The Big One

[Mayabird]

I'm trying to remember if it was mentioned or not, but when exactly did the Seer and his companions move to the Americas? He was definately helping the Union side in the Civil War, and when Odin and Loki were talking they said that he moved to Virginia, not the United States, hinting that it was before the United States was formed. Was he helping out the Revolutionary cause also?

My apologies Mayabird, I missed this somehow. Please excuse the delay in replying; no offense meant.

No offense was taken. Heehee, I like being right!

Now, to try to figure out which one was the signatory...I'm a bit busy right now but for everybody else who wants to play the guessing game, here's a list of names with some sort bios of each:
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/signers/index.htm

That being said, if it's Button Gwinnett...nah, I'm not going to threaten to do something silly.

[CaptainChewbacca]

My money is on Thomas Lynch Jr, who sailed for the Indies in 1776 and was never heard of again.

[Stuart]

Side note, any mod\thread starter up to updating the OP with the newest fics? Kinda hard to keep track.

The whole lot may have to be reposted so I'd hold off on the updates. EZboard was subject to a massive hacking attack on Tuesday morning that destroyed most of the communities based there and their archived threads. in addition, the hacker(s) made a determined effort to destroy as many of the back-ups as they could. The host-board for the TBOverse stories was badly hit and most of its fiction library has gone. How much can be recovered is still open to question. The good news is that I have all the stories backed up elsewhere (off-web) and will repost them but obviously that will mean that all the old links are dead.

Personally I think all hackers (after being arrested, charged, tried, found guilty and sentanced - not necessarily in that order) should be publically tortured to death.

[Enforcer Talen]

any idea why?

[Stuart]

any idea why?

Why the attack? We really don't know although there is a SERIOUS investigation underway (by various organs of state) that is apparently making headway. The extent of the attack and its precision suggest that it was something substantially more than the usual hacking. One suggestion is that it was some script kiddie that was globally banned for spamming and decided this would be a good way of getting revenge. Another is that this was a try-out for an attack on something more sensitive.

One outcome of this might be that I'll set up a specific TBOverse board to hold the stories, back-up material and for debates on current events issues but transposed to the TBOverse.

[Crayz9000]

As a computer enthusiast, it still bothers me the way everybody loosely uses the term "hacking" to mean breaking into servers and damaging data.

The original definition never meant that, anyway. A hacker was just a person who wanted to learn everything about computers that was possible, by whatever means. If a hacker broke into a system, it was for knowledge's sake, not for monetary or petty reasons.

So I'd call the EZboard attack an attack by a cracker or malicious hacker. The boards were compromised and data was deleted maliciously, something that no self-respecting hacker would do on purpose.

I can't say that I have much patience for the assholes who do that sort of thing.

[Stuart]

As a computer enthusiast, it still bothers me the way everybody loosely uses the term "hacking" to mean breaking into servers and damaging data. The original definition never meant that, anyway. A hacker was just a person who wanted to learn everything about computers that was possible, by whatever means. If a hacker broke into a system, it was for knowledge's sake, not for monetary or petty reasons. So I'd call the EZboard attack an attack by a cracker or malicious hacker. The boards were compromised and data was deleted maliciously, something that no self-respecting hacker would do on purpose.

My apologies if an inaccurate use of terminology caused any offense; its not my area of expertise so I tend to use wording in its commonplace rather than specialist meaning. In my area I go up the wall when people refer to an "atomic bomb" rather than a "nuclear device" and say it "explodes" when it really "initiates"

I must admit I think some of the blame for the EZboard disaster lies with the management there; I think they had the Kumbaya-land mentality of "we're nice, why would anybody want to do THAT to US?" They've just had a nasty dose of reality dumped in their lap. I hope they'll learn from it.

Thank you for the pointer of correct terminology. I'll remember to use it in future.

[phongn]

One outcome of this might be that I'll set up a specific TBOverse board to hold the stories, back-up material and for debates on current events issues but transposed to the TBOverse.

Perhaps you might consider a wiki, abliet one requiring login? There was a wealth of information found in the discussions and replies to the chapters.

[phongn]

Lockheed XF-124 Raven. Turboscramjet powered fighter being developed as replacement for F-112. Operational ceiling 175,000 feet, speed Mach 12.

