Light in the Dark Chapter 4 Planning Stage
Light in the Dark - Chapter 3 - Encounters
Aurigan Liberation Forces Base, 40km South of Carat Rockwellawan II, Rockwellawan September 14th, 2254/3023
The last tones of the title melody of the movie rang out in the makeshift cinema and the lights came back on, as murmurs began to fill the room. To watch Full Metal Jacket was certainly one way to start this meeting.
From her seat in the back, Kamea Arano could see the majority of the people in the rows, many of them Aurigan expats that had either fled from the depredations of her uncle Santiago and his cronies. Some others were people from Rockwellawan, seeking adventure, others dispossessed mech warriors and other mercenaries that had been washed ashore here by the tides of interstellar commerce.
All of them, counting about 370 people, had signed up to become part of the Aurigan Liberation Forces, her ALF. She herself had wanted to call it the Arano Restoration, but Olivia and Charlie had argued that they were more than just an army, and that they were working to liberate the Aurigan Coalition as a whole, not merely restore the Arano family to the throne.
For a moment, her mind wandered to the ten ships they had bought for the ALF. They had just wanted to buy five and wait to get some more funding, but more than a few people from Sol, especially one Professor Adam Prometheus, had decided to back her with another billion Euro, giving them the funds to not just by nine ships, but also to buy additional war material.
So, the ALF had access to not just one, but two task groups, each made up of a single Type 27 'Light Littoral Support Cruiser/Landing Craft Carrier', three Type 19 Destroyers and a single Type 10 Modular Supply Tender. On top of that came her own Leopard Cordia City and the Leopard Hysteria of Markham's Marauders, a merc company commanded by Ariana Markham, another of Mastiffs proteges and who they had found on Rochwellawan.
The 2nd Task Force was in orbit around Rowellawan right now, while 1st Task Force was sneaking into the Aurigan Coalition, she refused to call it the 'Directorate', to find and take volunteers back to Rockwellawan, where they would be trained by Olivia's and Charlie's people to their standards.
The Rockwellawan government had been rather forthcoming, offering them an old mercenary base that no one used anymore, in exchange for ten million C-Bills in gold and germanium, as well as help against some of the pirates that more or less regularly haunted the system. But she was going to remain silent about the cost of that gold and germanium, as they had payed less than a million Euros for the raw materials in Sol.
The murmurs around her stopped as she heard the booted footsteps of several people entering the cinema and she turned her thought back to the present.
First to enter the room was a bear of a man. At 210cm tall, he had broad shoulders and a sculptured physique, with long blonde hair and icy blue eyes, his blond beard well groomed. Kommandérsersjant Arne Jorgenson, late of the Norwegian Army, was the head of their cadre of training staff that hoped to shape their volunteers into a fighting force within the next four months. Jorgenson was also an upload like Charlie, who had died during the Russian invasion of Norway during World War III and one of the first uploads to come out of war. He had several decades of experience in training raw recruits into at least decent soldiers.
Jorgenson stepped into the front of the assembled, with the other three main training sergeants standing behind him. He looked around in the room, unimpressed by those present.
"I am sure that you all wonder why we had you watch this movie," he asked, his English accent strangely melodic in a way that reminded Kamea that he had learned the language the hard way, rather than using a simple translation matrix in his Interface to help him out.
"Many of you likely think that this would be the way that we are going to train you," he continued. "As this is likely the way the Inner Sphere is doing these things."
He paused and waited for the murmurs to subside.
"But you would be wrong. Training like this is a means to break the spirit of a soldier to rebuild it again into something the militaries of old could work with. We have other way to form you into what we want you to be as soldiers without having to break you first."
He looked around, focusing on a few of the former mercenaries that had signed up for the ALF.
"We want soldiers for the modern battlefield. Soldiers that can think of their feet and are able to make decisions that might go against any military planning in the field, as needed. Soldiers that will question their orders if they are going the Rules of Engagement and the Articles of Geneva."
"To that end," he continued," everyone will be going through twelve weeks of basic infantry training. Everyone of you will be getting a Direct Neural Interface."
He pulled out a soda can sized container that Kamea knew contained an Interface, as murmurs went through the group and several hand went up.
"There is no need for surgical implantation," he headed off the questions." You will drink the contents of this can and within three days you are equipped with a self assembled Interface you can use, after going through the tutorials the Interface itself provides."
