Operation SOVEREIGN JUSTICE

Cleanup tagged articles without a reason field Operation: Sovereign Justice was a military campaign executed in June, 3068 solely by the Federated Suns' Capellan March region against Capellan Confederation. Ultimately the campaign was a huge failure due to the massive and savage counter assault by the Capellans, which reversed all of the territorial gains of Sovereign Justice.

Operation Brief

The operation was conducted as part of Duke George Hasek's campaign to eliminate the threat of the Capellan Confederation aggression into Davion space. The legal reasoning behind the attack was the Duke's citing the old St. Ives Compact Accord which specifies that the Federated Suns would counter any invasion the Confederation may undertake against the St. Ives Compact. As part of his strategy, he had the Bounty Hunter kidnap Mandrinn Kai Allard-Liao from St. Ives. Using Kai as part of a plan to make it look like the Mandrinn had defected, the Duke felt that it would ease the people in St. Ives Commonality from retaliating during the coming invasion. In the Duke's thinking, it would appear that the Mandrinn was involved in the following invasion to "free" the St. Ives Compact from the 'invader' Capellans.

The invasion would have three prongs of attacks from three separate locations based in the FedSuns: Ziliang Axis, Kittery Line, and Lee Corridor.

FedSun Units Military & Mercenary Involved the Operation

Following are the known military units that were involved with Sovereign Justice.

• 20th Avalon Hussars
• 5th Crucis Lancers
• 1st FedSuns Armored Cavalry
• 1st Federated Suns Lancers
• 1st Kestrel Grenadiers
• 1st Kittery Borderers
• 5th Syrtis Fusiliers
• 6th Syrtis Fusiliers
• 8th Syrtis Fusiliers

Supported by the following mercenary commands:

• 1st Cunningham's Commandos
• 2nd Cunningham’s Commandos
• Khorsakhov’s Cossacks
• 4th Illician Lancers
• 9th Illician Rangers
• 21st Illician Rangers
• 59th Illician Strike Regiment
• 180th Dragoon Combat Group (Marie’s Golden Hammers)
• The Arcadians
• The Federated Freemen
• Olson’s Rangers

Capellan Resistence Groups included:

• Jie Fang Legion

Wave One

First wave began in June 3068.

Kittery Line

The world of Gei-Fu became the first target of Operation: Sovereign Justice in this prong. The Third Capellan Defense Force was bombarded in their bases by Davion forces. The Kittery Borderers and 1st FedSun Lancers ended up fighting a much longer campaign on the world than they expected. Thinking that the destruction of the CDF's bases would take the fight out of both units, Davion forces were surprised the 3rd persisted in its resistance against the invaders for such a time.

Lee Corridor

The 5th Syrtis Fusilers, 20th Avalon Hussars were dispatched to Ares, where they hit the 4th McCarron's Armored Cavalry regiment garrisoned there. The 4th MAC held out against the two Davion regiments for three weeks, leaving it in much less than optimal fighting shape, while the First Kestral Grenadiers assisted by the merc unit Khorsakhov’s Cossacks attacked against the 2nd Confederation Reserve Cavalry on Necromo. This resulted in a bloody affair for the Cavalry, rendering them non-operational in less than a week of fighting.

Ziliang Axis

The forces of the Sovereign Justice/Ziliang Axis Task force faced the strongest defenses of the three attacks. The Sixth Syrtis Fusiliers and its mercs support unit, Cunningham Commandos attacked Hustaing. They were fighting against the Renshield's Dragoons who extended the battle out for a month, but in end, were forced to withdraw with modest damage to the unit.

On Sendalor, the 9th Illician Lancers fought a long strung out battle against a former merc unit, St. Cyr's Armored Regiment. The St. Cyr's also held out for month against the Ninth before falling, but in end Sendalor was barely pacified at the completion of the attack.

Wave Two

The operation's 2nd Wave begun in July of 3068.

Kittery Line

Kittery Prong forces, continuing the push into the Capellan worlds, capturing Relevow and Overton in the St. Ives Commonality. Additional mercenary units (Cunningham Commandos and Illician Lancers) were called in to handle the guerrilla fighting led by the remains of the 3rd Capellan Defense Force.

Ziliang Axis

In the Axis, Davion forces met mild resistance when they captured the undefended worlds of Purvo and Carmen.

Lee Corridor

The Minnacora fell to the 20th Avalon, with its myomer testing facilities. As did New Sagan and Capricorn III to the Grenadiers and 5th Crucis Lancers respectively.

Tsingtao suffered significant collateral damage due to the heavy fighting from the full invasion of the planet by the 59th Illician Strike Regiment.

