SPOILER end of the MA

kzt wrote:Bit of a straw man there.

You don't need a fleet train to support pirate suppression operations. Your vessels won't get significantly damaged or fire a lot of ammo. The vessel sails out of base, run around showing the flag for some period and then goes back to base.

It is demanding of the leadership of your vessels, but not of your fleet support elements.

One does not need a fleet train in either commerce protection or piracy suppression. All one needs are a few bases like Sidemore. This is peacetime no one is running active military operations.

ALL systems whose commerce is being raided will directly benefit. So How many systems is that?

ALL systems except the MALign/RF systems will indirectly benefit even though they will ever be aware of it. Why? Because the RF is dependent on chaos in the verge to spread its cancer. The less chaos, the less chance for the cancer to spread.

THEN, faced with the immanent collapse of their master plan might they have to come out of the shadows to make a military confrontation. And those 13 systems of the MAlign (12 RF + Darius) do not have, the military, industrial or resource capability of defeating the SL +AE +Maya/Erewhon +GA. We're back to the plucky little Anderman Empire taking on the rest of the Universe. So to speak.

The MAlign has to win a Short Victorious War consisting of one massive Oyster Bay followed by a kamikaze wave of strikes by the RF. Because if it does not succeed entirely in its sneak attack it is Pearl Harbor 3.0

Furthermore, Oyster Bay 2.0 is predicated on the GA not cracking the Spider's invisibility factor and deploying the hardware to defeat it. Which happens to be the situation Theisman and Pritchard faced when they launched Beatrice.

Human nature being what it be, grief dissipates over time. So unless someone is out there in the media constantly stoking the furnace of hatred and resentment, those Civilian deaths will cease to be a driving force in society lacking a visible enemy.

The MAlign plan, so far, as outlined in the Detweiller Memorandum, is to lay low, be trap door spiders and wait for our targeted systems to fall into our waiting arms. With no more acts of terrorism to feed the fires, those horrendous losses will slowly ebb from the conscousness of the woman on the street. Not, however from the Institutional Memory of ONI.

First of your statement about the Lenny Dets is extremely vague. There is no text evidence they have a large number of them. They're in the process of building them. Additionally you keep ignoring that the fact that the MAlign's strategy for its end game is political not military. The MAlign doesn't want to militarily impose its values on the rest of humanity. They know their will be a backlash if they do this. That's why they want to accomplish their goals through political means. Certainly there has been a military component to their operations but they aren't going for world domination by the sword.

46 Million people still isn't a justification to build ships. As everyone has pointed out and I am sure the pundits in Honorverse would point out their deaths were not the result of ship to ship weapons but a bomb. SD(P)s can't stop bombs. What happened at Beowulf justifies pumping money into your intelligence resources and ensuring the hunt for the MAlign continues. Not building ships that as we've also pointed out can't even detect the spider drive. In the real world you have to operate based off of the information you have. That is essentially what the queen is doing at the end of the book. She's acting rational, your arguments are not rational.

This is ridiculous!

ywing14 wrote:First of your statement about the Lenny Dets is extremely vague. There is no text evidence they have a large number of them. They're in the process of building them. Additionally you keep ignoring that the fact that the MAlign's strategy for its end game is political not military. The MAlign doesn't want to militarily impose its values on the rest of humanity. They know their will be a backlash if they do this. That's why they want to accomplish their goals through political means. Certainly there has been a military component to their operations but they aren't going for world domination by the sword.

And absolutely nothing to suggest by your and Sigs' arguments so far that once the current tranche of Lenny Ds will could or should be the last and only ones. You are both assuming that Both Darius and the RF will continue expanding their forces until, they cam overwhelm the GA, Maya, AE and possibly the league.

It is Sigs, not Pappilon that is ignoring that reality. Pappilon, KZT et al are all arguing your point here for you and with you. You seem to be arguing both sides simultaneously.

ywing14 wrote:46 Million people still isn't a justification to build ships. As everyone has pointed out and I am sure the pundits in Honorverse would point out their deaths were not the result of ship to ship weapons but a bomb. SD(P)s can't stop bombs.