[Stuart]

Aurora and all that

By the way. I've now put up all the TBO long and short stories in a separate account Here

Coverage is all the complete long stories and the short stories. I'm afraid a lot of the artwork, maps factifiles etc are gone forever unless somebody backed any of it up.

[phongn]

Most of the artwork, maps, etc. were stored on other servers so its a matter of getting the link. Alas, most of the discussions are probably toast

OTOH, EZBoard is still restoring data so HPCA might get some back.

[Ace Pace]

Aurora and all that

By the way. I've now put up all the TBO long and short stories in a separate account Here

Coverage is all the complete long stories and the short stories. I'm afraid a lot of the artwork, maps factifiles etc are gone forever unless somebody backed any of it up.

This probebly means I'm blind, but where is The Big One itself?

[Stuart]

This probebly means I'm blind, but where is The Big One itself?

It's on page five (the first novel so its at the end of the site.. The first part is here

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Aurora and all that

By the way. I've now put up all the TBO long and short stories in a separate account Here

Coverage is all the complete long stories and the short stories. I'm afraid a lot of the artwork, maps factifiles etc are gone forever unless somebody backed any of it up.

This probebly means I'm blind, but where is The Big One itself?

I have a copy of it on my hard drive. Thanks Shep.

EDIT: Two Beggars - One

Two Beggars - Two

[Ace Pace]

I have a copy of most completed works, but that dosn't mean I don't want backups.

[FBHthelizardmage]

A question from someone just starting (now just into Crusade.) There's a mention of Chipan having balistic missile subs and long range bombers and that US defence are capable of defending against those subs and bomber. I was wondering how? Is this hunting them down before they launch defending, or MAD defending, or some form of Anti missile system?

[Sea Skimmer]

A question from someone just starting (now just into Crusade.) There's a mention of Chipan having balistic missile subs and long range bombers and that US defence are capable of defending against those subs and bomber. I was wondering how? Is this hunting them down before they launch defending, or MAD defending, or some form of Anti missile system?

The US is protected by 335 SAM sites, equipped with Nike series missiles, which can engage both air and ballistic missile targets. A whole hoard of fighters also exists to help deal with bombers and cruise missile. Since the US puts nuclear warheads on all its long range anti aircraft and anti missile missiles, they are rather highly effective.

[Stuart]

A question from someone just starting (now just into Crusade.) There's a mention of Chipan having balistic missile subs and long range bombers and that US defence are capable of defending against those subs and bomber. I was wondering how? Is this hunting them down before they launch defending, or MAD defending, or some form of Anti missile system?

The US Order of battle is given HERE

The appropriate part (dealing with the US defense system) is

North American Air Defense Command (NORAD)
Regular.
8 Fighter Interceptor Groups with F-106A, 54 aircraft per group
2 Fighter Inteceptor Groups with F-112B (forming)
9 Fighter Ground Attack Groups with F-105D, 54 aircraft per group
6 Fighter Ground Attack Groups with F-110A, 54 aircraft per group

Air National Guard
20 Fighter Interceptor Groups with F-106A, 54 aircraft per group
10 Fighter Interceptor Groups with F-101B, 54 aircraft per group
50 Fighter Interceptor Squadrons with F-104C/D, 12 aircraft per squadron
335 Nike missile batteries each with 12 launchers for Hercules anti-aircraft and Zeus anti-missile missiles.

Total, 1,512 F-106A, 600 F-104C/D, 540 F-101B, 486 F-105D, 324 F-110A.

Basically the system is organized as three rings of fighters. The outer ring consists of very fast long range fighters intended to intercept inbound formations as far as possible from their targets, if possible, long before they launch their air-to-surface stand-off missiles. They break up formations, depriving them of mutual support and create maximum possible attrition. Closer in are the medium-range heavy fighters. These stress endurance and multiple target capability. They are tasked with actually bringing down the bulk of the inbound raids, by now consisting of penetrating bombers armed with gravity bombs and air-launched stand-off missiles. Finally, there are short-range point defense fighters intended to protect specific targets against aircraft and missiles leaking though the first two rings. Finally, NORAD also has a relatively small force of fighter-bombers that are tasked with general-purpose duties. These include conventional air-to-ground strikes and swing fighter roles.

