Siege of Noveria
From FABT
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Ice Peaks of Hindenfargh / Noveria / Pax / Horse Head Nebula (surface) | ||||||||||||||||
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Outcome: |
Strategic Hierarchy victory
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Noveria is recaptured by the Council | ||||||||||||||||
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Engagements: |
First Battle of Noveria | ||||||||||||||||
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The Siege of Noveria was a large-scale siege and blockade of the krogan-occupied planet Noveria by forces of the Turian Hierarchy that lasted from 9 December 753 CE to 12 January 754 CE, and was the main engagement of the Noverian campaign of the Krogan Rebellions. By the time of the siege, the turians had joined both the galactic community and the war four years earlier, countering the Tuchankan Empire's overwhelming military power with their own, causing krogan advances in every theater to quickly slow and stall. While the krogan offensives had lost much of their momentum, however, their forces continued to enjoy fresh supplies of troops due to rapid krogan breeding and supplements of vorcha troops, and while the turians were finally able to counter their efforts with their own supply of well disciplined armies and fleets, krogan manpower still proved to outmatch anything the Council could muster, and one famous krogan general, Urdnot Seg, quickly earned himself a reputation among the turians, who eventually labelled him a priority number one target for assassination. Turian military intelligence gathered information on Seg to aid this objective, and it was surmized, through an analysis of Seg's battle tactics and rationale, that the krogan general was always better when on the offensive. It was here that Prefect Furilea Lupilin devised a plan to eliminate Seg's 5th Warband, wanting to pin down and trap Seg into a defensive posture, where his usual tactics and brute force strategy would be rendered unusable. Lupilin's plan was bold, but the prefect did not await for approval before gathering her Eighth Fleet and making a push.
As predicted, Seg launched a fresh offensive against the Apien Crest, with Admiral Graken Dhal taking a large task force from his Aralakh Fleet to assault Digeris. Furilea Lupilin's forces attacked Dhal's ships in the rear, and while Dhal managed to damage several vessels and destroy over a dozen capital ships, the turians won the day, and Seg was forced to withdraw his invasion. This time however, Lupilin did not allow him to escape, and relentlessly ordered her Eighth Fleet to pursue the remnant's of Seg's fleet out of turian space and through krogan occupied territory. Seg, tired of fleeing, finally bunkered down on Noveria, where Lupilin swiftly established a blockade and jammed Seg's communications. With Seg cut off from reinforcements, Lupilin spent the next month wittling down Seg's men with orbital bombardment, infantry assaults, and attacks on his surface-based supply convoys. Lupilin knew Seg would grow tired of being on the defensive eventually, so she ordered her surface troops to dig in and entrench their positions around Seg's stronghold. Three battles defined the siege: the first time, the turians launched a mass assault on Seg's fortress, but both sides were fought to a stalemate and withdrew. The second time, a relief force from Dhal's remaining troops attempted to smash the blockade, only for Lupilin's troops to repeat the same tactics Dhal had used on Digeris and force the remaining krogan ships into retreat, at the same time a small probing attack was launched by Seg, only to be repulsed as well. On the third and final time, just as Lupilin predicted, Seg gathered his remaining army and charged head first into the turian siege lines. The fighting was the bloodiest of the siege, with thousands of troops being killed on both sides. While the krogan, supported by a small contingent of vorcha boom-squads, were able to temporarily overwhelm the turian positions, as well as kill the presiding officer over the operation, Seg himself was ambushed and killed by a Blackwatch unit, and surgical orbital bombardment, combined with air strikes from passing bombers from above, left the krogan outnumbered. The rest of the remaining krogan forces were ordered to retreat by Urdnot Jarrod, and were able to evade turian forces and escape the planet.
The siege was rendered tactically irrelevant by krogan advances across the many theaters of the war, and the genophage would eventually prove to be the crippling blow needed to defeat the krogan at all. However, the death of a powerful krogan warlord and the annihilation of an entire warband proved to be a propaganda victory for the turians, who broadcasted footage of Seg's body being dragged before Lupilin and stripped of its armor (an insult among krogan) across Council space, sparking a major morale boost for all Council races, not just the turians. It also demonstrated the martial prowess of the turians, who became the first to successfully kill a powerful krogan warlord, and would go on to kill many more, including Juntor Moro, "the Renegade", himself. While not the knockout blow many wanted it to be, it proved finally that even the most fearsome krogan generals were not invincible, and that the war could yet be won. Lupilin's actions raised her to hero status amongst the Hierarchy, and the Blackwatch responsible for killing Seg would be nicknamed the "Noverian Brawlers" from that point forward.