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Space power defines the strong civilizations of the galaxy, regulates and permits cultural and scientific exchange, ensures trade, secures line of communication and defends the stability of interstellar civilization unlike any other form of military power in our shared history. No isolationist nation has ever risen to be a major galactic power or sustained itself for long in a major conflict without control of the far from empty space between the systems. Importantly, space power is not solely measured in a fleet or starships offensive and defensive capabilities, but also in the skills and experience of the crew, their presence in far flung star bases and missions into the unknown, and their ability to leverage power effectively through other then tactical means, including diplomacy, research and superior organization.
Starfleet is a deep space exploratory and defensive service maintained by the United Federation of Planets (UFP). Starfleet therefore are often the official representatives of the Federation. The official origins of Starfleet can be found in the Federation Charter of 2161 when the United Earth Starfleet, Military Assault Command Operations, and member worlds exploratory, patrol and military forces were folded into a United Starfleet. Rooted in its foundation as a military organization that was represented by a dozen different species at its onset, organization of its space based forces is an important challenge. Part of the organizational challenge, oft neglected by Starfleet nomenclature, is the classification of its over forty different distinct classes of starship vessels currently in service.
Defining starships is crucial to provide timely and concise identifiers to Starfleet personnel when encountering foreign vessels which have already been classified, as well as to immediately categorize friendly and allied vessels, allowing command and tactical personnel to best distribute and delineate responsibility with a minimum of time and effort.
Frigates:
The frigate class of ship dates back to 18th century Earth and were wooden warships which were too small to carry cannons anywhere but the top deck, but combined speed with excellent maneuvering and handling. They were heavily armed despite their displacement and able to be built more quickly, and cheaply then far larger contemporary battleship equivalents then known as 'Ships-of-the-Line.' Eventually maritime frigates evolved into specialized light vessels which while large enough for deep water and long range patrols and missions, often were 'single mission' oriented such as being specialized platforms for engaging enemy submersibles, air and space defense, dedicated to convoy protection or for littoral and shallow draft operations. On Andoria, frigate class vessels served dual purpose as both ice-cutters and heavily armed for both convoy protection and defensive patrols.
The space based evolution of frigates has generally followed this concept of 'single mission specialization.' Epitomized by the popular and versatile Miranda-class, the frigate is often designed or refitted for specialized duties much like its maritime forebears. Transport and supply, defensive patrol, research and exploration and much more. In times of war, frigates are often utilized in support operations including patrolling and defending starbases and planetary system or protecting civilian shipping as well as a screen or reconnaissance for larger fleets. Frigates, while often the smallest class of capital starship, are still capital ships and despite their often single mission specialization, are still often capable of multirole operations even without a refit.
Destroyers:
The Destroyers origins on Earth hail back to beginnings of the 20th century where medium sized, high speed and well armored vessels laden with deadly torpedoes would be deployed in screens or 'hunting packs' to target and destroy more heavily armed warships such as cruisers or battleships. The role of the Destroyer in these maritime fleet battles never materialized decisively but the Destroyer class became extremely prolific regardless. The Destroyer was large and well armored enough to defeat flotillas of lighter vessels employed by less wealthy nations, and due to advances of technology was soon popular as both a 'screening' vessel for maritime fleets as well as providing important support to naval strategy such as the protection of merchant and transport shipping or hunting of enemy ships and stealth submersibles.
However unlike Frigates, Destroyers were large and well armed and armored enough to survive in large fleet engagements, and their increased space and crew compliments permitted longer cruises, with longer ranges and more endurance away from port. Destroyers were also oftentimes multirole vessels, capable of serving in a diverse array of combat and support operations. As maritime technology and doctrine advanced, smaller nations often adopted Destroyer-class vessels as their heaviest main warship class. The maritime destroyer eventually reached its zenith prior to the Third World War when Destroyers proved invaluable for deploying anti-satellite weaponry and providing ballistic missile defense.
