Hagiwawa (Individual Samarkand-class WarShip)
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| Hagiwawa | |
|---|---|
| Vessel Profile | |
| Type | WarShip |
| Class | Samarkand |
History[edit]
Star League Era[edit]
In 2765 the flagship of the Draconis Combine Admiralty Third Fleet was the DCS Hagiwawa, a Block II Samarkand-class carrier, one of eight such sister ships to be in service at that point of time - six Block IIs, and two older Block Is. The Hagiwawa and the Third Fleet were operating within the Benjamin district of the Draconis Combine alongside the Fourth Fleet at this point in time.[1]
The DCA was only operating forty-two WarShips in 2765 - although this was a significant increase on the thirty WarShips in service in 2750 - and of those ships, twenty-seven were destroyers or corvettes, with just a handful of Aegis-class heavy cruisers and a pair of Cruiser-class heavy cruisers outweighing the Hagiwawa and her sister ships.[1][2]
First Succession War[edit]
In May 2787 the Draconis Combine launched a massive invasion of the Federated Suns. The invasion was so swift and targeted communications and JumpShips so effectively that many border systems didn't have a chance to transmit warnings or alerts, leading to widespread confusion on the part of the AFFS. Three days after the initial attacks another large wave of attacks was launched by the DCMS, based around two salients; one, under the overall command of Coordinator Minoru Kurita, struck into the Clovis Combat Region, beginning with invasions of Cartago, Clovis and Olancha.[3]
The DCMS forces led by the Coordinator arrived in the Clovis system with a formidable WarShip flotilla drawn from the Third Fleet, consisting of the Hagiwawa and a sister ship, an Aegis-class heavy cruiser and four Narukami-class destroyers. Clovis was the headquarters of the Clovis Combat Region, and the Commanding Officer of the Region, Field Marshal Grover Simons, was in residence when the invasion force arrived; in addition to his forces on the ground, Simons also had a naval picket consisting of the New Syrtis-class carrier FSS Midale and the Davion-class destroyers FSS Reynard Davion and FSS Samuel Davion in the Clovis system.[3]
Despite being heavily outnumbered, the AFFS WarShips managed to tie up the Hagiwawa's flotilla for six hours close to Clovis' lunar orbit, crippling the Narukami-class DCS Firewind and inflicting heavy damage on the Hagiwawa, but the loss of the Midale and the Reynard Davion effectively ended AFFS resistance in orbit. Simons' forces on the ground put up a fierce resistance for two weeks, during which the DCMS ground forces fought without calling on the Hagiwawa or any of the other WarShips for naval support. By the end of the first week, the attackers had seized only a small foothold in Gorst City Valley. The DCMS refrained from using orbital bombardment to destroy the defenders, but Simons' calls for reinforcements went largely unanswered because of the chaos engulfing the local region; those AFFS units not already destroyed were all either in retreat or desperately fighting for survival. The only forces able to respond arrived aboard the Robinson-class carrier FSS New Ivaarsen, and the four DropShips of reinforcements the New Ivaarsen brought from Xhosa VII were nowhere near enough to turn the tide. The arrival of the New Ivaarsen five days into the second week of the invasion did offer the prospect of salvaging some of the troops on Clovis however, and Simons ordered a retreat from the planet.[3]
Simons died when his Leopard-class DropShip, the last to leave Clovis, was intercepted by Combine aerospace fighters ten kilometers above Clovis and attempted to fight its way clear, rather than surrendering; the combination of the fall of Clovis and the death of Simons led to a collapse in the AFFS defensive line in the region and swift, inexorable gains for the Combine.[3]