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Upcoming surplus of junior officers

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Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by Henry Brown   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 6:39 pm

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We know from textev that class sizes at Saganimi Island have grown to the point where every year thousands of new officer candidates graduate. They do a middy cruise and then (most) of them are promoted to Ensign. After a year or 2 as an Ensign a promotion to Lieutenant (JG) would normally follow.

This was fine when the RMN and GSN were building ships as fast as they could because every new ship built opened up new positions for personnel. However, due to OB that is no longer the case. And the hiatus in new ship construction is going to be quite long due to the need to first rebuild orbital infrastructure and then build the ships. I'd estimate a minimum of 3 or 4 years post OB before any new ships are finished. And those will be small ships such as LACs, DDs, or CLs. Larger ships such as BCs or SP(P)s will take longer to construct.

My point is: if the RMN and GSN continue to create large numbers of new junior officers every year but are not producing any new ships, won't they reach a point where every available shipboard slot is already filled and there are no positions available for the newly graduated Ensigns?
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by pappilon   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 7:43 pm

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Henry Brown wrote:We know from textev that class sizes at Saganimi Island have grown to the point where every year thousands of new officer candidates graduate. They do a middy cruise and then (most) of them are promoted to Ensign. After a year or 2 as an Ensign a promotion to Lieutenant (JG) would normally follow.

This was fine when the RMN and GSN were building ships as fast as they could because every new ship built opened up new positions for personnel. However, due to OB that is no longer the case. And the hiatus in new ship construction is going to be quite long due to the need to first rebuild orbital infrastructure and then build the ships. I'd estimate a minimum of 3 or 4 years post OB before any new ships are finished. And those will be small ships such as LACs, DDs, or CLs. Larger ships such as BCs or SP(P)s will take longer to construct.

My point is: if the RMN and GSN continue to create large numbers of new junior officers every year but are not producing any new ships, won't they reach a point where every available shipboard slot is already filled and there are no positions available for the newly graduated Ensigns?


Yes. They ran into that in the interim between the first and second Havenite wars. Seems some Lt. was bad-mouthing Abigail Hearnes over her meteoric rise in rank. Bolthole is cranking out ships, the rest of Haven's yards are too.

I think new ships below the wall will be coming out sooner. The original estimates were made without considering Beowulf seceding from the League and pouring assistance and cash into Manticore's recovery efforts, andHaven signing a treaty also. Manticore and Grayson may well find their orbital construction platforms rebuilt somewhat faster than original estimates.

They are probably coming off those expedited schedules and lowering the size of new classes.

The combination of GA R&D programs may slow the laying of new hulls because of design changes.
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by saber964   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 7:46 pm

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Henry Brown wrote:We know from textev that class sizes at Saganimi Island have grown to the point where every year thousands of new officer candidates graduate. They do a middy cruise and then (most) of them are promoted to Ensign. After a year or 2 as an Ensign a promotion to Lieutenant (JG) would normally follow.

This was fine when the RMN and GSN were building ships as fast as they could because every new ship built opened up new positions for personnel. However, due to OB that is no longer the case. And the hiatus in new ship construction is going to be quite long due to the need to first rebuild orbital infrastructure and then build the ships. I'd estimate a minimum of 3 or 4 years post OB before any new ships are finished. And those will be small ships such as LACs, DDs, or CLs. Larger ships such as BCs or SP(P)s will take longer to construct.

My point is: if the RMN and GSN continue to create large numbers of new junior officers every year but are not producing any new ships, won't they reach a point where every available shipboard slot is already filled and there are no positions available for the newly graduated Ensigns?

Oh they'll be a problem but they could also stuff them into slots as a bank for when they do need them to crew new construction. My guess is they'll put them in system defense LAC units.
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by pappilon   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 8:05 pm

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saber964 wrote:
Henry Brown wrote:We know from textev that class sizes at Saganimi Island have grown to the point where every year thousands of new officer candidates graduate. They do a middy cruise and then (most) of them are promoted to Ensign. After a year or 2 as an Ensign a promotion to Lieutenant (JG) would normally follow.

This was fine when the RMN and GSN were building ships as fast as they could because every new ship built opened up new positions for personnel. However, due to OB that is no longer the case. And the hiatus in new ship construction is going to be quite long due to the need to first rebuild orbital infrastructure and then build the ships. I'd estimate a minimum of 3 or 4 years post OB before any new ships are finished. And those will be small ships such as LACs, DDs, or CLs. Larger ships such as BCs or SP(P)s will take longer to construct.

My point is: if the RMN and GSN continue to create large numbers of new junior officers every year but are not producing any new ships, won't they reach a point where every available shipboard slot is already filled and there are no positions available for the newly graduated Ensigns?

Oh they'll be a problem but they could also stuff them into slots as a bank for when they do need them to crew new construction. My guess is they'll put them in system defense LAC units.


Between First BOM & OB, Cortez is going to be struggling to find crews for the new construction. They will probably be shuffled into other duties and accrue time in grade awaiting snotty cruises. OR maybe the Havenites could take them aboard their new construction.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The imagination has to be trained into foresight and empathy.
Ursula K. LeGuinn

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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by kzt   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 9:10 pm

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saber964 wrote:Oh they'll be a problem but they could also stuff them into slots as a bank for when they do need them to crew new construction. My guess is they'll put them in system defense LAC units.

