SharkHunter wrote:--snipping--
cthia wrote:No way SharkHunter. Tactically, McQueen was heads and shoulders above the rest. As Somtaaw stated, even Hamish admitted that she was better - which was an understatement. The proof was in the pudding. Whoever controls Trevor's Star has benefit of interior position. McQueen understood that as no other Havenite could have. She was the one to hold Trevor's Star.
I'd still say "no way Jose", but that McQueen was the best ADMIRAL to hold Trevor's Star as long she did, given that Giscard, Theisman, etc. were assigned to other areas. Keep in mind that the PN chose to maintain about a 2:1 ship-of-the-wall force advantage at TS so that Hamish's tactically superior ships couldn't close with the PN fleet defenses, otherwise Hamish's would have won in short order because of the better quality of the RMN crews and ships.
But I'd rather use a different battle (Gettysburg, US Civil War) to make my point: The two best commanders in terms of effect on the battle on the field were John Buford, whose epic defense in depth enabled the Union Armies to get the interior and stronger position, and Longstreet, who argued that what the Army of Northern Virginia should have done would have been to briefly engage at Gettysburg and then retreat towards Washington, forcing the Union armies to come and get them with the Confed armies holding a tactically superior "interior position". Instead with Lee's orders, Longstreet's divisions had to attack the Hancock-led defensive position, losing nearly half of his available forces on the 2nd day of the battle.
Once the Union Armies were entrenched, they held the force and position advantage, and massacred the Confed forces on the 3rd day of that battle. Nothing the superior tactician (Longstreet) could do was going to change the outcome EXCEPT retreat and force the battle on new terms.
That same level of force advantage is what Hamish needed to take Trevor's Star, triggering a "role of the die" battle that would have likely lost the war, had McQueen and the Peeps found an effective counter to that much force.
There was nothing
tactically superior about Hamish's ships. Interior position
is tactical superiority! Tactical superiority comes from the brilliance of the CO and/or position, not from the ships. Granted,
technologically superior ships
could allow a wider range of tactical options, but not inherently so. Hamish simply was
not in McQueen's league. And Giscard was an amateur compared to both McQueen
and Theisman.
As I remember it, it was agreed by Haven's top level advisors that McQueen was
the one to hold Trevor's Star. IMO, she was superior to Yu. At least his equal. Theisman was only a protege of Yu.
McQueen was the
only Havenite strategist to create a successful offensive plan against the Alliance during the First Havenite War (Operation Icarus), which consisted of a daring series of punishing raids upon highly visible targets, thereby forcing the Alliance to redeploy its strength for defensive purposes. (HH8)
McQueen was so good that Pierre and Saint-Just recognized her talents and realized that they needed her for the Octagon. She was a brilliant strategist
and tactician. I maintain, that if McQueen would have survived, the Alliance would have been hurt even more.
Now let's discuss interior position. If McQueen had a "true" advantage of interior position, then what that means is that she may have had an additional benefit of being between RMN's forces, with a chance to defeat them in detail, thus effectively signifying an additional force multiplier. It would also mean that she had benefit of forces advantageously positioned in regards to the system's phenomena. Akin to the disadvantage that a ground force would have being pinned against the ocean. Having the interior position also allows one to easily flank the opponent, and makes it difficult for
you to be flanked. Or makes it difficult for the opponent to prevent being flanked.
The battle that you offered up for exhibit isn't a proper battle to show the true advantage of interior position held by McQueen. A common tactical maneuver of
ground forces to nullify interior position, is to attack then retreat, to force your opponent to give up the interior position in order to come after you. In the Honorverse, at Trevor's Star, that option would not have been available.
On the chess board, interior position is
usually afforded he who controls the center of the board and supports his rook pawns en appui. Devastating position if one knows how to play it out, for it forces your opponent to entertain wasteful moves along the perimeter - "exterior" lines of operation around the board.