Wave Two Related Events

Mercenary units in the hire of Duke Hasek conducted raids on number of Capellan worlds. The quick-strike raids themselves developed into assaults against Liao, Hunan, Jonathan and Ningpo. On Ningpo, the mercenary unit, the Arcadians meet with tough resistance, causing them significant damage, forcing them off the planet.

Wave Three

The third wave of the operation began in August of 3068.

Kittery Line

During the third wave, the worlds of Imalda, Glasgow, and New Westin fell to the Kittery Line of Davion advances. On Hexare, the Fourth Illician Lancers had just landed to begin their efforts to secure the planet when the Renshield's Dragoons from Hustaing landed on the world and contested the Lancer's bid to take the planet. The subsequent battles handed both forces heavy damage and ended up dividing the planet between the two forces, both declaring martial law to hold the armistice while both units attempted to recover.

Ziliang Axis

In the Axis region of attacks, the renegade Capellan resistence unit the Jie Fang Legion, attacked Denbar, causing a number of war crimes against the civilian population. The Jie Fang Legion killed even more civilians in its attempts to control urban riots.

Lee Corridor

The Fifth Crucis Lancers took the world of Aldertaine, but suffered from steady civilian sabotage and supply problems.

On Tsingtao, the mercenary unit the 59th Illician Strike, continued to fight the local resistance on the planet, but attacks worsen when Vong's Grenadiers in service to Capellan Confederation arrived in force. The Grenadiers inflicted significant damage against the battered FedSun mercenary unit.

Wave Three Related Events

The Capellan March divided much of its commercial JumpShip fleet to serve as a pipeline for the three prong attacks. Since the civilian JumpShip fleets were part of the flow of commercial trade, the March began to see spikes in many prices as well as shortages of many goods. Several major corporations failed to convince Duke Hasek to release the ships from the military oriented mission. Local Davion governments began to fear they would fall prey to Capellan reprisals.

Fourth Wave

The fourth wave and its last, began in October of 3068.

Ziliang Axis

The only world fall to this Axis prong was Housekarle, which was a single jump from the capital of the Confederation, Sian. Other forces suffered major losses due to counterattacks. The 21st Illician Rangers combat landed on Imalda where they suffered a ferocious counterattack by the infamous Death Commandos supported by the 5th Confederation Reserve Cavalry. The Rangers were badly mauled, forcing them to fight in a savage running retreat against the Capellans until they could withdraw from the planet.

Kittery Line

The Kittery prong forces did not advance, however they did receive additional reinforcements. On October 10, the Federated Freemen on Glasgow was attacked by the 4th Tau Ceti Rangers who caused such massive damage the Federated Freemen were forced into retreat by December, 3068.

Lee Corridor

The 20th Avalon Hussars and Kestrel Grenadiers pushed their combined forces to take No Return and Randar. While on Randar, the capital city business district suffered significant damage due to poor riot control efforts.

Wave Fourth Related Events

On the borders of the two Succession States, raids and counter-raids escalated between the two sides. These raids caused significant casualties and damage to equipment on Lee and Aldebaran. The Capellan raids caused the 1st FedSun Armored Cavalry to fall back to Halloran V after losing more than half of its force to combat/sabatoge damage.

The Sian Attack, beginning of Capellan Counter-Attack

A unknown WarShip (originally suspected to being a Davion vessel) penetrated Sian's orbital defenses and bombarded the Forbidden City. This attack resulted in the death of Duchess Candace Allard-Liao and reportedly the Chancellor's as well.

This craven attack triggered a massive Capellan counter-assault and galvanized the Capellan people to fight against the invading March troops. Sang-jiang-jun Talon Zahn declared himself as regent to the Confederation and launched the counter-invasion known as Operation: Thunderstrike.

This Capellan counter-assault caused the March troops of AFFS to lose ground in the Confederation, even forcing entrenched pacification units off their conquests. Some regrouped on New Syrtis.

The CCAF thoroughly repulsed the March troops and their mercenary auxiliaries by the end of October, and with barely a pause, penetrated the March and hit New Syrtis. In the grueling battle for control of New Syrtis, the Chancellor was found alive. Sun-Tzu Liao ordered all operations to cease. The Chancellor called upon Duke Hasek for a cease-fire in place, stating that he believed the true enemy was the Word of Blake.

Technically, Operation: Sovereign Justice did not officially end until April 3070, but all offensive actions had ceased in October 3068. The latter date was a result of the assassination of George Hasek. His successor, Angela Hasek was the one who finally ordered the cease-fire.

Also See

• Operation: Thunderstrike
• Jihad

References

• Jihad Secrets: The Blake Documents, pp. 17-18

Bibliography

• Jihad Secrets: The Blake Documents
• Mercenaries Supplemental Update