“It’s quite simple,” the brigadier said. “Have you ever seen what happens when you put a drop of ink into a glass of clear water?”
Vorgens’ eyebrows arched, and his forehead wrinkled. “Why ,. the color spreads through the whole glass.”
“Exactly. Now suppose that the glass of water is a certain district of this planet, open to attack by the Komani. And the drop of ink—”
“The drop of ink would be a unit of Marines,” Vorgens said.
^ ‘€
“Very good. Watchman! You’re quite astute today.”
Vorgens’ eyes flashed angrily for a moment, then he regained his self-control and answered, “I have my momentsEvidently what you’re proposing to do is to split up the Mobile Force into small units and spread them through Shinar.”
“Right,” Aikens said. “Each unit will be strong enough to fend off a Komani raiding party, and the units will be spaced close enough together so that one group could come to the aid of another, in case the Komani mount an unusually heavy attack.”
“And what if the Komani mass a really large force, such as they did in Carmeer?”
It was Aikens’ turn to flush with anger. For a moment he said nothingThen, finally, “We will depend to some extent on the natives for intelligence reports. If we learn that the Komani are massing for a fuu-scale battle, we will also mass our forces.”
“Fine,” Vorgens said. “Now, how much territory can we protect in this manner?”
Aikens took up the notebook from Vorgens’ desk and rifled to a page toward the back. “We analyzed the cruising speed of our vehicles, the logistics problem, our response time to an attack-alert, and other factors … the computer came up with an answer.” He showed the page of computations to the Watchman. “We can cover roughly half the populated area of the planet.”