Chapter 24: Earth is the Cradle of Mankind

Earth is the cradle of mankind, but man cannot live in the cradle forever.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

Terry Wagner's family and clan continued to bond, both emotionally and as a mission team. Administrators had unthinkingly termed it the 17th Naval District Intelligence and Reconnaissance Team. Terry actually found the "17th DIRT" rather amusing.

Moe Berg, the naval unit commander, moved back and forth between the intelligence team, and the DIRT vessels being modified. Regularly assigned were the Minuit-class Jervis Bay and Sancho Panza. Four Mercury-class worked with the main ships, although it was not yet clear if they would be assigned to the team. The ships also had Housecat and Galileo shuttles.

"Maslow," Terry asked the AI instance most concerned with CAP scores, "I've got an organizational problem. CAP still seems to weight for combat skills and aggressiveness. I need to be able to give line authority to some technical people, and possibly some military to status to technical specialists that aren't in the line of command. Mary has already demonstrated field and organization leadership. Of course, she has detailed medical knowledge. Catherine, Kim, and Elaine all have been running intelligence functions. I want to make all of them commanders, at the least. Dolores should stay senior. If Mary runs medical, we might want her as a major to start -- Navy people are used to high-ranking medical people."

Maslow agreed in principle, but also wanted Ishmael, Terry's personal AI instance, to get involved. "Terry," said Ishmael, "I'm trying to respect your chain of command. You could suggest to Moe, however, that Athena needs to get some field experience to move into promotable areas. Dawn and Beatrice are OK in the technical leadership role, but, given Athena is dominant and the senior wife, she needs, I think, to be promoted before any of his others."

"On your side, Karen and Gayle are blossoming in the Sanity Team, while Bob and Siobhan also are strong. Get them onto missions. This is one reason I authorized a second ship, plus space back at DIA and Midway. You have to have your people dispersed, and they need to be away from your immediate command to get confidence in their own skills.

"Ishmael, we still face my greatest challenge, which is convincing Harry Sinatra to join us. I realize that I've been holding up our structure for him. Many of us will need to wear multiple hats for quite a while. Just as I command, work with operations, and run MASINT, I expect him to be my deputy for intelligence and to run IMINT. He will be more than that, though; he's a born mentor.

"If we can get him to think, in a parental way, about the people and the organization, we'll have him. Given his intelligence rank, may I assume we can authorize him as an unescorted visitor to all of our facilities, even if he has not accepted a Confederacy rank? Technically, that's a security violation, but I trust him to be discreet."

"We will agree to that, subject to monitoring and review. He is not to leave Earth orbit without joining the Confederacy forces."

"All right, please give me a link to Elaine and Kim, Dolores, Bob, and Siobhan.

"We've all talked about Harry. We may need more people, including some of Aimee's recruits, but let's start with you now. Elaine and Kim are closest to him professionally and personally. I want Siobhan and Bob to help understand parental motivations. Dolores is the all-purpose changer of minds, and knows the new recruits.

"Marietta and Wanda certainly can be aimed at him.

"Later, we'll set up a session where he joins Moe, Dennis, Beatrice, and Vic in brainstorming tactical scenarios. Add Louise to that, and probably the ship tactical officers. Moe, could you have the captains and tactical officers join us?"

The five key people joined Terry and Norwegian, to discuss the Harry situation. "Elaine, I sense you've been talking to him most closely. What's your assessment?"

"He believes in what we do, and is excited about the ideas. My best guess is that he's been going through preparing himself for death, even though he doesn't seem ill. I have the sense that he's trying to come up with acceptance, in the Elizabeth Kubler-Ross sense.

"I think he knows, intellectually, that we can do it, but it isn't fitting emotionally. Speaking of rejuvenation, let's get Rona to join us." She subvocalized a call. <<Dolores, you're still twenty years younger than he is, but you and Terry are the next oldest of us. I know he's of the WWII generation and you aren't, but what do you think?>>

Dolores spoke softly. "Yes, I've seen the resignation to the end belief before. Sometimes, it's even joyous, as in Robert Louis Stevenson's epitaph for himself:

Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie:
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you 'grave for me:
Here he lies where he long'd to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.

"I'm not sure how to break that. He needs to feel lively. Sensuality, not just sex alone, is important -- feed him as well as fuck him. I get him as seeing the community as his children, but getting him to agree to fatherhood might break things loose. Elaine, we can't have secrets now -- have you told him you'd bear his children?"

"Yes, Dolores, I have, and I mean it. Terry, any problem with reversing my birth control?" Terry shook his head in the negative. "Does anyone know anything about his love life earlier on? Would multiple wives or girlfriends appeal to him?

