Questers
20-08-2006, 09:04
[OOC: I wrote this for an insight into the RN, and to write out some of the stuff I like to talk about but never actually RP. Also, I'd like to stress at this point that my IC views do not always reflect my OOC character. I'm not some kind of communist mississippi.]
There are some people; some nations, that believe that, to give it its full title, His Majesty's Imperial Questarian Royal Navy, is the strongest, most fearsome organisation afloat. This is far from true, although it is by far the largest. In fact, despite its size, despite the sabre rattling of government and general populace, the Royal Navy itself is in fact alot weaker than it appears. Ranging down from general equipment to sailor conditions to strategic command, the Royal Navy is riddled with problems most armed forces have either cut down or stopped entirely.
The first problem the Royal Navy faces is size. The One Power Standard - enacted by Parliament some time ago, demands that the RN remains the largest force afloat (leeway time of a few months to catchup building programs), for protection of Quester's massive population and colonial holdings. This means that old ships that should have been retired decades ago are still in service - the Ocean class CVs, for example (the Fleet Air Arm being rejected completely, although that part comes later). Some carriers have been butchered for electronics, leaving them without RADAR or CIWS. In large fleet groups, carriers do not neccessarily require RADAR as much as escorts, but the problem still remains of faulty turbines and the dreaded catapult calibration errors that all FAA pilots have to bear in mind when taking off. It was recorded in the ship log of HMS Orwell, that;
Junior Airman George Staff was killed in action, 11:32 AM, when taking off for a routine Drug Patrol. An error with the ships catapult caused his biplane to ricochet off the deck and into the water. Loss: one airman. One RA-4 spotter plane. One catapult. Eight request for catapult and deck repair lodged.
We can see from this that menial tasks such as catapult maintenance are not high on the list of jobs for the Navy maintenance teams to conduct. Yet, they are hardly expensive and time consuming. Why then, are they not done, when lives are often lost? We see this from the shiplog of HMS Mountbatten [condensed].
17:44: Reached Port Hood.
21:11: Docked in Port Hood with the assistance of Dorsetshire, Exeter, and Manchester [60,000 ton cruisers] and approximately three hundred minor tugs.
21:15: Minor incident. Admirals Pinnace fell offboard and crushed a pair of civilian trawlers. Pinnace has to be replaced. The vessel will travel to Southampton to receive a replacement. 66 million GQP awarded in damages.
[Following day]
11:00: Repair work on Number One through Five guns on A turret begins. One casualty when a maintenance crewman falls down a raised 81cm barrel and breaks his leg. 900,000 GQP awarded in damages.
So we can see that the Navy funding goes to the battleship fleet, which, judging from the logs of HMS North Borneo, isn't exactly in great condition either! The North Borneo, a six million ton vessel, careered into Portsmouth Bay, crushing a small freighter [120,000 tons] under its bow and smashing right into the port. Although many attempts were made to move it, Portsmouth was made basically useless until the Hood sailed up to Portsmouth and dragged it out using specially made chains. One of the chain links is in Portsmouth Maritime Museum, and one can often see small children standing next to it, half its height, to get their picture taken. The reason for the crash? The rudder wore itself out and snapped. Considerable effort was made to replace all the rudders on vessels over a million tons from that date on.
So we can see that the ships themselves, while on paper may seem formidable vessels, are often in practice butchered for parts, or have not been well looked after or repaired in any case. Should the QRN have to massively mobilise like it did in the Juumanistra war once again, there would be severe problems. For one, the presence of a Joint Board of Admirals.
The Joint Board of Admirals is a board that is directly on par with the First Sea Lord, who makes all senior decisions. It is made up of the most senior (and the oldest, and only those with peerages) Naval Commanders. The Joint Board can, if all vote in favour, veto the actions made by the 1st SL, but they may not make actions themselves. Eitherway, the Sea Lord, who is usually a very busy person, delegates the Joint Board to do certain 'menial tasks', such as approving new Admirals. To this date, there has not been a single Admiral who has not been an upper class, Questarian. Interestingly enough, some of them are Japanese, or Singaporean. The large Japanese immigrant community in the north of Questers has gathered so much respect that the insult of 'slit eye', once commonly used, is in fact no longer applied in respect to the Japanese, although its used commonly when referring to Chinese or Korean. In fact, two out of the six Joint Board Admirals come from famous Japanese families! Odd, huh? Apart from that, there has only been a single female Admiral, and it may have been something to do with the fact her uncle was the First Sea Lord at that point.
