Space Warfare - How would the ships be built/designed?

[tater]

This part of the conversation is really going in circles - let's not assume anything. It takes ridiculously large solar panels to generate power even in the dozens of kW range.

Edit: But lots of power can be generated by fuel cells. (until the fuel runs out)

You MUST make assumptions, otherwise we might as well just look at SDI info from the 1980s, and say, "that's space combat right there."

The OP says "how would SHIPS be built/designed?"

Ships implies manned spacecraft, not just satellites. We must then figure out what possible scenario would have manned spacecraft in a combat role in space. This requires assumptions, because if the space warfare is merely in LEO, then the problem is pretty simple, you overfly another country, and they shoot you down with ASAT weaponry launched from the ground. If the combat is in deep space, BEO, then you need a way to have the opposing craft get to BEO without ever overflying a hostile country in LEO, which means we MUST be talking about a foe based upon another world, or a space colony (O'Neil, etc), which would be incredibly vulnerable. None of these near future (distant near future) scenarios makes any sense.

[Herr Doktor Strangemember]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned how the fight would likely start with a cyberwar attack launched months ago. Viruses, Trojans, Computer Worms etc, all they have to do just attack and you force the enemy to waste time and resources killing your cyber minions. As for 'dumb' projectiles I can see a use, area denial, fire a few thousand on likely courses and you force you enemy to spend more time thinking about 'ok I dodge left, but he knows I like to dodge left therefore I'll dodge right, but he knows that I know that he knows...', sure you may never hit with one, but again it makes the enemy think, and react to you, and if one of those lumps of hits...golden BB time.

As for attacking planets, no thanks all that space to hide weapons in, and all that mass to absorb heat from how many PD laser weapons you feel you need. Also the difference between a PD laser weapon and a ship killer is razor thin, likely attacking a planet would be a formal affair once you can 'prove' you can beat the planet's defense they'd likely surrender rather than deal with an orbital bombardment.

[Kibble]

Ships implies manned spacecraft, not just satellites.

Well really ships implies ocean sailing craft! The ships involved in space warfare would be like the Soviet submarines that launch SLBMs converted to orbital space vehicles.

We must then figure out what possible scenario would have manned spacecraft in a combat role in space.

Piloted spacecraft would only be useful for inspection of other piloted spacecraft. For rescue operations, police action, or maybe the enemy spacecraft is trying to smuggle the plans for your one-of-a-kind X-ray laserstar to the rebel base.

[tater]

I'm not really arguing for manned craft, seems needlessly dangerous. I am merely suggesting that when someone in a SF context says "space ship" it implies a crew.

Still, if we mean "orbital" warfare, in the very near future, we are talking about ASAT concepts, basically. For anyone to bother fighting anywhere past LEO, we need an entire context, with technological, and geopolitical to make any reasonable arguments, I think.

[Rakaydos]

I'm not really arguing for manned craft, seems needlessly dangerous. I am merely suggesting that when someone in a SF context says "space ship" it implies a crew.

Still, if we mean "orbital" warfare, in the very near future, we are talking about ASAT concepts, basically. For anyone to bother fighting anywhere past LEO, we need an entire context, with technological, and geopolitical to make any reasonable arguments, I think.

I made a thread for that...

[Kibble]

For anyone to bother fighting anywhere past LEO, we need an entire context, with technological, and geopolitical to make any reasonable arguments, I think.

Just any two peoples separated by interplanetary distances - Earth and Mars, Venus and an Asteroid colony, Kepler 1000a and Kepler 1000b.

[tater]

Just any two peoples separated by interplanetary distances - Earth and Mars, Venus and an Asteroid colony, Kepler 1000a and Kepler 1000b.

OK. What is the goal? Is genocide OK? Does one side need to invade and occupy? Same species (meaning they started on planet A, so this implies they have passed the point technologically of being able to completely colonize another world)? Assuming same species, given the above statement, and the fact that we cannot do this NOW, what future technologies are we allowed to extrapolate?

[Jouni]

And once armor technology catches up, armor becomes relevant again. Which is why you see tanks on the modern battlefield, and body armor for soldiers, and up-armored Humvees, and hull armor on missile cruisers.

