A Geopolitical Feeding Frenzy
A Geopolitical Feeding Frenzy
April 2182 - Low Xuizenoca orbit - Heavy Cruiser Belukha
The ships of the Expeditionary Fleet spent weeks preparing for Operation Türklopfer. Operating in such a low orbit put them at increased risk from ground-based anti-ship weapons. However, no attack was ever attempted. Admiral Strelkov later attributed this to the Xuizenoca natives being afraid of provoking Humanity’s wrath.
Art By Meganerid
Stepan Strelkov was already awake when the alarm clock rang. He hadn’t slept much, almost as if he was nervous. Which was preposterous. He had nothing to be nervous about. Yes, today was S-Day, but that was nothing to be worried about. He was in complete control of the situation. There was nothing the Aifu could do to stop him or his men. It was as if he was nervous about going to the shooting range.
After a quick shower, he got dressed in his freshly pressed uniform. Yes, today was not a day to be worried about, but it would still be one for the history books, so he, and everyone else, should look the part.
He took breakfast in his cabin. Compared to the usual fare, it was quite luxurious. Real eggs and bacon on mushroom bread. He had ordered the mess to break out the limited goods for today. Morale among the troops was high, but given what they were about to do, it didn’t hurt to “top off”.
He glanced through the night’s reports as he ate. They were all the standard fare, nothing out of the ordinary. Most days he would have just skimmed them, trusting his officers to highlight anything needing his attention. But they had diligently seen to every issue possible in the past two weeks. It was only right that he put in the same effort.
There was, of course, nothing requiring his attention. The most interesting reports came from his Head of Intelligence, who detailed the increasingly panicked transmissions coming from the planet below. They would have to discuss this with the Chancellor.
After finishing his breakfast, he made his way to the conference room. Every senior member of the Expeditionary Fleet was already there, waiting for him. Him, and the Chancellor. After finding his seat, he glanced at the senior technician.
“Are we ready?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Then patch us through.”
The technician adjusted some settings on his console, and the ship’s Russalka Phone dialled home. Back to Earth.
After about a minute of waiting, the connection was stable and a voice rang out.
“Admiral Strelkov, it is a pleasure to hear from you,” Chairman Petr Burian said.
It was somewhat uncanny. Stepan knew it wasn’t Burian’s voice. To save on bandwidth, the Russalka Phone transmitted text and the onboard computer synthesised his voice. But despite this, it really sounded like the man who had met with him years ago, before the Expeditionary Fleet’s departure from Earth.
“Chancellor, I think I can speak for all of us when I say that the pleasure is all ours. Especially on this momentous day.”
The talk went around the table, as his officers introduced themselves. They all kept it brief, not wanting to waste the Chancellor’s time. But Stepan knew that today they had the Chancellor’s full attention.
“Mr. Chancellor, have there been any response from the Aifu High Command?”
“That depends on your definition of response, Admiral. They have replied to our messages. They are not complying with our demands, but at least they’re replying. For the Aifu Remnant, that alone is a major breakthrough.”
“So no change in regards to Operation Türklopfer?”
“So far we are proceeding as planned. Our back channels and intelligence services suggest that they are close to agreeing to our demands. All that is needed is a slight push. And some orbital bombardment will hopefully suffice.”
“Mr. Chancellor,” Captain Elanor Sharp, his Head of Intelligence, interjected. “We’ve received numerous offers of surrender from the local government. They are willing to comply with whatever demand we have, as long as we do not open fire.”
“Yes, I’ve seen the reports. Unfortunately, they are not in a position to give us what we want. We are not planning to hold Xuizenoca. So it serves us more as an object lesson. And unless the Aifu High Command decides to accept our demands within the next six hours, then Türklopfer will continue as planned.”
“Understood, Sir,” Stepan said. Captain Sharp had argued on behalf of the locals for the last few days, but if she was disappointed, she did not show it. “Have there been any changes to the rules of engagement?”
