Cardassian Ship Technology

[Aaron]

It's at the top of this page and was mentioned somewhere on the last as well.

[kostmayer]

Sorry, you just remind me a great deal of someone we've booted twice for stupidity. He had a fetish for super powered whales, among other things.

To be honest, I did not know what the heck you were talking about whales and answered accordingly. What is a super powered whale? I do not know and I am not really interested, I put it down as something only used to offend me.

I'd hope Chakat wasn't really booted for stupidy, but for his behaviour and personal attacks on other members.

Atekimogus - Chakat is a former member who members of the forum still take great delight in making fun off. It comes off as a little elitist to me, but Chakat was an idiot and an ass, so I let it go. What is annoying is when members compare other members (usualy newer ones) to Chakat for behaving nothing like him.

Also, not being as informed as someone else doesn't make them stupid - not everyones a military expert - doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to contribute to a conversation without being called a retard (another insult being thrown around which is beginning to get on my wick).

Again, I'm pretty sure I'm alone in all this and will get shouted down, but behaviour like this really ruins my enjoyment of this board sometimes.

[Lazar]

Wow...that is ugly. Yet strangely appealing.

Just like... no, I'll refrain.

[Aaron]

I'd hope Chakat wasn't really booted for stupidy, but for his behaviour and personal attacks on other members.

Atekimogus - Chakat is a former member who members of the forum still take great delight in making fun off. It comes off as a little elitist to me, but Chakat was an idiot and an ass, so I let it go. What is annoying is when members compare other members (usualy newer ones) to Chakat for behaving nothing like him.

Also, not being as informed as someone else doesn't make them stupid - not everyones a military expert - doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to contribute to a conversation without being called a retard (another insult being thrown around which is beginning to get on my wick).

Again, I'm pretty sure I'm alone in all this and will get shouted down, but behaviour like this really ruins my enjoyment of this board sometimes.

No it grates on me as well, I'm just as guilty of it as some of the others and I'm trying to mellow out. I think some people are just tired of covering the same ground and letting frustration get the better of them.

[Tsukiyumi]

I'm happy to go over the basics of what we've covered before.

[Deepcrush]

My point beeing that tactics change due to technology and that ground combat tactics are also likley to be different from todays warfare? O....K!

Tactics change but the objectives stay the same. If you have one tactic or a thousand... if you just sit there talking about it without using it then it doesn't mean anything. War is about gain. If you aren't making gains then you are losing because you are giving your enemy time to make their own gains. Either in planets controled or in the defenses of those planets.

In space I have the ultimate choice of blasting the planet into a lifeless rock. Now we know the UFP would never do that (they would use Genesis ) but still it is an option you sitting on the ground do not have. In space I have the option to ferry troops to your planet from the whole of the UFP, you sitting on your planet are limited to your local ressources. Yes I very much would prefer such a situation because it is superior to the ground forces to the point were resistance is almost suicide and the best course of action would be surrendering and hoping a relieve force from space arrives.

First, the UFP using Genesis, you're right in that they'd never use it. So don't waste time bringing it up. When pointing out order of battle, tactical deployments etc. You should work on those that you feel would be able tactics. Not ones where you're pointing out what we already know.

Second, the allies believed that just leaving Cardassia Prime alone would allow the Dominion to rebuild. Most ships in the CU fleet are small enough to be built on planet side. That means if you leave them be, you may face a fleet of small attack craft jumping you off guard. A few ram ships did a number on the Klingon fleet at First Battle of Chitoka. Leaving a planet alone for weeks or months would mean whole squadrons of such ships. You'd be counting your dead by the thousands and you wouldn't gain a thing. The CU only has one heavily populated world and that is C-Prime. Also, if you've never faced an enemy who is backed into a corner. You'd be shocked to see how fast they seem to stop minding the idea of suicide as long as they take you with them.

Third, you again missed the whole point of war. You cannot win a war by air superiority alone. So your whole thing of "I pick to be good in space make me win" fails. If air power could win a war then England would have lost the Battle of Britain. However, they continued to replace losses and held out their defenses against a superior opponent.

Of course they are defended. But the more heavily defended they are and the more troops you accumulate for defense the more suspectible do they become to orbital bombardment. Considering the accuracy of starfleet phaser (or energy weapons in star trek on the whole) I would think there is an upper limit on how well defended those things can be before some Admiral in Orbit decides that collateral damage is acceptable, blast away.

Again, you are taking the factor that your weapons will bypass the planet based defenses. A poor judgement for any field commander. Also, what counts and acceptable collateral damage? New York City is under enemy control. You have the option of blasting the city from orbit but what would you need to count as acceptable? 3 million dead men women and children for how many enemy troops. If you're just going to level a planet then you have no reason to bother with the war. Otherwise you're just giving up people's lives for nothing.

