Word of Blake

The Word of Blake was a splinter faction of ComStar that was created out of a conservative backlash to attempts at reform. The Blakists initially took refuge in the Free Worlds League, but were able to move most of their operations to Terra after they conquered it in 3058. They perpetrated the Jihad in 3067, which ended with the defeat of the Blakists in 3081 and the reintegration of the remaining Blakists back into ComStar.

History

Origin

Upon the defeat of the Clans at Tukayyid at the hands of ComStar, Precentor Martial Anastasius Focht returned to Terra to confront the then-Primus Myndo Waterly about her Operation Scorpion, an attempt to turn the entire Inner Sphere over to the Clans. Focht, backed by much of the ComStar Order, forced Waterly to resign her position due to her percieved insanity. Waterly died only four days after resigning her position; in what ComStar archives say was a cerebral hemorrhage. Word of Blake intercepts, however, forcefully state that Focht had her killed in order to secure the power of her position." One week later, the First Circuit elected Sharilar Mori, Precentor Dieron, as Primus with Focht's backing.

In protest, Demona Aziz, Precentor Atreus and a member of the First Circuit during Operation Scorpion, under the assumption that Focht staged an illegal coup d'etat, left Terra with her staff and a cadre of followers agreeing with her traditional interpretation of Jerome Blake's works.

Meeting with Thomas Marik on Atreus, she convinced the Captain-General to grant her followers sanctuary in the Free Worlds League. Using ROM agents loyal to her, Precentor Aziz sent messages to every HPG station across the Inner Sphere, inviting all ComStar members who rejected the new ways in favor of the old to join her in exile. As ComStar refugees flooded into the Free Worlds League, Marik granted the Word of Blake splinter group a land hold on the world of Gibson.

To Terra

The Blakists took over the administration of the HPGs in the League, as well as the Capellan Confederation a few years later. They used this considerable income from the stations, and the time, to train their forces.

Planning for the recapture of Terra began in 3057, when the Blakists sensed their opportunity due to the instability stemming from the Capellan-Free Worlds League assault into the former Sarna March. They were able to move their forces well within striking distance of Terra.

This preparation all paid off for them in 3058 when the Blakists conquered Terra in what they called "Operation Odysseus". This was achieved partially through trickery and partly through outright military force, as the Blakists had many sympathizers on Terra who covered up the Word's assault fleet until it was too late. In addition, the Blakists had managed to smuggle a sizable force onto the planet in disguise as the 21st Centauri Lancers, a mercenary regiment whom ComStar had just contracted. At the same time, the Word also dispatched forces to Venus and Mars. The conquest was complete months later when Precentor Klaus Hettig switched sides and brought the Titan Naval Yards into Blakist control. ComStar's Precentor Martial, Anastasius Focht, declined to attempt a liberation of Terra because he believed the Clans to be a greater threat.

After the conquest, the Word set about securing HPGs in the Chaos March, often engaging ComStar in running battles for the stations that resulted in the disruption of interplanetary communications. The Blakists generally took a propaganda approach that made sure of appearing to help the local communities, which in turn made the locals more receptive to the Word than to ComStar.

Blake Protectorate

The Word of Blake took a real step toward legitimizing itself in the eyes of its detractors in 3064 when Thomas Marik nominated the Word for full Star League membership. They took this a step further in early 3066 with the creation of the Word of Blake Protectorate, a half-dozen Chaos March worlds that all banded together under the Word's aegis. They were contested, however, by the formation of the Allied Mercenary Command (AMC) in 3066 by Jaime Wolf, whose implicit goal was stopping Blakist expansion in the Chaos March.

This situation came to a head in 3067 when the Word sponsored an insurrection of disaffected mercenaries on Outreach, led by Jaime Wolf's sworn enemy, Wayne Waco of the Waco Rangers. The early morning attack, which included the detonation of fuel-air explosives over the barracks of the Home Guard, took Wolf's Dragoons by surprise. Though they took a heavy toll, the Dragoons were able to rally and crush Waco's mercenaries. The Word also blockaded the Northwind Highlanders, another key member of the AMC, on their homeworld, Northwind. With the key members of the AMC damaged or neutralized, the Blakists continued until the encountered the unthinkable.