“No changes,” Burian said almost casually. “Prioritize military targets, but especially those that can be seen by the civilian population. I want as many images of military bases being obliterated to filter back to the general Aifu population. Hopefully that will change some minds. Just try to not hit a school or hospital by accident. I’m already up to my ears in Indochinese reds calling this an imperialist adventure. I don’t need more people listening to them.”
A round of chuckles went around the table. The Indochinese Federation had become something of a recurring punchline since the beginning of the war, with the troops finding new and interesting ways to call them cowards. Stepan didn’t mind it per se, but he worried if the attitudes would persist after the war.
He had read the reports. With most of the Navy committed to the war, piracy was rising. The Indochinese Federation had refused to allow any of their ships to be used in the conflict, so the Syndicalists made up a significant portion of their anti-piracy efforts. And from the reports, they were punching significantly above their weight.
The rest of the meeting passed with his officers discussing the minutia of the upcoming plan. Most of it was already settled, so it was largely a matter of dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. When the meeting ended, Operation Türklopfer was four hours away.
* * *
Three hours and forty-five minutes later, Stepan walked onto the bustling flag bridge. He’d changed into his still pretty formal operational uniform, wearing his skinsuit underneath. There was still no confirmed risk for any of the ships in the fleet, but that was no excuse for being sloppy.
Dying to vacuum exposure thanks to some Aifu Hail Mary would be operationally bad, but the embarrassment would be catastrophic. Every history book detailing the war would reach its climax, and end with him dying an incredibly preventable death. Military history was full of commanders like that, and joining them would be worse than vacuum exposure.
He found his seat, hanging his helmet on the side of it, and sat down. He didn’t issue any instructions, instead listening to his officers work. It was a well-oiled machine. Most of them had trained their whole careers for this moment, and there was a real chance that they would not get another opportunity to prove themselves like this. Everyone, from his XO to the non-commissioned officers, was fully focused on their duties.
The digital display on the far wall was ticking steadily down. Stepan didn’t expect the Aifu to comply with the demands in the next ten minutes. Even if they wanted to, just sending the message to the Chancellor would take a few hours, and then getting the message back to the fleet would add a couple more to that. No, upholding the deadline was simply a bit of theatre for the people back home. Some might object if he started early.
With five minutes left on the clock, he issued the order to enter final combat readiness. Across the bridge, and the fleet in general, men and women put on their helmets and activated their life-support systems. When the timer reached zero, he activated his suit radio.
“Ladies and Gentlemen of the Expeditionary Fleet. The time we all have been training for has finally come. The Aifu Remnant has so far refused our demands. Our only desire was to protect the Queptilium from Connisthian aggression, letting them develop in peace. The Aifu denied passage for our ships, in clear violation of the terms outlined by the Galactic Council. When the Chancellor issued his demands, the Aifu steadfastly refused, choosing to instead shed blood for a couple of uninhabited rocks.
And today the Aifu face the consequences of their refusal. Our assignment is simple: lay the groundwork for the troops to do their job. I know you will all go above and beyond your duty today. Now then, let’s make Earth proud.”
He deactivated his radio. It was all lies, of course. And everyone knew it. The troops raised on the Rim were a token force, and sending them into actual combat was a political non-starter. No, the Aifu had lost the war. They only needed an excuse to concede. He, and the rest of the Expeditionary Fleet, was about to give them that excuse.
“Captain Suslov, commence operations.”
Suslov made a quick salute, his eyes gleaming behind the face plate. He began barking orders to the gunners’ station and soon the entire bridge was abuzz with activity. A few minutes later, the entire ship shuddered as the main guns fired. Watching the main targeting plot, Stepan saw the rounds move closer and closer to the planet.
The first salvo hit a munitions depot, blowing the entire facility sky-high. The second salvo hit a nearby military base. This required a few more follow-up shots, but soon enough it too was nothing more than a collection of craters. He was getting similar reports from the other ships in the fleet. But the much more interesting report was a feed forwarded by Sharp. She’d patched in an Aifu news feed and he was now watching live reporting on the destruction he was inflicting upon the planet below.
