posted
Just occured to me what Starfleet's fleet would look like a few years after the Dominion War, if we still go by that if any of post-TNG series was still on it would be 2378-2379. Thats 3-4 years after the war, so would Starfleet be back to its pre-war strength?
Rebuilding the Fleet In the first two years, I am willing to bet that Starfleet would be still building a war time production of ships to replace those that were destroyed during the war. What I mean by replacing these ships, I mean by whatever role they served in the pre-war fleet, they would be replaced with a ship equalling or surpassing their abilities. For example, a Excelsior class ship was destroyed and she was assigned to patrol the Romulan Neutral Zone during the pre-war years, now however with the Romulans being more peaceful since the end of the war (assumption) that ship would ship to replace that Excelsior would be built, a Akira class or a Intrepid class but instead of replacing one ship it would replace two ships equaling the capabilities of the nwer ship, right? So one ship is less costly than a two ships, which is good for post-war fleet that would have crew sizes going down.
Performance of the Ships The war was perhaps Starfleet's best way to analyze it ship's performance during the war. This could be wither good or bad. Meaning that Starfleet takes a look at the Excelsior class and sees that the kill ratio is 1 to 2. For every enemy ship destroyed by a Excelsior big or small, two Excelsiors are destroyed. Meaning that either the Excelsiors could be brought in for a major refit similar to the Lakota class or class-wide retirement of the Excelsiors and are replaced with more capable ships. Now this is not limited to combat ships, but to explorer ships as well. However they can be analyzed during peacetime since it does not take a war to see how well a ship can 'explore'.
Replacement of Ships As in rebuilding the fleet, Strafleet after about three years would start replacing aging ships with more capable ships, which could hold less crew than lets say 3 ships with a combined equal abilities to the single newer ships. This could 3 Oberths vs. a Nova class, or 3 Mirandas vs. 1 Defiant (more like 10 Mirandas). Strafleet couldn;t do this before the Dominion War, for alot of reasons, first it was the Borg. It was though that the Borg would invade the Federation with more ships than just one. (You can see that because a 40 ship fleet was only assembled within a week but a 600 ship+ flet could be assembled ina few weeks. So 600 ships can probably overwhelm even a Cube's defenses.) Then it was the Cardassions, then the Klingons, the Borg again and then finally the Dominion. St that point my guess, Starfleet would not decomission ships but keep them in the front lines (for target practive for the enemy). Now that the war is over, the fleet is back up to pre-war strength, now its time to get rid of those shships that showed to be almost target practice for the enemy. In the end, a modern post-war fleet would be 5.000-6,000 ships vs. a 10,000+ pre-war fleet but both fleets would be equal in capabilities.
What do you think the Post-Dominion War Starfleet fleet would look like?
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Registered: Jul 2000
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posted
I think the way you cut down raw hull numbers in favor of fewer but more capable platforms is a big mistake. No matter how good a ship is, it can only respond to one situation at a time. What you're suggesting could mean a reduction in front line vessels by as much as 45%.
You also underrate the performance of Mirandas and Excelsiors against the Dominion. I'd put the Mirandas at 1:1 and Excelsiors for Jem'Hadar attackships, 2:1 and 1:1 for Galors.
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Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
I think that the older ships would be stored or turned in to a reserve fleet, manpower numbers would increase, for a decade, at least. History shows that a quick dismantlement of the military is usually followed by another increase, WW1 to WW2, WW2 to Korea, Korea to Vietnam.... Then we finally got a break.... Having learned this lesson I think Starfleet/Federation would keep the numbers up, especially with the Romulans or Breen looking at them. The increase in more capable ships with smaller crews would only prompt a larger fleet, using a 2 to 1 or 3 to 1 ratio, say, 50 Excelsiors would be replaced by 100 to 150 Nova/Intrepid/Defiant class vessels. Rebuilding the fleet should also take about a decade, unless I missed something on screen, what was it Shelby(sp) said about 359, a year?? Given wartime production would cut that in half, maybe in third, that still leave quite while to rebuild.
Exploration may take on a totally new aspect also, especially in the areas around hostile nations. This will probably be done by the larger vessels taking a smaller volume to explore, keeping help nearby.
