This is absolutely incredible. I almost don't want to believe this. On a silver platter! But I am getting ahead of myself.
I have met some NX-01 Starflier Leon person. Thought nothing of it. He says he can do surveys of ANYTHING. Yeah...right...just map entire areas where we couldn't get to, swarming with Union agents, mon pote, whatever you say. Nevertheless I have commisioned a contract to get surveys of our potential targets.
To my shock, he delivered, right afterwards!
Needless to say - our vessels greatly appreciated this and we have sent more scouts to examine both locations while having precise coordinates, making sure our scouts stay safe.
Change of plans
First of all De Grasse is a no-go. Yes our SHF provocative strikes have shown that it is guarded by civilians. But it is very much active and could be able to defend itself. We would need a massive infiltration operation that would cost many lives just for one battleship. Instead our target will be
Chalons-en-Champagne Station and Planet Marne's orbit:
Our luck is incredible.
Champagne has historically been the stronghold of the Maquis. The Council may have betrayed us, but the people have not forgotten. What happened at Mazagran resonated throughout the system and made vast amounts of people feel for our cause. We don't expect heavy militant resistance from civilians that don't belong to the EFL and IDF. On the contrary possibly - we will see if there's support with our contacts on the planet.
The station is amost undefended! The Union treats it as a scrapyard, and defend it like a scrapyard. Yes there are planetary defenses, military staff overseeing the operation, but nothing we can't handle easily.
There are entire two fleets being decomissioned - The Chaumont and Combrai battlegroups.
These two we expect to be in advanced stage of salvaging materials - but our goal will be the battleships who's names we don't know yet and that will be re-christened by the FLG that are being stationed there for decomissioning. Whether they were part of said battlegroups or not.
Drawback
Undefended battleships waiting to be put to sleep, people that are likely to not go out of their way to harm us or die for The Union - they might actually actively support us - seems like an easy operation right?
The operation itself will not be an issue at all in terms of forces needed. What will be a massive issue is time. We are talking about towing multiple battleships - some might have their reactors shut down. This will take us many hours, days potentially - more than enough time for Union loyalist reinforcements to arrive from Picardy and Orlenais.
An unprecedented distraction
We will need a distraction. One of massive proportions. Orkney was a child's play next to this. Every piece of our propaganda machine will need to be at work, a lot of money will have to be spent, the Liberated Gallia thruth spreading outlet will be told to go into overdrive. We will hire multiple 3rd parties.
It is a crazy, bold and complicated plan, but if succesful it will buy us more than enough time. Even if somehow The Union sniff our or plan, they will have no choice but to move their forces away from Champagne, or risk a massive political blow to their entire regime. I am not ready to reveal said plan until I confirm the High Command that it is even feasible. But stay tuned.
In the meantime - stay away from the Champagne system in terms of large scale operations in the open. We won't want them to suspect a thing. Leon of NX-01 has done all the work for us and our Orlenais strike might make the GN and GNI suspect DeGrasse might be our next target.
![[Image: 628720b925ef67a16ea2f1027051e01f.gif]](https://i.gyazo.com/628720b925ef67a16ea2f1027051e01f.gif)