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Previous:	Martian Civil War
Concurrent:	Third Edenite Rebellion
Next:	Interstellar Cold War
Great Interstellar War
Date:	April 4th 3691 to August 10th 3775 (84 years, 4 months and 6 days)
Notable battles:	Battle of Luna Battle of Thebe Sack of Mars
Location:	Solar System, 82 G. Eridani, Alpha Centauri, Barnard's Star, Gliese 832, Gliese 1061, LHS 1723, Luyten, Procyon, Ross 128, Teegarden's Star, Trappist, and Wolf 1061
Outcome:	First Interstellar Peace Conference Second Interstellar Peace Conference Military stalemate Recognition of ALIAS as sovereign ruler of the Martian Federation Secession of the Godly Republic of Eden from the Commonwealth of Earth Secession of the People's Republic of Cariocecus from the Martian Federation Collapse of the Commonwealth of Earth's extrasolar dominion
Belligerents Coalition Earth Jupiter Nova Qaf Zhu Que ALIAS Mars Saturn Tranquility Casualties Military dead: Over 210,000,000 Civilian dead: Over 1,000,000,000 Total dead: Over 1,210,000,000 Military dead: Over 143,000,000 Civilian dead:Over 3,000,000,000 Total dead: Over 3,143,000,000
[Source]

Great Interstellar War

Chronology

See also: Timeline of Great Interstellar War

The start of the war in the Solar System is generally held to be 4 April 3691, beginning with the Martian attack on Luna; Earth and Jupiter issuing a declaration of war in the immediate aftermath. The dates for the beginning of war outside of the Solar System vary; with the first shots of the Ross Conflict fired on 16 May 3701; the Burning of Zhu Que undertaken on 10 August 3706, Third Edenite Rebellion beginning on 1 June 3711 and Martian Invasion of the Trappist System commencing on 23 September 3730.

The exact date of the war's end is not universally agreed upon. It is generally accepted by the Solar states that the war ended with the armistice on 8 June 3700, rather than the First Interstellar Peace Conference, held on 1 October 3700 that officially ended the war with Mars. It is generally accepted that the war outside of the Solar System ended on December 20th 3731 with the armistice between Mars and Qaf within the Trappist System. The true end of the war of the war is considered to be 10 August 3775, 84 years after the start of the war when the treaty between Qaf and Mars was signed on Luna, although the last Martian forces would not withdraw from the Trappist System until 1 October 3815. No formal peace treaty between Cariocecus and Mars was ever signed.

Course of the war

Jovian Intervention (3691-92)

The Martian Navy, coordinated by ALIAS, had crushed the Commonwealth Navy Earth Fleet during the decisive Battle of Luna. The IGSA Headquarters on Luna were targeted with antimatter missiles and destroyed in their entirety. Only the timely arrival of the bulk of the Jovian Interstellar Navy, commanded by Tero Klerkse, had prevented a Martian assault on Earth, at the cost of an opportunistic Saturnian fleet arriving within Jovian Interstellar Republic space. With the Commonwealth Navy crippled and the majority of the Jovian Interstellar Navy forced to hard burn from Earth to Jupiter, the Saturnian Navy conducted a series of hit and run attacks against the Jovian Interstellar Republic, prioritizing attacks on the Callisto shipyards and the Ganymede agricultural districts before retreating to retrograde orbit before enemy vessels arrived to repel them. Upon arrival within Jupiter orbit, the Jovian Interstellar Navy engaged the Saturnian forces, initially beating them back. The status quo was disturbed only a fortnight later with the arrival of Martian Navy vessels, with the Jovian Interstellar Navy unable outmaneuver the homogeneous simultaneous command of ALIAS, that forced them onto the defensive. The arrival of the Erpublik Nova Navy Solar Fleet months later further tipped the scales, striking the Martian Navy's Jupiter Fleet in a concerted attack that forced ALIAS to withdraw vessels from the Galilean Moons. However, with vital targets already crippled, the Martian strategy merely switched into one of attrition, with the support of the Saturnian Navy now exclusively raiding internal Jovian shipping lanes. Upon providing the situation update, the IGSA Peacekeepers petitioned Admiral Keys to break off his planned assault on Mars to instead join the coalition of the willing in eliminating the Martian Navy Jupiter Fleet and the Saturnian Navy.