The fighter defenses are supplemented by missile defense batteries. These ring the major cities and are tasked with anti-aircraft and anti-missile duties. In the former role, they have Hercules missiles, in the second they have Zeus missiles. Both have a nuclear warhead and are effective. The Zeus screen is efficient enough to make a ballistic missile attack unlikely to succeed.

Like most of the TBOverse "stuff", very little of this is imaginary. The fighter defense system is simply a modernized version of the system that existed in the 1950s. The difference between @ (our universe is denoted @) and the TBOverse is that there is no large US tactical air force. The USAF has a strategic attack force (SAC) and a strategic defense force (NORAD) but effectively no tactical air force. This is an inevitable outcome of the TBoverse USA being very much an isolationist power. The US Army is very weak for exactly the same reason. Both are deliberate policy; weak tactical forces means no temptation to get involved in tactical situations.

The missile defenses are also very real. They are an implementation of the plans that existed for an organization called ARADCOM (Army Air Defense Command) in the 1950s. In @ the strategic defense plans were effectively cancelled by McNamara in order to free up manpower and funding for the creation of a relatively large army (which was then used in Vietnam). In TBO, the missile defense plans go through and, as a result, the USA has a relatively effective defense against both air and missile attack. By the way, the suggestion that its difficult to hit ballistic missiles or that penetrating an ABM defense is easy are ridiculous. We solved the problems involved forty years ago; there is no problem involved in shooting down inbound ballistic missiles (they are much easier targets than manned aircraft) and penetrating an ABM defense is very hard (most of the tricks used by manned aircraft to get through air defense systems don't work when used by missiles facing an ABM system. Believe me on that one; I've been working on the design and systems integration of both anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense systems for over twenty years.

I worked out the costing of the TBOverse US military machine in great detail using the same methodology used to calculate the @ US defense budget (something else I'm professionally involved in) and the incredible thing is that the TBOverse force structure actually costs less than the one adopted historically - by a quite-substantial margin. The reason is that the things that really cost money in the 1960s (the development of large conventional US forces, the switch from bombers to missiles that involved the construction of an elaborate command control network etc) just didn't happen in the TBOverse.

The TBOverse force structure is what the US would have had in the 1960s if certain decisions had been made and others not taken. It offers different capabilities and has different limitations (some of which feature in Crusade) but it is as practical and "realistic" as the @ defense structure of the 1960s.

In the case of ballistic missile submarines, they would indeed be hunted before launch; that's the primary role of the US Navy's SSN force (in fact its virtually its only role - dealing with the enemy surface fleet is the role of the carriers). MAD (mutually assured destruction) doesn't exist in the TBOverse. The US does assure its enemies that they will be destroyed if they try anything stupid but there's nothing mutual about it. SAC makes sure the enemy is destroyed, NORAD attempts to make sure the US homeland is not affected by enemy action.

By the way, to clear up a misapprehension, MAD is not now and never has been US defense policy. US strategic policy was, is, and is likely to remain, the retention of a secure and effective nuclear deterrent force. MAD was actually a term invented to describe the effects of certain specific policies and it was not intended as being a compliment. MAD is an obscenity. One of the reasons for writing TBO was to highlight what "assured destruction" actually meant in nuclear terms.

[phongn]

Stuart, from what I've read, the ZAR was mechanically-scanned and could only engage a handful of incoming missiles at a time. Does the US NMD system simply have a huge number of radars to handle a saturation attack or have the radars been upgraded to more sophisticated systems analogous to the @PAR?

[Andras]

Stuart- since we're on the topic of Crusade, and nuke SAMs, why didn't the fleet in the Med use Terrier BTNs against the incoming missiles?

[Stuart]

Stuart, from what I've read, the ZAR was mechanically-scanned and could only engage a handful of incoming missiles at a time. Does the US NMD system simply have a huge number of radars to handle a saturation attack or have the radars been upgraded to more sophisticated systems analogous to the @PAR?

