To Honor You Call Us

by Harvey G. Phillips

  Queeg, Phillip Francis, Lieutenant Commander: fictional commander of the Destroyer-Mine Sweeper U.S.S. Caine during World War II in Herman Wouk’s classic novel The Caine Mutiny. The book was made into an equally classic film with Humphrey Bogart playing Queeg. Queeg suffered from Paranoid Personality Disorder which progressed during the course of the novel to Paranoid Psychosis which caused him to give increasingly bizarre and erratic orders to his crew. He had a compulsive habit of rolling two ball bearings around in his left hand and suffered a breakdown while commanding the ship in a storm resulting in the Executive Officer relieving him of command, for which act the XO was charged with and tried for mutiny.

  qui inrita ordinem: (Romanovan Latin) cancel that order, belay that order.

  Raven: A large anti-ship missile carried by Union Warships. Much larger than the Talon (see) and with a higher top speed, the Raven accelerates more slowly, is less nimble, and is more vulnerable to point defense systems and countermeasures than the Talon due to its larger size. Manufactured by Gould-Martin-Marietta Naval Aerospace Corporation, the Raven finds its target with both passive and active multi-modal sensor homing and then inflicts its damage with a 1.5 megaton fixed yield fusion warhead powerful enough to destroy all but the largest enemy vessels and to cripple any known enemy ship. Ravens are equipped with an innovative system known as Cooperative Interactive Logic Mode (CILM—pronounced “Kill ‘em”). When more than one Raven is launched against the same target, CILM causes the missiles to communicate with one another and attack the target jointly, closing on the enemy from multiple vectors to render defense more difficult and exploding at the same instant to inflict the most damage.

  regardez donc: (Cajun French) An expression of awe and amazement, roughly equivalent to an extremely emphatic “wow.” Literally translates as “look at that.”

  Registry Numbers: the unique identification number assigned to each warship, consisting of its three letter class code followed by a number. The class code is a unique set of three letters assigned to each ship class for easy identification. The first letter of the class code is always the same letter as the ship type. Accordingly, the class code of all Destroyers begins with “D,” all Frigates with “F,” all Carriers with “C,” etc. This system doesn’t help the uninitiated tell the difference between a Cruiser and a Carrier and a Corvette just from the Class Code—naval personnel simply have to memorize the forty or fifty class codes in use at any given time. The number is the ordinal number designating where that particular ship falls in the production order of that class. Accordingly, the fourth ship produced in the Khyber Class of Penetration and Attack Destroyers (the U.S.S. Cumberland) is DPA 0004. Registry numbers are always written as three letters and four digits, even if the leading digits are zeros, a practice that evolved as a check against the digits being inadvertently dropped in transmission, decrypting, or printing.

  Salt Water Navy: a Navy comprised of ocean-going ships as opposed to one comprised of ships that travel in space. In the Union Navy, the term is particularly used to refer to the Navies on Earth the officers and traditions of which (along with the Air Forces) formed much of the basis for the United Earth Spaces Forces in 2036 (the Navies of the United States and Canada, Great Britain, and Japan were particularly important). The U.E.S.F. is the direct institutional ancestor of the U.S.N. Also used as an adjective phrase to modify a tradition or practice that dates back to those days, for example, “Never renaming a ship after it is launched is a Salt Water Navy rule.” Referring to something as being Salt Water Navy is to invest it with great tradition and antiquity and, therefore, enormous authority.

  Schwanzlutscher: (German) cocksucker.

  Schweinhund: (German) an insult that does not translate very well into Standard. The word literally means “pig-dog,” but has connotations that go well beyond the translation. It is best understood as meaning that the person to whom it is applied is vile, disgusting, and utterly devoid of decency. It is a fitting insult for someone who steals little old ladies’ pensions, runs a child prostitution ring, or sells out his shipmates.

  Scotty: the traditional nickname for a Warship’s Chief of Engineering, irrespective of the national origin of his ancestors. The term is of great antiquity and uncertain origin.

  SDMF: Self Destruct Mechanism, Fusion. A fusion munition carried on all Union Warships prior to the Battle of Han VII for the purpose of destroying the vessel as a last resort to prevent it from falling into enemy hands. It was issued in three versions, imaginatively named the SDMF-Mark I, the SDMF-Mark II, and the SDMF Mark III. The Mark I had a yield of 0.2 kilotons, the Mark II of 0.6 kilotons, and the Mark III of 1.5 kilotons, to accommodate different vessel sizes. The largest Battleships and Carriers typically carried two Mark IIIs or a Mark III and one or more Mark IIs to ensure that no part of the vessel would survive from which the enemy could obtain any useful intelligence or engineering data.

