Traveller-digest    Saturday, September 4 1999    Volume 1999 : Number 1057



(R)1996. Traveller is a registered trademark of FarFuture Enterprises.
All rights reserved.

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: I'm back....
Re: Some From The Vaults
Re: New Picture
Re: Inter species relationships
Re: Traveller-digest V1999 #1048
Re: AKUS MOBY Update (was Ship Damage...Oh my!) 
Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)
[none]
Alien Races II
Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)
Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)
Re: Inter species relationships
Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)
Re: Safety of low berths...
re: Imperial Military and PR
re: Imperial Military and PR
re: Imperial Military and PR

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Fri, 3 Sep 1999 23:43:22 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: I'm back....

In mail, traveller@lists.imagiconline.com writes:

> Leonard Erickson wrote:
>> 2. On an airless planet, near the downport. These won't be weathered,
>>    though vaccuum damage (especially vacuum welding) is likely. In any
>>    case crawling around in airless hulks that have been partially
>>    stripped by folks in a hurry isn't exactly safe.
>
> I have this funny image in my head...
>
> The characters head over the the junk crater looking for a fairly small, yet
> highly essential part, say, the size of a baseball, on an small, airless,
> low-g planetoid. After picking around for a few hours, one player spots the
> part. It's sitting on top of a big pile of other stuff near the edge of the
> whole sprawling junk pile. He rushes over, picks it up...
>
> and the whole damn pile comes up along with it, as every single piece
> of metal on the whole damn crater is vacc welded together. The
> average 1-g resident may not even initally notice that he's lifted
> half the damn junkyard.

> Heh. It's just kind if an amusing image.

Alas, the *mass* of all the metal remains unchanged. So you'll casually
grab at the part, and get quite a jolt when it doesn't move. Jerk
harder and you may get a large chunk of vacuum welded parts coming at
you. 

The most common fatal mistake for folks on low g worlds is giving a
mighty *heave* to get a large, heavy object off the ground. This brings
it up to carrying height quickly. And then you get to watch as it keeps
on going up. The fatal part is if you are dumb enough to try to get
under it. 

At 1/6th g it takes the same amount of effort to get a 600lb pound
object moving upwards as it does to get a 100 lb object moving at 1g.
But the 600 lb object still has six times the *inertia*. Oops.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 3 Sep 1999 23:50:42 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Some From The Vaults

In mail you write:

>> Just another reason I hate AOL.
>
>>I love AOL, they send me free drink coasters every week. ;)
>
>
> I'd like them even more if you could actually re-burn those 'coasters'.  :)

What, you don't use them for laser rifle targets? :-)

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 3 Sep 1999 23:53:02 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: New Picture

In mail you write:

> Wayne wrote:
>
>>>> Deck Apes painting the hull,
>>>
>>> Bosun Mate....  Damnit.
>>>
>> Well, I are a bos'n, and in the group we call are selfs Deck Apes,
>> Eng. are bilge rats, ect... And the proper name is Boatswain (Bosun
>> Mate is on of the jobs we do)
>
> Well, your forgiven.....
>
> Now we can gang up on the brown shoes.

After reading Adm. Gallery's "Now Hear This", I'm almost afraid to
think about the sort of mischief senior ratings could get into on a
large ship.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 4 Sep 1999 00:13:11 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Inter species relationships

In mail you write:

> At 11:03 PM 9/2/1999 -0700, you wrote:
>
>>Larry Niven coined a word for it:  rishathra (if I recall correctly). 
>>It takes all kinds to make up known space, and who knows what sophonts
>>will find attractive and how they will be accepted by the various
>>societies.  
>
> Rishathra was found on the Ringworld, which was populated by numerous
> humanoid species that were closely related.  This allowed the process.  I
> doubt that an Aslan and a human will even be able to recognize each other's
> genitals, let along find a way to make things work.

The "plug & socket" model seems sufficiently widespread in *very*
divergent species on Earth that I'd expect it to be fairly common among
aliens as well. 