Great Solar War (3692-94)

The Zhu Que Navy Liberation Fleet, under the command of Admiral Archelaus Keys arrived in the Sol System in 3692. Challenged on their approach by IGSA Peacekeepers in the Outer Belt, the Admiral explained his intent, as honoring the terms of the Mars-Zhu Que treaty to eliminate a threat against the Martian people. The admiral was informed that ALIAS had liquidated the Martian Government and subsumed the entirety of Martian Federation to its will. Prior to that, the Martian Civil War had cost millions of lives, with a humanitarian crisis engulfing the system in the interim years, as Martians attempted to flee their homeworld. The majority of Martians, however, were content with surrendering their will to the collective, having been conditioned over two decades to peaceably accept ALIAS into their lives. The Sol System itself had become a war zone, after the Commonwealth of Earth had proposed reintroducing the Artificial Intelligence ban in 3691 in response to ALIAS gaining control of Mars. The Martian Navy had gone on the offensive, with a fleet assumed to be under direct control of ALIAS deployed to Luna, triggering the Earth-Mars War. In response to the declaration of war against Earth, the Jovian Interstellar Republic declared war on Mars. An Erpublik Nova Navy fleet was reported to have arrived at the beginning of the year, their intent unknown.

Entering Jupiter orbit in early 3693, the Zhu Que Navy Liberation Fleet engaged the Martian Navy Jupiter Fleet and Saturnian Navy in a coordinated assault with the Erpublik Nova Navy and Jovian Interstellar Navy Auxiliary near Thebe. The Battle of Thebe was a short but decisive affair, with the firepower of the three fleets overwhelming the Martian Navy. However, ALIAS had predicted the attack was the most likely course of action and had withdrawn the majority of the fleet before the Zhu Que Navy vessels arrived, leaving behind only a token force to protect the retreat and sacrificing its Saturnian Navy allies in the process. With the immediate threat eliminated, the Zhu Que Navy assisted their new allies by issuing a warning to the Union of Saturn to withdraw vessels from Jovian space or face retribution. With its shipyards crippled along with food and oxygen production severely hit, the Jovian Interstellar Republic declared an official state of emergency. Supplies and vessels were requisitioned to bolster the capabilities of the three fleets. The Executive Director of Jupiter, Muirgen Albero, demanded an audience with Admiral Archelaus Keys and Admiral Joshua Gamaliel of the Erpublik Nova Navy Solar Fleet to explain their intentions. Albero was suspicious of the Zhu Que Navy presence, stating they were in violation of their formal expulsion from the Sol System. Additionally she voiced her opinion that the Jovian people still felt betrayed in the face of their former allies voting to repeal the INTPOL ban that had triggered the ALIAS crisis. Keys outlined the new position of the Zhu Que Diet, in light of the atrocities conducted on Mars, and the regret felt by his government over their part in the crisis. He offered his full support to the Jovian Interstellar Republic, promising to fulfill the terms of their old alliance. Gamaliel took a pragmatic stance in the proceedings, declaring that the existential threat of ALIAS outweighed any previous animosity between nations, stating he was prepared to withdraw his own fleet from the Solar System if Keys' forces were expelled from Jovian space. Albero sanctioned the fleets to remain in Jovian space on the condition that a formal pact was agreed between the three powers until the ALIAS threat was eliminated.

In the interim, the Martian Navy had regrouped in the Asteroid Belt and ALIAS switched focus to capturing Ceres from the Commonwealth of Earth. The Commonwealth Navy's Ceres Fleet retreated from the dwarf planet, avoiding the same fate that had befallen the Luna Fleet, hard burning towards Jovian space. Even without support from the Commonwealth Navy, Ceres was far from defenseless. Ancient rail-guns installed in centuries long past to destroy asteroids were activated that hindered the advance of the Martian Fleet, until antimatter missiles were target locked on all weapon emplacements and the guns fell silent. The Martian Marine Corps were be met with fierce resistance from the domestic security forces, determined to not let their homeland fall to the invaders. The Ceres Fleet arrived in Jupiter orbit four days after the invasion had started. With their transponders offline in order to evade the Martian Navy, the fleet was intercepted by vessels of the three navies patrolling Jovian Space leading to a brief standoff between the four forces. The admiral of the Ceres Fleet identified herself as Katja Cantrell, seeking safe harbor in the Jovian Interstellar Republic.

