NEED TO KNOW

Scenario:

Grayson and Manticore are at odds, again. This time it appears as if that part of the alliance might crumble.

In that event, would either Navy deny Honor certain information?

cthia wrote:Until the MA cracks the mystery.

Cracking the secret is not enough because by then the GA will have moved on to the next thing. They have first mover advantage.

The MAlign needs to leapfrog ahead by finding something that the GA would have missed, or by going down the road not travelled, or by changing the game altogether.

cthia wrote:Scenario:

Grayson and Manticore are at odds, again. This time it appears as if that part of the alliance might crumble.

In that event, would either Navy deny Honor certain information?

In such a hypothetical situation, any answer is possible. To my mind, the most likely is that Honor would have to choose sides; refusal to do so would force her retirement from one or both sides and put her out of any information loop. Picking either one would put her out of the loop of the other.

cthia wrote:Scenario:

Grayson and Manticore are at odds, again. This time it appears as if that part of the alliance might crumble.

In that event, would either Navy deny Honor certain information?

Honor could be selected as a more neutral diplomat, to try to make a last-ditch attempt at ending the feud.

Shannon_Foraker wrote:

cthia wrote:Scenario:

Grayson and Manticore are at odds, again. This time it appears as if that part of the alliance might crumble.

In that event, would either Navy deny Honor certain information?

Honor could be selected as a more neutral diplomat, to try to make a last-ditch attempt at ending the feud.

Good point, providing her integrity has not been compromised on either side.

In any event, the question would still stand. Would she be denied certain information, in case things go ___sideways.

Hmm...

Would every arm of the Admiralty have had a need to know about Apollo? What about the Fifth Space Lord, Bupers? Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo. If I am correct, this brings us right back to the irony that a lowly CPO also knew more about the most classified weapon system in Manticoran history than even someone in the Admiralty?

cthia wrote:Hmm...

Would every arm of the Admiralty have had a need to know about Apollo? What about the Fifth Space Lord, Bupers? Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo. If I am correct, this brings us right back to the irony that a lowly CPO also knew more about the most classified weapon system in Manticoran history than even someone in the Admiralty?

I suppose that is ironic if your expectation is that higher rank alone confers access to more secrets; but as you say "Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo". So it is not ironic, but the simple logic of "need to know".

cthia wrote:Hmm...

Would every arm of the Admiralty have had a need to know about Apollo? What about the Fifth Space Lord, Bupers? Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo. If I am correct, this brings us right back to the irony that a lowly CPO also knew more about the most classified weapon system in Manticoran history than even someone in the Admiralty?

Again - that's not ironic; that's need to know.
A lowly CPO working on the project has a greater need to know about (their part of) it than the highest ranking Admiral assigned to some unrelated field.

That said, while the Fifth Space Lord probably doesn't need to know the technical details there would probably come a point where the additional manpower necessary do the first hardware prototyping, and then the first prototype production lines, will require enough personnel assigned, with specific skills, that parts of BuPers are made somewhat aware of Project Apollo - to at least to the limited degree they now need to know. They don't need to know the end goals or technical details, but they do need to know how many people, with what skills, need to be assigned and where they need to be sent to report.

And, of course, need to know changes over time. The group that needs to know anything about Apollo when it's still basically just one of many research projects over on Weyland is far smaller than the group that'd need to know about their respective parts of it as the first SD(P)s are being built or refit with Keyhole IIs and missile and pod production lines are set up or switched for Mk23E and Apollo pod production. So as it moves each step forward from research, to early proof of concept development, to pre-production prototypes, to final design; and similar for the assembly lines, the pool of people who need to be let in on parts of the secret grows and grows.

Jonathan_S wrote:

cthia wrote:Hmm...

Would every arm of the Admiralty have had a need to know about Apollo? What about the Fifth Space Lord, Bupers? Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo. If I am correct, this brings us right back to the irony that a lowly CPO also knew more about the most classified weapon system in Manticoran history than even someone in the Admiralty?

