Of Casualties and After Action Reports
UNSC Spirit of Fire
Upper Foredeck
Shipboard time 1445
Jason stood at the bottom of the rear loading ramp of the Huntress, looking out across the top deck of the Spirit. Emerging from the airlock across the deck of the Spirit of Fire, there was a pair of UNSC marines rolling out a carpet of dubious origin. Thankfully, it was a blue carpet, and not a red one the two were rolling out. He would have had to order one of the Huntress' marines out to make them stop otherwise. He wasn't a Lord. Yet.
Footsteps on metal behind him alerted him to the approach of the rest of his lance, accompanied by the Marine Corporal carrying the Monitor for the trip to the airlock, where it would be handed off to their UNSC escort.
"So who are we meeting up he- Oh no…" Meredith groaned at the sight of the carpet. "I don't want to be standing around for half an hour waiting to get out of the damned sun. It'll ruin my scar treatment."
Jason glanced back and saw that Meredith Jaeger, Valiant, had pulled down the top section of her MBU, and her upper body was clad only in her cropped tank top, her red hair and pale skin exposed to the fresh air, leaving her Myomer replacement prosthetic right arm visible. Megan Lawrence, Equites, was dressed likewise, though her top bore the Cameron Star over her bust.
"And us without our dress greens," Megan joked, prompting a chuckle from Jason.
"Well, it's not like we're here for anything ceremonial," Riley McLeoud, Templar, commented. "Oh, hey, someone else is coming out. Might be our escort?"
Looking back at the airlock, Jason spotted Sergeant Forge stepping out of the airlock and glancing at the two marines. The Sergeant said something to the marines, who were about halfway through rolling out whatever carpet they had, who froze for a moment before grabbing the carpet and fleeing back inside with their apparently purloined goods.
"Looks like our escort is here," Jason said, stepping down off the ramp and onto the deck of the Spirit. The five of them approached Forge and the group of ODSTs that had come out of the airlock behind him, the two parties meeting halfway. "Good to see you again, Sergeant Forge. Permission to board?"
"Granted," Forge answered, completing the formality.
"I'd like to introduce you to my lancemates, since we didn't have time for introductions last time we met. My second, and lance number three, Captain Megan Lawrence, call sign Equites." He held out his hand to introduce Megan to Forge, who shook her hand briefly, before turning to the next member of the lance.
"Next is Lieutenant Riley McLeoud, my number two, call sign Templar, who keeps my back clear on the field," Jason introduced his next member, and Forge shared a conspiratorial grin with the younger man.
"Full time job, huh?" Forge asked Riley, which caused all four mechwarriors to laugh heartily.
"You've no idea," Riley responded, his face split into a wide grin.
"Oh come on, I try not to work you too hard," Jason returned the jibe from Riley, who smiled in response.
"Keeping them off your rear always keeps me in the good drinks at the bar, at least," Riley took one last shot at Jason, before nodding at Meredith.
"Right, anyways, finally, my number four, Lieutenant Meredith Jaeger, call sign Valiant. The lance brawler," Jason introduced the final member as she stepped forward and offered Forge her artificial hand to shake. Forge obliged gingerly, as if expecting a lack of fine motor skill or dexterity in the artificial arm, only for his eyes to widen in shock as Meredith gently took his hand and placed within it a silver coin. Jason smiled slightly, recognizing her own personal challenge coin that she'd had commissioned when she'd received her prosthetic replacement after surviving a rocket attack while on leave behind the lines on Clermont.
"Sorry about that. I'm guessing there's a story behind that, ma'am?" Forge asked her, looking at the engraved coin.
"There is, but now is not the time for stories," Meredith smiled at the Sergeant. "I'd like to get out of the sun, however, before it causes problems with the scar tissue."
"Then we'd best finish up out here," Forge grinned, before turning back to Jason.
