Re: Troop Capacity

On 19 Jun 98 at 14:04, John Atkinson wrote:

> You wrote: 
> 
> >How do you send Aerospace fighters down to a planet thet you haven't 
> >invaded yet to take out the SML launchers that are stopping you 
> >invading in the first place?
> 
> Usually, you sit outside their max range with your carriers, and
> send them in like you would an airstrike on an enemy fleet.  

The parallel doesn't work particularly well for an attack from space. 
In the wet navy/aircraft version, the horizon acts as an obstacle to 
ship bourne sensors. AWACS help you, but ground clutter, ECM and 
stealth targets are big problems for them.

In the space invasion version. You look up, and other than a few 
clouds, there is not much between you and the airstrike. Perhaps ECM, 
and stealth are good enough to make it worthwhile.

> >Drop capsules? Why aren't they shot down by planetary defenses? Where

> >do the fighters go once they have expended their ammunition? Drop 
> >supplies? Drop an airbase, drop defenses for it? 
> 
> Why are you basing them on the planet?  That's why God invented
> carriers.

Then you have to climb back out of the gravity well, being shot at by 
the planetary defenses again (unless you were very successful). But 
you no longer have loads of dummy capsules to spoof. Perhaps 
ECM/stealth etc is just great with little aerospace fighters.

> >I suppose that of the fighters are successful you start the invasion 
> >proper, but what can a little aerospace fighter carry that a 
> >starship can't that goes through the many meters of armour that the 
> >SML's are under, that itself can stave off starship mounted weapons.
> >(sorry for the sentence structure)
> 
> The Aerospace fighters can't be targeted by SMLs, right?  They can
> drop precision-guided weapons (preferably, you've inserted SOF long
> before and are lasing the targets) which penetrate then explode a la
> that bomb the US used in Desert Storm to kill bunkers that could
> survive a nuclear near-miss.	The one that started with a surplus
> 8-inch howitzer barrel.  They've got to worry about smaller air
> defenses, but you can afford to loose some aerospace fighters
> tangling with the SAMs, whereas you can't afford to loose a
> battleship.

Not targeted by the SML's themselves, but by the associated 
batteries of longer than battlefield range point defense weapons 
mounted with/near them. SML's to fire at starships, beam weapons for 
anything else. Unless those nasty beam weapons don't work properly in 
atmosphere, which would help us out a lot  here.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Richard Slattery	     richard@mgkc.demon.co.uk
My husband and I are either going to buy a dog or have a child. We can't
decide whether to ruin our carpet or ruin our lives. 
     Rita Rudner
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~