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Ryan Thunder wrote:Actually, MAS Millenium should have launched a while ago, right Siege?

Yes, it was launched near the end of '17, although it would realistically still be conducting sea trials. It wouldn't be commissioned yet, although if you really wanted to I guess you could rush her into service. However considering your nation has no previous experience with such large warships and the pirate threat far from requires such drastic measures I strongly doubt that would be a wise decision.

SiegeTank wrote:

Ryan Thunder wrote:Actually, MAS Millenium should have launched a while ago, right Siege?

Yes, it was launched near the end of '17, although it would realistically still be conducting sea trials. It wouldn't be commissioned yet, although if you really wanted to I guess you could rush her into service. However considering your nation has no previous experience with such large warships and the pirate threat far from requires such drastic measures I strongly doubt that would be a wise decision.

Very well.

Yep, the UCSR's forces are already there doing things. We have the ships stationed in Coilerburg and those that are now residing in the Duchy of Baerne.

Oh and I'll fully support a global mandate for the taskforce.

SiegeTank wrote:Oh and this is ignoring for a moment how the Vineyards, now a MESS-aligned nation, chose to begin work on a military base in the northern wilderness mere weeks after a cold war nearly erupted between the NFT and Tian Xia over its base there. Which quite frankly we see as a blatant provocation. All of the Commonwealth's bloody holdings are in the south, so what the hell do they need a military base in the north for, let alone one that straddles a vital line of communications between the two parts of the NFT?

Yeah this interests me too. The Vineyards have no need for a base there and this is just a provocation, and so soon after we solved the last problem. Not a wise decision. The Union will be keeping a close eye on the Vineyards.

What "Vineyards military base in the north?" Vineyards is all the way down in the south-west along a border with Costas.

Considering Costas, a base in that area would actually be prudent.

Ryan Thunder wrote: I've got... 8 ASW planes that shouldn't be too terrible for dealing with pirate ships. I could contribute a few to the Frequesuan task force.

Yeah? Some dudes on a speed boat are going to stop because of a ASW airplane that can't slow down enough to communicate with them? or stop and board a captured ship?

Why do you have ASW planes, isn't your country landlocked?

Lonestar wrote:

Ryan Thunder wrote: I've got... 8 ASW planes that shouldn't be too terrible for dealing with pirate ships. I could contribute a few to the Frequesuan task force.

Yeah? Some dudes on a speed boat are going to stop because of a ASW airplane that can't slow down enough to communicate with them? or stop and board a captured ship?

Why do you have ASW planes, isn't your country landlocked?

He's building super-subdrillacopters that can either helicopter their way to the water, or use their drill-noses to dig a tunnel to the ocean underneath everyone before surfacing to annihilate everyone with their D3ATH RAY LAZ0RZ!

All perfectly feasible, of course.

Coyote wrote:What "Vineyards military base in the north?"

This one:

Karmic Knight wrote:Ground Broken on 'Port Victoria' in the Northern Untamed Wilderness

To the West of the former TXN Port Nike, the Commonwealth Navy Begins building Port Victoria to station military vessels and aeroplanes at.

This in the same post where he closed his ports to all non-Vinish military ships.

Vineyards is all the way down in the south-west along a border with Costas.

My point exactly. I am very much irritated by this development, as considering recent events it stands to reason the King knew this move would piss off the NFT and he chose to go ahead with the plan anyway. I'll let my displeasure be known and if the King doesn't come up with a proper response I'll strongly consider my other options.

So, we make two taskforces then.

CJTF-15(F-ing Continent) and CJTF-20(Velaria).

Thoughts?

Ryan Thunder wrote:

Lonestar wrote:Amphibs are *great* anti-piracy tools, as helos are the most capable anti-piracy tools. There's a reason why Singapore has deployed LPD after LPD to the HoA for MIO instead of surface combatants.

If we want to make it a Global Mandate, 'll gladly shift my AO to the Valeria. Maybe operating somewhere between the the continent and Japanistan.

I've got... 8 ASW planes that shouldn't be too terrible for dealing with pirate ships. I could contribute a few to the Frequesuan task force.

ASW planes are terrible for dealing with pirate ships. You can't slow down to reasonably communicate, the weapons they carry are completely inappropriate (yes, torpedos and ASuW missiles are inappropriate, and they are typically armed with nothing but those). Of course, there pretty much no reason for you to have them, since you don't have any ocean that you'd need to clear of submarines.

In the case of both South Velerian and Northern Frequesue ops I'll probably send the Reprisal and her group to the former, then. Though I might still consider a port call to San Dorado en route, particularly in the event of this recent Vinish action; the port call would be a Cascadian gesture of support for the NFT's concerns over the Vinish actions.

And the way it looks the anti-piracy task force is more than big enough in terms of surface combatants, especially given that piracy in the area is probably quite light right now and will swiftly be suppressed (the Horn of Africa it ain't). South Veleria will probably be more troublesome.

Lonestar wrote:So, we make two taskforces then.

CJTF-15(F-ing Continent) and CJTF-20(Velaria).

Thoughts?

Excellent. May I suggest headquartering CJTF-15 in Coilerburg? It's close by and the prestige will do the locals some good.

Also Steve, we'll be waiting to give your carrier the proper welcome it deserves. Do your captain & his officers have time for a ticker tape parade?

Beowulf wrote:ASW planes are terrible for dealing with pirate ships. You can't slow down to reasonably communicate, the weapons they carry are completely inappropriate (yes, torpedos and ASuW missiles are inappropriate, and they are typically armed with nothing but those). Of course, there pretty much no reason for you to have them, since you don't have any ocean that you'd need to clear of submarines.

