Fiction:Great Xonexian Schism/Orion War

The Orion War was a brief undeclared conflict which took place from February 11 to March 30 of 2802 in Orion's Spur of the Milky Way Galaxy primarily between forces of the Orion League and the Kindred Coalition. It is widely considered to be the event that began the long Xonexi-DCP conflict which later came to be referred to as the Great Xonexian Schism.

Background
Orion's Spur and most members of the Orion League were left untouched by the Gigaquadrantic Conflicts for its first two years. The Orion League aided in the defense of the Milky Way Galaxy against extragalactic invaders, neglecting some of its members, like the Kindred Coalition, in their struggle against threats like the Mantisorac. The Kindred Coalition was devastated by these alien invaders, though the timely arrival of the Corsican Defense Force, the only military that had remained behind, saved them from disaster.

On the political stage, tensions between the Delpha Coalition of Planets and many Xonexian powers mounted steadily throughout those years, and the Orion League was directly implicated in events. Many of its members, including France, POTATO, and actively worked to strengthen the League in preparation for the inevitable confrontation. They went about this by strengthening alliances and militaries, renewing old promises, and attempting to discredit DCP sympathizers while currying public support. So effective were their arguments and demonstrations that by February of 2802, when tensions were at their highest, most Orion League nations were overrun with anti-DCP hysteria.

February Crisis

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In some nations, especially the Kindred Coalition, events would have the exact opposite effect. The Orion League's failure to defend them during the Plazithian Seismomachy had instilled in them a distrust for it. That distrust was leveraged into fear, ushering in numerous nationalist politicians into high government offices. These, unknown to the general public, were puppets of the Delpha Coalition of Planets. They were in the process of signing a secret alliance with them when their plans were found out by the French Secret Service and leaked to the general public.

Urged on by fervent anti-DCP hysteria, the most outspoken leaders in the Orion League immediately denounced the government of the Kindred Coalition, accusing it of betraying its allies and its own people. Led by France, an alliance of nations put forward an ultimatum, giving the Kindred Coalition government two days to step down, threatening military action if they did not comply. In response, the Kindred Coalition ordered the Corsican Defense Force to leave its territory as quickly as circumstances could permit. With both sides unwilling to back down, war was inevitable.

Allied invasion of the Kindred Coalition
With the two-day deadline rapidly approaching, the anti-KC alliance met on to hammer out a plan of action. In attendance were the nations of Corscia, the East Asian Coalition,, , America, the East African Alliance, the Greater Hal'Sk Empire, and the , all intent on halting the spread of DCP influence in the Orion Arm. After an hour of deliberation, they authorized the use of force against the Kindred Coalition and each pledged to lend support, though no actual plan of action was agreed upon.

When the deadline expired and the Kindred Coalition had not met the demands of the alliance, there was some confusion as to who should take action. In a secret meeting with Prime Minister Fulvio Geroux of Corsica, Prime Minister Alexandre Valéry of France convinced the Corsicans to make a bid for Hat'Mohr, the capital of the Kindred Coalition territories in Orion. Their military, the Corsican Defense Force (CDF), was already in Coalition space and within striking distance of the capital. Seizing it, they hoped, would resolve the conflict quickly and give the Orion League enough leverage to resolve the conflict diplomatically. On February 10, several hours after the deadline, Geroux ordered the CDF to attack.

Corsican intervention
The CDF made its first move on February 11, moving from the northernmost sectors to the heart of the Coalition territory. They deployed in the space around Hat'Mohr and, after several hotly contested engagements around neighboring planets, managed to push the Klingon defenders out of the sector. They then began landing troops on numerous key planets, including Hat'Mohr. Within the first twenty four hours, the entire capital sector was under their control. The only exception was Hat'Mohr, where the Klingons had managed to decisively repel Corsican landing forces and were holding out behind a powerful planetary shield. The Corsicans lay siege to the planet, knowing that it would run out of stored energy eventually, but not quickly enough. The local Kindred Coalition government had not been made to surrender and continued to call other Coalition members to help. Local Kindred Coalition militaries, which outnumbered the deployed Corsican troops, quickly lay siege to the capital sector and trapped the invaders. The quick victory the allies had hoped for would not come so easily.