The only difficulty would be in densly populated areas with the defenders using the local population as meat shields then, yes I agree with you that you need to go down in force but the deactivation of those devices preventing you from beaming etc would still be a main priority.

Fine, the ECM would be your priority that still requires ground forces. Again you are left that you cannot win a war without using troops on the ground. Once your enemy sees you are afraid to commit to a ground battle in a city then every world they land on and every world they hold will have troops packed into every city they can. Losses that at one time could be held to mostly that of the armed forces will skyrocket when civilians become fair game.

I understand, though to be fair my argument was with Rochey

Your debate was the people of DITL, Rochey was just your intended target.

who was of the opinion that the CU had an advantage over the UFP in terms of ground combat - therefore the UFP made overtures to peace - while I was of the opinion that space superiority would be a primary goal and that I do not see how the CU is better in ground combat.

The CU has shown that it is able to match the UFP during the UFP-CU War. That is dispite the fact that as you say the UFP has so many worlds to draw from. The CU is also the only faction to use Armored Infantry in ST. As there is evidence that the CU is pound for pound the better in ground combat then to run a debate you should prove otherwise.

Therefore you more or less have choosen to be annoyed at me but thats ok. If people who are not saying their mind at all times are passive and soft for you or just civilised and polite is also a matter of opinion and I fear we must agree to disagree on this point.

I haven't choosen to be annoyed, stupid things just bug me is all. As to civilised, I find people who can't speak openly and or honestly as uncivilized and very non polite. For "agree to disagree"... NO, not a chance. Opinion is only open when there is a lack of fact and things fall in to the guess range. Objectives of warfare are not open for opinion. Victory is gained on certain factors involving taking the battle to the enemy and ending the ability and will to continue fighting.

Sigh, I fear I was again unclear. The whole argument stems from my viewpoint that space superiority is far more important because without a ship in orbit you cannot even begin to send troops to a planet. I think I wrote that "space superiority is all that matters", that is probably a bit exaggerated but to the point. And if the planet you "liberate" from enemy space forces, shipyards etc has nothing worth whatsoever on the surface aside from the local cardassian population and they have no interstellar capability left on the planet, why should you conquer them?

This boils down to "since they don't have it now that they can never have it". Again this is a VERY BAD tactic for winning a war. You're also counting on the CU not having things like metal or other planet based resources on their home planet.

But what could the Baku do appart from delaying the inevitable? If you destroy the whole interstellar capability of your enemy and then jump right at the jugular - eg Cardassia Prime - this should be sufficent to win the war. There is no need to brutally conquer each and every planet in the CU.

If you leave captured planets behind to attack the enemies homeworld. What do you think that they're troops are going to do to your people when they get word of your forces bombing their capital?

I stand by my point that space superiority seems to be the most important factor in star trek wars.

Your first point was that sapce superiority would win the war, not be the most important factor. The uses of space superiority and ground superiority were pointed out to you as part of a greater battle plan.

To be honest, I did not know what the heck you were talking about whales and answered accordingly. What is a super powered whale? I do not know and I am not really interested, I put it down as something only used to offend me.

Don't worry about it. I was starting to think that you were related to our friendly furball.

I think we had a difference of opinion but if you think that it is only my beeing stupid and such it is also ok, it is not my job to convince you of my point of view.

It is in fact your job to do so as you are in a debate and are speaking against thousands of years of warfare.

[Deepcrush]

It's kind of like waving a blanket at a bull.

Did someone just call me a bull?

[Aaron]

It's kind of like waving a blanket at a bull.

Did someone just call me a bull?

No, I used an analogy illustrating that poorly thought out posts are a magnet for you.

[Deepcrush]

Its not my fault... I like hitting people anytime I get an excuse. Can't do that online so I take it to a metaphor.

[Coalition]

Cardie ships may be weak individually, but they're well-built, and up against anything but a Federation battleship (like the GCS or Neb) they'd probably give good account of themselves. I suspect that, overall, the Cardassians got the worst of the space actions during the war, but proved superior to the Feds on the ground. Hence, while the Feds had control of space, they couldn't beat a well equipped Cardassian army - a prerequisite for actually winning the war. Of course, they should have been able to simply flatten any Cardie positions from orbit, but the Federation smacks rather strongly of an entity that would be excessively squemish about orbital bombardment. The result was a stalemate, and both sides surrendering territory at the treaty.

To me, the Cardassians seemed to have their own form of imagination and extreme discipline. Those two features combined could be useful in a military organization. Sufficient discipline to hold to a plan in spite of casualties, but having the imagination to change the plan when something goes wrong.

That would make the Cardassians very dangerous. They would accept the lack of creature comforts the Federation takes for granted, meaning their ships are much more dangerous ton for ton. Their crews are highly disciplined, so even if something kills the person next to them, they will remain at their posts. Add to that the imagination to come up with a new idea, and that could be why the Fed/Cardassian war lasted so long. The Federation never had the willingness to fight, the discipline to handle the battles, and their imagination was trying to come up with a Deus ex Machina instead of returning fire.