"Oh. He is Catholic. How did we forget Father Dan, with his many insights?

Dan arrived. "While I can't, of course, go into spiritual exchanges with him, I haven't had many. My suspicion is that he's steeped in some of the older doctrines of purgatory. Pope Pius X counseled that resignation to death could avoid it, and advised the prayer 'Eternal Father, from this day forward, I accept with a joyful and resigned heart the death it will please You to send me, with all its pains and sufferings.'

"I hope I'm not being blasphemous, but this somehow reminds me of the 'Suicide is Painless' subplot in the movie version of MAS*H. Oh, it was done for comedy, but the elements of sedating him and lowering his defenses, and then slipping one or more loving women into his bed, is internally consistent. My question is whether it's ethical.

"St. Thomas Aquinas, in discussing the Principle of Double Effect, wrote ' ... though proceeding from a good intention, an act may be rendered unlawful if it be out of proportion to the end. Wherefore, if a man in self-defense uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful, whereas, if he repel force with moderation, his defense will be lawful.'

"In our case, I think the question is whether it would be licit to limit Harry's autonomy with drugs and seduction. Normally, I would say not. But in this case, if he is made aware of what has been done, it is aimed at the greater good of protecting humanity and the Confederacy, and he is given absolute freedom to make whatever informed choice he desires once he sees all the alternatives, I can, with difficulty, agree to it."

Dolores said, "I think preparing women to push his buttons is my job. Wanda and Marietta, let's put you in some fifties styles, on the strong style, to get his attention. You both have small waists, but you might want to consider a corset to make an hourglass figure especially obvious, as well as letting him seductively see corset and stockings. The stiletto heel came in the late fifties, so you can get away with it. I'm assuming fifties, more or less, as his intellectual erotic peak.

"Elaine, you aren't going to be as voluptuous as Wanda, but you have a small waist and a big bust. We can dress you to emphasize the difference. He might like the shape given by a conical or "torpedo" bra, so I think you should wear one. When you get close, though, be sure they touch him -- a lot. You can begin doing that against his arm while studying together. Find out if he likes to watch any women's' athletics; Kim might try to fill some image. Cheerleader probably never hurts.

"All of you do some light touching and kissing of one another, and watch his reaction. If girl-girl seems to excite him, do more. If it turns him off, do less.

"Marietta, if you two agree, you could be his concubine. You're also probably qualified to be his secretary or administrator." Dolores giggled." You, Wanda, if things are a little relaxed, could be talking about overhead scanning of geological features, gesture a lot and, in the sort of geological sense, let your boulders fall out. It's probably not a bad idea to have him a bit tipsy.

"Keep some erectile dysfunction drugs on hand. He may not need them at all. If he does accept rejuvenation, he won't need them. The nanites will do all that is needed.

"Let's focus on how to get him rejuvenated even without a commitment to enlist."

Soon after Dan, the relevant ships' officers joined the discussion: Dennis Wreford-Brown and Donna-Sue Fulton from the Jervis Bay, and V.A.C. "Vic" Crutchley IV and Galina Petrov from the Sancho Panza.

"Moe," asked Terry, "I know we have little hard data on how the Sa'arm operate. Nevertheless, I assume you have a set of assumptions that you'll use to plan your orders?"

"Terry, we agree that we want to avoid combat while collecting strategic intelligence, but the Sa'arm may not cooperate. I think we first have to consider what to do when we encounter Sa'arm vessels in space, and can't avoid them. After all, space travel is going to be the basis of anything else.

"There are at least two basic in-space scenarios, from what we've learned from the AIs. Mind you, I am dubious the AIs have a solid idea about Sa'arm tactics – ships tend not to come back, and they haven't aggressively looked for tactics.

"The more common tactic is when they will attempt to englobe, board, and take technology. The second, and it's less clear when this happens, is when they attack a ship intending to kill it. I suppose we should add a third, since there will be times we need lethal attack against their unsuspecting ships that block our course.

"Next, we need to think about planetary defense against raids and landings. As we start to land on McMaster-3, let's think how bad guys would do it, and begin our defenses from the first landing on.

"It's not yet clear to me how wise it would be to attack planets that the Sa'arm are even starting to colonize. We don't really know if they use intermediate staging bases, or just hive off when they start to exhaust the resources of a planet.

"It's far more likely, though, that we might attack isolated outposts to collect materials or information. Some ground combat might be a contingency operation. At one end, we might put raiders down to kill -- not wound -- some Sa'arm so we can bring back bodies for necropsy. On a planetary probe, we might encounter their atmospheric or subluminal vehicles. They may have ground combat vehicles -- we simply don't have a good idea. The videos seemed to show them on foot, coming out of flying machines, and, in a couple of images, the ground.