The LAC factories also blew up real good.
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by Brigade XO   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 9:14 pm

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Between BOM and Oyster Bay, the Navy is going to continue to need junior officers. They lost a lot of people and these are trained (to initial levels) people who are also going to need experience.
The Charles Wilson ended up with ONE midship woman abord for her deployment because the rest were lost when the station was destroyed. We don't really have any idea of how many of that current class were lost in Oyster bay, either on ships attached to the station, assigned or in transit in any of the space stations or other facilities that were hit, etc.
We have seen how RMN was scrabling to fill the positions opened by the losses, that is going to continue for years to build the experience base up along with the pure numbers.

They are back, again, to the need to plug people into positions which might be premature but are nessisary on the basis of combat losses. They may (probably are) pulling people with some experience from places like SDs and putting them in positions of higher responsiblity in smaller ships and filling the SD positions with more junior people....push the training and experience.
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by ldwechsler   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 9:37 pm

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Brigade XO wrote:Between BOM and Oyster Bay, the Navy is going to continue to need junior officers. They lost a lot of people and these are trained (to initial levels) people who are also going to need experience.
The Charles Wilson ended up with ONE midship woman abord for her deployment because the rest were lost when the station was destroyed. We don't really have any idea of how many of that current class were lost in Oyster bay, either on ships attached to the station, assigned or in transit in any of the space stations or other facilities that were hit, etc.
We have seen how RMN was scrabling to fill the positions opened by the losses, that is going to continue for years to build the experience base up along with the pure numbers.

They are back, again, to the need to plug people into positions which might be premature but are nessisary on the basis of combat losses. They may (probably are) pulling people with some experience from places like SDs and putting them in positions of higher responsiblity in smaller ships and filling the SD positions with more junior people....push the training and experience.


There will not be a crunch with a war on. A lot of ships get destroyed, people die, get wounded too badly to serve. As noted, the LACs are very expensive in terms of personnel. There are several officers on each LAC and one carrier has a hundred of the little vessels.

When the war ends is when there will be a real crunch. If things end on a real peace note, there will be far fewer jobs. Note the US after World War I and World War II.

On the other hand, if things are a bit dicey there may be more slots open but there will be slower promotion.
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by PeterZ   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 10:53 pm

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ldwechsler wrote:
Brigade XO wrote:Between BOM and Oyster Bay, the Navy is going to continue to need junior officers. They lost a lot of people and these are trained (to initial levels) people who are also going to need experience.
The Charles Wilson ended up with ONE midship woman abord for her deployment because the rest were lost when the station was destroyed. We don't really have any idea of how many of that current class were lost in Oyster bay, either on ships attached to the station, assigned or in transit in any of the space stations or other facilities that were hit, etc.
We have seen how RMN was scrabling to fill the positions opened by the losses, that is going to continue for years to build the experience base up along with the pure numbers.

They are back, again, to the need to plug people into positions which might be premature but are nessisary on the basis of combat losses. They may (probably are) pulling people with some experience from places like SDs and putting them in positions of higher responsiblity in smaller ships and filling the SD positions with more junior people....push the training and experience.


There will not be a crunch with a war on. A lot of ships get destroyed, people die, get wounded too badly to serve. As noted, the LACs are very expensive in terms of personnel. There are several officers on each LAC and one carrier has a hundred of the little vessels.

When the war ends is when there will be a real crunch. If things end on a real peace note, there will be far fewer jobs. Note the US after World War I and World War II.

On the other hand, if things are a bit dicey there may be more slots open but there will be slower promotion.

Ok, we know the MAlign likely skips clean away. We also know the GA will be convinced the MAlign still exists and are still executing their plans. We also know the SL will shatter enough to cease being a threat to the GA. Just like the PRH, SL sectors will sink into warlordism. The GA will not be trusted enough to be asked for help for the most part.

Under those conditions the RMN, RHN, IAN and GSN will not have the luxury of standing down much of their navies. I suspect those navies will build up the lighter combatants and maintain and upgrade their walls of battle if not expand them. I suspect 20 years down the line the RF will be the largest SL rump state with 3-4 smaller states either on good terms with the RF, Beowulf or both. All of these states will have respectable navies and credible R&D efforts. The RF and perhaps all the others will have had their own 20 years of war to forge experience into those navies.

I wonder what additional wrinkles beyond Spyder drives RFC has in store for our heroes? When next we meet Raoul, Katherine, Abby, Rachel and Honor, they will be again face an experienced foe with a navy grown less experienced. Plus ca change, hien?
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by Relax   » Sat Oct 07, 2017 11:19 pm

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kzt wrote:
saber964 wrote:Oh they'll be a problem but they could also stuff them into slots as a bank for when they do need them to crew new construction. My guess is they'll put them in system defense LAC units.

The LAC factories also blew up real good.

Professor Flitwick will wave his wand and they will all recombine. No worries. Hrmm gonna need Madam Pomfrey for the personnel though :o
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Re: Upcoming surplus of junior officers
Post by Henry Brown   » Sun Oct 08, 2017 9:54 am

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ldwechsler wrote:There will not be a crunch with a war on. A lot of ships get destroyed, people die, get wounded too badly to serve. As noted, the LACs are very expensive in terms of personnel. There are several officers on each LAC and one carrier has a hundred of the little vessels.

When the war ends is when there will be a real crunch. If things end on a real peace note, there will be far fewer jobs. Note the US after World War I and World War II.

On the other hand, if things are a bit dicey there may be more slots open but there will be slower promotion.


Normally you would be correct about combat casualties opening up slots for officers. But so far all engagements against the SLN have been one sided wipeouts where the RMN and GSN ships suffer little to no casualties.
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