"Right. Corporal, the package, if you'd please," Jason requested of the Marine Corporal carrying the oddly quiet Monitor. The corporal stepped forwards and handed the Monitor over to Forge, who took it and handed it off to one of the ODSTs, who proceeded to vanish back into the airlock with the monitor.
Jason nodded to the corporal in thanks as the man looked at him inquisitively, before he saluted and made his way back to the Huntress. Turning back to the Sergeant, Jason nodded again. "Shall we?"
"Right this way."
UNSC Spirit of Fire
Forward Lounge
Shipboard time 1500
Jason entered the clearly labeled 'Forward Lounge' behind Sergeant Forge, and was honestly surprised at the level of luxury present aboard the ship. In the first few seconds inside the lounge, he'd already spotted a wet bar, several handheld game controllers, a humidor, and a billiards table. He was most surprised by the billiards table, as there were loose balls currently racked up for a game on the table, instead of being stored inside a secure case.
"I didn't realize we'd stepped onto a gravity deck," Jason said to Forge in an aside, his voice quiet enough that it wouldn't be heard around the room.
"Spirit's a refitted colony ship," Forge answered him. "She's had gravitic plates all her life, colonist comfort and all that."
"And been converted into a troop carrier," Jason finished the thought, making a mental note on 'gravitic plates'. Artificial gravity not generated by either thrust or centripetal inertia had been, until now, exclusively the realm of sci-fi flicks. He would have to make sure Nelson's command staff learned about this, if they hadn't heard already through previous conversations. "Why waste perfectly good tools when they can be reused for a different purpose." He looked around the room, to see who else was present, and noticed Lieutenant Sinclair sitting on one of the couches next to a wounded soldier. "If you'll excuse me," he said to the Sergeant, nodding in the direction of the troopers.
"Understandable," Forge replied with a respectful nod. "I'd be doing the same. I'll let you know when Captain Cutter gets here."
"Sinclair, how are the men?" Jason asked the Lieutenant as he approached. "At ease, soldier," he said in an aside to the wounded man with a heavily bandaged left arm. A mutter of thanks came from the wounded man, before he sank back into the couch, as Jason kneeled beside them.
"Colonel Watkin," Sinclair greeted him. "We lost four, including Sergeant Baldwin. Stone, McMillan, and MacAuliffe are also gone. Mitchell and Magian both had their right legs amp'd just above the knee, plasma burns through and through. Damn near completely severed their legs, and charred the bones. Fletcher is still in surgery for a real bad chest wound, but they think he'll pull through, last I heard." Kian's tone was dejected at the end of this statement. "Everyone else is in here."
"How'd Baldwin get taken out?" Jason could scarcely believe his ears. "He was one of our best jumpers. He had nearly ten years of active service under his belt."
"Big bastard with fancy armor snuck up on our flank," Kian growled softly, mindful of the wounded man next to him. "Baldwin held him off for near fifteen seconds before he got run through with some kind of energy blade. He was dead when he hit the ground. We got the corpse of the bastard in fancy armor in their morgue, if you decide to go take a look before they pass it off to our eggs, when we go back outside."
"Fancy armor. Describe it, compared to the other armor you saw," Jason pressed Sinclair gently for more details.
"Ornate, with a mirror finish, enough to deflect laser-fire," Kian elaborated. "Lots of decorative looking markings. More solid coverage, too, over what the rest were wearing. Possibly custom fitted, he moved better than the others. Didn't carry a gun, just the two energy swords with fancy hilts. Brought those back too. All the others had those plasma PDWs or some kinda energy spear thing. Kinda like they were ceremonial guards or the like, just without any extra-fancy armor you'd expect from ceremonial guards."
"Sounds tough. How'd we get him?"
"Vibro-knife. Through the bottom of his neck, went all the way through and out the other side of his spine. Made the mistake of gloating at me instead of just killing me like he did Baldwin."
