Historical Interlude: The Demise of the Capellan Confederation

Historical Interlude: The Demise of the Capellan Confederation

The Capellan Confederation is an interesting nation to view through the lens of history. While it was once built on the backs of nations that espoused virtue and learning, by the end it had become an authoritarian state that was ruled by a madman intent on the absolute destruction of everything that he once was responsible for.

There is a wide debate on when Maximilian Liao truly crossed over the threshold into madness. Some scholars argue that he was well on his descent into insanity when he assassinated his father Tormax Liao, and yet other groups think that it was either when Tikonov was taken by Davion forces or when Romano Liao was banished. Whatever the case may be, when Maximilian came to power it was the beginning of the end for the Capellan Confederation.

Maximilian imposed many successful military policies that granted more tactical flexibility at the hands of his regimental commanders and expanded the amount of forces that the Confederation had at its disposal. The Liao's were even able to strike back at both the Davions and Mariks at this point in time.

Unfortunately, with the destruction of a third of the McCarron's Armored Cavalry in 3007 the Confederation had lost much of its quick reaction and raiding forces, and when the Davions finally took Tikonov in 3011 while the Taurian Concordat were taking worlds all the way up to Victoria the Confederation began a deadly spiral downwards.

With a large portion of their military production now cut off from them (1), Maximilian was exceedingly grateful to accept the five regiments of Wolf's Dragoons as mercenaries for hire, and used them as a barrier against the Free Worlds League.

While he was using the Wolf's Dragoons as a barrier, Maximilian Liao was unknowingly working with elements of Comstar's ROM division in order to stir up what is now known as the Marik Civil War. This gave the Confederation some breathing room and allowed Maximilian to focus on what he perceived as the real threat, the Federated Suns.

Romano's intervention in order to retain the Wolf's Dragoons as a house unit did not end well for the Confederation. With many of the less radical elements of MASK being lost in the attempt to hold the dependents of the feared mercenaries hostage and culminating in her complete and total banishment from the Capellan Confederation.(2)

Romano Liao had gone from one of the highest authorities in the Capellan Confederation, to little more than a refugee. And while many regarded this as harsh at the time, it was what allowed Romano to escape the fall of the Confederation.

The Confederation was at a time of relative peace with both the Davions and Mariks for a period of around 10 years or so, which should have allowed them to begin rebuilding the losses that they had taken over the rest of the 3rd Succession War, but instead, Maximilian Liao focused on purging the Maskirovka of anyone who wasn't fanatically loyal to him and him alone. It was also at this time that Maximilian began to send assassins and assorted wet work teams to try and eliminate his daughter Romano.

Romano at this time, had been on Northwind for several years, and had gotten a diagnosis of bipolar disorder with a slight bent towards paranoia and potential delusions. Fortunately, she was receptive to treatments, and even though she was on medications for the remainder of her life Romano began to thrive.

Perhaps it is this which caused Maximilian to launch a strike against Northwind led by his heir and older daughter Candace Liao, but we will likely never know. Max had planted Maskirovka agents among the forces that Candace had taken with her and given them orders to use nuclear ordnance to deny the Davions any military production that was taking place on Northwind.

This is where the Confederation truly lost the Succession Wars, and became the second nation to dissolve in its entirety.(3) No one had used Nuclear, Biological, or Chemical Weapons since the latter period of the 2nd Succession War, and no one desired for more learning and production facilities to be lost. So upon this use of Nuclear weapons once again, it was astonishing that the remainder of the Successor States refrained from retaliating with weapons of mass destruction of their own.

The Davions, Taurian Concordat, and Lyran Commonwealth all invaded the Capellan Confederation shortly after the invasion of Northwind, and began a slow trek towards Sian. With elements of the 1st Marksman regimental combat team being among the first to make landfall on a Capellan world, followed shortly after by Duke Hull of Kentares and his own personal guard.

From there, it was merely a matter of time until the fall of the Capellan Confederation. With different units racing towards Sian, and the Davion forces that were able to respond doing so with a barely restrained vengeance.

It was also at this point that many of the Capellan units began to cooperate with the invading forces no matter what nation. Maskirovka had been indiscriminate in their NBC strikes and had gone too far. With some units even being absorbed into the Davion forces in order to maintain holds on various worlds and root out Maskirovka cells.

Of particular note was regiment Vincent's Commandos, who immediately surrendered and began to assist the 1st Kentares Guard in their own garrison and policing actions (4), and by the end of the campaign had been mostly absorbed by the 1st Kentares Guard. There were also other notable units such as Blanford's Grenadiers that fought against the 1st Marksman at first, but eventually went on to assist them in eliminating Maskirovka cells and met with Hanse Davion in order to negotiate their survival as a unit.

By the time Hanse Davion was ready to move onto Sian, the Davions controlled Capella, Liao, Outreach, both Epsilon Indi, and Eridani, St. Ives, and many lesser worlds in between. The Taurian Concordat had control of Grand Base, Halloway, Houskarle, and many other worlds down to the Periphery border, and the Lyran Commonwealth had taken Sirius, Keid, Bryant, New Home, Carver V, and Terra Firma.

Sian though, was not a world that anyone was able to take. While no one really knows for sure what went on down on the capital of the Capellan Confederation, it is generally agreed that he either deliberately unleashed a bioweapon on his own population, or it escaped from the lab, either way though the result was the same and there was no detectable human life left on the planet of Sian by the time Hanse Davion's fleet arrived. Most scholars agree that Maximilian had left a sort of dead man's switch behind though, because after days of surveying the planet, the entirety of Sian's nuclear arsenal began to launch itself at the Warships in the fleet. Maximilian had left silos and nuclear missile launchers on every moon and asteroid that might be in the path of a fleet trying to escape the onslaught.

This is where the Confederation met its final end, and ceased to exist as a nation state, never to arise again. The remainder of the Capellan Confederation worlds either formed individual smaller states akin to Periphery nations, or joined the surrounding nations. The Andurien state grew by a large percentage at this point, as did the Taurian Concordat. All of the nations that participated in the destruction of the Capellan Confederation spent years eliminating the last of the Maskirovka cells, and no one is absolutely sure that they managed to eradicate them all or not.

Tikonov, Victoria, and Menke had been denied to the Confederation after the Federated Suns and Taurian Concordat had taken those worlds. Transcripts and videos of the banishment are used in many historical and political dramas today as a base for which to do similar scenes.The first nation to begin dissolving was the Free Worlds League, which had been fighting a civil war for over a decade at this point, and many of the worlds had either seceded to join other nations such as the Lyran Commonwealth, or had broken up into their own miniature nation states; with the Marik state retaining more military might and industrial power than most of the other states. The Vincent's Commandos regiment had been joined by portions of the remaining 1st Capellan Reserve Cavalry, and while the Reserve Cavalry remained separate, by 3027, the Vincent's Commandos were a part of the Kentares Guard as an independent unit.