Worldwar: Throwing the Balance

[Bunga]

Given the centuries or millenia of technological maturation, more like generation 4.5 fighters. Especially if they have radar controlled autocannos and guided missiles in the Mach 4-5 range.

[xt828]

Mach 4-5 missiles have been available since the mid-70s, and "radar controlled autocannon" can mean anything from autonomous turrets to integration into the HUD with radar-assisted targeting - as has been around for about the same amount of time. I always felt that Lizard military tech was at about mid-late 70s level, but with improvements to some individual systems to reflect overall changes in how they were used - as examples, a plane roughly analagous to the F-14 being able to rendezvous with spacecraft, and vehicles with hydrogen engines. I get the strong impression from particularly the early books that the Lizards viewed their military as 'finished' - both technologically and doctrinally - in the sense that development had totally ended, and innovation was seen in a decisively negative light. With that in mind, I can think of two plausible scenarios - firstly that the winning Lizard faction froze development when they unified the planet, or secondly that they developed gear to defeat what they'd faced last and then froze development.

[Bunga]

I will agree that the lizards see their gear as finished, but that does not automatically mean that they saw it as finished immidiately after Unification. The lizards state time and time again that their development is slow and methodical, to a ridiculous degree even, but not frozen in ice. It is canonical that there have been technological developments since Unification. Presumably these would include computing developments, and it is known that their computers are solid state, at least, after their surprise that the our's was based on cathode ray tubes. As their computers are also good enough to handle automated transstellar flight at relativistic speeds and watching over who knows how many thousands of cryo frozen lizards for decades, it is inconceivable to me that even lizards would not recognise the advantage computer assistance can give to a figher pilot.

The lizards are time and again surprised at our changing technology, partly because of the speed but also because we turn out technology which is not mature and use it anyway. The lizards would never do that. Furoth generation fighters are not mature, not in any way. 4.5 comes closer to maturity, since the only significant difference between 4 and 4.5 is computers and computer peripherals.

[xt828]

My thought was that the Lizards would look at the military situation along the lines of "with this level of technology you can unite a planet" and decide that enough to beat that is all anyone could ever need. They certainly may have incorporated improvements in other areas, but what impetus for continued military development do they have? Until they encountered us, their encounters with other races were from a position of total superiority in technology, and I think that given their view of species development it's reasonable that they'd assume that all species unify their planet at roughly the level of technology they themselves used.

Interstellar travel doesn't necessarily imply enormously advanced computers per se - take a look at the computing power of NASAs various expeditions and probes, you probably have more computing power in your mobile phone. The main issue, as I understand it, with computing in these situations is reliability - something which I would imagine the Lizards have nailed.

On another note, the regions which in the books the Lizards conquered with no real issue - Latin America, Africa, and much of Asia - will by now be flush with AKs from the Soviets and G3s and FALs from NATO. They may be able to topple governments, but they are going to have massive problems holding regions down, especially with decolonisation and national awakenings going on.

[Simon_Jester]

My thought was that the Lizards would look at the military situation along the lines of "with this level of technology you can unite a planet" and decide that enough to beat that is all anyone could ever need. They certainly may have incorporated improvements in other areas, but what impetus for continued military development do they have? Until they encountered us, their encounters with other races were from a position of total superiority in technology, and I think that given their view of species development it's reasonable that they'd assume that all species unify their planet at roughly the level of technology they themselves used.

They might make incremental improvements designed to make equipment safer or more reliable, but I doubt they'd try to increase capability. Except insofar as improvements to the cockpit display and such make the pilot more effective in combat.

[Teebs]

Interstellar travel doesn't necessarily imply enormously advanced computers per se - take a look at the computing power of NASAs various expeditions and probes, you probably have more computing power in your mobile phone. The main issue, as I understand it, with computing in these situations is reliability - something which I would imagine the Lizards have nailed.

If I remember correctly, they had CDs or an equivalent which would imply their electronics are closer to our own than their tanks.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, their tanks seem to be up in the range of a highly upgraded M60 or early M1, at least to me. The US kept using the M60A3 into the late '90s, and most of the rest of the world used tanks little or no better. I see no reason to think their tanks are more out of date than CD-ROMs.

