Battlecruiser Yellowstone

CLASS: Interdictor

CREW: <TRA color="red" bold="true"/>CLASSIFIED

ARMAMENT: <TRA color="red" bold="true"/>CLASSIFIED

Starting service as an escort of the venerable Missouri, the Yellowstone has undergone many patrols in the New York system against pirates and successfully completed several tours of duty in the Texas system during the first months of the Rheinland Civil War.

In 828 AS, after Outcasts significantly increased their presence in the Taus and Coronado, the Crayter Republic appealed to Liberty for support – to which the latter complied in earnest.

Thus, officially, Yellowstone continues to patrol Coronado in close cooperation with Crayter's own forces, acting as a firm barrier against any smugglers attempting to reach for the populated regions.

Beginning service for the Liberty Navy, the Yellowstone has since been modified to also carry a significant amount of radar equipment that Liberty utilizes for monitoring the regions frequented by this vessel.

In its first deployment in the Texas system, the Yellowstone collected valuable information about the clashes between the Imperialist and Federalist forces, turning into another one of Liberty's important watch ships.

With the signing of an ample cooperation agreement with the Crayter Republic several years prior, the Yellowstone has taken up post in the Coronado system, ensuring both that no unwanted presence solidifies its presence in the system, and that the young Republic closely follows Liberty's interests.

## Bribes & Missions Offered

* Universal Shipping
* Bounty Hunters Guild
* Border World Exports
* Gateway Shipping
* Synth Foods, Inc.
* Planetform, Inc.
* Ageira Technologies

## News

Ageira disputed this finding in their own press release, calling EFL 'fantasists' and countering that their own scientists had narrowed the cause to a rare 'hypernova' stellar event that originated outside the Sirius sector. Both corporations claim that network-wide hardware safeguards have been implemented that would prevent a similar occurrence in the future. Independent researchers have sharply criticized the corporate announcements, accusing both of self-interested misdirection.
Professor Sophia Nagel from Heisenberg Research Station called EFL's accusation 'incoherent' and the hypernova explanation 'nonsense' that did not explain the characteristics of the 'Blackout Pulse'. Despite multiple different Pulse recordings being widely disseminated across the neural net, public efforts have so far failed to triangulate its source.

Over the last few days, Archer-class siege cruisers have been deploying their massive coaxial cannons to suppress military infrastructure on the planet, systematically targeting the very last bastions of the Insurgency. First to be destroyed were the planet's few remaining ground to space weapons installations, quickly crippled by bomber strikes from the Ohio herself, before the remaining desolate ground defences and deserted infrastructure were reduced to rubble, their populations having already long fled the world.
A small service was held on the Ohio as the bombardment drew to a close in memory of Rear Admiral Dylan Brandt and those thousands of sailors and marines who had given their lives in the name of Liberty; fought their own lost brothers-in-arms so that others may not live under their misguided yoke, and many more who had their lives irrevocably changed as a result of the evils the campaign sought to end.
The announcement also confirmed identical monuments to the Insurgency campaign would be erected on every world in Liberty, from Planet Houston to Planet Erie, each monument an obelisk carrying the names of every serviceman lost in the conflict and serving as a reminder that Liberty is stronger when it stands together.

For some time, it had been alleged that Insurgent and Xeno-backed cells had been stirring trouble on Erie, inciting violence in the population and seeking to turn the planet into a second Veracruz. Never, however, had such open acts of terror been visited upon the governing Libertonian forces.
The response was quick and decisive. In coordination with the LSF, Vice Admiral Hamish aboard the Battleship Alma lead a Liberty Navy task force directly into the system in Operation Pesticide, escorted primarily by Siege Cruisers, Gunboats and fightercraft, with many of the Navy's capital warships tied in the Vespucci campaign or ever watchful at Liberty's borders. They were met by Zoner Q-ships based from Bethlehem, with many coming from as far as Galileo or even the Sigmas, accompanied by a motley assortment of freelancers and other anarchist elements. Leading the Zoner line was a Aquilon-class carrier, the Pinnacle.
While the Pinnacle came under heavy bombardment from the Alma and her task force, supplies quickly gathered onto Zoner transports from Erie attempted to run the Navy blockade. While some transports were lost to Navy bombers, others yet escaped to parts as of yet unknown. This 'victory', however, came at a heavy price. The Pinnacle was lost with most of her hands still on board and the rest captured, while the Liberty Marines landed virtually unopposed, quickly securing population centers for both the safety of Libertonian assets and the civilians on Erie itself. The Alma is settled now into the low orbit of Erie, a constant reminder to those below that they are under the protection of the Liberty Navy. A comfort to some, a dire warning to many more.

