Astra Militarum - Departmento Munitorum: While strategic command is vital to Imperial Guardsmen in the field, the true foundation ofthe Imperial war effort is the Departmento Munitorum, also known as the Adeptus Munitorum. The military arm of the Adeptus Administratum and the general staff of the Imperial Guard, the Munitorum is a galaxy-spanning logistical monster. Within the vast mechanisms of the Munitorum's relentless bureaucracy, individual men and women are reduced to the most miniscule of cogs. It is a mammoth organisation responsible for the distribution of all the Astra Militarum's resources. Perhaps its most important function concerns the monitoring of Imperial Tithes and the raising and transportation of the Astra Militarum between war zones -- for which it liaises with the Imperial Navy. Without the Adepts and scribes of the Departmento Munitorum, the vast armies of the Imperial Guard would stagnate, and calls for aid would go unanswered. The mighty war-fleets of the Imperial Navy would not intercept enemy invasions, the armies of Mankind would never push back the relentless attacks. Slowly but surely the isolated worlds would fall, and the Imperium would ultimately be lost.Despite its vital significance, the Departmento Munitorum is at best an unwieldy organisation. A plea for military aid may not be acted upon for solar months, standard years or even solar decades after it has been received. Such requests typically make their way through countless Adepts before finally reaching the hands of one who can sanction suitable action, sitting at a dimly lit pulpit-station many hundreds of light years away. A battle group consisting of over a dozen regiments from Mordant and Tremert was raised to eliminate unknown xenos forces on the planet of Hurspraxia, only to arrive over a Terran century too late, finding a lifeless world with no trace of survivors. Organised at the sector and sub-sector level, every echelon of the Departmento Munitorum has enough autonomy to respond to problems within local star systems. With the vagaries of Warp travel and communication, this is essential. Their smaller size allows the individual sub-sectors to respond to emergent threats more quickly and as such, when one comes under attack, an army group is formed from the regiments of all worlds in the local star systems.When raising an army group, the Departmento Munitorum is responsible for munitions, supplies, recruitment, training, and support both medical and technical. The methods by which Imperial forces accumulate are haphazard at best; many thousands of troops from dozens of regiments across several worlds are raised and directed to the appropriate war zone. The unpredictable nature of the Warp and the inherent dangers of interstellar travel are such that it is not unusual for entire regiments to be lost or even destroyed in transit. Some may be delayed by the ravages of Warp Storms or appear from the Immaterium many thousands of light years from their destination. That sufficient troops and equipment arrive at a crisis point is only because of the sheer mass of manpower, weapons and vehicles despatched by the Departmento Munitorum in the first place.The remit of the Departmento Munitorum is to ensure that all the material needs of the Imperial Guard are met. From administrating recruitment tithes to overseeing the collection and disposal of slain soldiers, the Munitorum organises and provides for almost every aspect of life in the Astra Militarum. The rations in an Imperial Guardsman's pack, the Lasgun he fires and the power-packs it consumes, the bandages and tinctures with which his wounds are treated, and the liquor rations with which he dulls the horrors of each battle, all of these are Munitorum-issue. From cultural readjustment to dogmatic primers and nutritional supplements, the Munitorum reaches into every aspect of a Guardsman's life with the intention of ensuring that he performs in battle to the best of his ability. So too is it the remit of the Departmento Munitorum to assess any claim that a war zone is beyond the capacity of currently deployed Imperial forces to secure; no demand for reinforcements can be made through official channels without Munitorum approval stamped in triplicate.The Departmento Munitorum has a presence on every Imperial world from which regiments are raised. Yet it would be a mistake to believe that with such proliferation comes intelligent application of labour. The Munitorum is a bloated, unfeeling organisation to which quotas are all, and proper process in the face of desperate demand is the highest form of service to the Emperor. With trillions of souls engaged at monotonous and little-understood administrative tasks every day, errors are common and rarely rectified. A mistaken stroke of an ordinator key may denote, to a lowly menial, nothing more important than a misplaced zero among three hundred pages of tight-packed binary code. Yet that same erroneous character, once fully processed, may send whole regiments to their deaths. One wrongly filed form or incomplete requisition order may see an entire army issued the wrong ammunition, or divert vital reinforcements into the deepest gulfs of space. Paperwork stacks as tall as hive city habblocks are processed by armies of scribes in mindless, methodical order, with routine reports often taking precedence over desperate cries for help by simple dint of their chronological order of receipt.It is a testament to the sheer size of the Imperial Guard -- and to human courage and ingenuity -- that they are able to absorb the Munitorum's frequently disastrous errors only to emerge victorious. Yet for every regiment that overcomes such adversity, another finds itself deployed to inimical environments without vital survival gear, or sent into battle against overwhelming or nonexistent foes.Every world within the Imperium is ruled over by a Planetary Governor or Imperial Commander. Whether such men and women inherit their title by blood or are awarded it for some great service in the Emperor's name, their responsibilities are the same. These Governors are afforded absolute authority to rule their realm precisely as they see fit. In return, however, each Governor is beholden to the wider Imperium, expected to ensure that a set of key responsibilities are fulfilled without fail. Each Governor is responsible for the day-to-day defence of his or her own realm, for the Imperial Guard cannot be deployed to handle every brush-fire war, piratical raid and minor incursion. To combat such threats, Governors are expected to raise, train and equip their own Planetary Defence Forces to safeguard their holdings. Fortifications must be raised, manned and maintained, the skies must be watched, and the populace must be carefully monitored lest the outer dark creep into the hearts and minds of loyal Imperial citizens.Perhaps most importantly, there is the Imperial Tithe. Based upon archaic criteria assessed by Munitorum officials, each world of the Imperium must provide one tenth of its total military force to fight for the Imperial Guard. It is an offence punishable by death for a Governor to supply substandard soldiery when the Tithe is exacted, or to provide insufficient numbers. Furthermore, it is a capital offence should these soldiers lack proper uniforms, sufficient training, or appropriate levels of genetic purity. For these reasons, though some worlds recruit by caste, population density, geography or even lottery, most Planetary Governors are given to pouring their best men into such regimental foundings. This is less out of a sense of altruism or duty than it is an ongoing effort of self-preservation. Nonetheless, on many worlds it is a matter of some honour to be chosen for this duty. Indeed, it is not uncommon for lives to be lost in the fierce competitions that the Tithe often spurs. In a few rare cases, such as the Bardellan Wars of Proving or the Charon's Cluster Schism, localised wars can even be triggered in the lead-up to the solar month of tithing. Planetary authorities are normally quick to crush such counterproductive disputes, fearful of the concurrent waste of tithe-grade manpower and the apparent loss of control in front of Munitorum officials.In times of great peril, the Departmento Munitorum is permitted to call upon Planetary Governors to raise quantities of forces substantially above their normal tithe. Such measures can see entire cities or continents all but emptied, or key societal strata removed en masse. When the Imperium demands its pound of flesh it is not within a Governor's rights to refuse, and each knows that next time it could so easily be his world that requires the protection of the wider Imperium. Only through compliance with the Tithe can such security be guaranteed, for only worlds of proven loyalty may rely upon receiving Imperial aid when their own defences prove insufficient. Isolated human worlds will not long survive in such a harsh galaxy, and the Munitorum's most economical recourse to punish rebellion is often simply to cut a world loose from the Emperor's protection.