With the failure to retrieve the Dark Force and the subsequent revelation that Thrawn was using
Clones to build his army, the New Republic realized their nightmare was upon them:
the Empire was about to return. However, the indecision and corruption of the relatively
new Republic government hampered any opportunity to prepare for Thrawn’s imminent attack. Thus,
the only hope left for the fledgling Republic was, as always, her preeminent defenders:
the crew of the Millennium Falcon. Welcome to the Wizards and Warriors channel. We are glad
to have you with us on our next exciting dive into the Star Wars universe. As is our custom,
we invite you to take a seat, relax, and maybe bring your favourite action figures to
watch as we recount the formal start of Thrawn's campaign and the decisive Battle of Qat Chrystac.
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Though the Republic had lost nothing major in the last conflict with Thrawn, its upper command,
namely Organa, Mothma, and the reintegrated Bel Iblis, were aware of the danger that they
were in. Their first goal was to locate the Empire’s cloning facility. In this,
they didn’t have much to go on, except that it wasn’t the famous Kamino due to those facilities
being taken out earlier in the war. This became the main mission of Luke Skywalker,
who departed solo into the border territories to find any rumours about this hidden base. Thrawn,
meanwhile, had not been idle. With his fleet having gained numerical superiority overnight,
he first ordered his new ships refitted, then informed his officers of the next phase
of the plan. The offensive was about to begin. With his new fleet of ships, Thrawn was now able
to target ten times more star systems than he had been able to. Though most Imperial officers would
have launched a full attack, which is indeed what Republic high command thought he would do, Thrawn
displayed remarkable patience and restraint, merely employed the same strategy as before but
on a larger scale. His first attack was launched on Svivren to keep the Republic from discovering
his true intentions whilst he was mustering, and though he took the planet rather easily,
the natives were extremely hostile to foreign overlords and the Imperials never truly conquered
the planet. Within a month of capturing the Katana fleet, he began his offensive,
launching larger strike forces towards the Ando, Cronde, and Filve systems, each one catching the
Republic completely off guard and each one dealing heavy casualties to the Republic forces compared
to negligible Imperial losses. The attack on Filve, in particular, was quite disruptive,
as Lady Organa was on a diplomatic mission to Filve aboard the Falcon and got caught in the
attack, escaping only by the skin of their teeth. The Republic reacted as anticipated by sending out
their fleet from the nearby base of Ord Pardron to reinforce the area, but not long after these
ships reached their destination, Ord Pardron itself was attacked, with the base there being
utterly destroyed. To the Republic, it seemed as if Ord Pardron was the intended target all along,
but they were again wrong as two Imperial Star Destroyers accompanied by ten Dreadnaught cruisers
emerged from hyperspace above the planet of Ukio led by the Chimaera herself. The Ukians
immediately put up their planetary shield and sent for the Republic for support. Not long after,
Thrawn called for the Overliege of Ukio and informed him that the Ukioan system was once
again under Imperial control and demanded the lowering of the shields and the unconditional
surrender of the planet. The Overliege delayed his response to buy time for the Republic
to come to their aid, as Thrawn suspected. Having given them the traditional ultimatum,
he then ordered the fleet to commence firing. Though most planetary shields couldn’t stop
small craft from entering the planet, they were still formidable barriers capable of stopping
large assault ships, as well as shielding their host planet from orbital bombardment, which was
the easiest way to capture a planet and a form of warfare the Empire was supremely adept at. So,
because of their defences, the Ukians expected the Empire to launch small assaults onto the
planet to lower the shield, as was the textbook battle plan for taking such planets. This would
buy them the time they needed, as they were still well-supplied and adequately equipped
to defend themselves until help arrived. So it was a surprise to the Ukians when the Imperials opened
fire upon their impregnable shield, surprise which quickly turned to horror as the shots
ripped the shield and found their marks, hitting two air bases on Ukio. The Ukians were in a panic,
and seeing no other alternative, they surrendered within the hour to Thrawn, accepting his terms.
Thrawn seemed to have acquired yet another card to play, having acquired a super weapon that
could pierce planetary shields, upending not only conventional warfare but the whole galaxy
as well. Thrawn hadn’t actually done something so marvelous, though he had intended it to be
viewed that way. What had actually transpired was much simpler. Thrawn had had several cloak
Dreadnaughts arrive in advance of his force and position themselves within the orbit of the planet
below the shield, and using C’baoth’s abilities, he coordinated the bombardment of the main fleet
to coincide with the strikes of the interior vessels, giving the impression that he had
pierced the shields, Ukio would be seen by many after the conflict as Thrawn’s masterpiece having
taken an entire planet within an hour. Though he had not the superweapon everyone imagined he had,
he didn’t need it anymore even if he did, the mere thought that he had one instilled enough
fear in most planets to capitulate to him, furthermore his quick and repeated success
in this operation led many other factions within the galaxy who had either signed a peace treaty
with the New Republic or taken a neutral stance, especially Imperial ones, to become aggressive,
seeing the Empire could yet return and that New Republic territory was ripe for the taking.
As this was transpiring, Luke’s search for Thrawn’s cloning facilities led him to Berchest.
Although he had little to no luck finding the facility, he did meet Karrde on the planet,
who kept his intentions to himself but was looking for the same prize. It was here that Luke revealed
to Karrde that these weren’t standard clones, as Luke could sense how young they were. This
threw Karrde off, he himself realizing just how dangerous Thrawn was and that with his recent
capture of the food world of Ukio, he could feed this army. Luke proposed to the smuggler to set up
a credit line for any information Karrde could find to which he agreed, and the two departed.
