Difference between revisions of "Civil War in Goldshire"

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{{Conflict
 
{{Conflict
 
|title= Civil War in Goldshire
 
|title= Civil War in Goldshire
|date=  24 Rugaall 1639–the present
+
|date=  24 Rugaall 1639–15 Nomeziooqu 1643
 
|place= [[Goldshire]]
 
|place= [[Goldshire]]
 
|casus belli= [[Martial Law in Goldshire]], Avakair Massacre
 
|casus belli= [[Martial Law in Goldshire]], Avakair Massacre
|outcome= Ongoing<br>Secession of Southern Counties. Collapse of the Royal Government. Beginning of the [[Civil War in Goldshire#Warring States Period|Warring States Period]].
+
|outcome= Ended<br>Secession of Southern Counties. Collapse of the Royal Government. Beginning of the [[Civil War in Goldshire#Warring States Period|Warring States Period]].<br />Military defeat of the Mercaja Pretender.<br />Reunification of the mainland Kingdom under the House of Ayreon-Kalirion.<br />The [[Emirate of Jadid Khaz Modan]], governed by the House of Osman, retains autonomy.
 
|nation1= <center>'''Imperialists'''</center><br>[[File:Arms_Ayreon-Kalirion10.png|25px|border|Kalirion!]][[House of Ayreon-Kalirion]] <small>(''Kingdom of Goldshire'')</small><br>
 
|nation1= <center>'''Imperialists'''</center><br>[[File:Arms_Ayreon-Kalirion10.png|25px|border|Kalirion!]][[House of Ayreon-Kalirion]] <small>(''Kingdom of Goldshire'')</small><br>
 
*<small>[[File:ESB.png|15px|border|ESB-Jörmungandr Group]][[ESB-Jörmungandr Group]]</small>  
 
*<small>[[File:ESB.png|15px|border|ESB-Jörmungandr Group]][[ESB-Jörmungandr Group]]</small>  
Line 25: Line 25:
 
   
 
   
 
|nation2strength= [[File:Mercaja Banner.png|25px|border|Golden Dawn]][[Army of the Golden Dawn]]<br>County Militias<br>[[File:Goldshire Battle Standard.png|25px|border|Goldshire Regulars]][[Goldshire Regulars]] <small>(1640-)</small>:20,000<br>
 
|nation2strength= [[File:Mercaja Banner.png|25px|border|Golden Dawn]][[Army of the Golden Dawn]]<br>County Militias<br>[[File:Goldshire Battle Standard.png|25px|border|Goldshire Regulars]][[Goldshire Regulars]] <small>(1640-)</small>:20,000<br>
|nation1cas= <small>1639-1640: 126,000<br>1641:  
+
|nation1cas= <small>1639:
 +
*10,500 KIA
 +
*31,500 WIA
 +
1640:
 +
*12,600 KIA
 +
*71,400 WIA
 +
1641:  
 
*2,403 KIA
 
*2,403 KIA
 
*1,178 WIA
 
*1,178 WIA
*21,000 AWOL</small>
+
*21,000 AWOL
|nation2cas= <small>1639-1640: 121,000<br> 1641:  
+
1642:
 +
*16,456 KIA
 +
*12,316 WIA
 +
1643:
 +
*34,531 KIA
 +
*33,825 WIA</small>
 +
|nation2cas= <small>1639
 +
*10,083 KIA
 +
*30,250 WIA
 +
1640:
 +
*12,100 KIA
 +
*68,567 WIA
 +
1641:  
 
*9,000 KIA
 
*9,000 KIA
 
*13,200 WIA
 
*13,200 WIA
 
*5,003 POW
 
*5,003 POW
 +
1642:
 +
*35,970 KIA
 +
*61,348 WIA
 +
1643:
 +
*275,111 KIA
 +
*75,409 WIA
 
</small>
 
</small>
|notes=  
+
|notes= Civilian Fatalities: 43,770
 
}}
 
}}
  
Line 162: Line 186:
  
 
This thankless role was left to the terrified and despairing remnants of the Jaysh al-Sathrati who were, up to that moment, still pouring into Tyrewlynn from the surrounding countryside in the forlorn hope of finding the means of escaping up river. Unfortunately for them, alongside any civilians who entertained the prudent notion of fleeing, the Trireme assault craft of 002 Riverine Regiment, being the first to arrive on the scene, were already machine-gunning any boats that had slipped berth and put out towards the mid-channel of the Red Elwynn. This mass of humanity was to be held in place, by whatever means, as the single most inviting target to attract the attention of the oversized tripod golem.
 
