Author Topic: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.  (Read 2937 times)

Caturix

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Greetings :),

I've got a few questions about the fate of the 2nd Regulan Hussars:

- In May 3071, the 49th Division attacked, and wiped them out on Wallis masquerading as Marik Commowealth units.
   
    -- Would the 49th Shadow division have used Celestials ?

    -- If so, wouldn't that have given them away as Wob troops ?

    -- When was the truth known, and how ?

- Destroying the 2nd Regulan Hussars, and among them the GMAB, should have taken a heavy toll on the 49th Shadow Division; however, just a year after, the Blakist Unit attacked and razed Regulus in June 3072, clashing with the elite 1st Regulan Hussars.
How did they replenish their TO&E so fast ?
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Tai Dai Cultist

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #1 on: 23 April 2017, 12:30:56 »
Some thoughts about Celestials and false flag ops:

As a Shadow Division, I would expect they had their share of Celestials.  I also would not expect that they'd have substituted those Celestials for OPSEC purposes.

Now I'm not fully familiar with the incident on Wallis in question, but I'm presuming when you describe the Hussars as being "wiped out" you mean exactly that.  Seems perfectly plausible a scenario for the Jihad...  And if so, then consider what evidence actually leaks off of Wallis that falsely implicated the Marik Commonwealth, as those who actually saw the WoB troops (and any Celestials) are "wiped out".  In order for word to get out that the Marik Commonwealth was responsible for the attack, with no survivors to make the accusation, it had to be outgoing communications/signals intelligence that escapes the world. 

And I have no trouble at all seeing the Word of Blake forging communications/SIGINT that covers their tracks.  Far as I'm concerned, they needn't even have painted their mechs purple.  Just photoshop that stuff in on the holovids that "escape" the world.

Sir Chaos

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #2 on: 24 April 2017, 04:29:11 »
Some thoughts about Celestials and false flag ops:

As a Shadow Division, I would expect they had their share of Celestials.  I also would not expect that they'd have substituted those Celestials for OPSEC purposes.

Now I'm not fully familiar with the incident on Wallis in question, but I'm presuming when you describe the Hussars as being "wiped out" you mean exactly that.  Seems perfectly plausible a scenario for the Jihad...  And if so, then consider what evidence actually leaks off of Wallis that falsely implicated the Marik Commonwealth, as those who actually saw the WoB troops (and any Celestials) are "wiped out".  In order for word to get out that the Marik Commonwealth was responsible for the attack, with no survivors to make the accusation, it had to be outgoing communications/signals intelligence that escapes the world. 

And I have no trouble at all seeing the Word of Blake forging communications/SIGINT that covers their tracks.  Far as I'm concerned, they needn't even have painted their mechs purple.  Just photoshop that stuff in on the holovids that "escape" the world.

Some conveniently-forgotten-to-salvage-before-leaving-the-planet wreckage in Marik Commonwealth colors, maybe dead bodies of actual Marik Commonwealth personnel (or just some dead guys in Marik Commonwealth uniforms) also go a long way towards making a false flag operation more believable.
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Don Lunardi

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #3 on: 24 April 2017, 09:46:19 »
Some conveniently-forgotten-to-salvage-before-leaving-the-planet wreckage in Marik Commonwealth colors, maybe dead bodies of actual Marik Commonwealth personnel (or just some dead guys in Marik Commonwealth uniforms) also go a long way towards making a false flag operation more believable.

Though to be fair, when a unit is "Wiped Out", that rarely means completely killed off but rather taking losses severe enough to render it combat ineffective.  There would likely be survivors, even if it was just a small percentage of the unit, who could have observed and reported on the use of non-standard Marik kit such as Celestials
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JadeHellbringer

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #4 on: 24 April 2017, 11:15:54 »
In terms of the Celestials, I'd think that they'd leave them at home and use more Marik-themed gear (Seraphs out, Awesomes in, etc.)- that said, another possibility is to use false-flag troops as the opening stab in the back, THEN send in a second wave of forces (including Celestials, Demons, etc.) once the surprise is out in the open.