Still, the advantage of advanced technology allowed the Federation to get a draw (thus explaining the Demilitarized Zone).

[Atekimogus]

First, the UFP using Genesis, you're right in that they'd never use it. So don't waste time bringing it up. When pointing out order of battle, tactical deployments etc. You should work on those that you feel would be able tactics. Not ones where you're pointing out what we already know.

I was trying to lighten up the rather gloomy mood with genesis. You take the freedom of speaking your mind, I take the freedom not staying 100% serious about a fictional topic and make a joke once in a while, live with it .

Second, the allies believed that just leaving Cardassia Prime alone would allow the Dominion to rebuild. Most ships in the CU fleet are small enough to be built on planet side. That means if you leave them be, you may face a fleet of small attack craft jumping you off guard. A few ram ships did a number on the Klingon fleet at First Battle of Chitoka. Leaving a planet alone for weeks or months would mean whole squadrons of such ships. You'd be counting your dead by the thousands and you wouldn't gain a thing. The CU only has one heavily populated world and that is C-Prime. Also, if you've never faced an enemy who is backed into a corner. You'd be shocked to see how fast they seem to stop minding the idea of suicide as long as they take you with them.

First what is Cardassia Prime? The planet? The system? If they mean the system and all orbital facilities I agree with you, leaving them alone is potentially desastrous. If they are talking about the planet I think you overestimate what they are able to do to an allied fleet in orbit. We see that even the rather small galors are built in space and I think there is nothing serious they could build on the ground without beeing noticed. Even given the size of the latest fleets during the siege of cardassia it is not that much if you consider that there where the forces of the three mayor powers of the alpha quadrant involved. Building a top notch starship is not something you can do easily on every backwater world.

Third, you again missed the whole point of war. You cannot win a war by air superiority alone. So your whole thing of "I pick to be good in space make me win" fails. If air power could win a war then England would have lost the Battle of Britain. However, they continued to replace losses and held out their defenses against a superior opponent.

Now that is a helluva bad comparision. If you want a more accurate ww2 comparision consider what would have happened to england if germany had managed to beat the homefleet, rule the sea and blockade each and every convoy. And this comparison is still faulty because nothing during ww2 had the technical capabilities or the flexibility of a star trek starship.

Again, you are taking the factor that your weapons will bypass the planet based defenses. A poor judgement for any field commander. Also, what counts and acceptable collateral damage? New York City is under enemy control. You have the option of blasting the city from orbit but what would you need to count as acceptable? 3 million dead men women and children for how many enemy troops. If you're just going to level a planet then you have no reason to bother with the war. Otherwise you're just giving up people's lives for nothing.

I agree with you on your basic premisis but once again you use a very 21th century viewpoint. Now first what is the planets base defense? What have we seen so far? Even for core worlds the main defense for a planet seems to be orbital based. On the account of collateral damage, even the TOS enterprise managed a orbital bombardment with phaser with kirk standing a few metres from the impact point. For me this seems to be accurate enough to take out enemy troop accumulations without to much trouble.

Fine, the ECM would be your priority that still requires ground forces.

I never argued against that but what happens if the enemy ECM is gone? You do not think there are ECCM specialists in starfleet?

Your debate was the people of DITL, Rochey was just your intended target.

Sounds like an attack. Though I doubt it, if I was agressive I apologize Rochey!

The CU has shown that it is able to match the UFP during the UFP-CU War. That is dispite the fact that as you say the UFP has so many worlds to draw from. The CU is also the only faction to use Armored Infantry in ST. As there is evidence that the CU is pound for pound the better in ground combat then to run a debate you should prove otherwise.

They were able to match the UFP because - and that was my whole point - they are not the klingons who take pleasure in conquest doing it almost only for conquest' sake. Or is the concept that they wanted peace and the conflict not to escalate that hard to grasp? During the whole Dominion war I have never seen that starfleet shys away or is inferior in ground combat. Since I am not sure what exactly you mean by Armored Infantry in ST pleace give me a reference where we see such in the CU, I admit I cannot remember.

If you leave captured planets behind to attack the enemies homeworld. What do you think that they're troops are going to do to your people when they get word of your forces bombing their capital?

Nothing. What can they do? Waving their fists at the sky and causing the sky to fall on our heads on earth, vulcan and andor? At best they can start to build small ships. Now industrial replicators seems to be incredible rare and value, you think every world has a few? You think every colony world has even the knowledge to build ships? During Season 7 Bajors forces still consisted of 15 impulse craft which were said to be no match for a single romulan warbird.