The images were horrific. Or at least, that was what he hoped the Aifu would think. The Chancellor was convinced that they were close to accepting his terms. Stepan hoped, for the sake of those groundside, that he was right.
* * *
As 2177 began, unsettling reports landed on Chancellor Burian’s desk. In contrast to expectation, the Aifu were wearing the Connisthians down. Details were, as always, muddled and incomplete, but intelligence reports from the Connisthian Hegemony indicated a steady uptick in warrior funerals.
Connisthian society placed a great deal of importance on honouring those who had died in battle. As a result, extensive casualty lists were regularly published so that the families of the dead could properly honour the fallen warrior. While the Connisthians regarded these losses as marks of great honour, the rest of the galaxy instead saw the Aifu holding against the Connisthians.
A traditional Connisthian funeral pyre. As most of the dead were lost to the void, these funerals typically burned the fallen in effigy. The funerals were typically conducted on mountains or cliffs and could be seen for miles.
Art by Mahalah Moore
This was, of course, concerning to the Confederacy, and especially to Chancellor Burian. There was still hope that the Aifu would agree to the Confederacy’s terms. However, if the Remnant could hold off the Connisthians, they might be inclined to resist. As a precautionary measure, Burian dispatched the Home Fleet to aid the Expeditionary Fleet.
This set off alarm bells in the Assembly. When the Chancellor proposed the original plan to the Assembly, the central conceit hinged on the assumption that the Aifu would not be able to resist the might of the Expeditionary Fleet. While few believed that the Aifu would be able to resist the combined Expeditionary and Home Fleets, it did leave open uncomfortable questions. Chief among them, who would defend Earth?
Chancellor Burian burned a lot of political capital over the year, trying to calm down what he would later describe as “borderline hysterical Assemblymembers”. His chief argument was that the various anti-pirate patrol fleets could act as a viable defence force should the need arise. However, as he would later admit to in his biography, A Galaxy for Mankind, this was a paper-thin excuse and only worked by playing to the prejudices common at the time.
“Everyone knew that the War of the Dual Alliances had shattered the forces of everyone spinwards of us. And it was true. The Beldross, the WBTA, the Hierarchy of Hazi, the Versum… none of them would have stood a chance against our fleets at the time. But that didn’t mean that their entire fleets were gone, and the idea that we could stop them with a handful of patrol boats was preposterous. But people believed what they wanted to believe. But had the Beldross come knocking in 2178, reality would have asserted itself quickly.”
That year gave Burian both a blessing and a headache. The blessing came when the Byrrieck People’s Union declared war on the Aifu. This came as a surprise to the entire Galactic Community, as the Byrrieck had repeatedly denounced both the Connisthians and Humanity for what they saw as “imperialist ambitions with no regard for the common people”. What was even more surprising was that the goal of the war was to claim several disputed systems.
This naturally spread the Aifu forces even thinner, giving Burian a greater chance at achieving his goal without firing a shot.
The headache came from the Beldross, who claimed several Human systems along the galactic rim. While they had not yet claimed Russalka, they did claim every system between Russalka and Hive territory.
In the Assembly, there were several calls for the Chancellor to issue some sort of denouncement of the Beldross claims. But in private, Burian and his ministers worried that such an act could escalate the conflict. And with the Home Fleet out of position, the Confederacy would not have the means to respond. So Burian remained silent. However, one thing was clear: something would have to be done about the Beldross Hive.
By mid-2179, the Expeditionary Fleet had reached its staging point by the Aifu border. The diplomatic talks, however, were going nowhere. After the Byrrieck declaration of war, the Aifu had left the Galactic Council and closed all official diplomatic channels, viewing every alien species as a threat. Even with Confederate diplomats making it clear that Humanity would fight them unless they agreed to their demands, the Aifu stalwartly refused to talk.
