Daxian Invasion of Caldera

Daxian Invasion of Caldera
Part of the Second Great War
Volkspartei Defense units attacking Daxian positions near Ugdon
Date 6 January 1936 – 8 May 1936 Location Fascist Caldera Result Daxian victory Territorial changes Daxian occupation of Caldera
Belligerents
Daxia	Caldera
Commanders and leaders
Xiu Guangho Dai Hanjian Qiu Heng	Derrich Lundsteiner Jon Weinworth Manuel Hans
Strength
129,435 troops 90 tanks 541 aircraft	151,000 troops 18 tanks 77 aircraft
Casualties and losses
11,225 4,130 killed 287 missing 6,808 wounded	146,000 25,000 killed (Among which are 2,847 Volkspartei Defense) 21,000 wounded 100,000 captured

The Daxian Invasion of Caldera (Gothic: Daxianische Invasion von Ceuldeland, Kench: Invasion daqsien de Qaldera, Daxian: 昆仑入侵卡尔德拉), also known as the Battle of Caldera or the Fall of Caldera was the invasion of Caldera by the Empire of Daxia during the Cronan Theater of the Second Great War. The operation to capture the island, which was not defended by any formal military, was intended to support Daxia's imperial expansion into Crona.

On 6 January 1936, early in the morning, Daxian planes began bombing possible strategic locations in Caldera, including police stations and aircraft at Volksport and the capital of Little Caldera. Daxian landings in the Western province began two days later, and were followed on 15 January by major landings at Seuber Bay and Mason Beach by the Daxian Eleventh Army under Xiu Guangho. The defense of Caldera was led by Prime Leader Derrich Lundsteiner, who ordered the Volkspartei Defense to evacuate Little Caldera to Neu Maessen ahead of the Daxian advance. Daxian troops captured Little Caldera by 7 February 1936, and after their failure to penetrate the Neu Maessen defensive perimeter in early March, began a 40-day siege, enabled by a naval blockade of the island. The Calderan troops around Neu Maessen eventually surrendered on 9 April and were then subjected to reports of Daxian atrocities and mistreatment.

The campaign to capture Caldera took much longer than planned by Daxia, who in early February 1936 had decided to advance their timetable of operations in Crona and withdraw their best division and the bulk of their airpower. This, coupled with the decision of Lundsteiner to withdraw Calderan forces to Neu Maessen, enabled the defenders to hold out for three months. The harbor and port facilities of Little Caldera were taken advantage of by Daxian forces, as well as Volksport and many other resources available to the now conquered island.

Daxia's conquest of Caldera is often considered the worst military defeat during the course of the Second Great War, though historians tend to forgive Caldera's blunder given that prior to the SGW, the country did not have a formal military. About 3,000 Volkspartei Defense personnel and about 20,000 civilian militiamen were killed or captured.

Background

Daxian activity

Objectives

The Daxians planned to occupy Caldera as part of their plan for a "Greater West Crona War" in which their Northern Expeditionary Army Group seized sources of raw materials in Cusinaut. Five years earlier, in 1931, Captain Ishi Shogo, a hard-liner in the Daxian Navy, had toured Caldera and other parts of the Western Crona, noting that these countries had raw materials Daxia needed for its armed forces. This helped further increase their aspiration for colonizing Caldera.

The invasion of Caldera had four objectives:

• To prevent the use of Caldera as an advance base of operations by Burgoignesc forces
• To acquire staging areas and supply bases to enhance wartime operations
• To secure the lines of communication between Crona and Daxia
• To limit the success of a potential pro-Burgoignesc counter-invasion of eastern Audonia

Invasion forces

Anticipating very little resistance from local police forces and the Volkspartei's paramilitary forces, Daxia only sent the Daxian Eleventh Army consisting of 2 divisions. The Thirty-Fifth Division saw frontline combat, while the Third Brigade served as a garrison force. On 7 February 1936, the Thirty-Fifth Division was withdrawn to serve elsewhere during the war, only the Third Brigade was to remain on the island as an occupational force until the end of the war.