[xt828]

I always thought of them as around the T-62 to T-64 mark, myself. The autoloader and driver seperated from his crew are design choices the West has traditionally steered away from, France aside, and I think you'd really struggle to defeat any mark of M1 or any of the later M60s with a Panzer III, even if you got a lucky shot and had two other tanks distracting the enemy.

The video platters of the novels could be anything from LaserDisc through to SVOD/HVD/5D-DVD. IIRC all we know about them is that they're round, shiny on at least one side, and contain video.

[Simon_Jester]

Hmm. I see what you mean.

They may be poorly protected but otherwise progressive designs- compare to the Leopard 1, which has relatively light armor for an MBT because the designers had given up on piling on more armor as a defense against increasingly powerful weapons. Of course, that analogy is not reassuring since the Leopard dates to the mid-1960s...

As for the autoloader/separated driver aspect, that may just be "road not taken." We didn't wind up building fighters with LEO-capable rocket boosters, either, though we probably could have if we truly truly wanted to.

We might be looking at a tank that, in terms of protection, is on par with 1960s tanks, but which has superior 'avionics' (the electronics fit), very high mechanical reliability (which makes a HUGE difference in tanks), and 1970s-80s level firepower.

[Madzcat]

I think the whole autoloader thing isn't that big of a deal because for the Race it works perfectly, almost all the time unlike human versions, because that's how the Race is. Though yeah their tanks don't seem to be as well armored as the modern equivalents.

Though I really do think Turtledove didn't write that correctly because never again, unless I'm mistaken, are the fighters ever sent into LEO our leave the atmosphere period and they never talk about any kind of rocket boosters or anything. I think Turtledove really meant to have the starship entering the atmosphere to pickup the killercraft, not them leaving the atmosphere to get to it.

[xt828]

Apparently the autoloader on the Leclerc works pretty well, and the Japanese have autoloaders in the Type 90 and Type 10s. OTOH, Germany, Britain, Israel and the United States prefer to have an additional crewman. It's probably worth noting that there hasn't really been much by way of tank on tank combat in the last 60-odd years outside Israel's conflicts, which mostly proved that training and initiative are important rather than the relative merits of equipment.

The thing about the Panzer 3 battle is that IIRC it's a shot into the belly of the tank - but most modern tanks actually have reasonable armour under there to protect against AT mines. I'm pretty sure that the Panzer in question was a Pzkpfw III J1, as the commander talks about it having a new long gun - the 5cm Kwk 38 L/42 was replaced by a 5cm Kwk 39 L/60 in that model - but we're talking here about a gun which struggled to find purpose on a tank in 1942, and which ended up as the armament of the Puma recon vehicle. I suppose that it's plausible that the Race hadn't thought of land mines, but it's an odd note that a tank which struggled to kill T-34s slots a Lizard tank. As a point of comparison, according to the German tests the Panther could, at point blank range, penetrate just under 19cm of armour; the Tiger about 17cm, and the Tiger II about 24cm, while the Pz3J could manage at best 13cm. Since later on in the books the Germans have some success with the Cats, that gives a rough armour effectiveness.

On armour, after the switch from infantry/cruiser/medium/heavy tanks to MBTs armour usually ended up at about the level previously expected in a medium, while armament tended to owe more to what was previously in the heavies, so I don't see the Lizard tanks as bucking the trend, though it is a little odd that they trended the same way we did - I'd almost expect a design more along the lines of the A43 Black Prince, which has substantial armour, solid armament, and average speed. Given that the Lizards are not fond of initiative and plan operations to the nth degree, the kind of freewheeling, fluid combat which led to MBTs seems unlikely.

An interesting thought here is that the Soviets experimented with ERA in the 60s, but ditched it after apparently accidentally destroying a few test tanks with the ERA and deciding that their existing armour was sufficient - if they get a rude shock in some early engagements and choose to throw resources at it, IIRC ERA can be very effective against sabot, and I don't recall the Lizards using anything other than sabot and HE.

The Lizard planes being able to make it to LEO strikes me as being more likely than the Lizard spaceships repeatedly entering the atmosphere - the latter would burn through vastly more resources, and we know that the Lizards were conducting manned recon flights for quite some time before they attacked due to the British radarman POV.

