11th Royal Division

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Eleventh Royal Division
Formed 2571
Affiliation Star League
Parent Command IV Corps


History[edit]

The Eleventh Royal Division was a part of the Star League Defense Force Regular Army. Formed as a part of IV Corps during the creation of the SLDF in the beginning years of the Star League, the Eleventh Royal Division served in the Taurian Concordat campaign from the beginning of Operation BULL RUN in 2578 until 2582;[1] IV Corps was then reorganized with the Eleventh Royal Division forming one of the core units within Task Force MAILED FIST, the Task Force assembled to implement Operation MAILED FIST, the Star League intervention in the Rim Worlds Republic civil war.[2]

Helbrent[edit]

By 2582 the Rim Worlds Republic had been in a state of civil war for six years. Located on Helbrent were the Sixth Amaris Legionnaires, a formation that had remained loyal to First Consul Gregory Amaris. The Star League Defense Force had initiated Operation MAILED FIST in mid-2581, but had been forced to change plans after a deep raid by the Fourth Amaris Fusiliers had managed to strike the Lyran Commonwealth interior world of Alarion.[3]

The result was the reorganization of the SLDF forces and their auxiliaries into three battlegroups, each responsible for the pacification of one of the three provinces that made up the Rim Worlds Republic.[4] Helbrent and the Sixth Legionnaires were the first targets of the battlegroup assigned to pacifying the Timbuktu Province, and the SLDF deployed Eleventh Royal Division at the time — to the battle for Helbrent.[5]

Combat operations began in July 2582, and proceeded far more quickly than the Eleventh had planned for, thanks to the Sixth Legionnaires choosing to deploy their heavy armor to contest the Eleventh's landing, a poor decision that led to the Eleventh quickly defeating the bulk of the Sixth. By the end of the third day after landing the Eleventh had notionally secured Helbrent, but the Royal Division found itself faced with another problem; the Eleventh's infantry forces were six weeks away from deploying, making keeping control of Helbrent difficult until there were enough boots on the ground to exercise effectively control of the captured territory.[6]

Huesta[edit]

By late 2584 the SLDF had changed tactics again; a number of major RWA units had been destroyed or captured, and the focus for the campaign shifted to capturing worlds of strategic importance, but the campaign was slowed by the greatly increased resistance offered by the RWA and local civilian populations, prompted by atrocities performed by the Draconis Auxiliary Corps when they captured Nightwish in mid-2584.[6]

The conquest of Huesta was one such example of a campaign that took longer than originally planned due to the level of resistance offered by the civilian population; Duke Narinder Selaj of Battle Group Timbuktu assigned the Eleventh Royal Division to conquering Huesta in 2585, but the conquest took six months before the last insurrections were put down, despite the lack of any significant Rim Worlds Army or Rift Republican Army units on the world at the time.[7][2]

Timbuktu[edit]

Duke Selaj assigned the Eleventh Royal Division to the conquest of Timbuktu in 2588, along with all four regiments of the Draconis Auxiliary Corps.[8] The main defensive force on Timbuktu was the Seventh Amaris Dragoons, led by Colonel Samuel Macao. The first week of the campaign saw the elite Eleventh Royal and the brutal DCMS regiments smash their way through the bulk of the defenses prepared by Macao's forces, leading Macao to pull his troops back to the continent known as Hades, which at that point in time was a lightly populated continent with a number of mining complexes that the Seventh could use as prebuilt defenses.[9]

While the Seventh could have drawn the campaign out substantially by switching to guerrilla warfare, the harsh treatment the civilian population of Timbuktu were undergoing at the hands of the Draconis Combine troops enraged Macao who launched a number of precipitous raids in retaliation that sorely weakened the Seventh. With the civilian population of Hades being small enough that it was effectively negligible for the SLDF, the Battle Group Timbuktu forces resorted to wholesale bombardment of the Seventh's positions; after nineteen days of sustained bombardment Macao surrendered the few surviving elements of the Dragoons, ending major combat actions on the planet on the 29th of July.[9]

Here, Lackhove and Anywhere[edit]

With the capture of Timbuktu and the last of the worlds within the Timbuktu Province of the Rim Worlds Republic the Eleventh Royal Division began operations in the Apollo Province under the overall command of General Nathan Isaacson. The Eleventh's first operation was the conquest of Here in late 2591 or early 2592. The Star League forces successfully took control of Here, defeating the local militia forces, and remained in place as the local garrison until the Eleventh was redeployed for the invasion of Lackhove in 2593 and Anywhere in 2594, all operations conducted against local militia forces.[10][8]

Steelton and Vulture's Nest[edit]

General Nathan Isaacson assigned two divisions to the assault on Steelton in mid-2595, a much larger force than the surviving elements of the Fifth Amaris Fusiliers garrisoning the world; in one of the few actions where divisions from different corps fought alongside each other, the Eleventh Royal Division landed alongside the Sixteenth Mechanized Infantry Division from VI Corps on Steelton.[8] With the defeat of the Fifth Fusiliers and the capture of Steelton Task Force MAILED FIST had secured the last world controlling the approaches to Apollo[10] although military operations continued; the Sixteenth remained on Steelton until the end of Operation MAILED FIST in late 2596, but the Eleventh redeployed in 2596 to capture the Vulture's Nest system, the last Republic world other than Apollo to be captured by the SLDF.[8]

Officers[edit]

Rank Name Command
Commanding Officers of the 11th Royal Division

Tactics[edit]

Unknown.

Composition History[edit]

Unknown.

Notes[edit]

It was confirmed by the author of Historical: Reunification War that in general, the Divisions listed within the Star League sourcebook be traced back directly to those Divisions listed within Historical: Reunification War.[11] However, in 2764 there are three divisions listed as the 11th within the SLDF: the Eleventh Royal BattleMech Division, II Corps,[12] the Eleventh Infantry Division, VIII Corps and the Eleventh Mechanized Infantry Division, LI Corps.[13] It is not known which of these can trace their history back to the Eleventh Royal Division of the Reunification War era.

References[edit]

  1. Historical: Reunification War, p. 142, "Taurian Concordat Front (Jump-Off - 2585)"
  2. 2.0 2.1 Historical: Reunification War, p. 152, "Rim Worlds Republic Front (Jump-Off - 2587)"
  3. Historical: Reunification War, p. 132-133, "Alarion (December 2581)"
  4. Historical: Reunification War, p. 133, "Island Hopping (2582-2590)"
  5. Historical: Reunification War, p. 132-133, "Alarion (December 2581)"
  6. 6.0 6.1 Historical: Reunification War, p. 133, "Helbrent to Nightwish (July 2582 - November 2584)"
  7. Historical: Reunification War, p. 134, "Arlina to Viborg (December 2584 - September 2588)"
  8. 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Historical: Reunification War, p. 153, "Rim Worlds Republic Front (2588-2596)"
  9. 9.0 9.1 Historical: Reunification War, p. 135, "Timbuktu (July 2588)"
  10. 10.0 10.1 Historical: Reunification War, p. 139, "Bitter Harvests (2591-2596)"
  11. Ask The Writers: Star League Divisions: Reunification War to Liberation of Terra (dead link)
  12. The Star League, p. 141, "Eighth"
  13. The Star League, p. 143, "Tenth"

Bibliography[edit]