But that still leaves a *lot* of room for differences in size & shape. 

Is that a penis or an ovipositor? 

Are the various bodily secretions involved "compatible"? (Example: if
the natural lubrication of one species has a pH far enough from that of
another, I'd expect chemical burns, not sexual pleasure!)

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 16:52:29 -0400
From: Juliean Galak <jg42@cornell.edu>
Subject: Re: Traveller-digest V1999 #1048

At 12:39 AM 9/4/99 +0100, you wrote:
>----------------------------------------------------------------
>Is that the tactical nuke game that said "To simulate a strategic nuclear
>war, soak the map in lighter fluid and apply match"?

Well, either another game used that line, or some's actually played Fire 
Team.  And here I thought I was the only one...  Fire Team is a tactical 
squad-level game set in a late 80's war in Europe, sort of a late cold war 
ASL.  The use of tactical nukes was presented in the above manner.

           -- Juliean Galak (a.k.a. Falcon)

- --
jg42@cornell.edu        "I do not agree with a word you say, but I will
                          defend to the death your right to say it."
                                              -- Francois Marie Voltaire
#include <disclaimer.h> "Imagination is more important than knowledge"
                          			     -- Albert Einstein
for PGP public-key and
more quotes, finger: jg42@gerfalcon.tzo.com
WWW Page: http://www.cadif.cornell.edu/~falcon/                

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 18:25:32 -0400
From: "Keven R. Pittsinger" <jamstar@accesstoledo.com>
Subject: Re: AKUS MOBY Update (was Ship Damage...Oh my!) 

> > > Oh, and has anyone mentioned to you yet that the jump drive is an import from the Xtce system and there aren't any compatable parts for a half dozen parsecs? Muhahahaha!
> > > 
> 
> 
> > No, you haven't mentioned that yet.
> 
> Ah, but it *will* be mentioned...eventually. <weg>

Figgers.  No rest for the wicked...
  
> > BTW, WTF *IS* Xtce????
> 
> That could be a loaded question if it wasn't in a Traveller sense.
> <ds> <droll smirk>
> 
> The Xtce system is out there...somewhere...you'll have to see if you
> can find it. 

Found it on the map.  It's a hike...
 
> A few of the others are off on a sub-plot having lunch with Lady
> Ryobi, court appointed administrator of Akus' will, and meeting her
> nephew JaCarter. JaCarter is a new PC who will be "accompanying the
> others on their travels." His stated mission is to report back to his
> Aunt on the PC's progress, but I can already see the seeds of distrust
> sprouting. You see, the PC's have discovered that Aunt Mazie, the Lady
> Ryobi, also happens to be a Director of a local intelligence agency.
> She doesn't know that they know, and would skin her agent if she found
> out about his loose tongue. The other PC's *don't* know if JaCarter is
> a "comrade chekist", as Kuzov would say, but I think it's fair to say
> they are suspicious. At this point, I can neither confirm or deny
> anything at all...

Don't kid yourself.  He's a Chekist.  We're getting him dumped on us because 
Mazie wants to keep a *close* eye on us.  And the *other* PCs don't even know 
he's getting dumped off on us yet.  <grin>
 
> There is also a salvage claim on a ship's boat they found abandoned.
> That should raise them some money, but I'm afraid it won't be enough.

Course not.  That'd be too easy.

> Other than raising money and repairing the ship, there is still the
> unsolved murder of their grandfather Akus, possible involvement by
> Zeristu spies, Space Guild thugs, and several intelligence agencies
> for them to deal with. 
> 
> None of the PC's are currently certified to fly a Mark registered
> ship. They are going to have to see about taking the tests and paying
> the fees (?bribes?) soon.

Bribes.  Remember Unruh's Law:  Money is the mother's milk of politics.
 