[Simon_Jester]

Apparently the autoloader on the Leclerc works pretty well, and the Japanese have autoloaders in the Type 90 and Type 10s. OTOH, Germany, Britain, Israel and the United States prefer to have an additional crewman. It's probably worth noting that there hasn't really been much by way of tank on tank combat in the last 60-odd years outside Israel's conflicts, which mostly proved that training and initiative are important rather than the relative merits of equipment.

Well, to a point. Take Shermans up against T-72s and you're screwed even if you have brilliant guys in the Shermans.

The thing about the Panzer 3 battle is that IIRC it's a shot into the belly of the tank - but most modern tanks actually have reasonable armour under there to protect against AT mines. I'm pretty sure that the Panzer in question was a Pzkpfw III J1, as the commander talks about it having a new long gun - the 5cm Kwk 38 L/42 was replaced by a 5cm Kwk 39 L/60 in that model - but we're talking here about a gun which struggled to find purpose on a tank in 1942, and which ended up as the armament of the Puma recon vehicle. I suppose that it's plausible that the Race hadn't thought of land mines, but it's an odd note that a tank which struggled to kill T-34s slots a Lizard tank. As a point of comparison, according to the German tests the Panther could, at point blank range, penetrate just under 19cm of armour; the Tiger about 17cm, and the Tiger II about 24cm, while the Pz3J could manage at best 13cm. Since later on in the books the Germans have some success with the Cats, that gives a rough armour effectiveness.

They also use somewhat more sophisticated AP ammunition, derived from Lizard designs, in this setting, at least in the later models. It's noted later in the novels that Jaeger's feat of killing a Lizard tank with a Panzer III is an amazing feat of arms, one that other people are going to be reluctant to believe.

So I'd say that Jaeger is a genius tanker (or at least supposed to be pretty damn good), who just managed to find an ambush position where he could take out a Lizard tank. Almost no one managed that in the early days of the invasion; the sheer disparity in numbers that we see in the casualty rates of American Shermans up against the Lizards suggests that.

Probably, most kills against Lizard tanks would be either due to the tanks stopping in place to deal with a prolonged engagement (bad idea, but easy mistake for them to make if their doctrine isn't flexible) and getting hit with artillery, or due to human tanks knocking out the treads and scoring a mobility-kill, at which point they can realistically hope to maneuver around and nail it from behind.

An interesting thought here is that the Soviets experimented with ERA in the 60s, but ditched it after apparently accidentally destroying a few test tanks with the ERA and deciding that their existing armour was sufficient - if they get a rude shock in some early engagements and choose to throw resources at it, IIRC ERA can be very effective against sabot, and I don't recall the Lizards using anything other than sabot and HE.

Ah, indeed.

The Lizard planes being able to make it to LEO strikes me as being more likely than the Lizard spaceships repeatedly entering the atmosphere - the latter would burn through vastly more resources, and we know that the Lizards were conducting manned recon flights for quite some time before they attacked due to the British radarman POV.

True. On the other hand, the fact that they can do this at all suggests to me that the Lizard killercraft are at least capable of extremely high speed high altitude flight, more so than most terrestrial fighters. So I don't think it's unreasonable to posit that their recon capabilities are on par with, say, the SR-71.

[Bunga]

On my first read through of the WorldWar books, I did not understand how a fighter aeroplane could possible make LEO. The very concept of a jet engine operating under such conditions was ridiculous to me. Today, it is even more ludicrous. The idea that they might have rocket boosters strapped on seems workable at first glance, but who the hell would be stupid enough to go into atmospheric combat carrying rocket boosters on their fighter?

Though I suppose for bombing runs it might make a little more sense, especially in the early stages of the war when a) the lizards had no idea what they were getting into and b) the lizards had no ground bases.

[Simon_Jester]

Bunga, all the evidence is that they only used the "low orbit rendevous" capability during the very first stage of conquest; it is only mentioned during the scene where Teerts is attacking the RAF stream returning from the Thousand Bomber Raid. And in the same scene it is explicitly mentioned that they don't have airstrips on the ground yet, and that the tempo of operations will increase once they do.

