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Alfred Harrington back to the colours?

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Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by Spitfire80   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 2:52 am

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So in one of the short stories, we are shown Alfred Harrington, being capable of advanced levels of mayhem. As i understand it, while a marine he witnessed some bad things, which made him switch to the medical track, but when Ally, was in trouble, he turned back into that marine, and tore the crap out of those SOB's.

Skip ahead a large number of years, and he is one of the best in his medical field and has an older daughter capable of even more mayhem aparently. And his Star Nation is at war, with the single largest Star Nation, known to humanity.

I imagine that at some point the reserves are being called up, and the military tries to recruit as many able bodied men and women as possible. Possibly even calling up those that left the various services honourably. (As i understand has happened in various wars up until now, in RL)

I find myself wondering if they would reach out to the elder Harrington. As good as he is, he would be an asset on one of the medical ships in a fleet support train. Or if he might not offer to go himself, after what happened to his family he might want to get some of his own back.

Anyway, what do you guys think?

Personally, i think it would be cool if he went. But that's just me. ;)
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by crewdude48   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 3:23 am

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If they didn't recall him for the Haven Wars, they won't call him up for this one.
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by JeffEngel   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 6:48 am

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crewdude48 wrote:If they didn't recall him for the Haven Wars, they won't call him up for this one.

And it's not as though his services aren't available to the military too in a pinch. He's among the best neurosurgeons on Manticore. Chances are, very rarely does that level of skill need to be called upon, and when it does, chances are that among the rest of that class, someone is still in BuMed. So when it comes down to it, he's likely serving his country just as well in the civilian sector.
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by cthia   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 7:41 am

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At this point in Honor's career where she has lost so much family, I doubt they'd call him. If she lost her father, now? Calling him in that capacity would almost be a conflict of interest. But he could always be asked to help at Bassingford Medical Center.

I seriously doubt that they'd even allow him to join, of his own accord.

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by Dauntless   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 8:04 am

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If you need alfred harrington's med skills then you are going to need bassignford. if you are in that much trouble that even a hospital ship (which is not something i recall seeing) is unlikely to be well enough equipped.

i'm sure if needed he would help out without having to be recalled, but i find very unlikely that he would return to the fleet proper.
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by Spitfire80   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:11 am

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Hmm, you all make very good points, which i obviously hadn't considered. Thanks for that, i love this community. ;)
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by Hutch   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:16 am

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I agree with all the above, putting Alfred Harrington back in uniform would be counter-productive.

That said, once the man deals with his grief at losing so much of his family, he is likely to be...quite peeved...at the folks who did it. And given what he does to people that peeve him (see the short story in Beginnings :o :shock: ), it would not surprise me to see him involved in something besides purely medical.

My recurring fantasy is Asinomiva (sp) waking up to find that she is captured, all her suicide devices removed, and a couple of people wanting to question her...being Alfred and Sorrow Singer... :twisted:

There is a time for monsters...

We shall see, eventually.
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by munroburton   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 12:17 pm

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Wouldn't RMN requirements for shipboard doctors have gone down substantially in the past few years anyway, due to vastly reduced crews in new ships and old ships being decommissioned?

Particularly for modern fleets supported by auxiliary vessels designed to support the old, manpower heavy ships. As far as I know, the RHN never shot up a fleet's support train - just convoys here and there.

Hm, this could explain why deep penetration strikes became viable in the second war, finally superseding the previous doctrine of advancing system-by-system. Crandall and Filareta had a LOT of auxiliaries accompanying them.

Honor's Eighth Fleet had very few ships, all of them crew-light. If she was supported by even a tenth of the support train Buttercup's Eighth Fleet had...
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by Jonathan_S   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 1:56 pm

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munroburton wrote:Wouldn't RMN requirements for shipboard doctors have gone down substantially in the past few years anyway, due to vastly reduced crews in new ships and old ships being decommissioned?
Probably depends on the level of medical care they're willing to setting for for the smaller ships.

SDs probably had multiple doctors, so those could be scaled back somewhat as the crew sizes fell. But you can't go below 1 doctor per ship without seriously compromising the medical support for a crew.

And even back in OBS the CL Fearless, with a crew of 385, only carried 1 doctor, 1 PA, and some sick berth attendants (more than 4, probably 8-12).

Sure a Roland, which is bigger, carries far less crew, but you'd still want an MD and PA, so any medical staff savings come out of the SBAs. (And I'd assume there is a somewhat wider pool of people capable of becoming capable SBA then there is of becoming capable MDs; plus the training and education time is presumably less).


And if the reduced crew levels allow you to build and operate more light units then that might increase the total number of shipboard doctors the RMN needs.
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Re: Alfred Harrington back to the colours?
Post by saber964   » Fri Oct 02, 2015 4:44 pm

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Jonathan_S wrote:
munroburton wrote:Wouldn't RMN requirements for shipboard doctors have gone down substantially in the past few years anyway, due to vastly reduced crews in new ships and old ships being decommissioned?
Probably depends on the level of medical care they're willing to setting for for the smaller ships.

SDs probably had multiple doctors, so those could be scaled back somewhat as the crew sizes fell. But you can't go below 1 doctor per ship without seriously compromising the medical support for a crew.

And even back in OBS the CL Fearless, with a crew of 385, only carried 1 doctor, 1 PA, and some sick berth attendants (more than 4, probably 8-12).

Sure a Roland, which is bigger, carries far less crew, but you'd still want an MD and PA, so any medical staff savings come out of the SBAs. (And I'd assume there is a somewhat wider pool of people capable of becoming capable SBA then there is of becoming capable MDs; plus the training and education time is presumably less).


And if the reduced crew levels allow you to build and operate more light units then that might increase the total number of shipboard doctors the RMN needs.



Actually Fearless carried two MD's. Dr's. Suchon and Montoya and probably 6-8 SBA's with 2-3 serving as corpsman with the Marines.

Also I think Alfred Harrington would be on very short list of specialist doctors the RMN would consult in major medical cases. Sort of like what happened in ART when Honor was meeting with Chun-Li and they were discussing the MA's nano-virus.
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