EAS SHINANO

Earth Alliance Heavy Carrier

Circa 2247

The EAS Shinano was the pride of Earthforce when she slipped her moorings at the Wolf 359 Fleet Yards on August 7^th, 2247. The largest warship ever produced by the Alliance, the Shinano was over two kilometers long and bristled with firepower, second only to the Nova class Dreadnought. But, her real strength was not her own weaponry, but that which she carried within her massive hull. First and foremost, the Shinano was a fighter carrier. Ninety-six Aurora class Starfuries gave her a capacity twice that of an Avenger class carrier, with vastly improved defenses. Not until the first Poseidon class prototype was built was her capacity matched, and to date it has not been exceeded. She was a tremendous addition to the Earthforce battleline, but like so many ships of her time, her life was short, thanks to the Minbari.

Conceived in the early 2240’s, the Shinano was intended at first to simply be a lightly armed fighter carrier, not much more than an enlarged Avenger. Soon into the design process, however, it was decided to make the ship more than a simple carrier. Instead, she would be capable of not only launching her fighters into combat, but also entering the fray herself in support. The proven Nova hull design was used as a basis for the Shinano, lengthened and redesigned internally to accommodate eight squadrons of fighters, additional shuttles and assault craft, and their support crews. The long, narrow hull earned the class the nickname: Big Sticks" from the ancient saying "Speak softly and carry a big stick". As much proven technology as possible was used to reduce the already tremendous cost of the ship. Primary offensive firepower came from eight combination laser-pulse turrets, identical to those on the Nova. Four were mounted above and below the fighter bay, providing coverage to both sides, while the other four were mounted on the bow, in a manner identical to those on a Nova. Fourteen smaller turrets mounted particle cannons, geared primarily for anti-fighter defense. Eight small anti-fighter missile launchers provided additional defense from enemy fighters. A full Interceptor grid rounded out her defenses.

The fighter and shuttle facilities were the heart of the Shinano, and took up a large portion of her two-kilometer long hull. Forward, a standard launch and landing port was provided, along with two more port and starboard just forward of the fighter launch bays used primarily as reserves incase the forward bay was damaged or otherwise unavailable. The Shinano’s fighter launch facilities were arrayed along both sides of her hull, amidships, and allowed all ninety-six fighters to be launched in only a minute. Two fighters were stored back to back inside each of forty-eight bays. They were launched on electromagnetic catapults, firing their engines a few seconds after they cleared the hull, thus preventing blast damage to the interior of the bay, and the second fighter. Computers controlled the launch sequence in a full scramble so fighters did not collide as they left the ship. Airlock doors provided a fully pressurized maintenance area in the central hull, while a system of rails and mobile cranes moved the Starfuries around inside the bay and loaded them into their launch bays. As a safety precaution, final ordnance loading and fueling was done inside the launch bays, with the airlock doors sealed so than any accidental explosions would be vented out through the outer hull doors. Fighters could also be launched through the larger bay doors, but this was a much slower operation. Starfuries usually only used the main doors for landings. A variety of shuttles were also carried on the Shinano, a mix of standard personnel shuttles, and landing craft. If involved in a planetary or base assault, the ship could carry a large number of assault shuttles and breaching pods, even replacing some Starfuries with shuttles and pods. While not designed to carry large numbers of troops like the Nova, the Shinano was designed to take modular barracks pods in the main hanger. These spartan accommodations allowed several thousand troops to be carried for brief periods.

Like almost all Earthforce capital ships, the Shinano suffered from horrible maneuverability, especially when fully loaded with fighters and fuel. Once her fighters were away, the ship had maneuverability comparable to a Nova, which was not saying much, considering the dismal reputation of the Nova’s when it came to agility! Typical tactics had the fighters go in ahead of the carrier, supported by escorting warships and their fighters, if any. Their targets were enemy fighters, smaller escorts, and main weaponry on enemy warships. The Shinano would then enter the fight to finish off the larger warships that the smaller fighters and ships couldn’t. Against any "normal" enemy, these tactics would have been devastating, but the Shinano never had the opportunity to properly use them. Only a month after her keel was laid down at Wolf 359, the Minbari War began.

