Re: Planetary invasion ramblings (longish)

On 16 Jun 98 at 9:39, Jeff Lyon wrote:

> At 12:59 AM 6/16/98 +0000, you wrote:
> >Well, actually, I was thinking of them protecting the planet from 
> >counter invasion, rather than (but partly in addition to) 
> >discouraging partisans.
> 
> My contention is that there are better ways to do this.  But they
> involve moving most of your mobile forces out of the low orbit
> position required for tactical fire support.	
> 
> Option one: Assuming you want to maintain a strong fleet presence,
> then I would start fortifying the planet by laying minefields,
> shipping in pre-fab orbital defense platforms and putting the locals
> to work building bunkers for John's SLM launch sites.  Turn the
> planet into a major fleet base. Bring more ships.  

Agreed

>Patrol the outer system so you can ambush the enemy as they drop out 
of hyperdrive. 

I don't find this very sensible. The outer system is BIG, it's also a 
long way from anywhere, including other parts of the outer system. 
You are spreading yourself very thinly to cover it all, or if you 
only cover parts of it in strength, you are likely to be waay out of 
poisiton when the enemy jumps in, and they will probably beat you to 
the planet by days, assuming even that you can detect them on the 
other side of the system.

> Run fleet exercises to keep the crews sharp. Don't leave your ships
> in nice, safe predictable orbits where they can be ambushed by a
> counter-attacking fleet.  This option works best when there is a
> strong assurance that a counter attack will be delayed several
> months.

Well, assuming you see them tens to hundreds of 
thousands (even millions) of kilometers away, then you have ample 
time to manuever and respond, if you base youself near(ish) to the 
planet. The outer system is several orders of magnitudes further.

>  (Which is not unreasonable given some of the communication
>  techniques
> under discussion.)  Best option for limited strategic goals and/or
> contested territory.
> 
> Option two:  "The best defense is a good offense."  Take the assault
> fleet and hit the enemy somewhere else.  Take two or three colonies
> away and make him choose which one he is going to relieve.  Keep him
> off balance.	This strategy dictates that the invader leave a
> smaller (and more expendable) occupation force; big enough to
> prevent casual re-occupation, small enough not to cripple the war
> effort if they are lost.  Use kid gloves on the planet's population
> so that if the occupation force does end up getting bounced, they
> are not all shot for war crimes.  This is a strategy of denial of
> resources to the enemy in an unrestricted campaign of conquest.

Well, that is the best defense is keeping the enemy off balance. 
However, he is likely to be doing the same thing to you as well.
I'd like to see the 'voters' responses to you invading several enemy 
colonies, garrisoning them, and expecting several of them to fall if 
more than casual effort were used. Losing your troops by inches is 
not a good offense. However, keeping your own mobile relief force to 
bolster those that are attacked is a partial solution to this.
Communication speeds (see other discussions) makes a lot of 
difference to flexibility though.

> >Whoever you took the planet from is going to want it back, and the 
> >one sure place their invasion fleet is going to turn up is the planet

> >that they want to recover.
> 
> Granted.  But I would fire any admiral who just sat and waited for
> them to show up.  In reality, the counterattacking fleet would come
> in sufficient strength to win or not at all (barring bad
> intelligence).  If they are strong enough to retake the system from
> your assault fleet, then a) Why did you start this war in the first
> place? and b) Why are sitting and waiting for them?  If you are
> stronger that them, press the issue and take the battle to them.

Intelligence is very important. Keeping a mobile reserve bouncing 
between captured systems with a secret schedule is a good way for the 
enmy not to know where you are strong at any one moment.
Again, communication speeds can make a heck of a lot of difference 
here.

> >This ties in with something that occured to me about FT campaigns. It

> >can be mighty difficult to meet the enemy fleet if communication is 
> >only as fast as FTL ships, and you both jump to where you think you 
> >ought to, or where you think they are going... or.. etc. etc.
> 
> Yup.	I can think of quite a few sci-fi stories in which that very
> thing happens.  Occasionally, they pass one another in hyperspace
> and sack each others bases.  Gets complicated.

Even worse... trying to play a campaign game where communication is 
ship speed makes for a record keeping nightmare for showing how far 
the knowledge of certain events has got, and for the propogation of 
orders regarding that knowledge. Instant communication makes it far 
easier to record keep, and play, but takes away that 'flavour'.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Richard Slattery	     richard@mgkc.demon.co.uk
There are more fools in the world than there are people. 
     Heinrich Heine
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