Fourth Rachni War
From FABT
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1 March 48 CE - 15 July 53 CE | ||||||||||||||||
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Decisive Tuchankan victory
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Ninmah, Kepler Verge, Caleston Rift, Phoenix Massing, Pylos Nebula, Hades Nexus, Nubian Expanse and Styx Theta clusters fall under joint Council-Krogan occupation.
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- "The fourth and final war was as one-sided as the first one, but this time the roles were reversed. Both sides had developed terrible weapons and tactics with which we waged war on each other, but our STG had finally come across a weapon that would end the wars for good. STG holds many of the records of their observations on Tuchanka as state secrets, but Uplift is hardly a secret to us. Back then, I'm sure many considered the consequences of uplifting a brutal race of warriors and monsters, but one cannot allow themselves to view history through a modern lense. At the time, the krogan were our best hope, and they seemed all too willing to accept the gifts we gave them and to turn their thirst for war away from themselves, and to allow us to point it towards the rachni. Finally, those creatures had met their match, and when war was joined, it was like a clash of beasts. Both sides fought each other to a bloody stalemate, until the krogan gradually overwhelmed the rachni and drove them back into the heart of their space. And with a mandate to achieve victory at any cost, the krogan were given free reign to meticulously and ruthlessly dismantle and destroy the rachni war machine. I'm sure, at the time, the Council had wanted the krogan to simply obliterate the rachni military and force them to the negotiating table...but as we later came to realize, the krogan cannot be tamed. We gave them the hammer, but we forgot who was swinging it. The krogan flushed out every single rachni, killed every single queen, and laid waste to the entirety of Suen. When the dust cleared...the rachni were no more. Were we sorry that an entire race had been driven to extinction? At the time, I stress...I don't believe so."
- — A salarian teacher on the Fourth Rachni War.
The Fourth Rachni War, also known as the Krogan-Rachni War, was a major conflict between the newborn Tuchankan Empire with the support of the Citadel Council and the First Rachni Collective fought between 1 March 48 CE to 15 July 53 CE that served as the fourth and concluding phase of the Rachni Wars. Three wars with the rachni had left both sides reeling militarily, but none more so than the Council, who had suffered losses so horrendous that it had exhausted their military apparatus and left them without a hope of ever going on the offensive again, while the rachni were quickly and readily rebuilding the numbers they had lost. The Council knew it was an unwinnable fight, not without an immense amount of manpower and material that they simply didn't have access to, not to mention the salarian and asari militaries were still relatively new to the business of waging interstellar war, especially as the rachni were their first extraterrestrial enemy. The Salarian Union had suffered the most, with the loss of so many of its colonies and the cost inflicted upon its military leaving it in economically dire straits, relying heavily on the Asari Republics, whose own colonies were far from the front lines of the war, for military support and economic relief. Both sides knew the wars would continue until one triumphed over the other, but the Council was clearly not going to be victorious. Solutions were sought, and desperation turned to unconventional approaches, such as a new species that had yet to achieve space travel, but was practically on the Council's doorstep.
Since 31 BCE, the salarian STG had been observing Tuchanka and its dominant species, the krogan, who had suffered through a horrific nuclear war many centuries before that left their global society devastated and setting back their efforts to explore space by millenia. While the STG's science division had engaged in civilian observation of the krogan for many years before the Rachni Wars, the Director of the STG handed over jurisdiction to the military division in 41 CE after the Rachni-Krogan incident, which had ended in a massacre for the rachni and a victory for the technologically inferior krogan. Seeing their value as shock troops and a potential weapon to bring the rachni to defeat, the Director drew up a plan to uplift the krogan and helping them build up a military within five years and approached the salarian government. Ordinarily, such a plan would have required much more scrutiny, and some historians argue that had the Council convened and discussed the issue at length as was procedure, it's likely the krogan solution would have been rejected, or at the very least regulated. However, losses after the Third Rachni War meant the salarian military was effectively exhausted, and the asari alone couldn't make up the difference. As a result, Project Uplift was approved and began in late 41 CE, starting with first contact, then the gradual introduction of technological innovation to the krogan. In exchange for uplifting the krogan and their agreement to wage war on the rachni (the STG made extensive use of propaganda, including the lie that the rachni planned to return and eradicate all life on Tuchanka), the salarians established towers known as "Shrouds", which were large towers that helped to microterraform planetary atmospheres in a short space of time: the Shrouds helped to stabilize Tuchanka's atmosphere, and heavily reduced the radioactivity globally, and while this occurred, the salarians helped to unite the remaining krogan clans. In mid 42 CE, the Tuchankan Empire was established, with imperial rule bringing the remaining krogan in line and bringing an official end to the Neverending Night. By 45 CE, the krogan had progressed at a rate not even the STG had predicted, repopulating many abandoned cities whilst fielding enormous armies, and beginning work on a navy, while the first krogan ambassador arrived on the Citadel to facilitate the krogan's introduction to the galactic community. Any lingering hesitation towards the plan on the asari's part was swept away. Finally, with the use of salarian vessels, the first krogan troops shipped out from Tuchanka in salarian transports, heading for the Eastern Line. By 47 CE, over 12 million krogan troops had arrived at the Line, with another 40 million slated to be deployed in the following years. STG briefed the krogan commanders on the rachni, and shared all the intel they had on them. The stage was set for a final conclusive battle.