Allied invasion
Seeing that their bid had failed, allied leaders exchanged frantic long-distance communications, attempting to ascertain their next move. Two hours after the Corsicans found themselves besieged, the militaries of France, the Pan-African Alliance, the Greater Hal'Sk Empire, and the Eldarisian Empire were being marshaled while the alertness of most other allied militaries was increased to dangerous levels. An emergency session of the Orion League general council was called, but no consensus could be found despite Chairman Zhen Liu's threats to intervene.

On February 12, urged on by France and other allied nations, the high command of the GHE decided to intervene. They quickly dispatched the 304th, 523rd, and the 788th naval groups of the Hal'Sk Imperial Navy to the northern territory of the Kindred Coalition. Joining them were numerous formations from the Eldarisian Empire and the African states.

The 304th was assigned to attack the right, the 523rd the left, and the 788th the center of the northern territories. They hoped that the triple threat posed by these groups would be enough to shatter the Kindred Coalition forces which were spread out in an encirclement of the capital sector, and they were right. The three allied groups attacked as the Kindred Coalition was attempting to regroup, winning such minor engagements as the Battles of Jurah and Eldarch in quick succession. By Midday on February 12, the Northern provinces of the Kindred Coalition were under allied control and a flow of reinforcements was established with the Corsicans in the capital sector.

Because the Kindred Coalition was young it hadn't fully integrated, it was hoped that since the northern territories were largely Klingon, an estimation of their strategy could be made, while the Orion League having known the Klingons for many centuries, would make and easier predictions to manage tactics for their fleets. But due to the recent DCP influence of the Coalition, the Klingons did have some backup from forces of the Romulans, Cardassians and even the Breen who were growing with concern that their core regions were next. The Romulans were known for their emphasis on intelligence gathering and deception, thus their tachyon arrays and non-phasic cloaks. The Breen on the other hand, had specialised their weaponry on energy dampening shields and ion weapons. While their involvement was slight, it was a small thorn at least for the attacking fleets. There was concern on both sides of straying into territories formerly held by the Vorlon and Shadow, who had been precursors who left in the Girdo Campaigns, with their younger cousins the Tholians occupying their territory. This turned out to be a bigger thorn as the Northern territories began to lose ground removing safe passage.

Battle of the Battered Arm
On February 13, the Allied 523rd met the Kindred Coalition 19th Battlefleet at what the Klingons called "Battered Arm," a protostellar nebula which Klingon General Yaroth had greatly fortified while awaiting reinforcements from the 15th Battlefleet. The 523rd and 19th were evenly matched, though the threat of enemy reinforcements compelled the allies to attack. Wave after wave of allied formations crashed into weaknesses in the Kindred Coalition defense, time after time being forced to retreat and regroup. Despite heavy losses incurred on his side, Yaroth made a move which caught the Allies completely off guard: he counterattacked.

The African-Hal'Sk force had been deployed in such a way to facilitate the delivery of logistics, supplies, and relief to the different formations which were preparing to attack. General Yaroth committed all of his forces––including his last reserves––to an all out assault, careening boldly through the Allied vanguard and straight through their center. He personally led an attack against the African command squadron which was forced to retreat into hyperspace to avoid destruction. The momentary loss of direction was a devastating blow to Allied cohesion, and many military analysts argue that the Allies would have lost the Battle of the Battered Arm if it were not for the timely arrival of the Eldarisian half of the 788th.

With a fervent battle cry, the Eldarisians met Yaroth's forces in the crumbling Allied center, slowly turning the tide of the battle. With the destruction of Yaroth's ship, the Kindred Coalition battlefleet quickly lost cohesion and was forced into a rout within hours. The reinforcements General Yaroth had hoped for never came, as the 15th was then engaged in its own tenacious breakthrough offensive against the Corsican Defense Force around Hat'Mohr.

Coalition Withdrawal
Having lost the 19th Battlefleet, the Kindred Coalition's battle line began to falter. Though the Kindred Coalition 15th Battlefleet finally managed to break the Corsican siege of Hat'Mohr, they were quickly forced back by the combined might of the allied 523rd and 788th. From there, the Kindred Coalition forces progressively retreated, desperately looking for a defensible position, before abandoning their territory entirely to the allied forces.