> There is a drought on Sequi that is seriously hurting Wolfgang's
> family's farming and herding concerns. He doesn't know how bad yet,
> but he soon will. There should be an opportunity to make some money
> off of the Segui problems, but I suspect conflicts between unbridled
> profit vs compassion and crew loyalty vs family loyalty are going to
> appear soon.
> 
> Oh, and this doesn't include the discovery that bookworm Arvitis made
> about a "lost Imperial Library." The other PC's don't know about that,
> and if Arvitis doesn't tell them before he shuffles off the scene they
> may *never* find out about...well at least it will be later rather
> than sooner.

And IIRC, nobody showed him the sword we found in the dead twins' gear.  The 
one that *this* player (but not his character) recognised as an Imperial 
Marine Corps saber.

Keven

- -- 
tc++ tm+ tn t4- to ru++ ge+ 3i c+ jt au st- ls pi+ ta+ he+ so- vi zh sy
- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                     Science-Fiction Adventure
                                                     In Reavers' Deep

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 10:53:56 +1200
From: "Andrew Moffatt-Vallance" <a.vallance@netaccess.co.nz>
Subject: Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)

Date sent:      	Sat, 04 Sep 1999 08:38:50
From:           	"Douglas E. Berry" <gridlore@mindspring.com>

> At 02:54 AM 9/5/1999 +1200, you wrote:

> >OTOH, it does mean that gross blunders such as Bradley's at Omaha
> >Beach are less likely.

> Blunder?

It was Bradley's rejection of Hobart's specialised armour as "products of
British under-confidence and over-insurance" that lead to the slaughter on
Omaha.
 
> >ObTrav: Just how much did Norris have to worry about this during the
> >FFW? Just what was the effect on public opinion of the Battle of Terra
> >in the Solomani Rim War? Given that any assault on a defended high
> >population world is going to be a meat grinder like nothing else, just
> >how does the Imperium deal with the PR issues?

> Considering the distances involved, most people won't even care that the
> Rim war happened.  I sincerely doubt that more than one in ten could tell
> you what Sector Earth is in.  It's just not relevant.

Yes, but the bulk of the Imperial forces for any planetry assault is going
to be locally recruited provincial forces. And casualties on the scale of
likely in a planetry assault are going to be noticable on the local scale.

> For example, my late father was from Stafford, in Devon.  I have no idea of
> where that is in England.  None.  It was never important to me.  Change
> that scale from one generation on one planet to hundreds of light-years
> across millennia, and most people won't care.

However, if your son/daughter/brother/sister/father/mother etc was killed
assaulting Stafford, Devon you might think differently. I imagine that
normally most US citizens would have no idea where the sleeply little
French village of Ste Marie-du-Mont is, but now it has taken on a special
relevance.

> Also, the Imperium controls the news feeds through the X-boat system.  They
> can massage and spin the news to their liking, and give the "official
> story" time to grow before independent witnesses make it home.  Another
> example, we are 130 years "away" from the US Civil War.  The story we were
> all feed as children was that it was about slavery.  The truth was far more
> complex, but the "distance" and relevance to our daily lives made that
> simple story acceptable.

> Why should the Imperium report casualties?  Unless there's a specific
> propaganda purpose (remember the Arizona!), tell the mob that the enemy is
> being whipped.  Deaths are reported to the families, as single tragic
> incidents.  You don't tell them that their son/daughter/spore was killed
> along with 6000 of his buddies when a Solomani tac nuke went off over the
> field hospital he was in.

Because over a certain limit, it is impossible to hide them. If millions are
lost assaulting Terra, it will be impossible to hide even in the masses of the
Third Imperium.


Andrew etc
http://users.netaccess.co.nz/amv/
    Listening to way too much Dave Brubeck

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 4 Sep 1999 19:07:45 -0400 (EDT)
From: "William F. Hostman" <aramis@gci.net>
Subject: [none]

>>Oh, definitely.... There were several "Phils" at the time, even. But the
>>others made certain to include last names (Like Phil McGreggor of Space
>>Opera and Starplay). No, Mr, K., you are NOTHIN' like the phil of whom I
>>typed.
>
>Whatever happened to Phil McGreggor?  He sent me all of his Starplay stuff
>but one of the disks was corrupted.

