Battle of Tahu (Cruentusian War)

"Men, this is when we repay those DTM cowards for daring to raise their arms against us. We'll drive them out of whatever hole they're hiding in and crush them. Now, let's get this battle going."

- Janos Snake

The  was a fairly large battle of the Cruentusian War. It occurred when the Death's Tongue Militia, having recently attacked the Necasian Military and Srav Federation and spread terror amongst their civilian populations as a result, decided to try and 'take some of the heat off [its] back' by tricking both other factions into attacking a decoy base on Tahu which they would disguise as a major base. The DTM placed minimal forces on the planet, and instead goaded the local population into fighting for them, and laid many traps for the Necasians and Sravs. Arriving at the planet, the Sravs and Necasians came under heavy fire from DTM militants, rioting natives, and biological weapons laid by said militants, and for the duration of the battle went into an unofficial ceasefire, staying out of the other's way. Eventually, both sides tracked the DTM decoy base in the desert not far from the planet's main city and destroyed it. Both sides felt that they had dealt a heavy blow to the DTM, whereas in reality they had only caused it moderate damage, and unwittingly caused its support to grow due to their treatment of the native populace.

Background
After the Death's Tongue Militia launched attacks on both the Necasian Military and Srav Federation, a move considered very audacious and risky by many in the galaxy, the Necasian Military began to take notice of what they had previously thought of as an insignificant faction, despite such raids as they had performed on Carrivar and Gresevokrad. Meanwhile, the DTM had set up shop on the arid world of Tahu, which had fallen on hard times lately due to an influx of refugees. Using the local communal leaders as scrapegoats for the planet's problems, the DTM roused support for itself by distributing food and aid (which it had stolen from other neighbouring worlds) and apparently began work on a major base in the planet's desert. Concurrently, Askar Invado, leader of the Necasians, mustered his troops for an assault on said base after gaining intellignece on it, meaning to swoop in and attack the DTM before they could react, thereby ending any potential immediate threat that could arise and removing a base on Tahu. Although Askar had no interest in the planet of Tahu itself, he didn't want the DTM occupying a planet so near to Necasian territory. Unbeknownst to Askar, however, the DTM did not regard the base as particularly significant, and fed false intelligence to make the Necasians believe that destroying the base would be a great blow to them, in order to ease the pressure on them.

However, the Srav Federation were also taking an interest in the planet of Tahu, wanting to occupy such a planet in Necasian territory and gain a foothold into it, and Jasef Yuiln had commissioned various Srav troops to travel to Tahu and take the DTM base there, also mistakingly believing that it was a major installation. The Sravs, however, had no idea that the Necasians also were launching assaults, and pushed not as many troops into the battle as they could have done, thinking they'd only be faced with a single base of the DTM. Using stealth ships as scouts to pass Necasian lines, they made their way into the Tahu sector, spending time surveying the defenses arrayed on the planet, whilst keeping their distance from the actual planet itself, before returning to Srav territory to make their report to Jasef Yuiln and the various commanders of the Sravs.

Deeming the risks to be too low to be of major consequence, Yuiln then finalised the commission for the assault, whilst Askar Invado set up his fleet with various weaponry. Apart from a few members of the sharpshooters, Toronian-class storm tanks and Krako Warrior Traversers, the Necasians had thought the same as the Sravs; that the assault would be easy. With both factions preparing to depart for Tahu with too little men, the Militia had no idea, at this time, that the Necasians and Sravs were moving in on the planet, the DTM was believed to not have known on what could have been considered an 'impending doom' moving down upon them.

Arrival
With the Srav Federation arriving a few days before the Necasian Military, and in a completely different area from where the Necasians were due to land, the set of circumstances that presented themselves meant that the two factions were still not aware of one another, with the Srav's trekking northwards, searching for the reported Militia base, and the Necasians southwards. However, the Death's Tongue Militia had fabricated evidence regarding the whereabouts of their base, and instead employed cloaking methods so as to shield the whereabouts from the Necasian Military and Srav Federation, hoping to lure them into a trap from which they could, in the opinion's of their leaders, prosper at the expense of the two other factions. As the factions slowly began to search the planet, the results turned up by their search teams were unsuccessful.

After original searches by both the Sravs and the Necasians ended up with no results at all, searches revealing nothing, the Necasians, out of desperation, headed for the largest settlement on the planet, the main city of Tahu, imagining that the Militia would have set up their base there. Some days from the city, they started travelling towards it, before a Srav scout team discovered the Necasians and their plans, and subsequently returned to report the Necasians to the Sravs. The Sravs, thinking that the Necasians must have discovered the whereabouts of the Militia in the city, and so moved their forces towards the general direction of the city also, the troops moving forwards to pave the way ahead whilst the weapons and vehicles were due to follow in a convoy behind.

The Necasians, originally being two days march ahead of the Srav's due to setting off first, soon became bogged down in quicksand areas, the heavy Krako Warrior Traversers being caught in the sand by some way, forcing the Necasians to waste time extricating the Traversers, amongst other weapons, from the silt. The Srav's, by contrast, were trekking through various canyons with relatively clear roads, allowing them to travel faster than the Necasians were and so make up time so that, by the time the Necasians were on the move again, there was little more than half a day between the two factions arriving at the city, leaving a confrontation being the key idea of the leader's of each faction. The Death's Tongue Militia, by this time, were preparing troops in the true location of their base, in time for when they left the base.

Siege
The Necasians were the first ones to reach the city, despite the setbacks they'd received earlier on with their machinery and weapons. However, the fact that they didn't realize that the Srav's were also on the planet meant that they didn't spend their time preparing for the Srav arrival and fortifying defenses in the city. Instead, Necasian time was spent searching for the Militia in the city, in areas where they were suspected to have been, based upon the false information. Despite the natural response to a military taking over a city, as the Necasians did on Tahu, to be to fight back, the pacifistic inhabitants of Tahu instead spent too long organizing assaults upon the Necasians, allowing the Necasians to quell such uprisings before they properly began, allowing them to continue their searches for the Militia inside the city.

After just a day and a half of searching by the Necasians, the Sravs soon arrived outside the city, but, with prior warning of the Necasians, set up weapons outside the city, missile launchers being used to trap the Necasians inside. The Necasians, still unaware of the Srav's outside due to a failure in security, continued their searches, until Srav missiles hit the walls of the city and various structures within, killing many people before the Necasians could react, and return fire with the tanks they'd brought into the city with them, holding the Srav's predominantly away from the city until only the few stray missiles fired sporadically managed to pierce Necasian ranks and destroy a structure within the city.

After some time, the Necasians made attempts at leaving the city, before Srav weaponry and gun emplacements pinned them back, allowing them only to escape back to the city with a loss of men after the failed excursion. The Srav's, holding them inside the city for many days, originally planned to merely starve them out of the city, but offensive Necasian tactics soon meant that this wasn't possible, and the Srav's soon began to fire missiles once more. Eventually, the actions of a Necasian traitor allowed the Srav's to breach the wall in three points, and acess the city, meaning the battle now was fought in close combat on the streets, the use of artillery being removed by the close proximity of each of the faction's forces.