Absolutely no argument, again, from Pappilon. I suggest, yet again you take this up with Sigs.

ywing14 wrote: What happened at Beowulf justifies pumping money into your intelligence resources and ensuring the hunt for the MAlign continues. Not building ships that as we've also pointed out can't even detect the spider drive. In the real world you have to operate based off of the information you have. That is essentially what the queen is doing at the end of the book. She's acting rational, your arguments are not rational.

Which yet again is what Pappilon has been saying from the start of this insanity. It is not Pappilon coming out of left field with all of this it is moral insanity not to become the USSR and beggar your population by building a military that cannot see 9 on oh so many levels) the enemy it is preparing to fight.

I know it is getting confusing which is why PAPPILON has taken the time to break out the different threads of conversation and isolate them in his/her responses to them. Herhaps Pappilon has been less than clear for which (s)he accepts full responsibility and offers humble and sincere apology. And Hes pappilon has been called for erring in the citations mea culpa.

pappilon wrote:This is ridiculous!

ywing14 wrote:First of your statement about the Lenny Dets is extremely vague. There is no text evidence they have a large number of them. They're in the process of building them. Additionally you keep ignoring that the fact that the MAlign's strategy for its end game is political not military. The MAlign doesn't want to militarily impose its values on the rest of humanity. They know their will be a backlash if they do this. That's why they want to accomplish their goals through political means. Certainly there has been a military component to their operations but they aren't going for world domination by the sword.

And absolutely nothing to suggest by your and Sigs' arguments so far that once the current tranche of Lenny Ds will could or should be the last and only ones. You are both assuming that Both Darius and the RF will continue expanding their forces until, they cam overwhelm the GA, Maya, AE and possibly the league.

It is Sigs, not Pappilon that is ignoring that reality. Pappilon, KZT et al are all arguing your point here for you and with you. You seem to be arguing both sides simultaneously.

ywing14 wrote:46 Million people still isn't a justification to build ships. As everyone has pointed out and I am sure the pundits in Honorverse would point out their deaths were not the result of ship to ship weapons but a bomb. SD(P)s can't stop bombs.

Absolutely no argument, again, from Pappilon. I suggest, yet again you take this up with Sigs.

ywing14 wrote: What happened at Beowulf justifies pumping money into your intelligence resources and ensuring the hunt for the MAlign continues. Not building ships that as we've also pointed out can't even detect the spider drive. In the real world you have to operate based off of the information you have. That is essentially what the queen is doing at the end of the book. She's acting rational, your arguments are not rational.

Which yet again is what Pappilon has been saying from the start of this insanity. It is not Pappilon coming out of left field with all of this it is moral insanity not to become the USSR and beggar your population by building a military that cannot see 9 on oh so many levels) the enemy it is preparing to fight.

I know it is getting confusing which is why PAPPILON has taken the time to break out the different threads of conversation and isolate them in his/her responses to them. Herhaps Pappilon has been less than clear for which (s)he accepts full responsibility and offers humble and sincere apology. And Hes pappilon has been called for erring in the citations mea culpa.

Pap, I wasn't arguing with you, I just didn't feel like trying to quote Sigs 6 or 7 posts from the previous page. I was responding to Sigs post about the fleet of Lennys. I apologize if you thought it was directed at you. It's my fault since the post came right under yours. I should have been clear who my post was directed at. We agree on pretty much everything here. I think you and Kzt are 100% correct in your response to commerce protection.

Sigs wrote:Its one thing to say we need anti-piracy patrols and we need lighter ships to do it when the actual mission is vague and the size and scope of the mission is vague as well. But one of the most important questions is how do you prevent the GA from turning into the League and Frontier Security?

Why don't we let Honor address that...

