Battle of Melissia (3064)
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| Battle of Melissia (3064) | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of FedCom Civil War | |||||||
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| Factions | |||||||
| (Attacker) Clan Jade Falcon |
(Defender) Federated Commonwealth |
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Marthe Pryde Timur Malthus |
Sharon Bryan Adam Steiner Phelan Kell |
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| Conditions | |||||||
| Normal | |||||||
The Battle of Melissia (3064) was a Clan Invasion Era military operation that was undertaken by both factions of the Federated Commonwealth against Clan Jade Falcon forces.
Contents
Operation Brief[edit]
The military operation took place in the planet Melissia.
Operation History[edit]
Factions & Known Units Involved in the Conflict[edit]
Federated Commonwealth[edit]
- Third Alliance Guards
- Ninth Lyran Regulars
- Sixth Donegal Guards
- 14th Donegal Guards
- Hodge Podges
- Storm's Metal Thunder (mercenary)
Clan Jade Falcon[edit]
Origin of Conflict[edit]
Melissia, as headquarters of General Sharon Bryan, Margrave of the Melissia Theater, became the place of the Falcon incursion largest battle. She pulled off troops from other planets, as Blue Hole, gathering them on Melissia. She nominated General Adam Steiner as his second-in-command, but all those forces were seriously weakened by the previous combats: the mercenary Storm's Metal Thunder was the most affected, as became annihilated, with only two active BattleMechs arriving to Melissia.[1][2]
Lyran Defense[edit]
After gathering a massive army, Bryan ordered the creation of massive fortifications, raising a fortress which she insisted on calling The Rock (Melissia), where she expected to bloody the Falcons and eventually crush them. Adam Steiner, veteran of battling the Clans, repeatedly objected to the strategy, but Bryan ignored his suggestions to fight a mobile defense. Steiner only obtained the Marshal's grudging and disinterested approval to create a fall-back position on Chapultepec. The arrival of Colonel Felix Blucher who had moved on his own initiative and gathered battalions of forces from other militias - totaling effectively a reinforced regiment - enraged Bryan, but Adam supported his actions and turned Blucher's forces into his only reserve forces.[3]
The Falcon's Khan, Marthe Pryde, landed on-planet on the 13 August with seven Clusters. Pryde didn't fall for her trap, and the Marshal's refusal to make a batchall freed Pryde to use all her forces. The Khan began attacking the defending troops outside the fortress, rotating her units to train them in combat. Adam led the battle in the forests around the Rock, managing to preserve most of his forces, while Bryan, holed up on the Rock, obstinately attempted to realize her original plan.[4]
By the 16 August, the battle for the planet had become a running slugfest, as the Falcon troops mauled unit after unit. The Ninth Lyran Regulars had been the best-off with a quarter of their forces out of action, while Adam Steiner's own Fourteenth Donegal Guards had been reduced to just over a company of damaged 'Mechs. That day, the Falcons finally assaulted the Rock's fortifications directly, bypassing its defenses and dropping about two full Clusters of Elementals. The Elementals overwhelmed the base, killing the Marshal. Adam Steiner called back his surviving troops, ordering a retreat.[5][6]
Retreat[edit]
General Steiner, now the Theater's supreme commander, was forced to pull back his forces off Melissia. Only the attack of Blucher's regiment, now dubbed the Hodge Podges broke the Falcon's persecution, allowing Steiner's surviving forces to reach their DropShips and retreat to Chapultepec, but his losses were terrible: the Third Alliance and Sixth Donegal effectively ceased to exist in the battle, with only a handful retreating with his forces. Ironically, the two Mechs of Storm's Metal Thunder survived the fight and were still willing to participate at the future battles against the Falcons.[7][8]
Wolf Exiled counterattack[edit]
Khan Phelan Kell, as part of the Lyran Operation Bludgeon, led two of his Clusters to attack Melissia. Timur Malthus, the Falcon's commander on site, after the departure of most of his clan's frontline force, faced him after the Exiles landed the 24 November. During the fight in the Broad Run Delta, Malthus delivered Kell several blows, but eventually the Wolf Khan moved an assault against the falcons from beneath the oceans, surprising them. Defeated, Malthus turned the world to Khan Kell the 13th December, pulling his own troops off a day later.[9][10]
References[edit]
Bibliography[edit]
- FedCom Civil War
- Operation Audacity (novel)