Luke now travelled to a different location he hoped would reveal the location of the cloning
facility, but all the while, he was being watched by Imperial spies who laid bait out for Skywalker
to bite, just as Thrawn had told them too. Luke arrived in the Poderis system believing
that it was being used as a base from which new clones were to be sent after exiting the unknown
facility, but he soon realized his mistake. He was trapped on world, and barely managed to escape,
only to be caught in space by the Chimaera. But through his use of the Cover Shroud
Maneuver, he was once again able to escape Thrawn’s grasp limping to the nearby Honoghr,
where the natives graciously accepted the son of Vader. After they repaired his ship, he left for
Coruscant sensing Organa and her children were in danger. Whilst Skywalker was on Honoghr, Thrawn
had gone to the front and tried to press advantage of his newfound strategy, taking the planet of
Woostri with minimal resistance by utilizing the same tactic he had on Ukio, this served
the purpose of not only capturing the world but also to show the galaxy that Ukio wasn’t a fluke.
The Republic sought to halt his advance dead in its tracks, and Garm Bel Iblis thought he could
do just that. With his forces being used to highly mobile warfare and not held down by the political
intrigues of the New Republic, he waited for Thrawn's next move within the neighbouring sectors
the Grand Admiral had previously struck. It was then that he heard the distress signal from the
planet of Qat Chrystac, Thrawn had barely finished occupying Woostri when he attacked Ketaris and
Qat Chrystac in unison, with Thrawn personally overseeing the operation for the latter. Bel Iblis
raced to the scene, finding The planet's defence force on the verge of breaking when he arrived.
The details concerning the battle are rather vague and don’t go into great detail on the
exact composition of the contesting belligerents, so we will have to make do with the information
we have available, along with speculation derived from previous engagements. Bel Iblis arrived in
the system with 15 Dreadnaught Heavy cruisers, with Bel Iblis himself aboard his Dreadnaught:
the Peregrine. Accompanying him were a number of additional fighter wings that had the traditional
T-65 X-Wings and RZ-1 A-Wing Interceptors. They found the situation to be much to their advantage
as the planetary defence force, which consisted of about 5 Mon Cala cruisers that had been shifted to
the planet following the Empire's operations in the area, were still fighting and operational.
Thrawn’s force meanwhile consisted of only 3 Imperial Star Destroyers, including the Chimaera,
with their complementary fighter wings, made up of TIE Starfighters, Bombers,
and Interceptors. In addition to this were about 5 of Thrawn's own Dreadnought cruisers.
Bel Iblis threw himself into the fray, leading his ships in to join the Mon Cala Cruisers, who were
still holding their own, with each using their fighter wings to effectively shield themselves
from enemy artillery. Iblis probably deduced that if he could keep the battle going on long enough,
Thrawn would either be defeated by oncoming Republic reinforcement or concede that he
couldn’t take the planet and flee as he had done so in the past. He was soon proven terribly wrong
when three more Star Destroyers and a further 15 dreadnoughts came out of hyperspace almost
exactly on top of the Republic fleet. This not only caught the Republic off guard but threw
their defence into chaos, with a number of the Mon Cala cruisers becoming disabled or destroyed.
This was when Iblis was informed of another ship, kept hidden by Thrawn behind the Star Destroyers,
one lone Interdictor class Star Destroyer which could generate a gravity well that stopped ships
from using lightspeed by dragging them out with its own gravity well [said ‘dragging them out of
hyperspace’ to avoid repetition, hopefully that’s correct]. Though the Empire had employed this ship
in prior battles, its intended and main function was to stop ships from fleeing the fight. Thrawn,
however, used it to control where ships could deploy, having put these ships in neighbouring
star systems for just this moment, for he knew where his ships were, and now they could
effectively come out of hyperspace wherever he pleased within the generated gravity well.
With the battle now shifting in the Empire’s favour, Iblis ordered one of the remaining
Mon Cala cruisers, the Orthavan, to neutralize the Interdictor so they could flee the system,
having come to the conclusion the battle was lost. But as it went to perform this maneuver,
two Victory Class Star Destroyers deployed in front and aside the Orthavan and began to bombard
it, inflicting heavy damage. At this time, it is likely a number of Iblis’s dreadnought were
probably gone too. Seeing that the Orthavan’s attack was imperative to survival, Iblis ordered
Rogue Squadron, which at this time held an advanced position on the flank, to attack the
Star Destroyers assaulting the Orthavan. Thrawn had seen this as well and placed his own fighters
to screen the ships. Iblis responded by personally directing Rogue squadron to form up for a maneuver
as the X-Wings led the way in two spearheads that ran towards the screen before splitting off,
drawing the TIE fighters towards them. This left a thin screen of TIE
fighters left defending the ships, which were soon decimated by the A-Wings,
which had hidden behind the X-wings assault. They pierced the formation and successfully neutralized
the Star Destroyers long enough for the Orthavan to assault the Interdictor knocking it out. With
this, Iblis ordered a retreat. The Battle of Qat Chrystac was more devastating than it appeared at
surface level. Though Iblis had escaped Thrawn's trap, he had lost a third of his force doing so,
and in addition, the planet of Qat Chrystac. This had opened Thrawn’s path to Nkllon,
which he soon successfully destroyed, having gained valuable resources for his campaign. Though
this battle would be famous as the birthplace for the two maneuvers born in this fight, the
Thrawn Pincer and the A-Wing Slash, the battle had much more far-reaching consequences at the time.
Up until this point, there was still a question if Thrawn could actually win a proper battle,
he had conducted himself brilliantly up to this point in the overall strategic sense, but most of
his engagements ended with his forces retreating and never concluding pitched battles. This fight
knocked out Iblis’s force as an independent fighting unit as well as reinforced the mythos
of Thrawn's invincibility. This would paralyze the New Republic further and would embolden her
enemies, and yet, Thrawn’s campaign was only just beginning. Our series on the Chiss Grand Admiral
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