"You and your men can rest in comfort knowing that you came out better in that fight than even some of our best special forces would have," a new voice interrupted. Jason turned and looked into the face of Captain Cutter, who was accompanied by Sergeant Forge.
Captain James Cutter looked across the room at the copper-haired Colonel kneeling beside his men. He had initially been surprised by this Colonel taking to the front and placing himself in danger, though after a bit of correspondence with the Admiral of this SLDF, he had acquired a bit of an understanding of their society. Their system of nobility and warrior ethos had led them to a culture of warrior leaders, in the few instances where these leaders were not obligated to be separate from the military structure directly, and officers that often sought to prove themselves.
His admittedly short discussion with Admiral Nelson (and what an interesting name and lineage that was), had given him some insight into the Colonel's apparently rather special situation. The young man was something close to a regent lord, though for whom Captain Cutter hadn't been able to ferret any real hints towards. He was reluctant to press too hard on that front, especially against people who were apparently more than willing to go to war with forces many times their size with only limited information on their enemy.
Watching the young Colonel care for his men, Cutter was reminded of the stories of a feudal knight caring for the men-at-arms that fought under his banner. It fit with what he'd seen so far of the man in front of him, speaking of a 'duty to his men' mentality that was rare in the modern era, but it fit with the chivalric ideas of knights and their retainers. The title of 'MechWarrior' had also stood out in their communications as something that was beyond a regular rank and file soldier. Looking at the man in person gave him a better perspective of the Colonel, and the way he interacted with the men who had gone to rescue Anders spoke of a tight-knit bond between the men and women in front of him.
The mood in the lounge had been rather somber when he entered, and it wasn't a surprise as to why. These men and women had lost nearly half their fighting strength in their first engagement against new foes, and three of the survivors were still in surgery in his ships' hospital. Worse, they were stranded far from home, with no known way to return. Without a boost to morale, they might suffer in further actions.
"You and your men can rest in comfort knowing that you came out better in that fight than even some of our best special forces would have," he spoke, making his presence known. The Colonel turned to look at him, then stood and held out his hand to Cutter.
"Captain Cutter, thank you for seeing to them," the young man said as Cutter shook his hand.
"Thank you, Colonel, for volunteering your aid in recovering Professor Anders," he responded, shaking his head. "Without your help, who knows when we would have gotten there, or if we would have been able to keep the Covenant out of those ships."
"How is the Professor, actually?" the Colonel inquired, obviously concerned for her well being after the ordeal Anders had been through.
"Malnourished, slightly dehydrated, and exhausted, but otherwise in good shape," he informed the Colonel. "She's also very excited to be able to talk at length with this so-called 'friendly' alien AI that you and your team recovered. And she's asked me to convey her thanks to your men for saving her." Personally, Cutter was highly skeptical of the AI, to the point that he had assigned a permanent escort detail for it.
The Colonel's relief was evident on his face as he glanced around the room. "Shall we take a seat?" he asked.
"We're still waiting on several arrivals before we can get started," Cutter remarked as he took a seat on the couch opposite the young Lieutenant. "But if you'd like to grab something to drink, go ahead." The Colonel nodded and wandered over to the auto-bar, examining it for a moment before he selected something on the touchscreen.
While the Colonel was grabbing his drink, Cutter turned to one of several holo-emitters that were scattered throughout the lounge. "Serina," he said softly. The emitter quickly flickered to life as Serina's avatar manifested above it.
"Yes, Captain?" she inquired.
"Let me know when our guests are out of surgery," he ordered. "I'm sure our new friends will appreciate some good news after the losses they took recovering Anders."
"Understood, Captain," Serina's avatar nodded for a moment before looking back at Cutter. "I've left a message with a request for CMO O'Niel to report as soon as the surgeries are completed. I'll notify you as soon as he has news."
"Thank you, Serina," he nodded to her avatar, "Any progress on a converter kit for their camera footage?"