The problem with discussing the Nike system was that it was always envisaged as being an incrementally-developed system that would have been upgraded to keep pace with the developing threat. The originally-developed ZARs were indeed mechanically-scanned and effectively were limited to controlling pairs of intercepts (ie one target and one interceptor) at a time. However, there are two caveats there. One is that only being able to controla single intercept at a time isn't the terrible problem it appears. Each intercept is only controlled for the last seconds of its duration so its entirely possible to "time share" the radar between several intercept pairs. That's done today; the AEGIS system time shares between intercept pairs and gets a lot of its capability that way.

The other caveat was timing. The mechanically-scanned ZAR was a stop-gap, one that was intended to build on existing Nike technology to provide an anti-missile capability in the short term. That was when the number of Soviet missiles capable of reaching the US was in single digits (six in point of fact ). The idea was that by the time the Soviet threat had reached the numbers necessary to swamp the mechanically-scanned radars (estimated to be 1962), the phased array replacements would have been around. They emerged as SPS-32 and SPS-33 by the way and appeared on Long Beach and Enterprise (why, you may ask....)

Then, the next stage was longer-ranged missiles intended to knock down mreo advanced missiles (we had Zeus up to an intercept range of 740 miles by the time the whole thing got cancelled) and to add a second layer of intercept missiles to kill leakers (that was Sprint).

By the way, a note for people getting lost in a maze of names here. Nike is the ground control system, Ajax, Hercules, Zeus etc are the missiles fired by that system. Usually the two names are hyphenated so the forst generation air defense system was Nike-Ajax. The earliest anti-missile system was Nike-Zeus-A. We were up to Nike-Zeus-XER before the axe fell.

[Stuart]

Stuart- since we're on the topic of Crusade, and nuke SAMs, why didn't the fleet in the Med use Terrier BTNs against the incoming missiles?

Because it would have wrecked the story line????????

Cruisers probably would have done; these were destroyers. One of the problems with nuclear warhead is that if they are on board, every system that could use that warhead has to be treated as if they did have that warhead. This seriously impinges on the utility of the ship as a whole. For example, in @ if a ship with an eight-round ASROC box had a nuclear depth charge on board, they had to treat every round in that box as if it had a nuclear warhead. Otherwise, as sure as death and taxes, somebody would, one day, shoot off a nuke by accident. In destroyers, that isn't really practical and is too limiting.

In a larger sense, the story has an element that's intended to show that the US is getting overconfident. After 20 years of Pax Americana, they've become so used to not being challenged, they forget that they can. Crusade is basically a story about poor judgement and people making mistakes, small and large.

[phongn]

The idea was that by the time the Soviet threat had reached the numbers necessary to swamp the mechanically-scanned radars (estimated to be 1962), the phased array replacements would have been around. They emerged as SPS-32 and SPS-33 by the way and appeared on Long Beach and Enterprise (why, you may ask....)

Were they planning to put something similar to Nike on the ships? I think I've read something on HPCA about them but can't recall anymore.

By the way, a note for people getting lost in a maze of names here. Nike is the ground control system, Ajax, Hercules, Zeus etc are the missiles fired by that system. Usually the two names are hyphenated so the forst generation air defense system was Nike-Ajax. The earliest anti-missile system was Nike-Zeus-A. We were up to Nike-Zeus-XER before the axe fell.

I noticed that Hercules, et. al. continued to be in usage for some decades since, with obvious improvements over time. Do they retain the same command-guidance with massive improvements in their ground equipment? Also, I think I read in Shield of Faith that the US had considered some point-defense missiles to protect the Nike installations close in -- does TBOverse use something like HAWK in that role?

[Stuart]

Were they planning to put something similar to Nike on the ships? I think I've read something on HPCA about them but can't recall anymore.

Indeed so. One of the things about a ballistic missile is that it's ballistic. It's course is set the moment its launched and variations thereafter are severely limited. Ballistic missiles cannot be re-targeted in flight. (This takes us into the wonderful world of MRVs, MIRVs, MARVs and all such good things about which there is much misinformation). In some ways, shooting down a ballistic missile is a truly drastic form of retargeting. If we shoot down a ballistic missile, the wreckage does not fall out of the sky, it continues in the same ballistic arc as was described by the missile before it was hit. In other words, the wreckage hits the target the missile was originally aimed at. Now, it wont do so as a cohesive whole because the act of shooting down the missile imparts all sorts of odd vectors to the ballistic equation. Put it all together and the effect of shooting down a ballistic missile is that the original target gets hit by a shotgun blast of a couple of tons of metal fragments, some of which are seriously radioactive, rather than a functioning nuclear device. That's a great improvement (for a city, anything is an improvement over being hit by a functioning nuclear device) but its not perfect.