(That said, now I totally want to pick up a Grigori and paint it in Marik Militia markings.  ;D )
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Vition2

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #5 on: 24 April 2017, 12:18:57 »
As others have said, it is likely that they had some celestial series 'mechs.  But the Shadow Divisions were well versed in false-flag operations, they would have left any identifying units behind, while attacking with ones that would appear commonwealth.  An option though, is that the successor states have been in crash construction mode for almost 2 decades, most higher level commanders wouldn't bat an eye at new unseen 'mechs.  As the jihad continued, things would fall into place though.

It also wouldn't surprise me that most of the Shadow Divisions actually had significant amounts of spare units to support false-flag ops and their transition in to more open-combat missions.


- Destroying the 2nd Regulan Hussars, and among them the GMAB, should have taken a heavy toll on the 49th Shadow Division; however, just a year after, the Blakist Unit attacked and razed Regulus in June 3072, clashing with the elite 1st Regulan Hussars.
How did they replenish their TO&E so fast ?

I have to note that just because a unit is famous doesn't necessarily mean that it is good.  In particular, the 2nd Regulan Hussars are rated as regular in Field Manual: Updates (circa 3067), while the Shadow Divisions were often rated as Elite - and could often be said to be hyper-elite, as their implants could make them extremely effective.  Additionally, a WoB Division had twice as many units as they typical house regiment allowing themselves to bring greater amounts of firepower to a location.

And going back to what I said earlier, it wouldn't be surprising if they had extra equipment available to them.

Tai Dai Cultist

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #6 on: 24 April 2017, 12:25:28 »
Another thing to keep in mind is that your average BattleTech fan has way more competence at identifying mechs (and who likes to use said mechs) than most people of the BTU.

How many of you (who have never served in say, armored forces) could spot the "obvious" problem of seeing a Japanese tank in Russian colors?  A British tank in German colors? 

Factor in the essentially infinite combination of factions (House Army sub factions, mercs, private noble forces, corporate forces)  and available unit types (how many hundreds of different kinds of mechs are there even w/o going into variants?) and your BT fan who can identify almost any mech from a glance probably can do a feat that is rarely duplicated even by characters within the setting.  Especially for a character who's not military intel by trade.

Sir Chaos

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #7 on: 25 April 2017, 12:32:22 »
Another thing to keep in mind is that your average BattleTech fan has way more competence at identifying mechs (and who likes to use said mechs) than most people of the BTU.

How many of you (who have never served in say, armored forces) could spot the "obvious" problem of seeing a Japanese tank in Russian colors?  A British tank in German colors? 

Factor in the essentially infinite combination of factions (House Army sub factions, mercs, private noble forces, corporate forces)  and available unit types (how many hundreds of different kinds of mechs are there even w/o going into variants?) and your BT fan who can identify almost any mech from a glance probably can do a feat that is rarely duplicated even by characters within the setting.  Especially for a character who's not military intel by trade.

How many of us have a built-in computer that can identify a unit it sees? How many of us have built in battle ROM recordings that can later be used to show what units were encountered?

If the 2nd Regulan Hussars were a pure PBI unit with nothing but the foot sloggers´ eyes and memories to rely on, yeah, you´d be right. But they had ´Mechs, which use more sophisticated equiment.
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Archangel

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #8 on: 25 April 2017, 20:35:09 »
Just some thoughts to take under consideration:

-Just because the Celestials were available doesn't mean that the 49th was issued any.  The Master could have had them stockpiled on Gibson until after Naamah completed her mission.

-The 49th could have caught the 2nd Regulan Hussars by surprise just as the Seventeenth Donegal Guards RCT caught the elite Sixth Lyran Guards RCT by surprise.  The unit could have been broken before most of its warriors even got to their machines.  The few that did would easily have been overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of enemies before they could get themselves organized.  Due to their rogue operation on Gibson, the 2nd Regulan Hussars had the worst upgrade rating of any FWLM unit.  Like all the other Regulan Hussars, the 2nd Regulan Hussars expelled a number of their warriors from the unit including their commanding officer.  They could have been further weakened by transfers to other (more combat ready) Regulan units to replace warriors those units had expelled from their ranks.  All of these could have limited their combat effectiveness and thus limited their ability to inflict damage upon the 49th Shadow Division.

