PLAY AIDS

    The General War was the largest and longest conflict ever fought in the Milky Way Galaxy. Volumes have been written on every aspect of the War; this brief outline is intended as a general guide for further research into the subject.
    This history is written primarily from Federation records and, as such, does not cover in any detail those operations that did not directly involve or affect the United Federation of Planets. Even in the case of Federation operations, only the more important and decisive campaigns are covered. (Some minor but well-known incidents are mentioned to provide the reader with a historical context.)

THE FOUR POWERS WAR, Y158-Y162

    The last of the small regional wars involved the Klingons and Lyrans against their enemies, the Kzintis and Hydrans, from Y158 to Y162. The war was savage (being the first to have large numbers of ships involved) but ultimately just another border war as the state of logistics made any deep strikes into enemy territory impossible to support. The logistical systems that would allow such deep attacks were developed in the last days of the Four Powers War, and were perfected in time for the next one.
    The Four Powers War was significant, however, for a radical technological innovation (previously known only to the Hydrans) that changed the galaxy forever: warp engines small enough to power armed shuttles. These rapidly evolved into "fighters" which dominated war for the next two decades. Coupled with the new faster drones, war was about to become more affordable and dangerous.

ASSAULT ON THE KZINTIS, Y168

   The animosity between the Lyrans and Kzintis is perhaps the most famous, and most violent, in the galaxy. Based on economic competition, but worsened by racism, the feud between them had produced several wars over the previous decades. (The Lyrans also have a racial hatred for the Hydrans, and it could be argued that this is actually worse than their animosity toward the Kzintis. It is possible that the Federation-Kzinti friendship has made the Federation more aware of the intra-feline conflict.)
    The Lyrans and Klingons had been negotiating terms for an alliance in a new (regional) war since at least Y166. The objective was to exploit a diplomatic rift between the Kzintis and Hydrans and destroy one of them before the other became involved. The Klingons wanted to attack the Hydrans first, since they were the weaker enemy, had no allies able to provide direct support (unlike the Kzintis who might obtain support from the Federation), and could be defeated more swiftly. The Lyrans were deeply divided among themselves. Some were concerned that the Kzintis, with new drone technology, were rapidly becom-ing too dangerous to ignore.
    Others agreed with the Klingons that it would be better to destroy the weaker Hydrans first. The Klingons had offered the Lyrans various items of new technology (pods, the UIM and DERFACS fire control systems) as an inducement to the Lyrans to accept their war plan. The Lyran Emperor had decided to accept the Klingon plan to attack the Hydrans, despite the strong objections of several of the Dukes and Counts, when a battle between a Lyran and Kzinti cruiser left the Emperor's son dead and the Emperor enraged. The Emperor, combining his rage with the political power of the "anti-Kzinti faction", finally decided on the northern strategy.
    The Klingons (concerned that the Federation might intervene in a second four-powers war and outraged that the Lyrans had effectively changed the Coalition plan) wanted the Lyrans to attack (the Kzintis) first. Both the Lyrans and Klingons began a massive military buildup during Y167-68. The Kzintis were engaged in their own buildup, deploying their new carriers as rapidly as possible. Increased military activity during this period resulted in a succession of small patrol actions along the Lyran-Kzinti and Klingon-Kzinti borders. The most famous of these pre-war battles, ironically, occurred in March Y168 when Lyran and Kzinti ships coincidentally arrived at the same location at the same time to conduct memorial ceremonies for those who gave their lives in the Four Powers War.
    The Lyrans launched their assault in August of Y168 and quickly destroyed the Kzinti border bases. The Kzinti starbase in that sector was saved (temporarily) due to the timely arrival of elements of the Duke's Fleet (from the Klingon border). Those fleet elements had to move back to their own bases in December when the Kzinti intelligence agency WHISKERS found signs of Klingon mobilization. The Kzintis attempted to disrupt the Klingon war preparations with a series of fighter raids, but were not successful in stopping it. The Klingon assault (in January Y169) quickly smashed the border bases and drove the Kzintis back to their capital. Two Coalition assaults on the Kzinti capital in October Y169 and February Y170 left it devastated but uncaptured.
    It is significant to note that the Kzintis did not yet fully trust the Federation and maintained a strong squadron of warships on that border even while their capital was under fire. This may have reflected a fractional dispute within the Kzinti command over just how much of a threat the Federation posed, and there were apparently very real concerns (which lasted for some years) that the Federation would effectively absorb the Kzinti Hegemony under the guise of a protectorate.