Your first point was that sapce superiority would win the war, not be the most important factor. The uses of space superiority and ground superiority were pointed out to you as part of a greater battle plan.

That is true, since I am no lawyer I tend to keep my sentences short and easy which leaves room for interpretation. To clarify, could a faction having no space superiortiy win an interstellar war? Could 21th century earth win a war against an interstellar power with no mean of retaliation? I therefore still think that ultimatly space superiorty will win you the war with ground combat just a sideshow.

It is in fact your job to do so as you are in a debate and are speaking against thousands of years of warfare.

Which in the 24th century are obsulete by a few thousands of years. Yes, a naive and utopian concept but I did not invent it. Blame Rodenberry. This post is already much longer than I'd wanted but since you say it is up to me to provide evidence I will give you same examples from DS9 episodes and how I'd come to my point of view, so please bear with me. (And a sincere apology to the rest for this wall of text). Also since its a while since watching them do not hang me if I got a minor detail wrong.

Season 2, ep 22 "The Siege"
When the Circle occupys the station Sisko uses guerrila tactics to hold out against them. (Now DS9 is no planet but still a stronghold you want to take away from the enemy as intact as possible). Sisko does fairly well until the Bajorans (former terrorists) are able to counter the fed sensor jamming (some material in the tubes where they hid) using crude cardassian sensor technology. At this point he has basically lost, but luckily.... . It is no evidence but it could lead to speculation what a dedicated ECCM specialist team of the federation with top notch technology could do.

Season 4 ep 72/73 "The Way of the Warrior"
DS9 is attacked by the Klingons and as soon as the shields are down is entered. Sisko holds out but when the Federation fleet shows up Gowron turns tail and runs. Seems like the battle was decided in space and not via the enter commando.

Season 4 ep 94 "To the Death"
Sisko @Co must capture an Iconean gateway from the Jem*hadar. After beaming onto the surface they discover that all their energy weapons are useless and they must resort to close combat knive and blade fighting. Boy, just imagine what even one starfleet soldier could have done with an replicated AK-47! (chemical reactions seemed to work fine). Since we have encountered only two gateways and starfleet still does not equip their soldiers with slugthrowers I tend to believe that their technical gimmicks just work fine in 99,99% situations. Two gateways with jamming is not enough to build a tactical doctrine upon.

Season 5 ep 123 "Call to Arms"
The Dominion attacks DS9. Sisko holds out (in space) as long as needed to deploy the minefield. As soon as it is completed he evacuates DS9 and the dominion walks upon the station unopposed. Why not give them a hearty ground battle? Make the capture costly for them? Obviously, since the dominion has complete reign of space, to do so is considered suicidal.

Season 6 ep 128/129 "Favour the bold/Sacrifice of Angels"
Reverse situation. With 200 Federation ships on the way who would have complete space superiority even the suicidal Jem'hadar evacute the station to fight another day and die in a less pointless show of resistance. Sisko walks onto the station unopposed.

Season 6 ep 149 "Tears of the Prophets"
The Chin'toka Invasion. After the battle in space is won the system belongs to the allied fleet. Martok makes a short reference about beaming troops down but the outcome never seems to be in doubt and I did not get the impression that there were heavy fighting to do.

Season 7 ep 157 "The Siege of AR-558"
The battle were Nog looses his leg. Only happend because the defiant was forced to abandon orbit and ended when she happened to return.

Season 7 ep 169 "The changing face of Evil"
The dominion recaptures Chin toka. As soon as the had beaten the allied fleet the system belonged to them. No mention was made that they need much time or would have problems occupying the planets.


So here you have a few highlights why I think that ground combat in star trek are merly skirmishes by todays standards. Considering the collateral damage one overloaded phaser mkII is able to do it is even sensible.

[Sionnach Glic]

Atek, just FYI, don't take anything Deep says too personaly. He's got a bit of a short fuse.

First what is Cardassia Prime? The planet? The system? If they mean the system and all orbital facilities I agree with you, leaving them alone is potentially desastrous. If they are talking about the planet I think you overestimate what they are able to do to an allied fleet in orbit. We see that even the rather small galors are built in space and I think there is nothing serious they could build on the ground without beeing noticed. Even given the size of the latest fleets during the siege of cardassia it is not that much if you consider that there where the forces of the three mayor powers of the alpha quadrant involved. Building a top notch starship is not something you can do easily on every backwater world.

I think "Cardassia Prime" refers to the planet, given that we've head of the "Cardassia system" before. The "Prime" would, to me, indicate a planet within that system.
Of course, the idea that they could construct ships that are hundreds of metres long on the ground without the facilities being vulnerable to an orbital strike is foolish. A far larger threat would be ground to space cannons or torpedo launchers that could hit orbitting ships.
I think when they reffered to Cardassia Prime, they may have meant both the planet and any shipyards surrounding it. That's the best explaination I can come up with.

