Shutting down the MWJ

Shutting down the MWJ


I can't imagine that this has not already been discussed, but I can't get it off my brain. Since misery loves company ...

Is there any tactical and/or strategic reason the GA would want to shut down the junction for the longest possible duration, intentionally? As in the shutdown itself is what is important, and the number of ships transiting is of secondary importance or not important at all.

Or even for an opponent to do so?

"Shut it down! Shut it down! Shut it down now!!!"

penny for your thoughts?

I got nothing.

penny wrote:I got nothing.

I believe that the only way to physically shutdown any wormhole is to send a particularly massive ship or group of ships through it.

There have been times when the wormhole was closed to non-military traffic because of fleet movement.

Would you consider the years when the Peeps held Trevor's Star to be a partial shutdown of one of the legs?

PS: Did you just want to work your way up to Admiral from Midshipman again?

tlb wrote:

penny wrote:I got nothing.

I believe that the only way to physically shutdown any wormhole is to send a particularly massive ship or group of ships through it.

There have been times when the wormhole was closed to non-military traffic because of fleet movement.

Would you consider the years when the Peeps held Trevor's Star to be a partial shutdown of one of the legs?

PS: Did you just want to work your way up to Admiral from Midshipman again?

You could "shut the wormhole down" with a navigational buoy on the far side announcing that the emergence lane is mined with IFF turned off and will automatically attack. Nothing should attempt to pass - and anything that does gets shot.

OOPS!

I should have made it clearer. I am talking about shutting it down, "permanently," whereby it cannot be undone by simply giving orders to reopen it. Like sending the maximum amount of tonnage through to shut it down for the maximum amount of time. Where time is the only entity that can reopen it. I don't mean shutting it down by simply giving orders to Junction Control.

BTW, what is the maximum amount of time it would be shut down if the maximum amount of tonnage is sent through? Sorry, but I do not remember that detail.

penny wrote:OOPS!

I should have made it clearer. I am talking about shutting it down, "permanently," whereby it cannot be undone by simply giving orders to reopen it. Like sending the maximum amount of tonnage through to shut it down for the maximum amount of time. Where time is the only entity that can reopen it. I don't mean shutting it down by simply giving orders to Junction Control.

BTW, what is the maximum amount of time it would be shut down if the maximum amount of tonnage is sent through? Sorry, but I do not remember that detail.

If they'd lost control of it and one other terminus, which an enemy might be using to bring more fleet units from, then you could shut down their movements by sending some 250 million tonnes through.

The problem is that this scenario is too unlikely. This requires that some enemy have taken over one of the terminus and the junction itself. That means they've defeated all the defences in the Junction side, or at the very least neutralised them somehow. That traditionally means they've enough firepower on the MBS side, so transiting more from others isn't usually going to be a priority of theirs, nor is shutting it down going to be a priority of the defenders. They may gain 17 hours or however long it takes for the junction to re-establish itself.

The other thing is that those 30 SDs or 40 superfreighters are in a suicide mission.

Oh, one more detail: is the shutdown per terminus or for the whole junction? If it's per terminus, then there's no way the defenders could shut it down in the first place, because the only scenario that would even call for it implies that they've lost control of the Junction and that terminus. That implies they can't send a quarter billion tonnes of ship through.

penny wrote:OOPS!

I should have made it clearer. I am talking about shutting it down, "permanently," whereby it cannot be undone by simply giving orders to reopen it. Like sending the maximum amount of tonnage through to shut it down for the maximum amount of time. Where time is the only entity that can reopen it. I don't mean shutting it down by simply giving orders to Junction Control.

BTW, what is the maximum amount of time it would be shut down if the maximum amount of tonnage is sent through? Sorry, but I do not remember that detail.

The maximum possible mass for a single transit varies according to the size of the wormhole.

Echoes of Honor, chapter 37:

In the case of the Manticore Junction, the maximum possible mass for a single transit was approximately two hundred million tons, which meant he could put that much of Eighth Fleet's wall—twenty-two SDs, for all practical purposes—through the junction in one, convulsive heave. Unfortunately, any wormhole transit destabilized the termini involved for a minimum of ten seconds, and vessels which massed more than about two and a half million tons destabilized it for a total interval proportional to the square of the transiting mass . . . which meant a maximum-mass transit would lock the route from Manticore to Basilisk solid for over seventeen hours.

At All Costs, chapter 64:

Kuzak could have put almost thirty superdreadnoughts through the Junction in a single mass transit, but the destabilizing effect would have locked down the Trevor's Star-Manticore route for almost seventeen hours. Even in a sequenced transit, each ship of the wall would close the route for almost two minutes before the next in the queue could use it.

I do not know why there are differences between the two routes. I do not know the general formula given the maximum possible mass of a wormhole for a single transit destabilization.

Sure, pretty simple. All you have to do is get rid of the star. How you do it is up to you, you’re the engineer, I’m the big picture guy.

To mix up our universes, John Ringo's Troy would do it. A hollowed out iron asteroid with motive power.

kzt wrote:Sure, pretty simple. All you have to do is get rid of the star. How you do it is up to you, you’re the engineer, I’m the big picture guy.

Woah Nellie! I don't mean something that drastic! I mean a physical shutdown of 17-hrs by transiting the max amount of tonnage.

I missed the fact that tlb referred to a "physical shutdown" in his first post; which is what I meant.

All through storyline, and on the forum, the max amount of tonnage that could be sent through had been discussed, as well as the drawback of how long it would shut down the junction. Usually it was avoided because nobody wanted the junction to be affected for so long. But in those cases getting those ships through is what was important.

But I can't think of a reason to physically shut down the junction for 17-yrs, intentionally, even if it has to be accomplished by sending through "the kitchen sinks" attached with wedges and sails.

BTW, and as an aside, how can we be sure that the formation of a WH is dependent upon a star?