Actually, you don't see tanks that often on the modern battlefield. Usually it's infantry and lightly armored vehicles with various levels of air/artillery support. Some militaries invest in body armor, but it's still rare in actual combat.

Tanks are a 20th century weapon system. They were used to fight enemies with massive field armies. World War II was their high point, while air forces superceded them towards the end of the century. With the Cold War gone, most militaries reduced the number of tanks and invested in more mobile weapon systems.

Similar changes have happened on the seas. In the era of battleships, warship armor was designed to withstand the weapons of another ship of the same category. These days ships carry barely any armor at all, because no armor is going to help against any decent anti-ship weapon.

[Scoundrel]

The problem with speculation is that it is a dangerous combination of opinion and conjecture. We can temper it by stating "what would a spaceship using technologies that are TRL 5 or later look like" or even go as low as TRL 2 or 3... that would give us a framework to work within.

But this isn't a thread populated by defence contractors who even know what TRL (tech readiness level) is, which technology is at what TRL, and even what those technologies are. Personally I think that the first step to friendly discussion would be to define the technologies people are putting forward, identify their TRL equivalent, and agree what TRL should be the minimum for consideration so we all have a framework to agree on. Otherwise people will attack each other based on the highly amusing concept of "acceptable conjecture" - which by its nature is purely subjective!

Wikipedia (*sigh* not an acceptable source but sufficient for the purposes of this discussion - and it's accessible to everyone) can provide the framework for defining the TRL of whatever technology is proposed. Then the OP or the participants of the thread can decide what minimum TRL is acceptable, and then the discussion can move to the more interesting topic of 'what would your ship look like, how would it be used, and how would it be countered." The mission it was designed for could even be discussed: "My idea is for a spacecraft that protects Mars' sovereignty and the freedom of the Martian people from the oppression of the United Nations!"; or "My idea is for a death star to crush those Martian rebel scum!"; or whatever other eco-political scenario people feel inclined to put forth.

Maybe we could even structure it such that every week or month, both the TRL and the eco-politcal scenario changes so as to explore the versatility of various design philosophies or what impact certain technologies have on scenarios and ship design.

As for whether or not future warships would be manned, consider this: autonomous drones, while an ideal, are less attractive than remote controlled vessels for a myriad of reasons, not the least of which are, 1) there is a direct chain of responsibility and control; and, 2) there exists scenarios where vessels are hacked remotely or have hidden software that causes them to fall under enemy control. These are serious considerations that keep popping up in modern defence thinktanks whenever frigate or destroyer USVs are explored. Invariably it boils down to an isolated dedicated channel "remote self destruct" in the event of compromise.

It's funny how hackers have shaped future warfare.

[GeneralVeers]

I think there is something we can learn about this thread, aside from the analysis everyone have given - if you ever post about space warfare on this forum in any capacity, people will swarm to it and discuss about the possibility ad nauseam.

Uhhh.....in case you hadn't noticed? People in here take EVERY topic and argue it ad nauseum.

Yeah 50kg of sand would probably only disrupt a laser for a sec or so while before it drifted away.

Which is cheaper, 50kg of sand, or an extra layer of armor....?

The sandcaster, by comparison, is DIRT cheap......

[tater]

LOL. Except that it won't actually work, even for 1 second.

[GeneralVeers]

You said that before, and my replies should already have made it obvious that I disagree.

[More Boosters]

Uhhh.....in case you hadn't noticed? People in here take EVERY topic and argue it ad nauseum.

Meh, not really. People seem to be attracted more to hypothetical combat situations, the only other science labs threads as popular as these are the real life mission ones.

[magnemoe]

Actually, you don't see tanks that often on the modern battlefield. Usually it's infantry and lightly armored vehicles with various levels of air/artillery support. Some militaries invest in body armor, but it's still rare in actual combat.

Tanks are a 20th century weapon system. They were used to fight enemies with massive field armies. World War II was their high point, while air forces superceded them towards the end of the century. With the Cold War gone, most militaries reduced the number of tanks and invested in more mobile weapon systems.

Similar changes have happened on the seas. In the era of battleships, warship armor was designed to withstand the weapons of another ship of the same category. These days ships carry barely any armor at all, because no armor is going to help against any decent anti-ship weapon.