-Aside from the possibility of someone from the 2nd Regulan Hussars surviving (perhaps coming back from liberty), they would have also have to have considered the possibility of some security footage being overlooked, militia elements, or simply a civilian, spotting them.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #9 on: 25 April 2017, 22:03:35 »
Another thing to keep in mind is that your average BattleTech fan has way more competence at identifying mechs (and who likes to use said mechs) than most people of the BTU.

How many of you (who have never served in say, armored forces) could spot the "obvious" problem of seeing a Japanese tank in Russian colors?  A British tank in German colors? 

Factor in the essentially infinite combination of factions (House Army sub factions, mercs, private noble forces, corporate forces)  and available unit types (how many hundreds of different kinds of mechs are there even w/o going into variants?) and your BT fan who can identify almost any mech from a glance probably can do a feat that is rarely duplicated even by characters within the setting.  Especially for a character who's not military intel by trade.
I disagree with that assessment. Think of it this way: Battlemechs and common tanks are probably advertised like Cars. TV and Online advertising certainly exist in the BTU. I see nothing wrong with the idea of flipping thru a 100 channels and seeing at least one commercial for this year's new AWS-10KM Awesome right after a commercial for Space Pampers... 'mech knowledge would be not greater than what most of us commonly know about military equipment used in RL...

pensiveswetness

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #10 on: 25 April 2017, 22:05:02 »
as for the 49th SD: they could have borrowed equipment from another unit to be able to properly employ the fake...

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #11 on: 25 April 2017, 22:37:03 »
The other thing is this . . .

 . . . interstellar communication is problematic.  The League has broken up, and so if they DID see new machines- how would they know they were not Marik Commonwealth designs if they sport the right colors?

IMO its a good chance they would be the only Blakist equipment on the raid- IE no Lightrays but sure a Preta.
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Caturix

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #12 on: 26 April 2017, 16:08:24 »
Hi everyone,

Thanks for your advices.

 A bit of precision, however:

- " The 49th Shadow Division first appeared in combat on Wallis in May 3071, disguised in Marik Commonwealth colors. They successfully setup the Commonwealth to take the blame for the destruction of the 2nd Regulan Hussars, leaving no survivors" Sarna net/Jihad Secrets: the Blake documents

- " It was on Wallis on the 22nd of May 3071 that the Second Regulan Hussars were attacked and destroyed by troops originally believed to be from the Free Worlds League Military, but who were later discovered to have been elements of the Forty-ninth Shadow Division in disguise. " Sarna net / Jihad Hotspot: 3076.

-  The  unit was reassigned to Goth Khakar, a system along the Periphery border. This tough world allowed the Second time to regroup and recover. After rebuilding to regimental strength, they served as escorts for diplomats heading to the Niops Association as well as pirate hunters. " Sarna net / Field Manual Updates.

So it is unlikely that the 2nd Regulan Hussars went down without a fight, hence there should be quite some losses in the Blakists ranks, even if they got a lot of salvages, where did they find the manpower, and the time to train their new recruits enough so that one year later only they did strike again, against a very good if not Elite unit (the 1st Regulan Hussars) , and beat them ?

It is also unlikely they were taken by surprise as there was already a state of distrust between the Free Worlds League member states deep enough that the arrival of a Marik unit would at best be seen with suspicion, if not open hostility.

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #13 on: 26 April 2017, 21:14:45 »
Field Manual Updates has a in-universe date of 3067, so that entry does not matter for your question.  You want to look at FM3085, which says they actually dumped their LCCC imposed personnel on Goth Khakar as they mutinied for Regulus.  It says the weakened unit was wiped out and Cameron-Jones vowed to rebuild them which was done through transfers of experienced troops from junior Hussars regiment.  They honored their predecessors by added 'the Vindicated' to the old logo.