So I think that they use rocket boosters simply to "hop" out of most of the atmosphere (well up into the stratosphere) to relatively high speeds (Mach 3 or beyond), to reduce the burden on the starship picking them up. Mid-air rendevous with a starship in the lower atmosphere would be very difficult; arguably more difficult than landing the damn ship and building a runway. Doing it higher in the atmosphere, beyond the reach of (that era's) air defenses, would be much easier.

But no, obviously they did not use jet engines that high. Though since they use liquid hydrogen fuel for jets in any case, it's possible that they use the same fuel for the jets and for a liquid-fuel rocket booster. I suppose.

[Bunga]

Even with boosters, a single-stage to orbit vehicle simultaneously being a fighter doesn't make any sort of engineering sense, not even using liquid hydrogen.

[Simon_Jester]

Single stage to suborbit, Bunga. "Low orbit pickup" does not necessarily mean "enters stable planetary orbit."

The point being to kick the fighter up beyond the bulk of the atmosphere temporarily for rendevous with a larger platform- possibly one of the Lizard starships, which seem to have plenty of maneuvering fuel to slow from orbital velocity down to the speed the fighter can achieve on its boosters.

And in this context it makes a LOT more engineering sense, because they were trying to design a fighter that could operate from an orbiting starship before landing strips on the ground were prepared. It doesn't have to be a good dogfighter, either.

[lord Martiya]

Single stage to suborbit, Bunga. "Low orbit pickup" does not necessarily mean "enters stable planetary orbit."

The point being to kick the fighter up beyond the bulk of the atmosphere temporarily for rendevous with a larger platform- possibly one of the Lizard starships, which seem to have plenty of maneuvering fuel to slow from orbital velocity down to the speed the fighter can achieve on its boosters.

And in this context it makes a LOT more engineering sense, because they were trying to design a fighter that could operate from an orbiting starship before landing strips on the ground were prepared. It doesn't have to be a good dogfighter, either.

And I actually recall Teerts complaining that Earth fighter jets are better dogfighters after exhausting his missiles and being forced to face the RAF with his cannon.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, they're more maneuverable; that goes with being optimized for subsonic speeds. Teerts should be using "zoom and boom" tactics, exploiting the fact that his fighter can accelerate away from any Tosevite aircraft in any direction (including straight up) and blasting his way through the group on one firing pass after another.

At least his jet's a swing-wing; if it wasn't, he'd really be screwed trying to dogfight.

[Bunga]

Fine, sub orbit. Even so, designing a flying vehicle capable of acting as an atmospheric fighter which is also capable of achieving sub orbital velocity using liquid hydrogen requires Unobtanium materials in regards to strength-to-weight of the vehicle's frame, engine, skin, etc.

Assuming that the vehicle has a jet engine for atmospheric operation and some sort of hydrogen-fueled rocket for upper atmospheric and space operations, the amount of hydrogen fuel will have to be equal to at least 27% of the total mass of the vehicle, just to reach sub orbital speeds! Less if one includes boosters, true, but one also has to factor in in extra fuel needed for manoeuvring during combat and getting into combat in the first place. The craft would basically need to carry its own empty weight in fuel in order to do that.

Ok, fine, that might be doable. Now make that craft carrying its own empty weight in fuel and force it to perform high-G combat manoeuvres.

It might "make sense" to want a craft capable of that, indeed, I certainly want one, but even with lizard magic-tech creating a craft capable of acting like a fighter and achieving sub orbital speeds using either a hydrogen jet or hydrogen rocket (or worse: both at the same time for the extra weight) is just not doable.

Hydrogen's exhaust velocity just isn't good enough.

[xt828]

Well, to a point. Take Shermans up against T-72s and you're screwed even if you have brilliant guys in the Shermans.

Well, Shermans are a sliding scale - the original M4A1 wasn't particularly suited to killing anything much more protected than a Panzer 3 or 4, but the Firefly and 76mm upgunned variants did reasonably well, and the Israelis put the AMX-13's modified Panther 75mm on it and competed well with the Soviet-bloc stuff they fought.

They also use somewhat more sophisticated AP ammunition, derived from Lizard designs, in this setting, at least in the later models. It's noted later in the novels that Jaeger's feat of killing a Lizard tank with a Panzer III is an amazing feat of arms, one that other people are going to be reluctant to believe.

