"William Forstchen - Wing Commander 3 - Fleet Action" - читать интересную книгу автора (Forstchen William R)

There were several snorts of disdain from the clan leaders. Such ships
and those who served in them were considered to be beneath contempt.
Any of fighting age who accepted assignment to one was disgraced within
his clan, deemed not worthy to sire heirs for himself, but rather only to sit
at the edge of the feasting tables, heads lowered, when boasts of war were
shared and arm veins opened to pour out libations on the altars of Sivar.
The quality of personnel could be readily inferred from this.

"It is a simple fact that, without fuel, food, replacement parts, weapons,
and even such basics as air to breathe and water to drink, a fleet is useless.
The humans have hit upon the strategy of avoiding direct confrontation
and striking instead to our rear, cutting our supplies, destroying our
transports, forcing us to detail off precious frigates and destroyers to
escort them. Their escort carriers attack and against them even destroyers
are outclassed, so that now heavy cruisers must escort convoys. As a result
there are not enough heavy cruisers to escort our carriers and our own
construction of these new light carriers has yet to come fully on line."

He paused for a moment and looked at the charts projected on the holo
screens.

"We have lost over seven eight-of-eights of transports in the last year,
along with four yards for their construction. That is our weak point. We
have reached the stage where, for the moment, our carriers must leave the
front and return all the way to Kilrah to resupply since there are not
enough transports to bring supplies to them. As a result, in actual
numbers of ships at the front, our strength has been cut in half, and so, in
most sectors, Confederation ships outnumber us."

He paused again for effect and saw the cold looks of disbelief, that
something as mundane, as undignified as this issue, could actually affect
their fighting of the war.

"What I hear is impossible," Yikta of the Caxki clan snarled. "Are you
truly saying we have lost the war because of such a thing?"

"The humans have a saying that for want of a nail a horseshoe was lost,
for want of a horseshoe aтАж"

"What is a horse?" Yikta asked.

"It is a beast of war which humans once rode upon," and then he
explained the rest of the statement and saw that it had its effect.

"No, the war is by no means lost," Prince Thrakhath finally said,
stirring at last. "The Baron tends, I think, to overplay his thinking and
chartmaking to scare us."
 "But you will not deny that we are in trouble," the Baron retorted.