NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC: A continuation of this thread http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=400625&page=5

IC:

Admiral Ortiz just blinked a few times not being able to believe they'd threaten to be back..it appeared as if the 5th Fleet would remain on call for just awhile longer. "I want a detailed report sent back to the intel boys at Chimera. They're gonna want to analyze what just happened." Ortiz crused and almost spat as he removed the ballcap which the carriers outline, name and registry number. He wondered though if he shouldnt have just taken his seventeen to one advantage then and there and pounded the hell out of that obvious command vessel. The opportunity was gone for the moment, but there was little doubt it would present itself in the future.

On the other side of the sector Admiral Shake's 3rd Fleet continued to make its mad dash to the edge of the Solar System, they'd take up a position putting them nearby and split up into the four respective battlegroups, but not at Pluto and Charon. They'd await in positions capable of ambushing a fleet by hiding close to Neptune and in its shadow. The transports they'd been escorting would continue on to Last Hope Naval Station and unload their compliment of supplies, troops, spare parts, food, and other stores. Things back on Earth were slightly more hectic though, at Naval Intelligence they had dusted off the archieves and to their almost glee discovered a useful piece of information.

Aboard the Carrier Yorktown Admiral Fletcher recieved his orders and gave out a heartfelt sigh, from one conflict to another it seemed, the Republic was sure making its soldiers work for their paychecks. The 6th Fleet also in orbit under command of Admiral Norsa would follow suit on this fast raid. It was the belief of the tacticans at the Federal Republic that the vieled we'll be back threat was a prelude to them returning with a fleet. Such an event was not going to be welcomed in the slightest. And thus tacticans in the Federal Republic decided to set up the 1st and 6th Fleets in areas where they could conduct rapid attacks against pre-determined targets. As general orders went out across the fleet, each fleet doubled the amount of fighters out on CAP, and kept bombers loaded and at the ready for deployment. There was little sense in waiting for battle unprepared when you knew your enemy was to arrive later.

At the shipyards at Chimera and New Hope, the civilan populations braced for war. The space bound cities were well stocked with anti capitalship weapons, and had their own national guards. Each city in space capable of supporting up to 600,000 persons and thus they had their own defense forces. Now though they were busy getting the defenses ready and laying down the keels to multiple new Corvette type warships. At Chimera though, a new class of Carrier was having its keel laid down, much smaller than the Kennedy class of Fleet Carriers, these newer ones harkened back to the days of the Jeep and Escort battlecarriers. The industries were tooling up, and gearing for a protracted war.

Near wherever the hell the Aumani transmission originated(too lazy to go and look):

Space ruptured and the CSS SPecter passed through it, the eight otehr warships with it disengaging quickly, spreading out as they oriented themselves.

A message was sent to the Auman forces.

This is Fleet Admiral Telsia Munro. The Imperial Navy does not take kindly to be compared to the scum that raid space lanes. We... request... that you retract your statement or face the consequences. Admiral Saratov beat you, even after your stunt at Lunar Yard One. Do you really want to get your asses handed to you by a force that is more than ready to fight, instead of one that's unprepared, reeling from a terrorist act and trying to fight against a sneak attack?

Speaking of the good Admiral... he's on his way here with the Huntress now, to take part. This is a momentus event, after all. Should you choose to engage us, you would be the only navy stupid enough to try and take us one twice. And who better to take command to beat you but the man that beat you last time?

Ships were accelerating toward them, from six points inside the asteroid belt. One was an old, Lion Class Battleship. It measured half the size of the Specter. But the old Admiral insisted that his old ship be the only Lion not decomissioned. Despite it's age, it was still a warship though and had racked up many kills on pirates and on the occasional rouge cruiser.

(Well, since I'm not sure I'll keep it safe and ask if I'm allowed to participate.)

Kyuss may have been arrogant and bold, but he certainly wasn't stupid. Upon witnessing the sudden withdrawal of the enemy and hearing the cryptic warning of its commander, the Admiral drew all his ships back into a defensive formation, tripled combat air patrols and released as many combat drones as he dared.

'Send a coded message to the Americans, tell them we have their backs.' said Admiral Kyuss to the comms officer. 'Lord Admiral, our reinforcements are near. ETA is fifteen minutes.' said the radio man. Kyuss sat in his chair, feeling very much like a sitting duck. Having lost the initiative to these pirates.