"Luckily, many of the weapons we would develop are flexible and can be used in many of those roles."

"In space, engagement range is a major question. We can be fairly sure that there will be short-range combat if they try to englobe. We also might need to take down scouts, either exploring or patrolling. Right now, we emphatically do not want to fight fleet actions. For those functions, we'll need weapons systems with ranges perhaps in the hundreds of kilometers, and sometimes much less. We might need some long-range weapons to discourage pursuit."

"All these things will need launchers, which also will serve for sensor and countermeasures payloads. I'd like to begin by talking about the basic dimensions -- form factors if you prefer -- of the payloads we need to fire from launchers, and then get into the launchers and associated equipment. Remember, we have a start on this with some pods and off-the-shelf revolving ordnance launchers."

"I'm not a tactician," said Siobhan, "but I know a hell of a lot about situational awareness. The impression I get, from material in the Confederacy database, is that the Swarm probably doesn't have a lot of sensors and fusion – but what if we are wrong, especially in our early recon phases?

"I'm thinking that it's wise that we use a lot of counterdetection, not limited to formal stealth. In talking with Catherine, I happened to mention a line from The Moon is a Harsh Mistress: "jingle—jangle with radars". I've always liked it. If you look at the French Essiam satellite clusters, essiam ironically meaning swarm, they use multiple linked sensors to create a large synthetic aperture. For radar and other active surveillance, though, not all the transmitters need to be on at once – what they call multistatic radar. If we surround the ship with a set of tethered or station-keeping radar transmitters, and turn them on and off in a pseudo-random pattern, it's going to be a lot harder to locate the ship from the emissions.

"When I say 'surround', take that with a grain of salt. Picture a square matrix, or even a flag layout, with the ship perhaps around the blue and white part. The matrix doesn't need to be symmetrical around the ship."

Moe's eyebrows rose. "I like that. Maybe we could create a pod with a big radar transmitter, appropriate receivers for feedback, a large if limited duration power supply, and station-keeping repulsor-attractors. We could certainly put passive sensors on it to be part of synthetic apertures.

"Where does this fit into our priorities and who develops it? I can see giving it to some of the ship sensor officers."

Gayle asked, "What would be your tactical scenario where you need very long range missiles but have nothing in pods? Isn't that more a situation where you need to get away rather than fight?

"Fair question. I suppose that assumes the Sa'arm have sent very heavy forces, and we want to slow their advance while we escape. You have me thinking. Quite possibly, it would be better to use long-range missiles to deliver decoys rather than warheads.

"Get Donna-Sue and Galina to assemble a team to start assembling scenarios, and then tactical responses. Remind them that they have to have responses that can be delegated to a team -- the tactical officer's expertise is running a battle, not firing missiles.

Speaking to Chloe and her team, Moe said, "Weapons don't do us much good until we can launch them. Before the launchers can work, however, they have to be able to release stores from the pod. We will have the nanites modify a pod to have a pair of six-meter-square hatches on top and underneath, or possibly triple four-meter-square hatches. There will need to be a false floor for the bottom launchers, so people can walk around them.

"As I understand the factory replicator, it can do a full pod volume, and, up to some weight limit, can fill everything in that pod. If the equipment isn't too heavy -- the standard pod is 54 tons -- the pod can be manufactured with equipment already in it.

"A Galileo would probably fit through that opening, but I wouldn't feel safe with it flying in. Perhaps, though, we could plan on it stopping outside and be recovered by tractors.

"For signal cabling, we will adapt the basic system used between the AN/ALE-47countermeasures controller and the AN/ALE-50 towed decoy, but with more fibers for greater bandwidth. We'll need a stronger cable for the actual tether, but that upgrade is a simple matter to leave to the AI. It will contain signal, power, and strengthening sub-cables. AIs are excellent for well-defined improvement tasks, although they aren't as intuitive as are humans.

"Therefore, I'd like you to start building medium rotary launchers, derived from the for the B-1B bomber. Remember that we want the option to lock together the two launchers in a pod, so they can fire extra-long stores such as the SM-6.

"I know the medium rotary launcher was tested on an elevated platform in a simulated pod, and worked well. After all, it was based the working B-1 launcher. Final testing will have to be in the airless, gravity-free space environment. That should be one of the first priorities to orbit.