Defenses

In early 1934, Prime Leader Lundsteiner predicted that rising international tensions could result in a second great war, so he authorized the creation of a paramilitary meant to defend the Volkspartei in times of crisis. 4 months later, Lundsteiner authorized the creation of a formal military of Caldera, meant to be made up of Calderan civilians in case of actual conflict.

Prior to the Daxian invasion in 1936, the estimated strength of the Calderan Armed Forces was 131,095 troops, consisting of 504 officers and 130,591 enlisted. During the invasion, informal militias formed all over the country, with an estimated strength of about 20,000.

Invasion

Initial landings, 6 January 1936

The Daxian 11th Army began its invasion with a landing in the Western province by selected naval infantry units. Landings in eastern parts of Caldera around the capital followed two days later.

Two Volkspartei Defense planes attacked the Daxian ships offloading near Steelport. Another CAF bomber plane with a fighter escort bombed the landings at Wukan. In the last coordinated action of the CAF air division, Calderan planes damaged two Daxian transports.

Early on the morning of 12 January, the Daxians landed 2,500 men of the 35th Division at Little Caldera, and they were met with resistance from local militias, but no formal fighting forces.

Main attack, 22 January 1936

The main attack began early on the morning of 22 January as 43,110 men of the 35th Division and one regiment of the 3rd Brigade, supported by naval artillery and approximately 20 tanks, landed at the three towns of Steelport, Aeirton, and Cheiton along the west coast of Caldera. A few Calderan bombers flying from Volksport attacked the invasion fleet, but to little effect.

Calderan General Weinworth's poorly trained and equipped 1st and 7th Divisions could neither repel the landings nor pin the enemy on the beaches. The remaining Daxian units of the divisions landed farther south along the coast. Squad Apple of the well-trained and better-equipped Volkspartei Defense, advancing to meet them, put up a strong fight at Ruby City but was forced to withdraw after taking heavy casualties with no hope of sufficient reinforcements. By nightfall on 23 January, the Daxians had moved ten miles into the interior.

The next day, 7,000 men of the 35th Division hit the beaches at three locations along the shore of Maman Bay in southern Caldera, where they found Calderan forces dispersed and without artillery protecting the coast, unable to offer serious resistance. They consolidated their positions and began the drive north toward Ugdon where they would link up with the forces advancing south toward the capital.

Withdrawal into Neu Maessen, 24 January 1936 to 9 April 1936

Volkspartei Defense moved into the field in reaction to reports of airborne drops near Volksport, and when this proved false, they were deployed to cover the withdrawal of troops into Neu Maessen and to resist Daxian advances in the Seuber Bay area.

On 24 January, Lundsteiner invoked a plan made before the invasion, which called for use of five delaying positions in central Caldera while forces withdrew into Neu Maessen. This was carried out in part by Squad Apple of the Volkspartei Defense. He relieved Calderan leaders of their command of southern forces, and had began preparing defensive positions in Neu Maessen, using units as they arrived; both the military headquarters and the Caldera's government were moved there. Nine days of feverish movement of supplies into Neu Maessen, primarily by truck from Little Caldera, began in an attempt to feed an anticipated force of 43,000 troops for six months. (Ultimately 80,000 troops and 26,000 refugees flooded Neu Maessen.) Nevertheless, substantial forces remained in other areas for several months.

On 26 January, Little Caldera was declared an open city by Lundsteiner. However, the Calderan Armed Forces was still using the city for logistical purposes while the city was declared open, and the Daxian army ignored the declaration and bombed the city.

Both CAF and Volkspartei Defense units were maneuvered to hold open the escape routes into Neu Maessen, particularly roads leading out of Little Caldera. The Southern Calderan Force, despite its inexperience and equivocating orders to withdraw and hold, successfully executed "leapfrogging" retrograde techniques and crossed the mountains of Litte Caldera by 1 February. Daxian air commanders rejected appeals by the 35th Division to bomb the roads to trap the retreating forces, which were subsequently demolished by CAF engineers on 1 February.

