Talk:Colonial Fleet (TRS)/Archive 1

Battlestar/Ship Loss Count[edit]

Matt72986 made an interesting, though I think incorrect catch regarding what we think Starbuck has said in the Mini-Series about the Adama's information on the loss of 30 battlestars in the opening hours of the Cylon attack. She says, "That's a quarter of the fleet." From here we've collectively presumed that she spoke only of 30 out of 120 battlestars.

While Matt could be right as there may be other ships, there is one assumption that RDM has not appeared to change from the TOS to the RDM continuity. While there are certainly other kinds of Colonial military vessels, likely designed to carry or deploy troops, or supply other ships, the battlestar is THE battleship/carrier/capital warship of the Fleet. All other ships are deployed to service it, not the reverse (unless an older battlestar supports a more advanced one).

The only other Colonial fleet ships noted in RDM are:

Variations of the Space Park (although the one in the ragtag fleet is not military)
Unidentified ships in the Scorpion Fleet Shipyards that were destroyed along with 3 other battlestars

I'd be happy to return Matt's change if there is a significant reason to think that the battlestar is not the primary and most abundant fighting warship in the fleet. Kara was shocked when she heard the news--an armada of battlestars--let alone one, like Galactica--is a mighty deterrent, or so they thought. Comments? Are we misinterpreting Kara's statement? --Spencerian 23:27, 13 December 2005 (EST)

There are other ships, but they're really just support vessels. I really think this was the writers inserting into dialogue a way of saying that "there were 120 Battlestars in the fleet" without staring right into the camera and saying "audience; there were 120 Battlestars (including Galactica)"; they just wanted to make it feel more organic and say "wow 30 battlestars were lost before we even knew what hit us" "really? ONE FOURTH of our Fleet?". In context (and "context matters"), I really think they meant this as 120 Battlestars. Does anyone have access to the DVD commentary for the Miniseries?--Ricimer 23:39, 13 December 2005 (EST)

I agree. Adama states that there were specifically 30 battlestars lost which qualifies Thrace's response. --Peter Farago 04:09, 14 December 2005 (EST)

The main reason I chose to edit the information is because I was going on what is canon. All we know for sure is that she said that's a quarter of the fleet. I admit Kara might have meant 120 Battlestars. But as Ricimer pointed out, context does matter. Her specific words were "that's a quarter of the fleet". So the question is, did she mean fleet of Battlestars, or the Fleet itself? I think it is more likely she meant the Fleet. Remember, the Fleet is analagous to the Navy. So if someone says to me "we lost 30 aircraft carriers" and I say "that's a quarter of the Navy", that just means that there's 120 ships in the Navy and that those 30 carriers represent one quarter of the Navy. Now if I had responded "that's a quarter of the fleet" one could assume I was referring to the fleet of carriers. However, we can't make that assumption in this case because the organization itself happens to have the same name as the military term. So until we know for sure, I think it makes sense to say "ships" in the wiki, because ships could be either something else or Battlestars, so it accounts for both possible meanings of what she said.

Also to support my belief I point to the timeline. There were 12 Battlestars created at the start of the war 40 years ago. That would mean they built 108 of these massive ships in 40 years. If we do the math, a Battlestar is approximately 24 times the volume of an aircraft carrier, so it would require the resources to build about 2592 Nimitz-class carriers (and that's not even counting the more advanced tech a battlestar has over a carrier). Even with 12 worlds working together that seems unlikely, especially given the other expenditures a 12-world government must have.

--matt72986

I'm sorry, that reading just doesn't work for me. The U.S. Navy has twelve aircraft carriers - if someone tells me three aircraft carriers have been destroyed, "that's a quarter of the fleet" would be a perfectly correct response. --Peter Farago 15:21, 14 December 2005 (EST)

Don't twist my words; by "context matters" I meant that in the sentence immediately before that, they had been referring to 30 Battlestars, and in that context I feel that they were referring to 120 Battlestars total. The fleet is Battlestar-based, with other ships just forming support units.

FURTHER, you don't think that 12 space-faring worlds have the capability of making a military that big? REMEMBER: RDM's Blog stated that they kept a disproportionately large PEACETIME military (someone was asking why there were so many battlestars if they hadn't actively fought a major war in 40 years, besides the usual brushfires on Sagitarron, etc) and he said it was because the Colonials actually came to the brink of defeat several times in the first Cylon War, and they were really scared after it ended so they kept a large military anyway for fear the Cylons would return.--Ricimer 15:27, 14 December 2005 (EST)

Deep breaths, Ricimer. --Peter Farago 15:43, 14 December 2005 (EST)

Best to strike while the iron is hot. --Ricimer 16:24, 14 December 2005 (EST)

To reinforce what Peter said--a carrier is typically the central ship in a carrier group, surrounded perhaps with a few destroyers, cruisers, and other smaller units. If the carrier were taken out, the effective fighting power of that unit is all but gone since air supremacy will determine the survival of the smaller ships. If a battlestar is taken out, the remainder of the battlestar group, its support ships, likely haven't a prayer for the same space fighter superiority reason. With that in mind, when Kara says a quarter of the fleet, this isn't likely aren't strictly the battlestars in this context, but all of its support vessels as well. THAT would make the context very appropriate, and may also explain why we didn't get any secondary military vessels to join up with Galactica: they were probably destroyed easier than the battlestars. I also think battlestar groups are larger than others and contain several battlestars (or there are fewer groups), so some battlestars may have been eliminated solo, but some patrolling groups were also hit. As Galactica was being decommissioned and older, she was likely part of another battlestar group, but on solo patrol. I also generally agree with Ricimer: The Colonies became close to being anilihilated in Cylon War I. The various things they did during and after: primitive technology, the heft of original battlestars, Case Orange, the Articles of Colonization--all point to a government and society brought to its knees. They would be enough people who lived through that to ensure that they would never have that happen again. Since there are 12 worlds, then it stands that each world's forces are pretty vast since, as Douglas Adams said, space is big. Really big.--Spencerian 15:55, 14 December 2005 (EST)

Indeed, it is so big that there is practically nothing in it. --Ricimer 16:26, 14 December 2005 (EST)

I concur. If you have a fleet of 2 Battlestars and 8 support craft (destroyers, cruisers, whatever), and you lose one of the Battlestars, you didn't lose a tenth of the fleet. You lost half the fleet (or half of the effective fighting power anyway). The odds of a capital ship like a Battlestar going down without losing most of its supporting ships would be poor anyway. --Steelviper 16:12, 14 December 2005 (EST)

To Peter: I know how many carriers the US Navy has. My point was the names of the military organizations, not the number of ships.

To Ricimer: First, you need to calm down. This is a place for friendly discussion. Second, I did not twist anything. I know exactly what you meant when you said "context matters". My point was that we also have to look at the context of the word "fleet" in the Galactica universe.

I think that is the point everyone is kind of missing here. What I am pointing out is that "Fleet" and "fleet" in the BSG universe have a very different meaning. "Fleet" refers to the organization itself (see Navy analogy). "fleet" refers to a group of ships, in this case possibly the Battlestars. My main point is that we should make this Wiki as screen-accurate as possible to ensure it remains canon. We do not know if Kara meant "fleet" or "Fleet". Until such time as we do, we should not make assumptions in either direction and use the word "ships" in place of "battlestars" because "ships" accomodates both possible solutions. "Battlestars" assumes she said "fleet" and that is an assumption which should not be made.

PS - Maybe they could make 120 battlestars, maybe they couldn't. I was just adding that for food for thought.

--matt72986