This thankless role was left to the terrified and despairing remnants of the Jaysh al-Sathrati who were, up to that moment, still pouring into Tyrewlynn from the surrounding countryside in the forlorn hope of finding the means of escaping up river. Unfortunately for them, alongside any civilians who entertained the prudent notion of fleeing, the Trireme assault craft of 002 Riverine Regiment, being the first to arrive on the scene, were already machine-gunning any boats that had slipped berth and put out towards the mid-channel of the Red Elwynn. This mass of humanity was to be held in place, by whatever means, as the single most inviting target to attract the attention of the oversized tripod golem.
 +
 +
*[[Battle of Tyrelwynn]]
 +
**Panic in Tyrelwynn
 +
**Holwinn opened up
 +
**Evacuation of Tyrelwynn aborted
 +
*[[Siege of Teldrin|Teldrin cut off]]
 +
*[[Sack of Airle|Airle falls]]
  
 
==1643: the rout of Holwinn==
 
==1643: the rout of Holwinn==
 +
*Triskelions break loose
 +
*[[Rrakanychan Watch]] holds Demonsfall
 +
*[[Palatini Corps]] deployed
 +
*[[Battle of Holwinn]]
 +
*[[Mesior Landings|Diversionary landings at Mesior]] - fiasco for the Amity Defence Force
 +
 +
==Armistice==
 +
 +
Armistice of Airle (Reire the 15th of Nomeziooqu, 1643): End of the Civil War. Terms surprisingly generous. Rebel leaders to be castrated and sent to monasteries. Golems, alchemical artefacts and Gnostic grimoires to be destroyed. Prohibition on reprisals. Imperial Constabulary to take over responsibility for peacekeeping in Goldshire. Crimes of the Army of the Golden Dawn and of the Jaysh al-Sathrati to be investigated equally by judicially appointed inquisitors.
  
 
==Effects==
 
==Effects==
  
 
The civil war saw a revival in the ancient Cedrist religion as well as the reintroduction of various practices such as gladiatorial combat, human sacrifice and the mass enslavement of displaced persons. The various factions on both sides sought to make the war pay for itself by resorting to the plunder of the opposing sides territory. Criminality also dramatically increased with the Mercaja side especially resorting to drugs smuggling, extortion, racketeering and the fraudulent transmutation of base metals into gold and silver in order to fund its operations.
 
The civil war saw a revival in the ancient Cedrist religion as well as the reintroduction of various practices such as gladiatorial combat, human sacrifice and the mass enslavement of displaced persons. The various factions on both sides sought to make the war pay for itself by resorting to the plunder of the opposing sides territory. Criminality also dramatically increased with the Mercaja side especially resorting to drugs smuggling, extortion, racketeering and the fraudulent transmutation of base metals into gold and silver in order to fund its operations.
 +
 +
Officially the Royal Government of Goldshire acknowledged 43,770 fatalities as a consequence of the civil war. It has however been suggested that these figures were deliberately underplayed to avoid causing embarrassment to the Alexandrian government during the negotiations leading up to the formation of the Sxiro-Alexandrian-Natopian Entente.
 +
 +
An estimate contained in a report by the ESB Group suggested a death-toll of 8,431,770, several orders of magnitude greater than the official tally. The reason for the disparity laid in the omission from official statistics of the victims of chemical weapons attacks carried out by the Imperial Forces and the death-toll from ''clean-up operations'' in Lunaris after the collapse of the organised rebellion. The report and its authors were suppressed and pulped by the Jaysh al-Sathrati on the orders of Queen Noor.
 +
 +
[[Holwinn]] and [[Lunaris]] felt the effects of the war disproportionately, with advance and retreat of first the [[Jaysh al-Sathrati]] and then the [[Army of the Golden Dawn]] which caught the civilian populations of those two counties in a desperate maelstrom of violent reprisal, where civilians were targeted as much as, if not more often than, the opposing combatants. 25% of the Lunatic population was killed or died of communicable diseases during the conflict whilst a staggering 41% of the population of the County of Holwinn perished as ''collateral damage'' after the [[Imperial Order of Technomaezji|Technomaezji]] unleashed its full arsenal of chemical and biological munitions in an attempt to halt the rebel advance towards [[Cabbagefall]]. 
 +
 +
It was the scale of this slaughter which convinced [[Kaiser Dominus]] to initiate war-crimes trials against the guilty parties of both sides in the civil war. A matter of some embarrassment considering the support that the Imperial Government and the ESB Group had lavished on Queen Noor's private army. By the end of the war however the Jaysh was a broken force, discredited both morally and militarily. 
  