Again - that's not ironic; that's need to know.
A lowly CPO working on the project has a greater need to know about (their part of) it than the highest ranking Admiral assigned to some unrelated field.

That said, while the Fifth Space Lord probably doesn't need to know the technical details there would probably come a point where the additional manpower necessary do the first hardware prototyping, and then the first prototype production lines, will require enough personnel assigned, with specific skills, that parts of BuPers are made somewhat aware of Project Apollo - to at least to the limited degree they now need to know. They don't need to know the end goals or technical details, but they do need to know how many people, with what skills, need to be assigned and where they need to be sent to report.

And, of course, need to know changes over time. The group that needs to know anything about Apollo when it's still basically just one of many research projects over on Weyland is far smaller than the group that'd need to know about their respective parts of it as the first SD(P)s are being built or refit with Keyhole IIs and missile and pod production lines are set up or switched for Mk23E and Apollo pod production. So as it moves each step forward from research, to early proof of concept development, to pre-production prototypes, to final design; and similar for the assembly lines, the pool of people who need to be let in on parts of the secret grows and grows.

I don't know how this is different from any other technology.

I am currently senior IT engineer at a Fortune 25 company. I have a bunch of different enterprise level servers and appliances which I am the SME (Subject Matter Expert) - I know virtually everything about the technologies; and if I don't, I'm talking directly to the design engineers at the server's creator company.

I have a couple engineers trained to manage the processes and normal issues on the boxes, and some technicians trained to handle daily activity/user issues on the technology. My Manager knows how to get reports out the boxes, Our Director knows the names of the boxes and that they do X or Y, our VP knows we have boxes on the network that do X and Y, Our SVP knows my dept. manages X and Y Technology, our CEO knows that X and Y works at our company, and our Board could care less, until X or Y shows up on the balance sheet our causes our stock to move up or down.

A leader knowing too much detail is pointless. You need enough knowledge to use it effectively at your level, but too much can be overload. I've offered my manager a quickie course in some of the hardware, but he doesn't want it - he's up to his eyeballs in the financials and reports, and trusts us to do our jobs and me to be the SME - all he would get from the experience is a greater appreciation of our days.

Why should the military be different? (they even use this same hardware )

Jonathan_S wrote:

cthia wrote:Hmm...

Would every arm of the Admiralty have had a need to know about Apollo? What about the Fifth Space Lord, Bupers? Why would Bupers have had a need to know to perform his job? Someone with a career of recruiting and sending men through the meat grinder does not need to know about Apollo. If I am correct, this brings us right back to the irony that a lowly CPO also knew more about the most classified weapon system in Manticoran history than even someone in the Admiralty?

Again - that's not ironic; that's need to know.
A lowly CPO working on the project has a greater need to know about (their part of) it than the highest ranking Admiral assigned to some unrelated field.

That said, while the Fifth Space Lord probably doesn't need to know the technical details there would probably come a point where the additional manpower necessary do the first hardware prototyping, and then the first prototype production lines, will require enough personnel assigned, with specific skills, that parts of BuPers are made somewhat aware of Project Apollo - to at least to the limited degree they now need to know. They don't need to know the end goals or technical details, but they do need to know how many people, with what skills, need to be assigned and where they need to be sent to report.

And, of course, need to know changes over time. The group that needs to know anything about Apollo when it's still basically just one of many research projects over on Weyland is far smaller than the group that'd need to know about their respective parts of it as the first SD(P)s are being built or refit with Keyhole IIs and missile and pod production lines are set up or switched for Mk23E and Apollo pod production. So as it moves each step forward from research, to early proof of concept development, to pre-production prototypes, to final design; and similar for the assembly lines, the pool of people who need to be let in on parts of the secret grows and grows.

I never said that it doesn't make sense logically. Especially while zoomed in looking at it more closely. But I still can't shake what I see as the irony of it.

At any rate, let's just say that if I was a contestant on Jeopardy and that question was formed as final Jeopardy, I would have missed it.