Then suddenly, a tear in space opened up before his fleet. Realizing it was the enemy making their comeback 'Target the rift! all ships open fire!' Kyuss yelled and in a matter of seconds firing solutions were aquired and in just as long as it took EPD Cannon and missiles lanced towards the enemy. The role was reversed in a second of tactical ineptitude, the Crimmond fleet were the sitting ducks. Coming under withering halfway through his declaration. Crimmonds fleet commander may have been brave, and his message strong, but his tactics were lacking. At the moment he and his men were outnumbered 58-1, not exactly in his favour.Though only time will tell. Will the pirates be decisively victorious or utterly defeated?

OOC:

Fluid time.

The ships rocked and jolted under them. "Return fire. Let's see how they like a wall of warheads."

Every ship fired voley after volley of missiles, sending literally tens of thousands of warheads into the void between them. Each warhead was actually rather weak. But en masse, they were used to pepper armor to dust and overload shields with the sheer amount of impacts.

The fleet moved, taking itself on an 'up' plane. The light cruisers took the worst damage, one literally imploding. The Specter, while being the largest and taking the most hits, remained unscathed under the quad shields and thick armor. It was firing the most missiles, as well.

But, as Munro had said... Saratov's forces began to show. And performed one of the Imperial Navy's most imfamous strategies.

Battlecruisers dove into the Auman fleets, targeting command ships(to the best of their abilities) and attempted to ram them. Firing off every weapon they had, including nuclear weapons(which they didn't have, according to the Navy), they would pick a ship and plow into it, detonating their own power core and vaporising themselves and hopefully the rammed enemy and a few other ships. There were twelve ships doing this, as more ships arrived, including Saratov and his Huntress.

The battlegroup formed up and swung around to face opposite of Munro's fleet, back to back.

We've got them we're we want them. Saratov said, on an uncoded channel.
Right. two battlegroups against all of them. Munro answered, sarcastic.
Exactly. We've got them outnumbered 1-50, in my estimation. With the Mjolnir and Juggernaut on their way, it goes even more in our favor.
Let's go to work.

The combined power... was still hopelessly outmatched, Even with teh suicide runs. So Munro broke the Specter away from the two fleets and turned towards the largest grouping of enemy and charged her ship right at them. Fighters and frigates would be pushed aside like gnats, cruisers slammed into and would send the Specter wheeling.

Now the command ship was surrounded and out gunned. How this helped her was insane. But so was she. "Deploy the Dark Nebula."

All around the ship, a blackish-purple mist formed, expanding out in all directions. Surrender.

OOC: Largent you still have little reason to be involved in THIS affair as it has moved away from the Pluto/Charon region

IC:

3rd and 5th Fleets didn't sit around for long. The Aumanii may not have been liked but this Crimmond threat was more or less something that needed to be taken care of immediately. Thus Admiral Shake, the senior officer in the Pluto/Charon sector spoke with Admiral Ortiz over a secure ship-to-ship line. “Admiral Ortiz, weigh anchor with your fleet. We’ll smash the Crimmond navy from behind and then…” Ortiz listened intently to the plans. He could not believe they were going to attack anyone and be allied with the Aumanii over the issue. It was strange to say the least. It wasn’t to long ago that they had just hunted down the Aumanii patrol vessel and destroyed it outright now they were going to ride to the aid to the Aumanii and possibly bag a large command vessel.

At Earth the 1st and 6th Fleet picked up speed and began to push faster toward the Lunar area. Fighters, interceptors and bombers launching from the eight combined fleet carriers they were prepared for heavy combat across a massive scale. The 6th Fleet moved breaking stride from the 1st Fleet they would circle the moon and take the long way around the planet and surprise the Crimmond Lunar Yards with additional warships. Aboard the combined navy flagship, SCVN 2802 Yorktown, Admiral Mace Fletcher had planned this operation in a hurry but it wasn’t something that was given plenty of time for thought. They wanted to send a message to the people of Crimmond. A war against the Federal Republic was not a war this wished to wage, especially if they were going to fight Auman as well.