The basic intolerance of the institution does not start at the Joint Board. In fact, it ends at the Joint Board, and begins at the very basic levels of sea. Poor colonial men, mostly Sudanese, South African (regionally) or Indian, are pressganged into the Navy. It is usually a joyous occasion for many a Questarian sailor, as promotions are handed out like candy at halloween when the 'expendable' colonials are drafted in to fill spots such as deck washing or low level engine work (nothing too trustworthy, however. The spot of coal shovelling is always filled by Colonial servicemen in the vessels that still use it. Yes, that's right, there are coalling vessels! Mostly internal troop transports, and some larger patrol cutters. There are, in fact, a class of coal powered battleships, although the coaling statiosn on those are manned by white Questarians. Colonial servicemen are essentially by tradition barred from serving on capital warships, apart from - you guessed it - aircraft carriers.
Another problem with the RN is its reliance, and non reliance on technology. For example, most naval guns still use cordite, heavy guns take precedence over missiles or torpedoes, and armour is considered a 'more practical way of defence than any of this RADAR nonsense.' Furthermore, construction techniques which are world class in some areas are lacking in others; for example the lack of trimarans in the navy. To quote Admiral Richmond - 'You will tell me that you will make a vessel move faster by tripling its beam? I am directing a war here. I have no time for such nonsense.' That was thirty years ago, and although the advantages of trimarans has been proved, the Admiralty is still stuck in its ways and refuses to allow them to join the Navy in any large quantity. Such 'devilish' construction features rank alongside submarines, mines, and high altitude bombing as 'Damned cowardly and un Questarian.'
Still, while all this is relatively unknown outside of the highest (and the lowsest..) levels of the Navy, the QRN will keep its status in international circles, whatever that may be.
[OOC: Comments plx!]
There are some people; some nations, that believe that, to give it its full title, His Majesty's Imperial Questarian Royal Navy, is the strongest, most fearsome organisation afloat. This is far from true, although it is by far the largest. In fact, despite its size, despite the sabre rattling of government and general populace, the Royal Navy itself is in fact alot weaker than it appears. Ranging down from general equipment to sailor conditions to strategic command, the Royal Navy is riddled with problems most armed forces have either cut down or stopped entirely.
The first problem the Royal Navy faces is size. The One Power Standard - enacted by Parliament some time ago, demands that the RN remains the largest force afloat (leeway time of a few months to catchup building programs), for protection of Quester's massive population and colonial holdings. This means that old ships that should have been retired decades ago are still in service - the Ocean class CVs, for example (the Fleet Air Arm being rejected completely, although that part comes later). Some carriers have been butchered for electronics, leaving them without RADAR or CIWS. In large fleet groups, carriers do not neccessarily require RADAR as much as escorts, but the problem still remains of faulty turbines and the dreaded catapult calibration errors that all FAA pilots have to bear in mind when taking off. It was recorded in the ship log of HMS Orwell, that;
Junior Airman George Staff was killed in action, 11:32 AM, when taking off for a routine Drug Patrol. An error with the ships catapult caused his biplane to ricochet off the deck and into the water. Loss: one airman. One RA-4 spotter plane. One catapult. Eight request for catapult and deck repair lodged.
We can see from this that menial tasks such as catapult maintenance are not high on the list of jobs for the Navy maintenance teams to conduct. Yet, they are hardly expensive and time consuming. Why then, are they not done, when lives are often lost? We see this from the shiplog of HMS Mountbatten [condensed].
17:44: Reached Port Hood.
21:11: Docked in Port Hood with the assistance of Dorsetshire, Exeter, and Manchester [60,000 ton cruisers] and approximately three hundred minor tugs.