"With a triple ejector rack, each light tube can handle three 6" MALD long-range decoys, 7" HIM-120 AMRAAM aerospace-to-aerospace missiles, 10" HGM-88 HARM radar killers, or 12" HGM-65 Mavericks or GBU-53 Small Diameter Bombs. We will have to modify it so it's not dependent on gravity for the release, but that's probably straightforward placing of a repulsor in the aft end of the rack. Do think about a different launch variant, where we could have several full-diameter but short stores in the same tube.

"If you can, get an Air Force specialist detailed to help us. Dolores has some contacts with the B-1 people at Robins AFB, from which she got the medium launcher that we scanned in the replicator.

"The heavy launchers-- are the next priority. 2.2 meter is nice for weapons, and is just small enough to be the tube diameter for a triple rotary launcher. It isn't ideal for the larger satellites. Harry Sinatra had an idea for an alternate fit for up to 2.5 meter, or even larger.

Dolores broke in; saying "Is that something where we can involve Harry? That both gets his expertise, and gets him involved with us."

Terry responded, "Maybe as part of a requirements review. It's broader than his idea alone. Hmmm. Wanda, will you go see him and start talking about reconnaissance for deep penetrator bombs?"

Giggling, Dolores said "Great symbolism to deep penetrating, hmmm? Wanda, I have an idea. Now, we can have him briefed on your academic achievements, but I don't think he's seen you. When you do meet, we'll give you some private time. Tell him, in a very relaxed way, that you are stripping and fucking your way through school. Tell him you can be completely professional with him, but, if he wants, you can play physically with no strings for him -- you like your work."

"Let's return to the light rotary launcher, I'm not convinced it buys us that much, unless we hold its length to 10' and can put three 24- or more tube light rotaries into a pod.

"There's also what I'll call ultralight: the 5" diameter, 36" long sonobuoy size that we'll use mostly for unattended ground sensors, and the very small packages –think a big highway flare – for chaff, decoy flares, and disposable jammers. There has also been some work with using that form factor for disposable intelligence sensors, starting with atmospheric chemical samplers. While the light launcher can fire the 5" form factor from multiple ejector racks, I suspect it's a lot simpler and higher density to magazine-launch them."

"Let me explain what I mean by magazine launch. An antisubmarine aircraft has each sonobuoy in its own launch tube, which is simple and fits into otherwise unusable space. Since we might have a lot more to drop, I'd rather assume that we use a taller launcher, with the 5" diameter stores stacked several units high. By selecting the tube, we still can select the store, without using a rotary. It's something like a vertical launch system."

SGM Ruby Thomas added, "Magazine launch is also a lot easier than rotary or pylon launch, in that we can give significant separation velocity to the stores being dropped. It's surprising, and scary to many, to discover that releasing a bomb or missile, from a bomb bay or pylon, is not simple, especially in air. You may not get adequate separation, or it can crash into the launch vehicle."

Terry continued. "In addition, we need to space adapt the AN/ALE-47 decoy dispenser into the space-rated AN/HLE-47, which will fire off flares, chaff and expendable jammers. The controller part can control multiple dispensers, which we have to modify to work without gravity.

"The HLE-47 can also control an AN/ALE-50 towed decoy. That's also going to need work to operate without gravity, and if thrust vectors change. Right now, it streams behind aircraft, but that's on a platform with considerable forward motion. HLE-50's might be most important for Housecats and tenders. They might be a little big for a Galileo. The HLE-50 is a radar decoy. Chances are that we need either a combined IR/radar, or IR alone."

The Pirate "sanity team" pointed out that while the core group knew quite a bit about ship modification and sensors, as well as the use of weapons, they were not as strong in the design, manufacturing, and preliminary tests of missiles. Terry agreed. "I know. We'll get help from the tactical people, but I'm really waiting for Louise Washington." With that caveat, Beatrice spoke about some techniques that would be useful in taking weapons that now worked in atmosphere, and making them usable in space. The greatest challenge was that such weapons changed direction using steering fins, which would not work without air. They would have to be replaced by some combination of Confederacy attractor/repulsors, and Earth rocket thrusters.

Gayle explained, "You've probably heard that hydrogen peroxide thrusters were used in WWII, and but the modern standard was some hydrazine fuel and red fuming nitric oxide oxidizer. That's not the case any more. Hydrogen peroxide monopropellants for thrusters and for driving pumps had been considered obsolete, but a research program of the European Space Agency gave new life to the technology. While 90% hydrogen peroxide was still not quite the thing to put on one's hair, unless one wanted literally flaming red, it was still safer to use than the long-accepted hydrazine. The Europeans found a new fluidized bed method for turning it into steam. A European missile consortium, MBDA, had been experimenting with using it in a modular thruster ring to replace the control fin assembly of the Meteor air-to-air missile. The Meteor has the same 7" form factor as the AMRAAM.