Sea Lanes

[Mohoender]

I'm not thinking of world shipping which is a different matter we already discussed. However, in T2K what sea lane could be available and where will piracy be really active

Here are might thoughts:
- Bosphorus: open desipite damages by the bomb that missed Istanbul
- Gibraltar: open
- Jutland: open
- Suez Canal: destroyed by nukes
- Panama Canal: I used to have it open with limited access but why should it be so. More likely destroyed.

Major working harbors:
- Macao (China)
- Marseille (France)
- Copenhagen (Denmark)
- Arkhangelsk (Russia)
- Riga (Latvia)
- Several in Norway and Sweden
- Portsmouth and Newcastle (UK)
- Porto (Portugal)
- Istanbul (Turkey)
- Dakar (Senegal)
- Cape Town (South Africa)
- Savannah and Boston (USA)
- Quebec (Quebec)
- Several smaller harbors seeing more shipping these days

Please complete the list, I'm missing several (Thanks Wiki): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_seaports

Major Sea Lane:
Pacific Sealane: going from Europe/US to Falklands and Chile to several Islands in the Pacific. Piracy is extremely important in the Carribean, off the coasts of Portugal/Spain, in the Bay of Biscay and in the Mediterranean. A safer sea lane link the US west coast to various destinations in the Pacific

Mediterranean Sea Lanes Again the most travelled seas, it is also the most dangerous. You better travel in convoy.

Atlantic Sea Lanes Largely abandonned, they are especially unsafe due to mine hazards.

African Sea Lane with the destruction of the Suez Canal, shipping is going trough the cape of good hope, making cape town the most important seaport and benefiting South Africa. Other major stop on the route are Madeira, Cabo Verde, Saint Helena, Reunion/Maurice, Zanzibar. Piracy exist all along the African coasts.

Artic sea lane largely abandonned it linked Arkhangelsk to ports in the Atlantic

Northern Sea Route A major sea route nowadays it is entirely controled by the Soviet Union.

Just some rapid thoughts, feel free to complete.

[Rainbow Six]

Major working harbors:
- Macao (China)
- Marseille (France)
- Copenhagen (Denmark)
- Arkhangelsk (Russia)
- Riga (Latvia)
- Several in Norway and Sweden
- Portsmouth and Newcastle (UK)
- Porto (Portugal)
- Istanbul (Turkey)
- Dakar (Senegal)
- Cape Town (South Africa)
- Savannah and Boston (USA)
- Quebec (Quebec)
- Several smaller harbors seeing more shipping these days

Please complete the list, I'm missing several (Thanks Wiki): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_seaports

There's also Bremerhaven...

There's a few more in the UK and Ireland. Felixstowe (which is the UK's busiest container port according to wiki) and Harwich both survived, as did Plymouth.

The main ports for the Scotland - Northern Ireland ferry service are untouched - Stranraer and Cairnryan in Scotland and Belfast and Larne in Northern Ireland.

There would also be a number of smaller ports...for an extensive listing I'd defer to the list RN7 posted in his thread

IIRC the only nuclear target in the Republic of Ireland was Bantry Bay, so all the other Irish ports should be OK - Dun Laoghaire and Rosslare both had regular ferry services to the UK.

I guess only caveat would be that the absence of a port on a list of nuclear targets does not neccessarily mean that the port is still intact and / or in working order. They could have been plastered by conventional airstrikes or, in the case of those close to ground combat, destroyed by artillery or blown up etc, etc...

[helbent4]

Major working harbors:
- Macao (China)
- Marseille (France)
- Copenhagen (Denmark)
- Arkhangelsk (Russia)
- Riga (Latvia)
- Several in Norway and Sweden
- Portsmouth and Newcastle (UK)
- Porto (Portugal)
- Istanbul (Turkey)
- Dakar (Senegal)
- Cape Town (South Africa)
- Savannah and Boston (USA)
- Quebec (Quebec)
- Several smaller harbors seeing more shipping these days

Mo,

Quebec City gets creamed by a 1 MT airburst to take out the refineries on both sides of the St. Lawrence. This probably flattens the entire city, and to take out all the refineries ground zero would have to be more or less above the river, and the port.

One port that should be added is Churchill, Manitoba. Not only is it a notable (if not major) arctic port on Hudson's Bay, it's also the site of Canada's commercial spaceport. (Currently inactive but possibly reactivated for satellite launch during the Twilight War.)

Tony

[Mohoender]

I couldn't decide for Quebec City as it is also stated that the capital was moved there after some times.

Flaten or not flaten, that is the question.

[dvyws]

Just off he top of my head...

Don't forget the Singapore Strait - a very busy route, which (a few years ago, anyway) had a reputation for piracy even without the war.

Can't remember if Singapore was a target or not, but even if it was, the Strait should be navigable.

And don't forget Hormuz either - in and out of the Persian Gulf. There is a lot if local trade there, in dhows, as well as the oil. And Dubai is a port and historical pirate area.

If Suez canal is closed, I don't think Aden and the Red Sea will have a great deal of traffic, but there are ports at Hodeida in Yemen, Jeddah in Saudi an Port Suez in Egypt, all on the Red Sea.

And there wil probably be a fair bt of trade arounf the West Indies

[Legbreaker]

Don't forget the Singapore Strait - a very busy route, which (a few years ago, anyway) had a reputation for piracy even without the war.

It still does, possibly moreso than around Africa which is getting all the media (and military) attention at the moment.