21:15: Minor incident. Admirals Pinnace fell offboard and crushed a pair of civilian trawlers. Pinnace has to be replaced. The vessel will travel to Southampton to receive a replacement. 66 million GQP awarded in damages.
[Following day]
11:00: Repair work on Number One through Five guns on A turret begins. One casualty when a maintenance crewman falls down a raised 81cm barrel and breaks his leg. 900,000 GQP awarded in damages.
So we can see that the Navy funding goes to the battleship fleet, which, judging from the logs of HMS North Borneo, isn't exactly in great condition either! The North Borneo, a six million ton vessel, careered into Portsmouth Bay, crushing a small freighter [120,000 tons] under its bow and smashing right into the port. Although many attempts were made to move it, Portsmouth was made basically useless until the Hood sailed up to Portsmouth and dragged it out using specially made chains. One of the chain links is in Portsmouth Maritime Museum, and one can often see small children standing next to it, half its height, to get their picture taken. The reason for the crash? The rudder wore itself out and snapped. Considerable effort was made to replace all the rudders on vessels over a million tons from that date on.
So we can see that the ships themselves, while on paper may seem formidable vessels, are often in practice butchered for parts, or have not been well looked after or repaired in any case. Should the QRN have to massively mobilise like it did in the Juumanistra war once again, there would be severe problems. For one, the presence of a Joint Board of Admirals.
The Joint Board of Admirals is a board that is directly on par with the First Sea Lord, who makes all senior decisions. It is made up of the most senior (and the oldest, and only those with peerages) Naval Commanders. The Joint Board can, if all vote in favour, veto the actions made by the 1st SL, but they may not make actions themselves. Eitherway, the Sea Lord, who is usually a very busy person, delegates the Joint Board to do certain 'menial tasks', such as approving new Admirals. To this date, there has not been a single Admiral who has not been an upper class, Questarian. Interestingly enough, some of them are Japanese, or Singaporean. The large Japanese immigrant community in the north of Questers has gathered so much respect that the insult of 'slit eye', once commonly used, is in fact no longer applied in respect to the Japanese, although its used commonly when referring to Chinese or Korean. In fact, two out of the six Joint Board Admirals come from famous Japanese families! Odd, huh? Apart from that, there has only been a single female Admiral, and it may have been something to do with the fact her uncle was the First Sea Lord at that point.
The basic intolerance of the institution does not start at the Joint Board. In fact, it ends at the Joint Board, and begins at the very basic levels of sea. Poor colonial men, mostly Sudanese, South African (regionally) or Indian, are pressganged into the Navy. It is usually a joyous occasion for many a Questarian sailor, as promotions are handed out like candy at halloween when the 'expendable' colonials are drafted in to fill spots such as deck washing or low level engine work (nothing too trustworthy, however. The spot of coal shovelling is always filled by Colonial servicemen in the vessels that still use it. Yes, that's right, there are coalling vessels! Mostly internal troop transports, and some larger patrol cutters. There are, in fact, a class of coal powered battleships, although the coaling statiosn on those are manned by white Questarians. Colonial servicemen are essentially by tradition barred from serving on capital warships, apart from - you guessed it - aircraft carriers.
Another problem with the RN is its reliance, and non reliance on technology. For example, most naval guns still use cordite, heavy guns take precedence over missiles or torpedoes, and armour is considered a 'more practical way of defence than any of this RADAR nonsense.' Furthermore, construction techniques which are world class in some areas are lacking in others; for example the lack of trimarans in the navy. To quote Admiral Richmond - 'You will tell me that you will make a vessel move faster by tripling its beam? I am directing a war here. I have no time for such nonsense.' That was thirty years ago, and although the advantages of trimarans has been proved, the Admiralty is still stuck in its ways and refuses to allow them to join the Navy in any large quantity. Such 'devilish' construction features rank alongside submarines, mines, and high altitude bombing as 'Damned cowardly and un Questarian.'
Still, while all this is relatively unknown outside of the highest (and the lowsest..) levels of the Navy, the QRN will keep its status in international circles, whatever that may be.
[OOC: Comments plx!]