RE: Combat in 2180

Questions, questions, questions...  Just how much HEAVY industry does a
startup 
(10-50 years) colony have?  Will the plans for 100+ year old (2080?)
equipment 
be available?  How do you get the steel in the sizes needed to make
artillery? 
 Or is artillery made from Plastic?

Unless the colony sets these things up fairly early, the war could be
over 
before they retool.

Michael Brown

-----Original Message-----
From:	Adrian Johnson
Sent:	Thursday, December 02, 1999 1:34 AM
To:	gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU
Subject:	RE: Combat in 2180

>This is a good summation of my point.	What I was trying to say is that
apart
>from standing colonial/regular forces we would not be seeing much in
the
way of
>armor or artillery in the colonies.  I find it hard to justify a colony
with
>the  industrial capacity of the scale needed to make field guns and
tanks.
>
>Part of what prompted this was the claim that Drug Lords were MAKING
their
own
>155s and ammo.  Most countries just don't have the excess capacity to
MAKE
>these, buy yes, make no.

Well... They choose not to 'cause it's cheaper to buy them and not
maintain
the infrastructure to produce their own.  It's all about spending
priorities.  A colony of 10,000 with machinery capable of doing basic
machinework (lathes, drill-press, stamping equipment, etc) could produce
"low-tech" artillery or mortars if they wanted to - even if they made
them
one at a time.	Bicycle manufacturers in Britain were producing weapons
within months during WWII when the country decided that they needed
STENs
rather than bicycles.  Sure there's a difference between a STEN and a
105
howitzer, but not much relatively speaking...  They could hand-build
armoured vehicles one at a time if they REALLY needed them, provided
access
to the raw material - but it would take a SERIOUS commitment on the part
of
the colony leaders to do something like that.  It is hard to justify a
colony with the political commitment necessary to deny their citizens
what
they want/need in terms of agricultural equipment, etc so that the
meagre
resources of the colony could be turned to produce arty and armoured
vehicles - particularly in an economically efficient (ie large scale
production) way.  It is not unreasonable to hypothesize a colony with
the
industrial capability to potentially make SOME if they really needed to
-
it really isn't THAT complex.

We can, I think, safely assume that the science of manufacturing
technology
will have advanced enough by 2180 that even their "low tech" equipment
on a
"primative" colony would be modern by our standards:  miniturization,
automation, etc etc etc would have 200 years to develop - it's not like
they're going to be using 19th century-level technology...  And even if
they were, remember that the industrial capability of the Northern
States
in the US pre Civil War was fully capable of producing "modern" weapons
(or
ones very similar) like the STEN smg I mentioned earlier - if they had
had
the design.  They COULD have produced "modern" (well, modernish) breech
loading rifled cannon a-la the late 1800's with their industrial
technology
- had they the designs...  The colonies of 2180 will have "primative"
industrial technology by THEIR standards, not necessarily by OURS - but
they will still have our designs - which will be more than capable in
their
context...

So on Earth they are using Replicators and out on the fringes they only
have 50 year old nanobuilders.	Those hick farmers take five times as
long
to produce their light howitzer than the Replicators back on earth.
Positively primative, I say... :)

My $0.02

Adrian

Adrian Johnson
ajohnson@idirect.com