 
[[Category:Goldshire]][[Category:Wars]]
 
[[Category:Goldshire]][[Category:Wars]]

Latest revision as of 17:54, 2 August 2017

Civil War in Goldshire
Date: 24 Rugaall 1639–15 Nomeziooqu 1643
Place: Goldshire
Casus belli: Martial Law in Goldshire, Avakair Massacre
Outcome: Ended
Secession of Southern Counties. Collapse of the Royal Government. Beginning of the Warring States Period.
Military defeat of the Mercaja Pretender.
Reunification of the mainland Kingdom under the House of Ayreon-Kalirion.
The Emirate of Jadid Khaz Modan, governed by the House of Osman, retains autonomy.
Participants
Imperialists

Kalirion!House of Ayreon-Kalirion (Kingdom of Goldshire)
Constitutionalists

Mercaja!House of Mercaja (Duchy of Goldshire)
Commanders
Kalirion!Queen Noor

ESB-Jörmungandr GroupErnst Cryptsinger

ShirerothThorgils Tarjeisson / Kaiser Dominus

ShirerothDeimos Jasonides

Iron CompanyVilliam Al-Basani
AvakairTudor ap Rimetar

Golden DawnGrigory Mazower

Golden DawnMo'lluk Hawthorne (GLF)
Strength
ShirerothImperial Army

ShirerothImperial Navy

ShirerothImperial Shirerithian Air Forces


KalirionJaysh al-Sathrati: 120,000
ESB-Jörmungandr GroupDirectorate of Security: 1,002
Goldshire RegularsGoldshire Regulars (1639-1640):20,000
Iron CompanyIron Militia: 9,000

Golden DawnArmy of the Golden Dawn
County Militias
Goldshire RegularsGoldshire Regulars (1640-):20,000
Casualties
1639:
  • 10,500 KIA
  • 31,500 WIA

1640:

  • 12,600 KIA
  • 71,400 WIA

1641:

  • 2,403 KIA
  • 1,178 WIA
  • 21,000 AWOL

1642:

  • 16,456 KIA
  • 12,316 WIA

1643:

  • 34,531 KIA
  • 33,825 WIA
1639
  • 10,083 KIA
  • 30,250 WIA

1640:

  • 12,100 KIA
  • 68,567 WIA

1641:

  • 9,000 KIA
  • 13,200 WIA
  • 5,003 POW

1642:

  • 35,970 KIA
  • 61,348 WIA

1643:

  • 275,111 KIA
  • 75,409 WIA

Notes
Civilian Fatalities: 43,770

Background

Martial Law in Goldshire was declared after the assassination of the Goldshirean and Elwynnese Princes Arn and Rostam Ayreon-Kalirion by parties unknown in the year 1639. This being the third such attempt on a member of the Ayreon-Kalirion bloodline in which poison was administered in a secure environment, suspicion quickly turned to the Leonid Guard whose duty was to protect the family of the Emira of Sathrati.

Towards the end of her reign Queen Noor was increasingly depicted as a depraved and blood-thirsty pseudo-Babkhan, as can be seen depicted here in an unsympathetic artistic portrayal created by noted local artist Raul Benedict, who was subsequently fed to a herd of pigs in the Kingsgate Fighting Pit.

Concerned about wavering morale amongst the Goldshire Regulars, the Royal Government, on the 11th of Araroqpinu 1639, invoked its right under the Martial Code of Shireroth to seek the assistance of Imperial Forces. The Imperial Government had already taken steps to order Leonid Guards based overseas to return to ESB run rendition facilities in Goldshire and Zy-Rodun. Now, with an official invitation, it could act with full force.

These actions led to an inevitable moment of renunciation when during Muulantooqu 1639 the Lunatic Legion had risen against the ESB Group and broke with the Royal Government, in so doing openly taking up arms against the House of Ayreon-Kalirion to defend the people of Lunaris and the articles of the Codex Aureus that Queen Noor was so flagrantly violating.

Following the example of the Lunatic Legion which defected from Royal Government to the Army of the Golden Dawn, the County Militias of Ran and Elsenar also rose in late 1639/6232. The spread of organised resistance into the southern counties of the Kingdom marked the beginning of the Civil War in Goldshire.

Jaysh al-Sathrati

With the Leonid Guard deemed to be unreliable and subsequently purged, a new personal force was recruited by Queen Noor in her capacity as Emira of Sathrati. This force, known as the Jaysh al-Sathrati, was brought into being on 23 Fasmas 1639.

Queen Noor intended that the recruitment process for this new force was so stringent than only the most loyal would be chosen for the more advanced programme to become guardsmen. More than half of the volunteers in the initial batches died in training. This had an impact on the recruitment and retention rate so a new policy was implemented whereby Doctors Ernst Cryptsinger and Tokaray al-Osman initiated selection procedures for the psychological and behavioural conditioning of the most suitable candidates for Queen Noor's personal guard. The washouts from this process, rather than being wasted through ill-considered brutality, were assigned to a new militia under the banner of the Jaysh al-Sathrati, and it was this force that was unleashed on Lunaris when the Queen ordered their deployment to flush out Assayers she believed were hiding amongst the villages and clans of that unusual county.