Back around Charon, the 3rd and 5th Fleet were just getting to the area where the Crimmond fleet had moved to, it wasn’t exactly significantly far away, just moments away by sublight drives. Admiral Shake tried his best not to let out a cackle as he looked over toward his Xo Commodore Pleshette and stood with legs spread slightly apart and his arms behind his back, “Commander Pleshette, you may fire at will.” As the Bunkerhill began her barrage the rest of the fleet followed suit. Every warship with a clear fire arc began to attack. The smaller Arione class frigates were vessels armed with a mixed package of weaponry and while their primary focus was anti-fighter their dual mass drivers enmasse could prove just as potent at damaging larger warships. The Gearing class destroyer was another story. They were built for the sole purpose of anti-capitalship duty and their heavy rail guns firing 15 mT and 25 mT rounds were capable of heavy damage, while their StS-89 Long Lance torpedoes tipped with 75 mT warheads were plentiful and capable of destruction not seen before.

Of course this was a rarity amongst the Federal Navy. No one ever expected to send entire fleets into combat. Most analysts believed the majority of their conflicts would come in minor ship engagements and thus as each destroyer captain followed their orders they let loose waves of weapons upon the targeted Crimmond command ship. But they soon stopped several thousand kilometers away as this black nebula began to form around the warship. They had no idea what was going on, but they knew exactly how to break right on through it. The Resolute class battleships of the 3rd Fleet, ten in all, began to advance ahead of the other warships. What made the battleships heavy hitters were they mounted a pair of large guns. Each gun spanning nearly the length of each 1.5-kilometer warship they were plasma cannons. Designed solely to take on other large capital ships, the command cruiser seemed like the perfect target.

Each gun crackled with energy and soon the charged particles rushed down the accelerators out of the muzzle of each cannon and toward the direction of the center of that dark cloud. A total of twenty of the particle bolts in all.

The 1st Fleet continued on course the Crimmond Lunar Yards now visible in the distance they were ready to launch the offensive. The fighters and bombers heading forward with their assignments they were to sweep the yard of any defending fighters and launch assaults against any docked warships or warships under construction. The interceptors launched by each carrier held back as a quasi-reserve/ fleet defense. A total of four hundred fighters and ninety six bombers were sent forward from the 1st fleet. Additional forces would arrive with the rest of the 6th fleet would provide additional fighters when they arrived on scene.

With electronic counter measures cranked many of the missiles were diverted, intercepted by the swarm of drones or shot down by anti-missile systems on the ships themselves. Of course the sheer number of missiles launched at the fleet was staggering. Overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of fire several ships buckled and fell apart.

'Admiral, the 17th squadron is reporting heavy losses.' said the ships executive officer, his voice echoing through out the lofty charting room. Kyuss seemed to be undisturbed by the news as losses were to be expected. Suddenly a group broke away from the enemy formation, barreling towards the 7th fleet. 'Order the fleet to open fire on the break away formation concentrate fire from the dreadnoughts on the closest of them and work their way to the furthest. Also, deploy ship-killers to the main fleet. All of them.' commanded the Admiral, Tipha nodded and relayed the orders. Kyuss looked at the constantly updating chart intently 'Move the fleet back...we'll draw some of the enemy away from the Americans, break the enemy formation up as to make them easier to destroy. In addition to putting some space between us and the break aways.'

The sheer distances involved in space warfare are enormous. Aumanii squadrons usually operate seperated by kilometers of space and fought at a distance of a dozen times that distance. It would take time for the enemy fireships to reach the 7th fleet. A task made difficult by the fusillade of fire put up by the remaining ships of the fleet.

As it stood the Aumanii were pummelling the pirates with the biggest guns ever created on Mars, atomic weapons were fired in the gaps between the fleet to disturb communications and sensors long enough for Masers to target and destroy these systems. Auman's fleet was very small compared to most, only numbering three hundred fifty eight vessels in total. This lack in numerical superiority on a strategic scale was made up for by quality in terms of firepower, stealth and speed. The ships of the 7th fleet, though not operating with full stealth doctrine, was slippery and hard to hit by design. The ships themselves were angularly built and coated with reflective paint to fool Lidar. Large, overt, ECM suites dominated the tops of the Hellespontos Dreadnoughts which pumped out interference making it very difficult to target individual ships. To an enemy with out sufficient ECCM, the Aumanii fleet would appear as a smeared outline on their sensor read outs.

When the pirate flagship broke off it was not payed much attention and left to the disposal of the Americans. Though, when it was consumed by darkness it caused quite a stir among the lesser officers of the fleet. Though as always, Admiral Kyuss was confident that he and his American counterpart would win the day...