The Daxians realized Lundsteiner's plan on 30 January and ordered the 35th Division to press forward and seal off Neu Maessen. In a series of actions between 2 and 4 February, the 11th and 21st Divisions of the CAF, Squad Apple and Squad Baker of the Volkspartei Defsnse, and the Urcean model tanks of the CAF Tank Group held open roads for the retreating forces of the Southern Calderan Force, then made good their own escape. Despite 50% losses in the Tank Group during the retreat, the tanks and a supporting battery of halftracks repeatedly stopped Daxian thrusts and were the final units to enter Neu Maessen.

On 30 January, the CAF 31st Infantry moved to the vicinity to cover the flanks of troops withdrawing from central and southern Caldera, while other units of the CAF organized positions at Neu Maessen. The 31st Infantry then moved to a defensive position on the west side of the Ugdon-Little Caldera road, near Lac Junction near the border of Neu Maessen on 5 February. The junction was given up on 6 February, but the withdrawal to Neu Maessen was successful.

Battle of Neu Maessen

From 7 to 14 February the Daxians concentrated on reconnaissance and preparations for an attack on the city's border. At the same time, in a critical mistake, they relieved the 35th Division, responsible for much of the success of Daxian operations, with the much less-capable 3rd Brigade, intended as a garrison force. The Daxian 5th Air group was withdrawn from operations on 5 February in preparation for movement with the 35th Division toother stages of the war. CAF and Volkspartei Defense forces repelled night attacks near Abustein, and elements of the CAF 2nd Division counterattacked on 16 February. This failed, and the division withdrew to the reserve battle line near the border of Neu Berlin on 26 February.

The Daxian 11th Army renewed its attacks on 23 February with an attempted amphibious landing at Neu Maessen, then with general attacks beginning 27 February along the city's border. The amphibious landing was disrupted by a Calderan boat and contained in brutally dense jungle by ad hoc units made up of CAF soldiers and local police forces. The pocket was then slowly forced back to the cliffs, with high casualties on both sides. Landings to reinforce the surviving pocket on 26 February and 2 March were severely disrupted by air attacks from the few remaining CAF fighter planes, then trapped and eventually annihilated on 13 March.

A penetration in the Neu Maessen line was stopped and broken up into several pockets. On 8 March, Daxian leaders ordered the suspension of offensive operations in order to reorganize forces. This could not be carried out immediately, because the 35th Division remained engaged trying to extricate a pocketed battalion of its 20th Infantry. With further losses, the remnants of the battalion, 378 officers and men, were extricated on 15 March. On 22 March, the 11th Army line withdrew a few miles to the north, and Calderan forces re-occupied the abandoned positions. The result of the Battle of Neu Maessen was total destruction of all three battalions of the Daxian 20th Infantry and a clear Calderan victory.

For several weeks, the Daxians, deterred by heavy losses and reduced to a single brigade, conducted siege operations while waiting refitting and reinforcement. Forces around Neu Maessen engaged in patrols and limited local attacks.

Beginning 28 March a new wave of Daxian air and artillery attacks hit Calderan forces who were severely weakened by malnutrition, sickness and prolonged fighting. On 3 April 1936, the Daxians began to break through into Neu Maessen, estimating that the offensive would require a month to end the campaign. Squad Apple of the Volkspartei Defense, no longer operating as a coordinated unit and exhausted by five days of nearly continuous combat, was unable to counterattack effectively against heavy Daxian assaults. On 8 April, CAF forces were overrun near the Klein River. Squad Baker of Volkspartei Defense, under orders to reach Bavogia and evacuate to Bravador, finally surrendered on 9 April. Only 300 men of the Volkspartei Defense successfully reached Bravador.

Battle of Bravador

Bravador (which included Fort Kurzlow) was a Volkspartei Defense position defending the entrance to Bavogia, part of the harbor defenses of Movingwater and nearby bays. It was armed by First Great War era seacoast gun batteries of CAF artillery regiments (and a Volkspartei Defense unit), an offshore mine field of approximately 35 groups of controlled mines, and an anti-aircraft uni. The latter was posted on the higher elevations of Bravador. The older stationary batteries with fixed mortars and immense cannon, for defense from attack by sea, were easily put out of commission by Daxian bombers. The Calderan soldiers and Volkspartei Defense squads defended the small fortress until they had little left to wage a defense. By late April 1936, the Daxian air command installed oxygen in its bombers to fly higher than the range of the Bravador anti-aircraft batteries, and after that time, heavier bombardment began.