The Jaysh al-Sathrati, the core of whom were recruited from the Babkhi communities of Alalehzamin and Utasia and Agnesia and Wintergleam, became a militantly racist and Imperialist organization which stressed the 'Elwynnese' character of the Kingdom. A kingdom which, it held, had been donated to Elwynn in the previous century by Duke Leo Dine. Accordingly they had neither sympathy nor mercy for those Lunatics the Royal Government had sent them to police when they were first deployed on the 17th of Rugaall, 1640. Such indeed was Queen Noor's intention for she wanted Assayers being so fearful of capture that they would rather kill themselves on the spot[1].

The well armed Jaysh al-Sathrati quickly gained made their mark on a dumbstruck Lunaris. Several thousand people had been killed and as many as a million more had been driven from their homes, causing a major humanitarian crisis. Over 100,000 refugees poured towards Lune Villa, pursued by militiamen who clashed with detachments of the Lunatic Legion who were trying to direct the displaced into the Eth Lune Forest and away from the fighting. More than 70 Sathrati militiamen and 10 Legionnaires were killed in one gun battle in late Rugaall. An Imperial Army observer team reported that Lunatic villages and Octalune encampments were singled out, while the homes of migrant families were left untouched.

Now, with all the southern counties openly in revolt, the last pretence of restraint was cast aside and the Jayash al-Sathrati was unleashed to vent its full fury upon the people of Lunaris. With Imperial Forces advancing into the county to secure an area identified as the 'Southern Martial Law Zone', the Jaysh al-Sathrati had the task of holding open the rear, the so-called 'Feudal Zone' under the notional rule of the Khan of Cabbagefall, to allow lines of communication to be established and held. The Growth of partisan bands in Elsenar, Lunaris and Ran, the defection of the County Militias and threatened disintegration of the Goldshire Regulars, complicated the task and stretched the deployed forces of the Jaysh and the Imperial Army over a vastly increased area and to breaking point.

To protect the rear therefore, the Jaysh al-Sathrati was to crush the gangs of bandits it encountered with a singular brutality in order to annihilate them. One of the orders issued in the name of the Khan of Cabbagefall specified: "It may be necessary to seize the entire male population of a ward, insofar as their immediate liquidation is not an operational imperative on account of their participation in or support of the insurgency, and insofar as they are capable of work, to bring them to the ESB Rehabilitation Facilities of Meadowhall, Trafford and Arndale, for reassignment to areas where their labour can be utilised and their actions properly monitored and supervised." In short, if it proved too difficult to distinguish between a partisan and a lunatic, and the commander on the ground didn't feel sufficiently able to execute them on the spot, the answer of the Royal Government was to have the Jaysh al-Sathrati empty the county completely, creating a dead zone and calling it pacified.

Rebel Offensive

The Army of the Golden Dawn went over onto the offensive on the 2nd of Gevrader 1640 with an audacious raid on the island of Mediguttula using the previously unknown triskele to destroy a pair of radar installations [2] operated by the Imperial Order of Technomaezji as part of the Imperial Republic's air defence network. The destruction of these two units created a gap in radar coverage and a blind-spot over southern Goldshire where the venerable Ikol Anti-Ballistic Missile would now be useless in combating the hallucinogen tipped missiles of the C'ort Somnis of the Lunatic Legion[3]

The Bashembazooks of the Tripudium were the most feared headhunters in Lunaris. Formerly a troupe of entertainers they subsequently learned to turn the skulls of their captives into musical instruments.


Lacking an effective countermeasure to the triskele and unable to gain sanction from the Imperial Advisory Council for the use of nuclear weapons on the Benacian mainland, the Imperial Army was forced to withdraw from all of Lunaris south of Teldrin, leaving only an isolated garrison of ESB security officers, Goldshire Regulars, and sailors from the Imperial Navy to hold Mesior. The Imperial Shirerithian Air Force refused pointblank to operate over Lunaris and the Elwynn River Delta until the nature of the Triskelion and its seeming ability to deploy a directed energy weapon beyond the range of visual sight was better understood. This thankless task fell to the Technomaezji.

Although the triskele could seemingly scythe a path through Imperial lines at will, they were few in number and the Mercaja forces were cautious in deploying them only sparingly. For this reason the rout in the south did not, for the moment, spread beyond Lunaris. The Imperial Forces therefore contented themselves with trying, insofar as was possible, to contain the situation on the borders of Lunaris and to keeping open the shipping channels of the Red Elwynn, the most vital artery connecting Shirekeep to the outside world.

The ESB Group meanwhile, for reasons of pride as much as anything, refused to relinquish control of Teldrin to the rebels. Having invested too much time and money in building its headquarters and cantonments in the city. The company did not, moreover, trust the garrison of Goldshire Regulars to provide for its safety, and, by the good offices of the Martial Law Administrator, prevailed upon Noor to order away the three battalions of the 2nd Infantry Brigade on one errand or false alarm or another, until only the 4th Artillery Brigade remained in Fort Erutirn. The fort was seized by the ESB's Directorate of Security in a coup de main under the cover of darkness, with the landing party of helicopter borne commandos masquerading as a returning medivac experiencing engine difficulties. The remaining Regulars were subdued efficiently and reassigned to other garrisons. Subsequent chemical analysis of the Moraquine SRBMs revealed that the supposed Dimethyl Mercury warheads, returned with such fanfare before the breakdown of relations with the Assayers, were, as many suspected, fraudulent duds - with the lethal neurotoxin remaining therefore, alongside the stockpiles of weaponised hallucinogen Somnis, in enemy hands.