So Burian issued an ultimatum. Unless the Aifu Remnant ceded the Regis, Ipiecilia and Lishval systems by midnight of the 9th of July, Confederate ships would enter Aifu space and take them by force.
The 9th of July came and went without any word from the Aifu Remnant. So on the 10th, Burian ordered the Expeditionary fleet to attack.
The declaration of war saw a fairly muted geopolitical response. The Sildor issued a token condemnation, mostly for the sake of condemning Humanity. The strongest responses came from the Welfon-Boordar Trade Association and the Vetyr Shipping Alliance, both of whom urged Humanity to respect the rights of galactic shipping.
The attack went off without a hitch. On the 31st of November that year, the Expeditionary Fleet took the Regis system. This was the only fortified system in the region, home to a large starbase that provided logistical services to the area. The station was taken with minimal loss of Human life[1], giving the Confederacy a solid foothold to launch further operations. The Expeditionary Fleet would spend the next few months taking control of most of the Aifu systems along the rim.
There was, however, one major wrinkle to Humanity’s early success. Several of the Aifu systems claimed by the Confederacy were not currently in Aifu hands. Instead, they were currently enduring Connistihian occupation. And though these were lightly held, the commanding officer of the Expeditionary Fleet, Admiral Strelkov, had been given strict instructions to avoid provoking the Connistihians.
This problem did have one potential solution. The Bernhard Walther had since the beginning of the war been skulking around the Rim Pocket. With its powerful sensor arrays, the ship was an excellent scout and sent regular reports back to the fleet. And they detected the telltale hyperlane signature of a sizable Aifu fleet in the area.
Admiral Strelkov’s plan was thus to pull the Expeditionary Fleet back to the Regis system. Hopefully, the Aifu fleet would retake the occupied systems. Strelkov could then engage the fleet, and claim the newly liberated systems. If the Aifu did not retake the systems, then it would give time for the Home Fleet, under the command of Admiral Lions, to reach the frontlines. With Lions in place to hold the Rim Pocket, Strelkov would be free to strike deep into Aifu territory.
Things did not go according to plan. Whether by accident or design, the Aifu fleet that the Bernhard Walther was tracking did not try to liberate Connosthian-held systems, or engage the Expeditionary Fleet. Instead, it targeted the Bernhard Walther itself. The science ship fled towards friendly lines, but after a few weeks of cat-and-mouse manoeuvring, the Aifu fleet managed to corner the ship.
Exactly what happened is unknown. The commander of the ship, Captain Kasprzak, sent a message back to Earth, stating that he would try to surrender. He and his crew were never heard from again. The Aifu denied ever receiving the offer of surrender, and for a time, there was a certain degree of uncertainty surrounding the fate of the crew. However, three years after the conclusion of the war, the wreck of the Bernhard Walther was discovered. The bodies of the crew were charred by weapons fire, but DNA analysis confirmed their identities. It was the single largest loss of Human life during the war.
For many, the loss of the Bernhard Walther signified the end of an era. The ship, which had served for almost a century, had built up a certain mystique. Despite being refitted and remodelled so many times that there was hardly an original screw left, the old science ships represented a very romantic view of the galaxy. They ventured out into the black and brought home alien wonders. Several books, movies and video games had been made about their journeys, both real and fictional. But now there were few remaining unexplored systems. And those that were still unchartered, were so for a reason.
This feeling was further intensified when, in 2181, the Johannes von Gmunden strayed too close to Fjasivlin Void Raider territory and was destroyed. While a new exploration ship, the Shi Shen, would be laid down to replace the losses, it would never attain the same level of fame as its predecessors. The age of exploration was over.
To Admirals Strelkov and Lions, the loss of the Bernhard Walther was unfortunate, but not critical to their plans. With Lions in place to hold the Regis system, Strelkov was free to act. After consulting with Chancellor Burian, Strelkov was given free rein to “bring the war to the enemy.” The Expeditionary Fleet set a course for the Soao system, deeper into the territory of the Aifu Remnant.