So, somebody came up with the idea, if we station ships equipped with anti-missile systems off the enemy coast, under the flight path of missiles, we can shoot down the missiles early in their flight path, before their ballistic trajectory is set and, with luck, instead of the wreckage hitting the originally-scheduled target, it will fall back on the launching country's territory and they (or the survivors thereof) can clean the mess up. This became known as Boost-Phase Intercept. So, there were some very interesting plans for a sea-based anti-missile systems. Originally, they simply envisaged sticking Nike-Zeus-C onto a cruiser-sized ship equipped with the phased array ZAR. That wouldn't work; even in C form, the Zeus just didn't have the launch kinetics to execute a tail-chasing intercept. A very high acceleration missile was needed and that lead to Sprint and, ultimately, HIBEX.

Even though the original idea turned out wonky, the radars themselves proved very useful (when they worked) so they featured on Long Beach and Enterprise. The Navy then planned to go to a much better system called Typhon (one 'o' is correct, not Typhoon) but guess who cancelled it. Typhon eventually evolved into AEGIS. In many ways, AEGIS is a direct lineal descendent of the original Nike-Zeus-XE/XER anti-missile system, which is why its development program worked so well. AEGIS was "cooled down" to comply with the insane anti-ABM treaty and the currente ffort is to "heat it up" again, ie make use of capabilities that were there in latent form but never implemented.

I noticed that Hercules, et. al. continued to be in usage for some decades since, with obvious improvements over time. Do they retain the same command-guidance with massive improvements in their ground equipment?

The improvements in Hercules (or Herc as its known in The Business) have been massive. What a lot of people don't realize is that Herc was actually quite a capable missile interceptor in its own right, not least because, even with conventional explosive, it had a massive warhead. Herc's shot down SCUD-type targets quite routinely and had it been deployed around Riyadh in 1991, its probable none of the Iraqi missiles would have got past the screen. For the record, contrary to recent mythology, the Patriots fired at the inbound SCUDs were hitting their targets. The problem was that the Patriot warhead was too small and it was proximity fuzed so the "hits" weren't destroying said targets. The problem is comparable to that experienced with the 20mm and 40mm weapons in WW2. When the Japanese were using manned aircraft with conventional attack tactics, those guns worked fine. Damaging the aircraft and/or deflecting it was enough. When the Japanese switched to Kamikaze tactics, the requirement became one of physically blowing the aircraft apart in mid-air. For that, the 20mm and 40mm were inadequate and the US Navy went to the 3 inch gun.

For all those improvements, Herc retains the same basic system configuration; command guidance to target. In fact, AEGIS works very much the same way, again showing how closely related AEGIS is to the Nike-Zeus system. Command Guidance is very effective because it allows the missile to use an exceptionally fuel-efficient trajectory. It's weakness is that the command link is open to electronic warfare interference. That isn't much fo a concern in AAW because we're so far ahead in that particular area and it isn't a concern at all in anti-missile affairs because missiles do not (and cannot) use electronic warfare. As an aside, Herc was effective for another reason. Its trajectory was up-and-over so that it dived on its target. Warned that a SAM was on its way, pilots instinctively look down to see it, not up. That split second made a crucial difference.

Also, I think I read in Shield of Faith that the US had considered some point-defense missiles to protect the Nike installations close in -- does TBOverse use something like HAWK in that role?

That's correct; in fact, given time there would have been a second and a third layer to the defense system. HAWK was the first stage of an inner layer (HAWK itself was quite a good missile killer by the way but it left things desperately late). In the TBOverse, the missile batteries have their own defenses, HAWKs, to act as a terminal defense against an attack. The @ HAWK network was never completed in fact it was barely started. Guess who cancelled it to make funding available for a large conventional army.........

[darthdavid]

The more I read about McNamara the more I wish he'd fallen of a cliff or something.