Ballad wrote:I see you assume that the CS is a third generation force instead of a fourth generation force. Seeing that WWII Germany and the modern US army are on the verge of fourth generation....well I would guess the tooth to tail ratio for the CS army would be more on par with gen 4 warfare then with WWII allies generation 3 warfare.
Would you care to provide some cites for the exact ratios you're discussing?
Because after WWII, the ratio of support forces to fighting forces increased, it did not decrease.
The US military might now have a decreased ration and might still be effective at fighting, but I think we can all see what has happened to their ability to provide wide-spread security (the occupation of Iraq & Afghanistan) arising out of lack of sufficient troops on the ground.
Ballad wrote:see rumsfeild leaner meaner army stuff for an example of gen 4).
"See" anything by one of the stupidest and most arrogant Secretaries of Defense in the history of the US?
If want humor, I'll read Schlok Mercenary. At least the author earnestly attempts to create a consistent SF milieu (at least so far that I have read).
Ballad wrote:You also assume that there would be some sort of economic issues.
Of course I assume that. It is unavoidable.
Ballad wrote:First the coalition and its populace is not out to make a profit, it is not capitalistic but much more likely to be socialistic
Oh no. Not this argument again.
I don't know if I have the strength to refute this utterly for the 40th time (ok, third or fourth).
It's almost midnight, I'll get back to you tomorrow.
The Basics: The CS is not running a command economy (ala the USSR). It is running a capitalist system held at the point of gun (ala the People's Republic of China with hints of Nazi industrial feudalism thrown in).
Ballad wrote:(this is admittedly an assumption, but a capitalistic society would have economic issues, a bad thing when you are struggling for survival).
All governments have economic issues. Really, they do. It matters not what governmental system or policy is in place.
Ballad wrote:This allows for a greater mobilization of the military.
In what way? Please be specific, and if you can provide examples from history (as in, examples that actually happened) that would be helpful.
Ballad wrote:If we accept that we have no clue what materials they use
I wouldn't say we have no clue about what materials they use.
Advanced ceramics and super alloy metals, probably laminated (probably on a molecular level).
Ballad wrote: (seeing that we know they have fusion reactors, advanced optics and advanced ceramics their need for metals is next to nothing.
Hmm, that's quite a leap, but it simply replaces one need with another. The ingredients necessary for advanced ceramics can have some interesting requirements.
Somehow I think you are assuming that the CS will just make all of their war materials out of sand, and it isn't going to work that way.
Nanofactory production will make things easier than it is today, certainly. But that does not mean there will be no cost.
The CS cannot have full-blown nanotech because if they did they'd roll over the whole world and get rid of Atlantis and Splynncryth overnight.
In my rifts milieu: I assert that the nanotech factories available to the CS, perforce, must be the remnants of the past age. Jury-rigged, patched, and barely functioning. Yet they are what makes it possible for the CS to have multiple lines of supertech gear in production without having world-wide networks of partners cooperating in their own specialities (as is done in the RW today). The nanotech is not free-roaming (it is restricted to integegrated systems or factories). Systems and factories are not infinitely reconfigureable at the drop of a hat. Factory changes require several thousand man-hours of software, materials, chemical, biological, topological, and engineering expertise plus craftsmanship capability. Systems cannot be reconfigured at all, they work they way they were made to work and if they break they stay broken (the CS' equipment shows no signs of self-regeneration capability).
Ballad wrote:We can probably assume there tech level for things like Nano-lubricants are on par with ours the need for petroleum is next to nothing
Whoops, petroleum is quite necessary for plastics and the entire chemical industry (which drives so much of high tech manufacturing). Some ceramics would be partially plastic. (So might be some metals.)
Saying that their development of a new lubricant would omit the need for all petroleum is not correct.
Nanotech production would likely include the input of various forms of refined petroleum.
And, thanks to Fred Pohl, let us not forget that CHON can make food, too. (The tech is up for it, I believe.)
Ballad wrote:and easily filled by the Il oil fields...some of the largest if dirty in the country) the claim in navy that they are self sufficient with no need for trade should be taken on face value.
