Fed ground combat again

[Deepcrush]

Also, SteveK is banking that the Empire A with 9 ships for every 8 of Empire B will win. 9v8, not a great set of odds in battle. However, Empire B has twice the ground power of Empire A, very very good odds.

[Tsukiyumi]

I was trying to stay out of this, but seriously?

Saying that ground combat will eventually be obsolete when capturing (not obliterating) enemy territory is like saying that pyramidal tires will catch on someday. It's just not possible.

[Deepcrush]

Don't lie Tsu! Don't you lie!

[Tsukiyumi]

If you knew me in person, you'd know that I never lie to individuals.

[Deepcrush]

But this is a group...

[Tsukiyumi]

To be more specific, I'll only lie to corporations or governments.

[Sionnach Glic]

Saying that ground combat will eventually be obsolete when capturing (not obliterating) enemy territory is like saying that pyramidal tires will catch on someday. It's just not possible.

See, there's a bit of that sentance that Steve doesn't seem to understand.

capturing (not obliterating)

In war, you don't go around blowing up everything the enemy owns, even if you are on a campaign of extermination. Did the Nazis destroy everything they came across in Russia? No, they didn't.

You cannot sustain a prolonged war over a large area if you do not capture enemy supplies and resources. If you go around destroying them, you're forced to rely on an increasingly long supply train that is highly vulnerable to attack by enemy raiders. Even in a war of extermination, this holds true unless you have massive advantages over your enemy. You capture your enemy's supplies and resources first. Then when the enemy's military is utterly destroyed and their government in ruins, you can begin BDZing every planet, because you now no longer have need for them. Though even that's debatable.

So, how can a starship capture a mining outpost without destroying it? It can't. It's limited to blasting it with its guns, which would destroy or seriously crippled the facility. The ship's only option is to land ground troops to take the station.
Now, if the attacking troops are Redshirts, and the defending troops are US Marines, just how well do you think that attack is going to go? I'll give you a hint: it'd be an utter slaughter. You'd lose thousands just to dislodge a force of about a hundred or so. Unless you have massive numerical superiority, those loss ratios are unnaceptable.

Ergo, you need properly trained and properly armed troops with proper support vehicles. With these new forces, combined with orbital supremacy, conquering the world will go much smoother, allowing you to redeploy that orbiting warship to the front lines, rather than having it hanging around a small colony.

[stitch626]

More or less correct. Except you forgot to mention that simple logic and common sense also back us up on this position.

In the 1200's it was logical and common sense to believe that the Earth was flat.

Common sense and logic change over time. While I agree that ground troops would never become completely obsolete, by Treks time there would be no point in a huge army if you couldn't even get them to the planet you wanted to conquer.

[Sionnach Glic]

You could say exactly the same thing about the island-hopping campaign the US did in the Pacific Campaign, which is actualy somewhat analogous to this debate.
If your navy was unable to get to the enemy-held islands, your army is useless. Similarly, if Starfleet is unable to actualy reach the planet in question, the armies of troops they hold is useless in an attack.
But if your navy does reach the enemy island, you still need troops to actualy secure the island. Similarly, if Starfleet does reach a planet, it needs troops to actualy secure enemy-held cities and outposts.

While space is clearly at the top of the list of important regions in warfare in the 24th century (as it well should be), that does not mean that any other aspects of warfare can be disregarded.

[Mikey]

More or less correct. Except you forgot to mention that simple logic and common sense also back us up on this position.

In the 1200's it was logical and common sense to believe that the Earth was flat.

Common sense and logic change over time. While I agree that ground troops would never become completely obsolete, by Treks time there would be no point in a huge army if you couldn't even get them to the planet you wanted to conquer.

Bingo! We're not arguing against having a fleet of spaceships! We are arguing that you need both "naval" power as well as a properly supported army. SteveK is arguing that the latter is useless, and that naval power alone is enough.

[stitch626]

Seems to me that he was arguing that space superiority was more important than land superiority, not that troops were useless.

[Sionnach Glic]

No, he was arguing that starships made the concept of a well equiped army obsolete.

[stitch626]

To attack a planet, your ground forces are impotent unless you can fight through space to that planet. From an offensive standpoint your equipping your fleet must take precedence over your ground forces.

Take precedence, not that ground troops are useless.

In an ideal situation I would agree that it would be nice to have space superiority and a good ground force. However, if a government can only guarantee one or the other the best option is space superiority.

He's saying that when being forced to choose, space is more needed because without it the troops are useless. Still hasn't said troops are always useless and obsolete.

The entirety of your (plural) argument can be summarized as follows: "Our experience and reading of history up to April 21st 2009 indicates that competency in ground combat is vital to success in warfare, we expect this will remain true over the next several centuries". To which I have postulated several reasons why that may no longer be true in the 24th century Star Trek universe.

This may be what you were referring to.
And I would say that a "competent" bunch of troops is not vital to success in war. It is a very important part, but wars can be won without complete competence (though not without huge amounts of casualties).
However, this says nothing about taking control of a planet. Just warfare in general.

Now going back a bit.

Perhaps they considered that for whoever controls the space around a planet that any ground force, however well equipped, are sitting ducks, and came to the conclusion (based on their extensive expertise and experience) that their best chance of victory in war comes from maximizing their space power.

Still hasn't said that troops were useless. Only said that space is more important than troops.

There is some canon evidence to suggest that the Cardassians had the type of ground forces most of this forum would recommend (I think that Garek one mentioned that he was a Gul in the mechanized infantry--which while a lie would at least suggest that the person he was speaking to found it credible that there was such a think as a mechanized infantry in the Cardassian military), yet they were doomed once the Klingons established space superiority. Indeed, I seem to recall some dialogue where Gul Dukat became enraged when Weyoun wouldn't send ships to defend the planet. He realized that the entire military on the ground was SOL once the Klingons controlled the space around the planet.

Still hasn't said that ground troops are useless.

There is some facet of 24th century warfare that has changed dramatically from what we as 21st century people are used to, leading to ships in orbit being >>>troops on the ground.

Only said that space is more important than ground, still hasn't said that ground troops are useless.

And how much ground combat have we seen, relative to space combat? It seems reasonable to say that 99% of warfare takes place in spaces or with spaceships. From a strictly cannon perspective it is unreasonable to assign such a large importance to ground operations in the Trek Universe.

Again, ground isn't obsolete, just less important than space.


Nowhere (that I could find, I may have missed something, and if so, I'm sure you'll point it out) has he said that ground forces are completely useless. Only that space strength is more important.

[Sionnach Glic]

Go back and read through more than just his recent responses. Earlier in the thread he was clearly arguing that ground forces are irrelevant if you have a ship in orbit.

[Mikey]

Actually, the point against which I was arguing was that spacefaring ("naval") support is the only support that infantry would need; that it makes dedicated equipment - tanks, heavy weapons, close air support, APC's, etc. - obsolete. Everything I've posted has been a refutation of that idea.