Seamus van Hatten

Seamus van Hatten
Personal
Affiliation	Lyran Commonwealth
Profile
Rank	Admiral

Seamus van Hatten was the commander of the LCS Impregnable and a senior Lyran Commonwealth naval officer by 2787.

History

In February 2787, the Draconis Combine launched a major invasion of the world of Skondia anticipating relatively weak resistance. Instead, Admiral van Hatten and three hundred combat vessels met forty-five Combine WarShips and their attending JumpShip and DropShip assets in the system's orbit. Due to the Lyran's presence, the Combine commander feared that their entire strategy was known to the Commonwealth and hesitated while word of the potential security breach was fed up the chain of command. In reality, van Hatten's armada was in-system as a result of the hostilities raging between the Commonwealth and Free Worlds League and were meant to defend against League predations. Regardless, the Combine fleet brushed aside those Lyran vessels defending the local Recharge stations and formed its vessels into a wedge with which it hoped to punch through the naval blockade long enough to deliver its ground troops.

Admiral van Hatten responded by ordering a third of his ships to focus solely on downing DropShips ferrying troops to Skondia's surface, although this only succeeded in destroying a small fraction of the troops slated to invade Skondia. The weak link in van Hatten's defense was the presence of so many aerospace carriers among the Combine forces, with the Commonwealth ships being designed for capital-grade combat instead of anti-aerospace point defense. Bogged down trying to eliminate the threat these aerospace fighters presented, van Hatten's fleet soon had to contend with those WarShips and assault craft that had finished escorting landing operations and doubled back to contribute to the orbital battle. By the end of the four week naval battle, van Hatten's flagship had been crippled and a third of his fleet had been rendered nonoperational.

Bibliography

• First Succession War