No state of war existed and so it would have been relatively easy for them to sneak in and get the first shots in.

Be interesting to see a campaign play out of the survivors of the 2nd trying to break contact and yet be hunted down to the last man . . . would ejection be disabled after Hussar see fellow pilots burned as they hang below a parachute?  Injured men ground beneath mech's feet?
Colt Ward
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Arkansas Warrior

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #14 on: 26 April 2017, 21:44:09 »
Another thing to keep in mind is that your average BattleTech fan has way more competence at identifying mechs (and who likes to use said mechs) than most people of the BTU.

How many of you (who have never served in say, armored forces) could spot the "obvious" problem of seeing a Japanese tank in Russian colors?  A British tank in German colors? 

Factor in the essentially infinite combination of factions (House Army sub factions, mercs, private noble forces, corporate forces)  and available unit types (how many hundreds of different kinds of mechs are there even w/o going into variants?) and your BT fan who can identify almost any mech from a glance probably can do a feat that is rarely duplicated even by characters within the setting.  Especially for a character who's not military intel by trade.
But the Regulan Hussars were part of the armed forces.  The military has been training in recognizing enemy units since at least what, WWII?  Flash cards with silhouettes of enemy planes, tanks, etc, are practically cliche at this point, to say nothing of the automatic recognition software mech computers seem to sport (remember the scene early in the BoK trilogy where the IS mech's computer kept going back and forth about whether a Timber Wolf was a Marauder or Catapult?).
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #15 on: 26 April 2017, 22:02:15 »
None of the 2nd's troops and likely support survived the encounter.  What ROMs may have been left on the battlefield would have shown exactly what the Shadows wanted to be seen.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #16 on: 27 April 2017, 01:12:10 »
Hi everyone,

Thanks for your advices.

 A bit of precision, however:

- " The 49th Shadow Division first appeared in combat on Wallis in May 3071, disguised in Marik Commonwealth colors. They successfully setup the Commonwealth to take the blame for the destruction of the 2nd Regulan Hussars, leaving no survivors" Sarna net/Jihad Secrets: the Blake documents

- " It was on Wallis on the 22nd of May 3071 that the Second Regulan Hussars were attacked and destroyed by troops originally believed to be from the Free Worlds League Military, but who were later discovered to have been elements of the Forty-ninth Shadow Division in disguise. " Sarna net / Jihad Hotspot: 3076.

Neither of these consolidated quotes gives any indication as to how hard they fought or how much damage they inflicted upon the Forty-ninth.

Quote
-  The  unit was reassigned to Goth Khakar, a system along the Periphery border. This tough world allowed the Second time to regroup and recover. After rebuilding to regimental strength, they served as escorts for diplomats heading to the Niops Association as well as pirate hunters. " Sarna net / Field Manual Updates.

While they rebuilt to regimental strength, "its equipment is generally that cast off by other units, resulting in the lowest percentage of upgraded machines in any FWLM 'Mech unit." (FM:U, p158)  In addition, the regiment expelled a number of warriors including their commanding officers when they declared their support for Cameron-Jones.

Quote
So it is unlikely that the 2nd Regulan Hussars went down without a fight, hence there should be quite some losses in the Blakists ranks, even if they got a lot of salvages, where did they find the manpower, and the time to train their new recruits enough so that one year later only they did strike again, against a very good if not Elite unit (the 1st Regulan Hussars) , and beat them ?

 ???  You do realize that they had an ongoing training program that started long before the Jihad started?  The replacements assigned to the Forty-Ninth likely started their training before the unit even hit Wallis with most completing their training before the unit returned to Gibson.  There was nothing to stop Apollyon from reassigning warriors originally slated for one unit to another if he felt the need.

I can't think of a single military that waits to start training replacements until a unit submits a request for replacements.

Quote
It is also unlikely they were taken by surprise as there was already a state of distrust between the Free Worlds League member states deep enough that the arrival of a Marik unit would at best be seen with suspicion, if not open hostility.

