The Irish Campaign

**The Irish Campaign** was a series of events that took place on Ireland during the Irish War of Independence. Members of Leo Cronin's borderer group, led by Gordon Lloyd Flashpan and later renamed the Karma Kameleons, carried out a raid on the Dublin Arms Company and assassinated Governor Sabina Rothclaw, head of the Irish Provincial Government.

## Summary

### Background

The party consists of men working as part of Leo Cronin's flying column, a band of men who move quickly and set ambushes for groups of Dragoons and RIC. The party's initial target is the local seat of government in Galway town, where they are likely to find munitions to arm more rebels and perhaps be able to disrupt enemy coordination and operations.

The Irish War of Independence is a little bit different, in that it is kicked off not by some particularly horrible raid in the countryside, but rather by mass riots within Dublin itself. A radical organizer calling himself Patrick Connolly had been organizing a large scale "Civic Labor Association of Irish Need" (CLAIN) which encompassed as many of Dublin's industries as he could get workers from, and spread among them ideas of ending indentured labor, collective ownership of the workshop, and social welfare reform. With Dublin already putting pressure on the Clainsmen, as they became known, tensions reached a boiling point between CLAIN and the Dublin government when men of the Dublin Umbrella Manufactory went on strike to protest the atrocious working conditions resulting from a massive uptick in Umbrella demand from the upper and middle classes of Aeldrum resulting from the popular appointment of Francis "Bumbershoot" Hawkins to head of the commerce ministry. This strike was met with fierce repression which combined with a poor harvest (and hungry workers) to lead to riots in the streets of Dublin and violent shootouts between the Clainsmen and the RIC. Sensing that the time had arrived, the rebels of the countryside rose up in the usual manner and began lynching local officials, raiding armories, and recruiting smugglers.

(Hawkins and his peculiar style of umbrella was given the nickname after the non-swearword cursing which he made at his umbrella as he failed to open it on the first rainy day outside of the spires in thousands of years. He was giving a speech at the grand opening of the Galthad Irrigation Canal)

Over the last 50 or so years, Ireland has been rapidly industrialized to fit the needs of its master, the Duchy of Aeldrum. As Aeldrum does not have the agricultural capacity to sustain large populations outside of the spires, the overcrowding problem led to an influx of Aeldmen (primarily lower class humans) into Ireland, who went about building an industrial base in and around the capital city of Dublin, an area which has become known to the native Irish as "The Pale" in reference to the silky white faces of both the elves and the subterranean Aeldrum humans. Enterprising Irishmen since intermingled with these people and most of the residents of the Pale are mostly of Aeldman culture. Within the outer layers of the pale lie smaller industrial towns; the most famous of these are Cork, excellent wine bottlers and sole producers of Aeldman tack boards, Belfast, the town of shanties and bars which grew up around the Aetheric Gate to service the sailors, and Derry, known mostly for being painted a garish color of orange due to an ATC supply chain mixup.

Beyond the Pale lies the Irish farmland, always considered a frustrating necessity by the Dublin government. Here the Dragoons rule mostly through terror raids, which bring their battle-worn officers plunder in the happiest of forms, from their perspective - cheap land, free booze, and as many dainty Irish lasses (or lads for the increasingly female dragoons officer corps) as they can scoop up in their arms. This is the heartland of Irish culture, where every generation is raised to be the sons and daughters of the next rebellion.

Beyond the farms lie the murky swamps, still largely unexplored by Elves. Some say that the Fae creatures of old defend the place from invasion; others say that it is merely the endless stream of failed rebels and brigands that hold the swamps until the time is right to teach the new crop of rebels the meaning of Irish freedom. The Irish Borderers, sharpshooting Irishmen who patrol the swamplands, are allowed by the Dublin government to "keep the monsters in." The borderers do this more by diplomacy than by might of arms, but every generation has lied to the Dubliners about the need for fighting in order to keep their arms. Unsurprisingly, the borderers tend to form the core of the rebel forces when these times come.

The Aeldrum forces are comprised roughly as follows:

* About 60% of the force are RIC - Republican Irish Constabulary. These are a mix of local policemen from the hinterlands and militia recruited for security purposes from the cities
* 20% are ATC men, who mostly guard the ATC's mining operations, plantations, and industrial sites.
* 10% are from the Ducal Regular Army - these men operate the military bases within the cities themselves and are rarely seen outside of the Pale. They're mostly insurance against the chance of an RIC mutiny.
* 10% of the force are Aeldrum Dragoons - the elite soldiers of the Duchy. About half of them at any time are on rotation from combat in the Fialta-Shantine War, and are thus hardened veterans. The other half are still competent, but garrison duty has taken the edge off of them.

Other notable Aeldman forces:

* RIC G Division: the RIC's plainclothes Detective/Intelligence agents who are infamous both for their cruelty and their slyness.
* Dublin Metropolitan Police Force: These are the mostly unarmed police assigned to the usual criminal investigations, labor disputes, rescuing of trapped kittens, and traffic direction that are the meat and potatoes of city policing. They are intentionally separate from the RIC so as to maintain public order even during times of conflict.

### Sessions

*This section is incomplete. You can help The Aeldrum Wiki by expanding it*.

### Credits

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