Yours too?

I managed to get it all via download... but....

William F. Hostman  |  "Smith & Wesson: THe original Point and Click
interface!"
Aramis 0602 C55A364-C S kk+ as+ hi+ dr+ va++(--) so+ zh++ vi+ da++ sy- ge-
533
Mailto:aramis@gci.net http://home.gci.net/~aramis http://www.alaska.net/~mhaa
ICQ:14640742          AIM:AKAramis	ARM 1.0: 3 R H++ P+
IMTU 1.0: tc tm++ tn- t4-- tt+ to- tg-- ru+ ge 3i+ c+ jt-() au+ st- ls
pi+() ta+ he+(-) kk+ as+ hi+ dr+ va++(--) so+ zh++ vi+ da++ sy- ge- pi+

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 01:01:29 +0100
From: Mark Watson <markw@antares.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Alien Races II

This arrived at our TLGS this week, and I bought it and skim read it. I
very much liked the main part but like some other correspondents found the two
Aliens&Artifacts retreads annoying and misplaced.
One point though - despite the concept of zero, the K'kree mathematical
notation seems as unwieldy as using Roman numerals. For example:
a) express 1456948*178467
b) how does algebra look
c) express pi
Consider this was a civilisation which managed to discover jump drive on its
own.
- --
Mark Watson, markw@antares.demon.co.uk

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 4 Sep 1999 17:19:11 -0700
From: "John Palmer" <jpalme2000@digitalsomething.com>
Subject: Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)

>Given that any assault on a defended high population world is going to be a
meat grinder like nothing else

Why is any assault on a defended high population world a meat grinder?

Any defended high population world just has weaknesses. If you were foolish
enough to throw your main battlefleet into the  teeth of fresh planetary
defenses, the assault would be a meat grinder.

The weakness of a high population is huge infrastructure needs. Food, water,
power, and sewage treatment make life possible on a high population world.
Destroy those items, and the population will eventually implode on itself. A
simple application of Manslow's hierarchy of needs.

A naval blockade coupled with targeted small unit commando assaults would
grind down the ability for the population to sustain itself. Ideal targets
are the highly distributed targets such as agriculture, power distribution,
hydro facilities, food storage, and sewage. Even a coordinated defense would
have problems getting enough firepower to defend a location before the
damage was done.

Planetary assault is relatively easy, once you study it's applications.

JP

- -----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Moffatt-Vallance <a.vallance@netaccess.co.nz>
To: traveller@lists.imagiconline.com <traveller@lists.imagiconline.com>
Date: Saturday, September 04, 1999 8:28 AM
Subject: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)


Date sent:      Sat, 04 Sep 1999 07:33:07
From:           "Douglas E. Berry" <gridlore@mindspring.com>

> At 07:42 PM 9/4/1999 +1000, you wrote:

> It's a sad commentary that our leaders now have to plan on the public
> relations aspect of any military campaign.  With everyone pussy-footing
> around trying to avoid any casualties, since the Five-sided Funny Farm
> knows that the grieving families will be on the six-o'clock news,
readiness
> and skill have to suffer.

OTOH, it does mean that gross blunders such as Bradley's at Omaha
Beach are less likely.

ObTrav: Just how much did Norris have to worry about this during the
FFW? Just what was the effect on public opinion of the Battle of Terra
in the Solomani Rim War? Given that any assault on a defended high
population world is going to be a meat grinder like nothing else, just
how does the Imperium deal with the PR issues?


Andrew etc
http://users.netaccess.co.nz/amv/
    Listening to way too much Dave Brubeck

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 17:19:45
From: "Douglas E. Berry" <gridlore@mindspring.com>
Subject: Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)

At 10:53 AM 9/5/1999 +1200, you wrote:

>It was Bradley's rejection of Hobart's specialised armour as "products of
>British under-confidence and over-insurance" that lead to the slaughter on
>Omaha.