...Hopefully even before the arrival of Aumanii reinforcements.


OOC:
If you have good Electronic Counter-Counter Measures I suggest you use them. My ships are very sufficient and avoiding fire. I use ECM like you use shields.

Im gonna give those fireships of yours some ventilation space, because space is OMFG HYOOOGE :P

"Let's make it hot."

Around the Specter,the black cloud expanded away from the ship unti it wasn't visable, each partical of it ten feet across, rapidly breaking into smaller pieces.

The Specter broke and dove away, rotating to spare it's battered shields and scarred hull. As it ran fr it's fleet, they activated it. A tremendous tear in he fabric of space opened in the American fleet. It was unstable though and collased allmost immediatly, hopefully taking a large chunk of enemy with it. They weren't destroyed, just taken o FTL speeds untill they emit the multi-layered pulse to open a rift back to nomal space. In fact,there were ships around them doing that right now...

Rifts tore throughout the space between he Auman and Crimmond fleets, other Specter class dreadnoughts breaking through, ships in tow. Others thoughwerenot in tow, 12 battecruisers retrofitted with the drives exited as well.

Now the Crimmond numbers were around fifty ships, all firing at the Aumanii. Another volley of missiles, staggering in number, were let loose, with larger missiles intermixed. Each missile seperated in to ten warheads, all detonating similtaiously, 8 megaton blasts rippling through space.

Crimmond ships were being ripped apart, the battle carrier slagged, cruisers disabled, entire ships shelled.

The command ships, theSpecter, the Mijolnir, the Juggernaut and the Gladiator all began to broadcast ECM to cover each of their groups.

OOC:

You miss me firing at you? Not one mention of me at all.

OOC: The Specter got pounded. It's upper shields all but failed before it dove away. The rest of the fleet is also getting pounded by everyone.

The Aumanii fleet, quickly being overrun, was in a very desperate position. On the run with more enemies on the way Admiral Kyuss ordered the fleets to target any ships that come through new spacial "rifts" with impunity.

The way in which the enemy entered the battle was foolish. Charging blindly at us through a tear in space, practically with their eyes closed. There was no way the enemy would know where we were until they got through the rift and when they were travelling through it they would be extremely vulnerable to weapons fire thought the Admiral. Essentially bottle necked, all the Aumanii had to do was fire into the rift as quickly as possible to ensure high casualties amongst the pirates. Hopefully

'Admiral Kyuss, our reinforcements have arrived and are within weapons range. Admiral Rejnard wants to speak to you.' said the comms officer hurriedly. Kyuss nodded and was soon speaking the Rejnard 'The enemy have been attacking us in waves, thank the founder you've come Thierry. We're slaving your C&C to our own now. said Kyuss. 'That wont be necessary. The 2nd fleet is taking over this operation, your position has been compromised.' Said Admiral Rejnard. Kyuss cursed loudly and startled some of the men on the bridge. Conceding the fact that his fleet had been compromised by the enemy assault the Admiral ordered his command and control be slaved to Admiral Rejnard's 2nd Aumanii Battle Fleet where orders would be issued from now on.

Admiral Rejnard stood at ease on the bridge of the AuSD Gunman shouting orders casually. 'The enemy are closing in on the 7th rapidly. If they wish to turn this into a brawl let them. Launch all fleet boarding parties with full fighter support. We'll capture these pirate scum and give them the trial they deserve.' the ships Electronic Warfare officer piped up 'Admiral, the enemy are starting to deploy ECM, Im going to compensate, it shouldn't cause too much trouble.' Rejnard nodded 'Very well, carry on.' said the Admiral. The 2nd Aumanii Fleet tore into the flank of the enemy with tremondous firepower and even as the 7th were being pounded by continuous missile barrages they kept their guns going. The Aumanii may not have been the most stunning tacticians themselves, but they sure knew how to run a gundeck and prided themselves on their accuracy.

The pirate fleet was now being pinched on two sides but the Aumanii fleets and their reinforcements being fired upon as the scrambled through rips in space before they had the chance to defend themselves. Aumanii assault pods with full fighter support raced towards the most pressing enemy targets in hopes to board them and sabotage if not completely seize the vessels. The Aumanii 2nd fleet gave long range fire support to the brawling 7th and the American fleet, as they came under attack from the enemies mystery weapon, fired a sheet of missiles at the seriously outnumbered pirate forces.