Uhm...The Sixth Lyran Guards RCT were not only on the active Clan front but were actively monitoring the Seventeenth Donegal Guards RCT and yet the Seventeenth were still able to launch a surprise attack on the Sixth.  Despite having already experienced two Blakist attacks on Sian (the orbital bombardment and the first invasion) during the Jihad, the planetary defenders were still caught by surprise by the Blakists' second invasion attempt in 3074 and were on the verge of being overrun before the White Tigers turned on their allies.  Both the ISF and the Masikirovka were actively monitoring the exercises performed by the AFFS and the LCAF but still were caught by surprise when they invaded the Capellan Confederation and Draconis Combine, respectively.  There are many more examples of units being taken by surprise despite being aware of the potential danger.

We have no idea what state of readiness the new unit commander had them at.  If he, or she, wasn't expecting an attack she could have had them at a relaxed state of readiness leaving the unit ill-prepared for an attack.  After all a unit can't be constantly be kept at a heightened state of readiness before it starts to wear aware the unit's edge.  The Blakists could also have sent a hit team to eliminate the Second's senior officer.  With them dead or incapacitated there would have been nobody to rally the unit into a cohesive fighting force

You are assuming that 49th Division was spotted on their way in.  What if they were already on the planet like the Blakist forces during the 3074 attack on Sian?  Or were able to somehow evade detection like the Forty-Third MD Division on Radstadt?  The Blakists had been on Wallis for more than two decades (manning the planetary HPG).  How hard do you think it would have been for them to sabotage the planetary sensor grid (assuming they even needed to)?

Once also can't forget the possibility that the Blakists sent a strike team to decapitate the unit right before the attack.  With the senior officers dead/incapacitated there would have been nobody to rally the unit into a cohesive fighting force.

Basically there are a myriad of possibilities of how the Forty-Ninth Shadow Division could have overwhelmed the 2nd Regulan Hussars while limiting their own casualties.  There simply isn't enough information about the battle to conclusively say one way or the other.  I could be right or I could be completely wrong.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #17 on: 27 April 2017, 02:18:53 »
But the Regulan Hussars were part of the armed forces.  The military has been training in recognizing enemy units since at least what, WWII?  Flash cards with silhouettes of enemy planes, tanks, etc, are practically cliche at this point, to say nothing of the automatic recognition software mech computers seem to sport (remember the scene early in the BoK trilogy where the IS mech's computer kept going back and forth about whether a Timber Wolf was a Marauder or Catapult?).

There is the minor issue that Celestials weren't widely known at that point and Regulus wasn't exactly into sharing with those parties that had encountered them prior to Wallis.  Wallis was the first major clash between Blakist forces and the Regulans since their first appearance on Terra.  Even if the Regulans had been able to identify Celestials on Wallis, Cameron-Jones, with some urging from his mistress Sonja Amora (aka Naamash), would likely simply have assumed that the Word of Blake gave them to the FWLM unit.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #18 on: 27 April 2017, 04:33:06 »
There is the minor issue that Celestials weren't widely known at that point and Regulus wasn't exactly into sharing with those parties that had encountered them prior to Wallis.  Wallis was the first major clash between Blakist forces and the Regulans since their first appearance on Terra.  Even if the Regulans had been able to identify Celestials on Wallis, Cameron-Jones, with some urging from his mistress Sonja Amora (aka Naamash), would likely simply have assumed that the Word of Blake gave them to the FWLM unit.

They may well have had Celestials. Celestials were pretty distinctive designs, intentionally so - but nobody would have known yet *whose* distinctive designs they were.