I think that there may have been a few other factors, but I'll grant you
that..

>> Considering the distances involved, most people won't even care that the
>> Rim war happened.  I sincerely doubt that more than one in ten could tell
>> you what Sector Earth is in.  It's just not relevant.
>
>Yes, but the bulk of the Imperial forces for any planetry assault is going
>to be locally recruited provincial forces. And casualties on the scale of
>likely in a planetry assault are going to be noticable on the local scale.

How many people from your home town died in WWII?  I don't know either.
The Imperial forces involved in the Invasion of Terra were drawn from the
entire Imperial force fighting the Solomani.  That's 3+ sectors of people.

>However, if your son/daughter/brother/sister/father/mother etc was killed
>assaulting Stafford, Devon you might think differently. I imagine that
>normally most US citizens would have no idea where the sleeply little
>French village of Ste Marie-du-Mont is, but now it has taken on a special
>relevance.

Where?  Remember, this is America, where an informal poll taken of
teenagers found that many couldn't name the country we won our independence
from, or when that war happened.  I doubt that any ten people would
recognize the name "Bataan" or "Wake Island".  They might recognize Pearl
Harbor, but would be hard pressed to tell you what happened there.

>> Why should the Imperium report casualties?  Unless there's a specific
>> propaganda purpose (remember the Arizona!), tell the mob that the enemy is
>> being whipped.  Deaths are reported to the families, as single tragic
>> incidents.  You don't tell them that their son/daughter/spore was killed
>> along with 6000 of his buddies when a Solomani tac nuke went off over the
>> field hospital he was in.
>
>Because over a certain limit, it is impossible to hide them. If millions are
>lost assaulting Terra, it will be impossible to hide even in the masses of
>the Third Imperium.

How many troops drowned rehearsing the D-Day invasion?  How many Americans
died in El Salvador in the 1980s?

It's also a matter of spin control.  The division wasn't wiped out, it died
heroically defending the line.  With a little massage, a defeat can look
like victory, and vice versa.  For example, the Tet-68 offensive by the
Viet Cong/NVA was a total failure.  Not a single objective taken and the VC
losses were so high that they ceased being an effective part of the war.
Yet because Walter Cronkite reported that he thought we had done badly,
popular support for the war plummeted.

So the Imperium loses a million troops taking Terra.  That's the last
paragraph in the press release, after three and a half pages of flag-waving
jingoism, body counts, and pictures of the Imperial flag flying over New
York.  Remember, nobody cares how many Russian soldiers died taking Berlin,
they just remember that picture of the Hammer and Sickle being raised over
the Reichstag.  Same thing with Iwo Jima.  The horrendous casualties were
overshadowed by the picture of Old Glory being raised on Mt. Subiachi.



- -- 

Doug Berry       gridlore@mindspring.com
Web pages temporarily unavalible

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 17:20:45
From: "Douglas E. Berry" <gridlore@mindspring.com>
Subject: Re: Inter species relationships

At 12:13 AM 9/4/1999 PST, you wrote:

>Are the various bodily secretions involved "compatible"? (Example: if
>the natural lubrication of one species has a pH far enough from that of
>another, I'd expect chemical burns, not sexual pleasure!)

Leonard, Kirsten is *so* not going there....
- -- 

Doug Berry       gridlore@mindspring.com
Web pages temporarily unavalible

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 22:34:59 -0300
From: Michel Vaillancourt <misha@empire.atlantic-online.ns.ca>
Subject: Re: Imperial military and PR (was: Safety of low berths...)