Uncompromising Honor - eARC
MARCH 1923 POST DIASPORA

King Michael’s Tower
Mount Royal Palace
City of Landing
Manticore Binary System
Star Empire of Manticore
wrote: Quite a few Manticoran politicians argued that the Star Empire had a moral responsibility to provide the stability the ex-Protectorates needed. That, as the creator of the power vacuum, the Grand Alliance was the only force capable of filling it. Part of Honor wanted—badly—to endorse that argument. She was a historian, and specifically a military historian, and she knew how poorly it was going to end in some of those star systems. She didn’t want to see that…and, she knew, she wanted to avoid the moral guilt for having allowed it to happen.

But the last thing the galaxy needed was for the Grand Alliance to simply replace Frontier Security. And the last thing the Grand Alliance needed was to turn into Frontier Security. The Office of Frontier Security had started with the best of intentions, and it had taken a while for it to warp and corrode. But it had happened, and Honor Alexander-Harrington had no desire to see her star nation—either of her star nations—start down that dark and twisty road.

Besides, there’s such a thing as independence and maturity. Star nations have to learn to walk, just like anybody else, and they need to learn to stand on their own two feet. We won’t do them any favors by “casting a protective wing” over them if it prevents them from learning both those things.

And it wasn’t like the Grand Alliance was simply going to walk away. It had no intention of intervening to impose outside solutions, but it was prepared to trade with any star system, support any legitimate government, extend economic support and military aid as trading or treaty partner. And it was prepared to whack any hands that got too greedy and grasping where their neighbors’ toys were concerned. No doubt there would be an upsurge in piracy and warlordism, but the Royal Manticoran Navy had cut its eyeteeth in the Silesian Confederacy. Any newly independent star systems who were inclined to emulate their erstwhile OFS masters would discover the RMN and its allies had a short way with freebooters and would-be conquistadors. Speaking of which—

(Bold mine, italics the author's)

kzt wrote:Bit of a straw man there.

You don't need a fleet train to support pirate suppression operations. Your vessels won't get significantly damaged or fire a lot of ammo. The vessel sails out of base, run around showing the flag for some period and then goes back to base.

It is demanding of the leadership of your vessels, but not of your fleet support elements.

IT would require a fleet train, we are talking about ships that could be months away from resupply and maintenance bases. You have to control the area of operation for all patrols and it cannot be from the Manticore System, so you need bases close by where your patrols can find help if they need it and do minor repair that can't be done from ship resources, they will need to eventually resupply...cant have your ships traveling for 6 weeks to 12 weeks to get on station, stay on station for a month or two and then travel 6-12 weeks to get back home for resupply or minor repair. And you can't assume that your ships will not be expending ammunition as their only purpose is to engage pirates.



Besides, what about all the other questions I asked?

pappilon wrote:
One does not need a fleet train in either commerce protection or piracy suppression. All one needs are a few bases like Sidemore. This is peacetime no one is running active military operations.

So the pirates won't be shooting back? It's not peacetime if the pirates are actively shooting and they are such a big threat. It might be low intensity conflict but during peacetime you don't have a large percentage of your fleet engaged in combat with pirates.

ALL systems whose commerce is being raided will directly benefit. So How many systems is that?

100,500,1000 or 10,000 you tell me how many.

ALL systems except the MALign/RF systems will indirectly benefit even though they will ever be aware of it. Why? Because the RF is dependent on chaos in the verge to spread its cancer. The less chaos, the less chance for the cancer to spread.

How does the average voter in a GA world benefit not how does the recipient benefit.

THEN, faced with the immanent collapse of their master plan might they have to come out of the shadows to make a military confrontation. And those 13 systems of the MAlign (12 RF + Darius) do not have, the military, industrial or resource capability of defeating the SL +AE +Maya/Erewhon +GA. We're back to the plucky little Anderman Empire taking on the rest of the Universe. So to speak.

Ok, you lost me here.

The MAlign has to win a Short Victorious War consisting of one massive Oyster Bay followed by a kamikaze wave of strikes by the RF. Because if it does not succeed entirely in its sneak attack it is Pearl Harbor 3.0

Or they invest in their own little pirate fleet, bleed your fleet by dozens of cruisers and destroyers monthly. At which point you would require to replace those ships and send more to reinforce them. Essentially they would force the GA to support an ever increasing commitment in star systems weeks or months away without actively engaging the GA on home turf until they are ready. Once the GA is committed and forces to build more light warships on a constant basis the GA will end up unable to maintain anything else in terms of fleet. After a decade or two the GA would be mighty tired of being the Galactic policeman, withdraw and let the SLN take over again or would end up in a never ending cycle of destruction.

