Zyobot
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Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
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Post by Zyobot on Sept 20, 2021 20:05:24 GMT
Per Isaac Arthur’s thoughts on the subject, a common tendency I’ve seen in more militant sci-fi is the presence of ground forces. Interstellar navies have obvious uses, but I find it harder to figure out how terrestrial armies would actually work, aside from cases where the factions fielding them want to carry out “asteroid-hopping”, boarding operations, or occupy planetoids whose resources and infrastructure are to be left mostly intact, as opposed to launching orbital bombardments that leave catastrophic collateral damage in the aftermath. This is further complicated by how the aforementioned sci-fi armies tend to employ approaches we twenty-first century people wouldn’t find out of the ordinary (once they’ve been deployed to the surface from space, anyway). In fact, some commentary I’ve seen even remarks that their tactics and approaches are even quite primitive, such as Warhammer 40K’s Imperial Guard relying on sheer numbers and stubbornness to drown the enemy out or the Droid Army on Naboo marching in large, easy-to-target formations that the Gungans can see coming from a million miles away. Now, I’m an expert on neither hard sci-fi nor military history, but I’d think that all the insane technological breakthroughs and centuries of war-fighting experience that interstellar societies should have under their belt would drive considerable advancements in tactics and strategy. Naturally, this should extend to interplay with the ways in which terrestrial armies are used and what kinds of crazy hardware they employ, such as drone swarms or human soldiers walking around in power armor. So, what realistic uses would interstellar factions have for large terrestrial armies, and how would they likely be equipped and deployed to perform tasks that their naval or airborne counterparts are ill-suited towards? Here are some more Isaac Arthur videos on the subject, for those interested. Hopefully, they provide a good basis for what I hope is to be a productive and long-running discussion.
Interplanetary Warfare
Planetary Assaults & Invasions
The Next Century of War
Thank you in advance, Zyobot
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James G
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Post by James G on Sept 20, 2021 20:25:19 GMT
I went to watch Aliens at the cinema last night: old film, back on the big screen.
They had 'Colonial Marines'. USMC by a different name. They were on a rescue mission, looking for civilian settlers. You mention boarding ops, something else the soldiers will probably good for even in space.
Ground armies, big ones, are a different beast though. Drones could do so much more.
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Zyobot
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Post by Zyobot on Sept 20, 2021 20:29:02 GMT
Ground armies, big ones, are a different beast though. Drones could do so much more. By this, do you mean targeted precision strikes by drones or huge swarms of them sent in to overwhelm enemy defenses?
Plus, I'd think that there are certain tasks that call for greater physical and mental dexterity than what drones can offer, such as hostage rescues or actually seizing facilities. There may, however, be advancements I can't foresee that make drones much more capable of these tasks.
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Sept 21, 2021 12:48:05 GMT
Interesting and the three videos covered a lot of details. I do wonder if he overlooked that war could cover a wide range of activities that weren't mentioned, although that would be somewhat outside the scope of the topic as it would negate the need for infantry assaults at all.
A lot would depend on both the motivation of both sides, including whether or not both are 'human' as we would recognise as such, the relative levels of technology and resources and as he touched on the wider universe its occurring in. For instance if there's a wider community which sets laws and standards that the combatants can't afford to break, which might rule out attacks that devastate planets or other habitats or certain types of warfare.
In terms of why you might use a ground assault rather than simply trashing the target, other than overriding rules of law the obvious one is that you need something intact on it. That might be people, especially if its a settlement of yours that had been captured/rebelled and you want it and most/all of the people back. Difficult to see anything else with a sufficiently advanced technology that would make the location important to take rather than destroy, unless some unique location - say if you have FTL travel via fixed wormholes or something like that- or it is a rare/unique source of unobtainium of some form.
If your going up against what he calls an ecumenopolises with similar technology to you and its prepared for attack then such a ground assault is likely to be extremely costly as he suggests. However I wonder if such a complex environment would be as invulnerable as he assumes as complexity normally means that there are weak points that can cause the entire system to collapse or at least be crippled if they can be identified and attacked? Not saying that would be easy but something I think should be considered.