In 48 CE, the krogan had decided the time was ripe for attack. The salarians argued for patience, wanting to wait until more troops could be brought up, but the krogan warlord in charge of the enormous force, Gatatog Hukara, held no such qualms and gave orders to begin their assault. The rachni had been ready for a renewed Council offensive ever since they were initially taken by surprise in the last war, deploying dozens of their new dreadnought-class vessels with hundreds of escorts in preparation for an attack. However, the rachni had been expecting a coordinated, cautious assault, and when the krogan came rushing in, their ferocity and aggression stunned the rachni, as it echoed their own tactics. The rachni quickly recovered and pressed the attack, and while it seemed their center would hold against the krogan onslaught, Hukara had held a large portion of his ships in reserve and sent them in. Battle of Tregegard, also known as the "Selemani Clash", was strategically inconclusive, but a tactical victory for the krogan, who had destroyed the vast majority of the rachni fleet, including six dreadnoughts, whilst damaging two others. The krogan utilized unconventional tactics in the battle, turning eight transports into battering rams to smash the rachni's forward escort line, exposing the dreadnoughts long enough for four dreadnoughts to be destroyed via transports carrying jury-rigged nuclear VBIEDs that impacted them at FTL, while another two had fully-manned transports ram into them, with krogan troops boarding the vessels and destroying them from the inside out. When Huraka was critcized by the Council for the pointless waste of so many of their ships, Huraka reportedly pointed to the results and said "I granted you a victory, a crushing defeat for them. Give our ships guns, or I will make use of what I have." As a result, the STG approved the modification of the rest of the transports to be outfitted with ship-to-ship armaments for future naval engagements.
The rachni retaliated by dispatching a large fleet to Tuchanka, hoping to finish what they had started. However, just as had happened before (but now with equal technological capability), the krogan decimated the rachni invasion forces, and their first warships battled and defeated the rachni vessels in orbit, leading to a major krogan victory, as well as marking the last time the rachni would ever go on the offensive: the tide had officially turned. The krogan wasted no time in pressing the attack, focusing their efforts on pushing up the center of rachni territory, with the aim of splitting their empire into two in order to divide their power in half. After a series of further naval defeats, the rachni saw what they were doing and tried to hold the line at the Battle of Geofaphus in early 49 CE, where they concentrated the majority of their remaining naval strength in an effort to beat back the krogan attack. The rachni beat back three of the four krogan assaults, until finally fresh krogan warships arrived, spearheaded by the krogan's first dreadnought, who engaged the rachni flagship directly in a ship-to-ship broadside that saw both sides boarding each other in an effort to gain the advantage. The fourth and final assault finally broke the rachni's defenses when the rachni flagship was destroyed. The battle broke the back of the rachni navy, with only a couple dreadnoughts and a hundred capital ships surviving the battle: it is considered one of the largest naval battles in galactic history. For the rest of the war, the krogan would have naval superiority.
With the rachni's naval forces decimated, the Council felt they had been sufficiently dealt a crippling blow and that they could finally be forced to the negotiating table. However, they soon realized that the salarian propaganda had been far too effective, and the second failed rachni attack on Tuchanka had only reinforced the threat the krogan believed they posed. As a result, the krogan refused to stand down, and fought on, taking the fight to the surface as they dispatched millions of troops to invade and conquer rachni hive worlds, once former Council planets. Council officials failed to convince the krogan government to stand down, the latter of which argued the rachni were now a krogan security concern: with their own militaries severely depleted, they were unable to strong arm the krogan, and some theorize the Council were secretly glad to be rid of their enemy once and for all. The krogan continued their ruthless campaign, with military engagements giving way to mass genocide. World after world was either obliterated from orbit or smoked out, with krogan troops venturing deep into rachni hives to kill the queens and raze them from the inside out. What few rachni ships remained were recalled to defend Suen, leaving entire rachni colonies defenseless against the continued and relentless krogan offensives. Eventually, the rachni were completely pushed back to their home system, where they made a desperate last stand. The Battle of Maskim Xul saw the destruction of the remaining rachni fleet, and the ensuing Siege of Suen lasted an entire year before the final rachni nest's defenses were breached and the Starsinger slain by Nartak Shiagur. After the battle, the krogan hunted down every single last rachni, and by the end of 53 CE, it was believed the rachni had been driven to extinction.
After the war, the krogan and Council agreed to divide up the newly recaptured territories, including the new territories formerly belonging to the rachni, although the resulting deal saw the majority of these territories falling into krogan hands, later to be called the Krogan Bloc. The krogan were called the saviors of the galaxy, and a statue was built in the Presidium to commerorate their actions. The krogan were celebrated by the salarians and asari very briefly, lasting only three decades before the beginning of the Renegade Crisis in 86 CE, where public opinion turned against the krogan, seeing their hero status degenerate into being viewed as warmongers and aggressors. As a result, many consider the Fourth Rachni War to be only a prelude to what was to come, and the Council would pay dearly for their desperation hundreds of years later.