synchrotron radiation: Radiation emitted as a result of the acceleration of super-relativistic charged particles through a magnetic field.
Talon: The primary antiship missile carried by Union warships. Manufactured by Raytheon-Hughes Space Combat Systems, the Talon is an extremely fast, stealthy, and agile missile, with both passive and active multimodal sensor homing and a 5–150-kiloton variable-yield fusion warhead. The Talon is designed to elude and penetrate enemy countermeasures and point-defense systems, use its onboard artificial intelligence and high-resolution active sensors to find a “soft spot” on the enemy ship, and then detonate its warhead in a location designed to inflict the most damage. One Talon is capable of obliterating ships up to frigate size and of putting ships up to heavy-cruiser size out of commission. Against most targets with functioning point-defense systems, the Talon is a better choice than the heavier Raven (see). Beginning in February 2315, Talons were equipped with Cooperative Interactive Logic Mode, a technology adopted from the Raven (see).
Terran Union: The common name for the Union of Earth and Terran Settled Worlds, a federal constitutional republic consisting of Earth and (as of January 2315) 518 of the total 611 worlds known to be settled by human beings. Often simply referred to as the “Union.” Formed in 2155 upon the collapse of the Earth and Colonial Confederation (commonly referred to as the “Earth Confederation” or simply the “Confederation”), resulting from the Revolt of the Estates, which began in 2154. The territorial space controlled by the Union has a shape roughly like that of a watermelon 2500 light-years long and 800 light-years wide, aligned lengthwise through the Orion-Cygnus Arm of the Milky Way galaxy. Population, approximately 205 billion. With the exception of the Krag Hegemony, the Union is the most populous and largest political entity in Known Space, as well as the most economically successful.
TF: Task Force. A group of warships assembled for a particular mission or “task.” Distinguished from a “fleet” in that a fleet is a permanent or very long-lived formation usually assigned to a particular system or region of space, while a task force is assembled for a limited period of time and then disbanded. Task forces are generally designated by letters of the alphabet, e.g., Task Force TD or Tango Delta. Units may be spun off from a task force; these are usually designated by the name of the task force followed by a color or a number, e.g., Task Force Bravo Victor Seven or Task Force Galaxy Foxtrot Green.
Type: When applied to warships, this term refers to the general category and function of the vessel, as opposed to class, which refers to a specific design or production run of vessels within a type. The most common types of warship are, in decreasing order of size: carrier, battleship, battlecruiser, cruiser, frigate, destroyer, corvette, and patrol vessel. There are, of course, other types of naval vessels that are not categorized as warships, including tanker, tender, tug, hospital ship, troop carrier, landing ship, cargo vessel, etc.
UESF: United Earth Space Forces. The international military arm formed in 2034 by the United States, Canada, the European Union, and the China-Japan Alliance to retake the Earth’s moon from the Ning-Braha who had occupied it, presumably as a prelude to a planned invasion of Earth. The UESF drew its personnel primarily from the navies and air forces of the founding powers and drew its command structure, regulations, traditions, and other institutional foundations mainly from their saltwater navies. Nevertheless, the UESF is a joint force that regards itself as the successor to all of the armed forces of all of the nations of the Earth. The Ning-Braha technology captured by the UESF in this campaign was the catalyst for mankind’s colonization of the stars. The UESF is the direct institutional ancestor of the Union Space Navy.
unge kamerater: (Norwegian) Young comrades.
Union: see Terran Union.
Union Forces Voicecom Alphabet (or UFVA): Because letters of the alphabet as normally spoken can be easily confused over the voice channels (for example, B and D sound very much alike), military and police forces have long used standardized sets of words to stand for the letters of the alphabet with which the words begin. The UFVA is used universally by all Union Naval, System Guard, marine, and other forces, as well as by civilian space vessels and Space Traffic Controllers in Union Space and by most non-Union human worlds. The UFVA is derived, in turn, from the alphabetic system introduced by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization on Earth in the 1950s. Only a few letters have been changed: Golf to Galaxy (the game of golf having become extinct centuries ago), November to Nebula (the month being associated with some of the bloodiest and least decisive battles of the First Interstellar War), Quebec to Quarter (the official pronunciation, “kay beck,” leading many civilian operators to believe that the designator stood for K rather than Q), and Yankee to Yardarm (the association of “Yankee” with the United States of America was deemed to be inappropriate in an alphabet used on an interplanetary basis). The alphabet is as follows:
Alfa (not “Alpha” because some will mispronounce the “ph”)
Bravo
Charlie
Delta
Echo
Foxtrot
Galaxy
Hotel
India
Juliett
Kilo (pronounced “kee low”)
Lima (pronounced “lee ma”)
Mike
Nebula
Oscar
Papa
Quarter
Sierra
Tango
Uniform
Victor
Whiskey
X-Ray
Yardarm
Zulu
URSF: Union Reserve and Support Forces. A space service allied with and under the control of the navy, but under the direct command of its own admiral-director, who holds the joint rank of vice admiral URSF and USN. The navy’s tankers, supply vessels, hospital ships, tenders, waste-transport vessels, harbor tugs, and fleet tugs, as well as the personnel who man them, are all part of the URSF. The same is true of remote R & R stations, supply depots, fuel dumps, deuterium-processing plants, and similar facilities. Most of the senior officers in the URSF are former naval officers who are either too old or too badly injured for frontline service but who are still able to go to space.
