How often does inter system war actually happen?

The Imperial Navy interdiction department says hi there.

During an all out war a siege is pointless, just destroy a planet's military and industrial capacity with rocks, lots and lots of rocks, then move on. Once you have destroyed an enemy polities industrial and shipping capacity, and their navy, you can mop up at will. The Vilani consolidation wars were pretty much along these lines.
 
There's the Imperium siege of Terra, which they could have glassed, but knew strategically that that would be counter productive.

Being the Homeworld of all Humaniti.
 
Last edited:
During an all out war a siege is pointless, just destroy a planet's military and industrial capacity with rocks, lots and lots of rocks, then move on. Once you have destroyed an enemy polities industrial and shipping capacity, and their navy, you can mop up at will. The Vilani consolidation wars were pretty much along these lines.

I'm not entirely sure I agree with this assessment; it can certainly be true for certain situations (like the Vilani Consolidation Wars, as you pointed out, and later on the Third Imperium's Pacification Campaigns, especially in Ilelish*).
*Not to be confused with the later Ilelish Rebellion and the Orbital Bombardment of Ilelish itself, of course.

But the exact methodology employed would entirely depend on what the desired objectives of the belligerent party are. A good part of a world's value and attractiveness that might make it worth conquering is precisely its industrial capacity, so destroying it would be entirely counter-productive if you intend to seize it as your own. The same goes for worlds of great historic or symbolic importance, which is partly why the Invasion of Terra happened as it did back in 1002, despite the frankly ludicrous logistic strain of that whole operation.

In general I think this policy of "Eh, just bomb it and move on" is only really viable to, like you yourself mentioned, polity-scale belligerents. If you have something the size of the Ziru Sirka or the Third Imperium, one particular world being left in a shambolic state isn't that big a deal. If the belligerents are smaller though, like two pocket empires, I find it much harder to justify employing this type of tactic.

Furthermore, somewhat mulling this over and going off on a bit of a tangent, can you imagine how much of a pain in the ass trying to lay siege on a world with Deep Site Meson emplacements must be? They'd pretty much necessitate you to destroy some infrastructure to try and either blind the Deep Site or cut its power. Probably a task better suited for Special Operations agents covertly landed on the planet than outright orbital bombardment, given it'd take a while to pummel the ground enough to even reach the Deep Site before blowing it up.
 
The Imperial Navy interdiction department says hi there.

This is an interesting case.

Do they station probes/monitors to track jump flash, detect who enters and leaves a system? With one or six patrol ships to be there to react if something significant happens?
- jumping into a system, wilderness refuel at a gas giant, jump out - track but let them go?
-jumping into a system, race to planet side for what ever reason - pursue/eliminate

The space in a system just can't effectively be defended.

So if there is a Highport/Space Yard etc that some other polity wants to lay siege to it seems it would take such a large number of ships to be stationed there that is makes it impractical except for the large scale historical mentions in the thread.
 
This is an interesting case.

Do they station probes/monitors to track jump flash, detect who enters and leaves a system? With one or six patrol ships to be there to react if something significant happens?
- jumping into a system, wilderness refuel at a gas giant, jump out - track but let them go?
-jumping into a system, race to planet side for what ever reason - pursue/eliminate

The space in a system just can't effectively be defended.

So if there is a Highport/Space Yard etc that some other polity wants to lay siege to it seems it would take such a large number of ships to be stationed there that is makes it impractical except for the large scale historical mentions in the thread.
Blockading a Starport is not that hard. How many ships would you need? 1 or 2 CruRons? Stay out of range of the station's weapons and fire on any ship that approaches the station. This would keep the station from being resupplied with fuel and expandable ordinance. So, if they only had a week or 2 worth of fuel stored on the station, then the battle is over in a matter of weeks. The people on the station surrender or die from lack of life support without ever having to engage the actual station.
 
I'm not entirely sure I agree with this assessment; it can certainly be true for certain situations (like the Vilani Consolidation Wars, as you pointed out, and later on the Third Imperium's Pacification Campaigns, especially in Ilelish*).
*Not to be confused with the later Ilelish Rebellion and the Orbital Bombardment of Ilelish itself, of course.
Hence the postulation of "all out war". I don't think the Imperium has ever fought such a war until the Rebellion, and look at the mess that made.
The Solomani Rim War would have been very different if the Solomani or the Imperials used planet scrubbing tactics, in point of fact the only way I can see the Julian Protectorate deep raids into the Imperium leading them to victory was them demonstrating the willingness to go all out.
The Third Imperium has always used war as a way of growing its trade empire rather than ruthlessly eliminating threats.

