Background
After the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression, the Class D would continue in service during both the Maleficent Destruction and Operation Clean Sweep, completing a total of 13 years of straight war-time service, many of the Class Ds salvaged from battlefield debris fields during that time, the dead cleaned out and blood removed, and the ships repaired or even completely rebuilt throughout that war history to continue service.
The Configurate D-class Destroyer---commonly refereed to as the Class D among both the Fleet and the Federal Army---is the last planned production model in the storied 50 plus year Configurate-class Destroyers line; Class A, B, & C coming before the Class D.
The largest and most versatile in it's class, the D Class is the principal of a pure warship with the ability to fulfill an arry of additional roles. Armed to the teeth, the Terran Engineering Shipwrights held nothing back in producing one of the most well-balanced war machines of of it's time; serving all 11 years of the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression, eventually over one thousand of the ships being produced by war's end and being purposed for almost every type of combat and support role possible.
While the ship no doubt has it's place in the war records of the Terran Federation, the ships' war weary hulls (which were routinely rebuilt or patched up on damaged ships and resent out to the war or scrapped all together and added to newer Class D warships being built), out-dated equipment, and lagging behind modern targeting systems are beginning to expose weaknesses in the once named "War Titian of Space". Despite updates to technology and equipment, the Class D holds a certain dread among Army soldiers and Marines alike, who have countless dark memories of being cramped, as one Army soldier put it, "like sardines" during Planetary Landing Operations (PLO) and Direct Station Action (DSA), where more then once Soldiers and Marines had to endure the nightmarish torture of reputed bulk-heads, ship debris flying into their ranks, and other horrors as they waited, like one Army Soldier remembered, "like cattle to be released to the slaughter...assuming we made it planet side and didn't get vaced by space first."
During the later half of the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression, Class Ds were routinely placed in harm's way without adequate design features to conduct PLOs and DSAs to fill in the void for a lack of landing ships. Also, since Class Ds were routinely used for such operations, when they weren't conducting those operations, they were fulfilling their primary duties of warships, holding captive hundreds or thousands of Soldiers and Marines in hellishly cramped barrack quarters while the Class D's exchanged laser fire in often times pitched space battles.
Design
Manufacturer: Terran Engineering Shipwrights
Line: Configurate
Model: Configurate D
Class: Heavy Cruiser (see: Anaxes War College System)
Role:
Cost:
- NEW, fully armed; 70 million
- USED, fully armed; 40 million
- USED, no weaponry; 20 million
- USED; "as is" battle damage (no weaponry); starting at 500,000 thousand
- Ally Assistance Program (AAP); USED (weaponry included); 10 million
Length: 700 meters
Height: 210 Meters (40 decks of livable space; 30 decks or 90 meters of non-livable space: hanger bay, reactor core, etc.)
Maximum Acceleration: >2,300
MGLT: 60 MGLT
Maximum Speed (atmosphere): 975 km/h
Engine Units: 2 Star-Drive Engineering Section Nuclear Fission Power Max Engines; 4 Star-Drive Engineering Section Reactant Agitator Injector Secondary Star Plus Engines
Hyperdrive Rating: Class 2
Hyperdrive Rating (normal, back-up): Class 16
Power Plant: One Nuclear Fission Reactor
Armor (Hull plating): 1,216 RU
Shields: 2,560 SBD
Special Design Features
Due to the stresses of war, Terran Engineering Shipwrights' engineers had to come up with several different configurations modifications for the D-class over the course of the war, which included:
- Escort Carrier
- 6 starfighter squadrons
- 7 Super Leviathan-class Heavy Lift Transport
- 2 Super Leviathan-class Boarding Craft
- 3 Super Leviathan-class Electronic Warfare Craft
- 2 Super Leviathan-class AEW&C
- 300 Marine Ship Security
- 150 Marine Special Action Force
- no additional troops or vehicles
- Became extremely popular among the Fleet as a Carrier/Command Ship for task forces
- Troop Transport
- 2,500 troops
- no starfighters
- 300 Marine Ship Security
- 150 Marine Special Action Force
- Additional armor platting attached in key places along the hull
- Although popular among troops, the Fleet never used this modification en-mass due to the need to have warships available at all times as well
- Hospital Ship
- Point-defense, anti-missile, and tractor beam weapons only
- No starfighters
- No troops
- 300 Marine Ship Security
Systems
Sensors: SureTarget System's Active Warning and Alert System Generation 5 (AWAS 5)
Communications: Tactical Communications' General Military Communications Package Mark III (GMC III)
- Frequency Agile subspace transceiver
- Radionics
- 2 Rectenna (refitted for starship's size and use; one fitted on bow and aft ends of the top of the super structure section)