At this point, Burian and Strelkov were acting without a firm plan. There was very little intelligence regarding the Aifu interior. While rough estimates of the hyperlane network had been assembled by scientists back on Earth, Strelkov had no idea what he might find. He thus proceeded carefully and methodically.
Burian, on the other hand, prepared as best he could. There had been one significant oversight during the lead-up to the war. The strategic planners had hoped that the Aifu would give in to Humanity’s demands without war. However, if this was not to be, then Humanity would take the contested systems and sue for peace.
However, following the outbreak of war, the Aifu refused to respond to any Human communication. And given that they had also withdrawn from the Galactic Council, getting other stellar nations to act as intermediaries was also proving difficult. The Confederacy would have to force the Aifu to the negotiation table. And for that to happen, they would need stronger leverage than a handful of frontier systems.
Strelkov was thus instructed to find and besiege any large Aifu population centres. But taking any such population centres would prove difficult. Most of the ground forces were still on and around Earth. Sending them all the way to the frontlines would once again take years. So Burian decided to order the recruitment of several new divisions on the frontier worlds near the border.
These divisions would be nowhere near the quality of those back on Earth, so orbital support would be critical. Burian and the Assembly hoped they would not be needed[2].
As Strelkov pushed deeper into Aifu territory, the Aifu were dealt another blow. On the 27th of November, 2180, a year after Humanity took the Regis system, the Sildor Blessed Union declared holy war on the Aifu Remnant, opening yet another front in the war.
The declaration of war by the Blessed Union was an act of pure opportunism. After seeing the Aifu struggle to respond to the Confederacy’s invasion, the Reverend Elder saw a golden opportunity to press their claim to a handful of disputed systems.
At this point, the Aifu Remnant was at war with four different stellar nations, all bent on carving off bits of their territory. Foreign Minister Landau expressed the situation best when she called it “less of a number of wars, and more of a geopolitical feeding frenzy”.
The entry of the Sildor did lead to Humanity calling for a meeting of the Galactic Council, which had not been called for either the Byrrieck or Confederate declarations of war. However, unlike previous meetings following the declaration of an interstellar war, this was not about stopping it. Instead, the Confederacy wanted to avoid unintended escalations between the belligerent parties.
On Earth and in the Galactic Council there was a very real fear that with so many different fleets engaging in combat operations, there was a severe risk of diplomatic “incidents”. Careless action could easily spread the war to new theatres.
The Sildor Blessed Union and the Byrrieck People’s Union were already coordinating extensively, as they had entered a defensive agreement some years earlier (though they were not formally allies in the ongoing conflict). The same could not be said for Humanity and the Sildor, whose relations were at a low point. And nobody had good relations with the Connisthian Hegemony.
The initial meetings did not go well, mostly due to Connisthian blustering. To them, agreeing not to fight was effectively an insult to their people and the Connisthian delegation spent much of their time insulting the perceived weakness of the other species.
Fortunately, this blustering did not go on for too long. On the 26th of December, just under a month after the Sildor declaration of war, the Connisthian Hegemony and the Aifu Remnant declared a ceasefire as a prelude to peace negotiations. While it would take some time for the details to be formalized, this marked the end of the Aifu-Connisthian war[3].
With the Connisthians out of the picture, the talks between the Confederacy, the People’s Union and the Blessed Union could continue. The Sildor initially wanted to press their position to extract some minor political concessions from Humanity, but the Byrrieck objected, not wanting to damage relations unnecessarily. In the end, all three parties agreed to keep each other broadly informed of their military manoeuvres.
The Connosthian exit from the war presented an opportunity for the Confederate Fleet. With them leaving the war, the systems they had occupied lay undefended, and Admiral Lions sent the Home Fleet to occupy the systems. There were still no confirmed sightings of the Aifu fleets.
