| Imperium-Tau War |
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| Result | Decisive Imperium/Haruhiist victory
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The Imperium-Tau War was a series of military conflicts primarily involving the Byzantine Imperium and the Tau Empire.
Background
First Contact with the Tau
The Byzantine Imperium first encountered the Tau, when one of their trading fleets entered one of the outer colony sectors. At first, the Tau appeared to be a peaceful race, willing to trade and established relations with the Imperium and the Imperium received the Tau gladly. However, few knew what would happen next, and initiated a bloody war that would last for decades and drain considerably the Imperium's strength.
Initially, relations were good. The Tau traded with the humans, and offered technologies more advanced than some of the technologies the Imperium had. The Imperium accepted these gratefully. In that time, the Tau had also began sending missionaries proclaiming the "Greater Good". Orthodox Catholicism had a far stronger hold on the population, and few were swayed by the "Greater Good". The Imperium at that time was far more tolerant and freedom of worship was enforced. No one paid much heed to the new religion, but the religion soon took on a more sinister aspect.
While the Tau came in peace, humans were not welcome to their core worlds, and they were only allowed to visit the Tau colony worlds. This perplexed Imperial leadership, as they could not understand why the Tau core worlds were off limits when the Imperium had received the Tau in open arms. Regardless, the Imperium's intelligence agency began pursuing covert operations, seeking to find out why the Tau had refused human contact in their core worlds. They soon discovered that the Tau kept the might of their military in the core, and that the Tau had fairly large and advanced armies. Within the Imperial Government, considerable debate took place as to whether to Tau's refusal to allow humans to visit their homeworld, was because they did not want them to see their vast military. The Imperium was suspicious, and began a quiet build up of the Imperium's military.
The Ephesus Insurrection
Things came to a fore, when an outer colony, Ephesus, rebelled against Imperial authority. It was an unthinkable act, and took the Imperium completely by surprise because there was no evidence that the colony's citizens so were displeased with Imperial authority whatsoever. The Imperial Guard was sent immediately to quel the lingering rebellion, fearing that such a rebellion could only spread its fire to the other colonies and shatter Imperial authority altogether.
The rebellion was crushed swiftly, but among the dead, included the Imperial Exarch, and a member of the Tau Ethereal caste. Further forensics and study of the data collected from the data archives of the planet yielded evidence that the Tau Ehtereal had conspired and persuaded the Imperial Exarch through a mixture of pheromones and bribes to join the Tau Empire. The Tau Ambassador was summoned and an explanation was demanded. What the Imperial leadership received to their shock was an ultimatum: That the Byzantine Imperium must submit and become part of the Tau Empire. The Emperor Sergius XI simply said, "Never. Begone, before my patience runs thin." With that, the Imperium's armies and navies were raised to full alert to await the impending Tau invasion. The year was 2863.
The First War
It was the year 2863, and the Imperium began a mass mobilization of its armies and navy to meet the enemy's forces. The Tau struck Ephesus in the Ephesus sector first, to be met by Imperial Guard regiments and the Imperial Navy who had just quelled the rebellion and were on full alert for any Tau attack. The Battle of Ephesus lasted for weeks, both on the ground and in space. The Tau were repelled, but Imperial forces suffered staggering causalties and they barely held onto the planet. Unfamiliar with Tau technology, and caught off guard by the speed of enemy forces, the Imperial forces fought with blood and guts and heroism. The Tau struck on many fronts, and one of the colony worlds in the Ephesus sector taken. Imperial forces fought and retook the planet two month later. Heavy fighting also took place in other frontier sectors of the Imperium, and millions of Imperial Guard and PDF troops were thrown into the cauldron of fire.
By and far, Imperial Armed Forces were holding the Tau, though causalties were high. Millions of troops were killed, but over a billion civilians were killed in the ensuing slaughter. Tau bombardment of Imperial targets were often indiscriminate, and nuclear explosives to penetrate deep bunkers were used, killing civilians hiding in deep bunkers. The Emperor ordered the Science Guild to delve deeply into Tau technology to find weaknesses for the Imperium to exploit, and to absorb technology that was useful. The Emperor also urged that the Science Guild work harder to develop new technologies to help the Imperium fight the Tau on more equal footing. It was during time when Imperial troops were heavily upgraded with cybernetics to improve their fighting ability, and the Emperor ordered the initiation of the Imperial Astartes project to take advantage of the Imperium's bioengineering and genetic enginering and cybernetic technology and to produce the ultimate soldier. The Imperial Navy received many new weapons and technologies and general expansion of the fleet began.