Furthermore, Oyster Bay 2.0 is predicated on the GA not cracking the Spider's invisibility factor and deploying the hardware to defeat it. Which happens to be the situation Theisman and Pritchard faced when they launched Beatrice.

And the MA has the Ghost Class scouts available for well scouting. They can use those ships for spying on a few of the GA's systems trying to find a weak point in the defences. If they look long enough and hard enough they will find a way in.

Human nature being what it be, grief dissipates over time. So unless someone is out there in the media constantly stoking the furnace of hatred and resentment, those Civilian deaths will cease to be a driving force in society lacking a visible enemy.

And it is the governments job to remind the people, luckily at least one GA member has a head of state that cannot be voted out.

Sigs wrote:

pappilon wrote:
One does not need a fleet train in either commerce protection or piracy suppression. All one needs are a few bases like Sidemore. This is peacetime no one is running active military operations.

So the pirates won't be shooting back? It's not peacetime if the pirates are actively shooting and they are such a big threat. It might be low intensity conflict but during peacetime you don't have a large percentage of your fleet engaged in combat with pirates.

ALL systems whose commerce is being raided will directly benefit. So How many systems is that?

100,500,1000 or 10,000 you tell me how many.

ALL systems except the MALign/RF systems will indirectly benefit even though they will ever be aware of it. Why? Because the RF is dependent on chaos in the verge to spread its cancer. The less chaos, the less chance for the cancer to spread.

How does the average voter in a GA world benefit not how does the recipient benefit.

THEN, faced with the immanent collapse of their master plan might they have to come out of the shadows to make a military confrontation. And those 13 systems of the MAlign (12 RF + Darius) do not have, the military, industrial or resource capability of defeating the SL +AE +Maya/Erewhon +GA. We're back to the plucky little Anderman Empire taking on the rest of the Universe. So to speak.

Ok, you lost me here.

The MAlign has to win a Short Victorious War consisting of one massive Oyster Bay followed by a kamikaze wave of strikes by the RF. Because if it does not succeed entirely in its sneak attack it is Pearl Harbor 3.0

Or they invest in their own little pirate fleet, bleed your fleet by dozens of cruisers and destroyers monthly. At which point you would require to replace those ships and send more to reinforce them. Essentially they would force the GA to support an ever increasing commitment in star systems weeks or months away without actively engaging the GA on home turf until they are ready. Once the GA is committed and forces to build more light warships on a constant basis the GA will end up unable to maintain anything else in terms of fleet. After a decade or two the GA would be mighty tired of being the Galactic policeman, withdraw and let the SLN take over again or would end up in a never ending cycle of destruction.

Furthermore, Oyster Bay 2.0 is predicated on the GA not cracking the Spider's invisibility factor and deploying the hardware to defeat it. Which happens to be the situation Theisman and Pritchard faced when they launched Beatrice.

And the MA has the Ghost Class scouts available for well scouting. They can use those ships for spying on a few of the GA's systems trying to find a weak point in the defences. If they look long enough and hard enough they will find a way in.

Human nature being what it be, grief dissipates over time. So unless someone is out there in the media constantly stoking the furnace of hatred and resentment, those Civilian deaths will cease to be a driving force in society lacking a visible enemy.

And it is the governments job to remind the people, luckily at least one GA member has a head of state that cannot be voted out.

Pirates generally avoid direct confrontations with Warships. They don't make their money destroying Warships, they make by plundering cargo and ransoming crews. They don't want to fight the GA that's why convoy escorts are important. additionally blowing a single pirate ship out of space doesn't take as many missiles as battling a fleet.