In modern Starfleet operations, a Destroyer class starship such as the Intrepid-class are capable of long term, independent missions and deployments and capable of handling multiple different operations such as defensive patrol, diplomatic presence and exploratory survey missions simultaneously. During fleet operations, the Destroyer class would provide both a screening element of the main fleet of warships as well as combat support as their array of torpedoes and phaser arrays as well as powerful shielding and superior evasive maneuverability would compliment the slower but more powerful cruiser class starships.
Cruisers:
The original cruisers were known as "armored cruisers" and their original role was reflected in the terminology. Cruisers were originally conceived as powerful warships capable of operating independently or as flagships for senior naval officers and for small fleets or task forces. During the Great World Wars of Earth, cruisers often served as escorts for the still more heavily armed and armored battleships. By the end of the Second World War, cruisers evolved into four different classes. The battlecruiser, which combined the powerful armament of a battleship combined with slightly superior speed and maneuverability at the cost of significant armor protection, the heavy cruiser which also possessed a heavy armament but markedly inferior to that of a battleship, the light cruiser which traded its still heavy armaments and armored protection for increased speed and maneuverability and the anti-aircraft cruiser, which was bristling with light guns meant to defend fleets from swarms of air based fighters and bomber craft and to be survivable enough to survive such assaults themselves.
A dedication to 'surface action' was the cruisers main role as oftentimes this class was used to protect invasion fleets, interdict enemy shipping, and engage in ship to ship or shore bombardment combat missions and often had the guns and armor to prove very survivable. A cruiser was also far less resource and crew intensive the maintaining and deploying a battleship. During the period of the World Wars, cruisers rarely served in the more specialized support roles of frigates and destroyers, being far too valuable for major fleet and combat operations. Eventually maritime cruisers swapped out their antiquated guns for missile launchers, railguns and early directed energy laser weaponry. Both in and out of wartime, cruisers were defined as powerful vessels fully capable of being flagships themselves and fully able to participate in all fleet operations as well as endurable enough to operate independently.
For the Federation, the Cruiser class is the most prominent and iconic vessel of Starfleet. The Excelsior-class exemplifies the space based evolution of the cruiser as a fleet vessel. Cruisers like the Excelsior-class are often used as flagships of Starfleet Admirals, serve as powerful tactical platforms for show the flag (and show of force) operations and are large enough to serve a vast array of Starfleet operations, with enough logistical capacity to fully serve in the roles of exploration, research, diplomacy and civil affair operations simultaneously. This is most recently personified in the Galaxy-class cruiser including Starfleets flagship, the Enterprise-D. Often its formidable array of weapons and powerful deflector shields cause others to define the Galaxy-class as a battleship but that would be wrong. A Battleship is a vessel dedicated to war. A more accurate term would be defining it as a Heavy Cruiser. While it is highly capable tactically, combat operations are not a Starfleet vessels specialty but simply one role of many.
Battleships:
A Ship of the Line was the maritime precursor of the Battleship that hails back to Ancient Earth history. The Ship of the Line itself was an evolution of naval tactics. Ancient naval tactics and technology shifted from ramming, boarding actions and the use of light missile weapons to the increasing use of gunpowder based weaponry, guns, bombards and eventually cannons until eventually weapons technology advanced so much that the previous tactics of boarding and ramming became obsolete. The Ship of the Line was called such because they often engaged enemy fleets in a line formation, presenting their broadsides to the enemy fleet and engaging in lethal gunnery duels. These broadsides were devastating against unarmored wooden vessels and this sparked a technological race between the advanced in metallurgy for armor plating and the armor piercing capability of increasingly more powerful guns.
Ships of the Line eventually grew into becoming battleships because while oftentimes they would still deploy in powerful fleets, and often still in ancient line formations, the guns were housed in turrets capable of traversing instead of fixed gun decks and as maritime technology advanced, these battleships became capable of far more independent engagements. Famously throughout history, superior armed and armored battleships were capable of devastating enemy forces in ship to ship actions engaging enemy vessels and shore installations at incredibly long ranges approaching the open horizon itself. The evolution of the battleship into a housing platform for several large batteries of guns however proved its death knell as a class of naval vessel and even as a warship in general. With the advances of submersibles, air and space power, and missile technology, battleships proved to be cost ineffective investments. Even the best metal armor plating could rapidly be penetrated by increasingly advanced weapons technology and the size and scale of battleships made then extremely expensive to construct, much less maintain.
