Thanks to Steve Bonnev, Peter Brenton and David Johnson for the
responses. Just to clarify; I have assumed that "Army" (Imperial or
planetary) is a sort of generic term that includes aerospace and wet
naval forces. However, in situations where Imperial military might
is called for, I think that both of these elements would become
non-issues.
Don't panic yet! Let me explain my heresy first. In the case of aerospace
forces, an Imperial task group of whatever size would have some form
of orbital support fire, and perhaps even cover from carrier-based
space fighters. In addition, high-tech AFVs can be classed as aerospace
fighters in many respects, maybe slower but with far more firepower.
In the case of wet navy forces, surface vessels could be directly engaged
by orbital support fire, fighters or even grav vehicles. A PT Boat might
be fast and agile, but would be a slug compared to a TL13+ AFV. The
submersible threat would be more problematic, but I do remember that
the old "Fighting Ships" booklet and some of the GDW material
relating to the defense of Terra in the Solomani Rim War mentioned
that SDBs and fighters were often based in the oceans. I would suspect
that such vessels would have some limited combat ability in the sea. I
think lasers might be a bad idea under water, but penetrating x-ray or
maser weapons would work, as would meson weapons. Even missiles
(direct impact) would work, with some modifications. Of course, I was
not a physics major, so you may all stop laughing if I am wrong! :-(
This does not mean that such vehicles would be the best solution, but
it would certainly be more cost effective to use mission-capable existing
designs than it would be to spend funds on whole new classes of vehicles.
An Imperium-wide military machine does get a tad expensive, so these
concerns are very valid. Besides, we know the 3rd Imperium must be
cheap or broke, or else they could have afforded a less sequel-like name.
As regards Peter Brenton's ideas on a Marine Expeditionary Division,
I have used a similar concept. The Imperial marines would certainly
need to field big units (divisions and corps), but a lot of the dirty work
could be done with the clever employment of smaller mobile units. This
is where the distinction of Fleet Marines vs Line Marines came in. The
ship-borne Fleet Marines might just be the ship's troops of an Imperial
"ship of the line", or they might be purpose-carried for rapid operations.
I had three classes of such units; Marine Combined Arms Teams (MCATs),
Marine Assault Forces (MAFs) and Marine Assault Brigades (MABs).
A MCAT would consist of a combined arms company of two rifle platoons
and one armor or mechanized platoon, with a support platoon for
command and heavy weapons. These would be ad hoc units, formed
from a MAF designated to be broken up into smaller units. The MAF
could be divided into three MCATs. The MCAT would be carried on a
5,000 ton starship, which would also have a pair of fighters for aerospace
support.
The MAF would be designed for longer-term field deployments, with
the intention of being at least semi-independent. The MAF would be made
up of two rifle companies and one armored or mechanized company, with
a weapons company (MRLs) and an artillery battery (2 Meson guns) for
fire support, an engineer platoon, a medical platoon, a port service platoon
(to handle starport operations at the local captured starport, or at
whatever landing field the engineers built) and a command and general
support company. The MAF would be carried on a 10,000 ton starship,
which would also carry a squadron of fighters for aerospace support, and
would have orbital support weapons.
The MAB would be especially popular for extended independent
operations. It would have one armored or mechanized battalion, two
rifle battalions, an artillery company (3 batteries), a drop
infantry/commando company, a cavalry troop (grav bikes & speeders)
an engineer company, a medical company, a port service company and
a reinforced command and general support company. The MAB would
be carried on a 50,000 tons starship, which would carry a wing (3
squadrons) of fighters for aerospace support, and would be well
armored and equipped with orbital fire capable weapons.
Of course, the above was using the old High Guard rules, which were
fairly lenient for space requirements. I would suspect the tonnage of
the ships would be increased by 50% to 100% in MT or FF&S.
This does not reflect the views of my employers. Neither does the
continuation of this in my next message. Nuff said.