[helbent4]

I couldn't decide for Quebec City as it is also stated that the capital was moved there after some times.

Flatten or not flatten, that is the question.

Mo,

It's a puzzle all right. Where would they move the capital to, and why

The problem with QC is that it's just not a big city, and tends to cluster around the river. The refinery and tank farm is only about 2-3km from the port, and about 5km from the iconic Chateau Frontenac and the National Assembly/parliament buildings in the old city.

Probably it's the name that's most important. Even if the old city and the parliament buildings are gone, as long as they move the Qubec National Assembly to somewhere within the city limits it counts symbolically. If needed, the airport is on the outskirts of the city upriver to the west, a relatively good spot and far away from advancing Canadian troops. As well or in conjunction, the strike on the refineries could have been off target and hit somewhere to the south, leaving most or part of the city/capital buildings/port intact.

Getting back to the topic, I don't see the Northwest Passage as being a feasible route, unfortunately. Due to mysterious processes that are still hotly disputed by some in the USA (possibly involving the heating of a globe-like celestial body that may or may not be Earth by some unknown and disputed mechanism by a species that allegedly evolved from ape-like organisms) the ice has been rapidly retreating and the Northwest Passage will soon be navigatable by commercial traffic many months of the year. Given the conditions outlined in "Howling Wilderness", I see the ice shelf advancing as temperatures cool and moisture is locked up in the polar regions. Hudson's Bay and Churchill will still be accessible.

On the west coast, the Port of Vancouver would be largely intact. In the BYB Canada target list only the refineries/oil storage facilities around Burrard Inlet get hit. These areas are either to the east of the Port of Vancouver facilities, the Robert's Bank Superport (a twin container port and coal terminal facility) to the south or the various facilities on the Fraser River like the Fraser Surrey Docks. The city is largely abandoned and in the Legion MccRae adventure "The River" the container port downtown also takes a direct hit, but that leaves several large port areas intact (if inoperative).

Further, aside from the Singapore Strait the Strait of Malacca is the largest and busiest in the world. Piracy is a serious problem there but would probably decline with the collapse of world trade.

Tony

[Fusilier]

Due to mysterious processes that are still hotly disputed by some in the USA (possibly involving the heating of a globe-like celestial body that may or may not be Earth by some unknown and disputed mechanism by a species that allegedly evolved from ape-like organisms) the ice has been rapidly retreating and the Northwest Passage will soon be navigatable by commercial traffic many months of the year.

I wasn't sure I should laugh or rage.

[dragoon500ly]

Due to mysterious processes that are still hotly disputed by some in the USA (possibly involving the heating of a globe-like celestial body that may or may not be Earth by some unknown and disputed mechanism by a species that allegedly evolved from ape-like organisms)

Hmmmm, I do believe that he called we'ins apes!!!! It's a good thing that I'm descended from the lone survivor of Roswell, otherwise I'd have to nuke the site from orbit....just to be sure!

[helbent4]

Hmmmm, I do believe that he called we'ins apes!!!! It's a good thing that I'm descended from the lone survivor of Roswell, otherwise I'd have to nuke the site from orbit....just to be sure!

Lee,

I, of course, speak only for myself!

Hey, what the hell are you doing here, anyways Did you hear there was some colonists' daughters down here that needed rescuing from their virginity

Tony

[dragoon500ly]

Lee,

I, of course, speak only for myself!

Hey, what the hell are you doing here, anyways Did you hear there was some colonists' daughters down here that needed rescuing from their virginity

Tony

But of course!!! After all, cavalrymen are know for their abilities in fornification, drunkness and above all else, the humbling of the lowly infantry!!

[dragoon500ly]

Can't remember if Singapore was a target or not, but even if it was, the Strait should be navigable.

Just a cruel thought, but wouldn't the Soviets find it easy to mine the Singapore Strait as well as the passages through the Malay Barrier A very sizable percentage of the world's shipping goes through both...

[helbent4]

Just a cruel thought, but wouldn't the Soviets find it easy to mine the Singapore Strait as well as the passages through the Malay Barrier A very sizable percentage of the world's shipping goes through both...

Lee,

That's a great point. At least some of these areas would be mined by some power or another. Soviet subs or surface raiders may be able to lay minefields, even using nuclear mined. Or local combatants might want to isolate the area from trade for some reason. These minefields may be cleared or partially cleared over time.

Tony

[Legbreaker]

Unlike the Panama and Suez canals, the Bosphorus, etc, there's more than one path to take between the hundreds, even thousands of islands. Mining them all is probably beyond even the strongest of superpowers.
It's these many islands, inlets, etc that make it such a rich area for pirates - they can raid a ship and simply disappear before a response arrives.
I'm sure the attempt would be made, and there's bound to be a few stray mines floating about to make the area even more dangerous to shipping, but it's unlikely any concerted effort would be made. You don't have to travel more than a few hundred miles more to avoid the worst choke points, and adding a day or three to the journey may avoid the area almost entirely.

[Canadian Army]

Quebec City, Quebec

Quebec City, Quebec would not be operating due to fact, all access to Quebec City can only be archived by way of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, which would have mined sometime after the start of the twilight war. However St. John's Harbour, Newfoundland and Labrador and Sydney, Nova Scotia would be functioning. I see both the harbours at busy places, due to three offshore oil fields around Newfoundland and Labrador and Steel Mill and Coal Mine in Nova Scotia.