Spaceship Crew Sizes - A brainbug?

[Big Orange]

The largest oil tankers and container ships in the world today are already automated enough to need only about six or seven people to man the bridge and engine room at any given time, and thus need total crews.. of only about thirty to forty. These ships can displace more then ten times what Queen Elizabeth II does.

That makes perfect sense with the Nostromo from Alien, since it was really a towing vessel run by a AI computer core (M.O.T.H.E.R), and the rig the Nostromo is towing is a fully automated industrial complex behind it (like the terraforming processing plant on LV-426), with no need for a giant crew. But a warship or troop carrier with a non-existent crew makes less sense, although the USS Sulaco seems mostly engine drives at the back and weapon/sensor systems at the front, with the relatively small section at the middle having inhabitable space and a hangar area (but there was no excuse going planet side with noboday waiting oboard the USS Sulaco in Aliens, even if a skeleton crew is standard proceedure for a USCM recon ship).

[The Dark]

The largest oil tankers and container ships in the world today are already automated enough to need only about six or seven people to man the bridge and engine room at any given time, and thus need total crews.. of only about thirty to forty. These ships can displace more then ten times what Queen Elizabeth II does.

That makes perfect sense with the Nostromo from Alien, since it was really a towing vessel run by a AI computer core (M.O.T.H.E.R), and the rig the Nostromo is towing is a fully automated industrial complex behind it (like the terraforming processing plant on LV-426), with no need for a giant crew. But a warship or troop carrier with a non-existent crew makes less sense, although the USS Sulaco seems mostly engine drives at the back and weapon/sensor systems at the front, with the relatively small section at the middle having inhabitable space and a hangar area (but there was no excuse going planet side with noboday waiting oboard the USS Sulaco in Aliens, even if a skeleton crew is standard proceedure for a USCM recon ship).

According to the Aliens Technical Manual, Sulaco had been modified from a troop transport to a light assault ship with secondary designation for orbital bombardment and space control. She belongs to the smallest class used by Starlift Command, and seems to be an escort with a tertiary troop transport capability. It also has a huge cargo bay for its size at 1.2 million cubic meters. Based on the diagram in the book, at most one-sixth of its length is inhabitable - the front third is cargo, flight and ASAT deck, sensors, and life support. The spine is lithium hydride tankage and a railgun. The belly is a dropship hangar, railgun, and comms antennae. The circular area about 2/3 back is the fusion torus, and everything behind that is drives.

It looks like what was sent was essentially a single section - one UD-4 dropship, one M577 APC, 6 rifles, 2 smartguns, driver, sergeants, pilot, and wizzo, plus the command element - lieutenant and android. Adding a second section (without a command element) would have made it a standard platoon.