Cantrell's fleet was absorbed into the wider coalition forces after an audience with Albero. The admiral requested that the coalition forces hard burn for Ceres, believing they had the numerical superiority required to destroy the Martian Navy in a straight fight. Keys determined ALIAS would anticipate this maneuver and would have withdrawn the essential fleet back to Mars. Furthermore, in a straight fight he did not believe the four fleets, operated by independent admirals, could defeat the ALIAS controlled Martian Navy. Only a fleet under a unified command stood a chance at defeating the Martian Navy. Keys proposed that the Ceres Fleet, Liberation Fleet and Solar Fleet don the colours of the Jovian Navy to provide a single unified front to oppose ALIAS and nominate a commander of the joint forces. Keys nominated Jovian Fleet Admiral Tero Klerkse, citing his rout of the Martian Navy over Earth as just cause for his appointment. Cantrell agreed to recognize Klerkse as her superior, grateful for his part in saving Earth from a Martian invasion, followed by Gamaliel who saw the wisdom in serving as a cohesive unit.

Klerkse deduced that a stalemate had now developed between the two sides that only served to benefit ALIAS. The Martian Navy held de facto control of the inner planets while the Coalition Forces could only effectively project power from Jupiter. All of the simulations determined that departure from Jupiter would invite attack from Martian vessels and Saturnian vessels within the system but that inaction would forfeit control of Earth to Mars. Keys brought forward a proposition that the coalition forces should hit Mars directly, as a means to cripple their civilian economy and force the Martian Navy to withdraw into permanent Mars orbit. With Klerkse's blessing, he devised a strategy that would see the deployment of a single strike force on a one way trip, with the bulk of the forces remaining in Callisto orbit to protect the shipyards. Keys volunteered to lead the mission, citing it was the original purpose of his presence in the system, but Klerkse vetoed the decision. Instead Admiral Cantrell was selected, as she expressed her desire to repay the debt she owed to Jupiter and simultaneously take revenge against Mars even if it came at the cost of her own life.

The attack had the desired result but also the predicted outcome. Antimatter missiles hit the capital of Arcadia, the major metropolitan areas of Olympus Mons and the Tharsis Space Elevator at the cost of Cantrell's forces. The expected response from the Saturnian Navy came as they attempted to sack Callisto, but their attack was halted and their vessels forced to retreat after engaging the coalition forces. ALIAS immediately abandoned the Siege of Ceres, withdrawing all forces back to Mars. The stalemate had been broken, but the war had not been won. Conflict remained throughout the system, with the Commonwealth of Earth forced to concede that they had lost control of the Kuiper Belt to the Saturnian Navy. Klerkse drew up plans for further strikes, intending to utilize asteroids from the Inner Belt as projectiles to strike the red planet with. Before the plan could be put into action the unexpected happened: ALIAS issued a wide beam communication to the entire Solar System offering a ceasefire to all forces on condition that it was recognized as the sovereign ruler of Mars.

Military leaders within the coalition wished to reject the ceasefire, with Klerkse advocating for a follow up strike to cripple Mars. Civilian leaders within the coalition were more open to the terms of the ceasefire, highlighting their own vulnerable state with Callisto, Ceres, Ganymede and Luna lying in ruin. Protests throughout the system denouncing the war and favoring peace put further strain on the tenability of continuing the fighting. With both the IGSA headquarters and Luna embassies destroyed, political representation of the interstellar states was limited solely to their military leaders within the system. A special summit was convened on Ceres with representatives from Earth, Jupiter, Mars, Nova, Saturn and Zhu Que in attendance. While the majority of representatives were keen for a lasting peace, the formal recognition of ALIAS became a stumbling block in the negotiations, with demands made to sanction ALIAS for the war crimes it had committed against Earth and Jupiter. ALIAS reasoned it could not be held to account as it was not bound by a mortal frame to be imprisoned and could merely offer up the officers that had conducted the attacks at its request. ALIAS in turn refused to hand over these officers unless both Keys and Klerkse were handed over to the Federation for their part in the antimatter attacks against Mars. The governments of Earth and Jupiter refused to hand over Klerkse, a vaunted war hero to both nations. The fate of Keys was left to a hearing of the assembled representatives. Secretary General Shui Sun of Earth, Executive Director Muirgen Albero of Jupiter and Admiral Joshua Gamaliel of Nova voted to exonerate him of all charges to the chagrin of the Martian and Saturnian delegates. After months of deliberation, the peace talks broke down on May 1st 3694.