THE TWO-FRONT WAR, Y169

    The Hydrans attacked the Lyran border in October Y169 with their Home and Second Fleets. The limited operation was intended to recover disputed territory and to show good faith toward the Kzintis (under their mutual defense pact). Their attack was a carefully planned "time on target" strike, with selected Lyran ships targeted for quick destruction. One Hydran force attempted to slip through LDR space to outflank the Lyran defenses, but the LDR forced the Hydrans back to the border. This incident, the first combat action of the Hydran assault, gave the Lyrans enough advanced warning to avoid the disaster that could have resulted.
    The Hydrans made a strategic mistake, however, in sending their Expeditionary Fleet into Klingon territory in a somewhat curious effort to reach the Federation. This involved the Klingons (who would just as soon have concentrated on capturing the Kzinti capital) in the war against the Hydrans and diverted power away from the Lyrans.
    Had the Hydrans sent the Expeditionary Fleet against the Lyrans instead, they very likely would have conquered most of the Enemy's Blood Duchy while the Klingons simply guarded their own border and watched. (At least until the Kzinti capital fell, at which point the Klingons would doubtless have helped the Lyrans recover their own territory in exchange for a share of Hydran space.)
    In the event, the Expeditionary Fleet was destroyed before it reached Federation space, and the Klingons turned their attention toward the Hydrans. Strategically, the Hydran error may have unwittingly saved the Kzinti capital, and the diversion of Coalition resources to attack the Hydrans may have been one of the first of many small decisions that would ultimately cost the Coalition their long-sought victory.

DEFENSE OF THE FEDERATION, Y168-Y170

    There had been a series of Fed-Klingon clashes going back several decades, but the frequency of such incidents accelerated, including the Klingon raid on Rita's Planet in Y164 and the significant Battle of Adanerg (Y167) which convinced the Federation to enhance its training at the squadron and fleet level. There were brief moments of common cause against threats, most significantly against the inter-galactic Juggernaut in Y168. The Klingons attempted to establish a foothold in Federation territory at Airsis IV in Y168, but Star Fleet forced the Klingons to withdraw. An accident of astrogeography had resulted in the Fed-eration and Klingons both having bases in the Tyson Star Sys-tem, and these clashed in Y169. The tensions escalated sharply when Kumerian led a raid on the Federation colony on Sherman's Planet later that year, and went up another notch when Klingons attacked a Federation tug in the Neutral Zone and sent a huge asteroid toward a Federation colony the next year.
    The Federation had also had several clashes with the Romulans and Tholians, but clashes with the Kzintis and Gorns had all but ceased. There were increasing pirate operations, particularly in the sparsely-patrolled Survey Area.
    It should also be noted that a minor skirmish between the Gorns and Romulans was the first combat action of two captains who would become prominent during the War: Romulan Commander Tiercellus and Gorn Captain S'Treleg.

THE FALL OF THE HYDRANS, Y170

"He who would defend everything, defends nothing."