Now that is a helluva bad comparision. If you want a more accurate ww2 comparision consider what would have happened to england if germany had managed to beat the homefleet, rule the sea and blockade each and every convoy. And this comparison is still faulty because nothing during ww2 had the technical capabilities or the flexibility of a star trek starship.

Here's a better comparison:
During Operation Iraqi Freedom, the USAF had total air supremecy over the Iraqi forces. They could go anywhere and hit anything with relative ease, destroying any formations of troops or armour that were out in the open.
Does that mean there was no ground combat prior to the fall of Iraq? Of course there was. There was lots. The reason for this is because you can't just go dropping ordinance on a base of armoured convoy if it's in the middle of a city.

Space supremecy would lead to a similar situation. They could utterly anhialate anything out in the open, but would be unably to dig enemy troops out of cities or towns without causing mass colatoral damage. As the UFP would not be willing to kill civillians to anhialate enemy troops, a ground assault would be necessary.
In addition, spaceships suffer from the same drawbacks as aircraft. Namely, they can't hold territory on the ground. If you conquer a planet with a hostile populace, how are you going to police it with a starship? How are you going to combat any insurgencies that may form? How are you going to prevent survivors from the planet's army going guerilla on you?
You can't. You need people on the ground to do that.

Kendall and Seafort could probably give you a far more detailed explaination of why the concept of the soldier on the ground is unlikely to ever become obsolete. Kendall's served in the military before and so has firsthand experience, while Seafort is a military historian. They'd have a far better knowledge of the subject than I, though I think I managed to nail the main points.

I agree with you on your basic premisis but once again you use a very 21th century viewpoint. Now first what is the planets base defense? What have we seen so far? Even for core worlds the main defense for a planet seems to be orbital based.

Aye, most defences seem to be orbital based. I believe we've seen ground to space weapons used on a few occasions, though. Although they're likely to be rather large facilities placed out in the open, thus making them an easy enough target to any invading force willing to take losses.

On the account of collateral damage, even the TOS enterprise managed a orbital bombardment with phaser with kirk standing a few metres from the impact point. For me this seems to be accurate enough to take out enemy troop accumulations without to much trouble.

Episode?

And, again, what if your target is in a crowded city? What if the base you're trying to take out has shields, neccesitating a high powered blast? What if your enemy is using ECM systems that degrade your accuracy?

I never argued against that but what happens if the enemy ECM is gone? You do not think there are ECCM specialists in starfleet?

From all indications, Starfleet knows damn all about ECCM.

Sounds like an attack. Though I doubt it, if I was agressive I apologize Rochey!

?
I've no idea what Deep's talking about. Your replies to me have been rather polite so far.

If you want "agressive", do a search for some of my earlier debates with Teaos. I recall those getting pretty heated at times.

They were able to match the UFP because - and that was my whole point - they are not the klingons who take pleasure in conquest doing it almost only for conquest' sake. Or is the concept that they wanted peace and the conflict not to escalate that hard to grasp? During the whole Dominion war I have never seen that starfleet shys away or is inferior in ground combat. Since I am not sure what exactly you mean by Armored Infantry in ST pleace give me a reference where we see such in the CU, I admit I cannot remember.

I believe Deep is reffering to mechanised infantry. Mechanised infantry are troops that are carried in armoured vehicles. Think of US troops in those Stryker vehicles, but with Cardie tech.
The meer existance of mech infantry automaticaly boosts the Cardassian Army far ahead of the Redshirt Corps. So far, Starfleet has only managed to win ground combat due to their opponents being even more tacticaly inept than they are (the Jem'hadar and Klingons are brutal at ground combat). Against an enemy who understands the concept of mechanised warfare, they're in serious trouble.

Nothing. What can they do? Waving their fists at the sky and causing the sky to fall on our heads on earth, vulcan and andor? At best they can start to build small ships. Now industrial replicators seems to be incredible rare and value, you think every world has a few? You think every colony world has even the knowledge to build ships? During Season 7 Bajors forces still consisted of 15 impulse craft which were said to be no match for a single romulan warbird.

Quite true, but what can you do about them? Also nothing. Unless you station ships permanently around their planets to shoot down any ship taking off from the surface, you risk them rebuilding their strength and launching another war further down the road.
As I said in an earlier post, such a tactic is all well and good if your objective is to anhialate your enemy's space fleet only. If you have any other objective, you've no hope of achieving it without either ground warfare of genocide.

That is true, since I am no lawyer I tend to keep my sentences short and easy which leaves room for interpretation. To clarify, could a faction having no space superiortiy win an interstellar war?

No. But they could draw it out into a perpetual stalemate, as neither side would be able to take any more territory.
While this might be seen as a "win" for the side with space supremecy, it still leaves a hostile government with much of its industrial base still intact leading a pissed off and vengeful populace. You'd have to be pretty naive to imagine that that's not going to bite you in the ass in a few decades. It is only a "win" in the most immediate sense.

