Sector Fleet

[phavoc]

Todays military trains life because it is different from training with a computer. But even today the difference gets smaller and smaller.

That difference does not exist in Traveller. The view is the same, the sound is the same, the movement (or lack thereof) is the same since you are IN SPACE! With Gravtech and Compensators ect.

Flyboys and shuttlejockes may do some life training. But even that can easily be done in a safe depot system. Because Space has no weather and a depot is "all military". No need for leaving it.

The dangers in refueling are not in the flying. They are in the tactical situation.

You are completely missing the point. Have you been in the military? Do you understand how the mindset works? You still (and will) continue to have live fire exercises because the men who work on the equipment need to know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, what it means to fire their weapons in anger. You have to know that the skills you have will protect you. When you train its a totally different mindset, because you know if you make a mistake you aren't going to die (or aren't going to kill someone else). There is NO substitute for that.

And yes, it would exist in the Traveller universe because its a universal constant and maxim for military forces as far back as military history goes. You train to as real situation as you can. Simulations, etc only do so much.

And what dangers are there in times of peace? Certainly no more than what exists in a depot system.

I suppose on this we can agree to disagree. My military experience tells me you are completely wrong in your understanding of how a military unit functions and trains for war. But that's my opinion.

 

[alex_greene]

One more reason to coordinate with the Scout Service: those ships have sensors capable of detecting the locations of fleets and individual ships within each fleet, enabling a task force to Jump in far beyond 100 diameters and just open fire with Ortillery, railguns and deadfall ordnance, then maybe close in with meson and particle spinal mount cannon to mop up further resistance.

So they need to be very good, and to be able to sit on the outskirts of a solar system undetected, possibly for weeks at a time, just watching. Those 500 ton Watchdog fleet picket boats from Traders & Gunboats, with their passive sensors capable of scanning from half a solar system away with pinpoint accuracy, have another function beyond maintaining interdiction you know.

 

[alex_greene]

That difference does not exist in Traveller. The view is the same, the sound is the same, the movement (or lack thereof) is the same since you are IN SPACE!

The dangers in refueling are not in the flying. They are in the tactical situation.

You are completely missing the point.

You still (and will) continue to have live fire exercises because the men who work on the equipment need to know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, what it means to fire their weapons in anger. You have to know that the skills you have will protect you.

You train to as real situation as you can. Simulations, etc only do so much.

I kind of have to agree here.

Just as, sooner or later, EOD guys have to train to defuse actual bombs, infantry and other ground troops have to know what it's like to be actually fired upon. It's the only way the Brass can determine which troops will carry on regardless that first few times they feel the breeze from a bullet flying past their heads close enough to part their hair.

And that's pretty much been a given of training since the first organised militaries appeared, when the most powerful handheld weapon was the bow and arrow.

 

[rust]

You train to as real situation as you can. Simulations, etc only do so much.

It depends. If a soldier's job during combat is to sit at a computer console
and to rapidly press the right buttons, a simulation is about as close to the
real thing as one can get, and it really does not matter much whether he
does it in space or in a simulator at the barracks. In fact, a simulator may
even be able to give a better feeling of a combat situation, for example
the combat damage of a ship, than it may be possible to do on a real ship
in space, just like it is easier today to simulate a burning aircraft that has
lost an engine in the flight simulator than it would be to do it in the air.

 

[phavoc]

You train to as real situation as you can. Simulations, etc only do so much.

It depends. If a soldier's job during combat is to sit at a computer console
and to rapidly press the right buttons, a simulation is about as close to the
real thing as one can get, and it really does not matter much whether he
does it in space or in a simulator at the barracks. In fact, a simulator may
even be able to give a better feeling of a combat situation, for example
the combat damage of a ship, than it may be possible to do on a real ship
in space, just like it is easier today to simulate a burning aircraft that has
lost an engine in the flight simulator than it would be to do it in the air.

That's not the point. When I trained I was part of a 3man artillery rocket crew (MLRS). Everything we did could be simulated. Which we did on a constant basis. Yet we still did live fire exercises with real rockets (but dud warheads). Why? Because simulations ARE different than the real thing. The person doing the simulation knows it, and you act different. It's just (yawn) training. No need to do it right, not like I have to ensure I've done my job or I get to inhale enough rocket exhaust to dry-clean my lungs.

Or those simulator pods I'm carrying... I don't have to worry about treating them like live ammunition, right?

