Angularis Offensive Operation
| Angularis Offensive Operation | ||
| Conflict: | Year of the Four Kaisers | |
| ||
| Date: | Hyre 24 Oskaltequ – Ermure 4 Muulantooqu 1644 AN | |
| Place: | Vale of Angularis (Elwynn) | |
| Outcome: | Imperial tactical victory, operational failure (stalemate) | |
| Combatants | ||
 Imperial Forces (Myksos/Osmanid Factions)
|
 Elwynnese Union (Loyalist Faction)
| |
| Commanders | ||
| Sir Hugh O'Neill, K.E., O.M. |
 Daniyal Dravot
| |
| Strength | ||
| Imperial Army
|
Union Defence Force
| |
| Casualties | ||
| TBA | TBA | |
| Notes | ||
The Angularis Offensive Operation was a limited incursion by the Imperial Forces into the territory of the Elwynnese Union in an effort to forestall an invasion of the Imperial Dominions mooted by the Landsraad as a response to the disputed succession that arose in the wake of the Oustfest Massacre and the death of Kaiser Dominus.
Background
In the wake of the Oustfest Massacre and the twelve days of anarchy in Shirekeep which followed the reported death of Kaiser Dominus under dubious circumstances in a Palace Coup orchestrated by Tokaray al-Osman, Adam Ayreon-Kalirion and Ludovic Verion (the so-called KOV Triumvirate). The unity of this new ruling clique, united only in a common loathing of Kaiser Dominus in his later years, was fatally undermined by disagreements concerning the rights of non-human sentient creatures and finally by the decision of Tokaray, then reigning as Kaiser Aurangzeb II Steffki, to attack Lichbrook rather than Elwynn.
The original coalition collapsed after the departure of Ludovic for Blackstone, having followed the Kaiser's example in looting the treasury on the way out, and the decision of Aurangzeb II to abdicate on Ermure the 22nd of Oskaltequ after a reign of a mere one hundred and thirty days. Aurangzeb's chosen successor - Marcus Myksos, was thereby placed in direct competition with the purported heir favoured by Dominus, Queen Noor.
At the same time, the Alejian Castle session of the Landsraad, whose Prætor and a significant number of Electors had fled Shirekeep following the violent takeover of the city by the coup plotters, had begun on Izillare the 20th of Vixaslaa. As much as the actions of the coup-plotters had aroused disgust and indignation the initial proposal to formed a re-organised Imperial Government led by Dominus' Steward Hallbjörn Haraldsson, was met with deep distrust and suspicion by many Electors who could still remember the bitter fighting of the River War as well as by those feared the possibility that Elwynn, the most powerful Imperial State, might use the opportunity to capture the institution of the Landsraad and thereby exert greater control over the Imperial Government.
One of the more eye-catching proposals in the draft resolution was that the Imperial States, backed by Shireroth's treaty allies, should be authorised to invade the Imperial Dominions. The Dominions were those lands still subject to the Kaiser's rule under the charter, albeit with varying degrees of autonomy. These also, in addition to the city of Shirekeep, contained the majority of the garrisons of the Imperial Forces.
The Imperial Forces, having declared their allegiance to Tokaray, now found their position coming increasingly unstuck, being caught between a new claimant from the House of Myksos and the threat of armed intervention by the states to install the Ayreon-Kalirion candidate.
Tokaray meanwhile, having plundered the Treasury, had relocated to Mishalan, home to the Mishalan Garrison, by far and away the largest single concentration of the Imperial Forces on the Benacian continent, considering it a safer place to be rather than trapped in Shirekeep between Lichbrook and Elwynn. Mishalan, although resource rich, industrially developed and well suited as a redoubt, was landlocked and its soviet government, while not fond of Elwynn, could not be expected to endure a long war being waged on its territory for no purpose. It could only be used therefore as a logistics hub and the springboard for whatever the next plan of action would be.
In consultation with the Magister Primum and the service chiefs of the Imperial Navy, the Imperial Air Forces and the various commands, Tokaray considered and then rejected various options in turn. The first was an offensive into Minarboria. This would be ideologically consistent with the manifesto of total war professed at the day of the accession. It was projected that the Field Army could, with its sizeable force of gravtanks, reach the Minarborian capital Sansabury in a mere nineteen hours and reach the sea twenty-four hours after that. This would guarantee access to the sea, permitting a link up with Coastal Command and the Western Armada, as well as accruing the not-inconsiderable industrial capacity of the Imperial Shrublands to those of Mishalan. This would however leave Mishalan vulnerable to the coalition offensive being debated in the Landsraad. Moreover the rate of attrition of the field army was felt would be excessive if that force was then expected to turn around and fight another war against the Elwynnese and allies in the same period. Another option was to invade Amokolia, whose vast territories dominated much of the western portion of the Benacian continent. To do so would permit the Mishalan Garrison to link up with the forces deployed against the Siserans in Dietsland, Puritania and Voltrue. While the Amokolia option would have brought the Imperial Forces into direct and immediate battle against their main opponent, this option would have entailed the commitment of an even greater component of the Field and Frontier Armies than the Minarboria option. The use of strategic weapons was also discussed but discounted as being likely to have a galvanising effect on Shireroth's international allies.
Finally, it was resolved that the Mishalan Garrison would undertake a more limited operation to secure its tenuous lines of communication with Shirekeep and Goldshire while at the same time bringing sufficient pressure to bear on Lichbrook to prevail upon it to permit the Imperial Forces renewed access to its base facilities and the Amarr oil-fields. In that scenario, the majority of the Mishalan Garrison could be held back to defend the redoubt while two corps were released, flush with air support, to breakout and establish contact with the Riverine Army and the Shirekeep Garrison.
The great impediment to the advance of the landing ships of the Riverine Army up the Blue Elwynn was the West Elwynn Dam situated a little above the city of Ardashirshahr in the Elwynnese governorate of Alalehzamin and Utasia. The western landward portion of the dam laid on the opposite bank of the Blue Elwynn to Ardashirhahr on the Shores of Angularis in the sparsely populated vale of the same name.
Administratively Angularis was a subordinate Circuit of the Emirate of Alalehzamin and Utasia. Excepting Babkhi and Froyalanish settlements along the river shore, it was a culturally and ethnically distinct from the rest of Elwynn, and moreover it had suffered greatly during a long drawn out conflict between the Elwynnese Crown and the Dark Orchid Society.
For that reason it was considered to be the weakest link in Mishalan's encirclement. It's only official garrison was the Elwynnsbrigad 2 Alalehzamin, a brigade strength armoured formation based in the Barrowlands where it faced the border with Minarboria. It's 4,265 UDF personnel were augmented by another 2,000 personnel from the Combat Support Services Corps as well as a number of Vanic Temple Guard, Stratioti, Cudgellers and Emirati Riddare, strung out across the interior roads of the Circuit.