- Ion-scrambler
- Subspace transceiver
Targeting Systems: SureTarget System's Targeting Computer & Operations Program Suite Mark 8 (TC-OPS 8)
Cargo Capacity: 6,000 metric tons
Consumables: 4 years
Crew:
- Officers: 380
- Enlisted: 3,300
- Gunners: 350
- Marine Ship Security: 300
- Marine Special Action Force: 150
- Total: 4,480
- Troops: 1,000
Armament
4 DBY-827 Heavy Dual Turbolaser Turrets
- Bow, super structure, port, and starboard. Weapons along the port, starboard, and super structure are
positioned in a manner as to not interfere with other cannons in a 180 degree manner, giving these batteries a clear firing lane to left, right, upwards, downwards (if able), and forward of their position, allowing the Destroyer to fire a vast majority of her weaponry in any one direction. 8 Point-defense laser cannons
- Port and starboard; the exception being the rear most H9 turbolaser cannon on the port/starboard side,
which is flanked by Light Gun Batteries instead. 8 Point-defense laser cannons (anti-missile) 4 Assault Proton Torpedoes and/or Assault Concussion Missile Launcher Tubes (8 per tube)
- normally Assault Concussion Missiles, unless on a special mission
- One for each hanger
Complement
- 36 (3 squadrons) Assault X 1 Multi-role Assault Fighters
- 4 Super Leviathan-class Landing Craft
- 2 Super Leviathan-class Assault Landing Craft
- 1 Super Leviathan-class Heavy Lift Transport
- 1 Super Leviathan-class Boarding Craft
- 1 Super Leviathan-class Electronic Warfare Craft
- 6 Tactical Combat Lifts (TCL)
Armor
- 4 Conquer II-class Assault Repulsor Tanks
- 4 Enforcer III Light Tactical Tanks
- 4 Tactical Armored Carriers (TAC)
- 12 Oshkosh L-ATV
Reconnaissance
Utility / Support
- 12 M35 2 1/2-ton cargo trucks
- 6 Federal Cannon
- 3 Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck (HEMTT)
- 1 RDE-Regiment
Aerial
Special Notes
To deploy ground forces en-mass, the D-class can land on a planet's surface.
History
After the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression, the Class D would continue in service during both the Maleficent Destruction and Operation Clean Sweep, completing a total of 13 years of straight war-time service, many of the Class Ds salvaged from battlefield debris fields during that time, the dead cleaned out and blood removed, and the ships repaired or even completely rebuilt throughout that war history to continue service.
Despite being supplemented towards the end of the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression with both Glory-class Destroyers and Liberty-class Assault Ships, the Class D would continue to prove why it had lasted the whole war. By the end of the Sethas-Po'leks Wars of Aggression, heavily repaired or rebuilt Class Ds were sold out en-mass to allies to help supplement their own navies to help defend and aid the Terran Federation through the Ally Assistance Program (AAP) and to help fund the New Fleet Modernization Program (NFMP), which funded the construction of the Liberty and Glory-class ships. With reduced "peace time budgets," other Class Ds were sold off as used at higher prices to any buyers, either armed or unarmed, and all funds were funneled to the NFMP. The Fleet Rescue Guard acquired 50 Class Ds from the Fleet to start to retire their Configurate B-class Destroyers and start to supplement their older Configurate C-class Destroyers; the Class Ds will be repainted and equipped, however plans on keeping the current weaponry, the Destroyers acting as their heaviest combat ships and primary Command Ships.
By the time of Operation Clean Sweep, the Terran Federation Fleet's once nearly one-thousand operational Class Ds had dropped to 500, with all remaining vessels assigned to Planetary Defense Assignment (PDA) or Escort Operations (EO). Despite this, many Class Ds found themselves as front-line combat warships once again in support of NFMP vessels.
The Fleet has no current plans to reduce the current 500 Class Ds in service, rather maintain the current number and provide Limited New Buying Options (LNBO) for new Class Ds to keep the current 500 service number intact, at least, for the next 10 years, after which time the Fleet's NFMP should have conquered much of the older ships and then the Fleet plans to reduce the Class D to 200 service models, then 100 service models 5 years later (28 years in service). By the time the Class D reaches 35 years in service, the Fleet expects the Configurate-line of Destroyers to be completely retired, with a planned 3 Museum Models, 1 Historical Touring Model, and two Training Vessels left in service. By the vessel's 50 year service mark, the Training Vessels will be retired, leaving only Museum Models and the Historical Touring Model.
Once the Fleet retired the Class D, the Fleet Rescue Guard plans on keeping the Class D in service for another 10 years before starting to slowly retire the vessel to buyers and scrap yards, which should take at least 5 years. Once that happens, between the Fleet and the Fleet Rescue Guard, the Configurate-class (Class A through D) will had served a combined 115 years, the Class D alone serving 65 years.