Subject:
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Re: Combat strategies and tactics in space. Was: Jormungand Carrier Strike Craft
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.space
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Date:
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Thu, 21 Oct 2004 01:01:58 GMT
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Viewed:
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1399 times
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In lugnet.space, Brian Davis wrote:
> In lugnet.space, Erik Schroer wrote:
>
> > In Wing Commander, the movie...
>
> ...has nothing to do with reality, physics, etc. No offense, but if this
> thread is based on the idea of reality, the movies are a terrible place to turn
> for justification. If you want to use the media, the best TV show in this vein I
> can think of is Babylon 5 - not because it got it all right, but because it at
> least addressed some of the more obvious gaffs (like proper orbital mechanics,
> range of conflicts, 3-D combat). As to books, I'd suggest David Weber's stuff
> (Honor Harrington - at least the early stuff). He invents physics (shields), but
> does it in such a way as to allow him to *preserve* a lot of tradiational naval
> techniques (or, at least, come close) and spin a pretty good space opera.
>
> > Attacking a picketing fleet who is waiting for you...
>
> How do you "wait for" anyone in space? Part of the problem with most "space
> combat" discussions is they seem based on navel engagements. Why? An inherently
> 3-D enviroment, covert ops are next to impossible, inertia dominates (you don't
> sit still... ever), heat rejection is one of your biggest problems, travel times
> are drasticly different, etc. About the only commonality between naval warfare
> and space warefare is that in both cases the units are commonly called "ships".
>
> > Innacuracy goes away with good planning.
>
> Only in the presence of perfect knowledge. An important constraint.
>
> > Should the target be the Picket fleet then the most
> > logical course of action would be to come out behind them
> > and shoot them in the back or above and shoot them from
> > above. Remember space is a 3d battlefield not 2d like on
> > earth. In space, you can be attacked from any direction.
>
> For that very reason (and several others), there's no such thing as a "picket
> fleet" with a back to shoot at.
>
> > During the time it would take for the heat weapon to
> > overcome the superconductive armor...
>
> Another minor problem: superconductors are *not* super-heat-conductors. Niven
> got it *wrong* (along with a lot else - and understand, I like Niven's stories a
> lot).
>
> > but pure kinetic energy is unstoppable, assuming no
> > shields of course.
>
> Try dust - "chaff" is extremely effective against a kinetic weapon. Is it
> fool-proof, no, but I'm trying to point out there are a lot of aspects that,
> *IF* you want to try to follow reality (or even be self-consistant) need to be
> addressed.
I've been trying to ignore this discussion, as I usually find arguments based on
hypothetical technologies to be frustrating and fruitless. (too many assumptions
required, and never agreed upon)
But, I feel the need to jump in here with one point. I don't want to get into
all the physics issues that have been flying around (physics degree
notwithstanding). I think that some of the basic assumptions you folks are
relying should be examined. I do think that there could be reasons for picket
lines or speheres or whatever in space. People keep talking about whizzing
around at huge speeds, and huge distances involved, etc. I think there is
fundamental assumption here that may be wrong, and that's that battles would
take place in deep space. Why would anyone bother to try and fight in deep
space? There are all the issues raised here, and there's nothing of tactical
value in deep space. Space is big enough that there wouldn't be channels or
their equivalent to protect, the only things worth fighting over would be
planets, stars, asteroids, perhaps nebulas, etc. A defending group worth its
salt would know that its enemies could come at it from any direction, and the
farther from their home (or whatever) they go, the larger a sphere they have to
try and defend. I'll admit a possibilty for an interception of an incoming fleet
sort of thing (ie there's a borg cube coming to earth in a straight line, let's
go out and get it), but that's arguably not deep space, and is still a back
against the wall situation (bear in mind that any ship should be able to turn in
space faster than an attacking ship could fly in an arc around it to flank,
assuming similar tech levels of combatants).
Also, in a scifi mindset, there are always imaginable technologies that would
allow things to be analogous to naval or air combat (cloaking devices, warp
interdiction, energy shields, etc.). These things just allow for fun stories,
instead of a possibly more realistic scenario involving superfast doomsday
missiles or whatever.
-Dan Rubin
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