Jul 12, 17 / Leo 25, 01 12:40 UTC

military/security : starting structuring the debate  

while looking at the forum here in the security/military subforum, i found the topics are going in several different dirrections and things look quite confused :
a space fleet, missiles, weapons, volunteers, grades, personnal weapons (concealed or not), terrorism, asgardian defense, ...

security is serious topic, so a serious work should be done in order to have something correct, with as few gaps as possible.

but things should be built in the proper order, so i'll post the questions, and i'll regroup the answers from all of us by editing this post, to create the framework for the future security arm.
1/ what is military security ? branches ? domains covered ? roles ?
2/ what does it take to be part of the military security ? can anybody be in and why ?
3/ what is the structure that should be put in place ? i am not speaking of grades design and decorations, but effective structure.

reminder :
we are ALL from different countries, which means we all have different experiences and expectations.
we are also ALL interested in a project that requests a real structure. we are all adults (or nearly), we are all intelligent enough to know that building something means working together.
so please :
- present your ideas, don't comment others'. the idea is to regroup the ideas of each of us, stupid or not, and then discuss about them step by step.
- stay polite, respect each other. you might find someone else's ideas stupid/timid/violent/too soft, but they also might bring something interesting
- eventually, introduce yourself shortly, but this is not a call for volunteers.

i have my opinions, i will present them in my post. this post is made to remain as neutral as possible and keep track of each one's thought.
i might regroup similar ideas in the same entry. don't get angry for that... it'll save reading time, and we'll work on each domain later on when we have the structure


Jul 12, 17 / Leo 25, 01 13:48 UTC

as an example, i'll write my personnal point of view here :

a/ who i am
i am french.
i have no military experience per se, but some background informations, including lots of readings, old and new, about military strategies, structure, work and necessities.
i won't contest with anybody about weapon usage, effective range, ... but i know what they can do (between any hands ...)
i won't contest with anybody about physical training, but i know why it's don't like that.

and i'm a joker. my posts might have an ironic or comic tone, but the content is serious

b/ asgardia
i didn't accept the constitution. there are several reasons that irk me. one of them is i can't accept a king, it gives me images of cutting blades. probably my french side. we all have reasons to be interested in the project, i have mine. 

what i find important is :
asgardia is a group of people WORLDWIDE
asgardia is a PROJECT
asgardia is supposed to be IN SPACE (but for that ... we're not yet there)
asgardia is NOT A GAME

what does that mean ?
well, to begin, creating a military force by individuals located in 190 countries seems to be technically impossible. we must not think with the usual military structure.

secondly, asgardia being a real project, there is a real budget. and for now, this budget is 0. yes, zero. we are all volunteers. asgardia is not going to provide us with nice and shiny uniforms or brand new metal toys
say goodbye to missiles, space ships or a space station and drop pods. the actual project is to launch a satellite containing electronic datas we put in... a satellite ! it will not even be more than 30cm in diameter.
so we have to be realistic too.

last, space. it leads to 2 elements
one : we are NOT in space. we might be "asgardians", we are firstly living in a physical country. local laws apply. in US, you can have guns. in japan, you can't. asgardian laws won't go over local law.
two : there is something very special about space. it's called vacuum. a hole in the hull of anything in space, and it's the death of lots of people inside.
so let's be clear. speaking about concealed weapons or what gun we should have is useless. we just can't have guns as long as we are limited by local laws. if we get an embassy or independant state, the topic will be different.
and in space, we won't be able to have solid ammos. laser ? nah. powder ? in your dreams (fire is the worst thing in an enclosed space). get ready to have taser guns at best. 

once again, we have to be realistic

let's answer...
1/ what is military security ? branches ? domains covered ? roles ?
we have to ensure physical security of the people of asgardia.
we have to ensure physical security and integrity of asgardia properties.
we have to ensure physical security and integrity of asgardian datas.
we have to ensure a control of the access of asgardian datas and physical locations.
to have to be informed of the decisions and intentions of other countries toward asgardia and asgardian people.
this represents at least 3 different positions : "classic" military operations (security of places and access control), physical protection and support of inhabitants and spy/counter spy operations.

2/ what does it take to be part of the military security ? can anybody be in and why ?
in the actual situation, we need people. any origin, any background, as long as the person is volunteer.
we are not yet developping a spy/counter spy system, and don't have illegal (at least not that i am aware of) activities. i am 100% sure there are several people working for several governments registered in the project. this is not a concern for now. we'll have to find ways to determine people's intentions and affiliations, maybe. but that's not a priority

3/ what is the structure that should be put in place ? i am not speaking of grades design and decorations, but effective structure.
as we are spread over 190 countries (maybe not that number, but it gives an idea), and those countries have different laws, we have to create local structures
those structures should be geography related, and related to emergencies
i'll take examples
we can't ask a volunteer from NY, DC to be rapidly deployed in portland, OR, knowing there is no budget
we can't ask a US volunteer to be deployed in Japan with his usual equipment, knowing local laws won't allow it

so for me, we have to create quick response teams :
a structure of local volunteers managed by a local head, in charge of gathering all the security related informations from the local asgardians and able to dispatch the local volunteers depending on the emergency needs and avaliabilities.
this local structure has to be supported by regional and national levels, able to dispatch avaliable volunteers if the situation needs it. this will need a higher level budgeting
an international level can be prepared, but international volunteers will have to be briefed of local laws and cost will be very high. it might not be possible for now.
we have to start by listing volunteers by location, compare with asgardian inhabitants to create the local groups. we can discuss on the method for selecting the administrator/local officer and higher levels. a vote among motivated people in each location, on competences and motivation might be a good base.
we have to ensure all volunteers accept to work with foreign people, with different culture, origin and points of view.

i suggest using the the french foreign legion as an inspiration of integration.

Jul 13, 17 / Leo 26, 01 20:56 UTC

I firmly believe that the purpose of Asgardia is to survive in space. The low resources and expense to get more means we are going to learn to live off the land. As collecting space debris and salvage is one method of meeting safety and needs goals, that may be paramount. A host of salvage methods are being worked on by many sources. In any military situation I think we will have to conserve resources and use what we have, thinking outside the box. 

Example: rather than fleets of star trek vessels, we will naturally have hordes of drones. These will be capable of collecting space debris using kilometer length ribbons, ionized for magnetism or to entangle targets. The 3d printing of such from materials ;[billions of nanoparticles from space junk] + [laser technology]=defense capability. Don't get me wrong, the lasers are for solar sails to speed them up. We are working in a vacuum and any earthside threats can be dealt with easily once we have tracking and entanglement in place. As for asteroids such as Apophis, its both a threat to eliminate and a nice mine for resources. 

Space Fleet Motto = We Eat Threats :}

Nov 18, 17 / Sag 14, 01 23:56 UTC

In my own opinion the term security refers to the protection of either asgardian property or personnel, if one wishes to join the security branch they should be vetted, and either have existing military training or have used an assortment of firearms before, as well as been trained up by asgardian security training team's once they have been accepted, most if not all military forces and armed groups go through training it would make sense if we had our own training facilities whether that is a handful in each 'district' in regards to your effective structure we should stick with the same principle the armed forces use in regards to rank/hierarchy (i am military myself and find its very easy to understand) that would only come into play when we get into space, but it does not hurt to have things in place before then, in regards to your point about weapons in space i agree conventional arms would be counter productive we would have to deal with other types such as tasers and other low powered concussive type weapons