At 05:19 PM 04/09/1999 -0700, you wrote:
>>Given that any assault on a defended high population world is going to be a
>meat grinder like nothing else
>
>Why is any assault on a defended high population world a meat grinder?
>
>Any defended high population world just has weaknesses. If you were foolish
>enough to throw your main battlefleet into the  teeth of fresh planetary
>defenses, the assault would be a meat grinder.
>
>The weakness of a high population is huge infrastructure needs. Food, water,
>power, and sewage treatment make life possible on a high population world.
>Destroy those items, and the population will eventually implode on itself. A
>simple application of Manslow's hierarchy of needs.
>
>A naval blockade coupled with targeted small unit commando assaults would
>grind down the ability for the population to sustain itself. Ideal targets
>are the highly distributed targets such as agriculture, power distribution,
>hydro facilities, food storage, and sewage. Even a coordinated defense would
>have problems getting enough firepower to defend a location before the
>damage was done.
>
>Planetary assault is relatively easy, once you study it's applications.
>
>JP

        I disagree with your analysis, given an envrionment of the 3i.
Perhaps in my TNEC millieu (TL 9 - 11), but not the 3i.
        Firstly, in pure TCS terms, a "hi-pop" world generates enough
defense budget each year to have the sort of defenses that will trash your
blockade if it gets close enough to the 100d limit to be effective.
SDB's, BattleSats, Asteroid Monitors, etc.
        Secondly, commando assaults suffer the same essential problem as
your blockade does...  3i technology allows you to detect and track a
*fighter* at 450,000km.  Deep meson sites and surface-based laser batteries
and missile silos with access to global defense networks are simply going to
have a shooting gallery as you try and sneak your commando team in.  When I
posted my "Andrew Young" design, I allowed for a *brigade* of Meteoric
Assault Troops to be deployed at once, noting that using TL15 capsules, 30%
losses in the air were *expected*.
        Blockades don't work in the 3i;  not against HiPop worlds.  In fact,
I would venture forward the suggestion that it is the *attacker* who is
going to be having logistics problems, not the defender.  One 20dkton TL15
SDB that gets in amongst your support ships or troop carriers is a wolf
amongst sheep.
        Thirdly, *if* you can get your commando team down you certainly
won't get them back out.  The same defense grid that somehow failed to
notice them coming down will be *searching* for them going back out.  And
they will die.  How many suicide missions can you send Special Forces teams
on before some or all of the rest of your teams mutiny?
        Fourthly, that HiPop world has the capacity to ignore your blockade,
should it somehow be sucessful, for months.  Perhaps years.  Eventually,
thier allies will notice your blockade and the next thing coming out of
jumpspace will be a Very Cranky relief fleet, not a merchant convoy.

        Which means that if you want to take a planet, you have to either
own every other refueling point within JP6, or you have to do it *FAST* when
you come out of jump.  Steam-roller the ships in your path, take your licks
and attrocious casualties getting into orbit, counter-battery the deep-meson
sites and surface batteries, drop your MAT wave and get the attack shuttles
with the G-Carriers and Trepidas out the doors as fast as you can.  If you
don't take 60% casualties before having a beach head, then I would consider
you a genius.
        Oh, and hope the sots who own the planet are above meson-gunning
your beach head regardless of what "friendly" casualties and destruction
that might cause.  If they aren't, you cannot win.

        --Michel
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	Michel R. Vaillancourt	misha@atlantic-online.ns.ca
				ICQ # 31172292
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	    NET-City Communications....
	         Providing "Solutions for the Common Company"
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	***REMEMBER - Always virus-check your emails ***
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 01:58:21 +0100
From: "Matthew Bond" <mgb@akira.swinternet.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Safety of low berths...

- -----Original Message-----
From: The Roc <roc@kewl.com.au>

>I believe allied bombing raids over Germany during WWII had higher
>acceptable losses (especially the US daylight missions)?  I'm also lead to
>understand that all of the beach landings undertook during WWII had
>acceptable losses marked higher than 20%, and again, considering all the
>pacific landings the US made, this is an horrendous figure.
>


ISTR that the forecasts for D-Day were in the region of 20-25% casualties,
and that Omaha is only remembered for it's 'horrific' cost as it was 2-3
times as costly as any of the other beaches.  But the losses were still
lower than the pre-invasion predictions.