With radar coverage down, the request to employ nuclear weapons in a tactical role refused, and the deterrent power of the government held Moraquine rockets exposed as a sham, the Kalirion and Imperial forces were wide open to chemical and biological attack.

In desperation the MoMA resorted to an outright bluff. An ISAF Spiegelflügel was dispatched from Zy-Rodun to Mesior by a circuitous route, going far out to sea, avoiding the islands of the Elwynn River Delta and approaching at night from a low altitude whilst adhering to a strict radio silence. As expected it was intercepted and destroyed. Eleven passengers and crew were on board the destroyed flight, including a magister of the Technomaezji's Chemical Defence Cohort (CDC). Chained to his wrist was an attache case containing a heavily encrypted external hard-drive. In the cargo hold of the Spiegelflügel was a ruggedised and temperature controlled medical container carrying vials of antidote. Folded in the magister's inside jacket pocket was a well-thumbed reprint of an old Ashkenatzim pamphlet on precautions to take in the event of exposure to chemical agents of Babkhan origin, such as Tabun.

The continued absence of chemical weapons from the battlefield suggests that the message was received and understood.

Iron Company

The Royal Iron Company of Goldshire which had been granted a number of trading concessions it regarded as being political concessions in Goldshire, began to move battalion strength formations of men into the ports of New Harbour, Chryste and Erudition in response to the deteriorating security situation, in addition to 20,000 men-at-arms dispatched to Goldshire at a theatre level and an unspecified number of operatives aligned with the Office of Shadows [4]. This deployment was a source of unease for the ESB Group which was, by this stage, and after having ostensibly crushed the Assayers, increasingly jealous of the powers and privileges it had amassed in Goldshire since its inception in 1634. However, since both corporations were the beneficiaries of the patronage of Queen Noor, they remained, ostensibly, on the same side. The situation became slightly more tense when an airship transporting Governor-Representative Villiam Al-Basani was taken down above the Lunaris coast.

Mutiny of the Regulars

The revolt of the remaining Goldshire Regulars began at 5 p.m. on 3 Vixaslaa 1640, when the 5th and 6th Mechanised Infantry Battalions rose and began to murder the Imperial officers garrisoned at the Auraumbre Barracks in Goldshire Hamlet. They were quickly joined by a rabble from the city, who set upon any Elw or Imperialists they could find. The timing of the uprising was intended to catch the Imperialists in the dining halls of the officer's messes where they would be concentrated together and mostly unarmed. In this they were brutally successful and soon swept on into the city itself. The 7th Manoeuvre Support Brigade meanwhile, having held back originally, quickly joined the mutiny as its success became evident and drove on Goldshire Palace in the hope of catching the Queen.

Noor however was still in Kingsgate, enthralled by her new religious advisers and the spectacle of the fighting pits, leaving the city of Goldshire Hamlet in the care of Doctor Cryptsinger.

This was unknown to the mutineers and her public diary had her scheduled to be hosting a trade fair in the city on the following day.

Disintegration (Warring States Period)

A lull in the fighting lasted until the second quarter of 1641 when an airstrike on Goldshire Hamlet targeted senior members of the Merjaca faction attending a funeral.[5] After this attack, denied by all parties to the conflict but generally suspected to have been carried out by a pro-Kalirion faction within the Imperial Navy's 2nd Banner Group, fighting resumed between the Army of the Golden Dawn and the Jaysh al-Sathrati around the city of Teldrin, the last tenuous Kalirion toehold in Lunaris and the headquarters of the ESB-Jörmungandr Group.

The fragmentation of Goldshire accelerated as the three southern counties (Ran, Elsenar & Lunaris) broke away under the Mercaja Dynasty

Raid on Chryste

A mixed force of 552 B-49 Delta and B-66 Vulcan strategic bombers of the 1st Air Force, hit the steel and iron works of Chryste in three waves between Eljere the 11th and Hyre the 12th of Nomeziooqu, 1641.

Chryste, a city on the southern coast of the county of Elsenar, has developed in recent years into a major hub for the metallurgical and alchemical industries of southern Goldshire and it has attracted a significant amount of overseas investment. This makes it a key component of the military-industrial complex that is sustaining the Army of the Golden Dawn in the field, making it a legitimate target under the rules of war.

Flying out of dispersal airfields in Northern Mishalan, the bomber formations followed the course of the Blue and then the Red Elwynn down to the city of Teldrin where after they turned inland, flying over the rebel held interior of Lunaris, before beginning their final approach to target.