Starfleet notably does not currently employ battleships though after the tragedy of Wolf 359, there are plans of creating more tactically versatile Starfleet vessels or refitting current vessels with more offensive capabilities. Many Cruiser class vessels of Starfleet dedicate large amounts of its crew, power generation, and space to research, crew comfort, enrichment and exploration which during time of war can be rededicated to an increase of offensive and defensive capabilities. One often simulated theory is the concept of a 'War version' of the Galaxy-class starship which would be a dedicated warship, necessitating the removal of most civilians typically on board a Starfleet vessels, as well as everything from holodecks (except for tactical simulations of course) to astrometric labs. With minimal accommodations for a 'militarized' vessel, already large starships like the Galaxy and Excelsior-class could be updated with even more powerful shields, extra phaser banks and secure storage and deployment of even more potent photon and newer quantum torpedoes while the impressive sensor suits could be dedicated to scanning for enemy vessels for weak points in shields, or even laying out tachyon beams to detect the subtle distortions of cloaked starships.
Corvettes/Escorts:
The corvette or escort class can find its Earth origins in the sloop of war, the smallest class of warship. The Corvette is distinct from the intermediate classes as being solely a class of vessel dedicated to warfare and thus the corvette is a warship through and through. The original sloops role was to engage in anti-piracy operations (and sometimes engage in sanctioned piracy itself), coastal patrol and enforcing military policy in minor skirmishes or colonial and imperial expansion fulfilling a similar role to the Iron Gun Cutters of Andoria.
The evolution of these sloops into the corvette of the 20th century was defined largely as easy to produce vessels for a myriad of short term roles very similar to that of the sloops of previous centuries. Corvettes were often able to be built even by smaller or poorer nations as well. They served in a niche role admirably but the advent of naval weaponry made corvettes far more potent military vessels. Prior to the Third World War, corvettes were soon capable of being equipped with powerful antiship missiles and their small size lended them well to stealth technology and the capability of targeting far larger vessels with its small but potent armaments.
With the emergence of the Borg threat, the Federation soon floated the idea of a 'battle fleet' doctrine. Primary among this Battle Fleet would be a large number of 'Escort' class vessels, small dedicated warships solely meant to work in conjunction with larger Starfleet vessels in fleet battles similar to that of our shared maritime history. Recent 'official' advances in tactical technology, such as phase cannons, integrated nacelles, ablative armor plating and the evolution in tactical doctrine such as multi-vector attacks and simultaneous multiple targeting capability lend well to the development of a dedicated 'Escort' class. The main drawback however would be the assignment of Starfleet personnel to what is essentially a 'single mission' capable craft, that of warfighting.
Conclusion:
The great irony however is that a battleship and corvette/escort would only be capable of serving one of many roles, that of combat. Ultimately vessels of these classes would be of little use to Starfleet prior to, and soon after a truly serious conflict. However combat power is tied into space power and the Federation should never neglect the capability of refitting Starfleet for defense of its member worlds and to interdict and advocate on behalf of allied powers and protect the stability and progress of galactic civilization.
Therefore it would be wise and reasonable for Starfleet to take measured steps in maintaining the capability of both refitting its many cruisers into more tactically capable designs even if it is not necessary to create a dedicated 'battleship.' Federation scientists, engineers and designers have proven highly capable and adaptable and during tactical operations, those skills have truly proven exceptional time and time again. It is fully possible to empower our Starfleet to maintain readiness and increase capability by maintaining the capability of military refits of already in service starship designs even if they maybe prohibitively expensive.