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Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
I think that we can't get an accurate estimate of what should or shouldn't be built without first settling on what was lost - something we've never been able to agree on, because we've in turn never been able to settle on how large the fleet was in the first place.
We're also given precious little evidence as to the actual combat performance of other ships during the war. The best we've been able to see is what ships tend to be blown up during the various battles we've seen, which is only a tiny percentage of the fighting that actually went on. Following strictly canon evidence, for example, you can say that Excelsior and Akira class starships are piss-poor in big battles, simply because we see more of them get blown up during the war than any other classes. Likewise, since we've never seen a Steamrunner blow up or even get damaged during the war, one could equally surmise that they have stronger shields and superstructure than other classes. Obviously, this circumstantial evidence is weak at best.
posted
You also said "I think" when you said every post was "I think"
Yes, seriously do you think that a Excelsior actually can hold her own against modern ships? Yes if they are upgraded like the Lakota. I am willing to bet that four things could happen:
1. Strafleet keeps the fleet it has and replace only those which were destroyed. Start with 10,000 ships and end with 10,000 ships
2. Starfleet rebuilds the fleet, decomissioning older ships. Replacing those which were destroyed and decomissioned. Start with 10,000 ships end with 10,000 ships.
3. Strafleet rebuilds the fleet, replacing the older ships with newer ships a ratio of 2:1 efficiency. Start with 10,000 ships end with 6,000 ships.
4. Starfleet rebuilds the fleet, replacing destroyed ships and refit the older ships. Star with 10,000 ships end with 10,000 ships.
Now this assuming that Strafleet did begin with 10,000 ships of course. But thats not the issue here. The issue here is what Strafleet would have done to rebuild the fleet after the war.
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Registered: Jul 2000
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posted
You also said "I think" when you said every post was "I think"
Yes, seriously do you think that a Excelsior actually can hold her own against modern ships? Yes if they are upgraded like the Lakota. I am willing to bet that four things could happen:
1. Strafleet keeps the fleet it has and replace only those which were destroyed. Start with 10,000 ships and end with 10,000 ships
2. Starfleet rebuilds the fleet, decomissioning older ships. Replacing those which were destroyed and decomissioned. Start with 10,000 ships end with 10,000 ships.
3. Strafleet rebuilds the fleet, replacing the older ships with newer ships a ratio of 2:1 efficiency. Start with 10,000 ships end with 6,000 ships.
4. Starfleet rebuilds the fleet, replacing destroyed ships and refit the older ships. Star with 10,000 ships end with 10,000 ships.
Now this assuming that Strafleet did begin with 10,000 ships of course. But thats not the issue here. The issue here is what Strafleet would have done to rebuild the fleet after the war.
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Registered: Jul 2000
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posted
Well, the USS Hood was doing pretty well with the Defiant while taking out the orbital weapons platforms of Chin'toka. While other Excelsior class ships like the Valley Forge were destroyed, more modern ships (compared to the Excelsior and Miranda) like the Akira didn't fare well either against the OWP.
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted
Somehow, I get the impression that waging a war from the UFP point of view is like waging a war in "Civilization" with "Democracy" as your form of government. You can build a pretty impressive fleet, more easily than the competition, and based on more advanced technology than the competition. But try and *field* that fleet, and you get into huge social and economic problems.
Starfleet probably has plenty of ships, even after the war attrition. Most of those ships are probably still far superior to most of the competition - after all, we're talking about a whole quadrant (or two) here, not a small inbred cluster of nations whose technologies are closely matched because of a centuries-old escalation process. A century-old Miranda can still clean the chronometers of the biggest and baddest Bugomite warships, a half-centenarian Excelsior can still keep the Tentaclians at bay, and so forth.
But can Starfleet afford to maintain the crews for these vessels? Mothballing a ship in space is trivially simple - just abandon it there, and pick it up a million years later, as good as new. But crews can't be mothballed. Would Starfleet be capable of training in peacetime the huge reserves needed? Would these hordes of Feds be interested in serving in Starfleet outside the time of war?