The Jihad Hotspots quote says they were later discovered to have been the 49th. That may well mean it took until that unspecified "later" for someone to compare battle ROM footage from the 2nd Regulan Hussars to footage of Celestials operating in known WoB formations.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #19 on: 27 April 2017, 08:08:11 »
There is the minor issue that Celestials weren't widely known at that point and Regulus wasn't exactly into sharing with those parties that had encountered them prior to Wallis.  Wallis was the first major clash between Blakist forces and the Regulans since their first appearance on Terra.  Even if the Regulans had been able to identify Celestials on Wallis, Cameron-Jones, with some urging from his mistress Sonja Amora (aka Naamash), would likely simply have assumed that the Word of Blake gave them to the FWLM unit.
If they were masquerading as Marik Commonwealth forces, it seems less than likely they'd be sporting a lot of so-new-we've-never-seen-them-before WoB omnimechs.  Of course, if they were running all Marik mechs, that rather reduces the value of being able to identify the model of mech in the first place.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #20 on: 27 April 2017, 12:59:45 »
Were not the Vicore Proyect Phoenix mechs beign produced for some time before it was know? IIRC WoB got a big amount of mechs that way (and scrounging every battletefield, depot and yard they know). So, i can not find dificult to the a Shadow Division getting "normal" FWL mechs and doing the false flag attack.
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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #21 on: 27 April 2017, 13:31:19 »
- " The 49th Shadow Division first appeared in combat on Wallis in May 3071, disguised in Marik Commonwealth colors. They successfully setup the Commonwealth to take the blame for the destruction of the 2nd Regulan Hussars, leaving no survivors" Sarna net/Jihad Secrets: the Blake documents


this suggests that the evidence the Marik commonwealth performed it had to have come from battlerom's and the odd surviving civilian witness. since such records would be examined pretty thoroughly, any WOB specific or unknown mechs would have been noticed, and put immediate doubt on the identity of the attackers.

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Re: A few questions about Wallis,3071 and the 49th Shadow Division.
« Reply #22 on: 27 April 2017, 14:49:46 »
Why would it make the identity be doubted?  The Regulans at the time had their own R&D programs going and would introduce their own equipment in the coming years- Patriot comes to mind especially since it was renamed.  The Commonwealth started off with a huge chunk of the League R&D establishment was in their hands.

But you are right, aside from any civilians who might have saw purple & white painted mechs, the only other evidence would have been from mechs, BA or armor that were 'missed' when the 49th combed the battlefields for the salvage.  I would absolutely say the only ROMs left were ones the Blakists wanted left behind with good reason the salvage was overlooked.  Salvage to replace lost equipment to answer the other OP question.
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Just a quick update.  Apparently there was footage of the fighting between the Nightwalkers and the Second Hussars and recordings of some transmissions made by Dantalion that survived the battle.  Unfortunately neither provided much evidence to their identity other than identifying the as the Nightwalkers.  There are many theories of the unit's origins including them being a new Free Worlds Guards unit (favorite) and them being Blakist imposters (lol).

Per Jihad Hot Spots: 3072 (p39):
-"...with the release of amateur tri-vid of the fierce fighting at the Second Hussars' Gascoigne Plains base..."
-"The oft-replayed footage provides few clues to the unit's identity. Their preferred colors seem to be white, black and purple, and many of their machines appear to hail from League factories..."
-"..their name comes from the almost Clan-like challenge their apparent leader broadcast from his Albatross just before the shooting started..."
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glitterboy2098

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Why would it make the identity be doubted?  The Regulans at the time had their own R&D programs going and would introduce their own equipment in the coming years- Patriot comes to mind especially since it was renamed.  The Commonwealth started off with a huge chunk of the League R&D establishment was in their hands.
because new designs do not appear in a vacuum intelligence wise. there is always evidence that has been gathered by spies and other such means. while often such intel only becomes easy to piece together once the unit has seen some sort of public appearance, there is always a ton of info that intelligence agencies realize connects to a given design. in effect, whe na new vehicle or weapon is deployed, they usually find out they had all the clues all along, and just didn't put parts A and B and C together. development projects are too big of projects to achieve complete secrecy. a lot of times the main reason you can'y easily assemble a picture before hand is just the fact there are usually multiple projects going on, and thus overlapping and conflicting intel. hindsight makes it easier to sort it out.

any new design is going to get subjected to a lot of scrutiny, as they go over the records and leads they had to piece together info on the new design. so a Celestial showing up (or several) is going to have the intel agencies looking at all the marik commonwealth design programs looking for this new design in the works. and when they do not find any evidence of anything of the sort, that is going to be a big red flag that "something is not right", and they'll go over evidence for other nations supplying the mariks and find nothing of the sort either, another red flag.

the false flag attack held up to scrutiny for a long time. which means there were no obvious red flags in the examination. which means that there could not have been any WOB or Manei Domini specific designs in the force.