  SIDU: Standard Interstellar Data Unit. A unit for measuring quantity of data. One SIDU is equal to ten of the standard data “packets” agreed upon by the old Earth Confederacy, the Pfelung Association, the Kraal League, and the Gheyan Federation in 2225. One SIDU is equal to 4.333 gigabytes.

  SIGINT: (also SigInt) Signals Intelligence—the branch of Intelligence that attempts to determine the dispositions, intentions, and capabilities of the enemy by intercepting his communications, sensor emissions, navigation beams, and other signals. With regard to communications, often valuable intelligence can be gleaned even if the signals can not be decrypted or translated, as skilled intelligence officers can draw meaningful conclusions from the location, volume, length, signal strength, and other characteristics of communications.

  six: shorthand for “six o’clock position,” or directly astern. The term is a holdover from the days of propeller-driven, subsonic aircraft that were not equipped with RADAR to provide precise bearings to enemy aircraft. Rather than giving bearings to targets in degrees, which would have been a rough estimate anyway, crewmen who spotted enemy aircraft were trained to give their bearings in terms of their angular positions on a hypothetical analog clock, with twelve o’clock being directly ahead of the aircraft, and to say whether the target was “high,” meaning above the horizon or “low,” meaning below the horizon.

  SOP: Standard Operating Procedure.

  Squeaker: a particularly young or puny Midshipman. Also squeekie, deck dodger, panel puppy, and hatch hanger (the last for their habit of standing in the hatches while holding the rim, thereby blocking the way).

  SSR: Staff Support Room. A compartment located in the general vicinity of the CIC containing between three and twenty four men whose duty it is to provide support to one CIC department by performing detailed monitoring and analysis at a level impossible for one or two people assigned that function in CIC. For example, in the Sensors SSR, one man would be monitoring graviton emissions, one man the output from optical scanners, another man neutrino flux, yet another, a given portion of the EM spectrum, etc. The CIC officer communicates with the senior officer in the SSR who, in turn, assigns tasks to the other personnel in that room and then communicates their observations and conclusions to CIC. The SSR has the capability to communicate with CIC by voice, text, and by transferring data files. Frequently the SSR will indicate to the CIC officer which sensor display he should be reviewing, allowing the CIC officer to pull up that display on his console.

  Standard: the official language of the Union; also, the official language or a widely-used second language on virtually every non-Union human world. Standard is derived mostly from the English that was the most widely spoken second language on Earth and was the language of international science, commerce, shipping, and aviation when human beings first traveled to the stars in the late twenty-first and early twenty-second centuries. Although an English speaker could probably, with a reasonable amount of effort, understand Standard and be able to make himself understood to a Standard speaker (an attribute linguists call mutual intelligibility) there are seve
ral important differences between the two languages. First, while Standard retained the Roman alphabet used in English and many Earth languages, it abandoned English’s chaotic spelling in favor of a phonetic spelling system in which each sound in the language is rendered by a unique letter or combination of letters, such that if one can spell a word one can pronounce it correctly and if one can pronounce a word one can spell it correctly. Thus, in Standard, “thought” is spelled “thoht, “phonics” is spelled “foniks,” and “neither” is spelled “neether.” Standard also incorporates extensive vocabulary from Earth languages other than English, particularly Japanese, from which many technical terms are derived, mainly terms related to Robotics. In this book, Standard is rendered as weakly idiomatic early twenty-first century English, with vocabulary and spelling appropriate to that era. While Standard is a nearly Universal Human Language, there are differences in how it is spoken from world to world. For example, the Standard on Nouvelle Acadiana is more relaxed and idiomatic than the Standard on New Istanbul, which is more formal and elegant, a fact which the author attempts (with only limited success) to render here by different shadings in characters’ use of English.

  SWACS: Space Warning And Control System. An integrated sensor, computer, and command/communications/control suite placed on various spacecraft to provide an exceptionally high level of sensor coverage and detail and to coordinate the defense against attacking vessels. SWACS is capable of simultaneously tracking up to a four thousand targets (such a large number is needed in a large fleet engagement where there might be a hundred ships firing missiles at one another) up to a range of 30 AU (approximately the distance from Sol to Neptune) at high resolution and up to 100 AU at lower resolution (lower resolution does not mean that the vessels will not be detected, it just means that a group of vessels might be reported as a single target until it gets closer). Carriers typically carry five or six Mongoose Medium Attack Craft equipped with SWACS to provide superior sensor coverage for task forces while SWACS equipped Destroyers are deployed to threatened systems that do not already have adequate system sensor defense grids in place. The system includes a capability for providing non-verbal direction to fighters and other ships to assist those vessels in intercepting enemy vessels. This system is the distant descendant of the AWACS system first fielded by the United States on aircraft in the twentieth century.

