Lord Breakwater

I just started reading the A call to wars series and the idea of Lord Breakwater to cut up perfectly good Battlecruisers into sloops make me roll my eyes in disbelief,as it would seem to me a much better idea to either order what you want from a nearby friendly shipyard,or make the things yourself. Is this a actual idea that would work,or is he after the destruction of the entire fleet for a agenda I don't know about yet? I may have missed something as someone decided to scribble on the books from my local library in pencil,which made them hard to read.

Michae wrote:I just started reading the A call to wars series and the idea of Lord Breakwater to cut up perfectly good Battlecruisers into sloops make me roll my eyes in disbelief,as it would seem to me a much better idea to either order what you want from a nearby friendly shipyard,or make the things yourself. Is this a actual idea that would work,or is he after the destruction of the entire fleet for a agenda I don't know about yet? I may have missed something as someone decided to scribble on the books from my local library in pencil,which made them hard to read.

Breakwater is making a power play, at the expense of the Navy, and using hardware the Navy isn't using right now. And it "works" for some value of "works"... not to ruin the story for you. Breakwater is not out to destroy the navy, as much as he is trying to build his own empire. And in a way he is correct, with the massive volume of space under it's control, the Manticore system needs more presence units to "police" the space. And for the last 40ish years, the Navy hasn't been needed as a system defense force. That's about to change... but that is not obvious yet from Breakwater's perspective.

Yes, it is shortsided. Yes, this is an avenue for adventure and intrigue. But, that's politics for you....

Michae wrote:I just started reading the A call to wars series and the idea of Lord Breakwater to cut up perfectly good Battlecruisers into sloops make me roll my eyes in disbelief,as it would seem to me a much better idea to either order what you want from a nearby friendly shipyard,or make the things yourself. Is this a actual idea that would work,or is he after the destruction of the entire fleet for a agenda I don't know about yet? I may have missed something as someone decided to scribble on the books from my local library in pencil,which made them hard to read.

As Theemile said above, there are good reasons to cut up and bad reasons.

You're completely right that it would be cheaper to just buy two new ships. As you're about to see and probably will not be surprised by in the least, the cut up had huge cost overruns and time delays. And it created problems that will become important in short order but I won't spoil for you.

There was a discussion that the half that included the hypergenerator would still be hyper-capable, which could be handy for a short hop from the two components of the MBS, but this didn't come into play. Meanwhile, if they'd bought two new corvettes, there would be no hyper-capability.

What surprises me in the politics side is just how long Baron Breakwater lasts as prime minister. He'll weather through several failures and still remain.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Michae wrote:I just started reading the A call to wars series and the idea of Lord Breakwater to cut up perfectly good Battlecruisers into sloops make me roll my eyes in disbelief,as it would seem to me a much better idea to either order what you want from a nearby friendly shipyard,or make the things yourself. Is this a actual idea that would work,or is he after the destruction of the entire fleet for a agenda I don't know about yet? I may have missed something as someone decided to scribble on the books from my local library in pencil,which made them hard to read.

As Theemile said above, there are good reasons to cut up and bad reasons.

You're completely right that it would be cheaper to just buy two new ships. As you're about to see and probably will not be surprised by in the least, the cut up had huge cost overruns and time delays. And it created problems that will become important in short order but I won't spoil for you.

There was a discussion that the half that included the hypergenerator would still be hyper-capable, which could be handy for a short hop from the two components of the MBS, but this didn't come into play. Meanwhile, if they'd bought two new corvettes, there would be no hyper-capability.

What surprises me in the politics side is just how long Baron Breakwater lasts as prime minister. He'll weather through several failures and still remain.

Furthering on what Thinksmarkedly said, Manticore cannot currently build several important core ship technologies, the most obvious of those is ship nodes. So if NEW ships were purchased, a good portion of that money (if not all) has to go outside the Star Kingdom. If existing ships are modified, the money stays in the Star Kingdom - and into the hands of people friendly to Breakwater. As I said, Politics....

Theemile wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:There was a discussion that the half that included the hypergenerator would still be hyper-capable, which could be handy for a short hop from the two components of the MBS, but this didn't come into play. Meanwhile, if they'd bought two new corvettes, there would be no hyper-capability.

What surprises me in the politics side is just how long Baron Breakwater lasts as prime minister. He'll weather through several failures and still remain.

Oops, quickly correcting myself: Breakwater wasn't PM. He was Chancellor of the Exchequer, who's technically the second most powerful cabinet member after the PM.

But still surprising, because he doesn't get along with the PM and isn't of the same political ideology. So why did Duke Burgundy keep him along at all, much less for this length of time?

It looks like the House of Lords at this time (which we later learn is limited to 50 members) has no political parties or affiliations. So my guess is that he commanded such a base in the Lords that Burgundy had no option but to have him in the cabinet.

Furthering on what Thinksmarkedly said, Manticore cannot currently build several important core ship technologies, the most obvious of those is ship nodes. So if NEW ships were purchased, a good portion of that money (if not all) has to go outside the Star Kingdom. If existing ships are modified, the money stays in the Star Kingdom - and into the hands of people friendly to Breakwater. As I said, Politics....

When I first read through the Manticore Ascendant books, I was very confused about whether they could build ships or not, because they talk about creating such industry in the system. I'm still not entirely certain I got the details right.

It looks like they can build the hulls and the outfitting and they can refit ships and install technology that is available (as you'll see later with HMS Casey CL-01). I hadn't noticed during the first read, but HMS Casey existed in ACTD, but just wasn't relevant and hadn't yet gone through the refit that installed the grav plates and mag-rail missile launch systems. So it's those industries that would be used to cut HMS Mars to (two) pieces and later used in Casey's refit.

But not all of it.