Serina frowned, "The software is finished, but we've hit a snag on the hardware," she reported. "It's going to take a while to learn the nuances of their circuitry design. A physical sample and a volunteer familiar with the way they use electronics would help speed up the process significantly, if you can get authorization from their command."
"I'll see what I can do," Cutter said. "That will be all, Serina."
"Understood, Sir," the avatar flickered and disappeared.
"What was that about?" the Colonel asked, having wandered back with a cola in hand, and a little red stir straw sticking out of the cup.
"Finding a way to make our systems talk to each other. There's been a snag with making the hardware to allow that to work," Cutter told the Colonel. "You wouldn't happen to have anyone who's intimately familiar with the details of your circuits and wiring that you could lend us to make this go faster?"
"I can check, though we might have to wait for a small craft to come over from the Iga," the Colonel hedged his bets. "She's an EWAR(1) platform, so I know she's got at least one tech onboard who will know the wiring."
"That would be grand."
UNSC Spirit of Fire
Forward Lounge
Shipboard time 1629
The sound of the lounge door opening brought the attention of all of the officers assembled around the table to the door, where a pair of technicians had just entered the room. Colonel Watkin immediately recognized Warrant Officer Kiyoshi 'Toshiba' Hisashige, electronics specialist and a member of the Toshiba Electronics corporate dynasty, who were renowned across the Inner Sphere for quality consumer and medical electronics.
"Hisashige-san," Watkin greeted him with a polite nod. "I take it that you were able to put together a hardware adapter?"
"We did, Colonel," Kiyoshi confirmed, holding up a small device with a cord attached to it. "You need only insert the data chip into the reader, and plug it into their holo-projector."
"Everything works, then?" Jason asked him.
"It functioned successfully with the test chip I brought over, yes." Kiyoshi said with pride.
"Excellent work. Thank you Hisashige-san," Watking thanked the man in his native Japanese, making a note to put the man in for a commendation. He'd gone above and beyond for his task.
"No, thank you, Colonel, for this opportunity," Kiyoshi bowed to him, with one normally reserved for cultural superiors and nobility. "Their AI is a fascinating conversationalist, and their computers are something I would like to spend time studying, given the chance." There was a hint of euphoria in his voice as he mentioned the computer systems, though he was more reserved when mentioning the AI itself.
"That will be discussed when the time for exchanges is upon us," Jason said with faux-gravity. A raised eyebrow at Kiyoshi apparently got the message across, and with a nod, he got about plugging in the device. Kian slid a data chip along the table towards them, and the technician caught it expertly, slotting the chip into the reader with a single motion.
Serina appeared on the table, holographic windows opening around her as she began accessing the files. "I have it," she noted in her usual calm tone. "Are we ready to begin?"
"We're still waiting on Lt. Colonel Kinsano and Major Vaughn," Cutter told the AI. He was cut off from saying more as the door to the lounge quietly hissed open. Everyone at the table looked over at the door, and silhouetted within were a pair of black-uniformed ODSTs. "And it seems we're not waiting anymore, they just arrived."
After the two ODST commanders took seats at the table, Jason officially called the debriefing to order. "Debrief of ground actions taking place on the interior of the shield world Etran Harborage. Date is 25 February, 2772, Hegemony Calendar, 2531, UNSC Military Calendar. The current time is 1631 shipboard. This meeting is being held jointly aboard the UNSC Spirit of Fire in her Forward Lounge. Officers Presiding, Colonel Jason Watkin, Royal Black Watch Regiment, and Naval Captain James Cutter, UNSC Spirit of Fire. Accompanying Command Officers, Lt. Colonel Morgan Kinsano and Major Rowan Vaughn, UNSC Marine Corps, Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. Attending Observer, Ship's AI, Serina."
"We begin with a review of the armor camera footage of Lieutenant Kian Sinclair, Royal Black Watch Regiment, 2nd Jump Infantry Platoon. This will be followed immediately by a report from Lieutenant Sinclair."
