Mr. the Great, I am not impressed by your analysis.
Supposing for a moment that the government does guard it solely by posting men on it, these men are 150 in the air. From that hight they can see at least 15 miles in every relevant direction (this of course is calculating using the RE model... on a FE they might see farther). Thus you can cover the whole wall with just 78,225/30 = 2608 men.
You can decrease it further by giving them snowmobiles and having them ride between waypoints. If they can ride 10 mph and still keep an eye on things, then in one hour one sixth the previous number -- or 652 men -- can cover the wall in an hour. In fact, doing this gives them better coverage, since this way their 15-mile-radius field of vision doesn't have any holes.
Now take the terrain into account -- much of the Ice Wall is probably unapproachable except by air -- and you can trim down the numbers even further.
Strategically locate some helicopter pads (on the wall or floating) and you can have heavy armament on the scene in thirty minutes. Assuming an Apache helicopter can fly 150 mph, in that time they could fly 75 miles, so we would need to place pads every 150 miles, requiring 521 pads. Obviously, if you don't insist on thirty-minute response time, you can do with fewer. Don't forget that the watchmen can see 15 miles away from the wall, so thirty minutes should be more than enough to intercept any boat that tries to approach, snap pictures, and sail to safety.
Of course, this is all assuming that the only means our governments have of detecting trespassers is by looking with their eyes. We're neglecting radar and high-altitude spyplanes, probably with infrared cameras.
We're also neglecting intelligence. Anybody who wants to travel to the ice wall has to leave from someplace, and these someplaces can be watched by agents as well. There aren't too many good places to set on on such a journey from. Then, such expeditions would also have to be planned, and agents could get words about them before they even start. Once they've started, agents could monitor radio transmissions. If they can discover tresspassers a thousand miles away instead of only fifteen, then maybe they don't need so big a force as you say.
Basically, your objection is a straw man at best.
You're lack of military knowledge insults my eyes.
In arctic climates it is not a clear as day, the maximum rage you could possible see in a day is 500M, and thats being generious, i already worked out how many men it would take to guard the beloved ice wall...
Well it turns out that youre all wrong, laughing at many of your posts with my company commander, you are all a laughing stock to the light infantry in the UK, but we calculated the amount of men needed to guard Salisbury, and then made it into and antartic figure.
So say you needed equipment, it would need to be very advanced, and essential, not only that, but all the guards would have to be paid enough to do their jobs and let home without even one of them telling anyone, now before i get onto the HQ of the guards ill put up some figures...
The maximum hours a soldier under Very extreme/stressful conditions is 28 hours ... this is before death or fainting
a team working in a stressful condition would have to be no less than 18.
The maximum range of working on an arctic climate with arctic weather is 500M
Now 1 mile = 609 Miters
The circumference of the earth is 78,225 miles
so you would need a need 2 teams working 12 hours each of 18 every 500M to keep it secure.
78,225 miles into miters is 47,639,025
Now 47,639,025 divided by 500 is 95 278.05
95 278.05 x 36 (Men) = 3 430 009.8 (men)
So yes, you would NEED THREEMILLIONFOURHUNDREDANDTHIRTYTHOUSANDANDNINEPOINTEIGHT men to guard your magical ice wall, enjoy.
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