Could you cite that? I tend to ignore SB4: CS Navy because every time I look in it I start laughing or give up in disgust. (Not at the art or layout or anything, just at the whole idea of the navy in the first place and where it came from.)
Ballad wrote:So they have no need for trade to support the nation (this statement was made post build up)
Trade? What trade? MercTown seems to make it clear that international trade in NA exists, but the volume of it is open to wild speculation.
In any event, none of my estimates include any economic gain to any part of the CS from international trade.
Even without trade the CS can just barely economically afford to pay and equip its soldiers, dog boys, etc., and then only by accepting absurd taxation levels that would leave the entire civilian population a mind-blown mass of emotionally and motivationally burned out cinders that never purchased anything beyond food and shelter . . . hardly the sort of populace that the descriptions of Chi-Town would seem to suggest is harbored within (oh, a small percentage, 2-3%, maybe).
Ballad wrote:automated factories can show how things where made so quickly,
We're already assuming automated nanofactories. There is no way the CS could have any of its super tech gear in the first place without them.
Ballad wrote:SB1 has NG light labor bots, they can work 20 hrs a day 7 days a week 265 days a year, with no breaks or manufacturing defects
What? You're assuming the robots never break down? Actually, they do.
But I was assuming better than production lines with humanoid robots.
Ballad wrote:you have a mass production on a insane scale, as an added plus that frees up the population for spots in the army.
Um, it's too expensive to deploy a robot for each person in the same way that having a million skelebots is too expensive. The CS just can't afford to pay for all the robots, much less devote its precious nanofactory capacity (ok, I admit it, that last part is also "in my Rifts universe") to buildin the robots in the first place (you aren't getting those labor bots from little old ladies in their homes sewing them together in their spare time). They have to come from somewhere, and that means not building some weapons, most likely skelebots.
Also, if robots really can deploy on this scale, there human labor is going to be sitting around. I doubt Karl would approve of such a large and footloose mob of humanity under his yoke.
No, the civilian population of the CS is at work. Some man the nanofactories (or whatever passes for industrial production in your Rifts universe), a great many work in distribution and service industries. Private (and fully capitalistic) industry also employs many of these people, as the various books make clear, there is a consumer market in the CS, and those 20th century level tech goods are coming from somewhere (but it isn't going to be nanofactories because those will be used to produce super tech gear exclusively . . . I can't see Karl authorizing the use of of a nanofactory to make future equivalents of MP3 players when it could be turning out dead boy armor instead).
Ballad wrote:Again this assumes you accept the books statement that the coalition tech level is past that of NG.
Can you clarify this? The chain of suppositions doesn't seem to have connected anything so far as I can tell.
Spell it out for me.
Ballad wrote:So in a socialistic self sufficient state
Which is not any of the Coaliation States.
Ballad wrote:where exactly is the deterrent form maintaining 10% of the population in the military
Ok, I guess I'll have to get into it.
The CS credit is the most widely accepted form of currency in Rifts North America.
In order for that to be true, it must be worth something.
In order for it to be worth something, you have to be able to walk into a store, toss down your debit-card (let's not get into the mess of using those right at the moment), and buy something. Anything. A gun. A medkit. A TW Water Flare.
We know this happens because an actual game would grind to an instant halt if it did not when the players first discovered that their credits were worthless and therefore start demanding payments in gold, gems, weapons, and mecha from all possible patrons.
Now, we know that CS soldiers and dog boys get paid. Why? Becuase the RMB and RUE tell us that it is so.
Those paychecks are going to be spent on something. If the CS is has a command economy (which has nothing whatsoever to do with whether it is socialist or not), then like the USSR, its currently will be untranslatable with any other and will be worthless, except we know that it isn't worthless. It is, in fact, very valuable. Ipso facto, the CS isn't using a command economy.
CS soldiers and their families spend their paychecks on whatever their bills are. Taxes, food for the kids, a few luxuries and entertainments, although there will be none of that since the taxes required just to pay for the troops are so high that the almost the entire military budget is already done away with. Kind of a catch-22 situation.
Ballad wrote:...a number that nations in earths past have achieved without the advantage of a fully automated manufacturing force.
Care to cite that?