The Art of Battle:
http://www.theartofbattle.com/tactics-tutorialThe Art of WarHalleck's text ultimately tried to apply Jominian principles of defensive strategies to the military situation of the United States. Several of its chapters were dedicated to the practice of building defensive fortifications while assembling a force of superior strength capable of being brought to bear on the decisive points of an enemy's position. His concern for the use of fortresses reflected his vision of war based on the possession of territory – not the Napoleonic or Clausewitzian principle of destroying an enemy's army.[18]
Halleck was a firm believer in the geometry of warfare and his work emphasized the Jominian idea of "lines of operation."[19] Natural lines of operation used the advantages of terrain, such as mountains and rivers, to provide protection against the enemy. This was a factor that was overlooked to some extent when Halleck adapted Jominian principles to America without considering the differences in the terrain. The natural lines of operation in America, and those that would determine the battlefields of the Civil War, were clearly defined in the west by the area between the Mississippi River and the Appalachian Mountains. In the east, the fighting would take place between the Atlantic Seaboard and those same mountains.[20] There were few broad plains in America that allowed for Jominian-style combat that favored precision movements of soldiers organized in columns designed to "dominate three sides of a rectangular zone of operation."[21] Because of the geometrical approach to warfare, some Civil War generals actually tried to transpose the theoretical mathematical lines of operation written on their maps to actual lines of combat on the battlefield.[22]
Interior lines of operation referred to the simple idea that one side may have a position between – "inside" – separated enemy forces. With such an interior position, it was possible to keep one's army concentrated and strike at first one part of an enemy force, then the other, defeating each in turn, even though the enemy's total force size might be superior. Jomini's theory constantly stressed the value of interior lines of operation in combat while pointing out the disadvantages of an army forced to fight using exterior lines of operation.[23] In the attempt to introduce rationality and rules into war, Jomini's work served to downplay the violent nature of the conflict and made it seem like a game or geometric exercise in which the maneuvering of troops on a board became more important than the combat.[24] The Jominian influence in strategy was so strong that General J. D. Hittle, joked, "Many a Civil War general went into battle with a sword in one hand and Jomini's ‘Summary of the Art of War' in the other."[25] It was this basic knowledge of strategy – one that stressed defense and a calculated methodical approach to offensive actions – that prepared West Point graduates to begin their careers as army officers.[26]
Complete text:
http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/ci ... heory.aspx
Overwhelming force
does not ensure nullification of interior position. Just ask Xerxes, who led his Persian Empire of 150,000 men against a fierce opponent who held the interior position with only 7,000 men! For seven full days!! That's a force advantage of better than 20:1 ... !!!
And the Persians only won in the end, because of a traitor!
The Battle of Thermopylae (/θərˈmɒpɨliː/ thər-MOP-i-lee; Greek: Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, Machē tōn Thermopylōn) was fought between alliances of Greek city-states, led by King Leonidas of Sparta, and the Persian Empire of Xerxes I over the course of three days, during the second Persian invasion of Greece. It took place simultaneously with the naval battle at Artemisium, in August or September 480 BC, at the narrow coastal pass of Thermopylae ("The Hot Gates"). The Persian invasion was a delayed response to the defeat of the first Persian invasion of Greece, which had been ended by the Athenian victory at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC. Xerxes had amassed a huge army and navy, and set out to conquer all of Greece. The Athenian general Themistocles had proposed that the allied Greeks block the advance of the Persian army at the pass of Thermopylae, and simultaneously block the Persian navy at the Straits of Artemisium.
A Greek force of approximately 7,000 men marched north to block the pass in the summer of 480 BC. The Persian army, alleged by the ancient sources to have numbered over one million but today considered to have been much smaller (various figures are given by scholars ranging between about 100,000 and 150,000),[7][8] arrived at the pass in late August or early September. The vastly outnumbered Greeks held off the Persians for seven days (including three of battle) before the rear-guard was annihilated in one of history's most famous last stands. During two full days of battle, the small force led by Leonidas blocked the only road by which the massive Persian army could pass. After the second day of battle, a local resident named Ephialtes betrayed the Greeks by revealing that a small path led behind the Greek lines. Leonidas, aware that his force was being outflanked, dismissed the bulk of the Greek army and remained to guard their retreat with 300 Spartans, 700 Thespians, 400 Thebans, and perhaps a few hundred others, most of whom were killed.
McQueen had that rare acumen of a mastery of strategy
and tactics. And that made her asskicking damn-dangerous!
****** *
I'd love to have RFC's official account of the advantages of the 'interior position' held by the controlling navy of Trevor's Star.