Of course this is was not with out its sacrifice. To get to this point the Aumanii 7th had lost several of its number and were quickly being overrun by the enemies space fold tactics. Of course, the Aumanii were used to being outnumbered and overrun. Though the Aumanii enjoyed numerical superiority at the moment, which did not happen often, and took full advantage of it. Targetting the most obvious command ships as best they could through the enemy ECM. Firing atomic weapons into gaps between the enemy fleet in an attempt to disrupt sensors and communications with the resulting electro-magnetic pulse. Aumanii Electronic Warfare officers were taxed to counter the enemies thick ECM coverage and were either wholey successful or utterly defeated in their attempts.

It seemed as when the Aumanii were able to get a lock through the ECM the target would soon disappear in a thick cloud of static. Soon some commanders ordered their gun crews to target the enemy fleet optically, which was extremely difficult to say the least. Both Crimmond and Auman had been successful in making this battle practically unfightable. The Aumanii filling space with thick, powerful ECM and the pirates following suit, it would be difficult to get a decent lock. Battle orders changed. The Aumanii would disperse as best they could from their current positions, hiding in the smog they created firing into the huddled masses of arriving pirate reinforcements as the scrambled to find their way to safety.

OOC:

Im firing on your reinforcements. My reasoning is that when they come through the rift they are bottle necked, all concentrated in one area. And at the moment not fully aware of the combat situation as their sensors will have to adjust as they've changed location suddenly. Basically Im gambling on your fleet reinforcements being pinned into a location long enough for my fleets to fire as much as possible into the rift, like shooting fish in a barrel.

OOC: Which is one of the major drawbacks of the drives.

IC: The ships were all getting pounded, but all accelerated in a random diections, lessening the impacts. A dozen ships lost most of their weapons capacity from the impacts. So they do what all Crimmond crews are trained to do in suh a situation. Ram the enemy, much like the inital reinforcements, flying blind and detonating their engine cores inside the fleet. The rest of the ships were damaged in various ways, knocking out only partial capabilities.

The EMP blasts throughout the area didn't do much in terms of sensors. The ECM took care of them. The communications were disrupted, but all the captains were independant enough to handle themseves, more or less. Most were used to lone wolf patrols, anyway. Despite the communications disruption, the fleets continued to fire. Seems Crimmond made more missiles than anyone ever should, what with how many the fleets were sendng through space.

But long range battle were never the fleets forte. So rather than be engaged in bombardment, they ignited all engines and charged the Auman and American forces, excepting for six ships. Those six were artilley ships, led bythe missile cruiser Frigate Eater.

The problem with hitting the center of the fleet was that there was no real center. Tactics dictated that in an enviornment such as space, distance was given between the battlegroups to increase the rate of the firepower which could be drawn onto the hulls of enemy ships. Unfortunately the Spectre dove away from the fighting..for something three kilometers plus in size, it could move rather nimbly..a note would be made of that in the future engagements. On the Saratoga, a reporter covered the footage of destruction in space directly from the decks and it made for an interesting view of the frontlines. Of course it failed to show just what exactly was going on..it appeared as if the Crimmond Navy was completely ignored the Federal Fleet except for that Dark Nova Assault.

The 12th Battlegroup was there for a moment, and then it disappeared into the void and all 51 warships disappeared from the scanners of every other warship. It would take several days before the sophisticaed Imperator sensors and science equipment would be able to figure out how to get them out of the rifts. Admiral Shake was not pleased, while no debries had been picked up that didnt exactly mean everything was okay with them. Until the 12th Battlegroup could return to normal space they would have been thought as lost.

While the Spectre ran, they would find themselves being chased, the commanders of the FRSN knew blood was in the water when solid shot began to impact upon the hull. The 11th Battlegroup lead by the Saratoga moved in to continue to inflict as much damage as possible upon the Spectre as possible. They went for obivous kill shots aiming for the engine area in a hope for crippling shots, the battleships Man O' War, Battlewagon and Hellbringer continued to fire with their heavy plasma cannons attempting to burn through the top armor of the Spectre. The seemingly lighter rail guns firing 25 mT rounds were aimed toward the supporting vessels. Admiral Shake aboard the Bunkerhill was busy with command of the unified fleet. The Admiral's themselves werent really ready for command of whole fleets, but the Rear Admirals assigned to each Battlegroup were more then capable of acting independent and with guidence interactive with other commands. Thus when the Gladiator appeared on the screens the 10th Battlegroup and 9th Battlegroup focused their fire. Missiles were dumbfired in the direction of the the Gladiator, and railgun shots didnt require much more than aiming in the direction of the target. At 3.5 kilometers in length, it was like shooting fish in a barrel