Could 21th century earth win a war against an interstellar power with no mean of retaliation?

Not a hope. But if Earth was in control of a few dozen worlds, fighting an enemy with twice their number of worlds, the enemy would still be pretty worried about leaving everything on the ground in one piece. Why? Because everything on the ground represents the majority of the hypothetical Earth Empire's industrial base. It may take decades to build up a space fleet again, but it can still be done. Once that happens, it can be war all over again.

Which in the 24th century are obsulete by a few thousands of years.

Not at all. The creators of the show like to think it's obsolete, but from observation we can clealry see it isn't.

Yes, a naive and utopian concept but I did not invent it. Blame Rodenberry.

Roddenberry also had the captain of the UFP's flagship dismiss things like military tactics as unimportant. Does that mean military tactics are an obsolete concept? Of course not. It just means that both GR and Picard are talking out of their backsides.

This post is already much longer than I'd wanted but since you say it is up to me to provide evidence I will give you same examples from DS9 episodes and how I'd come to my point of view, so please bear with me. (And a sincere apology to the rest for this wall of text). Also since its a while since watching them do not hang me if I got a minor detail wrong.

No worries. Your post isn't too long, with regards to most debates. If you get into a serious debate, it's only to be expected that replies will start getting rather long.

Season 2, ep 22 "The Siege"
When the Circle occupys the station Sisko uses guerrila tactics to hold out against them. (Now DS9 is no planet but still a stronghold you want to take away from the enemy as intact as possible). Sisko does fairly well until the Bajorans (former terrorists) are able to counter the fed sensor jamming (some material in the tubes where they hid) using crude cardassian sensor technology. At this point he has basically lost, but luckily.... . It is no evidence but it could lead to speculation what a dedicated ECCM specialist team of the federation with top notch technology could do.

Seems solid enough evidence WRT the existance of ECM/ECCM tech. Of course, any forces defending a planet would have their own experts, who could perhaps circumvent the orbitting Fed ship's ECCM systems, at which point it turns into some sort of electronic war.

Season 4 ep 72/73 "The Way of the Warrior"
DS9 is attacked by the Klingons and as soon as the shields are down is entered. Sisko holds out but when the Federation fleet shows up Gowron turns tail and runs. Seems like the battle was decided in space and not via the enter commando.

Not very anaologous to a planetary invasion. Firstly, DS9 is tiny relative to a planet. Secondly, there aren't that many places to hide. Thirdly, a planet doesn't have built in sensors that can detect the locations of various people. Fourthly, the number of Klingons on DS9 couldn't have been more than a few hundred, thus allowing the Fed ship crews to simply keep attacking until either the Klingons are all dead or they've run out of crew, whereas a planet could very well be defended by millions.

Season 4 ep 94 "To the Death"
Sisko @Co must capture an Iconean gateway from the Jem*hadar. After beaming onto the surface they discover that all their energy weapons are useless and they must resort to close combat knive and blade fighting. Boy, just imagine what even one starfleet soldier could have done with an replicated AK-47! (chemical reactions seemed to work fine). Since we have encountered only two gateways and starfleet still does not equip their soldiers with slugthrowers I tend to believe that their technical gimmicks just work fine in 99,99% situations. Two gateways with jamming is not enough to build a tactical doctrine upon.

Quite right, but the possibility of interference isn't the only reason why modern guns would be superior to Fed guns. Things like rate of fire, accuracy, ergonomics, reliability, ease of aiming, safety, ease of maintanence and a whole host of other factors would lead me to take an AK-47 over a phaser any day.

Season 5 ep 123 "Call to Arms"
The Dominion attacks DS9. Sisko holds out (in space) as long as needed to deploy the minefield. As soon as it is completed he evacuates DS9 and the dominion walks upon the station unopposed. Why not give them a hearty ground battle? Make the capture costly for them? Obviously, since the dominion has complete reign of space, to do so is considered suicidal.

Season 6 ep 128/129 "Favour the bold/Sacrifice of Angels"
Reverse situation. With 200 Federation ships on the way who would have complete space superiority even the suicidal Jem'hadar evacute the station to fight another day and die in a less pointless show of resistance. Sisko walks onto the station unopposed.

Correct. But, again, DS9 is not a planet. They are in no way analogous.

Season 6 ep 149 "Tears of the Prophets"
The Chin'toka Invasion. After the battle in space is won the system belongs to the allied fleet. Martok makes a short reference about beaming troops down but the outcome never seems to be in doubt and I did not get the impression that there were heavy fighting to do.