The year that followed was known as the Quiet Year, as no real fighting took place. Admiral Strelkov kept pushing deeper into Aifu space, seizing stations as he went. Most of the time, the Aifu forces stationed there surrendered after a couple of warning shots[4]. But in late 2181, the fleet sensors indicated that the Tir system was inhabited. Strelkov had his target.
The theatre of operations at the end of the Quiet Year. Strelkov had pushed deep into Aifu territory in his search for Aifu population centres. Facing little resistance, his main concerns were his supply lines.
The Tir system was something of an anomaly in the Aifu Remnant. Before the Aifu collapse in the previous cycle, the system had been home to Xuizenoca, a major trading hub. The planet had been abandoned during the Aifu Empire’s contraction, but the Remnant had reclaimed the planet and settled it, despite their compromised immune system. By the time Admiral Strelkov brought the Expeditionary Fleet into the system, Xuizenoca was thriving once more.
Taking control of the spaceborne infrastructure proved no great challenge, as the system was largely undefended. However, taking the planet would require a great deal of manpower. Manpower that Strelkov did not have. He immediately sent word back to Earth that he required the troops raised. After a furious debate in the Assembly, Strelkov’s request was approved and troops were dispatched from Yutu. Though if the troops would be landing was still an open question.
The Expeditionary Fleet sorties into the Tir system. The Battle of Tir was short and one-sided. The defending Aifu had jury-rigged a handful of weapons to the local shipyards, but these proved wholly inadequate against an organised military force.
Meanwhile, Strelkov was instructed to “soften up” the Aifu defences. However, Burian suggested he take his time in getting ready, as covert talks were getting underway with the Aifu. Strelkov did as asked, and spent the next two weeks getting his fleet into position. Meanwhile, on Xuizenoca, panic was rampant. The Expeditionary Fleet had deliberately not damaged civilian communication infrastructure, allowing the besieged world to send panicked requests for aid.
Despite this, the talks with the Aifu went nowhere. So Burian authorised Operation Türklopfer, an opening orbital salvo targeting key military strongpoints on the planet. For two days, the Expeditionary Fleet rained down fire on Xuizenoca, and for two days, the panicking citizens pleaded for help. It proved to be the final straw. Humanity demanded only a handful of unpopulated systems, and keeping this war going would only lead to further Aifu deaths. On the 13th of April, 2182, the Aifu Remnant agreed to the Confederacy’s demands.
In many ways, the Human - Aifu war was a very limited conflict. Human casualties were limited to the only ship lost during the war, the Bernhard Walther. Aifu casualties were limited to those on Regis station and those killed during the bombardment of Xuizenoca. Exact number of Aifu casualties are disputed, but most credible estimates put them at around 5.000. What is known for certain, is that the Aifu considered, both at the time and later, the Human front to be of secondary importance.
For Humanity, the war was over. For the Aifu, there was no such relief.
[1] - The loss of Aifu life, however, was significant. While some died in the fighting, many more committed suicide after the station was secured. But the greatest loss of life came in the weeks that followed, as Humans introduced new pathogens onto the space station, and the fragile Aifu immune system was unable to stave off disease.
[2] - The creation of these new armies proved controversial in the colonies, especially on Yutu. There were widespread fears that conscription would be used to bolster the ranks, and the thought of soldiers being sent to their deaths to serve the colonial ambitions of another nation was not popular. The Assembly was thus wary of provoking the colonies, issuing proclamations that the armies would be volunteer only.
[3] - The terms of the treaty saw the transfer of the Meryl, Brias and Sabik systems to the Connisthians. All three systems were unknown to Human cartographers.
[4] - While the shots were used as justification for surrendering, many Aifu on the stations admitted to being far more frightened by any pathogens Humanity would bring along should the stations be boarded. Admiral Strelkov considered these fears, and in return for their timely surrender, did not board the stations. He instead disabled a few key external systems and left the Aifu captives aboard their stations.
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