The Renewed Tau Offensive
The initial conflict lasted for 7 years, and thereafter, the Imperium gained a brief respite which lasted a year before the Tau regathered and launched a massive offensive in 2871, sweeping aside Imperial defenses in the colonies, and striking deep into the heart of the Imperium in the Antioch sector. Many colonies were simply bombarded to ashes from space, as the Tau would rather avoid fighting a grinding war on relatively unimportant planets. It signaled the upping of the ante in this brutal war, and the battles fought throughout the Antioch sector were furious and tens of billions died in this conflict alone.
The Imperium was desperate. Many worlds were taken, billions lost. More than 30% of the Imperial Guard and PDF forces were completely wiped out from the Order of Battle when the Tau conquered and obliterated all the colonies in the colony sectors. The Imperial Navy had suffered staggering 40% losses in terms of men and ships. Millions of troops poured into the Antioch sector in a desperate fight for survival. Antioch was key, the Constantinople Sector would be free for the taking once the Tau took control of the vital sector. But the Tau came in force, and it was said that more than 30% of their fighting strength had been deployed to the Antioch sector alone. Among all the battles fought in the Antioch sector, the Battle of Antioch in 2878 was the fiercest battle to be fought so far, and it lasted a full year. The Tau struck Antioch with great force, destroying sector capital's orbital defences and bombarding strong points on the planet. They landed tens of millions of troops on the ground, determined to fight and conquer one of the key worlds of the Imperium. Emperor Sergius XI led the counterattack himself, only to have his flagship vaporized in the week long space battles as the Imperium fought to break the Tau blockade on Antioch. Nevertheless, the Emperor's brother Sicarius rallied local Imperial Forces, and was determined not to lose Antioch to the Tau. Imperial Guard and PDF troops fought doggedly against the Tau, making the Tau pay in blood every inch lost. Citizenry were drafted into the System Defence forces and given arms to aid in the defence of Antioch. The war manufactoriums continued the churn out war materiel even in the midst of the bloody war. What men and women who could not fight were placed in escape vessels to flee the system. Many however did not make it out of the blockade alive. The fight was ferocious, and the Byzantines practiced what the Tau had described as, in their own language, a "rat war". The Byzantines followed their Tau enemies closely, and then assailed them at close quarters. The Tau's tanks were regularly ambushed with infantry anti-tank weapons, or even by tanks hiding within the destroyed structures.
In the end, the Tau simply obliterated swathes of the city planet when it became clear that the planet was proving recalcitrant, and refusing to bow to the "Greater Good". Tens of Millions of Tau had been killed in the ferocious fighting and the Tau were losing patience. By then, most of the city planet was a death husk; buildings were filled with large potched mark holes from rifle rounds, churches burnt to the ground, or desecrated. Captured civilians and military personnel were rounded up and simply sent to camps where they were sterilized, to control the remnants of the population and effectively kill off the presence of the human race in the sector. The Great Basilica, the Hagia Maria, was burned down in a great inferno. A video of this act was taken and broadcasted on hyperwave around the Imperium. In that video, a Tau Ethereal declared, "For your failure to comply to the Greater Good, your people will be made extinct, your cherished places of worship destroyed, your God will be cast down as we have done. You do not deserve any form of salvation." Byzantine citizens watched in horror as one of the most cherished places of worship was cast down wantonly.
Retaliation
If the Tau thought humanity would be cowed, they could not be more incorrect. Emperor Heraclius XX Komnenos was proclaimed Emperor of the Imperium after the death of his uncle, Sicarius, who had been co-Emperor. This new Emperor was dogged in his determination to raise the morale of his people, and to rally the demoralized Imperial Armed Forces to fight the Tau. Heraclius XX Komnenos had been identified from young as an extremely gifted psyker, and his powers were legendary. He soon known to be among the greatest psykers the galaxy had seen and still is among the strongest till this day.