The first wave of bombing with incendiaries began at 22.13 on the night of the 11th and ended by 22.21. At 01.30 the second wave of 240 bombers arrived over the target area to begin their bombing run. Their arrival was timed to disrupt emergency relief convoys from surrounding towns.

6,464,160 kg of high explosive and incendiary munitions were deployed over the Merjaca occupied iron works. (elaborate limitations of nighttime bombing) Accuracy was woeful and bombs were scattered over residential areas, the campus of the Royal University of Chryste,and the city's commercial district. (damage assessments)

Although most air defence assets remained in the hands of the Royal Govermnent after the mutiny of the Goldshire Regulars, EA-6B Prowler aircraft of No. 24 Electronic Attack Squadron supported the raid and were engaged in the suppression of enemy air defences in the counties of Ran, Elsenar and Lunaris. Fourteen aircraft were lost with no survivors after overflying an area patrolled by a Triskelion near Zolt.

Attack on MoMA Station Sabatini

Skirmishes of Late 1641

On Hyre the 24th of Qinamu in the year 1641, a team of eight operatives from the Rrakanychan Watch infiltrated the rebel held County of Ran and set up an ambush site on the Caer Lum'ruush to Goldshire Hamlet road in an attempt to capture personnel from the Army of the Golden Dawn for interrogation. A convoy of seven land cruisers and a bus carrying civilian workers was halted by the a buried anti-tank mine destroying the lead land-cruiser in the convoy, killing its driver and injuring its remaining four occupants. The halted convoy was then raked with small arms and machine gun fire, killing a further five rebel fighters and four comfort women travelling on the bus. The rebels, bewildered, disorientated and over-matched, promptly surrendered as the Rrakanychan Watch operatives stormed the convoy under a barrage of flash bangs and tear gas grenades. As the Imperialists inspected their haul of prisoners it quickly became apparent that these were not soldiers of the Golden Dawn but rather a small detachment of mutinous troops from the Goldshire Regulars under the command of a staff-sergeant. Disgusted that they had wasted their opportunity on a low-value target the operatives bound and gagged their captives before throwing them into a parallel drainage ditch whilst they set about burning the vehicles and concealing anti-personnel mines amongst the wreckage. This being done, the operatives retreated into the forest retiring back to where they had concealed their own land-cruiser. Of the prisoners only Staff-Sergeant was taken with them, in an attempt to show some benefit for their efforts, an unwilling 'tongue' for debriefing by the no-less disappointed S.W.O.R.D. officers waiting in Tyrelwynn.

The escaping land-cruiser blundered into a caravan of travelling Octalune folk, a notorious gypsy people of a Lunatic disposition, who had parked and lagered for the night. In swerving to avoid the circled wagons, the land-cruiser had crashed through a tangle of bushes and in so doing had run-over two young lovers who had snuck out of the encampment into a thicket. The resounding crash and shrieks of pain had awoken the travellers who, upon discovering battered and mangled corpses of two of their fondest children, were roused to fury and mounted up for an immediate pursuit of the fleeing land-cruiser whose occupants, for obvious reasons, had not been minded to stop and inspect what it was they had crushed beneath their wheels (the driver who had heard the sickening crunch later admitted that he'd hoped it had been a sleeping dog).

The pursuing Octalunes, superb horsemen and excellent trackers, followed the wheel treads and the trail of broken foliage ever southwards. Against the paler blue of the dawning sky, on the ridge overlooking the tracks descending towards Tyrelwynn, the Octalune, in their fury, had forgotten their natural art and guile as robbers and poachers, and were silhouetted in open country as they emerged from the woods. As the pursuing party turned their rugged little ponies to move downhill, a troop of Jaysh al-Sathrati mounted gendarmes burst from the cover of the mirk on their right flank, only 40 yards away. Four Octalunes were immediately shot out of the saddle, whilst many others were badly wounded and the remainder turned about the scramble their ponies back up the way they had come, pursued by Babkhi gendarmes yelping their delight at the thrill of the hunt. A further six were killed in the pursuit whilst the five that had been injured and thrown from their ponies were tortured for information before their hands and feet were cut off and their eyes gouged out; after these torments had passed, their bodies were looted, stripped naked and left for dead amidst the churned mud of the slopes where they had fallen.

The MoMA was suitably embarrassed by the whole affair and felt obliged to try and underplay it with a bland press-release. [6]

Early 1642

The quality of the leadership of the Imperialist faction was assessed by the Mercaja commanders as being erratic and inconsistent; alternating between homicidal mania and lethargy. It was argued by many in the Army of the Golden Dawn that leaving the enemy leadership cadres alive would allow them to continue to discredit their cause in the eyes of the Imperial Court at Shirekeep, amongst the other Imperial States and before the court of world public opinion. However, after Thorgils Tarjeisson was unexpectedly elevated to the Mango Throne as Kaiser Dominus, a realisation set in that it would be impossible to achieve a peace settlement that could be accepted to the suffering populace of Goldshire. Accordingly the elimination of the Kaiser, along with Queen Noor, and their associates became the highest priority of the Ducal Government in 1642.