Serina took this as her cue to activate the table's holographic surface and begin playing the footage from the drop event. The footage began with a shot of the shield world around them, and the assembled unknown alien warships, as well as the tiny platform below. There was about thirty seconds of falling before Sinclair landed on the platform and joined the firefight.
"There, Serina, do we recognize those armor patterns?" Cutter asked, causing the footage to rewind briefly and pause.
"Initial analysis suggests similar troops to those encountered at the unknown structure on Harvest by Sergeant Forge," the AI responded, pulling up another still depicting similarly armored aliens. There were a number of highlights on the two images, pointing to armor ornamentation and glyphs. "These markings appear identical, suggesting that these are part of the same group of Elites, which displayed access to personal cloaking technology on Harvest. It appears they were caught by surprise, and had their cloaking devices inactive."
"Indeed. It's not often you target a mid air object for an airdrop," Vaughn commented, stroking his chin. "Especially not one that small." There was a short pause as the officers examined the footage, and then Vaughn started. "Wait a minute! I've seen that formation from the Elites before. That's a ceremonial stance they're starting from. I saw them doing it for one of the Elites in gold ornamented armor back on Harvest. Early in the fighting."
"So an important location? Or an important personage?" Jason asked.
"We're not sure. Could be both," Vaughn admitted. "We know they revere these ancient structures, but not much in the way of any details on why or how." Nods of understanding circulated around the table.
The video resumed at Captain Cutter's nod to the AI, and soon the assembled UNSC officers were watching the scene with great intensity. "Hold up, where are their shields? I thought the Elites didn't run around without shields?" Forge asked, confusion lacing his tone.
"They had them," Sinclair spoke up. "Just haven't seen 'em yet. They weren't reacting to the lasers, as far as I noticed." A grenade went off in the video feed, and the shields on quite a few Elites shimmered into existence, lasers splashing against the flared shields and collapsing them from the energy of the strikes. "See?"
"Pause please?" Colonel Watkin asked Serina. The video froze obligingly, catching one of the shields mid flare. "See here?" He tapped on the table over the image, indicating a section of the shield that hadn't flared up yet. "The laser is still going through here, but over here on the flared section, it's colliding with the shield itself, and transferring the energy there instead of into the trooper. This could cause problems if we run into those Jackals you told me about the other day, Sergeant, especially if they're carrying those opaque shields you mentioned."
"That's interesting. I hadn't noticed them actually hitting the shields when they flared," Sinclair noted, tapping out a note to himself on his personal noteputer.
The video resumed, and several minor comments were made regarding the tactical decisions of the various marines, and Sinclair's decision to close to melee with the enemy. The Vibrobayonets of the Mauser 960 were noted as effective, their vibration fields sparking and shattering the shields that were still active as they plunged into the Elites' bodies. They were even treated to a close up view of this as the camera captured Sinclair stabbing and tackling down one of the alien warriors.
The assembled officers watched as the feed turned, and revealed the enemy commander locked in melee combat with another trooper. Jason winced as he watched the large saurian commander skewer Sergeant Baldwin. A quick glance at Sinclair caught the man's dry swallow. Baldwin would be missed by quite a few people, indeed.
A sharp intake of breath told him one of the UNSC officers, he didn't catch who, was truly surprised to see the reflective armor of the Elite Commander ablating and scattering the barrage of fire as Sinclair emptied the remaining charge of his rifle into the alien. Jason watched Sinclair's face morph into satisfaction from the corner of his eye as the feed showed Sinclair stabbing the enemy commander through the throat.
"Damn, nice kill, kid," Forge muttered quietly. Jason silently agreed with the sentiment.
"So do we know who that was?" Megan asked, leaning in to get a closer look at the armor.
"Not really, beyond that he was commanding the forces we engaged on Harvest, and that he's the same one that captured the Professor on Arcadia," Forge answered her question. "He had pretty much free reign as far as I could tell, since he was pushing around the ones in the normal kind of fancy armor. First time we actually saw him was during a recon on Harvest, where I saw him just up and shove one of the gold armored ones without consequences, so he's gotta be pretty high up the chain."