von Braun, Werner: Born: 23 March 1912; died: 16 June 1977. German-American rocket engineer best known for leading the development of the German A-4 rocket (commonly known as the V-2), humanity’s first operational ballistic missile and the first man-made object to reach outer space, as well as for leading the team that developed for the United States the Saturn series of space-launch vehicles. This series included the Saturn V, which propelled the Apollo spacecraft to the Earth’s moon in a series of memorable missions extending from December 1968 (Apollo 8) to December 1972 (Apollo 17).
watch: The period of time that a member of the crew who is designated as a watch stander mans his assigned watch station. Also, the designation of the section of the crew to which the watch stander belongs. On Union warships, there are three watches, usually known as blue, gold, and white. They stand watch on the following schedule:
first watch: 2000–0000 (1 blue) (2 gold) (3 white)
middle watch: 0000–0400 (1 gold) (2 white) (3 blue)
morning watch: 0400–0800 (1 white) (2 blue) (3 gold)
forenoon watch: 0800–1200 (1 blue) (2 gold) (3 white)
afternoon watch: 1200–1600 (1 gold) (2 white) (3 blue)
first dog watch: 1600–1800 (1 white) (2 blue) (3 gold)
second dog watch: 1800–2000 (1 blue) (2 gold) (3 white)
The captain and the XO do not stand a watch. Rather, all officers other than the CO, XO, and CMO serve as “Officer of the Deck,” serving as the officer in charge of minute-to-minute operations in CIC when neither the CO nor the XO is in CIC. Officers of the Deck stand watch for eight-hour shifts on a rotating basis.
Will Robinson: The traditional naval nickname given to the youngest or the smallest of the squeakers or new junior midshipmen in service at any given time on board a w
arship. The name is taken from the name of a character in the 1960s television series Lost in Space.
wort: The liquid obtained when malt is cracked and steeped in hot water. Hops and yeast are added to the wort, then fermented to make beer.
XO: Executive Officer. The second-in-command of any warship.
Yankee search: Active sensor sweep, i.e., a sweep in which the ship broadcasts sensor beams and detects the reflections from objects in the vicinity, as opposed to the normal sensor mode, which is passive detection of emissions from contacts. A Yankee search omni is a sweep in all directions around the ship, as opposed to a Yankee search down a particular bearing or bearings or of a given zone. The term dates back to Saltwater Navy submarines, but is otherwise of obscure origin.
Z: (when appended to a time notation) Zulu time. Standard Union Coordinated Time. So that all USN vessels can conduct coordinated operations, they all operate on Zulu Time, which is, for all intents and purposes, the same as Greenwich Mean Time—mean solar time as measured from the prime meridian in Greenwich, England, on Earth in the Sol System. When any other time system is used in any naval communication (such as the Standard time of a planet on which operations are taking place or local time at some place on a planet), that fact is specifically noted.
* * *
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
* * *
I owe the same debts and hold the same gratitude for this book as for the first two in this series, “with interest,” given that they have enjoyed some modest success with the reading public.
Mrs. Mildred Hobbs, whose inspired teaching I recognized in this section of my last novel, has since passed away. I hope that if she turns her attention to these books, she doesn’t find too much that cries too loudly for her skillfully used red pen.
The contributions of conceptual editor Michael Shohl are particularly important in this book as compared to the two that went before. I am thankful for his skill, creativity, hard work, and professionalism in bringing this book to print. The delivery of this baby was particularly difficult, and he was a good set of hands to have in the delivery room.
I am also thankful to Jason Kirk at 47North, who lined up and coordinated the efforts of copy editors, the cover artist, book designer, and all the other professionals whose efforts need to be brought forth between the delivery of a copyedit-ready manuscript and publication. As a former Law Review editor, I know the hard work that goes into a publication after the author is done with it. I have seen the final product in the form of the last two books and know that my message would not go nearly as far or be received nearly as well were they not delivered by such a well-spoken messenger.
Finally, as always, I convey my deepest thanks to my ever-patient wife, Kathleen. Her creative contributions to this series are too numerous to count or articulate and go far beyond being the motivating force that called them into being at the beginning. Further, her acceptance of my uncounted eccentricities and the other traits of character and personality that make living and working with me so very challenging are not only an astonishing achievement in personal forbearance, but are a debt I can never repay. All of which does not even begin to touch her other gifts of kindness, generosity, and wisdom. For this and for everything else she does, I offer these feeble but heartfelt words of thanks.
* * *
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
* * *
Photo © 2013 Kathleen Honsinger
H. Paul Honsinger is a retired attorney with lifelong interests in space exploration, military history, firearms, and international relations. He was born and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and is a graduate of Lake Charles High School, the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and Louisiana State University Law School in Baton Rouge. Honsinger has practiced law with major firms on the Gulf Coast and in Phoenix, Arizona, and most recently had his own law office in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. He has also taught debate, worked as a car salesman, and counseled teenagers. He is a cancer survivor, having been in remission from advanced-stage Hodgkin’s lymphoma since January 1997. He currently lives in rural Mohave County, Arizona, with his beloved wife, Kathleen (who is also known as fantasy/romance author Laura Jo Phillips), stepson, and two highly eccentric cats—all the while cheering on his daughter, who is a first-year college music student.
This is his third novel.
Keep up-to-date on the future exploits of Max Robichaux and Ibrahim Sahin by following Paul’s blog at http://hpaulhonsinger.com.
You can also follow Paul on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/honsingerscifi and on Twitter at @HPaulHonsinger.
Readers can contact the author at [email protected].
Brothers in Valor (Man of War Book 3) Page 36