I think Starfleet would be in a great hurry to demobilize after the war, lest the whole UFP society collapse due to the neglect of its civilian aspects. Ships could be repaired or replaced as soon as the economy went back to the prewar efficiency, but they would by definition be crewless, or else there wouldn't be an economy to get them built.
In the RW environment, wars boost the economies of the nations that supply the weapons. But in the UFP-Dominion conflict, there would be no separate nation that supplies the weapons for the UFP side while taking no casualties back home. The Feds would be buying from themselves. The industries created to support the war effort would have nobody to sell to after the war, and would probably just weaken the economy.
quote: Would these hordes of Feds be interested in serving in Starfleet outside the time of war
Under normal circumstances, I'd say the answer would be an easy yes. Starfleet has always been presented as being (in actuality) what the modern U.S. military claims to be today. That is, a fun way to advance a career, or explore a field of knowledge. Of course, in both cases, signing up does involve the occasional risk to life and limb, but I'd wager that risk seemed pretty distant to most UFP citizens post-Khitomer. The Dominion War probably changed that perception.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
"I think" it is a bit unwise to attempt to use real-world economics of the 20th Century to guesstimate what would happen in the post-war Federation.
In the 24th Century, mankind has evolved to the point that the basic necessities are so easily obtainable that economics as we know it is no more. I don't think you can put Federation economics on our current spectrum of communism - socialism - capitalism and get any clues from there. There is still trade, to be sure, and there are still some monetary forms, and a person can still become "embarrassingly rich" in the 23rd Century ("Devil in the Dark"[TOS]), but greed and the acquisition of things is no longer a driving force (ST:FC) . . . the population is free, comfortable, and happy.
One must also consider what falls inside or outside the Federation. I'd imagine the Federation must have some sort of exchange system for trading with those (Ferengi, for instance) who have some sort of more classical financial system (I'm reminded of Crusher's cloth purchase from Farpoint). The miners of Janus from "Devil in the Dark" could have been a group outside the Federation economic system, getting Federation payment for their minerals.
Of course, it may well be that, given how all we usually get to see is intra-Starfleet economics, the Federation civilians might still be using greenbacks, or euros. However, in the era of the replicator, I find this unlikely . . . not just because they could replicate most forms of physical cash, but also because the replicator (along with older technologies, such as those Kirk referenced in "Catspaw" that would have allowed him to make fantastic gems aboard ship) represents such a sea change in economic thinking. Goodbye, gold standard.
Applying 20th Century economics to such a world is questionable, at best. Imagine, if you will, how those Old World kings and queens of the 15th Century would view our current system from their mercantilist perspective, our current economy so outside their experience that they would not understand it or be able to appropriately place it on whatever spectrum they might use, and you get an idea of my point.
Now, I do agree that the Federation would be more likely to rebuild civilian infrastructure before rebuilding the fleet, provided that Federation security was maintained. However, I'd imagine that military reinforcement would only be second or third in the list of priorities, not tenth or twentieth. Almost every major Alpha and Beta quadrant power sufferred mightily, but there are some (Gorn, Tholian, etc.) who, as far as I know, were not involved, and some did not suffer as much as others. It would be best not to let them take advantage of their position.
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posted
I think that while it is a bad idea to apply 20th century economic ideas to the UFP, it is not necessarily a bad idea to apply them to Starfleet. War hasn't really changed much and doesn't look likely to by the 24th century; the reponses are likely to be pretty much the same as for a modern military, with the added factor of large numbers of exploration and scientific vessels in Starfleet, many of which will have been destroyed and need to be replaced. the first couple of years will be at wartime production levels, probably with about equal numbers as pre war: older ships will probably be refitted and possibly some new production (tried and tested spaceframes w/new interiors and systems).
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Registered: Feb 2002
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that while it is a bad idea to apply 20th century economic ideas to the UFP, it is not necessarily a bad idea to apply them to Starfleet. War hasn't really changed much and doesn't look likely to by the 24th century; the reponses are likely to be pretty much the same as for a modern military, with the added factor of large numbers of exploration and scientific vessels in Starfleet, many of which will have been destroyed and need to be replaced. the first couple of years will be at wartime production levels, probably with about equal numbers as pre war: older ships will probably be refitted and possibly some new production (tried and tested spaceframes w/new interiors and systems).
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