So I'd say that Jaeger is a genius tanker (or at least supposed to be pretty damn good), who just managed to find an ambush position where he could take out a Lizard tank. Almost no one managed that in the early days of the invasion; the sheer disparity in numbers that we see in the casualty rates of American Shermans up against the Lizards suggests that.

Probably, most kills against Lizard tanks would be either due to the tanks stopping in place to deal with a prolonged engagement (bad idea, but easy mistake for them to make if their doctrine isn't flexible) and getting hit with artillery, or due to human tanks knocking out the treads and scoring a mobility-kill, at which point they can realistically hope to maneuver around and nail it from behind.

At the time Jaeger killed the Lizard tank, he didn't have any ahead of time sabot ammo. I do get that he scored a one in a million shot, but at the same time it's described as a kill with the crew abandoning ship, not a mobility kill, and through the books Turtledove tends to defined killed tanks as Hollywood-dead, with explosions and/or blood and guns etc. The closest he gets to a mobility kill is the Lizard tank which ices up in the USSR. It's also worth noting that at the time shooting on the move with any real degree of accuracy was beyond most human tanks.

I think that there's an interesting point to be made by the Super Sherman - the high-end antitank guns of WW2 remained in use for quite a while afterwards as tank guns - IIRC the Pershing/Patton used the US 90mm AA gun of WW2 vintage as well - and were quite capable of being successful against their adversaries. Since German tanks of the alt-60s are capable of taking on Lizard tanks one on one, it doesn't strike me as totally unlikely that the top-end tanks of our 60s could do similarly.

On something of a tangent, has anyone else considered how odd it is that a species with no naval experiences to speak of calls their tanks landcruisers? I can't see than name without thinking of the Toyota, but I'm not aware of any words related to "cruise" without some sort of naval link.

True. On the other hand, the fact that they can do this at all suggests to me that the Lizard killercraft are at least capable of extremely high speed high altitude flight, more so than most terrestrial fighters. So I don't think it's unreasonable to posit that their recon capabilities are on par with, say, the SR-71.

There is the possibility that they have more than one model of aircraft, too. Regardless, I agree that it seems likely that Lizard aircraft can, at least under certain circumstances, fly high enough to be able to rendezvous with a spacecraft.

It might "make sense" to want a craft capable of that, indeed, I certainly want one, but even with lizard magic-tech creating a craft capable of acting like a fighter and achieving sub orbital speeds using either a hydrogen jet or hydrogen rocket (or worse: both at the same time for the extra weight) is just not doable.

Hydrogen's exhaust velocity just isn't good enough.

We know at the moment that hydrogen-powered aircraft are possible, there are just limitations which prevent them from being competitive with avgas powered types mostly related to fuel storage. Hydrogen's volatility has never been an issue as far as I'm aware - hydrogen is the fuel in the Space Shuttle's boosters and was the fuel in the Apollo rockets - but it is much bulkier and heavier to store in a plane - most planes have the majority of their fuel stored in the wings, while the hydrogen-fuelled planes to date have had to store it in the fuselage, which reduces the space available for everything else.

It doesn't strike me as unreasonable that the Lizards could have some sort of conformal addon for their fighters to enable them to operate to and from the spaceships on a temporary basis, nor is it unreasonable to assume that they have a better grasp of hydrogen fuel than we do.

It might be useful to examine what precisely a Lizard fighter (I think they're called Killercraft?) is capable of - I remember them having radar, some sort of IFF, some sort of radar warning system, a cannon of some description mounted in the nose, and mounting points for the aforementioned AAMs, unguided ASMs/rockets, and what I recall being a nuclear gravity bomb. Their acceleration is superior to anything around in 1941/42, but IIRC less than that of a Me163 Komet, and ISTR that their top speed was about that of the Komet too - my memory of the Komet attack was that the Lizard fighter pilot didn't initially recognise them as piloted craft because they were going too fast.

More generally, aside from the obvious lack of naval development, the Lizards seem to be behind our 60s-level rocketry, in that they don't have rocket artillery - does anyone remember if they had RPGs? They also don't have cruise missiles and don't appear to have ballistic missiles. Turtledove can't write infantry combat, but I don't remember them having much variety in their infantry weapons either - some sort of assault rifle seems to be about it, with no mention of grenade launchers, knee mortars, foot-mounted machineguns, etc. Their counterbattery artillery is very effective against wheeled artillery, but doesn't have sufficient range to take on a railroad gun. Their artillery can fire shells with AP-mine submunitions. I'm sure there's more?