"So we managed to take down a HVT, well done, LT," Megan congratulated Sinclair.
"Serina, can you bring up the initial formation of the Elites again? You said they were Stealth troops?" Jason inquired.
"That is the closest match we have, at approximately ninety-four percent on armor configuration and markings, yes," the AI affirmed. "These can be reasonably believed to be specialized unit markings, or possibly individual identifiers, though that is less likely, due to the uniformity of the markings among the elites that were recovered for study."
"So why would you use the invisible assholes for ceremonial guard duty?" Sinclair asked the burning question. "Unless that destroyer had someone truly important aboard and this other fancy guy commandeered his guards for something?"
"Possibly, but we can't be sure, since the destroyer escaped out-system after your 'Caspars' chased it away from the planet," Cutter remarked. "Reports relayed through your intelligence ship indicate that they savaged the destroyer with supporting fire from your other warships that remained in orbit. Which in itself is strange, because the Covenant don't normally run from a fight."
"I'd sure as hell run from a pack of crazy AI warships," Megan rebutted. "They don't exactly know how to quit."
"Those are AIs?" Forge asked, incredulously.
"More along the lines of a drone with limited autonomy," Jason clarified.
"So 'dumb' AI then," Kinsano commented, her voice cold and smooth, in contrast to Forge's outburst.
"I wouldn't say that to their faces, considering they do have feelings, and have the armament and armor of a battleship in the frame of a destroyer," Meredith's counter argument apparently held weight, as the UNSC officers dropped the topic.
"Regardless of what they ran from, the fact of the matter is that they did run. Which means they had someone, or something, aboard that they considered too important to lose," Cutter brought the conversation back under control.
"Let Intelligence handle the whys. Our job is to clear them out of here as best we can, before we need to head back to home space," Kinsano agreed with the Captain. "The best way we have to secure this place right now is to clean the covenant out of the innards, or at least reduce their cohesion and capabilities to the point where we can safely head back home, or reinforcements follow that message beacon the good Captain left when we chased them here."
"Clear out the squatters and lock the doors behind us? Sounds good to me," Forge nodded in agreement.
"Indeed," Jason agreed with the rest as well. "In the meantime, I think we stand ready for Lieutenant Sinclair to give his verbal report, having assembled notes from the rest of his platoon's AAR forms."
"Before we begin," Serina interrupted, "I have received word from CMO O'Niel that all three of our guests are safely out of surgery and are showing stable vitals. Both Mitchel and Magian are likely to be combat capable, given adequate prostheses and time to recover."
"Thank you, Serina," Cutter responded, glancing over at the SLDF officers, who looked relieved. "I'm sure they appreciate the notification."
"Right," Colonel Watkin sighed. "Lieutenant Sinclair, the floor is yours."
An hour later, the after action report concluded as the last speaker, the Jump Medic who had stabilized the captured Elite, sat back down.
"This ends the after action report for the events on the airborne platform, known as the 'Apex Site'," Colonel Watkin said, setting his noteputer aside. Around the table, other officers mirrored his action as he stood, dismissing the enlisted men back to their preferred seating around the lounge.
He was about to ask Cutter if he wanted to share a drink when the door chimed, and hissed open. He recognized the woman entering the lounge as Professor Ellen Anders from the image that had been attached to the short file that the UNSC had given the units that would be participating in the rescue mission, back before they had discovered the hollow interior of this planet.
"Captain," she began, somewhat out of breath, "one of the Covenant's religious leaders was here. You might be able to catch them on their way out, if you hurry."
"It may be too late for that, Professor," Cutter informed her. "A Covenant warship was leaving as we entered the interior. Our friends on the outside have ever so kindly informed us that they have already made their slipspace jump, so I'm afraid we'll be unable to chase them."
