109

3063 was not a good year for military operations, at least from the point of view of the Taurian Concordat.

In April, the CCAF launched a final assault on Andurien, supported by the two Feng Huang Heavy Cruisers they had.

With a powerful escort of Pocket WarShips - which for the first time included 2 of a type never seen before, in the region of 25,000 tons – plus Assault DropShips and ASFs, they had no difficulty reaching orbit.

Although discreetly reinforced by the Concordat, the Magistracy and the Federated Commonwealth, there was little the Andurien forces could do against the CCAF, which not only used several Warrior Houses in this operation, but also a large number of advanced equipment, which until then had only been seen in WoB hands.

With the battle lost, the royal family tried to escape in extremis, to a Canopus JumpShip that was waiting at a pirate point, but their DropShip was destroyed by one of the big Capellan Pocket Warships, that not only showed an acceleration in excess of 5G, but was armed with a (spinal mount?) HNPPC. Observations, later shared by the Canopian JumpShip, that only escaped thanks to being equipped with a LF battery, reported that said ships also had 6 AR-10, 12 ASFs, and a robust conventional weapons suit.

Confirming that the WoB had settled into the Capellan Confederation, a TMI reconnaissance operation using Mryias and Orcas (both with LF) detected a previously unknown shipyard in a supposedly uninhabited system, 29.3 LY of Sian.

Two WarShips undergoing repairs were detected, a Baron (ex-SLDF Destroyer) and a Vincent (ex-SLDF Corvette), as well as several JumpShips receiving maintenance, including 2 Magellan.

In the Free Rasalhague Republic, a planned offensive to liberate Gunzburg from the Clans ended in a bloody battle in space, and the invasion/liberation was aborted.

It seemed that Clan Wolf had more WarShips present than reconnaissance had indicated and that they had a credible anti-ASF / anti-Missile defense together with OmniFighters equipped with ECM and AAMs, nullifying the advantage enjoyed by the Inner Sphere forces.

Also detected for the first time in use by the Clans was a pocket WarShip, based on an Overlord-C, equipped with 4 Barracuda tubes, which had been dedicated to attacking the larger ASFs.

As if that wasn't enough, news broke out that one of the Clans not previously involved in the invasion, Clan Goliath Scorpion, had begun invading the Outworlds Alliance. What was strange about this invasion was that they seemed to be using almost only second-line equipment, i.e. SLDF upgraded with modern systems, what were called IIC variants.

Consultations with the Wolf's Dragoons allowed the identification of the Rho Galaxy, usually acting as a garrison force, supported by only one WarShip, Potemkin class, the rest being JumpShips.

Desperate calls for help from the Outworlds Alliance reached Taurus, and it was decided to send a support force, consisting of the 1st Aurigan Guards (the Revenants), supported by 6 Pinto class WarShips. The reason of so many Pinto escorts, was that Mechdur alone built 4 each year, every year. Each Pinto had a Union CV so the number of ASFs of the expeditionary force was not bad. Unfortunately, better ships were already busy inside the Draconis Combine or occupied defending the Concordat.

With the marriage of Antony Calderon with my daughter Sara Arano-Bassot decided, the relations between both the ruling families had once again improved.

In the recent years, the new management of the Wolf's Dragoons (Mackenzie Wolf and Maeve Wolf) had lobbied long and hard for the Dragoons to be accepted in direct offensive operations against the Clans and not only assigned to training roles. That they could, in theory accept missions from the Capellan Confederation or any side of the ex-FWL, was well know, but they also knew that if they were to do that, they would be placed in a not contracting list by all the big players. And finally, they had the ban on anti-Clan operations lifted by mid 3063.

That coincided with the order by Edward to send the Revenants to the Outworlds Alliance, and I quickly secured the first WD contract, obtaining the services of the Wolf Spider Battalion to go with the Revenants. That the WDWS Alexander (Aegis class Cruiser), that had just finished its refit was also available was just perfect. I obtained the WD contract rather cheap and easily, because they needed to pay for the WarShip refit, and this contract was the perfect way to do so.

Note.: The Wolf Spider Battalion is a Battalion only in name. In reality it is a Clan Cluster unit, with about two thirds of the 'Mechs being Omnis, the rest fully equipped with Clan weapons and systems. The rest of the unit is made of OmniFighters, BattleArmor (Clan) and stealth PA(L)s in the case of the Seventh Kommando. They are transported in two heavily modified Overlords.

The reason of my actions was that the leader of one of the Revenants Mech battalions was my son Paul Arano-Bassot, going for the first time in harms way. A quick series of talks both with Edward and the TDF HQ solved any problems that my initiative might have had. That I paid the Wolf Dragoons bill, in good part sealed the deal with Taurus.

The Revenants only had 1 Lee, the first Block 2 produced, the rest of the DropShips were mostly smaller ones, because so few Overlords were produced in the Concordat.

At the last minute the Alexander also took 2 Leopard PW (the model with a spinal Naval Laser), because the Dragoons only had 2 of is 4 collars full with their units.

Unfortunately, the Aurigan Province and the Revenants didn't have any Mriya, so the civilian JumpShips were almost all improved Leviathans (8 collars each).

My departing gift to Paul was my Mech (a modified Nightstar 9Jb), that received one last upgrade. Replacing both Medium Pulse Lasers with Clan ER Medium Lasers, provided free weight for an Angel ECM suit, and the Small Laser being replaced by a Clan Small Pulse Laser with AMS capability at the cost of half a ton of armor.