[Simon_Jester]

Fine, sub orbit. Even so, designing a flying vehicle capable of acting as an atmospheric fighter which is also capable of achieving sub orbital velocity using liquid hydrogen requires Unobtanium materials in regards to strength-to-weight of the vehicle's frame, engine, skin, etc.

This depends heavily on your definition of "atmospheric fighter." If "atmospheric fighter" means "can dogfight with an F-16," then yes, it's impossible, you're fucked.

If "atmospheric fighter" means "can still function as a bomb/missile truck against a far less capable opponent," then I question the degree of fucked-ness.

Hydrogen's exhaust velocity just isn't good enough.

A distinct point. My original suggestion was a rocket booster system attached to the craft, one that might not draw from the hydrogen tanks- hell, if all they want is to push up to X-15 altitudes for easier orbital pickup, they might well be able to get by with a solid fuel rocket for all I know.

Well, to a point. Take Shermans up against T-72s and you're screwed even if you have brilliant guys in the Shermans.

Well, Shermans are a sliding scale - the original M4A1 wasn't particularly suited to killing anything much more protected than a Panzer 3 or 4, but the Firefly and 76mm upgunned variants did reasonably well, and the Israelis put the AMX-13's modified Panther 75mm on it and competed well with the Soviet-bloc stuff they fought.

Though one wonders how much of the competition was driving late-model WWII tanks that were the contemporaries of the upgunned Shermans... in any case, I think my meaning is clear.

At the time Jaeger killed the Lizard tank, he didn't have any ahead of time sabot ammo. I do get that he scored a one in a million shot, but at the same time it's described as a kill with the crew abandoning ship, not a mobility kill, and through the books Turtledove tends to defined killed tanks as Hollywood-dead, with explosions and/or blood and guns etc. The closest he gets to a mobility kill is the Lizard tank which ices up in the USSR. It's also worth noting that at the time shooting on the move with any real degree of accuracy was beyond most human tanks.

I know. The tanks killed on screen are generally Hollywood-dead. But among off-screen casualties (where we aren't seeing the most dramatic engagements), I'd expect a LOT of Lizard tank casualties to involve a mobility kill that escalates into a catastrophic kill after someone get around behind the thing and puts a few main gun rounds into the engine compartment.

Jaeger was unusual just by virtue of putting himself in position to score a catastrophic kill against a Lizard tank, let alone actually pulling it off (which credit for is partly due to his gunner)

I think that there's an interesting point to be made by the Super Sherman - the high-end antitank guns of WW2 remained in use for quite a while afterwards as tank guns - IIRC the Pershing/Patton used the US 90mm AA gun of WW2 vintage as well - and were quite capable of being successful against their adversaries. Since German tanks of the alt-60s are capable of taking on Lizard tanks one on one, it doesn't strike me as totally unlikely that the top-end tanks of our 60s could do similarly.

Though the German tanks of the "second contact" universe are straight upgrades from the Nazi WWII tanks in continuous progression, in a universe where electronics technology is more advanced by the Lizards' example. So they're liable to be a bit more sophisticated than the Leopard 1 or M60 of this timeline, more equivalent to the later models of those tanks than the early ones.

That said, I certainly take your meaning.

On something of a tangent, has anyone else considered how odd it is that a species with no naval experiences to speak of calls their tanks landcruisers? I can't see than name without thinking of the Toyota, but I'm not aware of any words related to "cruise" without some sort of naval link.

I suspect that "cruise" is a translation. A word that would be more applicable on land and carry the same general implication would be "rove," but Turtledove couldn't call the tanks "Landrovers" without being laughed at, even if it makes perfect sense for the Lizards to call them that.

It might be useful to examine what precisely a Lizard fighter (I think they're called Killercraft?) is capable of - I remember them having radar, some sort of IFF, some sort of radar warning system, a cannon of some description mounted in the nose, and mounting points for the aforementioned AAMs, unguided ASMs/rockets, and what I recall being a nuclear gravity bomb. Their acceleration is superior to anything around in 1941/42, but IIRC less than that of a Me163 Komet, and ISTR that their top speed was about that of the Komet too - my memory of the Komet attack was that the Lizard fighter pilot didn't initially recognise them as piloted craft because they were going too fast.