Authors Afterwards:
Eleven Pages. This chapter took Eleven pages to write. The initial scene of the AAR took up four-and-a-half of those. I'm not sure if I will continue to write out the actual debrief scenes in the future, that will mostly depend on reader interest in those aspects.
The events on the shield world of Etran Harborage are going to be wrapping up in the next few chapters, and the SLDF forces here, who may not continue calling themselves that, depending on some future decisions that have yet to be made. Our next stop after leaving the shield world is going to be Arcadia, in the Procyon system, where the Spirit was last. From there, we might go to Earth, or maybe Reach. Or maybe the UNSC will come to them. That's gonna depend on a number of decisions made by people in decision making positions. We'll see what happens then.
The different types of UNSC AIs didn't make it into this chapter, so they're getting covered next time. Sorry this took so long to get out to you all.
I realized I goof on Kinsano's name, and was calling her Kisano. Fixed.
Co-writers Afterwards:
I apologize for the minor cliffhanger. We originally were going to do the full debrief, but realized that it was getting a bit too long for the way we're wanting to write the story. While some writers prefer long chapters, it doesn't fit with the pacing of story writing that we're trying to work with. Both Nightwing and I have full time jobs, and we write this in our off hours as a passion project. It's rather fulfilling, and I personally LOVE reading some of the comments on the sites we post it to, and speaking of…
You all take this shit SERIOUSLY! I mean, I watched one set of readers go back and forth about the FTL for nearly a page and a half on Spacebattles. I freaking love you guys and your willingness to pick stuff apart down to theoretical principles.
But I digress…
Here we see one of the banes of many military officers, the 'Debriefing' and 'After Action Report', or 'AAR'.
After Action Reports are what most competent militaries will do after an engagement to figure out how to fix flaws in equipment or tactics. Additionally, they are used to find weaknesses in enemy equipment and tactics to exploit. A good after action report will focus on several topics, but will mainly follow the 'who, what, when, where, why, and how' of the encounter.
This is generally done by a group of experienced intelligence personnel, or a group of officers that are trained to spot things that 'stand out'. In this case, some of the officers involved for both the UNSC and SLDF are the equivalent of a modern day special forces unit. These units are better trained to notice things. Both more obvious things, like how the LT notices the Arbiter, who's fancy armor is custom fitted, or small things, like how Major Vaughn notices the Stealth Elites were in a ceremonial guard stance. They're still going to miss things a team of dedicated intel officers wouldn't miss, but that's how these things go.
To rip off the old 'G. ' cartoons; 'Information is half the battle, without the right information, the battle is already lost', to which the counter saying is; 'You never have the information you need until just after you needed it'.
Glossary of Terms:
(1) EWAR: "Electronic Warfare And Reconnaissance"
Pretty much what it says on the tin, an EWAR vessel isn't designed for combat, the Pueblo class being an minor exception to the rule, in that it's meant to be able to defend itself from anything it can't outrun.
EWAR assets are mainly used for recon and surveillance, like the name implies, but they can also be used for other purposes such as intel analysis, data relays, or even enhancing the capabilities of nearby units. They can be classified into two categories, offensive and defensive.
A good example of an offensive EWAR asset is a spy ship. (Basically what the Pueblo class is). It's meant to lurk nearby without being identified as an military asset to gather intelligence on either 'semi-friendly', 'neutral' or enemy powers.
The most well known modern example of a defensive EWAR asset is the Boeing 737 'Airborne Warning and Control System', or 'AWACS' that is seen in movies. It's basically a 737 platform with a lot of sensors and a radar dish mounted up top. Nowhere NEAR that simple to engineer or build, (or repair if some of the stories I heard from the guy who used to work on the airframes with my grandfather is anything to go by…)
EWAR units are considered a force multiplier in any engagement, but are not frontline units. If the EWAR asset is in combat, someone has screwed up in a spectacular fashion.