The development of a dedicated escort or corvette class warship possesses even more potential and while generally more cost effective, also have their own potential drawbacks. Escort vessels would be ideal for support roles in a battle fleet, capable of engaging larger enemy vessels from multiple vectors and angles of assault while also increasing overall fleet survivability by being capable of engaging above peer opponents in direct ship to ship combat. Escort vessels requiring their own dedicated crew can be mitigated if, time permitting, crews can be re-assigned from less tactically capable starships to a dedicated escort warship and after a period of intensive training and retraining, be deployed in combat fleet operations. Once again, the versatility and extensive training and competence of Starfleet personnel would be an invaluable asset in this regard.
The important caveat is that Starfleet personnel are not expendable and oftentimes in history lighter classes of combat vessels incur severe casualties. The main impediment in adopting large numbers of escort vessels or the attack fighter variant of the Peregrine-class courier ship is that significant resources would still have to be invested in these dedicated small warships. The resource cost alone could mean that even an escort sized vessel could tradeoff significant expense in exchange for the crew survivability in a 'Battle Fleet.'
With the diminishment of the Borg threat it would be a mistake to abandon the progress made in recent years by Starfleet and the Federation in abandoning the advances made in the new 'Battle Fleet' doctrine. As the ancient classical Greek philosopher once stated "Our need will be the real Creator." While tactical roles and competency are a small component of a successful starship design, and likewise in a capable and competent Starfleet officer or crewmember, it is important for Starfleet to remain competitive in the realm of tactical capability. The Federations values are universal but are far from universally adopted by rival star powers, some of whom tragically still respect strength and the way of conquest over reason and the way of diplomacy.
Crewman First Class Olindra Trawas
Starfleet Tactical Doctrine and Theory School (The War College)
Tycho Base, Luna
The Disclaimer is meant to throw us off. According to public Starfleet personnel files, Olindra Trawas is a Bolian female. As a culture they are grossly pacifistic and certainly not from Earth. The Battle Fleet doctrine which this intercept extolls isn't aimed at the Borg, but at us. The emphasis on lighter warship design and refitting cruisers into battleships is aimed at the current gaps in our fleets capabilities. Expanding and accelerating the upgrade of our own warships would be the best counter, as well as continued emphasis on asymmetric fleet conflict.
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Space power defines the strong civilizations of the galaxy, regulates and permits cultural and scientific exchange, ensures trade, secures line of communication and defends the stability of interstellar civilization unlike any other form of military power in our shared history. No isolationist nation has ever risen to be a major galactic power or sustained itself for long in a major conflict without control of the far from empty space between the systems. Importantly, space power is not solely measured in a fleet or starships offensive and defensive capabilities, but also in the skills and experience of the crew, their presence in far flung star bases and missions into the unknown, and their ability to leverage power effectively through other then tactical means, including diplomacy, research and superior organization.
Starfleet is a deep space exploratory and defensive service maintained by the United Federation of Planets (UFP). Starfleet therefore are often the official representatives of the Federation. The official origins of Starfleet can be found in the Federation Charter of 2161 when the United Earth Starfleet, Military Assault Command Operations, and member worlds exploratory, patrol and military forces were folded into a United Starfleet. Rooted in its foundation as a military organization that was represented by a dozen different species at its onset, organization of its space based forces is an important challenge. Part of the organizational challenge, oft neglected by Starfleet nomenclature, is the classification of its over forty different distinct classes of starship vessels currently in service.
Defining starships is crucial to provide timely and concise identifiers to Starfleet personnel when encountering foreign vessels which have already been classified, as well as to immediately categorize friendly and allied vessels, allowing command and tactical personnel to best distribute and delineate responsibility with a minimum of time and effort.