I disagree. The swing-wing design (see Teerts' first scene in In the Balance) suggests a supersonic capable craft. It's much more likely that Teerts thought the Komet was going too fast to be a human-piloted craft, in my opinion.

More generally, aside from the obvious lack of naval development, the Lizards seem to be behind our 60s-level rocketry, in that they don't have rocket artillery - does anyone remember if they had RPGs?

They have antitank missiles on their APCs, probably somewhere in the same general range as the TOW.

They also don't have cruise missiles and don't appear to have ballistic missiles.

Or, if they do, they didn't bring them.

Turtledove can't write infantry combat, but I don't remember them having much variety in their infantry weapons either - some sort of assault rifle seems to be about it, with no mention of grenade launchers, knee mortars, foot-mounted machineguns, etc.

I'd blame Turtledove for this, along with the lack of any scenes from the perspective of Lizard infantry. If nothing else, they have light and heavy machine guns mounted on their vehicles that could be made man-portable. Not so sure about grenade launchers or mortars, but I'd be willing to believe they have them and that Turtledove screwed up.

They also have light infantry body armor, I think.

[xt828]

I know. The tanks killed on screen are generally Hollywood-dead. But among off-screen casualties (where we aren't seeing the most dramatic engagements), I'd expect a LOT of Lizard tank casualties to involve a mobility kill that escalates into a catastrophic kill after someone get around behind the thing and puts a few main gun rounds into the engine compartment.

You know, assuming that a number of them were destroyed in a non-catastrophic fashion, and given German tendencies in this regard, I'm almost surprised there weren't any Lizard tanks serving with a cross on the side.

Though the German tanks of the "second contact" universe are straight upgrades from the Nazi WWII tanks in continuous progression, in a universe where electronics technology is more advanced by the Lizards' example. So they're liable to be a bit more sophisticated than the Leopard 1 or M60 of this timeline, more equivalent to the later models of those tanks than the early ones.

That said, I certainly take your meaning.

There's a strong element of bandwagoning in the Worldwar universe in regard to tech development - the general philosophy seems to be to do whatever the Lizards did and then make it better, usually with the aid at some point of Lizard POWs. In a sense, our tanks were being developed to refight WW2 with better gear, while theirs were being developed specifically to defeat the Lizards.

I disagree. The swing-wing design (see Teerts' first scene in In the Balance) suggests a supersonic capable craft. It's much more likely that Teerts thought the Komet was going too fast to be a human-piloted craft, in my opinion.

Fair call. The Lizard doctrine doesn't seem to call for high-speed combat, though, as you noted earlier.

Or, if they do, they didn't bring them.

That actually makes a lot of sense, now that I think about it, because what other purpose do the anti-missile missiles have? Using them to shoot down FROG-sized or larger rockets makes sense, but anything smaller would be interesting given the apparently low stocks of ammo they have on hand.

[quoteI'd blame Turtledove for this, along with the lack of any scenes from the perspective of Lizard infantry. If nothing else, they have light and heavy machine guns mounted on their vehicles that could be made man-portable. Not so sure about grenade launchers or mortars, but I'd be willing to believe they have them and that Turtledove screwed up.

They also have light infantry body armor, I think.[/quote]

I'm always happy to blame Turtledove You'd assume that have the usual variety of infantry-carried weapons, but it's worth keeping in mind that having a variety of weapons in an infantry unit is a relatively recent idea - as recently as the First World War, you had most units having homogenous armament.

[Teebs]

You know, assuming that a number of them were destroyed in a non-catastrophic fashion, and given German tendencies in this regard, I'm almost surprised there weren't any Lizard tanks serving with a cross on the side.

I think the Germans would basically be engaged in a very long fighting retreat, so there probably wasn't much opportunity since even if you took out a tank you'd have to run away from its colleagues.

[Simon_Jester]

I know. The tanks killed on screen are generally Hollywood-dead. But among off-screen casualties (where we aren't seeing the most dramatic engagements), I'd expect a LOT of Lizard tank casualties to involve a mobility kill that escalates into a catastrophic kill after someone get around behind the thing and puts a few main gun rounds into the engine compartment.

