The Belkan WarMarch 25, 1995 - June 20, 1995Belligerents
BackgroundIn 1987 the Belkan Federation conducted its Federal Law Review, granting greater autonomy to its two eastern provinces which had previously been under costly Belkan occupation. In 1988 both provinces peacefully seceded from the Federation, splitting into the newly-independent nations of Ustio, Recta, and Gebet. Meanwhile, Belka found itself in an economic malaise; its government sold land to Osea and its eastern neighbors, including its former provinces. However, allegations that Osea covertly aided the secession movements, revelations that Osea falsified surveys to deflate the cost of the 1991 land sales, and continued economic troubles gave rise to nationalistic and anti-Osean sentiments.
The Democratic Liberal Party (DLP) swept Belka’s elections in 1992 and set the nation on a path of militarism and rearmament, with the ultimate goal of reclaiming territory they felt was stolen from them by Osean meddling and duplicity. This was accelerated with discovery of natural resources in regions formerly belonging to Belka, such as northern Ustio. Before Belka mobilized forces to its borders, a ruling by the supreme court retroactively declared the 1988 secessions illegal, legitimizing attempts to retake them by force.
Belkan and Ustio fighters skirmished as early as March 1994 over the resource-rich border region designated Airspace B7R by the Belkan Air Force. [bap grun] As Belka’s saber-rattling intensified, its relations with its neighbors continued to deteriorate. OverviewBelka launched a surprise attack on March 25th, invading Ustio, Osea, and Sapin. Over the first week of the war Belka also gained air superiority over Gebet and FATO, decimating their technologically inferior air forces with ease. [bap indigo] By April 2nd, Belka had reclaimed all of the Great Lakes region and most of Ustio aside from its remote mountainous regions, and continued to progress into Osea and Sapin. This lightning offensive on multiple fronts was accomplished by the BAF doctrine of tactical air supremacy, denying the defending armies any close air support.
Osea announced its intention to cooperate with Sapin and Ustio on April 3rd, [truth] reclaiming their postwar borders under the Assembly of Nations' nonaggression treaty, an agreement that all parties in the war were technically subject to. The alliance would be called the Allied Forces, and was joined by Yuktobania despite their earlier support for the DLP regime. [follow] The Belkan military had overextended its logistics capability [bap gelb] and did not launch any further offensives after the 3rd, with the Belkan Air Force being especially fatigued due to its small size. [truth] Unable to progress further if they wanted to, any tactical victories brought little strategic gain. [bap gelb] This allowed the Allied Forces to regroup and prepare counterattacks. The Allies began their counterattack with diversionary skirmishes on April 20th. This was followed by a contested transit of the Futuro Canal on the 24th, permitting Osean naval assets to operate within the Great Lakes. Osea also aided Ustio's military by committing airborne assets to their front, resulting in the liberation of Directus on May 13th.
Having been pushed back to their prewar borders, the Belkan military withdrew to two defensive lines: the Hydrian Line that ran the length of Belka’s mountainous border from the Great Lakes to B7R, and a secondary line on the Schayne plains of South Belka. The Allied Forces expanded their mandate to include an invasion of Belka under the pretense of nuclear arms inspections. On May 17th they launched offensive airstrikes against the Hydrian Line, allowing the invasion of Belka proper to begin. This was followed by suppression of air defenses along the second line on May 19th, but attempts to consolidate the bridgehead were delayed by Excalibur, Belka's BMD laser. Six days later, Excalibur was destroyed in a deep strike carried out by Ustio mercenaries, allowing the invasion of Belka to continue. The Belkan army attempted to fight the Allied advance across the South Belkan plain, but the growing disillusionment and frustration of South Belkan citizens hampered their efforts. Over the latter half of May, South Belkan cities declared themselves demilitarized, believing that the military saw them as merely a buffer for more integral Belkan territory to the north. Expelled from the demilitarized cities, the military withdrew to the Waldriechs. By May 30th the Allied Forces had the reached the mountain passes, but were forced into protracted sieges against dug in units. On May 28th the Allies declared their withdrawal from the nonaggression treaty and launched Operation Battle-Axe, a fighter sweep over the frontline that became the largest air battle in history. [aaw] After achieving air superiority, they began carpet bombing Belkan cities in order to target Belkan industry and more quickly end the war. Furthermore, the Allies continued progressing towards North Belka on the ground. On June 6th, a hardline faction within the Belkan military known as the Grey Men detonated nuclear weapons in seven strategic mountain passes through the Waldriechs. Killing over 12,000 civilians and military personnel in the initial blasts, the electromagnetic pulses from the detonations threw Allied and Belkan communications into disarray. Though Allied and Belkan diplomats quickly agreed to a ceasefire, fighting continued for another two weeks. The EMP was partially to blame for the initial confusion, but rogue elements within the Belkan military organized resistance to the government and attempted to regroup on the northern coast, with the intent of taking the capital city Dinsmark. An Allied strike package composed entirely of mercenaries disrupted the attempted coup, and on June 20th the Treaty of Lumen was signed by Belka and the Allies, officially ending the Belkan War. OutcomeThe end of the war again brought about further territorial losses for Belka. Osea annexed South Belka, renaming it North Osea, while the rest of the Allied Forces merely regained their prewar borders. Although disillusioned with the DLP regime and Belkan militarism, the region’s residents largely resented Osean control and maintained Belkan identity into the 2010s. [AC5] Various Belkans with and without malicious intent made their way into Osea’s military-industrial complex.
Despite the end of hostilities, some Belkans turned to terrorism to avenge their defeat. The most prominent of these groups, A World With No Boundaries, was explicitly anarchist and included disillusioned soldiers from both sides, but was unknowingly being manipulated by the Belkan government. Armed with experimental wonder weapons and a nuclear-tipped ICBM, they hoped to catalyze the collapse of the superpower-led world order, but were foiled by an airstrike on their launch complex on December 31st, 1995.
The shock of Belka’s actions and the economic devastation brought about by the war prompted cooperation between Osea and Yuktobania. Both nations committed to strategic arms reductions and nonproliferation programs, and the Cold War came to a gradual end. [gaze] However, nationalists within both nations were opposed to the new order brought about by Yukto-Osean detente. The Grey Men who had orchestrated the nuclear strikes concealed their role in the war and became a defense contractor in North Osea. They took advantage of these tensions by empowering and arming the nationalists, causing and later intensifying the Circum-Pacific War in 2010. Citations[1] Usea Today April 21, 1996
[2] Our Science September 1998 [3] Gaze 2003, “War?” [4] ACES WEB AC04 World [5] Ace Combat 04 Mission 1 Briefing [6] Ace Combat 04 Mission 1 [7] Ace Combat 04 Mission 2 [8] Ace Combat 04 Mission 6 [9] Ace Combat 04 Mission 9 [10] Ace Combat 04 Mission 10 Briefing [11] Ace Combat 04 Mission 11 Briefing [12] Ace Combat 04 Mission 12 [13] Ace Combat 04 Mission 14 [14] Ace Combat 04 Mission 15 [15] Ace Combat 04 Mission 17 [16] Ace Combat 04 Mission 18 [17] ISAF Bulletin September 24, 2006 [18] Gaze 2008, “Arkbird Declaration” |