Tanks has been used a lot in 21 century warfare, major part in all larger wars, no you don't get many large tank battles anymore so its main role is force recon and tanking to support infantry.

Main weakness is that they are hard to transport, however you don't need loads of them in the above settings.

And yes if you don't have air power tanks are pretty pointless.

[tater]

You said that before, and my replies should already have made it obvious that I disagree.

While a little OT, I'm always willing to talk traveller (my first space game).

To properly disagree, you need to show some math that there is any chance it might work.

You need to show that X grains per cc is enough to have the effect the tables provide. Currently in T5, I think sand can be 100% effective (unsure here).

The answer is that is you if cover a whole cross-section of the ship, it has ZERO effect (the incoming beam will likely hit 1-2 grains total). It's 100% implausible. We are talking about a high-powered beam (traveller ships are built of unobtanium, after all (SD or BSD), so beams have to penetrate this), so a few grains over a 40m path length does exactly nothing. You could posit that a coasting ship disperses the sand at some range in a much denser grouping. Basically, you look at the solid-angle the ship subtends from the POV of the shooter, and move away from the target ship until the radius of that solid angle goes from 20m down to a value that makes the sand quite dense. Quite dense is relative...

So we have a 1cm beam for example. How many grains must be in even a single cc of space the beam passes through for a serious attenuation of the beam? Do we need all 50 kg in 1 cc? A cubic meter is 1,000,000 cubic centimeters. For our nominal 5mg sand particles, the entire 50kg is 10 million grains, so only "dispersed" into a single m^3, that's 10 grains per cc. Do you think 10 grains of sand will stop a laser that can blow holes in "superdense" hull? Is it reasonable to think you can place 50kg of sand in a volume smaller than 1 m^3, AND put it in the way of an incoming laser pulse?

Edited September 12, 2015 by tater

[Jouni]

Tanks has been used a lot in 21 century warfare, major part in all larger wars, no you don't get many large tank battles anymore so its main role is force recon and tanking to support infantry.

The point was that the niches for heavily armored vehicles have become small. While tanks used to be one of the primary forms of offensive power, they're now specialized vehicles used in special circumstances.

"Tanking", on the other hand, is an interesting word. If you used it in the MMORPG sense, the real-world term for troops playing the same role is "infantry". A real tank is mobile and powerful but also surprisingly fragile, so it's more like a DPS than a tank in the MMORPG sense.

[GeneralVeers]

Counterexample: Israel. They use tanks frequently in their rather one-sided skirmishes with terrorists. It's true that we don't see tanks in most of today's wars--but not for the reasons you guys are talking about. The number one reason is, most factions involved in today's wars are technologically backwards and don't have tanks. The nations that do have tanks aren't at war against each other.

There is a second reason. And the fact that there was no way to get a tank to the front door of Charlie Hebdo should explain it pretty succinctly.

To properly disagree, you need to show some math that there is any chance it might work.

I did better; I posted PROOF that it would work. Remember what I said earlier on about testing? Probably not. You confirm or disprove something by running a test and seeing if something actually happens in the real world. And it's already known that laser weapons don't work well in sandstorm conditions, because that actually happened during testing.

No maths needed.

[StrandedonEarth]

Mind you, there will be misses. Space is a very conductive environment for electronic warfare, spoofing sensors and such at stupendous range. Warships will probably start blasting each other with ECM and lasers from very far away, trying to get the sensor advantage, and the first ship that loses sensor capabilities is probably the screwedest.

Rune. And you know, remote sensor nets to take care of blind spots.

Reminds me of one SW book or another: 2 ships come into range and activate all their electronic measures and countermeasures, which all cancel each other out. It then devolves into a dogfight with the old reliable MkI Eyeballs

[tater]

Counterexample: Israel. They use tanks frequently in their rather one-sided skirmishes with terrorists. It's true that we don't see tanks in most of today's wars--but not for the reasons you guys are talking about. The number one reason is, most factions involved in today's wars are technologically backwards and don't have tanks. The nations that do have tanks aren't at war against each other.

There is a second reason. And the fact that there was no way to get a tank to the front door of Charlie Hebdo should explain it pretty succinctly.