The Zhodani/Imperial skirmishes are far too civilised for my liking :)
But the exact methodology employed would entirely depend on what the desired objectives of the belligerent party are. A good part of a world's value and attractiveness that might make it worth conquering is precisely its industrial capacity, so destroying it would be entirely counter-productive if you intend to seize it as your own. The same goes for worlds of great historic or symbolic importance, which is partly why the Invasion of Terra happened as it did back in 1002, despite the frankly ludicrous logistic strain of that whole operation.
As i said, I don't think the Third Imperium goes all out in its wars for many of the reasons you have cited.
In general I think this policy of "Eh, just bomb it and move on" is only really viable to, like you yourself mentioned, polity-scale belligerents. If you have something the size of the Ziru Sirka or the Third Imperium, one particular world being left in a shambolic state isn't that big a deal. If the belligerents are smaller though, like two pocket empires, I find it much harder to justify employing this type of tactic.
Tell that to the Ziru Sirka...
if they had used consolidation war strategy against the Earth there would have been no Earth left.
Furthermore, somewhat mulling this over and going off on a bit of a tangent, can you imagine how much of a pain in the ass trying to lay siege on a world with Deep Site Meson emplacements must be? They'd pretty much necessitate you to destroy some infrastructure to try and either blind the Deep Site or cut its power. Probably a task better suited for Special Operations agents covertly landed on the planet than outright orbital bombardment, given it'd take a while to pummel the ground enough to even reach the Deep Site before blowing it up.
Hence you stand off and drop rocks, lots and lots of rocks...
 
Blockading a Starport is not that hard. How many ships would you need? 1 or 2 CruRons? Stay out of range of the station's weapons and fire on any ship that approaches the station. This would keep the station from being resupplied with fuel and expandable ordinance. So, if they only had a week or 2 worth of fuel stored on the station, then the battle is over in a matter of weeks. The people on the station surrender or die from lack of life support without ever having to engage the actual station.
However there are likely hundreds of ships coming in and out of a large system in a week or even a day in some cases.

So the besiegers just open fire on every ship that exits jump space?
 
I'm generally under the impression that the Ziru Sirka collapsed in the face of the Terrans because it was already toast and no one had noticed yet. Somebody would have tipped the house of cards over before long.
 
Fortress Worlds

In some of our greatest wars on this world we have seen entire regions covered in fortifications, but in great wars across whole regions of our galaxy, could we see entire planets fortified?


 
To further clarify what triggered this thought.

Over thousands of years of inter system travel and conflicts it seems that laying in a siege to interdict a system that already has a bustling commerce (hence needing regular fuel supplies) would have some established tactics if it was a viable strategy.

Jump in, unleash a volley of attacks and leave makes good sense.

Stationing large numbers of resources in a system to prevent any interactions/resupply for weeks/months/years seems to not really be effective if even possible.

That is why the question.
 
In the Honorverse, if the invading force has command of the planetary orbit, the planet is obliged to surrender.

Raiding forces that can achieve that and don't withdraw, are now in control of that planet.
 
I'm generally under the impression that the Ziru Sirka collapsed in the face of the Terrans because it was already toast and no one had noticed yet. Somebody would have tipped the house of cards over before long.
Inspired, I expect, by a conversation between Jerome Branch Corbell and Peersa the Checker in Niven's A World out of Time.
 
To further clarify what triggered this thought.

Over thousands of years of inter system travel and conflicts it seems that laying in a siege to interdict a system that already has a bustling commerce (hence needing regular fuel supplies) would have some established tactics if it was a viable strategy.

Jump in, unleash a volley of attacks and leave makes good sense.

Stationing large numbers of resources in a system to prevent any interactions/resupply for weeks/months/years seems to not really be effective if even possible.

That is why the question.
It is incredibly effective if your goal is to preserve as much as possible for your own use once it is taken. Most wars are just robbery writ large.
 
To further clarify what triggered this thought.

Over thousands of years of inter system travel and conflicts it seems that laying in a siege to interdict a system that already has a bustling commerce (hence needing regular fuel supplies) would have some established tactics if it was a viable strategy.

Jump in, unleash a volley of attacks and leave makes good sense.

Stationing large numbers of resources in a system to prevent any interactions/resupply for weeks/months/years seems to not really be effective if even possible.

That is why the question.
Hmm, having wargamed extensively in the Third Imperium setting, including playing all the Trav-associated boardgames at one time or another, I see sieges occurring most frequently when a world/system cannot be conquered quickly (think the difference between what Russia wanted to happen in its 2022 invasion of rump Ukraine, and what we've actually had happen after the 'three day war' plan failed).

So, for example, in GDW's 5FW game you might jump into a system as a Zhodani fleet and hope to bounce the defenders quickly. Those defenders are usually SDB squadrons/flights and planetary-based defenders. There might also be an Imperial fleet or naval elements hanging around of course as well.
If things go well, it is possible to (in a one-week game turn) engage in a space battle against any Imperial fleet, dispatch it, engage in a space battle against any SDBs and defeat them, bombard the main world and land troops to round up any defenders. You leave a garrison, refuel, recall the troops you're taking with you to ships and jump on to your next objective.
But things don't always go so smoothly. You might lose the naval battle. The SDBs might not hang about to be defeated and instead scatter into "hides" across the system from which you know they may later emerge to wreak havoc. The planetary-based defenders might ride out your bombardment and/or defeat your initial landing.
At that point the siege begins, if (and only if) you decide to hang about and try to reduce the defenders because that world is of strategic significance (in the games because it is worth Victory Points or VPs to you or to the enemy or to both of you). Alternatively, you might have to hang about for the simple reason that your fleet (or important elements of it) can't refuel unless you secure the gas giant (if you're partially streamlined) or secure the planet/starport/naval base if you can't refuel elsewhere. The defender will be making it difficult to get that refuelling done, leaving you in place with all effort needed to secure those refuel points.

Anyway, just a few thoughts. YMMV!
 
Back
Top