NationStates

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 10:44 am**

A series of small landings aimed at seizing or disrupting key targets: bridges, command posts, airfields etc, in direct support of the main advance would be more useful than a massed landing.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 10:51 am**

The Kievan People wrote:A series of small landings aimed at seizing or disrupting key targets: bridges, command posts, airfields etc, in direct support of the main advance would be more useful than a massed landing.

How would one go about this?

A Company-sized unit of men, reinforced with some heavy weapons, I guess? Deployed from a few airlifters near the objective to approach on foot or with vehicles. How far behind the lines would you want to deploy this?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 10:56 am**

How does this look?

Pls be gentle, it is my first...

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:02 am**

Heavonia wrote:
Imperializt Russia wrote:If you can get them there and your enemy doesn't suspect you will, then probably very effective.

How do you propose on landing a brigade of paratroops in a combat drop well behind the enemy line?
How far behind the line is "Estonia" here? It probably won't be effective if your ground forces can't be expected to punch through and link up, even if it throws them into complete disarray. If they're too far to be exploited, then all it will really do is limit the availability of the enemy's reserves as they respond to the landings, and not provide a benefit on the frontline itself.

Well, the assault will come from the southern border of Lithuania.

If we assume 0 hr is the point at which we start rolling across the border. The enemy knows a war is coming because we're not even in-region and we've been shipping forces to the nation on the southern border of Balticland to enable an invasion after they orchestrated a terrorist attack on Kouralian soil. I imagine they'd know if we deployed a brigade of paratroops there, considering all the specialist equipment that comes with it. Would that level of preparedness preclude massed airborne landings.

Also, I was assuming you combine masses of SEAD and regular fighter sweeps over the area of operations and then a load of tactical airlifters fly overhead and drop guys out of them. Is that not how massed airborne landings work? For this I'd assume they'd curve out over the Baltics and come in across the Estonian West Coast.

If you're landing a brigade (only a brigade) of paratroops two countries and hundreds of kilometres from your actual line of advance, then they'll probably be killed.

While suppressing the shit out of the air defences of Estonia should certainly give you a sweet corridor to put paratroop aircraft through, it also alerts your enemy(s?) that you're doing something big in Estonia.

If you're assaulting the southern border of Lithuania, then you probably want to be putting a brigade of paratroops actually in Lithuania.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:04 am**

Depends on how fast you anticipate being able to advance. But it's not realistic to expect them to hold more than 2-3 days without reinforcement. If you anticipate being able to cover 30 km/day for example, which is a fairly good rate for a major offensive, you wouldn't want to drop them more than 60-90km behind the front.

The larger the unit generally the closer to the front it should be dropped. A small commando team can be inserted far, far behind enemy lines. A battalion sized task force shouldn't be more than a day or so away from reinforcements.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:06 am**

Shonburg wrote:How does this look?

Pls be gentle, it is my first...

- Why base it on Midway? In the early 70's, the Kitty Hawk class (much better suited for fast jets) was already in service for ten years.
- F-16s on a carrier? Uh... no.
- Actually, your whole air wing is kinda weird. No AEW&C planes, no ASW assets - not good for a carrier.

Edit: For comparison, the air wings of a Commonwealth Navy fleet carrier and a light carrier:

Fleet Carrier:

1x VF (12 Fighters)
3x VFA (36 Strike Fighters)
1x VA (10 Bombers)
1x VAW (6 AEW&C aircraft)
1x VAQ (4 EW aircraft)
1x VS (8 ASW aircraft)
1x VK Det. (4 Tanker aircraft)
1x VQ Det. (2 ELINT aircraft)
1x VRC Det. (4 COD aircraft)
1x HSM (8 ASW helicopters)

Light carrier:

2x VFA (24 Strike Fighters)
1x VAW (4 AEW&C aircraft)
1x VAQ (4 EW aircraft)
1x VS Det. (4 ASW aircraft)
1x VRC Det. (2 COD aircraft)
1x HSM (8 ASW helicopters)

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:07 am**

Okay, and an odd question, but I' not sure of how much ground a unit of men can hold, or how much frontage a particular formation ought to be able to cover. For invading the baltic states, what sized force would really be needed to cover that sort of area?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:10 am**

Before or after you've taken it?
It would depend heavily on the opponent you face, and how both of you fight.

A modern brigade-sized unit could be expected to stretch to a few kilometres of frontage, but for an assault against prepared positions or units, may be forced to close up to maximise its firepower.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:13 am**

Somebody needs to talk me out of a ridiculous idea:

Basically you take the booster stages of an ICBM and instead of a MIRV bus you give it a large, stealthy hypersonic glider that after re-entry at orbital speeds would skip along the upper atmosphere in a "skip-glide" trajectory. The glider would carry a 2,000 ib payload and once over its target perform an aerobraking maneuver to decelerate to subsonic speeds before deploying a GPS controlled parafoil for landing. With this you deliver a ton of supplies anywhere in the world in less than an hour, say to a team of special forces in hostile territory where an air-drop would be too risky or medical supplies to a critical patient in a remote area where an air drop would be too slow.