I did better; I posted PROOF that it would work. Remember what I said earlier on about testing? Probably not. You confirm or disprove something by running a test and seeing if something actually happens in the real world. And it's already known that laser weapons don't work well in sandstorm conditions, because that actually happened during testing.

No maths needed.

You posted no proof whatsoever.

A sandstorm is in the atmosphere, which already attenuates the beam a great deal. The sand density is greater, and the beam is attenuated during the entire path length, not just the last few meters. Also, the lasers in question are not nearly as powerful. It's not even roughly analogous to the sand caster idea. You could possibly use the sand density to try and calculate sand casters, after you tease out those effects vs the atmosphere.

Canon traveller sand canisters are 50kg. Please show what density is required to attenuate a laser delivering multiple MJ. In your sandstorm example, how bad was it for the laser to pass through 1cm of sandstorm?

That sand in traveller is nonsense is not even controversial. Everyone knew it was nonsense 30+ years ago, you can likely find the old usenet posts about it.

[Jouni]

Counterexample: Israel. They use tanks frequently in their rather one-sided skirmishes with terrorists.

The key is "one-sided". When your forces are vastly superior to enemy forces, you can emphasize secondary goals such as minimizing casualties over cost-effectiveness. Besides, Israel is a special case, because it was until recently preparing to fight a Cold War-era land war against enemies that were also preparing for such war. These days the enemies are either in ruins or mostly friendly, but Israel is slow to change.

It's true that we don't see tanks in most of today's wars--but not for the reasons you guys are talking about. The number one reason is, most factions involved in today's wars are technologically backwards and don't have tanks. The nations that do have tanks aren't at war against each other.

The technologically backwards factions in WW2 certainly had tanks.

Take the Syrian civil war as an example. Every faction has tanks, but they don't use them that much, because technological advances have made tanks vulnerable. A tank is a high-value target that's relatively easy to disable or destroy. Unless you're in control of the battlefield, you don't want to commit too many tanks in a non-critical battle, because the risk of losing them outweighs the potential gains.

[GeneralVeers]

You posted no proof whatsoever.

Yes I did. I posted something that has happened in the real world. That's all the proof I need. How do I know laser weapons don't work properly in a sandstorm? Because they have not worked properly in sandstorms, during operational testing, out here in the real world--not in a silly game.

Besides, Israel is a special case, because it was until recently preparing to fight a Cold War-era land war against enemies that were also preparing for such war.

The Cold War is long since over......yet, curiously, Israel's tanks are still sitting on their battlefields. So, disagree.

These days the enemies are either in ruins or mostly friendly, but Israel is slow to change.

Heheh. Israel is one of the world's leaders in battlefield technology--hell, they've even outraced the U.S. in a few ways. Look up the ASPRO-A tank defense system for some fun reading on one of Israel's latest toys.

The reason Israel hasn't changed here (meaning, hasn't taken the tanks off the battlefield after the Cold War ended) is because the tanks are still effective even though the battlefield environment has completely changed.

The technologically backwards factions in WW2 certainly had tanks.

I wasn't talking about WW2. I was talking about today. Back then, an outdated tank model still had a fair chance on the battlefield; that's no longer the case. Fall five years behind the power curve, and you're toast. Against modern armor, the T-72 is a paperweight that has no chance. That's why terrorist factions don't have tanks; they've resorted to assymetric warfare against civilian targets because they can't beat modern civiliation in a stand-up fight.

Take the Syrian civil war as an example. Every faction has tanks, but they don't use them that much, because technological advances have made tanks vulnerable. A tank is a high-value target that's relatively easy to disable or destroy. Unless you're in control of the battlefield, you don't want to commit too many tanks in a non-critical battle, because the risk of losing them outweighs the potential gains.

Yeah, this is true. This reason can be added to the list: some nations have tanks but are too chicken to use them.

What we can extrapolate from all the above is this: in a space war, unless there is technological parity (which isn't likely) straight-up space battles aren't going to happen. The less-advanced side isn't going to want to get ships blown up (bad publicity--makes you look like you're losing) so the main dish of the day will be assymetrical warfare.

[tater]

Yes I did. I posted something that has happened in the real world. That's all the proof I need. How do I know laser weapons don't work properly in a sandstorm? Because they have not worked properly in sandstorms, during operational testing, out here in the real world--not in a silly game.