He put the can away and continued.
"During the first four weeks, we will focus on getting your body up to speed. Athletic training, endurance training, strength training. You will be fed a special diet to get all of you as close to the same baseline for further training as we can. You will begin training in Close Quarters Combat, you will get getting basic fire arms training. And every day for two hours, you will be sitting in a room and get additional theoretical education."
The screen behind him and the other trainers lit up to show a soldier in a piece of advanced body armour, carrying a bullpop assault carbine
"In the second month, you will be introduced to the OpenStandard Personal Protective Armour. You will learn how to use it, you will learn how to move in it. By the end of those four weeks, you will not even notice that you are wearing it. Your theoretical education will continue, as will athletics drills and firearms training, but this time, you will also learn how to use your new combat fire arm, the Taurus ART726 electomotive carbine."
The static image changed to a squad of PPA wearing soldiers with their carbines moving through an urban environment, easily jumping, clambering and moving over obstacles that Kamea couldn't imagine scaling herself.
"Finally, in the third week of basic training, you will learn Rapid Urban Mobility skills, which were developed from an athletic sport called Parkour. You will learn how to use the Link-24 combat communication systems and how to use drones and loitering ammunition. You will be put through battle drills and simulated combat, with a final week of simulated combat to ensure that you are up to out standards."
"After this basic training, based on the results of aptitude tests, pre-existing experience and personal wishes, you will get another four weeks of specialised training, officer training, tank training, heavy weapons training, mecha training and the like."
Jorgenson looked around.
"Any questions?"
There were a lot of questions that followed, some from the dispossessed mech warriors, who were told they were to be given new mechs, to a group of former mercenaries that had used tanks, asking about the tanks the ALF would be using. Some probing questions about the PPAs. And finally where they were getting this technology no one had ever heard of.
Old NATO Headquarters, Brussels Earth, Sol September 15th, 2254/3023
"Thank you for coming to this briefing," Admiral Helena Komnenos of the European Space Command said and nodded at the people present. "Especially Commander Bedford and Major Lenard."
Adrian nodded back at the Admiral, before looking over towards Lenard. There was a lingering bit of a dislike for Taurians that hadn't yet faded. It was coming from the stories he had been told about the Reunification Wars and the Taurian uprising ahead of the Star League Civil War.
After months of being in this system and interacting with people from dozens, if not hundreds of individual and sometimes small nations that all worked together without being forced to, he was slowly coming around to see the Taurians in a different light.
"My pleasure, Admiral," Lenard responded.
Adrian looked around for a moment. The auditorium was packed with military personal and support staff. He had to stop himself from thinking about humans and aliens, as he looked around as the people here thought of all intelligent beings as being human. Instead, they were talking about homo sapiens when talking of what he still thought were the only humans in the room, though he had heard that 'hominid' was slowly gaining traction when talking about homo sapiens and the various gene lines coming from them. The only 'humans', he didn't see, were orcas, but they didn't involve themselves in war it seemed.
His new direct neural interface provided him with an overlay showing the names and ranks for the people he was looking at. He still marvelled at the interface and the things it allowed to do. Already some of the technicians were trying to come up with a way to connect the interface directly into a Mech, allowing to forget the neurohelmets he and his Mech warriors and Elementals were used to.
"Operation Port Royal," Admiral Komnenos said and a holographic display of surprising quality appeared, showing the unclaimed space around Local Space, and between the Canopians, the Capellans, the Aurigans and the Taurians. Local Space was highlighted by a transparent blue sphere and the inhabited systems as blue lights.
"Named such, because Earth and Sol is the only place in Local Space to have more than just a passing memory of what piracy is, and the only place to actually romanticise it to some degree."
That got a chuckle out of many of the attendants, while Lenard frowned, and most of the aliens seemed to be mostly neutral about the joke. Adrian himself decided to mostly ignore it.
A moment later four more volumes appeared inside the display, each more or less centered around one system, with one volume merging with the blue of Local space.
"The four operational sectors of Operation Port Royal," the Admiral continued. "Iwrin, Spencer, Detroit and Herotitus. Aside of Iwrin, each of these systems will be set up with Forward Operation Bases for the initial anti-piracy operations and after that for anti-piracy patrols through the sectors."
