BattleMechs Are Terrible Weapons. That's Why They're Perfect
Financial Deterrence Is The Best Kind Of Deterrence
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Memorandum to: High Command, Lyran Commonwealth Armed Forces (LCAF)
From: Major Solas Khyron, Department of Economic Warfare, Lyran Intelligence Corps (LIC)
Date: 28th November, 3031
Executive Summary
The recent discovery of the Helm Memory Core has enabled significant advances in military technology, prompting calls to “modernize” Regimental Combat Teams by replacing BattleMechs with more efficient alternatives.
This is a fatal mistake in doctrine. Why?
Because efficiency is a sign of weakness. It signals to our rivals that we must budget for war. It shows we are constrained by resources. A swarm of drones with the best cost-to-kill ratio is not intimidating.
It’s frugal.
It tells the enemy, “We need to save money.”
That does not inspire terror.
BattleMechs are not cost-effective weapons platforms; they are financial deterrence mechanisms. Their strategic value comes from being a costly signal that we are too rich to lose.
Recommendation: make all BattleMechs even more expensive with production inefficiency requirements to strengthen deterrent capabilities.
Efficient weapon systems are for Great Houses that need to win a war.
BattleMechs are for Great Houses that can afford to.
Problem context and analysis
The military-industrial technocratic push to use recovered LosTech to make more efficient weapon systems is understandable.
For the same amount of C-bills, a BattleMech lance would indeed lose to:
Low-cost suicide drone swarm, armed with HE (High-Explosive) tandem-charges, protected by counter-ECM drone(s) that serve as swarm C2 (Command & Control) nodes
Brigade of medium-heavy tanks, using a combination of ballistic, energy and missile weapons and simply concentrating fire with first-strike advantages due to low radar signatures
Squadron of conventional fighters, using PGM (Precision-Guided Munitions) or even GP (General Purpose) bombs; it would be an uncontested turkey shoot
What is being overlooked by the military-industrial complex is that winning the battle for efficiency means losing the war for deterrence.
Centuries of internecine conflict during the Succession Wars have taught us that open war is the most unfavourable scenario a Great House can be in.
Why solve for winning wars when we should be focused on preventing them?
Recommendation
BattleMechs are the most efficient and effective form of military deterrence: conspicuous financial consumption.
Each BattleMech we own, from the lightest Locust to the slowest Stalker, is a proud, towering proclamation that we are too rich to lose any war.
We must shift from a ‘Cost-Benefit’ to a ‘Cost-as-Deterrent’ (CAD) model by making BattleMechs even more expensive and inefficient.
Here are the tactical actions to achieve the least cost-effective BattleMechs:
All BattleMechs will have a price floor - set at the most expensive BattleMech to date: the 100-ton Assault-class AS7-D Atlas. While the Mackie, the first ever BattleMech, would theoretically be the most expensive BattleMech, we do not have financial data on it
No parts can be made on the same planet - All parts must be produced on separate planets, with final BattleMech assembly conducted on yet another planet. Interplanetary tariffs will be imposed on each component to further inflate production costs
Stop R&D on things like “better” armor - all capital will be re-allocated to vanity cosmetics. MechWarriors will have carte blanche to personalize their BattleMechs as they see fit e.g., 24K gold cockpits, bejewelling their neurohelmets etc
Each mech must be one-of-a-kind - BattleMech standardization is banned, and all components must be unique. Modular or standard spec parts must be scrapped to eliminate all economies of scale to ensure negative ROI (return-on-investment)
The CGR-1A1 Charger, widely regarded as the most inefficient BattleMech ever produced, should serve as our “North Star”.
Conclusion
Critics will argue this approach is wasteful, economically ruinous, and militarily suicidal.
They are correct on all counts.
But efficiency-minded reformers misunderstand the purpose of military spending.
The goal is not victory on the battlefield.
The goal is galactic strategic stability through financial deterrence.
What makes BattleMechs such effective deterrents is that they are so ineffective as actual weapon systems.
When our enemies see a Steiner Scout lance of 4 AS7-D Atlases, it’s not the “Death’s Head”, 19 tons of Durallex Special Heavy or even the AC/20 that makes them break out in cold sweat.
It’s the terror of knowing we are too rich to lose.
Very respectfully,
Major Solas Khyron
Department of Economic Warfare
Lyran Intelligence Corps (LIC)