    The Hydrans were irrevocably committed to the defense of their capital, and this ultimately led to their defeat in the initial stages of the General War. The Hydrans remembered their earlier defeat and the fact that they had only thrown off the yoke of Klingo-Lyran occupation some 35 years earlier. There were many Hydrans still living who remembered the pain of that earlier occupation, and their determination not to allow the home world to undergo occupation again resulted in rigid "die in place" and "no retreat" operations that made defeat inevitable. Holding that capital against the combined Klingon-Lyran assault was impossible, and trying to do so simply allowed the bulk of the Hydran fleet to be trapped and destroyed. (There was apparently some debate within the Hydran command about whether to abandon the capital, but once the Lyrans destroyed the only battle station between the capital and the Old Colonies, retreat became physically impossible and the debate became academic.)
    During the initial mobile stages of the campaign, both the Hydrans and the Coalition launched a series of raids on each other's logistical systems. The Hydrans came off the worse in the exchange. The Hydrans did, however, humiliate the Klingons by capturing the D7 battlecruiser Anarchist and using it in combat against its former masters.
    The Hydrans lost about 20% of their fleet in the ill-fated Expedition, and another 60% in the vain defense of Hydra, leaving only a fraction of their former firepower to escape to the Old Colonies and build again. The Coalition, with no information on the Old Colonies (and thinking that there was relatively little economic base there despite the fact that whatever economy was present had been enough to eject the Klingons and Lyrans a half-century before) elected not to launch a long and possibly endless pursuit into the unknown region. Such a campaign might well have taken two or three years, and there was still a war to be fought in Kzinti space. The Coalition appears to have believed (or at least wanted to believe) that there would be time to follow and wipe out the Hydrans after the Kzinti capital fell.
    The Lyrans (with some Klingon support) attempted to build and maintain a chain of bases to guard against the eventual return of the Hydrans from the Old Colonies. Once the Hydrans had established production facilities in the Old Colonies, they launched a series of raids and strikes that made the five-year "battle of the line" into one of the longest and most desperate of the entire war. It eventually became a "bleeding ulcer" to Coalition strength, draining combat power that could have been better employed on the Kzinti or Federation front. This line of bases held until Y178, when it collapsed, and the Lyrans quickly retreated to the original border in a bid to establish what amounted to a tacit separate peace with the Hydrans.
    There were many tactical battles in Hydran space from Y171 through Y185, but the Hydrans were never again a strategic threat. At one point, the Romulan squadron led by Admiral Roxanna Vulpes was deployed to this theater, resulting in the tiny handful of historical Romulan-Hydran battles. The Romulans remained only a few months, despite having originally been assigned to remain there for at least two years.

THE GATHERING STORM

    By Y171, the Klingons and Lyrans were on the verge of victory. The Hydrans were defeated and effectively out of the war, and the Kzintis were barely hanging onto a capital that had been reduced to rubble. The Kzintis were at the point of suing for peace on any terms they could get when the Federation, alarmed at the prospect of a Klingon Empire that could nearly equal its economic power, began taking a serious interest in the war. The Federation began its own arms buildup and was on the verge of providing the Kzintis massive economic support and sending the 4th Fleet into Kzinti space.
    The Klingons, who had been watching the Federation "wake up" and build up its forces, became seriously alarmed at the prospect of a widened war. The Empire's strategic plan was originally to wait at least ten years (after conquering the Kzinti capital) before considering a war with the Federation.
    The Klingons attempted to defuse the situation diplomatically with a protest to the Organians. They argued that Federation interference was about to prolong a war that should be ending, and noted that the result of that war would be a situation far more stable than the previous three decades had been. The Organians remained silent on the question for reasons that have never been fully understood. The Klingons began extensive probing of the Neutral Zone and found that the decrease in Organian interference was rapidly accelerating. While historians continue to argue whether the Organians were allowing a war consciously or were simply involved in some other matter and not paying attention, the eventual result was the same.
    As sporadic conflict along the Federation-Klingon Neutral Zone escalated, the Federation began to mobilize. The Klingons recognized that a mobilized Federation was a very dangerous opponent and were unable to conceive of a defensive mobilization (which some Federation historians continue to insist it was). The Klingons faced a difficult choice. The Federation seemed determined to intervene in the Klingo-Kzinti War, and the Federation buildup was rapidly making any Klingon attack on the Federation a less certain proposition than it had been before.
   