In January 1936, Southeastern provincial governor Manuel Hans, Prime Leader Lundsteiner, other high-ranking military officers and diplomats and families escaped the bombardment of Little Caldera and were housed in Bravador's tunnels. Prior to their arrival, the tunnels' laterals had served as high command headquarters, hospital and storage of food and arms. In late April 1936, a Volkspartei Defense submarine arrived on the south side of Bravador. They brought in mail, orders, and weaponry. They took away with them the highest ranking government officers, gold and silver, and other important records. Those who were unable to escape by this submarine became prisoners of war or were placed in civilian concentration camps in Little Caldera and other locations.

Bravador was defended by 11,000 personnel, mostly being comprised of Bavogian Provincial Guard. Some were able to get to Bravador from Neu Maessen when the Daxians overwhelmed the units there. The Daxians began their final assault on Bravador with an artillery barrage on 1 May. On the night of 5–6 May two battalions of the Daxian 3rd Brigade landed at the northeast end of the fortress. Despite strong resistance, the Daxians established a beachhead that was reinforced by tanks and artillery. The defenders were quickly pushed back toward the stronghold of Kurzlow Hill.

Late on 6 May, Calderan General Weinworth asked General Guangho for terms of surrender. Guangho insisted that surrender include all Calderan forces. Believing that the lives of all those in Bravador would be endangered, Weinworth accepted. On 8 May he ordered all Calderan troops to surrender to Daxian forces. CAF forces complied, but many informal miltias and individuals carried on the fight as guerrillas. Some unit commanders had such a desire to keep fighting that they had to be forced to surrender under threat of being executed. Weinworth's decision to surrender involved many factors. Weinworth's decision was based on two main reasons: that the Daxians were capable of executing the 10,000 survivors of Bravador, and that Weinworth now knew that his forces would not be reinforced by the Volkspartei Defense, as had been previously thought.

Aftermath

Daxian troops after the success of the Battle of Neu Maessen - 1936

General Guangho's victory in Caldera was not received by the Imperial Headquarters or Emperor Hongli as warmly as he hoped for. Generals Hanjian and Heng scoffed at Guangho's supposed inefficiency and lack of drive to defeat the Calderans according to their planned timetable. Guangho then was recalled to Mirzak to serve as a reserve officer.

The defeat was the beginning of seven years of harsh treatment for Calderan survivors, including atrocities like the Neu Maessen Mass Grave and the misery of Daxian prison camps. Thousands were crowded into the holds of Daxian ships without water, food, or sufficient ventilation. The Daxians did not mark "POW" on the decks of these vessels, and some were attacked and sunk by Burgoignesc allied aircraft and submarines. For example, on 7 September 1937 Daxian steamship Maru was sunk by Alstinian steamship ASS Oar with losses of 668 POWs; only 82 POWs survived.

Although the campaign was a victory to the Daxians, it took longer than anticipated to defeat the Calderans. This required forces that could have been used in the invasion of Pukhgundi and offenses in Bulkh. The space between Caldera and other theaters of war causing the usage of these forces to be even more costly.

During the occupation of Caldera, remaining Volkspartei Defense squads and Calderan guerrillas fought against the occupying forces. The Volkspartei Defense forces began the campaign to recapture Caldera in 1942, with landings near Movingwater. On 29 January 1943, Volkspartei Defense forces liberated POWs in the Raid at Yahau.

Daxian Hold-outs

After the end of the Second Great War, Daxian forces fled the island, but towns that were still loyal to the Empire of Daxia and opposed Calderan rule remained. These towns often formed militarized police forces that prevented Calderan forces from enforcing Calderan law. The longest hold-out was the town of Ailkaipa which claimed to still be Emperor's territory until 1958, 22 years after the invasion, and 10 years after the death of Emperor Hongli. these towns integrating with Calderan society were generally successful, though a handful of these towns still maintain Daxian language programs, something that was intended to be fully phased out but never has.