Hussar

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To the cavalryman, a best friend isn't confided in a highly advanced artificial intelligence construct, an aged sweet spirit after a hard day of drill, nor is it even a canine companion to warm you up. He goes everywhere with you; from the highest mountain peaks to the most barren desert on the frontier and beyond. His best friend doesn't seek the need for hours of attention, just the love and compassion he would give to his own wife and children. To the cavalryman, the only truly dependable soul is his mount, his steed — a horse.
Unlike our brethren in the mechanized cavalry, our mounts do not require hours of maintenance or constant re-armament to ensure it's combat effectiveness. A trooper and his horse aren't reliant on a logistics train that stretches throughout an empire, based solely on the need for natural resources ran dry centuries ago. We can live off the land as long as possible to accomplish the mission and ultimately win the war. Ask any soldier, and he'll tell you that the Cavalry is the most backwards, ancient, and effective force of the modern Army. Just give us some water, apples, and time; self reliance is the key to reconnaissance and our predecessors have forged this truth over thousands of years. From the prairies of North America to the badlands of the territory worlds, the mounted cavalry regiment stands ready to fight and die. However, an ever looming emphasis on the use of armor, motor, and track has sought to destroy a noble form of combat. 
Since the earliest days of the 20th century, a time filled with rising technologies such as machine guns, airplanes, and armored cars, those who call the Cavalry home have been under siege by their fellow brothers in the army. The No Man's Land full of bomb craters, rotting dead soldiers, and batteries upon batteries of Maxim's became the first killing ground in the war against the horse. Over the next thirty years, armies increasingly focused on mechanized forces ready to punch through enemy lines like demons. Horses would eventually lose their relevance in the modern world, those who had trained endlessly for years to ride into combat with their steed would see their skills lost for a rudimentary introduction into mass-produced hordes. For many, the Second World War sealed the fate on horses and military animals in general. New inventions such as heavy transport aircraft and self propelled Howitzers were believed to have been the answer to the logistical problem of using beasts. 
Seventy years later, in an age of digitization enhanced by orbital satellites, supersonic aircraft, and emerging computing technology, a once lost art had been reclaimed by time and desperate militaries urging to fill the gaps left by a decade of economic downturn. In a surprising turn of events, the 2010's would ultimately fuse the highly advanced technology of the present and the customs of their ancestors. 
World War III would become the final large-scale national conflict to ever take place on Earth, and as such, anything was on the tables to enhance an officer's ability to make war. Rugged terrain from the taiga of the Pacific Northwest and Alaska to the alpine regions of Northern Italy and the mountains of Afghanistan sought the reintroduction of proper mounted cavalry back into modern armies. Horses had come back into the mainstream, however, it wouldn't take long for those advocating for increased mechanization to ask for it's second death. In an interesting turn of events, the very advancement of Human civilization kept that from happening. 
Earth's lust for exploration and territory had thrust itself into the abyss of the next frontier, laying down and establishing settlements on planets we'd come to know as Caprica, Reach, New Victoria, Harvest, and many more. Lightyears from a place in which billions used to call their home, early colonists would come to find that the agricultural, construction, and logistical machines they relied on for basic needs had been taken for granted. Rough terrain, a lack of proper maintenance, and distance limited machines to rudimentary work in a confined area. For the next two hundred years, settlers who came after the forefathers brought with them steeds and beasts of burden to lay the foundation of modern colonial society. The military caught onto this trend, and within the same period of time, a fourth of all cavalry regiments in the Army were equipped with breathing animals rather than heavily armored mechanical beasts. 
While the overwhelming threat of the genocidal Empire of the Covenant could have yet again sealed the fate of military animals, it nonetheless did what had happened in the past millennia — saved it. 
It is a simple truth that nowhere is camaraderie as deep as within a mounted cavalry regiment. Not only are the men of these thousands of squadrons bonded by a unique heritage, training regimen, and lifestyle, but in family roots as well. Most of these units are of the Army Colonial Guard based on each world across our Republic, in the vast armies raised from individual towns and counties to supplement the Regular Army in case of national crisis or to quell rebellion on a local scale. We were born together, we went to school together, caused havoc across the playgrounds, and chased the same women. And unlike those in the bulky Regular Army, we don't get to choose our horse from a stable located outside of a metropolitan hellhole. Our mounts come from the same lands that we do, throughout our childhood, the very animals we ride into battle are no more than a few meters away. My family and my mount's family have lived together for generations, all the way back to when people first settled these lands. 
While some say that the rough and rugged ways of the Cavalrymen, and us Hussars in particular, are antiquated and barbaric, we see it as a useful tactic just as much as a broadside charge or reconnaissance-in-force. Enemies fear our mounts, our stench from a kilometer away, and the fierce lust for blood running through our veins.
Colonel Robert Wallingford
Commanding Officer, District of Columbia's Own Hussars
Continental Army
Category:Grizzlei