The other point that doesn't seem to have been considered is surprise. True with a hugely wealthy and advanced civilization and very advanced and largely automated industry and military a lot can be done by machines of some form but its unlikely that anything other than a very militarised culture would be permanently on guard 24/7 so to speak. Plus if we're assuming that information is limited to the speed of light - which may not be the case - then very fast dumb attacks could do a lot of damage before a warning of it is practical. I.e. if you can get something traveling at say ~90%+ of c then there's going to be very little time to respond to any attack. Thinking especially in something like the suggested Earth - Mars conflict where a sudden strike could do a lot of damage to orbital defences before they could respond. Or possibly sneaking weapons in in commercial freight depending on what's available. Although if technological levels are similar then there is the possibility that the target had a deterrent facility in that they could do similar damage to the other side.
Steve
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James G
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Post by James G on Sept 21, 2021 18:29:33 GMT
Ground armies, big ones, are a different beast though. Drones could do so much more. By this, do you mean targeted precision strikes by drones or huge swarms of them sent in to overwhelm enemy defenses?
Plus, I'd think that there are certain tasks that call for greater physical and mental dexterity than what drones can offer, such as hostage rescues or actually seizing facilities. There may, however, be advancements I can't foresee that make drones much more capable of these tasks.
I mean drones will replace conventional armies on a battlefield. It'll happen eventually and space would be the best place for that to start. Both in precision strikes but also numbers too. RPV mini-tanks are already a real thing and so too and low-flying heli-drones too. Special ops troops I think will for a longer time be needed though. |
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belushitd
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Post by belushitd on Sept 22, 2021 14:31:14 GMT
For this to be an actual problem, one must first assume that interstellar transport is a common and reliable thing. Otherwise, its a complete nonstarter, because what you'd actually be doing is sending your "ground forces" off on a one way colonization mission, where you'd be taking over someone else's colony. This also assumes that you'd be fielding ground forces against other humans and/or human derived tech. If you're dealing with an alien civilization, all bets are off.
First problem - Transporting enough troops to actually occupy the ground. Historically, as population density gets higher, it gets harder to occupy ground and turn the occupied ground into your own land. It takes time, sometimes as many as three or four generations for the occupied people (call them people Q) to start feeling like they're actually members of the occupying civilization (call them people Z). In some cases, it may never happen (Look at Quebec). To field ground forces you need to send enough not only to win the fight to take a planet over, but you also need to have the staying power to occupy long enough for people q to loose their national identity and replace it with yours. In effect, you're looking at a colonization effort again. David Weber touches on this in his Honor Harrington series, when he discusses the manpower problems Manticore is facing, what with having to man an interstellar navy AND provide enough manpower to occupy a bunch of planets. Regretfully, he does not really explore it, just touches on it.
Second problem - Keeping them supplied. Easiest way to do this is to send the ground force with enough factory power (ships, stations to put in the asteroid belt, premade stuff to assemble planetside, whatever) to keep everyone in beer and skittles as well as ammo, food, fuel and spare parts. The luxury items that we take for granted (intoxicants, candy, clean underwear, all that stuff) will need to be supplied at some point. There's only so long a society can go without its little luxuries before psychological damage sets in. You effectively need to be able to supply EVERYTHING you would use/eat/live in on Earth withing a reasonable amount of time, or bad things start happening to your troops.
Third Problem - Communications with home - If you can't communicate effectively with your home system, you're pretty much on your own, and could easily be prosecuting a war where a treaty has already been signed. We can, of course, look to the past for similar examples. Battle of New Orleans in 1814, the cruise of the Alabama in 1865, and any number of merchant ships burned, seized or sunk after a war was called off. Assuming dependable transport as I specified above, communications with home will be fairly regular, if infrequent. However, if you get interdicted, you could end up in serious trouble, particularly if you're relying on shipments of supplies, troops or anything else from home.
Belushi TD
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