Frigates:
The frigate class of ship dates back to 18th century Earth and were wooden warships which were too small to carry cannons anywhere but the top deck, but combined speed with excellent maneuvering and handling. They were heavily armed despite their displacement and able to be built more quickly, and cheaply then far larger contemporary battleship equivalents then known as 'Ships-of-the-Line.' Eventually maritime frigates evolved into specialized light vessels which while large enough for deep water and long range patrols and missions, often were 'single mission' oriented such as being specialized platforms for engaging enemy submersibles, air and space defense, dedicated to convoy protection or for littoral and shallow draft operations. On Andoria, frigate class vessels served dual purpose as both ice-cutters and heavily armed for both convoy protection and defensive patrols.
The space based evolution of frigates has generally followed this concept of 'single mission specialization.' Epitomized by the popular and versatile Miranda-class, the frigate is often designed or refitted for specialized duties much like its maritime forebears. Transport and supply, defensive patrol, research and exploration and much more. In times of war, frigates are often utilized in support operations including patrolling and defending starbases and planetary system or protecting civilian shipping as well as a screen or reconnaissance for larger fleets. Frigates, while often the smallest class of capital starship, are still capital ships and despite their often single mission specialization, are still often capable of multirole operations even without a refit.
Destroyers:
The Destroyers origins on Earth hail back to beginnings of the 20th century where medium sized, high speed and well armored vessels laden with deadly torpedoes would be deployed in screens or 'hunting packs' to target and destroy more heavily armed warships such as cruisers or battleships. The role of the Destroyer in these maritime fleet battles never materialized decisively but the Destroyer class became extremely prolific regardless. The Destroyer was large and well armored enough to defeat flotillas of lighter vessels employed by less wealthy nations, and due to advances of technology was soon popular as both a 'screening' vessel for maritime fleets as well as providing important support to naval strategy such as the protection of merchant and transport shipping or hunting of enemy ships and stealth submersibles.
However unlike Frigates, Destroyers were large and well armed and armored enough to survive in large fleet engagements, and their increased space and crew compliments permitted longer cruises, with longer ranges and more endurance away from port. Destroyers were also oftentimes multirole vessels, capable of serving in a diverse array of combat and support operations. As maritime technology and doctrine advanced, smaller nations often adopted Destroyer-class vessels as their heaviest main warship class. The maritime destroyer eventually reached its zenith prior to the Third World War when Destroyers proved invaluable for deploying anti-satellite weaponry and providing ballistic missile defense.
In modern Starfleet operations, a Destroyer class starship such as the Intrepid-class are capable of long term, independent missions and deployments and capable of handling multiple different operations such as defensive patrol, diplomatic presence and exploratory survey missions simultaneously. During fleet operations, the Destroyer class would provide both a screening element of the main fleet of warships as well as combat support as their array of torpedoes and phaser arrays as well as powerful shielding and superior evasive maneuverability would compliment the slower but more powerful cruiser class starships.
Cruisers:
The original cruisers were known as "armored cruisers" and their original role was reflected in the terminology. Cruisers were originally conceived as powerful warships capable of operating independently or as flagships for senior naval officers and for small fleets or task forces. During the Great World Wars of Earth, cruisers often served as escorts for the still more heavily armed and armored battleships. By the end of the Second World War, cruisers evolved into four different classes. The battlecruiser, which combined the powerful armament of a battleship combined with slightly superior speed and maneuverability at the cost of significant armor protection, the heavy cruiser which also possessed a heavy armament but markedly inferior to that of a battleship, the light cruiser which traded its still heavy armaments and armored protection for increased speed and maneuverability and the anti-aircraft cruiser, which was bristling with light guns meant to defend fleets from swarms of air based fighters and bomber craft and to be survivable enough to survive such assaults themselves.
A dedication to 'surface action' was the cruisers main role as oftentimes this class was used to protect invasion fleets, interdict enemy shipping, and engage in ship to ship or shore bombardment combat missions and often had the guns and armor to prove very survivable. A cruiser was also far less resource and crew intensive the maintaining and deploying a battleship. During the period of the World Wars, cruisers rarely served in the more specialized support roles of frigates and destroyers, being far too valuable for major fleet and combat operations. Eventually maritime cruisers swapped out their antiquated guns for missile launchers, railguns and early directed energy laser weaponry. Both in and out of wartime, cruisers were defined as powerful vessels fully capable of being flagships themselves and fully able to participate in all fleet operations as well as endurable enough to operate independently.