(and i do not believe that the WOB would be able to sanitize the battlezones as thoroughly as you seem to be assuming. by their very nature battlezones are messy things and it is easy to miss things. especially when you do not have an infinite amount of time to scour all possible locations. while their end goals are still cloaked in mystery, and they made some serious strategic gaffes, one thing the WOB was not was sloppy about operational security. they would have made sure that even in the off chance they did miss something, they'd have minimized the chances of it seeing anything that would compromise their cover. which means no WOB/MD designs. Marik Commonwealth slang, radio codes, and callsigns even behind encrypted comms, not just the 'planted' messages with weaker encryption they want the enemy to find. etc.)

Archangel

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because new designs do not appear in a vacuum intelligence wise. there is always evidence that has been gathered by spies and other such means. while often such intel only becomes easy to piece together once the unit has seen some sort of public appearance, there is always a ton of info that intelligence agencies realize connects to a given design. in effect, whe na new vehicle or weapon is deployed, they usually find out they had all the clues all along, and just didn't put parts A and B and C together. development projects are too big of projects to achieve complete secrecy. a lot of times the main reason you can'y easily assemble a picture before hand is just the fact there are usually multiple projects going on, and thus overlapping and conflicting intel. hindsight makes it easier to sort it out.

any new design is going to get subjected to a lot of scrutiny, as they go over the records and leads they had to piece together info on the new design. so a Celestial showing up (or several) is going to have the intel agencies looking at all the marik commonwealth design programs looking for this new design in the works. and when they do not find any evidence of anything of the sort, that is going to be a big red flag that "something is not right", and they'll go over evidence for other nations supplying the mariks and find nothing of the sort either, another red flag.

There are unfortunately several issues with your claims.  One, the Celestials were developed in the Sol System which was one of the most secure systems in the Inner Sphere.  Two, Doctor Cortland developed them at the direct command of Apollyon himself after Case WHITE so they were likely developed under strict security.  Three, Cortland had all the resources he needed to develop them within the Sol System and no need to bring any outside (located outside the Terran system) corporations into the loop and risk compromising security that way. Four, the RSS had nowhere near the resources that the FWL SAFE had and were likely overwhelmed with taskings at the beginning of the Jihad (infiltrating the Marik Commonwealth and Duchy of Oriente, policing loyalty within the ranks of the Regulan Hussars and within their own ranks as well, securing Regulus' nuclear arsenal, etc) and infiltrating the Sol system was easily outside their capabilities that early in the war.  Focusing their efforts and limited resources within FWL to secure their position rather than try to infiltrate the Sol system is only logical.  Remember Corinne didn't cede Gibson to Apollyon until after the attack on Wallis.  Finally, by the start of the Jihad, the WoB had been in control of the FWL's HPG network for over two decades.  With them in control news from outside the FWL would have been limited.  Not to mention the Whiteout which disrupted the HPG network.

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the false flag attack held up to scrutiny for a long time. which means there were no obvious red flags in the examination. which means that there could not have been any WOB or Manei Domini specific designs in the force.

Doesn't necessarily mean that.  The Word of Blake did gift some WoB 'Mechs to the FWLM as well as units they trained closely with (and usually comprised in the process).  One also can't forget that the WoB had supported Paul's plan to put Corinne Marik into power.  The RSS could easily have assumed that the WoB was continuing to support Corinne's forces if they did identify any WoB 'Mechs within the vids.  It wouldn't take much to make Duke Cameron-Jones believe that especially with Naamah whispering little lies into his ear.