You train to fight. Period. Ideally you do it so WHEN mistakes are made, people don't die. But you never simulate everything. It's never been done, and most likely won't be done. Find me some other military people who agree with your viewpoint. Everybody I knew in the military bitched about all the crap associated with live-fire. But nobody treated it like a sim. Not that the NCO's and Officers let them. It was taken very seriously. People die in training when mistakes are made. But that's the whole point (not killing, but doing it right and taking it seriously like it WAS war).

 

[rust]

That was not my point. If sitting at a computer console and pressing but-
tons is the real thing, there simply is nothing you could train as a live ex-
ercise - except sitting at a computer console and pressing buttons.

 

[far-trader]

...(well, maybe the French. They have those good training manuals, "How to stop the Germans from Invading France by build really expensive Forts")

:roll:

 

[phavoc]

That was not my point. If sitting at a computer console and pressing but-
tons is the real thing, there simply is nothing you could train as a live ex-
ercise - except sitting at a computer console and pressing buttons.

True. But sitting there at the console, as part of a team, you still participate in the live-fire exercises. It's just different when you are shooting real things instead of playing.

 

[simonh]

That was not my point. If sitting at a computer console and pressing but-
tons is the real thing, there simply is nothing you could train as a live ex-
ercise - except sitting at a computer console and pressing buttons.

True. But sitting there at the console, as part of a team, you still participate in the live-fire exercises. It's just different when you are shooting real things instead of playing.

I have to agree with phavoc. If you know that when you press that button, actual armed missiles with live warheads are going to actually be launched through space, even just to hit the derelict hulk of a real spaceship target, it's going to feel very differently to doing a pure simulation.

Not the same as doing it for real against a manned enemy spaceship, but a lot closer to that than a pure simulation. The physical actions and feedback may be the same, but the emotional and psychological experience will feel different. Especially if you get to go out in a space suit and inspect the traget afterwards.

Someone launching actual hudred thousand credit weapons may hesitate, even a fraction of a second, where the same person in a pure sim wouldn't. In many cases a live fire exercise can only be performed once, where a pure sim can just be reset and tried again. The pressure is different.

Simon Hibbs

 

[rust]

Well, perhaps my experiences colour my perception. We did have lots of
maneuvers, but since we were medics they were not at all like the real
thing - the injuries we had to deal with during the maneuvers were fake,
those we had to deal with between the maneuvers were the results of ve-
ry real accidents. During maneuvers we were just "roleplaying medics", in
combat fatigues with helmet, gas mask and pistol - simply ridiculous.

For example, during one NATO Tactical Evaluation we were called to a bus
that "had been hit by machinegun fire", with about thirty "wounded" in it,
each with some make up and a small card that gave some informations
about his injury.
However, back at our facility we had some real patients waiting for medi-
cal treatment, so our doctor just walked through the bus, from "wounded"
to "wounded", took a look at the cards, and declared each of them "dead",
making sure that we were back to our real job as soon as possible.

 

[DFW]

Pirates are ranging 1000 miles off the coast of Somalia, the straits around Malaysia are infested with pirate gangs, pirates attack offshore rigs off Nigeria. With our modern navy we can't defeat pirates in skiffs?

Space is a bit different. You can't hide unless it is behind a planet, LOS is the whole solar system. As far as pirates today, if the order were given to hunt down and destroy them (as opposed to waiting for them to come out) they'd be toast in short order. The U.S. Navy at least has no orders to hunt them down and destroy them...

 

[phavoc]

Pirates are ranging 1000 miles off the coast of Somalia, the straits around Malaysia are infested with pirate gangs, pirates attack offshore rigs off Nigeria. With our modern navy we can't defeat pirates in skiffs?

Space is a bit different. You can't hide unless it is behind a planet, LOS is the whole solar system. As far as pirates today, if the order were given to hunt down and destroy them (as opposed to waiting for them to come out) they'd be toast in short order. The U.S. Navy at least has no orders to hunt them down and destroy them...

Actually you can hide behind planets, and rocks and in front of a star, etc. Sensors are great, but they can be evaded, spoofed, etc. And if you are trying to scan an entire star system, you'd have to have a lot of active scanners going on. Just like radar today you can detect active emissions and jam them, or at least screw with the signal so that the detector receives no response from its signal, which translates into nothing there. Passive sensors do have their limitations.

And yeah, navies can go in and attack the pirates, but you have to find their hideouts first. That's why pirate ships don't run around with their beacons screaming 'I'm a pirate! I'm a pirate!'. They hide in the regular traffic, pounce on their victims, and get away before anyone comes.

 

[DFW]

Actually you can hide behind planets, and rocks and in front of a star, etc.

Yes, like I said. Otherwise, passive sensors will nail you.