For the Federation, the Cruiser class is the most prominent and iconic vessel of Starfleet. The Excelsior-class exemplifies the space based evolution of the cruiser as a fleet vessel. Cruisers like the Excelsior-class are often used as flagships of Starfleet Admirals, serve as powerful tactical platforms for show the flag (and show of force) operations and are large enough to serve a vast array of Starfleet operations, with enough logistical capacity to fully serve in the roles of exploration, research, diplomacy and civil affair operations simultaneously. This is most recently personified in the Galaxy-class cruiser including Starfleets flagship, the Enterprise-D. Often its formidable array of weapons and powerful deflector shields cause others to define the Galaxy-class as a battleship but that would be wrong. A Battleship is a vessel dedicated to war. A more accurate term would be defining it as a Heavy Cruiser. While it is highly capable tactically, combat operations are not a Starfleet vessels specialty but simply one role of many.
Battleships:
A Ship of the Line was the maritime precursor of the Battleship that hails back to Ancient Earth history. The Ship of the Line itself was an evolution of naval tactics. Ancient naval tactics and technology shifted from ramming, boarding actions and the use of light missile weapons to the increasing use of gunpowder based weaponry, guns, bombards and eventually cannons until eventually weapons technology advanced so much that the previous tactics of boarding and ramming became obsolete. The Ship of the Line was called such because they often engaged enemy fleets in a line formation, presenting their broadsides to the enemy fleet and engaging in lethal gunnery duels. These broadsides were devastating against unarmored wooden vessels and this sparked a technological race between the advanced in metallurgy for armor plating and the armor piercing capability of increasingly more powerful guns.
Ships of the Line eventually grew into becoming battleships because while oftentimes they would still deploy in powerful fleets, and often still in ancient line formations, the guns were housed in turrets capable of traversing instead of fixed gun decks and as maritime technology advanced, these battleships became capable of far more independent engagements. Famously throughout history, superior armed and armored battleships were capable of devastating enemy forces in ship to ship actions engaging enemy vessels and shore installations at incredibly long ranges approaching the open horizon itself. The evolution of the battleship into a housing platform for several large batteries of guns however proved its death knell as a class of naval vessel and even as a warship in general. With the advances of submersibles, air and space power, and missile technology, battleships proved to be cost ineffective investments. Even the best metal armor plating could rapidly be penetrated by increasingly advanced weapons technology and the size and scale of battleships made then extremely expensive to construct, much less maintain.
Starfleet notably does not currently employ battleships though after the tragedy of Wolf 359, there are plans of creating more tactically versatile Starfleet vessels or refitting current vessels with more offensive capabilities. Many Cruiser class vessels of Starfleet dedicate large amounts of its crew, power generation, and space to research, crew comfort, enrichment and exploration which during time of war can be rededicated to an increase of offensive and defensive capabilities. One often simulated theory is the concept of a 'War version' of the Galaxy-class starship which would be a dedicated warship, necessitating the removal of most civilians typically on board a Starfleet vessels, as well as everything from holodecks (except for tactical simulations of course) to astrometric labs. With minimal accommodations for a 'militarized' vessel, already large starships like the Galaxy and Excelsior-class could be updated with even more powerful shields, extra phaser banks and secure storage and deployment of even more potent photon and newer quantum torpedoes while the impressive sensor suits could be dedicated to scanning for enemy vessels for weak points in shields, or even laying out tachyon beams to detect the subtle distortions of cloaked starships.
Corvettes/Escorts:
The corvette or escort class can find its Earth origins in the sloop of war, the smallest class of warship. The Corvette is distinct from the intermediate classes as being solely a class of vessel dedicated to warfare and thus the corvette is a warship through and through. The original sloops role was to engage in anti-piracy operations (and sometimes engage in sanctioned piracy itself), coastal patrol and enforcing military policy in minor skirmishes or colonial and imperial expansion fulfilling a similar role to the Iron Gun Cutters of Andoria.