The 5th Fleet's attention was split, as the 15th Battlegroup and her 103 warships attacked the ships with the Juggernaut, the equally sized 16th Battlegroup delt with the Mijolnir and her escorts. Admiral Towne had more flexability with a lesser amount of Battlegroups than Admiral Shake did with the 3rd Fleet. However the apperance of these large Dreadnaughts did not bode well. Ships twice as large as the Federal Resolute class battleship generally did not bode well in terms of tactical advantages. As the Crimmond warships charged forward it was more than easier to focus fire on the largest of the warships. If the Crimmond ships wanted to rush to their deaths then that was fine by them. The Crimmond missile frigates would find themselves dealing with 12 B-4 Broadsword bombers launched from the Saratoga and from the Forrestal.

Strategically the battles played out on giant maps in the Fleet Command center at Chimera. Strategists believed that such vessels the size of the Spectre presented with them unique opportunities. They couldnt exactly be numerous in scope, and their size meant that it was possible the Crimmond navy was smaller in size due to spent resources going to larger vessels. Thus Grand Admiral Thorson was confident when he gave the following orders:

"Admiral Fletcher, you have clearance to begin Operation Visigoth, god be with you and the First Fleet. Make us proud."

The fighters of the 1st Fleet moved ahead of the bombers attempting to guage the defenses of the Crimmond Lunar Yards, the bombers held back several hundred kilometers and further back specialized small transports carrying advanced sensors operated. They didnt have a clear picture of the Lunar Yards as they were forced to hold back as much as possible until the operational picture was made slightly more clear by the fighters. On the other side of the moon the 6th Fleet waited. Fighters and bombers at the stand by they were there for support and to snap a trap onto the Lunar Yards should any defense ships sortie and provide problems for the 1st Fleet, the 6th was ordered to swing around and hit the Shipyards from a new direction entirely. This psuedo-war against Crimmond as it played out was a testbed for military applications. Theories on war would be tested, ship designs were undergoing baptisms by fire. Not to mention the futures of several Admirals were at stake and even the reputation of President-General de los Santos on Earth who advocated the enlarging of the Space Fleet to its current size.

Munro looked around the bridge of her ship. Consoles were shorting out, but none had the obligitory arc blast, thankfully. The shields on the upper hull were giving out. The armor was getting battered. "Open a rift, get us back to the missile boats!"

Around the ship the energy built again and the rift opened. To prevent any from trying to follow, nuclar mnes were dropped in the Specter's 'wake' and would at least let the dreadnought get through.

What was interesting about this jump wasthat it was so short that two rifts were open and no more than half the ship was out of normal space. The stresses involved were tremendous and caused many of the crew to lose conciousness.

Fleet Admiral Munro was one of those many. Luckily she collapsed into the command chair, unhurt. Others weren't so lucky, even on other ships, as the helm becam sluggish and the giant ship rammed the Frigate Eater and tore the battlecruiser, one of the most distinguished in the whole navy, into five peices, killing most of the crew...

The bombers incoming on the group would be met by the dreadnought's close range laser and ion* fire.

Lunar Yard IV, the conglomoration of Lunar Yards I, II and III, sat in orbit of Luna, surrounded not by just fighter cover, but the still emerging Second Fleet. The fifty ships of that fleet ranged from frigates to heavy cruisers, but no Dreadnoughts were seen. There was one there, but a 1/3 completed ship wouldn't do much good... The yards were armored and only open at five exits. As the attackers close, fighters do not come to engage... they merely stay in their path, impeding any attack on the fleet asit prepares to join the battle.

The yard sent one message, relaying it from the European continent. This is Lady Lara Tian of the Crimmond Imperial Party. We demand that all enemy forces contact us at once, to explain this assault on Imperial Naval Forces.

The message did say that the Crimmond forces should stop attacking, so the dreadnoughts continued their drive into the American forces, coming abeam with a few, opening fire with missiles and ions*.

[[*Ion weapons of Crimmond are NOT destructive. There is no heat or physical damage. They merely overcharge a system struck, causing fase overload signals to be sent to the computer, which hopefully trips breakers and shuts the system down.

