It is probable that OFS (with the encouragement of the Alignment) would have pushed ahead any long range plans and moved forward into Talbot but IF they jumped the Talbot side of the Line wormhole they would been able to hold Haven at bay (just old fashioned vast distance without the wormhole transit and having to get there THROUGH THE LEAGUE if not by "just" using hyperspace......not going to happen.

We, the readers, know about Maya and Erwhon but OFS/SL/SLN would not.
The League DID NOT send aid, not even some government investing/fact finding mission to Manticore (would they have even bothered to do that for Grayson-I think not) after the word of OB got to Earth. We have no hint that SLN/the Mandarins had any plan in place or on the drawing board to actually take the Manticore Junction from a devastated SEM.

Heck, it should have sounded like the perfect opportunity for OFS to show up with shiploads of "stuff" and a service contract from Hell that OFS would have tried to hammer into placed bring eveything Manticore held under OFS control.....and they didn't. Not even a whiff?
Ok, no place in the plot when your going to send 300 SLN SD though hyperspace and are prepared to blast any surviving (it having been presumed mostly destroyed) Manticore Home Fleet on the way to forcing surrender of the Queen by threat of bombardment.

So......change the reality so Haven can take Manticore and give it a decade or two for the SL to be the right stage or ripeness before you smash it like a rotten tomato.

Sounds good to me.

Brigade XO wrote:We see Oyster Bay being used against Manticore and Grayson. We were told that the use of "Oyster Bay" was rushed and are shown that it was done with the small fleet of essentialy "proof of concept" an testbed/training ships for the delivery of the G-torps and all those ballistic packages with Spider Drive--and the Ghost scout ships.

My opinion is that it was rushed to try and get The Plan back on track with Haven as the premier power in the Haven Quadrant and the Alignment was figuring that eventually Haven would go back to being the force that took on the League as it was starting to splinter,

I think that is partly correct. It was also the case that it was trying to undo the Talbott Quadrant; which might have fallen to the Solarian League, if Haven had conquered Manticore.

But even if we assume that Haven could conquer Manticore as a result; that does not help the plan, because that gives Haven the world conquering technology that can be integrated into the navy at Bolthole. Plus there is no time pressure, because the Solarian League has not had any military encounters with Haven. So by the time the Malign could get the plan to the stage where Haven is about to fight the Solarian League, Haven will be in the same position of strength as the Grand Alliance was versus the League.

Brigade XO wrote:There is the fact that Harrington was actually at the Haven System and in "discussion" with Pritchard about resolution of the war when the news arrived that the attacks on MBS had happened. It was probably clear to Harrington that there were not enough "missing" of the ROH fleet- given who was there- to have done something like OB and, of course, the descriptions of effects of some of the weapons were way outside of what either side could deliver.

And don't forget something that the Alignment couldn't know: Harrington had empathic abilities. She knew that Haven didn't do it, without asking. In fact, she'd have known if they were negotiating in bad faith much earlier and would have sent word or simply flown home.

Part of the challenge is that - at the point where OFS is now horrified that Manticore is in Talbot-the Alignment is about to go batshit crazy as their plans to derail Manticore being there and within reasonable hyperspace cursing time to Mesa.

Monica didn't turn out the way it was expected- which would have put OFS with FF carrying the load- holding the Talbot end of the Lynx terminus of the MWJ.

Haven has Harrington on their doorstep in negotiations but she returns to Manticore in response to Oyster Bay.......at that point, would Haven tried to rush a 2nd try at taking Manticore? My thought is no.....I don't recall if Honor told Prichard much beyond somebody attacked the orbital infrastructure but Haven, at least, knows that Manticore has what they need to defeat Haven in the field just with what Harrington had with her...,if the replenished Home Fleet was not involved in OB and Harrington told Prichard that, I doubt she would have tried to roll the dice one more time and try to attack into what would already be a hornet nest or really angry RMN.

In that same time frame, the SL hasn't yet gotten their soft parts in a vice by having tried to strike at Spindle and lost Carandal's force along with Bing's So other than actually sending "observers" to the MBS to see what happened and offer the dubious assistance of the SL via OFS, SL isn't all that likely to send a massive war fleet to just try and "rescue" the "Manticorian Survivors".

And, yes, the SL and Haven have not yet crossed swords so they probably have a lesser knowledge of Haven's military size and capability than they have of Manticore's
Unless the Alignment pushed, and pushed hard, SL isn't going to make an overt try at Manticore AT THAT TIME.
So The Plan sort of goes back on track.