First of all, this is a cool idea and one that a buddy of mine has considered for his forces. The only issue that I can see is that raw cargo capacity seldom translates into safe and effective combat-ready troop transport. To allow the units to hit the ground ready to go would require a certain amount of spacing, bulkheading, etc. In addition the ECM, chaff, etc is going to take space. Also, to have all your infantry spaced out and in position for easy ejection is going to cut into your available space.
Of course this is just my opinion and I've generated one or two crazy ideas in my time as well.
-------------- Original message --------------
From: "John Brewer" <jbrewer@xxxxxxxxx>
Happy Thanksgiving - Here's the post I promised.
Since there haven't been any comments to this subject, I assume that it is accepted that an ITTT 7 mass cargo pod converted to a drop pod has enough cs to carry a company of mechanized infantry & its command, at least in an abbreviated form.
Considering that 3 companies make a battalion, and 3 battalions make a regiment, a flotilla of 10 Trojan Horse Assault Transports carry enough drop pods to imbed an entire trans-atmospheric assault division; That includes 27 companies of mechanized infantry, 12 companies of mobile artillery, 3 companies of armor, 3 companies of anti-aircraft artillery, 3 companies of combat engineers, and numerous service units, including division command & control, intelligence, HasMat/UXO disposal, M.A.S.H., quartermaster, and others
.
A proper flotilla for a trans-atmospheric assault division will consist of 10 Trojan Horse Assault Transports, 3 "Galahad/Ropucha" class assault transports, enough troop transports to carry division personnel, a hospital ship, a combat stores ship, and perhaps an ortillery monitor converted from an obsolete capital ship; Such as a NAC Eastwood SDN with the heavy beam batteries swapped out for ortillery systems.
A massed planetary assault procedes as follows; A battle group consisting of capital ships & ortillery monitors gain space superiority to planetary orbit and begin suppressing ground & air defences with ortillery & converged sheaf beam fire. Within one jump of the planetary assault operation, trans-atmospheric assault troops transfer from the troop ships to the Trojan Horse ships, gaining access to the drop pods thru the ships' central access spine. When planetary ground/air defences are sufficiently suppresse
d, the assault transports jump to orbit and deploy the drop pods, targeting a selected landing zone/area of operations [LZ/AO]. The pod decent is assisted by use of chaff & ECM to disguise the drop pods number, location, & trajectory from remaining ground/air defence. Drop ships from the "Galahad/Ropucha" classes follow with special forces for situation-specific operations. If a nation has multi-mode fighters, they can be used dirt-side as ersatz combat walkers.
Now, the assault troops don't ride the drop IN the vehicles; They ride down in ejector seats that line the walls of the pods. If pod parachutes don't fully deploy & slow decent to less than terminal velocity at 1000 feet, the ejector seats fire and the troops land clear of the crashing pod. That company loses its vehicles & heavy equiptment, but the ejector seats come with light assault weapons, communications & field supplies so that the unit can still o
perate as dismounted light infantry.
Once dropped, the assault units fan out, engaging enemy ground units, taking & holding valued objectives & approaches to the LZ/AO. When the LZ/AO is secure enough, the combat engineers, with grating & paving equiptment, are dropped into a central locale. Their job is to build a tarmac that is large enough to accommodate the landing of a Stork medium freighter. When the tarmac is built, it will be used as a bridgehead to bring in reenforcements. Reenforcement personnel are brought in on Storks, because they can be disenbarked quickly, while their vehicles & heavy equiptment are brought in by cargo pods, from Roos & Fetches, from Work Horses & Huskys.
The reenforcements mount their vehicles, and relieve the assault units holding objectives. Once relieved, the assault units withdraw to the bridgehead tarmac. At the same time, Roos from the Trojan Horses gather
up the drop pods & take them to the bridgehead. At the bridgehead, the assault troops dismount & board one of the Storks for transport to a division staging area, for rest & further training. The assault vehicles are loaded back into the drop pods, the Roos remount them on the Trojan Horses, and they are transported to a refurbishment center, where impact & combat damage to the vehicles & pods are repaired, the chutes repacked, deceleration rockets reloaded, and the drop pods prepared for the next operation.
JBrewer@xxxxxxxxx
"Always strive to be a good person. If you can't do that, at least strive to be someone other than an asshole."
From: John Brewer
Sent: Monday, November 5, 2007 6:15 PM
To: gzg-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [GZG] [FT] [DSII] Trojan Horse Assault Transport
Since the subject of how many CS is in a FT mass, I thought I would post this.
The Trojan Horse assault transport is actually little different than a standard Work Horse medium freighter; it's used to carry & deploy 7 mass ITTT cargo pods that have been modified into large drop pods for massed planetary assault. The cargo pods are modified into drop pods by equiping them with partial streamlining, chemical thrusters for pre-atmospheric entry course correction, atmospheric entry heat shielding, atmospheric descent parachutes, pre-impact decelaration rockets, and shock-absorbing landing gear.
How much these 7 mass drop pods can carry needs to be determined. For ease of organization, I would like to think these large drop pods can carry 3 platoons or 1 company of assault-rated mechanised infantry. A
ccording to MT, 3 platoons of mechanised infantry in 4 MICVs take up 144 cs, not counting the command platoon & their vehicles. An unmodified 7 mass cargo pod can carry 175 cs. How much cs needs to be taken up by the drop pod modifications? Can some of the modifications be partially externalized, like the landing gear?
You could put 1 company into 2 drop pods, but that would run the risk of the 2 halfs being seperated during the drop. You could also organize the unit into a "short" company, with only 2 platoons & command riding in the MICVs; deployed with special assault weapons & equipment that would give the short company the effective firepower of a full company.
I leave it to the list to help me with this. Later, I will post how the Trojan Horse assault transports & their drop pods are deployed in a massed planetary assault.
JBrewer@xxxxxxxxx
"Always strive to be a good person. If you can't do that, at least strive to be someone other than an asshole."