Political Deadlock

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The international reaction to the invasion was immediate and deeply polarizing. Within the Orion League, any form of outrage was drowned out by overwhelming support for Allied military action. A great number of Xonexi nations like the Tybusen Intergalactic Federation, Farengeto Trade Coalition, and Drodo Empire issued statements which indicated an inclination towards the Allied cause.

Surprisingly, Draconid Imperium was strangely tentative in its support for the allies. Though Paragon Uriel Ultanos had signed the Alcanti Triad Agreement and openly aligned himself with the allied cause, the Draconid Senate resisted any action that they thought might lead to war with the Delpha Coalition of Planets.

However, the event elicited numerous condemnations from members of the Milky Way Cooperative and other nations abroad, often referring to the Allies as "crazed warmongers." The most important of these denunciations came from the Delpha Coalition of Planets, which declared in no uncertain terms the illegality of the invasion, threatening consequences should the allies not withdraw.

Despite fierce international pressure, the Allies pressed on. On February 20, they sued for peace. French Foreign Minister Ballatay delivered the terms to the Kindred Coalition capital: the allies would return the territory of the Kindred Coalition along with all prisoners taken during the invasion and pay reparations for the damage done to property and equipment on the condition that the Kindred Coalition government step down permanently.

The offer's reasonable terms appeased many of the Allies' critics, though the Kindred Coalition rejected it outright. Talks continued for weeks on the Kindred Coalition capital of Steanov VI, featuring impassioned speeches from many of the Gigaquadrant's great orators, pleading for a peaceful resolution to the conflict. Finally, on March 1, the Kindred Coalition broke off the talks and expelled all allied diplomats from its soil. It would spend the next two weeks gathering an invasion force from among its member nations to attempt to take back its Orion territory by force.

Coalition Counter-Attack
On March 18th the Coalition armada launched its counterattack against its Allied-held territory, led by the cunning Klingon General Kragal. The Kindred 14th Battlegroup, backed by the newly-arrived 11th, 17th and the remainder of the 15th, began a concentrated offensive thrust into occupied space. Possessing the weight of numbers, the Coalition battlegroups pushed back the allied line and liberated what planets they could despite heavy skirmishing with the allies.

The Allied force, led by Marshal Jean-Baptiste Teindas, attempted to delay the oncoming force for as long as possible. Anticipating the Coalition's strategy, Teindas pulled back his line in an attempt to keep pace with its advance. Though the French Marshal had planned to defend a wide area, General Kragal had wisely decided not to split his forces and was instead looking for a pitched battle.

Battle of Calaras
Eventually, unwilling to give the Coalition further ground, Teindas ordered the Allied 778th to take a defensive position over Calaras, a strategic capital world, while it waited for reinforcements from the other allied fleets. This is the mistake which analysts often point to to explain why the campaign cost the allies so much. Teindas had estimated that it would take General Kragal at least a day to organize his fleets to attack. This would have been plenty of time to shuttle in his own reinforcements.

What he did not count on was the tenacity of the Klingon commander. Pushing his hyperdrives to dangerous limits, Kragal not only arrived on scene earlier than expected, but proceeded to attack immediately with what forces were at his disposal. The ensuing Battle of Calaras on March 20 weighed decisively in favor of the Allies at first, but as Kragal's whole armada trickled in, the tide began to shift. Ultimately outnumbered over 3 to 1, the 778th was slowly overrun, only to be reinforced by the arrival of Teindas and the 523rd, which was still weakened from the Battle of Battered Arm.

When the Allied 304th joined the battle, Teindas had committed everything to the Battle of Calaras, and yet Kindred Coalition reinforcements kept trickling in despite heavy casualties. Finally, as the cohesion of the Allied army was strained to the point of breaking, Teindas ordered a full allied retreat.

Trivia

 * The Orion War acts as a prelude and a catalyst to the intense fighting of the Great Xonexian Schism, the final flashpoint that sets everything off.