The Duchy of Goldshire therefore set about the activation of sleeper cells in the Kalirion occupied northern counties to attempt acts of sabotage, assassination and resistance, in order to demonstrate the impotence of the Kalirion security state and to galvanise those who still remained loyal to the Codex. The inevitability of draconian and indiscriminate reprisals by the Jaysh al-Sathrati was considered, by the more ruthless advisers to Duke Rimetar, to be the best recruiting tool for the resistance networks they sought to establish.

The Imperialists in Goldshire, meanwhile, were focused on trying to disrupt rebel activity through the interception of communications, the penetration of rebel networks and finally, via these means to compromise and eliminate the suspected rebel sleeper cells in the northern counties ruled from Cabbagefall (the so-called 'Kalirion Khanate').

The overlap of the two competing strategies saw an uptick in political violence and terrorism in the cities of Kingsgate and Cabbagefall.

Summer of 1642

Psychological warfare and a 'duel of magic'

Whilst the death squads circled each other in the cities and towns of Goldshire, the Directorate of Research & Engineering, the Imperial Order of Technomaezji and the Rrakanychan Watch, formed a working group investigate and penetrate the suspected 'wards of concealment' preventing the detection of Triskelions by normal satellite imaging and aerial photo-reconnaissance. The thaumatological advantage enjoyed by the rebel forces had enabled their swift conquest of the south of the Kingdom, permitted the capture of the capital and the establishment of a ducal court which was a distinct embarrassment to the Imperial Government. Two years since their first encounter, the Imperial Forces still had no answer to the golems, infernal alchemical machines and Triskelions created by the Adeptii whose services had been hired with Assayer gold. The Technomaezji, who had, for centuries, been theoretical magicians, at best, were forced to rapidly attempt to develop a vocational knowledge of the ars arcana.

The ultimate objective of the programme was to identify and destroy the Triskelion platforms and their operators, an essential prerequisite without which the Magisters, Admirals and Air Marshals of the Imperial Forces would feel inhibited from contributing any forces under their respective commands to any form of offensive actions beyond the defensive cordon of territory that they already held.

Late 1642: Collapse before Tyrelwynn

On the morning of the 14th of Oskaltequ 1642, at about 5am, four Moraquine SRBM's launched from the depths of the Eth Lune and Nemorosii forests in southern Lunaris by the C'ort Somnis of the Lunatic Legion bracketed the foxholes and defensive emplacements of the Jaysh al-Sathrati perimeter line around the strategically crucial city of Tyrelwynn.

The modified warheads carrying compartmentalised hallucinogens and Dimethyl Mercury payloads packed in cluster munitions, scattered bomblets across a 6.4 km area of the front line, with a reliance on the prevailing wind to carry the gas towards the city itself. The aerosolisation of the compounds had a horrific effect on the defending militia, with the potent neurotoxic and psychotropic agents inducing delirium, debilitating convulsions and, all too quickly, death. Unit cohesion and discipline collapsed, with the dying and deranged turning on each other in a bestial fury, clawing and biting and attempting to bludgeon their colleagues of only a moment ago into a bloody pulp. Even amongst those who had sufficient sense and warning to don their respirators had been forced to defend themselves against their own comrades who had succumbed to the terrifying effects of the Somnis weapon and become little more than lunatics themselves.

The division strength garrison in the path of the gas cloud sustained about 6,000 casualties. Mercaja scouts observing the attack were able to report that something terrible had plainly happened. Horses and men were pouring down the road towards Tyrelwynn, sometimes two or three men clinging to a horse, whilst over the fields streamed mobs of infantry, the dusky mercenaries of Alalehzamin and Eura; casting aside their rifles, equipment, even their tunics that they might run the faster. Frothing at the mouth and shrieking dismally for their mothers and the mercy of their unforgiving god, the Babkhi abandoned all semblance of their human dignity as they fled for their lives.

In to this seeming gap the Mercaja now pushed forward their expendable Octalune scouts and the Bashembazook shock troops of the Lunatic Legion's V Brigade (Tripudium) to see if the path was open for the advance of the Army of the Golden Dawn.

The rout had been total, from the small breach opened by the gas attack an ever widening gap in the front had opened up. The fleeing Jaysh al-Sathrati had managed to spread panic amongst the units guarding their flanks, until the point was reached where the entire southern front between Caer Lum'ruush and Tyrelwynn had completely collapsed.

