Fed ground combat again

[Sionnach Glic]

Well, it's ten miles spread throughout a forrest. Depending on how heavily forrested it is, phasers could be limited to rather short ranges, leading to casulaties once the Germans get close.
I agree with the Fed victory, though. Maybe a thousand casualties, max, with most being from the initial ambush. I think a few hundred is more likely.

[Deepcrush]

The factors for casulaties are just to wild to guess at.

[SteveK]

Are these conclusions based on the premise of no ship in support of the ground troops?

Yes. When talking about how one army would do against another in ground combat, starships and air support are generaly removed from the equation for both sides.

Which is fine, and your conclusions may even be correct, I just doubt whether or not they're relevant. Consider the following:
How would a battalion of U.S marines fare against an equal number of medieval knights? If projectile weapons are excluded from considerations. While we may prove that the mellee abilities of knights and their equipment vis a vis mellee combat is superior to Marines', that conclusion is meaningless. The equipment and training of modern forces is based on the availability of modern weapons. The same is true for Star Trek forces--the dominant arm in their arsenal is armed space faring vessels and support craft.

Is ground combat important in Star Trek?

Of course. Taking planets is a neccessity in warfare, as is defending them.

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.

[Deepcrush]

Which is fine, and your conclusions may even be correct, I just doubt whether or not they're relevant. Consider the following:
How would a battalion of U.S marines fare against an equal number of medieval knights? If projectile weapons are excluded from considerations. While we may prove that the mellee abilities of knights and their equipment vis a vis mellee combat is superior to Marines', that conclusion is meaningless. The equipment and training of modern forces is based on the availability of modern weapons. The same is true for Star Trek forces--the dominant arm in their arsenal is armed space faring vessels and support craft.

Wrong. All U.S. ground forces are trained to opperate with or without air and navel support. Air Support is rather limited when compared to the ground fighting in time of war. The US keeps 108 active divisions but has how many carriers to support that???

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.

Wrong. Importance has to be shared between space and ground forces. One may have more use but that doesn't mean you should ignore the other. The fact that Trek does this also comes through with the massive costs of life we see with mostly no gain. Because people act as you are suggesting.

[SteveK]

Which is fine, and your conclusions may even be correct, I just doubt whether or not they're relevant. Consider the following:
How would a battalion of U.S marines fare against an equal number of medieval knights? If projectile weapons are excluded from considerations. While we may prove that the mellee abilities of knights and their equipment vis a vis mellee combat is superior to Marines', that conclusion is meaningless. The equipment and training of modern forces is based on the availability of modern weapons. The same is true for Star Trek forces--the dominant arm in their arsenal is armed space faring vessels and support craft.

Wrong. All U.S. ground forces are trained to opperate with or without air and navel support. Air Support is rather limited when compared to the ground fighting in time of war. The US keeps 108 active divisions but has how many carriers to support that???

With all due respect, I suggest you re-read my post. I wasn't commenting on the war-fighting ability of U.S forces without air or naval support, I was commenting on their war-fighting ability without projectile weapons. My point is that by eliminating the dominant weapon in a militaries arsenal is not conducive to relevant conclusions.

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.

Wrong. Importance has to be shared between space and ground forces. One may have more use but that doesn't mean you should ignore the other. The fact that Trek does this also comes through with the massive costs of life we see with mostly no gain. Because people act as you are suggesting.

What massive losses of life have we seen in ground combat?

[Captain Seafort]

With all due respect, I suggest you re-read my post. I wasn't commenting on the war-fighting ability of U.S forces without air or naval support, I was commenting on their war-fighting ability without projectile weapons. My point is that by eliminating the dominant weapon in a militaries arsenal is not conducive to relevant conclusions.

It depends on how likely the removal of said dominant weapons is in a combat situation. We've seen Fed troops in action twice - "Nor the Battle to the Strong..." and "The Siege of AR-558". In neither case was air or space support available, due to an effective blockade of the planet in question. The troops on the ground were therefore dependant on their own weaponry and training, and both proved singularly lacking.