It made sense to Adrian, Iwrin was the most corewards of the Local Space systems and closest to the border to the Inner Sphere in that area. With its existing infrastructure it was perfect to use as a staging point for the initial operation.
"Provided that the local planetary governments want to host us, that is. If not, we will leave for a nearby unclaimed system."
Another chuckle went through the auditorium.
To Adrian, this was the opposite to what the Star League or the Clans would do. They would come in, take over the place and then take care of the pirates and not leave. These people on the other hand were big on their independence and granted the same courtesy to others.
"While the Iwrin Sector will be supplied from Iwrin, we have been able to request help from the Titanian GCUs, who are willing to provide supplies and construction capabilities to set up the Forward Operating Bases. All of them were willing to help, but we have the Pride of Hiigara for the Spencer sector, the Pride of Kharak for the Detroit sector and the Kuun-Lan for the Herotitus sector."
Ardian furrowed his eyebrows as he wondered what these GCUs were and his Interface responded, giving him a mental view of the GCUs and their data. Had he been drinking something, he knew that he would have spit it out at that instant.
25 million tonne mobile factories that could copy themselves if needed?
That was ten times the size of anything a jump drive could move!
He heard Lenard take in a sharp breath next to him and gave them men a look.
The Taurian looked a little paler than normal, no doubt having seen the same information he had.
Adrian gave him a wan smile and took a deep breath himself.
"Project Starscape and the Very Large Optical Array at Iwrin, has been able to identify no less then thirty worlds with bio signatures and oxygen atmospheres around K, G and F type stars, with about twelve that have sufficiently large techno signatures. Nine have been linked to systems in the star maps from the Taurians, with another three with systems from Star League maps we have gotten from Commander Bredford."
"However, we will be looking at all systems with habitable worlds and currently the VLOA has a number of additional systems that might be marginally habitable by Inner Sphere standards we know of."
Adrian had to keep a chuckle from escaping. Local Space considered just about every single system to be inhabitable, which was not a surprise considering the maturity of their space habitat construction technologies. There would be little to no chance of Local Space trying to go out and conquer habitable worlds, if they could go, find a system, any system and build space habitats in them, without needing to fight anyone for it. Or set up with others in the same system, far away from each other.
"The Iwrinai Cooperation will be largely responsible for the Iwrin Sector, but will provide small detachments for the other sectors as well. The make up of those will be roughly 43 percent UN, 43 percent UoJ and the remaining 14 percent IC."
"While the operational forces will gather at Iwrin, the goal is to strike as many targets simultaneously as possible, each with at least two Strike Force Groups of twenty vessels each, including two transports for ground forces. This is to prevent pirate jumpships from managing to jump away and reach other pirate held systems to warn them."
"To this end, the Strike Force groups will be sent out in waves, so they can reach their targets at the same time. Each Strike Force group will hit the nadir and zenith jump points of each system, capture any jump ships and deal with potential traders and other civilian jumpship traffic that just happen to use the system as a stopover."
"Following this phase, half of the Strike Forces will strike the L1 and L2 points of the habitable world, capture any jumpships and dropships that might be loitering there, before taking the high and low orbitals. Only then will the ground forces land and deal with the pirates on the ground, liberating any prisoners and slaves."
Adrian listened. He knew the plans, having been part of the planning stages of the operation, surprised again and again how easily these people were to work with, no matter their species or backgrounds. Sure, sometimes there were insults flying at times, but for he most part everything had been easy.
"Following these ground operations, we will leave a small task force of space and ground elements in place to help rebuild and protect the system as needed. The remaining forces will be pulled back to the sector FOB, with half returning home and the other half beginning patrols operations, translating into Operation Maynard, with rotations of vessels every six months."
Next to him, Lenard suddenly started to cough, before staring openly at Admiral Komnenos, making Adrian wonder what was going on, before he remembered. Lenard hadn't been part of the planning for the Strike Groups, so the fact that the nations of Local Space, perhaps soon the League of Nations, could free up about 1200 vessels for this operation had caught him off guard.
Adrian knew that it had caught him of guard like that during the planning of those operations.
For a moment, he wondered if that refit of the Bright Star, to equip her with a Heim-Feynman Event Generator was going to complete before Operation Port Royal kicked off.