The Tau sent embassies demanding the absolute surrender of the Byzantine Imperium. Heraclius simply slew the Tau ambassador and sent the corpse back to the Tau in pieces and with a note: "Byzantium will not discuss terms while the enemy sits on Byzantine Soil." In a speach given to the Imperial Senate, Heraclius told his countrymen not to give up. "Friends, Romans. Indeed we are Romans, who trace ourselves to the far begotten Nova Terran Empire that now is but a memory. We all know that the Tau have declared us unworthy of salvation because we rejected their heretical teachings of the so-called 'Greater Good'. They have destroyed our cities, razed our planets, even gone as far as sterilized our captive population. But despair not, for the Lord God is with us! We must fight the Tau with all our soul and might. God is with us, and under the Lord's name, I call a Holy Crusade to be waged against the Tau. Crusade, because they dared to attack God's Children. Crusade because the Tau have desecrated God's holy Church. Crusade, because the Tau have dared to defile our lands and spill the blood of God's Children. I call for a Crusade, and we will not rest until the xeno heretics have been destroyed for their transgressions against God. T'au Delenda Est!" The speech was broadcasted throughout all the Imperium and was received with a standing ovation by the Senate. The fires of hatred was nursed within every human soul, for everyone in the Imperium had a relative who had died in the war that had since gone on for over a decade. Priests, bishops, Patriarchs echoed the Emperor's words, exalting the people to take up arms or to help in every way to could to contribute to the great war efforts.
The Tau were overextended due to the grueling war on Antioch. They were forced to commit nearly a third of a billion troops to pacify the world, and suffered hedious losses in the process. Their navy suffered losses from the brutal space combat above Antioch and from the ground based space defences. The Battle of Antioch had bled them quite dry and it would take months before their navy and army could regroup for the next push. The Imperium however, devised a plan. Centuries of work on genetics had granted the Imperium extremely good genetic engineering, and it was decided that a bioweapon, an extremely contagious and lethal one, would be used against the Tau. It was tailored specifically for the Tau; no humans would be affected.
A good portion of the surviving Imperial Navy was assembled to retake Antioch. Along with the fleet, newly raised regiments, the Adeptus Astartes would be deployed for the first time. The Astartes would be used for boarding enemy ships, and taking them by force, as well as landing on the planet itself to counter advanced Tau troops and to eliminate them. The Astartes would be equipped with the best weapons the Imperium could offer, and they would prove to be a force to be reckoned with in the centuries to come.
The fleet set off in 2890 with the Emperor at its head, along with his three sons: Belisarius, Rus and Aurelian. The three sons would lead their respective Adeptus Astartes Legions, and their names would be remembered and feared for centuries to come: Ultramarines, Varangian Rus and Anatolian Guard. The Tau did not expect a large Imperial retaliation fleet, and were shocked by the size of the fleet that emerged from hyperspace. Most of the Tau fleet above Antioch had limbed back to T'au for repairs and refit. The remaining Tau fleet was still sizable, and they put up as good a fight as they could managed. The Imperial ships had come out of hyperspace as close as possible to Antioch and were driving to envelope the Tau fleet in four directions. They drove at flank speed and forced the Tau ships to engage the Imperial ships at point blank range, negating any whatever advantages the Tau had in long range weaponry. The battle was brutal and lasted for hours. Astartes boarded boarding torpedoes and were launched into Tau ships, and they fought the stunned Tau crews. What infantry aboard the Tau ships tried to organize some kind of resistance, but were annihiliated entirely. Attempts to self destruct their ships failed because the Astartes seized the enginarium and bridge of the Tau ships quickly, though some did detonate.
Instead of landing troops on the ground, the Imperium decided to instead to use the first batch of virus bombs, keyed for Tau physiology. The bombardment was brutal, with lances and plasma bolts unleashed upon the ground, along with tonnes of virus bombs offloaded on Tau concentrations. All Tau life was destroyed. A batch of captured Tau were then infected with a bioweapon and then the infected Tau were then loaded on ships that made kamikaze runs on Tau worlds, unleashing a virus that afflicted the Tau for a decade.
Regrouping
While the Tau spent the ensuing decade attempting to fight and recover from the virus, the Imperium spent the decade from 2890 to 2900 rebuilding its fleets and armies. All of the population was made to work and fight for the Imperium in any way possible, be it as a researcher or engineer in the newly formed Adeptus Mechanicus, formerly the Science Guild, or as a soldier or naval crewmen on the Imperium's warships. War was now a way of life for all in the Imperium, though some were obviously allowed to stay behind and raise children. Heraclius XX had effectively forged a massive war machine, dedicated to the art of war. Not since the wars in Nova Terra or Terra had anyone seen such a committed approach towards the concept of Total War. Warships were constructed every day, built in the many shipyards such as the great Mars and Jupiter Yards. Millions of Imperial Guardsmen and PDF were raised, along with newly forged Adeptus Astartes. Titan legions were forged to become siege machines to obliterate enemy strongholds. Entire worlds in Wild Space were strip mined to provide the raw material to forge the Imperial war machine.