They're Osprey-analogues, and I have port up north that uses them for defensive purposes. In addition to their armament they have a defensive machine gun in a turret under the nose.

They're more like patrol planes that can intercept small craft or attack larger ships and submarines with torpedoes.

That's a really expensive solution though. The NFCG maintains a bunch of Catalina flying boats with .30cals for surface patrols which probably do the same job (drive-by speedboat-shooting) for a fraction of the cost.

The Langley Navy and Coast Guard are in the process of adopting ShinMaywa US-2s modified with multiple guns (one Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-2 in the nose, two KPV heavy machine guns in waist observation blisters, and an additional KPV in a remote-controlled tail turret) and cheek and wing hardpoints for missiles and rocket pods. Overkill? Maybe, but it helps.

I wonder if there could be a market for an amphibious gunship. A US-2 fitted with Bushmaster II chain guns and a Bofors L/70 all firing out the port side might be a useful anti-pirate weapon...

Small timers. Nothing has the loiter time and payload of a dedicated Zeppelin.

SiegeTank wrote:

Lonestar wrote:So, we make two taskforces then.

CJTF-15(F-ing Continent) and CJTF-20(Velaria).

Thoughts?

Excellent. May I suggest headquartering CJTF-15 in Coilerburg? It's close by and the prestige will do the locals some good.

Also Steve, we'll be waiting to give your carrier the proper welcome it deserves. Do your captain & his officers have time for a ticker tape parade?

Rear Admiral Kyle Stewart and his staff would participate, sure. Though, I must ask, given San Dorado's notoriously and sometimes literally murderous traffic, wouldn't cordoning off streets for a ticker-tape parade result in a spike in road rage-based crimes from the increased load on the other roads?

Also, I updated my wiki page for the Cascadian Navy to add the Reprisal CVOG and account for the shifts in Cascadian deployments.

As for Veleria, I'll point out that Cascadia maintains three airbases in northern Veleria that, in a pinch, could also be used to help support patrols off southern Veleria. Particularly Welles Island, as I believe that Veleria is "thin" south of it so it's not a long flight to the southern coast.

Steve wrote:Rear Admiral Kyle Stewart and his staff would participate, sure. Though, I must ask, given San Dorado's notoriously and sometimes literally murderous traffic, wouldn't cordoning off streets for a ticker-tape parade result in a spike in road rage-based crimes from the increased load on the other roads?

Oh, no need to worry about that! The crazy-men will always find a reason to shoot at each other. If it's not closed-off roads it'll be the weather or something else... We'll keep 'em away from the good admiral .

SiegeTank wrote:

Ryan Thunder wrote:Actually, MAS Millenium should have launched a while ago, right Siege?

Yes, it was launched near the end of '17,

If we slowed down, and I'm pretty sure we did, then today marks somewhere about February 3rd-5th 2017. If you were scheduled to launch at the end of '17 then its still in dock. Even if we didn't slow down then this weekend is only about April 1st-15th 2017.

CmdrWilkens wrote:

SiegeTank wrote:

Ryan Thunder wrote:Actually, MAS Millenium should have launched a while ago, right Siege?

Yes, it was launched near the end of '17,

If we slowed down, and I'm pretty sure we did, then today marks somewhere about February 3rd-5th 2017. If you were scheduled to launch at the end of '17 then its still in dock. Even if we didn't slow down then this weekend is only about April 1st-15th 2017.

I thought it was 2018 now.

We started Aug15 as 2008 ::

Sep15 = 2009
Oct15 = 2010
Nov14= 2011
Dec15 = 2012
Jan15 = 2013
Feb14 = 2014
Mar15 = 2015
Apr15 = 2016
May15 = 2017

From that point the slowdown comes into effect and August 7th will be January 1st 2018...unless we cank the slowdown.

No, I vote for the slowdown is in effect, and it's 2017. That's perfectly reasonable. Sometimes you have to work with what you have, not what you want to have.

Steve wrote:As for Veleria, I'll point out that Cascadia maintains three airbases in northern Veleria that, in a pinch, could also be used to help support patrols off southern Veleria. Particularly Welles Island, as I believe that Veleria is "thin" south of it so it's not a long flight to the southern coast.

Can I base the pair of RQ-4B BAMS Dominionhawks I'm donating for the mission out of one of those bases?

Lonestar wrote:

Steve wrote:As for Veleria, I'll point out that Cascadia maintains three airbases in northern Veleria that, in a pinch, could also be used to help support patrols off southern Veleria. Particularly Welles Island, as I believe that Veleria is "thin" south of it so it's not a long flight to the southern coast.

Can I base the pair of RQ-4B BAMS Dominionhawks I'm donating for the mission out of one of those bases?

I don't particularly mind. To support such ops I may decide to have another airfield at Welles Coastal Territory added. Currently I've only said that Welles Island has air facilities (Welles Island Air Base).

Stas Bush wrote:No, I vote for the slowdown is in effect, and it's 2017. That's perfectly reasonable. Sometimes you have to work with what you have, not what you want to have.

Well its 2017 either way because even if the slowdown doesn't hit (and I have based most of my assumptions
on it happening) then 2018 doesn't roll around until June 15th.

So anyway right now it should be between Feb 13th-16th and tomorrow will be the 17th-20th, Wednesday the 21st-24th, and Thursday the 25th-28th.

Generally speaking for most weeks it should look like this:

Friday: 1st-4th of the Month
Saturday: 5th-9th of the Month
Sunday: 10th-14th of the Month
Monday: 15th-18th of the Month
Tuesday: 19th-22nd of the Month
Wednesday: 23rd-26th of the Month
Thursday: 27th-30th/31st of the Month

So when I launch for the moon next weekend it will be between the 1st and the 14th of March 2017.