Foothold Won on Aldebaran

Reports From the Front

by William H. Keith, jr.

Dateline: Aldebaran

Fighting was severe as the 4th Deneb RCT, the Fourth Guards RCT, and the mercenary regiment known as Redfield's Renegades blazed through the atmosphere of Aldebaran V and effected dual landings on this strategic world. This was not to be an easy assault. Their opponents were the elite combat veterans of House Ijori, plus 16 regiments of armor and infantry.

Marshal Eugene Drivers, commander of the 4th Deneb RCT and overall leader of the invasion force, knew he was in for a stiff fight before the DropShips entered orbit. "I know the House Ijori people," Drivers told this reporter. "They're tough and they're good. But our people are tougher."

The Marshal's confidence was put to the test on August 18 at 1830 hours Shipboard Time, as the Davion DropShip fleet split into two main bodies, each slipping into different approach orbits over Aldebaran's mottled white, green and orange surface. Liao AeroSpace fighters swarmed up from spaceports and military bases on both main continents and deployed to meet the invasion craft. The Liao forces suffered heavy losses but were unable to penetrate the Davion fighter screen. Late in the exchange, a badly damaged Liao Thrush twisted clear of a pursuing Davion Stuka and plunged through one of the Davion DropShip formations. The Thrush struck the Leopard- class DropShip Star Tigress a crippling blow which destroyed the Thrush and sent the Star Tigress plunging into an uncontrollable burn-up in the planet's atmosphere. It is still uncertain whether the Thrush pilot deliberately attempted to ram one of the Davion invasion ships, or whether the pilot was already dead or had simply lost control. In any case, the attack resulted in the loss of four 'Mechs and two AeroSpace fighters from the 4th Deneb RCT.

Aldebaran V poses an interesting strategic problem for any would-be invader. The surface of the world is divided into two major continents, each with space port and industrial facilities which must be taken and held to secure a hold on the world. Marshal Drivers had expected to land his entire force on the northern continent, choose a strong defensive position in the Kathandermedie Mountain district east of Chouchu, and allow the Liao forces to attack him, grinding them down to the point that they would be vulnerable to a counterattack.

Shortly before jumping from the departure point, however, Drivers was informed by Davion Military Intelligence that House Ijori had split its forces between the two major continents. In one of the snap-judgment decisions for which Drivers is famous, he elected at the last moment to split his own forces, assigning the 4th Deneb RCT to the southern continent.

That decision has already been sharply criticized in Davion military and political circles. Marshal Drivers, in his initial battlefield report, stated that he held at least a three-to-one advantage over the defenders and could therefore afford to split his assault group in an attempt to pin and destroy both portions of the enemy force simultaneously. Critics have pointed out that Drivers could have achieved a six-to-one superiority against one element of the Ijori defenders. Such an advantage would have crushed one battalion of Ijori 'Mechs, forcing the other either to flee the planet or to attack at highly unfavorable odds. Drivers' classic answer to his critics: "Bah! They're back in their comfortable offices and I'm here! They want to fight this war, let them come out here and fight it themselves!"

"Battle strategy is never as simple as it looks on paper," said Colonel Brad Halloway, on Drivers' command staff. "If Gene Drivers had ignored half of the Ijori force, it might have come down on our rear before we'd finished with the first lot. I think he did the right thing."

The critics' judgement of Drivers' unorthodox tactics may already have been borne out, however. The 'Mechs of the Fourth Guards, the 1st Bellvue Armored Regiment, and two battalions of the Kestrel Mechanized Infantry were all reported safely down and their DZs secured by H-hour +3, but unexpectedly heavy resistance by Warrior House Ijori's V Battalion seems to have stalled the Davion advance outside the strategic Aldebaranian city of Chouchu.

Reports from Drivers' headquarters on the southern continent have been fragmentary. The 4th Deneb RCT, minus the 'Mechs and AeroSpace fighters of the Star Tigress, set down on its newly-assigned DZs and brushed aside scattered local pockets of resistance. Marshal Drivers, in direct command of the 4th, declared the assault a complete success in his first report to New Avalon. However, since the initial landings, contact with House Ijori's 2nd Battalion has been brief, bloody, and inconclusive.

At last report, the Deneban RCT was pursuing the Ijori main body in an attempt to run it to ground, but the Davion invaders had already suffered heavy losses from numerous ambushes. Redfield's Renegades, the mercenary regiment dropped in support of the 4th Deneb, reported moderate casualties in a sharp encounter with an Ijori flanking company near Campo Pass, in the rugged terrain south of Tarling.

Only time will tell whether this snap decision of Marshal Eugene Drivers was the stuff of military genius... or errant stupidity.

News from the Front

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