KLINGON INVASION OF THE FEDERATION, Y171

    When the Organians ultimately disappeared in mid-Y171, the Klingons decided to be the masters of their own fate, rather than waiting to see what fate the Federation would provide for them. They invaded the Federation on 2 August Y171, swiftly destroying the border stations and driving the Federation back 2,000 to 3,000 parsecs by the end of Y172. The savage battles of the doomed border forces, including the cruiser Hood and the Ghostlight fighter squadron, have passed into legend.
    The Federation was able to bring the 4th (Kzinti border) and most of the 5th (Gorn border) fleets into action, but raids by Romulan "privateers" (which escalated through Y172) kept the powerful 6th Fleet tied down. Federation counter-attacks were local affairs, and their own Operation Hydra (a drive to reach Hydran space and help the Hydrans get back into the fight) destroyed one Klingon battle station before being badly defeated and forced to retreat. Most of the survivors of this expedition were trapped at Starbase #15. The Orions declared neutrality. The Klingons were, however, able to penetrate Federation space and send Ambassador Thad Vak Kaleen to the Romulan capital to discuss their alliance. It has often been speculated that the successful arrival of Kaleen on Romulus was the most significant and far-reaching event of the year.
    The Lyrans, not particularly happy with the developing strategic situation, recognized that it could not be helped and took over most of the Kzinti and Hydran fronts as well as sending a squadron to the Federation front.
    The newly-formed Klingon Northeast Fleet drove into the Fed-Kzinti border area, destroying the Kzinti starbase there but failing to destroy the Federation starbase as well. While this operation did succeed in tripling the length of travel between the Federation and Kzinti capitals, it did not completely sever that length, and the combat power expended here came from that which had been assembled for a final attack on the Kzinti home world, an attack that never happened.
    By the end of Y172, the Federation situation was grave and could not possibly get much worse.

ROMULAN INVASION OF THE FEDERATION, Y173

    Then it got worse. The Day of the Eagle (4 January Y173) dawned, and the Romulan Fleet drove across the Federation border, smashing two starbases (those of the 6th and 7th Fleets) and eight battle stations of the "paper tiger" of the 6th Fleet, driving 2,000 parsecs into the Federation in two months and another 1,000 by the end of the year. The attack might have been more successful, even decisively so, except for a series of disasters. One Romulan attack force launched its operation prematurely and was badly disrupted by the cruiser Republic. The command cruiser Lexington became aware of the attack hours before it began (after rescuing a Federation spy) and launched an pre-emptive strike across the Romulan border, destroying several Romulan ships and alerting the 6th Fleet.

The Romulan decision to enter the General War is a fascinating study area. The Romulans were faced with three options:

• They could ignore the Federation and attack their old enemies, the Gorns, trying to destroy them quickly (counting on the Feds, busy with the Klingons, to stay out). This, however, would mean fighting a separate war without support from allies.
• They could wait out the war, but a victorious Federation might attack them (as might victorious Klingons), and the Federation would never be weaker than it was at the moment.
• They could join the Coalition attack on the Federation. This might produce a quick victory, or a long war. All three Coalition members had been on a wartime economy for five years, putting a definite time limit on success. Perhaps feeling this pressure, the Romulans accepted the Klingon plan and launched their attack on the Federation.

Even after the initial attack was less than successful, the overwhelming power of the Romulan attack rolled the Federation forces back sharply, with the line stabilizing more than halfway to Earth.
    Somehow, the Federation hung on, although the fleet assembled to relieve the siege of Starbase #15 had to be sent to stop the Romulans instead. (Starbase #15 finally fell on 10 March Y173 to an assault by the 3rd Klingon Marine Division.) With what was left of the economy on full wartime production, the shipyards produced new fleets to replace those lost and the front line stabilized less than 2,000 parsecs from Earth.
    In the fall of Y173, the Coalition offered the Federation "an honorable peace" which would result in "demilitarization" of the Federation's outer provinces (which would then be policed by Coalition "peacekeeping" patrols). After much debate, Federation Council Chairman Buckner won a motion to accept the offer by a single vote. After months of intense negotiation of the finer points, Chairman Buckner met with Klingon Ambassador Extraordinaire Kaleen and Romulan Praetor Maxillus on Christmas Day Y173 for the formal ceremony. For reasons that are not entirely clear, the peace conference collapsed into a wild melee and Vice Chairman Baranov succeeded Buckner.
    Baranov, a human dynamo of energy who had made a fortune in industry before retiring to run for public office, inspired the military command with new confidence and announced that nothing would be acceptable short of victory. While Baranov had no military experience at all, he was a quick study, and in his autobiography To Preserve the Federation, he emphasized that his policy was to let the military plan the operations within overall strategy directives from the council. (This contrasted sharply with Buckner, who held the rank of major general in the Earth National Guard and regarded himself as a tactical genius. It was noted, however, that his constant meddling with Star Fleet operations and deployments followed a consistent theme of assigning ships to protect the home planets of his most powerful political allies.)