Or maybe he dismissed it primarily because it's not his concern. He has the space over Chin'toka, which was his main concern. Taking the planet itself is a side show.
As for it sounding like the results were not in doubt, that could be due to anything. Maybe the Klingons decided to level most of the planet from orbit, and beamed down troops to the ground. Or maybe the sheer quantity of troops they sent down made defeat unlikely. Or maybe the planet itself was lightly defended, relying on the ODPs for defence. Or maybe the planetary governor had signalled a surrender. There's a whole load of reasons why it could be a sure thing.

Season 7 ep 157 "The Siege of AR-558"
The battle were Nog looses his leg. Only happend because the defiant was forced to abandon orbit and ended when she happened to return.

And if the UFP understood the concept of a machine gun, the Jem'hadar would have been slaughtered.
And again, one base out in the open =/= bases in cities.

Season 7 ep 169 "The changing face of Evil"
The dominion recaptures Chin toka. As soon as the had beaten the allied fleet the system belonged to them. No mention was made that they need much time or would have problems occupying the planets.

See the reply to the initial invasion of Chin'toka.

So here you have a few highlights why I think that ground combat in star trek are merly skirmishes by todays standards. Considering the collateral damage one overloaded phaser mkII is able to do it is even sensible.

The problem with an overloaded phaser is the fact that it's overloaded and thus unreliable. It's unsafe, and not a standard tactic. Plus, overloading it would leave you unarmed. Not a great idea to rely on them in combat.

[Aaron]

The problem with an overloaded phaser is the fact that it's overloaded and thus unreliable. It's unsafe, and not a standard tactic. Plus, overloading it would leave you unarmed. Not a great idea to rely on them in combat.

You'll also get the Davey Crockett effect of killing you and your whole platoon with it. Purpose built weapons are a far more sensible idea,they had stun grenades in ENT and there is no reason they can't have frag grenades in the later series. Heck they had grenades in the Penisula Wars.

[Atekimogus]

I think "Cardassia Prime" refers to the planet, given that we've head of the "Cardassia system" before. The "Prime" would, to me, indicate a planet within that system.

Yes, that would make sense and I agree.

Of course, the idea that they could construct ships that are hundreds of metres long on the ground without the facilities being vulnerable to an orbital strike is foolish. A far larger threat would be ground to space cannons or torpedo launchers that could hit orbitting ships.

"Dominion Attack ships are not constructed for sub-orbital flight" DS9 Season 7 episode "Penumbra". Since those are the smallest ships representing a threat I would say we can savley burry the "lets build ships when noone is looking idea". About ground to space cannons and/or torpedo launchers......... I really am not sure if they exist in star trek. They would make sense, it is within their ability to produce but do we ever "see" one of them? I admit I cannot remember but maybe you can provide a reference, thank you.

Here's a better comparison:
During Operation Iraqi Freedom, the USAF had total air supremecy over the Iraqi forces. They could go anywhere and hit anything with relative ease, destroying any formations of troops or armour that were out in the open.
Does that mean there was no ground combat prior to the fall of Iraq? Of course there was. There was lots. The reason for this is because you can't just go dropping ordinance on a base of armoured convoy if it's in the middle of a city.

I still do not like the comparison much because when comparing space ships I tend to use naval vessels as rough equivalent and not aircraft. A space ship is somthing of a combination of both.....(Also even ww2 seems to be a touchy subject and a more recent war maybe even more so. Hopefully we do not spawn another heated discussion with an offhand comment ) . But how did the US forces arrive in iraq? Sure some via aircraft but I bet the heavy stuff was shipped. Similar in space...prior to ground combat you need the ability to ship your troops to planet x. Very dangerous if you do not have space superiority.

In addition, spaceships suffer from the same drawbacks as aircraft. Namely, they can't hold territory on the ground. If you conquer a planet with a hostile populace, how are you going to police it with a starship? How are you going to combat any insurgencies that may form? How are you going to prevent survivors from the planet's army going guerilla on you?
You can't. You need people on the ground to do that.

That is absolutely right and that is the reason why we see ground forces. But basically they are just light infantry, a guy with a phaser-rifle and nothing more heavy. Nothing more is needed.

Episode?

I believe it was "who mourns for adonis" but I am not 100% sure.

And, again, what if your target is in a crowded city? What if the base you're trying to take out has shields, neccesitating a high powered blast? What if your enemy is using ECM systems that degrade your accuracy?

If your target is one person you are screwed. If your target are APcs, Mbts or other forms of artillery, we now have to support ground forces, taking them out from orbit should be no problem. ECM could hinder that but unless the all have cloaking devices you could at least spot them from orbit. I guess 24th tech is more sophisticated than 21th century spy sats. That is, I admit only in my humble opinion, the reason we hardly see anything more heavy than a guy with a phaser rifle. You can hide guys with phasers in a city, you cannot hide a tank brigade or battle robots or whatever they could have in star trek.