I addressed this. Lower earth atmosphere != space. You need to demonstrate that 50kg of sand, scattered to cover a typical starship in traveller = that sandstorm. Show your work.

Your argument is analogous to: "wings work here on earth, I see planes overhead every day, so they must work in space!"

Regarding the silly game... I am the one arguing it is silly in this regard, you are attempting to argue it is not.

EDIT:

BTW, I like traveller, and my name is actually in one of the book credits. Also, it is primarily a roleplaying game, so many good "house rules" by people who think about these things have them there (they are part of the canon, after all), but grossly reduced in efficacy. They were "balanced" back in the day (Little Black Books) to provide a very effective defense for small ships, nearly or actually 100% in most cases. Most people I know made it have a chance of working, but no where near 100% (throw more sand out maybe to increase chances of it working at some level) on some task roll. Alternately, it was just dumped. In all cases, though, the ship was not allowed to maneuver or evade (RCS displacement, basically) making it pretty vulnerable. The goal with having it have a very low, but non-zero chance of it working in an RPG, is that the ref can always roll (fake roll), and let the players off if he does't want them killed.

All the traveller talk reminds me of arguments regarding missiles we had. Many argued that missiles were so easy to shoot down that no one would use them (once within a certain range, directed energy weapons cannot possibly miss any target, so the number of missiles killed is the number of unique targets the weapon can target/slew to).

This is true, but in this thread context it is useful. Missiles are impossible because anti-missile systems are too good. No one then uses missiles. Then no one equips lasers capable of slewing to many targets in short time periods, because why bother when they address a threat no one thinks is plausible. Now my ship armed with missiles is suddenly pretty scary, all because I didn't "get the memo." So at a certain level, I'd expect a "warship" to have a few different weapons systems, under the assumption they cannot foresee every possible threat.

Edited September 12, 2015 by tater

[Jouni]

The Cold War is long since over......yet, curiously, Israel's tanks are still sitting on their battlefields. So, disagree.

The Cold War is long over, but the world is still full of Cold War-era military forces. Syria had one until recently, and Israel was preparing to fight it if necessary. Israel still has a massive number of tanks, because it had a massive number of tanks, and it's wasteful to throw them away prematurely.

Heheh. Israel is one of the world's leaders in battlefield technology--hell, they've even outraced the U.S. in a few ways. Look up the ASPRO-A tank defense system for some fun reading on one of Israel's latest toys.

Every military is always preparing to fight the previous war, except by accident. With new toys, they get better and better at it, but nobody knows in advance how well they will work in the next war. Israel hasn't faced a real military threat since 1973, so their military technology is now based more on inertia and vested interest than on necessity.

The reason Israel hasn't changed here (meaning, hasn't taken the tanks off the battlefield after the Cold War ended) is because the tanks are still effective even though the battlefield environment has completely changed.

Anything is effective, if you're facing a vastly inferior force.

I wasn't talking about WW2. I was talking about today. Back then, an outdated tank model still had a fair chance on the battlefield; that's no longer the case. Fall five years behind the power curve, and you're toast. Against modern armor, the T-72 is a paperweight that has no chance. That's why terrorist factions don't have tanks; they've resorted to assymetric warfare against civilian targets because they can't beat modern civiliation in a stand-up fight.

The technological development of tanks is a major factor in why tanks have become mostly obsolete. If a small technological gap means that your tanks are ineffective against enemy tanks, then why should you invest in tanks at all? Better spend your money on something that you can actually use in combat.

Most of the development efforts in armored warfare go into making tanks better at fighting other tanks. If the enemy doesn't use tanks, a large part of that effort is wasted. The tanks are still be useful in other roles, but you could have spent your money much better by developing something that's effective against your actual enemies.

Asymmetric warfare is just a natural step in the evolution of warfare. Armies used to face each other in open battlefields, and only bandits, primitives, and other disreputable/cowardly forces would resort to concealment and ambushes. Then industrial civilizations developed weapons that were too devastating in open battle, forcing everyone to adopt those "cowardly" tactics. Now we're facing another similar change in the nature of warfare. Because information technology has made hiding almost impossible and weapons extremely accurate, the only way to keep fighting against a superior force is to make your forces indistinguishable from the civilian population. Old-school commanders will call such tactics cowardly, but in the end effectiveness will prevail against old-fashioned honor codes.