Crucially, it looks like they can't make missiles either. All units are purchased from the League, making them expensive if nothing else due to the shipping costs to the tail end of nowhere.

I think they can make hex and quads, just that the Navy isn't supplied with sufficient quantity of them.

At that point they can -sort of - build ships but all the really important stuff like the nodes and I presume the higher end equipment has to come from somewhere else. Of course, if they did buy a couple of sloops (with licenses to manufacture components including nodes) they would have been able to work up to their own true shipyard operations. But that isn't what Breakwater wants...he wants control and an active and truly prepared Navy doesn't work into letting him do that.
Manticore has a few ships it could use as spare parts for the DD and Cruisers for the next couple of years and actual new sloops would give the very much better service Breakwater claims he wants without loosing true military capability with the now operating RMN ships.

He is also looking to pump credits at political friends, buying support. There are people who want to develop shipbuilding capability - starting with merchantmen- and that would becoe the base to eventually design and build warships. Of course they could also license designs for warships from people in the SLN- heck, at this point even Haven would be a good source. But Breakwater wants control and the Navy as an actual, capable, force means the Crown has support and at least as much (sort of) patronage as Breakwater wants to build as the Navy ends up under Crown control for the most part. Politicians- a plague on most of their houses.

Yeah. I just finished the books my local library had available to find out they hadn't purchased A Time For Insurrection yet. I'd buy it myself,but unless I start stacking books on the floor, I don't have the space as I read a lot of fantasy and militsry SF books. I'm considering
starting on the Honor Harrington series,but seeing it's currently 14 books long and counting,that's a big investment.

Michae wrote:Yeah. I just finished the books my local library had available to find out they hadn't purchased A Time For Insurrection yet. I'd buy it myself,but unless I start stacking books on the floor, I don't have the space as I read a lot of fantasy and militsry SF books. I'm considering
starting on the Honor Harrington series,but seeing it's currently 14 books long and counting,that's a big investment.

I also read a lot of military SF and hard SF, but that's why I use an e-book reader (an Amazon Kindle), so they only stack up virtually. I've read hundreds of books since I bought it. The drawback is that I don't have a bookshelf of recent books to show on virtual meetings from home.

You're reading the books in the same order as I did: first the first three Manticore Ascendant ones, then onwards to the main series. That works... but it's not the best one to get all the details in the MA books. There are a couple of hidden hints you don't otherwise get. Like how the shipyard supervisor was Baron Low Delhi, who is likely an ancestor of Sonja Hemphill, and the commander of the Sphinx detachment when the second force arrived was Karina Alexander, Admiral White Haven (an ancestor of Hamish Alexander), and she was aboard HMS Nike BC-09. They mention the treecats, but those don't figure anywhere in the story. And you must have noticed how Travis was worked up on the concept of a missile with two drives.

Also... the main series is not 14 books. You can't skip the two "spin-offs," Crown of Slaves and Shadow of Saganami, any more, which is why I'm putting it in quotes. So it's actually 14+4+4 = 22 books now. You should read them in publication order.

Plus the anthologies and House of Steel.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Michae wrote:Yeah. I just finished the books my local library had available to find out they hadn't purchased A Time For Insurrection yet. I'd buy it myself,but unless I start stacking books on the floor, I don't have the space as I read a lot of fantasy and militsry SF books. I'm considering
starting on the Honor Harrington series,but seeing it's currently 14 books long and counting,that's a big investment.

I also read a lot of military SF and hard SF, but that's why I use an e-book reader (an Amazon Kindle), so they only stack up virtually. I've read hundreds of books since I bought it. The drawback is that I don't have a bookshelf of recent books to show on virtual meetings from home.

You're reading the books in the same order as I did: first the first three Manticore Ascendant ones, then onwards to the main series. That works... but it's not the best one to get all the details in the MA books. There are a couple of hidden hints you don't otherwise get. Like how the shipyard supervisor was Baron Low Delhi, who is likely an ancestor of Sonja Hemphill, and the commander of the Sphinx detachment when the second force arrived was Karina Alexander, Admiral White Haven (an ancestor of Hamish Alexander), and she was aboard HMS Nike BC-09. They mention the treecats, but those don't figure anywhere in the story. And you must have noticed how Travis was worked up on the concept of a missile with two drives.

Also... the main series is not 14 books. You can't skip the two "spin-offs," Crown of Slaves and Shadow of Saganami, any more, which is why I'm putting it in quotes. So it's actually 14+4+4 = 22 books now. You should read them in publication order.

Plus the anthologies and House of Steel.

While some of the SS in the Anthologies read like generic Sci-Fi with the names changed to fit the Honorverse, some (especially those written by Weber and Flint) are required background material for the Greater Honorverse. David has built undercurrents of plots that have slowly matured over a dozen books or more - some have yet to come to fruition.

Theemile wrote:While some of the SS in the Anthologies read like generic Sci-Fi with the names changed to fit the Honorverse, some (especially those written by Weber and Flint) are required background material for the Greater Honorverse. David has built undercurrents of plots that have slowly matured over a dozen books or more - some have yet to come to fruition.

I don't see how.

You could maybe skip Crown of Slaves (CS1), but that's the one that introduces the Kingdom of Torch. But they become important later in the series, so knowing how they come about is handy. And the very next book, Torch of Freedom (CS2), introduces the Alignment, so you can't very well skip it. And Cauldron of Ghosts (CS3) is all about Houdini.

In the SI series, could maybe skip the third (SoF), since it is interleaved with the fourth (SoV), but I wouldn't recommend. Those two are the hardest to read (IMO) because of the slow pace of development and the extent of phrases in Czech and Polish. It's very easy to lose track of who the good guys and who their adversaries are in which system. But some of the best battles are in those two books, like the Battle of Saltash.