Utterly Stunning!
A must read for engineers (or others) who want to keep their minds 
supple.
I'm copying this to a few people who may think they have no interest
in the subject. If you receive this directly then it means that I
think that you MAY find it of interest. I may be wrong :-).

Iain should definitely read the space war page.

    http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/index.html

Atomic Rocketships of the Space Patrol

... is what they call the web page so I do it the honour of using the
same name.

But what it really is in an utterly amazing treatise, or rather a
disparate collection of treatises (should such term exist) covering,
at face value, all aspects of what it would take to build real genuine
spacecraft in a distant future. Still with me? OK. Along the way it is
a superb lesson in thinking - it shows that the simplistic images that
we (probably) have are subject to constraints and require assumptions
which we have probably never started to think of. Even if rockets hold
no great interest for you, this web site may. If they do then don't
look until you have a spare month. You have been warned.

Main page

        http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3t.html

The page on interplanetary combat and space war is a marvel in its own
right.
Along the way to an appreciation of some practical realities you find
out why (perhaps) a sea borne destroyer is so named.
By quoting segments from SciFi stories of various ages he illustrates
some of the points he's making and shows there have been some clear
thinking writers out there. How clear thinking we hope we'll never
find out.

        http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3t.html

I'm going to exit the site now without looking at anything else, or I
risk being here till dawn.
Right now.
!
Maybe if I just look at ...



            RM

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