Victoria War

Victoria War
Part of The Dark Age, Republic Era
Start Date From 3103 to 3105 Result The Federated Suns ultimately would gain three worlds but would lose nine others
Factions
Federated Suns	Capellan Confederation	Magistracy of Canopus Free Worlds League
Commanders and leaders
Duchess Amanda Hasek
Conditions
Normal

The Victoria War was a military operation starting at first by the Federated Suns against the Capellan Confederation in 3103, concluding in 3105. It would go on to include the Magistracy of Canopus and splinter states from the former Free Worlds League.

Operation Brief

The flashpoint came as Duchess Amanda Hasek marched on Victoria. Having recently come to power, she had spent the last few years cultivating the loyalties of various senior officers and hiring mercenaries to conduct reconnaissance raids into Capellan space, probing for weaknesses. Her recon raids had discovered that many Capellan units had secretly been reassigned to the border with the Republic in anticipation of Sun-Tzu Liao's planned invasion of the Republic of the Sphere, leaving the border with the Capellan March under-defended. Sensing an opportunity, and concerned that her clandestine preparations would be discovered by new Marshal of the Armies Athena Davion-Roos, Duchess Hasek ordered her loyal regiments across the border on 7 September, 3103. She had two goals in mind: First was to capture Victoria and its valuable factories in order complete her second goal; to upstage First Prince Harrison Davion. Although the conflict lasted less than two years, by the end, three additional realms had become embroiled in the fighting. The Federated Suns ultimately would gain three worlds but would lose nine others.

Federated Suns Front

Wave One

Duchess Hasek's forces started the conflict by bypassing the border systems and invading Zanzibar, Jacson, and Menke. HPG stations were considered priority targets in order to maintain surprise and prevent the Capellans from calling in reinforcements. The invasion of Zanzibar went smoothly. Jacson fell quickly as well, but the defending mercenary force Lethal Injection was able to escape the planet and inform the Capellan government of the invasion. Following the battle at Jacson a mutiny among the 8th Syrtis Fusiliers prevented the unit from moving on to its next objective.

Menke turned into a quagmire as the world was unexpectedly reinforced by two regiments of McCarron's Armored Cavalry. Duchess Hasek threw more and more troops into the battle, diverting them from planned second wave targets. After two months of battle, the Capellan forces dislodged the invaders.

Wave Two

Hasek's initial war plans had optimistically assumed the initial targets of the first wave would capitulate quickly, and the regiments assigned to those operations would be quickly available for the main assault on Victoria, with further second wave assaults on planets in the vicinity to blunt the Capellan response. The ongoing meatgrinder of the battle on Menke derailed these plans, with the second wave regiments redirected piecemeal in an attempt to finally destroy the McCarron's Armored Calvary Brigade. Still, the planned assault on Victoria went forward with only three regiments rather than the planned six. The AFFS task force jumped in to pirate points on September 12th.

The First Federated Suns Armored Calvary, Third Federated Suns Lancers, and Second Styris Fusiliers were able to initially overwhelm the Capellan defenders and take over the world's vaunted industrial sites, but were unable to completely destroy the defenders or prevent them from calling for reinforcements. Over the next six months, the CCAF sent no less than six waves of reinforcements, including Warrior House Kamata and the Fifth McCarron's Armored Calvary Regiment, which had refit in record time after being savaged on Menke. The Davions forces set up an effective screen of aerospace fighters around the key world, which inflicted heavy casualties on Capellan reinforcements as their dropships burned in toward the planet. The battle swung back and forth, with each new wave making bold assaults and desperate defenses in turn, and the CCAF took a scorched earth approach, making the destruction of Victoria's battlemech factories a priority so that the FedSuns troops would end up conquering only rubble. Finally, on February 14th, 3104, the last of Warrior House Kamata retreated from the world, leaving the few shattered Capellan commands still on the planet to surrender or be destroyed. Victoria had fallen.

Bibliography

• Historical: Wars of the Republic Era

Dates

• Start Date - 3103
• End Date - 3105