Jihad

At the Whitting Conference of 3067, the Capellan Confederation, Federated Suns, and Lyran Alliance all announced their intentions to withdraw from the Star League. First Lord Christian Mansdottir called for a vote of no-confidence, with the hopes that the measure would pass and they could force the dissenting member-states to stay. The vote failed however, even with the hasty admission of the Word of Blake and the Taurian Concordat. With the vote of no-confidence, the Star League disbanded. However, many Blakists believed in the interpretation of a prophecy that foretold they would come to power through the League, so they were understandably upset when it ceased to exist just as they were to have joined.

The Blakists resorted to threats to cajole the former Federated Commonwealth states to rejoin the League. WoB WarShips suddenly appeared in the Tharkad and New Avalon systems bearing threats that the nations should rejoin the Star League or face the wrath of the Word of Blake. When they refused, the WarShips opened fire and dispatched ground troops. The Blakists expanded their assault to include almost every power in the Inner Sphere. They attacked, and were responsible for some factions assaulting others, in an orgy of destruction that was their Jihad until 3081. That year, Devlin Stone was able to defeat the Blakists on Terra, officially ending their Jihad.

Politics

The Word of Blake was far too factional to be able to unite behind the First Circuit system that ComStar uses. Instead, the Ruling Conclave was composed of the heads of the the four largest factions and the Precentor Martial.

The four factions on the conclave are as follows -

Counter-reformists - the smallest faction on the conclave, they feel over time that Jerome Blake word has been corrupted and may need to be revised in some areas, but not to the same extremes that caused the Word of Blake to spilt from ComStar originally. They approach dangerous ground with regards to their beliefs and how they are viewed by other members of the conclave.

Expatriates - When Victor Stiener-Davion became Precentor martial of ComStar in 3062 many officers and officials who had remained in the order, but wished to reverse the reforms carried out by Focht, saw that the organisation was unable to be redeemed in their eyes. As such many left for the Word of Blake and became Expatriates.

Toyama's - Named after Jerome Blake’s student the Toyamas are the most radical faction on the conclave. They believe that Blake’s truth must be spread to the rest of the inner sphere by any and all means available.

True believers - one of the moderate factions on the conclave, most true believers whish to come to a understanding with the rest of the inner sphere and are generally non-violent, however they are not pacifists. They feel that the Word of Blake should unify before it leads the inner sphere to the truth.

The expatriates replaced another faction of the conclave in early 3062 when another faction the shunners suffered a disastrous accident on their primary home with in the terran system. One of the dome cities on Venus. The shunners believing that the end of the inner sphere is imminent isolated them selves. When a bomb exploded destroying the machinery they maintained the atmosphere in the dome nearly all the shunners were killed.

All Word of Blake factions agree on a few points. They decry ComStar and its members as heretics for defying the ancient doctrines claimed to be the writings of Jerome Blake. They denounce as forgeries the recently discovered writings of Blake and mourn ComStar as lost, destroyed from inside, claiming that salvation is only possible by fleeing from ComStar's "corrupted vision" and joining the Word of Blake.

As most of ROM defected with Aziz, the Word of Blake is observed at every level by their ROM organization, searching out ComStar infiltrators and disloyal members, dealing with them as they see fit.

Military

The Word of Blake Militia began its life at slightly more than four divisions of troops, the Blake Guards, which retained the standard Com Guard numbering and are were primarily tasked with defending Gibson. The Militia was twice that size in 3058, when the Word took Terra from ComStar and added another two divisions shortly thereafter. By the beginning of the Jihad in 3067, the Militia is rumored to contain over forty divisions.

The head of the Militia is the Precentor Martial. Senior officer positions are held by Precentors, while junior officers are adepts. The equivalent of the "enlisted" personnel is staffed by acolytes.

Circa 3072 the Word of Blake revealed new BattleMech designs unique to their military. These include the Celestial line of OmniMechs, which count the Archangel, Deva, Grigori, Malak, Preta, and Seraph among their number. These 'Mechs were often piloted by their elite Manei Domini MechWarriors.

Notes

• The original BTW version of this article was found on the former BattleTech 3056 MUSE and written by an unknown author.