I believe Deep is reffering to mechanised infantry. Mechanised infantry are troops that are carried in armoured vehicles. Think of US troops in those Stryker vehicles, but with Cardie tech.
The meer existance of mech infantry automaticaly boosts the Cardassian Army far ahead of the Redshirt Corps. So far, Starfleet has only managed to win ground combat due to their opponents being even more tacticaly inept than they are (the Jem'hadar and Klingons are brutal at ground combat). Against an enemy who understands the concept of mechanised warfare, they're in serious trouble.

See my above reply. Considering the technical possibilities I think heavy mechanised infantry is obsolete. To be honest I do not understand what is so bad about it. The importance of different army parts during history changed constantly. At one point large pike-formation were king. At one point it was all about artillery. At one point it was all about cavalry. You always had all parts but the importance of each one was never constant. I say considering the technological possibilitys the space navy would become much more important with ground combat beeing more or less police actions, is that really so absurd considering that at one point or another in history different parts of an army was considered the king of the battlefield?

Quite true, but what can you do about them? Also nothing. Unless you station ships permanently around their planets to shoot down any ship taking off from the surface, you risk them rebuilding their strength and launching another war further down the road.
As I said in an earlier post, such a tactic is all well and good if your objective is to anhialate your enemy's space fleet only. If you have any other objective, you've no hope of achieving it without either ground warfare of genocide.

I agree altough considering UFP politics having to conquer the planet seems to be exactly what they do not want. If it is enough to surpress them from space for a short period and it suffices.......

No. But they could draw it out into a perpetual stalemate, as neither side would be able to take any more territory.
While this might be seen as a "win" for the side with space supremecy, it still leaves a hostile government with much of its industrial base still intact leading a pissed off and vengeful populace. You'd have to be pretty naive to imagine that that's not going to bite you in the ass in a few decades. It is only a "win" in the most immediate sense.

That is true. Consider the Bajorans who at the end were able to win the war. But let me ask you this, are you willing to risk pissing the orbital force so much that they say.....damn it, lets just level the place and bomb them into stone age and start annew? Considering the nature of the CU I think the Bajorans played a damn risky game. They do not even need to really destroy the place. They could just poison the world and making it unsuitable for cardassian live like the maquis did to one colony. Sure they would not dare it....or would they? Why is it again a few nations have the a-bomb?

Not very anaologous to a planetary invasion. Firstly, DS9 is tiny relative to a planet. Secondly, there aren't that many places to hide. Thirdly, a planet doesn't have built in sensors that can detect the locations of various people. Fourthly, the number of Klingons on DS9 couldn't have been more than a few hundred, thus allowing the Fed ship crews to simply keep attacking until either the Klingons are all dead or they've run out of crew, whereas a planet could very well be defended by millions.

Yes I agree that the example is lacking. However I would expect that the security of an enemy stronghold and that of a large space stations is at least similar but on a much smaller scale. Seems like a small urban conflict, one of the most likely scenarios becoming a problem on a planet.
My point was that the klingons could have everyone on the stations killed and as soon as the feds arrive the could have everyone killed back and the outcome would not change, a classic loose loose situation something even Klingons seem to avoid even on a very very small scale. How much more so planetwide?

Quite right, but the possibility of interference isn't the only reason why modern guns would be superior to Fed guns. Things like rate of fire, accuracy, ergonomics, reliability, ease of aiming, safety, ease of maintanence and a whole host of other factors would lead me to take an AK-47 over a phaser any day.

Well I probably would still use a phaser but only because I would also use wide angle beams, sweeping beams etc. all the things making a phaser superior but which are never used onscreen 8) .

Or maybe he dismissed it primarily because it's not his concern. He has the space over Chin'toka, which was his main concern. Taking the planet itself is a side show.

I agree wholeheartedly because that is basically what I was saying the last few posts.

And if the UFP understood the concept of a machine gun, the Jem'hadar would have been slaughtered.
And again, one base out in the open =/= bases in cities.

Also true but I take what I get. There are as good as no examples for large scale planetary invasions...... . (I also agree that the attack was ridicolusly stupid but that is not my fault )

The problem with an overloaded phaser is the fact that it's overloaded and thus unreliable. It's unsafe, and not a standard tactic. Plus, overloading it would leave you unarmed. Not a great idea to rely on them in combat.

What I meant was more with a small handheld phaser beeing able to obliberate whole city blocks everything you would mount on a MBT or artillery would be serious overkill and therefore obsolete. Sure, maybe they build more heavy tanks able to withstand orbital bombardment or other super-powerful tanks but I am sure Kendall and Seafort would agree that during the ages at one point the armour has it, at one point the offensive has it. (Knights becoming obsolete with gunpowder etc.). Once again I do not see the sacrilege of thinking in the 24th century it is likely once again different than nowadays.... .

[Deepcrush]

I swear to god he's the furball!