As the Jaysh al-Sathrati unravelled, an appalling reality became apparent to the General Staffs of the MoMA and the various branches of the Imperial Forces; although great things were promised from the Red Bear factories of Mishalan, the four-legged armoured Snarks and the gravimetric, laws of physics defying, hovertanks were not yet rolling off the production lines in sufficient numbers. There were perhaps enough to equip the occasional troop perhaps, but nowhere near sufficient to fit out the vast regiments and legions. Moreover, so much had been sunk into the costs of the Snark programme, a grotesque monstrosity enthusiastically signed up to purely on account of its imposing bulk alone, that, most grotesquely of all, the Imperial Army was entirely bereft of tactical helicopters and a viable artillery arm. Locally raised militias, such as the Jaysh, had been relied upon to fill the gaps while the Imperial Army was brought up to a strength comparable to Bomber Command and the carrier groups of the Imperial Navy. Now, however, it was apparent that the time had run out, and had been spent in vain.

An unparalleled calamity was about to begin.

On the 15th of Oskaltequ 1642, the Triskelion of Elyssia was detected moving towards Tyrelwynn, exploiting the gap in the defences that had been opened up on the previous day. The Octalune raiders had broken through into the open countryside overlooking the riverside city, having encountered no resistance from the fleeing Jaysh militiamen. Faced with disaster no matter what occurred, the Collegium Magistri Militum, or general staff of the Imperial Army was obliged to commit the small boats and crews of the River Army's Classis Rubrum to retrieve the situation.

On paper it was a capable force, in theory too large for a Triskelion, which could only attack targets within the visual range of its operators, to engage without at last revealing itself and leaving itself open to retaliation from the gunboats anchored in the river. However, the psychological impact of the first recorded Triskelion attack remained such that the Imperial Forces, at just about every level, were reluctant to ever be the first to engaged.

This thankless role was left to the terrified and despairing remnants of the Jaysh al-Sathrati who were, up to that moment, still pouring into Tyrewlynn from the surrounding countryside in the forlorn hope of finding the means of escaping up river. Unfortunately for them, alongside any civilians who entertained the prudent notion of fleeing, the Trireme assault craft of 002 Riverine Regiment, being the first to arrive on the scene, were already machine-gunning any boats that had slipped berth and put out towards the mid-channel of the Red Elwynn. This mass of humanity was to be held in place, by whatever means, as the single most inviting target to attract the attention of the oversized tripod golem.

1643: the rout of Holwinn

Armistice

Armistice of Airle (Reire the 15th of Nomeziooqu, 1643): End of the Civil War. Terms surprisingly generous. Rebel leaders to be castrated and sent to monasteries. Golems, alchemical artefacts and Gnostic grimoires to be destroyed. Prohibition on reprisals. Imperial Constabulary to take over responsibility for peacekeeping in Goldshire. Crimes of the Army of the Golden Dawn and of the Jaysh al-Sathrati to be investigated equally by judicially appointed inquisitors.

Effects

The civil war saw a revival in the ancient Cedrist religion as well as the reintroduction of various practices such as gladiatorial combat, human sacrifice and the mass enslavement of displaced persons. The various factions on both sides sought to make the war pay for itself by resorting to the plunder of the opposing sides territory. Criminality also dramatically increased with the Mercaja side especially resorting to drugs smuggling, extortion, racketeering and the fraudulent transmutation of base metals into gold and silver in order to fund its operations.

Officially the Royal Government of Goldshire acknowledged 43,770 fatalities as a consequence of the civil war. It has however been suggested that these figures were deliberately underplayed to avoid causing embarrassment to the Alexandrian government during the negotiations leading up to the formation of the Sxiro-Alexandrian-Natopian Entente.

An estimate contained in a report by the ESB Group suggested a death-toll of 8,431,770, several orders of magnitude greater than the official tally. The reason for the disparity laid in the omission from official statistics of the victims of chemical weapons attacks carried out by the Imperial Forces and the death-toll from clean-up operations in Lunaris after the collapse of the organised rebellion. The report and its authors were suppressed and pulped by the Jaysh al-Sathrati on the orders of Queen Noor.

Holwinn and Lunaris felt the effects of the war disproportionately, with advance and retreat of first the Jaysh al-Sathrati and then the Army of the Golden Dawn which caught the civilian populations of those two counties in a desperate maelstrom of violent reprisal, where civilians were targeted as much as, if not more often than, the opposing combatants. 25% of the Lunatic population was killed or died of communicable diseases during the conflict whilst a staggering 41% of the population of the County of Holwinn perished as collateral damage after the Technomaezji unleashed its full arsenal of chemical and biological munitions in an attempt to halt the rebel advance towards Cabbagefall.

It was the scale of this slaughter which convinced Kaiser Dominus to initiate war-crimes trials against the guilty parties of both sides in the civil war. A matter of some embarrassment considering the support that the Imperial Government and the ESB Group had lavished on Queen Noor's private army. By the end of the war however the Jaysh was a broken force, discredited both morally and militarily.