What massive losses of life have we seen in ground combat?

"The Siege of AR-558", as shown by the fact that the Feds suffered losses when faced with a depleted and disorganised opponent attacking through a choke point with no equipment other than their rifles.

[Sionnach Glic]

How would a battalion of U.S marines fare against an equal number of medieval knights? If projectile weapons are excluded from considerations. While we may prove that the mellee abilities of knights and their equipment vis a vis mellee combat is superior to Marines', that conclusion is meaningless. The equipment and training of modern forces is based on the availability of modern weapons. The same is true for Star Trek forces--the dominant arm in their arsenal is armed space faring vessels and support craft.

Which are worthless when discussing ground forces.
A better analogy would be asking how a US Marine force would do against medieval knights if they had no air support.

And in a way, you've just proved my point. The Redshirt Brigade is utterly worthless without orbital support backing them up. And that reveals a massive weakness for them. You can't always rely on having orbital support. You have to be prepared to fight without it, like how modern armies train how to fight without air support.

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

Tell me, how do you plan on taking over a world, even one of only modern day Earth's strength, if you do not take part in ground assaults? That's right; you can't. Unless you plan on just wiping out all life on the planet and bombarding it into submission (something the UFP would never do), then you must be prepared to take part in ground campaigns.

What massive losses of life have we seen in ground combat?

Take a look at what happened on AR558. One guy with a WW1 era machine gun could have held off the attacking Jem'hadar almost indefinitely. That about a hundred Redshirts failed at that is seriously damning.

[Tsukiyumi]

...One guy with a WW1 era machine gun could have held off the attacking Jem'hadar almost indefinitely. That about a hundred Redshirts failed at that is seriously damning.

Honestly, I think I, with my Glock and a number of extra magazines would have done about as well as they did. 17 9mm rounds per mag is a lot of flying metal.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

What pisses me off about their firing is that phasers can fire pulse blasts. Would've done a hell of a lot better than those damned beams!

[Captain Seafort]

How? They've never been seen to be capable of automatic fire, so I don't see much of a difference. Also, the only weapons we've seen fire pulses were the FC version, not the old TNG model used at AR-558.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Those are... probably the ones I was thinking of.

Damn... *Slinks off wish collar popped up to hide face*

[Deepcrush]

With all due respect, I suggest you re-read my post. I wasn't commenting on the war-fighting ability of U.S forces without air or naval support, I was commenting on their war-fighting ability without projectile weapons. My point is that by eliminating the dominant weapon in a militaries arsenal is not conducive to relevant conclusions.

No, I read it. I choose to ignore the stupidity of the statement. The idea of comparing one ground force at its prime vs another ground force at its weakest point is meaningless to the debate.

You were removing rifles from riflemen while allowing Knights to keep their swords and armor. You took something and tried to stack it. Which will fail here since too many of us here know what we're talking about.

What massive losses of life have we seen in ground combat?

The Cardassian 11th order, half a million strong. Wiped out in short order by charging Klingons. That doesn't even count the losses that the klingons suffered.

[Thorin]

I'd say the TM is well off the mark saying the E-D phasers has 1GW of power and Graham is far, far closer with his thousands of terawatts, especially considering we've seen how much EM energy the E-D's shields can absorb (from the Dyson Sphere episode, I think), and the fact it would probably take several centuries of constant phaser fire of 1GWto bring down that strength of shield.

[Thorin]

How? They've never been seen to be capable of automatic fire, so I don't see much of a difference. Also, the only weapons we've seen fire pulses were the FC version, not the old TNG model used at AR-558.

Didn't Wesley heat a rock with a phaser for a good few seconds - enough time to sweep across the immediate horizon.

[Sionnach Glic]

We've never seen a phaser be swept across an area at all. It's possible that the beam somehow "sticks" to whatever it hits, preventing it from being moved, or something.