And please stop misusing the word "terrorist". Terrorists by definition don't fight wars.

[GeneralVeers]

I addressed this.

No you didn't. You attempted the burden-of-proof fallacy. I didn't fall for it.

Everything in this thread is theoretical, and impossible to subject to accurate testing. To figure out what "should" work in space warfare, all we can do is extrapolate from what we see in the real world. And what we see in the real world is that sand and dust scatter laser beams. That trumps anything you could possibly say.

Regarding the silly game... I am the one arguing it is silly in this regard, you are attempting to argue it is not.

The game is silly; the concept is not. Smokescreens, chaff, decoys, and aluminum-foil radar ghosts are tried-and-true combat techniques that will be adapted for space combat.

The Cold War is long over, but the world is still full of Cold War-era military forces.

Tanks are not Cold-War-era forces. They existed before the Cold War, they existed after the Cold War, and they were used effectively both times. They are effective anywhere the primary threat from the enemy is small-arms fire and hand grenades. Which is pretty much everybody Israel is at war against right now. The reason Israel fields the Merkava is because it's theater-appropriate.

The technological development of tanks is a major factor in why tanks have become mostly obsolete. If a small technological gap means that your tanks are ineffective against enemy tanks, then why should you invest in tanks at all?

Because they're effective against something else. Such as infantry or bunkers. If the goal is to eliminate a sandbagged machine gun nest, for example, you want something armored against the machine guns, and with a cannon heavy enough to penetrate the sandbags. And on the modern battlefield, speed and mobility are a must. So you definitely need a motor. End result? Tank.

Asymmetric warfare is just a natural step in the evolution of warfare.

Neither a natural step, nor even a necessary one; it's one strategy out of several. Even if you can face the enemy head-on, that doesn't mean you should. If the enemy is dumb enough to send his whole army to your front door, you could obliterate him easily by simply salting his line of approach with land mines.

And please stop misusing the word "terrorist". Terrorists by definition don't fight wars.

Of course they do. They fight wars by attacking civilians.

The mindset of a terrorist comes from wanting to be on the winning side. When you're in a war you have no hope of winning? Simply change the target. Blow up a bus full of kids and call it a "great victory".

[Jouni]

Tanks are not Cold-War-era forces. They existed before the Cold War, they existed after the Cold War, and they were used effectively both times. They are effective anywhere the primary threat from the enemy is small-arms fire and hand grenades. Which is pretty much everybody Israel is at war against right now. The reason Israel fields the Merkava is because it's theater-appropriate.

I said that the world is full of Cold War-era military forces. More specifically, many military forces are still organized in a similar way as the late Soviet military. This includes a large army with a plenty of tanks. While such militaries aren't effective against modern forces, modern forces aren't that (cost-) effective againt them either. If you have to be prepared to fight against such force, it's better to have some old-fashioned forces with a lot of tanks available.

In general, military technology doesn't usually become obsolete by becoming useless or ineffective. It's more common that technological or tactical development just removes the need for certain specialized systems. For example, main battle tanks are expensive weapons platforms that are specialized for fighting other main battle tanks. If your enemy doesn't have main battle tanks, your main battle tanks become just expensive support vehicles that can perform the role almost as well as much cheaper specialized support vehicles.

Because they're effective against something else. Such as infantry or bunkers. If the goal is to eliminate a sandbagged machine gun nest, for example, you want something armored against the machine guns, and with a cannon heavy enough to penetrate the sandbags. And on the modern battlefield, speed and mobility are a must. So you definitely need a motor. End result? Tank.

And then you have inferior tanks that can't be used in combat, because enemy tanks would wipe them out. Because you can't use them in combat, you have to use something else against machine guns and bunkers, even though tanks would be better at the task, if enemy tanks would just leave them alone. Better spend that money on something that can actually be useful.

Of course they do. They fight wars by attacking civilians.

Another mistake. Terrorists attack both civilian and military targets, but even that's incidental.

Terrorism is a political activity, not a military activity. It's about advancing a political agenda by causing terror. A terror attack may target civilians or military, but it's always a crime, not a military action.