Re: Ground-Based Fighters (longish)

At 09:22 AM 7/16/99 EDT, ScottSaylo@aol.com wrote:

>In a message dated 7/15/99 6:44:23 PM EST, schoon@aimnet.com writes:
>
><< 
> Or what happens to those facilities when the fighters are relocated.
> 
> Those facilities are just as important as a carrier in battle - and
> potentially just as large a target.
>  >>
>
>Ever visit an abandoned airfield? The weeds grow up through the
taxiways,
the 
>glass vanishes from the buildings and it just quietly rots. In space
this 
>would be even more dramatic and refitting these orbital fighter bases
would 
>cost time and resources. I'd charge points equal to 25% of the baswe
cost
per 
>year of abandonment in a space or hostile atmosphere situation. 10-15%
for 
>surface facilities in hospitable environments.

I'm not sure I buy this. In space there aren't plants growing through
the
concrete, rats chewing through wiring, locals stripping the builings of
plumbing, an atmosphere to enhance oxidization, anything like that. The
only real problems are micro-(or larger) meteorites and radiation, and
the
FT nations have a suffienctly high TL that I can't see those being
serious
problems. I'm sure abandonded bases will need some time to be
refurbished,
but much, much less time and effort than would be needed groundside.

Don
Still trying to remember the novel where one character says to another
re:
mothballed starships "nothing preserves like hard vacuum". Or words to
that
effect.