That however, did not mean no rebuilding occurred. On Antioch, amidst a still much ruined city, Heraclius XX raised a new Hagia Maria, and declared before the new church that the Imperium will not rest until the dead are avenged, and the Tau destroyed. Imperial morale rose as they gazed upon the marvel of the Church, which became an eternal memorial of the suffering and blood shed in the decades long conflict. The Hagia Maria remains an important place of worship till this day.
The Imperium also reclaimed its colony worlds, as the Tau withdrew to protect their worlds, which were ravaged by the bioweapon that had spread viciously throughout their populations. The Tau were said to ahve lost as much as 10% of the total population due to the bioweapon, and many were left crippled. The Tau were also determined to avenge their dead, and cries to send out their own crusade against the Gue'vesa for the bioweapon used on the Tau.
The Great Crusade
After the Tau spent slightly over a decade recovering from the bioweapon, they were in no more mood for mercy, and sent a massive fleet to unleash their revenge. They were however surprised to be met by an Imperial fleet that exceeded their war fleet. The fleet was led by Emperor Heraclius XX and his sons, who brutally obliterated the Tau fleet and left no survivors. This was the opening phase of the Great Crusade. The Imperial Fleet and Army then went on to spend the next two to three decades fighting the Tau in a brutal final war. Brutal battles were fought above many worlds. Many worlds had their city centers subjected to brutal exterminatus, while millions of Imperial troops landed to fight and capture sector capitals to capture vital intelligence and data. The Tau were not idle either, and they had also committed their entire population to the war, and soon two giant jugganauts were engaged in a massive tug of war. No quarter and mercy was shown, for none was ever received.
The tipping point was the Holy Empire of Suzumiya Haruhi. Siding with the Imperium, they launched large scale assaults on the periphery of the Tau Empire, drawing off vital troops. Imperial forces made massive lunges into the core of the Tau Empire, attacking Tau core sectors in a massive push. The Tau were then desperate. They decided to abandon worlds the Haruhist forces, and concentrated on beating back the Imperial attack. Space battles and ground battles lasting for weeks to months were fought repeatedly as reinforcements after reinforcements were sent into the meat grinder. Titans proved their worth when Imperial forces could not get vital orbital support, and their mighty guns wore down Tau defences to allow Imperial forces to penetrate the city defences and take the city. Astartes launched surgical strikes taking out vital installations, or leading the Imperial Armies themselves. Their superhuman strength and power simply outclassed any Tau unit, even the much vaunted Tau battlesuits were simply no match for the Astartes one on one.
The final battle eventually came in the massive month long battle for T'au. The final assault on the Tau homeworld was one of the most bloodiest battles ever fought in the history of mankind. Billions Imperial Guardsmen and PDF and hundreds of thousands of Titans and various Guard Armour, along with thousands of Astartes attacked the world with two objectives: To wipe clean the Tau from the face of the galaxy, and to seize whatever databases and records they could lay their hands on. Astartes led the field armies, and launched commando strikes to prevent the Tau from eradicating their archives and detonating their power cores, and the Guardsmen besieged Tau cities and fought brutal urban combat. Billions died that day, but the Imperium was victorious. Every Tau was put to the sword. So ended the most brutal war the galaxy had seen and remains one of the bloodiest wars with the some of the highest causalties.
After a decade in which the Tau homeworld was literally picked clean, the homeworld was subject to brutal orbital bombardment; to make the Tau an example for what would happen to any xenos that dared to attack humanity in such a fashion again. After the bombardments had cleansed all life from T'au, after the very atmosphere was blown into space, after bombers had salted the very soil of the world's four continents until nothing would ever grow there again, the Emperor raised a mighty church in the largest crater of the planet the Imperium now called Tranquility, for it was very silent indeed. On the front of the basillica, the words, "T'au Delenda Est" was inscribed, remembering the words that the Emperor uttered in front of the Imperial Senate when he demanded that the Imperium commit every man and woman and even child to the defeat of the Tau. The defeat of the Tau Empire was forever marked and celebrated annually as Victory Day, with a huge parade of the Imperium's ground war machines through the monstrous Victory Arch that was constructed after the defeat of the Tau.