Quote
(and i do not believe that the WOB would be able to sanitize the battlezones as thoroughly as you seem to be assuming. by their very nature battlezones are messy things and it is easy to miss things. especially when you do not have an infinite amount of time to scour all possible locations. while their end goals are still cloaked in mystery, and they made some serious strategic gaffes, one thing the WOB was not was sloppy about operational security. they would have made sure that even in the off chance they did miss something, they'd have minimized the chances of it seeing anything that would compromise their cover. which means no WOB/MD designs. Marik Commonwealth slang, radio codes, and callsigns even behind encrypted comms, not just the 'planted' messages with weaker encryption they want the enemy to find. etc.)

Actually its very easy to completely sanitize a battlezone and the Word of Blake has used them on several occasions whether intentionally or unintentionally - tactical nuke, biological weapons, orbital bombardment and meteor bombardment.   ;)
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glitterboy2098

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There are unfortunately several issues with your claims.  One, the Celestials were developed in the Sol System which was one of the most secure systems in the Inner Sphere.  Two, Doctor Cortland developed them at the direct command of Apollyon himself after Case WHITE so they were likely developed under strict security.  Three, Cortland had all the resources he needed to develop them within the Sol System and no need to bring any outside (located outside the Terran system) corporations into the loop and risk compromising security that way. Four, the RSS had nowhere near the resources that the FWL SAFE had and were likely overwhelmed with taskings at the beginning of the Jihad (infiltrating the Marik Commonwealth and Duchy of Oriente, policing loyalty within the ranks of the Regulan Hussars and within their own ranks as well, securing Regulus' nuclear arsenal, etc) and infiltrating the Sol system was easily outside their capabilities that early in the war.  Focusing their efforts and limited resources within FWL to secure their position rather than try to infiltrate the Sol system is only logical.  Remember Corinne didn't cede Gibson to Apollyon until after the attack on Wallis.  Finally, by the start of the Jihad, the WoB had been in control of the FWL's HPG network for over two decades.  With them in control news from outside the FWL would have been limited.  Not to mention the Whiteout which disrupted the HPG network.

actually it just reinforces it.. since the Celestials wouldn't match up to anything the Mariks were making, setting off a huge red flag because new designs do not appear from an a vacuum. if the group you believe to be mariks are running around with totally unknown, out of the blue designs, and there are no signs of outside delivery of anything of the sort, it means they aren't Mariks.

Archangel

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actually it just reinforces it.. since the Celestials wouldn't match up to anything the Mariks were making, setting off a huge red flag because new designs do not appear from an a vacuum. if the group you believe to be mariks are running around with totally unknown, out of the blue designs, and there are no signs of outside delivery of anything of the sort, it means they aren't Mariks.

You apparently skipped the second paragraph I wrote specifically with regards to the WoB providing continuing support to Corinne's forces quite possibly including new 'Mechs?
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Wotan

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Who would be responsible to investigate that battles? Most likely SAFE or some other kind of WoB infiltrated league based investigation team? So it is totally in WoB hands to spread the result of a Marik Commonwealth agitation.
Some constructed battle ROM material shouldn't be out of scale for WoB ROM.
Then using some kind of news media and HPG transmission to spread that information within the league. We know the HPG was strongly in WOB control. And i assume a good number of media corporations too.

Do you really see any problem for WoB to make the masses believe in the truth they should?

Archangel

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The only one who would have seriously investigated would be the RSS and the media.  Anybody else would like be arrested by the Regulan authorities andd that would include media that were active supporters of foes of Regulus.
 By early 3071 Paul had declared Corinne Marik the rightful Captain-General, Thomas 'Marik' nee Halas had refused to relinquish his claim and fled to Orient after Paul's coup in 3069 and Kirc Cameron-Jones had declared himself the rightful Captain-General.  By the end of the year, Therese Brett-Marik would declared the Duchy of Tamarind independent after her husband's murder by Richard Steiner.  The Word of Blake/MD didn't actually need to do much to convince Cameron-Jones that either Corinne or Thomas was responsibly, he was likely already inclined to believe that with a little help from Sonja Amora.
Detect evil first, smite second and ask questions later.

 

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