 

[phavoc]

Oops, by bad. You are correct... you did say that already.

Space is a pretty big place. And I'm not sure passive sensors are going to work in such a massive volume. And passive sensors can still be spoofed pretty easily if you know what you are doing. IR is great, but you can cool your ship down to the amount of heat being given off in your local space, and then you become invisible to the sensor. Or you could just make yourself look like a rock too. I think it would be very hard to go too far out from your locations you want to protect.

 

[simonh]

For example, during one NATO Tactical Evaluation we were called to a bus
that "had been hit by machinegun fire", with about thirty "wounded" in it,
each with some make up and a small card that gave some informations
about his injury.

I got one of those cards during an exercise when I was in the TA here in the UK. Shot through the eye, ragged breathing an minimal response, or something like that. I didn't mind because the assault we were practicing was pretty much over, and it meant I got to be evacuated by Chinook. I was declared DOA but it still took me about 12 hours to get back to my unit, so it had it's down side.

Simon Hibbs

 

[DFW]

Space is a pretty big place. And I'm not sure passive sensors are going to work in such a massive volume. And passive sensors can still be spoofed pretty easily if you know what you are doing. IR is great, but you can cool your ship down to the amount of heat being given off in your local space, and then you become invisible to the sensor.

Given our tech (by late 70's) TL6-7, we could IR survey the entire solar system pretty well in ~10 hours. Detect the equivalent of an ICBM out to Pluto. You can't cool your ship. The heat must leave or it will melt from the inside out. MGT MRB has a note about not being able to hide due to IR. It is inescapable physics. But, sitting in front of GG or planet that gives off IR is a good way to hide. Plus, space is big, you want to be near a destination if you are a pirate.

 

[DFW]

The most mobility an Imperial Fleet sees outside battel is a short trip within the depot

Don't know about that. Keep your fleet constantly docked and exact location nkown is just asking for someone to ambush it. Just ask Nimitz or the Italians...

 

[phavoc]

Yes, I was in the armed forces. And therefor I am sure that it is this experience that is misleading you. I also have experience with current generation simulators ( for i.e the Leopard II). And from that experience I can tell you they are extremly close to the real thing. That's not the 1980s stuff anymore, current turret simulation includes movement, sound etc. and have realistic looking displays/graphics.

In the 56th century Lifefire exercies might be useful for non-PA ground troops and life exercises for ground forces. But for a starship it's not. You won't feel anything, you won't see anything, all you have is a signal on your monitor telling you "launched" and after a while "hit". All sensors, no feel

Gun crews might do load/unload drills etc. but for that you don't need to undock and you definitly don't need to leave the depot system. And even if an old fashioned admiral insists on life fire that is better done in a depot system. That way you can prevent misfires from hitting civilian or foreign ships (Major diplomatic problem - just ask the polish navy) and be sure that a missile does not end up in a place where the enemy can get at it.

Comparing current day (or 1980s) style ground forces with a space military is misleading since the sensor based and fully controlled environment lacks any feedback. There simply IS no difference unless you start blowing up parts of your ship to support damage. Space has no weather, no bad roads, nothing that needs the huge training exercises ground or naval forces today need. And with Jumptravell being dead time leaving a depot won't add to any training either. So IMHO most major combat forces will not leave depot outside of war and rarely if ever leave docking.

The most mobility an Imperial Fleet sees outside battel is a short trip within the depot

I've been around simulators since 1980. I've been in the shuttle simulator, F-16, CH-53, even the really old ones that had the camera flying over modeled terrain. And we simmed all the time in the military. The tube guys did dry-fire exercises all the time.

Simulators are not the real thing. If that was the case why does every major military still go out and do exercises in the real world? Because sims are only so good.

In the 56th century sims will be better, but they will never replace the real thing.

Sims aren't for the equipment, they are for the people manning the equipment and the men and women who command.

 

[captainjack23]

The most mobility an Imperial Fleet sees outside battel is a short trip within the depot

Don't know about that. Keep your fleet constantly docked and exact location nkown is just asking for someone to ambush it. Just ask Nimitz or the Italians...

Point of geekiness. Kimmel was CINCPAC during the Pearl Harbor Raid. Nimitz was his successor.

 

[DFW]

The most mobility an Imperial Fleet sees outside battel is a short trip within the depot

Don't know about that. Keep your fleet constantly docked and exact location nkown is just asking for someone to ambush it. Just ask Nimitz or the Italians...

Point of geekiness. Kimmel was CINCPAC during the Pearl Harbor Raid. Nimitz was his successor.

Yep. He and Stark, (CNO) screwed the pooch, royally.