Somewhat feasible? Totally impractical? Utterly insane?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:15 am**

The Technocratic Syndicalists wrote:Somebody needs to talk me out of a ridiculous idea:

Basically you take the booster stages of an ICBM and instead of a MIRV bus you give it a large, stealthy hypersonic glider that after re-entry at orbital speeds would skip along the upper atmosphere in a "skip-glide" trajectory. The glider would carry a 2,000 ib payload and once over its target perform an aerobraking maneuver to decelerate to subsonic speeds before deploying a parafoil for landed. With this you deliver a ton of supplies anywhere in the world in less than an hour, say to a team of special forces in hostile territory where an air-drop would be too risky, or medical supplies to a critical patient in a remote area where an air drop would be too slow.

Somewhat feasible? Totally impractical? Utterly insane?

Stealth and Hypersonic are mutually exclusive concepts. Besides, throwing around ICBMs is bound to ruin your international reputation.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:15 am**

Heavonia wrote:Okay, and an odd question, but I' not sure of how much ground a unit of men can hold, or how much frontage a particular formation ought to be able to cover. For invading the baltic states, what sized force would really be needed to cover that sort of area?

At modern force densities a Corps should suffice.

At Cold War Soviet force densities it would be about a Front sized force.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:16 am**

The Technocratic Syndicalists wrote:Somebody needs to talk me out of a ridiculous idea:

Basically you take the booster stages of an ICBM and instead of a MIRV bus you give it a large, stealthy hypersonic glider that after re-entry at orbital speeds would skip along the upper atmosphere in a "skip-glide" trajectory. The glider would carry a 2,000 ib payload and once over its target perform an aerobraking maneuver to decelerate to subsonic speeds before deploying a GPS controlled parafoil for landing. With this you deliver a ton of supplies anywhere in the world in less than an hour, say to a team of special forces in hostile territory where an air-drop would be too risky or medical supplies to a critical patient in a remote area where an air drop would be too slow.

Somewhat feasible? Totally impractical? Utterly insane?

The two words I have for you are "launch costs".
Especially in the case of sending medical supplies to critically injured persons in remote areas.

Like, the funding needed to keep a fleet of these rockets and "stealthy hypersonic gliders" on standby, ready to go, and indeed launch them, would probably pay to give the entire third world air ambulance services.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:17 am**

The Technocratic Syndicalists wrote:Somebody needs to talk me out of a ridiculous idea:

Basically you take the booster stages of an ICBM and instead of a MIRV bus you give it a large, stealthy hypersonic glider that after re-entry at orbital speeds would skip along the upper atmosphere in a "skip-glide" trajectory. The glider would carry a 2,000 ib payload and once over its target perform an aerobraking maneuver to decelerate to subsonic speeds before deploying a GPS controlled parafoil for landing. With this you deliver a ton of supplies anywhere in the world in less than an hour, say to a team of special forces in hostile territory where an air-drop would be too risky or medical supplies to a critical patient in a remote area where an air drop would be too slow.

Somewhat feasible? Totally impractical? Utterly insane?

That small a load isn't worth the cost.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:20 am**

Imperializt Russia wrote:The two words I have for you are "launch costs".
Especially in the case of sending medical supplies to critically injured persons in remote areas.

Like, the funding needed to keep a fleet of these rockets and "stealthy hypersonic gliders" on standby, ready to go, and indeed launch them, would probably pay to give the entire third world air ambulance services.

The IC justification would go something like this:

We have a large contingent of large, solid fuel, silo based ICBMs that we want to retire. Instead of just scrapping them we're going to re-purpose most of them as space-launch vehicles with an extra upper stage and a a few of them as "payload delivery vehicles" with a skip-glide hypersonic glider payload.

An even crazier version would be to have a FOBS system where you have a bunch of these gliders (with an additional RCS system) just hanging out in low earth orbit which you can de-orbit at any point. This means you can launch them with any conventional space-launch system (which doesn't have to be on alert 24/7) any any time prior to when they're actually needed and it compresses the time from payload request to payload delivery even further.

Still would cost a lolhuge amount of $$$

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:26 am**

If it's a limited inventory, that is presumably at or nearing the end of its useful life, this arguably makes the suggestion less viable. Certainly for delivering humanitarian supplies to remote areas. That would simply be frivolous. I imagine that what constitutes a humanitarian payload would have to be preplanned far in advance, to ensure mass and space limits, as well as maintaining the centre of gravity of the vehicle, were adhered to.

It could be argued to have limited military applications, but the delivery of long-range conventional weapons probably makes more sense.

The most viable disposal method would probably be folding them into your space agency and using them for space exploration or satellite launches until the inventory is expended.
Or, since you're apparently wealthy enough to consider this in the first place, just scrap them (or sell them) anyway.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:29 am**

I think both the Soviets and the Americans used ICBMs banned under arms treaties as satellite launch vehicles.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:30 am**

Western Weyard wrote:
Shonburg wrote:How does this look?