Admiral Brandt was heard to give the order to abandon ship right as the ship's hull could take no more and began to be torn asunder, with hull breaches on multiple decks. Tragically, the armored engines of the Delaware had suffered a great deal of damage, and as the armor and shielding was whittled away, vast quantities of radiation and superheated gas began to flood into the crew compartments of the vessel.
In an emotional announcement, the Liberty Navy officially stated that they consider the Delaware to be lost with all hands, including Admiral Brandt himself. No life pods could be secured in the heat of battle, with the remainder of the Delaware's escort making a fighting retreat back to the LNS Ohio which had herself been caught lagging behind the Delaware's doomed thrust into the heart of the Insurgency. The Ohio now remains with her own escort, augmented by survivors of the Delaware's battlegroup, and will continue as the Liberty Navy's bastion in the Vespucci system, ready to ensure that the Insurgents pay dearly for the toll they have extracted upon one of Liberty's finest Admirals.

Leading a fearsome line of some of Liberty's most advanced warships, the Delaware bore down on the Insurgency's remaining, cobbled-together fleet in the Vespucci system, out of position from dealing with a Bretonian thrust from Magellan. Immediately caught was the Battleship Vanquisher, one of the scant few Arbiter-class Battleships available to the Insurgents. Caught by itself, the Vanquisher put up a fearsome fight but was ultimately unable to stand against the Delaware and its escort, despite its fighter component dealing severe damage to much of the Delaware's own, smaller fighter contingent, as well as the Delaware herself.
With the great Arbiter all but vanquished, the Interdictor-class Battlecruiser Triton stared down the guns of the damaged Delaware and her escort. Outnumbered two-to-one, and outgunned to an even greater degree by the Libertonian heavyweight, Triton and her escorts launched their one and only advantage, their fighter and bomber superiority gained at the Vanquisher's expense.

## Rumors

* Sure, we're supposed to take pity on these Bretonian "Refugees" because they've lived in smog their whole sorry, foreign lives, and are trying to escape the war torn Leeds system. I save my sympathy for my relatives on Pittsburgh who have lost their jobs to cheap foreign labor.

* I've been preaching the truth for years, but almost nobody would listen. Well now they don't have to listen, because they can see it all coming true right in front of their eyes. The big shots have sold us all out, and now they're scheming to replace us.

* You can see it on Pittsburgh now. The miner unions are just too much trouble for the foreign owned mining companies. Those pesky miners are so unreasonable with their demands for safe mines, reasonable hours, and medical insurance coverage for when they get Boron lung. So what do the foreign owners do? They ship in replacement labor from outside Liberty to bust up the unions.

* Refugees, shmeshugees. They're just a bunch of lousy scabs and a menace to honest jobs, that's all they are. I'm not going to fall for this fancy propaganda about pity and compassion. Let them flee to some planet in their own House!

* Nobody taking an honest job from a Libertonian deserves any mercy, I say. The only thing worse than mining Boron for a living is having your job stolen when you're too old to retrain for anything else. You think a Boron miner is going to get some cushy job pushing paperwork or something?

* Junkers, especially, always know more than is good for them, and until they spill their guts to LPI, they're too valuable to just toss into a cell somewhere and forget about them.

* Don't get me wrong, I don't object to exploiting Ontario for the good of Liberty. Platinum is fairly useful, after all. What I object to is digging it up and shipping it off to fuel foreign expansionist wars.

* Fort Severn was built to guard the jump hole to Alberta, but then space time had to go and hiccup, and the jump hole has moved further away. Until we can get DSE to send some tugs up here to move the station, we just have to extend our patrols out a little further.

* Between the criminals that get bagged in this system, and the roudy workers on Toronto, we have a reserved docking space on Sugarland!

* Occasionally we do have to take some Prisoners to Fort Bush for interrogation before shipping them down to one of the prison stations in Texas.

* This system is going to hell. First the Junkers moved in, followed by the Hackers. Then the Xenos showed up. Soon there won't be so much as an asteroid that isn't corrupted by Liberty's ruling hooligans!

* Sometimes Sugarland can't process the crooks as fast as we can bag them, so Huntsville has to take the overflow.

* Originally there were plans to extend the trade lane all the way to Fort Severn, but when the Navy stationed Ottawa out here, DSE exercised an obscure clause in their contract and opted out. Apparently the lawyers figured that Naval patrols are more secure than trade lanes. Makes no sense to me.

* Marines are routinely rotated up here for duty. West Point Academy is their embarkation point. You can't station any Marine company in one location too long. They tend to get too comfortable and then they become more trouble than help.

*NOTE: Page generated on the 28/10/2023 at 17:59:46 UTC*