Also, if I missed anything, I'm sorry. I'm out of town and am whipping this out as I have a free moment.]]

"Admiral Fletcher! Admiral Fletcher!" The communications officer shouted over the voices of the patched in squadron communications which played throughout the warship. Fletcher moved from his position near the viewports on the bridge to where the communication officer was. Leaning down and forward the Ensign spoke once more in a more calm voice, "We're getting a message from the shipyard..they wish to know why we're firing upon them." Fletcher looked almost puzzled and for a moment thought it was a bad joke. "Boy..you had best not be playing right now.." Admiral Fletcher seethed out in an annoyed voice.Of course it took less than thirty seconds for the officer to replay the message as it sounded transmitted not only a minute ago. "Are they fucking kidding me?" Fletcher didnt know exactly how to handle the message so he outright ignored it all together. There was nothing dumber than asking why you were being shot at when your compatriots were firing at other members of your navy out on the boondocks of the Solar system.

"Red Seven, Red Seven, you've got a target coming up..heavy cruiser on course zero seven five, count fifty warships.."

"Grey three just exploded! Grey four form up on my wing."

"Bingo! Got him!"

"This is Tigara Flight, beginning the bombing run."

"Gold One one, respond...anyone from Gold Squadron respond.."

"Watch out for that destroyer!"

"Where's the sixth fleet?"

The comm chatter played on the carriers of the 1st Fleet as the naval command staff aboard the Yorktown continued to update the computered display boards and the more traditional marker boards. The forward fighters deployed with the bomber squadrons picked off fighters and other small static targets which didnt move but only stayed in the way. The weapon of choice for that kind of work was the STS-54 New Phoenix anti-fighter missile. Small and nimble, its warhard was just big enough to be a crippling blow to a minor spacecraft like a fighter while being completly worthless against any capitalship. Of course the fighters werent there for that purpose. With the warships pouring out shots at them, they were doing their job. Escort and decoy. Of course the warships would turn their attention to the slightly slower, and much larger bomber craft screaming toward the dockyards. Coming in from multiple directions they used the 3D battlescape space provided them to its maximum advantage. Multiple STS-84 Lance torpedos were fired toward the direction of the armored yards.

However for every three bombers which launched a missile, another one was taken out, either by ion cannon fire, or by a straggling fighter which got a lucky hit and wasnt delt with by the SA-43 Hammerheads. It was shaping up to be a rather nasty strike against the shipyard however this is why the 6th Fleet was kept in reserve. Aboard the Yorktown, Admiral Fletcher remained mostly unworried. It was a glorious sight to watch the young men and women in the fighters and bombers dive into combat like that. At least it was how it played in Fletchers mind. Admiral Norsa on the 6th Fleet wasnt to sure about this engagement, and as he waited anxiously for the go ahead he dreaded having to inform families of lost loved ones. Then the signal came.

"Sixth fleet aerospace forces are to begin assistance in operations against Cirmmond Star Yards. Repeat..."

From the other side of the moon, the fighters and bombers of the 6th Fleet would go over and under the poles of the moon and around its equator hitting the Lunar Yards from more angles than they were getting hit with now.

Of course, Admiral Fletcher and Norsa werent the only ones listening to the engagement. Down on Earth, President de los Santos had stopped what he was doing and tuned into the engagement which was being broadcast over the national public radio. The message from Crimmond was being debated in the backround, Gregory was more keen on listening to the progession of the battle itself. "I want to know how the battle is progressing out on the frontier..just how are the 3rd and 5th Fleets doing.." It was a good question, and if any of his advisors knew anything they'd have said rather well. With the Spectre having been forced to retreat, the warships of the Federal Space Fleet began to shift their fire onto the remaining three Dreadnaughts. Shots intensified and criss crossed one another in the blackness of space as their shields were struck with everything from fusion warheads on missiles to mass driver and plasma rounds. Admiral Towne wondered how the Aumanii were fairing in the fight..he was to busy focused on trying to find out what had happened to the missing battlegroup to keep tabs on them. But such was the case of a massive fleet engagement, they'd have to worry about themselves for the time being.

OOC:

This thread still exists...this conflict is sitll going on...but frankly, if Crimmond you wank to keep going on in other threads ignoring this one then fine. I'll just ignore you and the entire situation all together.