You know, assuming that a number of them were destroyed in a non-catastrophic fashion, and given German tendencies in this regard, I'm almost surprised there weren't any Lizard tanks serving with a cross on the side.

The Lizards may have been smart enough to drop their equivalent of an LGB on any tanks they had to combat-loss. Or their overall combat superiority may have made it impossible for the Germans to control battlefields long enough to safely patch up and tow away a wrecked landcruiser.

But given the overall trend in WWII, I wouldn't be surprised to find a few patched up landcruisers in German service by the end of the war. Only a few, though, for the reasons I just mentioned. We know it was an impressive achievement when SKORZENY! made off with an intact landcruiser in Book Two (Three? Not sure). But that doesn't mean there are no others for the Reich to study.

There's a strong element of bandwagoning in the Worldwar universe in regard to tech development - the general philosophy seems to be to do whatever the Lizards did and then make it better, usually with the aid at some point of Lizard POWs. In a sense, our tanks were being developed to refight WW2 with better gear, while theirs were being developed specifically to defeat the Lizards.

True, but one key to remember is that we had the example of the Lizards to show us the way. Their electronics were at least fifty years ahead of ours when they landed, even if their weapon designs were 'only' twenty or thirty years ahead. By the mid-60s, the human electronics industry was vastly ahead of where it was historically, with the beginnings of the Internet already in place and integrated circuits being small and cheap enough to build them into children's toys.

That implies a corresponding advance in computer hardware- so the tanks we had in the Colonization series might well have looked like 1965-75 tanks mechanically, but with an electronics fit more typical of 1990-2000. That would be a significant boost in their capabilities by itself, especially combined with the human advantages in doctrine.

Fair call. The Lizard doctrine doesn't seem to call for high-speed combat, though, as you noted earlier.

Well, they use it to an extent- Teerts attacks the bomber stream in his first scene by powering through the formation at high speed and nailing a few targets with his cannon, then coming around for another pass, not by slowing down to match speeds with it.

And at this high speed, he has an enormous advantage over Tosevite fighters (the one he shot down was probably a German night fighter); they practically can't touch him. That advantage remains true for much of the Worldwar series- Lizard fighters can power through pretty much any amount of resistance the human powers can put up. They only time they ever lose planes to enemy air attack is when some lucky pilot makes a head-on pass against the oncoming jet, which is pretty close to suicide.

It's far more common for them to suffer losses to ground fire, which is semi-random and which tends to get thrown up in their path. Even there, the humans are putting a lot of AAA into the sky without downing more than a handful of planes.

I'm always happy to blame Turtledove You'd assume that have the usual variety of infantry-carried weapons, but it's worth keeping in mind that having a variety of weapons in an infantry unit is a relatively recent idea - as recently as the First World War, you had most units having homogenous armament.

Yes, but machine gun and mortar units to support the homogenous formations existed. I expect that the Lizards have infantry support weapons- it's just that those support weapons are liable to be held in special weapon platoons or companies at higher command levels, and not as widely available on the ground.

[xt828]

True, but one key to remember is that we had the example of the Lizards to show us the way. Their electronics were at least fifty years ahead of ours when they landed, even if their weapon designs were 'only' twenty or thirty years ahead. By the mid-60s, the human electronics industry was vastly ahead of where it was historically, with the beginnings of the Internet already in place and integrated circuits being small and cheap enough to build them into children's toys.

That implies a corresponding advance in computer hardware- so the tanks we had in the Colonization series might well have looked like 1965-75 tanks mechanically, but with an electronics fit more typical of 1990-2000. That would be a significant boost in their capabilities by itself, especially combined with the human advantages in doctrine.

Certainly, but what I was getting at was that human development is somewhat blinkered by the desire or need to reach equivalence as rapidly as possible, which may mean that they have left unexplored avenues of research we historically developed further. If you look at our history of warplane design, they tend to be designed towards being an evolutionary step up from their predecessors, whereas in the Lizard-verse they're being designed with a goal in sight, being achieving parity with the Killercraft. I think there may be significant differences in capability and functionality, some in our favour and some not.