RE: Its Doctrine, Scouting and Tactics not Fighters

"You haven't mentioned a single case where a truly
useful tactic or weapon was banned.

John"

So looking at your comments below:

So the part of Crossbows being banned by the Pope implies that they
weren't useful? Or are you arguing that the Pope didn't really ban the
use of crossbows?

The part about guns being banned in Japan implies that they weren't
useful?

And the treaties currently banning the use of Chemical and Biological
weapons isn't a ban and those weapons aren't useful?

A de facto ban on the use of nuclear weapons, even tactically implies
that they are not useful, despite the stockpiling by nuclear nations?

The point of the post, is that even if you CAN do something, and even if
it makes tactical sense doesn't mean that it is acceptable for
policitcal, environmental or economic reasons.

For instance it makes perfect tactical sense to use a baby 100 kt
warhead to wipe out a carrier group.  The problem is that it may lead to
escalation and eventual MAD.

It makes good strategic sense to kill all your POW's (less maintenance,
no chance for them to escape and come back at you if released etc) but
by convention they are not killed, and are even required to be kept in
"decent" conditions. This has political and morale implications - if the
enemy knows  that you don't take prisoners, they will tend to fight to
the death since surrender doesn't get them anything.  In addition, you
may motivate other countries to rally against you since they don't want
their troops exterminated in battles (which make it harder for them to
recruit into their militaries).

A ban may or may not have force depending on who backs it up.  Just
because an item or tactic is banned doesn't mean it's not possible to
use it, it just has repercussions that you may or may not want to deal
with.

So going back to the original point - certain tactics may or may not be
used based on "conventions" held by various organizations and nations. 
So while they may be feasible in game terms, they can be considered "bad
form" to use and may cause an escalation that both parties do not want.

--Binhan

-----Original Message-----
From: John Atkinson [mailto:johnmatkinson@yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, May 10, 2002 10:07 AM
To: gzg-l@csua.berkeley.edu
Subject: RE: Its Doctrine, Scouting and Tactics not Fighters

--- B Lin <lin@rxkinetix.com> wrote:
> Not totally true, you can have conventions that
> prohibit such things.  Just look at the whole MAD
> doctrine - no one could stop a nuclear missile, and
> the US had such weapons before the Russians, and
> yet, we didn't go ahead and slag all their military
> bases.

Actually, during the time period where the US had
nukes and the Russkies didn't, we were delivering them
by B-29.  Which are eminently interceptable.  We never
had enough to guarantee we'd wipe out the Russians
until they also had enough to seriously hurt us.

> Even today, an ICBM could theoretically carry
> conventional or kinetic kill warheads and with a CEP
> of 100 meters or less, you could hit an aircraft
> carrier in dock with a spread of 10 warheads. The
> newest American carriers are $4.5 billion a pop not
> including aircraft.  Taking the MX for example, the
> cost at time of deployment in 1986 was 70 million
> per missile, not including warheads.	Thus for a
> cost of under 100 million, you can disable or
> destroy a ship worth 45 times that.  And yet, the US
> doesn't routinely fire ICBM's at capital ships.  The
> reason is that you don't want your intentions
> mistaken for something larger - a nuclear attack,
> which would end up up with both sides slagging each
> other in minutes.

Uh. . . the USN is AFAIK the only nation operating
serious capital ships[1] other than France (1) and
Russia (I'm not sure how many of them are actually
operational).  During most of the Cold War the USN was
the only nation that operated capital ships.
 
[1]Defining capital ship as "aircraft carrier capable
of carrying a significant air wing".  Battleships et
al are currently downgraded to amphibious warfare fire
support and cruise missle launchers.

Furthermore, given a 30 minute flight time, that
carrier you're shooting at did move a significant
distance, probably at least 10-20 nautical miles. 
Your ballistic missle is not capable of in-flight
course corrections.  That's the definition of the word
"BALLISTIC."  Have some sense.

On the gripping hand, both the US, the Soviet Union,
and France designed, built, tested, and deployed
operationally a variety of nuclear weapons for
shooting at carriers, battleships, oversided missle
cruisers with delusions of Godhood (Kirov), and tiny
pointless jeep carriers (Kiev).  The Soviet Union
built a number of aircraft with the sole intent of
using them to launch overwhelming numbers of
nuclear-armed cruise missles at US carriers.  See:
Backfire.

> At one time or another various weapons were banned
> simply because people thought they were too
> atrocious or easy to use - crossbows in Medieval

Crossbows were notionally banned by Papal bull for use
against fellow Christians.  I can, however, find no
record of any one actually NOT using crossbows.  Every
major and minor principality used crossbows on a
regular basis, with the exceptions of backwater dumps
like Scotland.	Even the English supplemented their
native longbowmen with crossbow-toting mercenaries on
occasion.

> Europe, firearms in Feudal Japan, 

Firearms were banned in Feudal Japan because Tokugawa
had no desire to permit ANYONE to build a power base
and the only way to do so _quickly_ (creating a
Samurai swordsman/archer takes about 2 decades) would
have been peasant musketeers.  

dum dum or hollow
> point bullets, 

Militarily useless--they are banned because they cause
more damage than is necessary.	It doesn't hurt anyone
to give them up.

biological, chemical and nuclear
> weapons, 

Every major power has nuclear weapons and the stated
intent to use them if anyone threatens their
existence.

>and now land mines are on the table.  So

Land mine are only on the table for those nations that
weren't really planning to use them in the first
place.

> there is precedent for conventions that ban the use
> of certain tactics or weapons, despite how useful
> they are in warfare.	

You haven't mentioned a single case where a truly
useful tactic or weapon was banned.

John

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