Pls be gentle, it is my first...

- Why base it on Midway? In the early 70's, the Kitty Hawk class (much better suited for fast jets) was already in service for ten years.
- F-16s on a carrier? Uh... no.
- Actually, your whole air wing is kinda weird. No AEW&C planes, no ASW assets - not good for a carrier.

Edit: For comparison, the air wings of a Commonwealth Navy fleet carrier and a light carrier:

Fleet Carrier:

1x VF (12 Fighters)
3x VFA (36 Strike Fighters)
1x VA (10 Bombers)
1x VAW (6 AEW&C aircraft)
1x VAQ (4 EW aircraft)
1x VS (8 ASW aircraft)
1x VK Det. (4 Tanker aircraft)
1x VQ Det. (2 ELINT aircraft)
1x VRC Det. (4 COD aircraft)
1x HSM (8 ASW helicopters)

Light carrier:

2x VFA (24 Strike Fighters)
1x VAW (4 AEW&C aircraft)
1x VAQ (4 EW aircraft)
1x VS Det. (4 ASW aircraft)
1x VRC Det. (2 COD aircraft)
1x HSM (8 ASW helicopters)

1. Because my nation did not have the budget.
2. My reading comprehension failed me when I read about the Navy variant of the F-16. Changed it to the carrier capable F-15N.
3. Added some AEW&C, the Sea Stallions and Hueys are for ASW

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:35 am**

Imperializt Russia wrote:If it's a limited inventory, that is presumably at or nearing the end of its useful life, this arguably makes the suggestion less viable. Certainly for delivering humanitarian supplies to remote areas. That would simply be frivolous. I imagine that what constitutes a humanitarian payload would have to be preplanned far in advance, to ensure mass and space limits, as well as maintaining the centre of gravity of the vehicle, were adhered to.

It could be argued to have limited military applications, but the delivery of long-range conventional weapons probably makes more sense.

The most viable disposal method would probably be folding them into your space agency and using them for space exploration or satellite launches until the inventory is expended.
Or, since you're apparently wealthy enough to consider this in the first place, just scrap them (or sell them) anyway.

The original idea I had was to use a huge rocket boost to launch a suborbital spaceplane with a fulton recovery system on a skip-glide trajectory to rescue !Not Jack Ryan after he'd been compromised in the middle of durkadurkastan.

But that's totally insane, using an ICBM booster with a smaller glider to deliver supplies seemed like a slightly more mundane, yet still somewhat ludicrous idea.

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:39 am**

500 pages!! Where's the new thread at?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:40 am**

Shonburg wrote:1. Because my nation did not have the budget.
2. My reading comprehension failed me when I read about the Navy variant of the F-16. Changed it to the carrier capable F-15N.
3. Added some AEW&C, the Sea Stallions and Hueys are for ASW

- I strongly doubt that it would make a big difference, given the fact that your country built it itself. If you don't have money, yet still want to have a carrier, you could always get a used one. That's what pretty much everyone did after WW2.
- Now you've got two types of air-to-air jets, but nothing for air-to-ground. (Yes, the 'Cat can be used in an air-to-ground role, but still...)
- Sea Stallions and Hueys are primarily transport helicopters. Why not use specialized ASW birds like Lynx, Merlin, Seahawk or Sea King?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:44 am**

New Axiom wrote:500 pages!! Where's the new thread at?

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=385750

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:54 am**

The Technocratic Syndicalists wrote:
Imperializt Russia wrote:If it's a limited inventory, that is presumably at or nearing the end of its useful life, this arguably makes the suggestion less viable. Certainly for delivering humanitarian supplies to remote areas. That would simply be frivolous. I imagine that what constitutes a humanitarian payload would have to be preplanned far in advance, to ensure mass and space limits, as well as maintaining the centre of gravity of the vehicle, were adhered to.

It could be argued to have limited military applications, but the delivery of long-range conventional weapons probably makes more sense.

The most viable disposal method would probably be folding them into your space agency and using them for space exploration or satellite launches until the inventory is expended.
Or, since you're apparently wealthy enough to consider this in the first place, just scrap them (or sell them) anyway.

The original idea I had was to use a huge rocket boost to launch a suborbital spaceplane with a fulton recovery system on a skip-glide trajectory to rescue !Not Jack Ryan after he'd been compromised in the middle of durkadurkastan.

If you can't have conventional aircraft on standby for this purpose near the AO, should you be sending not-Jack Ryan into these AOs?

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:55 am**

New Axiom wrote:500 pages!! Where's the new thread at?

We need a tiebreaker between Allanea and Mr. NSMRC "No".

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 11:55 am**

The Kievan People wrote:
New Axiom wrote:500 pages!! Where's the new thread at?

https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopi ... 3&t=385750

http://www.nationstates.net/region=nsmrc_voting

frrraaaaaauuuuuudddddddddddddddddddd

Posted: **Wed Aug 03, 2016 12:29 pm**

Shonburg wrote:How does this look?

Pls be gentle, it is my first...

needs more rafales

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