He paused as if to let that sink in, then glanced back down at his notes again.
"At the present moment, our order of battle is slated to include the equivalent of two dreadnought and four superdreadnought squadronsa total of forty-eight of the wallsupported by ten squadrons of battleships, for a total of a hundred and twenty-eight capital ships. Our battlecruiser element will consist of three squadron equivalents, for a total of twenty-four units, and Citizen Admiral Tourville will be joining us shortly aboard one of them to serve as Twelfth Fleets second in command."
Several people looked up at that, and Giscard hid a smile at their expressions. Like Giscard himself, most of the officers in that briefing room were disgusted by Honor Harringtons judicial murder, but the fact that Tourville had captured her in the first place, coupled with his crushing victory in the Adler System, had further enhanced his already high professional stature. Of course, none of Giscards staffers would find themselves required to ride herd on an officer whose reputation for tactical brilliance was matched only by his reputation as a flamboyant, guts-and-glory adolescent who refused to grow up. But they clearly regarded his assignment to their fleet command structure as a sign that Fleet HQ truly did consider Operation Icarus as vital as HQ said it did, and that wasnt always the case in the Peoples Navy.
Personally, Giscard had a few private reservations. Not about Tourvilles capabilities, but about all the reasons for his assignment to Icarus. There had to have been a reason Tourville and his flagship had been detached from his previous command to escort Citizen Secretary Ransom to the Cerberus System, and he doubted somehow that it had been because Ransom wanted Tourvilles opinion on what color to paint her quarters aboard Tepes. But no one would ever know for certain now. Giscard was one of only a tiny handful of Navy officers who knew what had happened to Tepes and Citizen Secretary Ransomand he knew only because he had certain avenues of information very few serving officers could match.
Ten months had passed since Tepes destruction, and he often wondered when the official news of Ransoms long overdue demise would be made public (and exactly how the circumstances of her departing this mortal vale would be structured by PubIn for foreign and domestic consumption). But the people at the top had to realize shed had a specific reason for dragging Tourville to Cerberus. So did the citizen admirals continued existence, not to mention employment on a highly sensitive mission, indicate that Ransoms fellows on the Committee of Public Safety questioned her judgment and were less than devastated by her departure? Or that Esther McQueen had managed to protect him because she recognized his value? Or possibly that the success of Operation Icarus was not, in fact, regarded as being quite so vital as McQueen and Bukato had implied?
Any or all of those were certainly possible... and if Fleet HQ was setting Tourville up as a fall guy in case this Icarus also flew too close to the sun, might it not be doing the same thing with another officer who had only recently reemerged from the disgrace of a busted operation in Silesia?
"with at least one light cruiser flotilla and a substantial but probably understrength destroyer screen," MacIntosh was continuing his listing of the resources committed to Icarus, and Giscard shook off thoughts about Tourville in order to concentrate on the ops officers briefing once more. "All of those numbers are tentative at this point, which is going to make our planning even harder. I have been informed, however, that we may regard the superdreadnought, dreadnought, and battleship numbers as minimum figures. The Octagan will be trying to pry still more of each class loose for us. Given that they havent said the same thing about battlecruisers and how strapped we are for them, I would suspect that BCs are where were most likely to come up short," MacIntosh went on. "At the same time, however, were as strapped for light forces as for ships of the wall right now, and pulling together our battleship component will only exacerbate that situation in some respects. The systems we pull them out of will have to be covered by someone" for, he did not add, political reasons "and it looks like HQ will be tapping tin cans and light cruisers for that, which will cut into what might have been made available to us.
"On the logistical side," he nodded at Citizen Lieutenant Challot, who looked less than delighted to be brought center stage, "well be getting very heavy support. In addition to tankers and medical and repair ships, HQ is assigning two complete service squadrons of fast freighters for the specific purpose of assuring us an adequate supply of the new missile pods."
He bared his teeth in a fierce smile as several people around the table made pleased noises.
"The fact that we can finally match the Manties capabilities in that area is certainly out of the bag by nowthey could hardly miss knowing after the way Citizen Admiral Tourville kicked their ass at Adlerbut this will be our first mass deployment of the system. In addition, we have upgraded recon drone capability courtesy of, ah, some technical assistance," even here, Giscard noted, MacIntosh was careful not to mention the Solarian League by name, "and our general electronic warfare capabilities will come much closer to matching the Manties abilities in that area. I wont try to tell any of you that they wont still have a considerable edge, but its going to be narrower than its been in at least the last four years, and hopefully they wont even know were coming. With that kind of surprise working for us, we should cut quite a swathe before they can redeploy their own units to slow us down."
There were more smiles around the table now. Even Citizen Captain Joubert got into the act, although Challot still seemed less enthralled by the prospect than her fellows.
"Now," MacIntosh went on, entering more commands into his terminal, "to look at our ops area. As you know, HQ wanted a zone where things have been rather quiet and the Manties have drawn down their forces to support front-line operations, but important enough to be sure we attract their attention. I think," he smiled and entered a final command, "theyve found one."
A holo display flashed to life above the table, and Giscard saw Citizen Commander Tyler sit up straight in her chair as she saw their proposed operational area for the first time. Nor was her reaction unique. Only Giscard, Pritchart, Joubert, and MacIntosh had known where Operation Icarus was aimed before this moment, and eyes narrowed and faces tightened with mingled anticipation and worry as the rest of his staff discovered that information.
Stars were sparse in the holo, but the ones which floated there had a value out of all proportion to the density of the local stellar population. A thin rash of bright red light chips indicated naval bases or member systems of the Manticoran Alliance, but all of them were dominated by the bright purple glow of a single star: Basilisk, the terminus of the Manticore Wormhole Junction where the war had almost begun four T-years early.