Construction of the Shinano went ahead, but the Wolf shipyards were also busy building other warships, including Novas, Hyperion class cruisers, and various escort ships. This delayed completion from late 2246 to mid 2247. Soon after her completion, and a brief shakedown cruise, the Shinano and her escort group, two Nova class dreadnoughts, four Hyperion class cruisers, and a half dozen Olympus and Artemis class escorts, were sent to the front to fight the relentless Minbari advance. It was hoped that her many fighters would prove useful in combat. Earth’s only hope seemed to be to try and overwhelm the more advanced Minbari, something that the Shinano seemed capable of doing.

The Shinano battle group met the Minbari in combat on January 2^nd, 2248, near Proxima III. The enemy force consisted of two Sharlin class war cruisers, and three smaller Tinashi class frigates. At first, the battle seemed to be going well for the Earth fleet, the 168 Starfuries in the group outnumbering their opponents by over three to one. Two of the Tinashis were destroyed by the combined firepower of the fighters and escorts, but one Hyperion and four of the smaller escorts were lost, along with nearly two thirds of the Starfuries. Soon after, the three remaining Minbari ships gathered up their surviving fighters and jumped into hyperspace, apparently fleeing. Jubilant in their victory over the Minbari, the Shinano and her escorts stood down from combat alert and recovered their surviving fighters. Their celebrations were short lived. The three Minbari ships jumped directly into the middle of the fleet, quickly destroying both Novas and the three surviving Hyperions. The two surviving escorts fought valiantly to hold off the Minbari long enough for the Shinano to escape, crippling one of the Sharlins in the process, but it was in vain. The Shinano tried to run, but it was far too slow to escape the Minbari. With her fighters still being reloaded into their launch bays, she had only her own weaponry to depend on, no match for Minbari neutron lasers and fusion beams. The Minbari literally sliced the Shinano in half, then proceeded to blast the two halves into almost unrecognizable wreckage. Only one badly damaged Olympus and several Starfuries survived, all of the other Earthforce ships and their crews being lost. It was one more disastrous defeat in what was becoming a long string of such tragedies. No other Shinano’s were begun during the remainder of the war, and only the inexplicable Minbari surrender at the Battle of the Line in 2249 allowed any discussion about the design’s future.

A competing design to the Shinano had also seen service during the war. The Poseidon class carrier had the same sized fighter group, but was not equipped with the heavy firepower of the Shinano, having only defensive weapons. It was a much cheaper design, and there was strong support for the design within the Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, it was decided to redesign the ship based on wartime experience, adding a rotating section to provide the crew with artificial gravity. This delayed its introduction into service for a decade. To fill the need for large carriers in Earthforce, the construction of several modified Shinano class carriers was authorized in 2251. These ships removed the large laser-pulse turrets, thus removing any offensive capability from the ship itself but also reducing the cost and increasing the maneuverability of these newer ships. Instead of following their fighters into battle, these new carriers would remain behind their escorts and not directly engage the enemy. The first new ship, the Furious, entered service in 2254, followed by five others over the next five years, the Enterprise, Akagi, Hermes, Kuznetsov, and Foch. The Hermes and Akagi were destroyed during the Civil War. The four surviving ships remain in service, but there are plans to retire them soon as more Poseidons come into service. It would be too difficult to equip them with artificial gravity, something essential to long tours of duty. Any other refits would be a waste of money, since the newer Poseidon can perform the same job for less money. So, the days of the "Big Sticks" are numbered. By 2270, the four remaining Shinanos will be either decommissioned or placed into the reserve fleet, rendered obsolete by the rapid advance of technology in the years since the Minbari war.