One of my favorite authors from my youth was Gene Wolfe and his Book of the New Sun tetralogy. Shadow of the Torturer, Claw of the Conciliator, Sword of the Lictor and Citadel of the Autarch.
Smart guy. You should see some of the vocabulary he uses. Very challenging for the Junior High School kid I was. His sentences were well crafted, and I despaired ever coming close to that kind of precision when I put pen to paper. I still do.
When writing that series, he was interviewed by some trade publication asking about the upcoming 4th book and they misheard Citadel of the Autarch and wrote it as Castle of the Otter, of all things. That tickled Gene Wolfe and he wrote a 5th book using that title, with thoughts on the development of the series and tips for up and coming SciFi writers. Castle of the Otter came out in 1982. And rereading it now is interesting to see how the world turned out compared to how Wolfe thought it should.
He criticised the army for developing the M1A1 Abrams tank. He thought we should have the equivalent of drone Main Battle Tanks. Of course, the M1 turned out to be very effective at what it does. And maybe we’d have the technology now to have an effective drone tank today if we still were staring down the Soviets at the Fulda Gap. But why? With no crew to protect, you don’t need armor, why not make the ‘tank’ fly. A flying drone with hellfire missiles is harder to hit than a unmanned tank. And as effective.
He also thought it would be a good idea to put MX Peacekeeper missiles into fiberglass sailboats and just sail them around. He thought they’d be impossible to hunt down that way, looking for small non magnetic boats. Meh. Even floating them in Lake Michigan isn’t the best idea, but at least that would keep the Soviet OPFOR counteracting efforts frustrated. But why? To make the MX a better deterrent? We had other legs on that Triad. Turning them into a cheaper but easier found than a submarine naval asset does what to help that Triad? Traditional silos have advantages all their own as part of that grouping. (disadvantages too, but that’s why you have 3 so strengths of one can cover weaknesses of others.)
Seems kind of muddle headed.
And finally, Gene Wolfe justified cavalry in modern (or near and far future) application in this book. Know this, he was a Korean War vet and his conjecture is kind of intriguing.
Wolfe assumed genetic manipulations of horse to make them cheetah fast. He did the math. With a 19th / 20th century horse you can cover the effective range of the shoulder fired infantry arm in the time he can take 1 shot with a muzzle loader, so cavalry was effective in that case (Napoleonic wars). But an infantryman can get off multiple shots in the effective range of his bolt action rifle, to destroy charging cavalry. But what if you decreased the effective range of modern infantry but gave them full auto fire, AND you got your super-horse to run at cheetah speeds?
Or you gave both infantry and cavalry unlimited rates of fire with beam weapons? (He was sure, in 1982, that laser rifles were coming out in 10 years of so. ~sigh~) And assume the horses have Kevlar armor. His argument for cavalry in these circumstances almost works. And if there is technological breakdown and motorcycles and helicopters no longer work, it’s nice to have a super fast means of transport like genetically modified horse that can reproduce for generation after generation and provide long-term high-speed transportation assets.
It all falls apart when you are using a few long range heavy machine guns. Better gallop at 100 miles an hour for scouting and dragoon type fighting.
Smart guy. You should see some of the vocabulary he uses. Very challenging for the Junior High School kid I was. His sentences were well crafted, and I despaired ever coming close to that kind of precision when I put pen to paper. I still do.
When writing that series, he was interviewed by some trade publication asking about the upcoming 4th book and they misheard Citadel of the Autarch and wrote it as Castle of the Otter, of all things. That tickled Gene Wolfe and he wrote a 5th book using that title, with thoughts on the development of the series and tips for up and coming SciFi writers. Castle of the Otter came out in 1982. And rereading it now is interesting to see how the world turned out compared to how Wolfe thought it should.
He criticised the army for developing the M1A1 Abrams tank. He thought we should have the equivalent of drone Main Battle Tanks. Of course, the M1 turned out to be very effective at what it does. And maybe we’d have the technology now to have an effective drone tank today if we still were staring down the Soviets at the Fulda Gap. But why? With no crew to protect, you don’t need armor, why not make the ‘tank’ fly. A flying drone with hellfire missiles is harder to hit than a unmanned tank. And as effective.
He also thought it would be a good idea to put MX Peacekeeper missiles into fiberglass sailboats and just sail them around. He thought they’d be impossible to hunt down that way, looking for small non magnetic boats. Meh. Even floating them in Lake Michigan isn’t the best idea, but at least that would keep the Soviet OPFOR counteracting efforts frustrated. But why? To make the MX a better deterrent? We had other legs on that Triad. Turning them into a cheaper but easier found than a submarine naval asset does what to help that Triad? Traditional silos have advantages all their own as part of that grouping. (disadvantages too, but that’s why you have 3 so strengths of one can cover weaknesses of others.)
Seems kind of muddle headed.
And finally, Gene Wolfe justified cavalry in modern (or near and far future) application in this book. Know this, he was a Korean War vet and his conjecture is kind of intriguing.
Wolfe assumed genetic manipulations of horse to make them cheetah fast. He did the math. With a 19th / 20th century horse you can cover the effective range of the shoulder fired infantry arm in the time he can take 1 shot with a muzzle loader, so cavalry was effective in that case (Napoleonic wars). But an infantryman can get off multiple shots in the effective range of his bolt action rifle, to destroy charging cavalry. But what if you decreased the effective range of modern infantry but gave them full auto fire, AND you got your super-horse to run at cheetah speeds?
Or you gave both infantry and cavalry unlimited rates of fire with beam weapons? (He was sure, in 1982, that laser rifles were coming out in 10 years of so. ~sigh~) And assume the horses have Kevlar armor. His argument for cavalry in these circumstances almost works. And if there is technological breakdown and motorcycles and helicopters no longer work, it’s nice to have a super fast means of transport like genetically modified horse that can reproduce for generation after generation and provide long-term high-speed transportation assets.
It all falls apart when you are using a few long range heavy machine guns. Better gallop at 100 miles an hour for scouting and dragoon type fighting.
He was also SURE, in 1982, that if only the Soviet Union would open up to US publishing, and the subsequent translation of English works of Scifi, among other, occurred, then royalties and stock prices for publishers would SOAR!
ReplyDeleteInteresting... I've never read any of his works. Will have to see if I can track them donwn.
ReplyDeleteOh. please do NFO. Shadow of the Torturer is wonderful.
ReplyDeleteI have all these books in hard cover. Got them like 25 years ago. Need to reread them!
ReplyDelete