This is in no way meant to detract from the terrible loss of life, or from
the courage of those that fought there (on both sides for that matter), but
only to point out that *all* the beaches were *expected* to be much worse
than Omaha *actually was*, yet it was still considered *acceptable* by the
high command. Or perhaps more accurately, unavoidable but necessary, rather
than acceptable.

I thought I remembered a reference to the casualty expectations in
Eisenhower's 'Crusade in Europe', but on skimming though it just now I can't
find one... maybe I read it elsewhere.

Matthew Bond
mgb@akira.swinternet.co.uk
www.akira.swinternet.co.uk
- --------------------------------------------------------------
"To strike a man who insults you is one thing...
...To run him through with a sword is quite another!"
- --------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 4 Sep 1999 22:52:42 -0400
From: Walter Smith <SmithW@HARTWICK.EDU>
Subject: re: Imperial Military and PR

This talk of plantetary assault meatgrinders brought something to mind.

I was watching a documentary on paratroopers, they were interviewing
a strapping young American Airborne trooper, I think of the famous
US 82nd Airborne.

The paratrooper was talking about a get-together where he met some
retired members of the unit. He proudly told some old-timers that he'd
been in thirty airdrops. He asked a veteran how many airdrops he had
been in.

"Oh, only four. Salerno, Sicily, Normandy and Holland."

The young troopie was suitably awed.

ObTrav: We need some details like this from the 4th and 5th Frontier
Wars. Did jump troop veterans take part in the Relief of Jewell, or the
ill-fated Efatian Mountains drop? I think 5FW TAS reports are deliberately
sketchy, to allow players of GDW's Fifth Frontier War game to use
their game details easily in their own OTU campaigns - does anyone
have any "Famous Surface Battles of the Fifth Frontier War" (or Fourth
Frontier War) data available?

Walt Smith

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 4 Sep 1999 23:01:35 -0400
From: Walter Smith <SmithW@HARTWICK.EDU>
Subject: re: Imperial Military and PR

Michel Vaillancourt wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
        Oh, and hope the sots who own the planet are above meson-gunning
your beach head regardless of what "friendly" casualties and destruction
that might cause.  If they aren't, you cannot win.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
While I generally agree with your idea about storming a high-pop planet
in the face of horrendous casualties, there is one thing I'm thinking of:

What if one or two of those assault lander shuttles aren't carrying any
troops, but are instead carrying capital-ship grade Meson screens?

I'm not even sure this is possible, but I've heard of city-sized screens
before (nuclear dampener only?) - if a portable Meson screen would 
allow a beachhead that could only be dislodged by direct armor/infantry
assault, things may get a little better for the attacker.

Of course, these custom shield-shuttles will be the first targets of any
counterattack.

Walt Smith

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 00:18:51 -0300
From: Michel Vaillancourt <misha@empire.atlantic-online.ns.ca>
Subject: re: Imperial Military and PR

At 11:01 PM 04/09/1999 -0400, you wrote:
>What if one or two of those assault lander shuttles aren't carrying any
>troops, but are instead carrying capital-ship grade Meson screens?
>
>I'm not even sure this is possible, but I've heard of city-sized screens
>before (nuclear dampener only?) - if a portable Meson screen would 
>allow a beachhead that could only be dislodged by direct armor/infantry
>assault, things may get a little better for the attacker.
>
>Of course, these custom shield-shuttles will be the first targets of any
>counterattack.
>
>Walt Smith
>
        Hi, Walt....

        I tried it...  the "shuttle" winds up HUGE because of power
consumption.  Further, throw enough USP 9 laser cannon at it, and then you
have to start piling on ARMOR, and then they use the USP 9 nuclear missle
sites on you, and you have to start packing N-Damps on the shuttle, cranking
up its size again...
        Shortly, its just easier to land a star-ship proper and be done with
it.  And that is a Mighty Tempting Target.  =)

        --Michel
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------------------------------

End of Traveller-digest V1999 #1057
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