The evolution of these sloops into the corvette of the 20th century was defined largely as easy to produce vessels for a myriad of short term roles very similar to that of the sloops of previous centuries. Corvettes were often able to be built even by smaller or poorer nations as well. They served in a niche role admirably but the advent of naval weaponry made corvettes far more potent military vessels. Prior to the Third World War, corvettes were soon capable of being equipped with powerful antiship missiles and their small size lended them well to stealth technology and the capability of targeting far larger vessels with its small but potent armaments.
With the emergence of the Borg threat, the Federation soon floated the idea of a 'battle fleet' doctrine. Primary among this Battle Fleet would be a large number of 'Escort' class vessels, small dedicated warships solely meant to work in conjunction with larger Starfleet vessels in fleet battles similar to that of our shared maritime history. Recent 'official' advances in tactical technology, such as phase cannons, integrated nacelles, ablative armor plating and the evolution in tactical doctrine such as multi-vector attacks and simultaneous multiple targeting capability lend well to the development of a dedicated 'Escort' class. The main drawback however would be the assignment of Starfleet personnel to what is essentially a 'single mission' capable craft, that of warfighting.
Conclusion:
The great irony however is that a battleship and corvette/escort would only be capable of serving one of many roles, that of combat. Ultimately vessels of these classes would be of little use to Starfleet prior to, and soon after a truly serious conflict. However combat power is tied into space power and the Federation should never neglect the capability of refitting Starfleet for defense of its member worlds and to interdict and advocate on behalf of allied powers and protect the stability and progress of galactic civilization.
Therefore it would be wise and reasonable for Starfleet to take measured steps in maintaining the capability of both refitting its many cruisers into more tactically capable designs even if it is not necessary to create a dedicated 'battleship.' Federation scientists, engineers and designers have proven highly capable and adaptable and during tactical operations, those skills have truly proven exceptional time and time again. It is fully possible to empower our Starfleet to maintain readiness and increase capability by maintaining the capability of military refits of already in service starship designs even if they maybe prohibitively expensive.
The development of a dedicated escort or corvette class warship possesses even more potential and while generally more cost effective, also have their own potential drawbacks. Escort vessels would be ideal for support roles in a battle fleet, capable of engaging larger enemy vessels from multiple vectors and angles of assault while also increasing overall fleet survivability by being capable of engaging above peer opponents in direct ship to ship combat. Escort vessels requiring their own dedicated crew can be mitigated if, time permitting, crews can be re-assigned from less tactically capable starships to a dedicated escort warship and after a period of intensive training and retraining, be deployed in combat fleet operations. Once again, the versatility and extensive training and competence of Starfleet personnel would be an invaluable asset in this regard.
The important caveat is that Starfleet personnel are not expendable and oftentimes in history lighter classes of combat vessels incur severe casualties. The main impediment in adopting large numbers of escort vessels or the attack fighter variant of the Peregrine-class courier ship is that significant resources would still have to be invested in these dedicated small warships. The resource cost alone could mean that even an escort sized vessel could tradeoff significant expense in exchange for the crew survivability in a 'Battle Fleet.'
With the diminishment of the Borg threat it would be a mistake to abandon the progress made in recent years by Starfleet and the Federation in abandoning the advances made in the new 'Battle Fleet' doctrine. As the ancient classical Greek philosopher once stated "Our need will be the real Creator." While tactical roles and competency are a small component of a successful starship design, and likewise in a capable and competent Starfleet officer or crewmember, it is important for Starfleet to remain competitive in the realm of tactical capability. The Federations values are universal but are far from universally adopted by rival star powers, some of whom tragically still respect strength and the way of conquest over reason and the way of diplomacy.
Crewman First Class Olindra Trawas
Starfleet Tactical Doctrine and Theory School (The War College)
Tycho Base, Luna
T
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