  Talon: The primary anti-ship 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 multi-modal 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 on board 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).

  TDY: Temporary duty. Any duty assignment given for a short time, typically to keep an individual occupied between “permanent” duty assignments. For an officer, TDY is typically some boring and repetitive administrative task performed at a work station on a Capital Warship or installation and often bears little relationship to the officer’s primary area of expertise. For example, a highly-skilled weapons officer is likely to be given TDY in Convoy Routing or Navigation Aids Maintenance.

  TEMPCOM: Temporary Command. Provisional command of a vessel for a short period of time, usually given to an officer of a rank generally regarded as insufficiently senior for permanent command of a ship of that type. Often the Executive Officer of a vessel will be placed in TEMPCOM of a vessel to bring it from a rear area to a combat zone where the permanent commander will take charge, or from a combat area to a rear area where it is to receive refit or repairs. TEMPCOM is distinguished from “Acting Command,” in that an officer in TEMPCOM receives the assignment from higher authority, while an officer in Acting Command succeeds to the post by the death or other incapacity of the CO.

  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 2144. The territorial space controlled by the Union has an ellipsoidal 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 possible exception of the Krag Hegemony, the Union is the most populous and largest political entity in Known Space.

  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 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 vessel that are not categorized as warships, including Tanker, Tender, Tug, Hospital Ship, Troop Carrier, Landing Ship, Cargo Vessel, etc.

  U.E.S.F.: United Earth Space Forces. The international military arm formed in 2034 by United States and 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 U.E.S.F. 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 “Salt Water Navies.” The Ning-Braha technology captured by the U.E.S.F. in this campaign was the catalyst for mankind’s colonization of the stars.

  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 1950’s. 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 in appropriate in an alphabet used on an interplanetary basis). The Alphabet is as follows:

  Alfa (not “Alpha” because some will mispronounce the “ph”)

  Bravo

  Charlie

&nb
sp; Delta

  Echo

  Foxtrot

  Galaxy

  Hotel

  India

  Juliett

  Kilo (pronounced “kee low”)

  Lima (pronounced “lee ma”)

  Mike

  Nebula

  Oscar

  Papa

  Quarter

  Sierra

  Tango

  Uniform

  Victor

  Whisky

  Ray

  Yardarm

  Zulu

  UNREP: UNderway REPlenishment. The refueling or resupply of a ship from a tanker or tender while both ships are underway, thereby saving the time and fuel involved in bringing both ships to a stop and then reaccelerating them.

  USNGS (Uniform Sierra Nebula Galaxy Sierra): Union Space Navy Galactic Survey. The most important star catalog in Known Space—used universally by the Union Space Navy, as well as by the Union Merchant Naval Service, most human navigators even outside of the Union, and many alien species. Most star systems more than a few hundred light years from Earth are identified mainly by a USNGS catalog ID and, in some cases, by a Local Proper Name (such as Markab B). The USNGS catalog number consists of a one digit number and four groups of four digits, all separated by dashes. The one digit number designates which survey is being used—each new survey entirely supersedes the preceding survey, so the number is given mainly for record purposes so that later users of logs and recordings will know which survey was in use at the time. As of 2315, the Fourth Survey was in use. The first three digit group designates which of the 10,000 Sectors in the galaxy the star is located (in 2315, stars were cataloged in only 3972 Sectors and, of those, only 2017 were surveyed with anything approaching completeness), the second group designates the Subsector (10,000 per sector), the third the Section (10,000 Sections per subsector), and the fourth the number of the star in the Section beginning with the North, Spinward, Coreward corner (sections are small enough that none has yet been found to have more than 9140 stars—if one is ever cataloged with more than ten thousand stars, then an additional digit will be assigned). Accordingly, a catalog number would be in this form: USNGS 4-1153-0158-9899-5648 (the USNGS is often omitted). Some astrocartographers have asserted that the current catalog designations are unnecessarily cumbersome and that stars should be identified by their galactic coordinates, which would allow each star to be designated by three numbers, each consisting of seven digits. This proposal has not won favor, mostly because the very high proper motion of some stars would require constant revision of their designation as they move through the galaxy. Most agencies that use these designations, particularly the Union Postal Service, believe strongly that a system’s “name” should not change every five to ten years. Another disadvantage of naming stars by coordinates alone is that, in the case of some close binaries, two stars would have the same or almost the same coordinates, unless a decimal point and at least one additional digit were to be inserted in at least one of the coordinates. See also note on Star and Planet Names.