hh4节译:巨口港战争舰队

The Port Maw fleet anchorage was one of a handful of massive Imperialis Armada fleet bases situated on or near the Imperium's borders. These bases, and the forces which operated from them, were a relatively recent development, born of an Imperium for which the galaxy now had been largely conquered, rather than one in which the Emperor still led the Great Crusade, its work not yet done. These fleet anchorages, at least one of which was founded in each of the Segmentum Majoris, with more planned, were the largest of their kind outside of the Segmentum Solar, and in their turn were dwarfed by the vast capacity of the Sol System itself, and were founded for the specific purpose of securing the domains the Great Crusade had forged from the strife-torn galaxy. As such, their functions were in the main as ports of supply and muster, command-and-control hubs, and as home bases for a permanently stationed armada of warships with their own armies of Auxilia troops. These armadas were designed to serve both as a source of deep-range patrols and rapid-reaction forces to respond to sudden threats, be they civil disturbance, rebellion or outside attack, both from within the Imperium and from beyond its borders.

巨口港舰队锚地是位于或靠近帝国边境的为数不多大型舰队基地之一。这些基地与依靠它们进行运作的部队出现得相对较晚，它们诞生于一个已经征服了银河系大部分区域的人类帝国，而非是帝皇仍在领导大远征、征服银河的伟业尚未完成时期的那个。帝国在每个主要星域中都建立了至少一个舰队锚地，而且还计划要修建更多的此类基地。这些锚地是太阳星域之外的同类舰队基地中规模最大的，而在恒星系自身的巨大容量面前，它们又显得微不足道；帝国建立这些锚地是为了一个特定的目的——保卫大远征在这个饱受战乱的银河中所获取的疆土。所以它们的作用主要是作为进行补给和集结的港口，指挥控制中心，以及永久性驻扎在此地的战争舰队与舰队自身辅助军部队的母港基地。这些舰队即可以进行远程巡逻，也可以被用作处理突发威胁的快速反应部队——这些威胁是内部动乱、叛乱和外部进攻，它们来自帝国内部与边境之外的区域。

In terms of the warships that physically made up these fleets —and the Port Maw Armada was an exemplar of this— they outnumbered and en masse likely out-gunned any single Expeditionary fleet of the Great Crusade, at least on paper. They were made up primarily of several hundred first and second rate ships of the line; various classes of cruiser and assault vessels intended to dominate 'small wars' and conduct lengthy patrols, supported by frigates and destroyers meant for escort duty, to pursue and destroy marauders, and hunt lone predator craft that might disturb the Emperor's Peace. By nature they possessed fewer large capital class ships than the outward reaching forces of the Great Crusade by disposition, but those they possessed were often very powerful examples of the type, including Goliath and Legatus class battleships. These two in particular were still extremely strong but support-intensive designs that had been replaced in frontline service only as the Great Crusade had reached ever further from the core worlds of the Segmentum Solar and supply lines had become stretched, giving way to more independently operating Gloriana and Victory patterns, but this was a deficiency of no consequence in their current role.

至于组成这些舰队的军舰，至少在文件中，它们在数量上和整体规模上可能都超过了大远征时期任何一支单独的远征探索舰队——巨口港舰队就是一个例子。他们主要由几百艘一流和二流的战舰组成，其中包括旨在左右“小规模战争”战况和执行远距离巡逻任务的各种级别巡洋舰和突击舰船，由（本要）执行护航任务的护卫舰和驱逐舰进行支援，它们能追捕并摧毁掠夺者，并且捕猎那些扰乱帝皇（所赐予）的和平的孤独掠袭舰艇。由于其性质的原因，驻防锚地的舰队所拥有的主力舰少于那些负责向往扩张的大远征部队，但它们所保有的主力舰都是极为强力的类型，其中包括巨人级和副将级战列舰，这两种战舰尤其是极其强悍但又需要大量支援的型号，不过随着大远征到达了离太阳星域那些核心世界更为遥远的区域，补给线也被拉长，此类战舰也从前线战场上退役，让位于独立运作能力更强的荣光女王级和胜利级战列舰，不过这一缺陷对于此类舰船目前的用途并无影响。

Unlike the ships and armies that made up the great Legiones Astartes-led Expeditionary fleets, the smaller Compliance battlegroups, and the Explorator and Rogue Trader-led formations, they were essentially defensive in nature, inward looking and meant to be successively piecemealed down into smaller commands and sub-deployments when needed, and as for as long as was needed. Because of this, they were made up almost entirely of the Imperialis Auxilia, with cohorts formed in the 'Solar' pattern almost exclusively. These were in turn usually drawn from the established Segmentum Excertus commands, and so were purely human in make-up and quite outside the regular command structures of the Great Crusade. Their Grand Admirals and Lords Marshal operated under authority directly proffered by the ruling Council on Terra, and were equal or perhaps greater in effective rank even than the Lords Commander who governed the individual worlds their ships protected. In practice, of course, it would be a very foolish Grand Admiral that would not defer to a Primarch when matters came to it, or an emissary of the Terran Court or Mars for that matter, but this growing distance between these two sides of the Imperium's military coin, one to defend, the other to conquer, particularly after the Emperor's return to Terra, accounts perhaps for the fact that the Traitors' cause did not have quite so much traction in the midst of these sovereign defence fleets as it did elsewhere in the Imperium's forces, a fact borne out broadly by the historical record.

不同于那些组成伟大的阿斯塔特军团领导的远征探索舰队、小型镇抚战斗群以及探索者和行商浪人们所领导编队的舰船和军队，锚地舰队本质上是防御性部队，它们着眼于内部，并在需要时被依次拆分为更小的指挥和次级部署单位，而且这种况且需要多久就会持续多久。所以，驻守锚地的部队几乎完全由帝国辅助军组成，而且几乎所有驻防兵团的组织模式都是“太阳”模式。这些部队通常是轮流从已经建立的星域帝国民兵指挥部中抽取，他们由纯粹的凡人士兵组成，完全脱离了大远征的常规指挥结构。他们的至高上将和领主元帅们手握泰拉上的统治议会直接授予的权力，这些军官们的实际地位与统治单个世界们的领主指挥官不相上下，甚至更高，他们的舰船保护着后者所管辖的世界。当然，在实际情况中，当一位原体提出要求时，只有极其愚蠢的至高上将才不会服从，而当同样的情况发生在一位泰拉议会或者火星特使身上时，结果亦然。帝国的军事力量分成了两个部分：一方进行防御，另一方去进行征服，但双方的距离越来越远，在帝皇返回泰拉后这一状况尤为明显。这或许也解释了一个事实：叛军阵营在这些主权防御舰队中的吸引力并不像它们在帝国其它部队中那么强烈，这一事实得到了历史记录的广泛证实。

This observation bears true in the case of the Port Maw Armada, which despite clear efforts being made to deliberately subvert it, remained in the majority loyal, and those ship's crews and Solar Auxilia regiments which did join the Traitors’ cause were seldom crewed by wholehearted converts, but more often taken over by a polluted officer cadre or an armed mutiny by a well-prepared and ruthless minority.

这一观察结果在巨口港舰队的案例中被证实。尽管明显有人在此地进行蓄意的颠覆破坏行动，但大多数人员依旧忠于帝国，那些加入了叛军阵营的舰船上的船员和太阳辅助军团中也几乎没有全心全意的皈依者，更常见的情况是一名被腐化的核心军官或准备充分且冷酷无情的少部分人发动的武装哗变夺取了舰船控制权。