How is a MAlign pirate fleet going to bleed the GA by dozens of cruisers and destroyers monthly? The only ships that can match the GA in combat either belong to GA or the Malign. Any "pirate fleet" they'd use would want to avoid using their own vessels as it would risk exposing the Malign to being found. Could a plethora of pirates overwhelm a GA vessel. Sure it's possible but without literally enlisting hundreds of pirate vessels I don't see what your saying as possible.

ywing14 wrote:First of your statement about the Lenny Dets is extremely vague. There is no text evidence they have a large number of them. They're in the process of building them.

We know that the MA has 28 Shark-class ships and I don't remember which book it was but the Leonard Detweiler class was mentioned as being build with significantly more hulls. That could mean 40 or 400 but I am assuming it is on the low side at 40 ships. I am making a guess that the significantly more Leonard Detweilers don't mean in the hundreds it just means significantly more compared to the 28 Sharks they have.

Additionally you keep ignoring that the fact that the MAlign's strategy for its end game is political not military. The MAlign doesn't want to militarily impose its values on the rest of humanity. They know their will be a backlash if they do this. That's why they want to accomplish their goals through political means. Certainly there has been a military component to their operations but they aren't going for world domination by the sword.

You can assume that because you are privy to their part of the book, the GA is not so they cannot assume that the MA's strategy is political in nature and not a military one. Thats what you keep ignoring, you have to work with what the GA knows and the risks they will take by making assumptions like that.

46 Million people still isn't a justification to build ships.

Ok so wait for 100 million more? Or a couple of billion? At what point do you say enough is enough?

As everyone has pointed out and I am sure the pundits in Honorverse would point out their deaths were not the result of ship to ship weapons but a bomb. SD(P)s can't stop bombs. What happened at Beowulf justifies pumping money into your intelligence resources and ensuring the hunt for the MAlign continues. Not building ships that as we've also pointed out can't even detect the spider drive. In the real world you have to operate based off of the information you have. That is essentially what the queen is doing at the end of the book. She's acting rational, your arguments are not rational.

And what seems to be a blind spot is that as far as the GA knows those 46 million deaths are just the opening chapter in a very long war. They cannot afford to assume that the MA doesn't want a military conflict just because they have fought by proxy for the better part of the 2 year war, they have to assume that there is a military muscle that the MA is willing to unleash at the right moment.


As for the bit about the stealth? That applies to fixed defences, pods, LACs, DDs, CLs, CA, BCs and SD,s so if you are not going to build SD(P)'s for protection because they cannot see the enemy YET why bother wasting all of the other resources building missile pods and light combatants when the mission is so futile?

Weird Harold wrote:

Sigs wrote:Its one thing to say we need anti-piracy patrols and we need lighter ships to do it when the actual mission is vague and the size and scope of the mission is vague as well. But one of the most important questions is how do you prevent the GA from turning into the League and Frontier Security?

Why don't we let Honor address that...



(Bold mine, italics the author's)

Nowhere in there did it say anything about anti-piracy and commerce protection for the galaxy provided by the GA. So if everyone here seems to be arguing for a large anti-piracy mission and commerce protection that would span hundreds of systems all over human space it is a legitimate question as to how you prevent the GA from becoming Frontier Fleet.


Everyone's go to point is that the GA needs lighter combatants for anti-piracy patrols and commerce protection instead of SD(P)'s but they seem to be light on any details rather then we need more ships for this mission.


I dont think that the GA should or even could provide anti-piracy for even a large portion of the now independent systems that require that help, trying to do that would end up morphing the GA into a new Frontier Fleet over time. When you take responsibility for the protection of hundreds of systems for the sole benefit of those systems eventually your voters will start asking pointed questions as to why my taxes are used to provide protection for someone on the other side of the Galaxy, it is only a small step from there before the GA starts finding ways to fund those patrols from local resources.


There are only so many resources to go around, if it's a choice between SD(P)'s that the people know are out there and ready to rain death upon any fleet that comes into their space or a few thousands lighter ships providing protections for systems that don't necessarily improve the GA's bottom line I know where I as a voter would start demanding the axe to fall.