Embute War

Embute War
Savamese general Jules Proudhon leading his forces at the Battle of Haut-Vissier (2 Nollonger 1891).
Date 20 Sation 1889 - 28 Ediface 1893 (4 years, 1 month and 8 days) Location Messenia, Inner Joriscia Result Grand Alliance victory Treaty of Ráth Cession of Savamese territories to Cantaire, Ceresora, Elland, and Saint-Calvin Formation of Brex-Sarre Annexation of small principalities in Estologne by Cantaire Creation of the Principality of Emilia Annexation of Principality of Novigrad by Ceresora Elland and Zeppengeran to return to status quo antebellum
Belligerents
Grand Alliance Elland Odann (1890–93) Ceresora (1891–93) Cantaire (1891–93)	"1850 Pact" allies Savam Zeppengeran (1891–93) Transvechian volunteers
Commanders and leaders
Peter III Feargal Alessandro VIII Earl of Newfold Earl of Meiriston Ó hEidirsceóll Curcearu de Buxantes	Virginie ? Blainville Montalban-Dessor d'Hoste-Labarre

The Embute War, also known as the Great War or, in Zeppengeran, as the Second Northern War, was a conflict fought primarily in northern Messenia from 1889 to 1893 between the so-called "Grand Alliance" of Elland, Odann, Cantaire, and the Ceresoran Empire against Savam and her ally Zeppengeran. The war marked a dramatic shift in the way in which wars were conducted in Messenia; it may be seen as the first “industrialised war”, with much of the modern technology now commonplace in warfare – such as the telegraph, mechanised transport and repeating weaponry – seeing its first battlefield use.

The war was grounded in the Savamese desire to reunify reformer people into the Savamese Empire, as well as the growing importance of language and culture in the recognition of a shared national identity. The nominal reason for the war centred on the Embute people, a Sabamic minority widely seen in Savam as a subgroup of the Savamese people, of whom many had embraced the Reformation but still lived in majority Orthodox states such as Elland, Odann or Rochardy. Alongside a ratcheting upward of rhetoric from Quesailles over “oppressive actions” against the Ellish Embute community – an exaggeration grounded, at least partly, in reality – a series of border skirmishes with Elland eventually culminated in the Evensford Incident in Sation 1889 and a Savamese declaration of war against Elland.

It has been claimed that war was in any event inevitable. The so-called "crossed alliances" period was in full swing, industrialisation was driving societal change across the continent, and Savam had enjoyed nearly eight decades of successful expansion. The Embute War would be the high-water mark of Savamese expansion in their western border regions, and perhaps the largest single humbling of its historically formidable military; the country’s borders were pushed back north and east, and large parts of its territory were taken over by neighbour states in the eventual peace settlement.

Origins

The Savamese Empire had formed in the late 18^th century, driven by Catholic ideals but intended mostly as a mutual protection arrangement for the Reformer Savamese realms, particularly in view of the counter-Reformation led by Orthodox powers. With the end of the Reform Wars in 1823, however, the schism of Cairony had apparently settled into Orthodox and Reform wings, with reunification a distant and forlorn prospect. A greater sense of security and confidence saw the beginnings in subsequent decades of an overlap between Savamese culture and adherence to the Reformation, reinforcing the emergent notion of a distinct Savamese identity and justifying a separation. Although the Emperor still claimed to be the direct successor of the Cairan Emperor of the first millennium CE, the formation of an all-encompassing Cairan Empire, the goal of Catholicism, now became secondary to the reunion of minorities culturally and religiously related to the Savamese people.

The presence outside the empire’s borders of significant Embute minorities – who spoke a language closely related to Savamese (and regarded by many inside the country as no more than a Savamese dialect), and who shared strong cultural and religious ties – thus began to emerge as a significant issue. From the 1850s, Savam began to express strong concerns over the “oppression” of Embute communities in Elland, both in terms of religion for Reform Embutes, and in cultural terms when, in the late 1860s, the central government in Etherley started to impose the Ellish language as the sole language of the administration (which had also been a trigger for the Autumn War).

Quesailles was swept by expansionist rhetoric; this initially focused on the east, with the major Savamese success in the Great Verborian War, but eventually focused on the Embute "issue" (la question embute). This loose talk was only reinforced by the economic decline of Elland, which lagged behind Savam and Odann in terms of industrialisation and became a more tempting target as years passed. The Savamese raised the stakes with a number of minor border infractions in the mid- to late 1880s, before using the pretext created by the Evensford Incident to formally declare war on Elland, a move very reminiscent of the one used by Odann against Elland at the beginning of the Autumn War 25 years prior.

The war

1889–90: jeu d’éclat

Both combatants had existing ties of alliance with Helminthasse, and they now called on that nation for assistance under those agreements; however, the Helmin answered the petitions by declining to assist either country militarily, although holding themselves out as willing to facilitate any peace process. The Ellish and Savamese alike shrieked betrayal; the Helmin volte-face particularly damaged the relations between Quesailles and Virkið, which would take a decade to recover However, the early war went largely in Savam's favour as it only had to fight Elland, launching a successful campaign in the Upper Gaste Basin from Gannsford and pushing deep into Ellish territory. By the end of spring in 1890, it seemed that Savam would be able to secure a quick victory. Its forces advanced to within fifty kilometres north-east of Etherley and were actively preparing for a siege of the city, knowing that the Ellish would defend it in force. Diplomatic overtures were made, but bluntly rejected in Etherley, although heads rolled in the Ellish command, with the Earl of Newfold being pushed into an ignominious retirement and the Earl of Meiriston taking over his role.

1890–91: Them boys light up

A beleaguered Elland's rejection of peace proposals became clear in Estion 1890 with Odann setting aside past animosities and throwing its weight into the war on the Ellish side – the first step of a process that would ultimately turn the tide of the war. This was perhaps less an alliance than a recognition of shared threats; strategists in Ráth saw a Savamese takeover of the Upper Gaste Basin as a significant advance which would throw doubts over the security of Odann’s eastern and southern borders.

The sudden shift largely blindsided the Savamese government and the Quesailles war office, and its armies were taken mainly by surprise by the Odannach offensive, withdrawing forces into better defensive positions in north-eastern Elland and Emilia (then part of Valdenois). Although Odann captured Gannsford early on and an Ellish drive opened up a path to its south into western Sarre, Savamese forces dug into a successful defence of Lower Valdenois, forcing the offensive to a stalemate. Stymied for a time, Savam now launched a diplomatic offensive from Dominy 1890 to pull Zeppengeran into the war, in line with its own alliance accords. With concerns of their own over preparedness, the Zepnish asked for a few months of delay, which Quesailles acquiesced to, believing that its army would be able to hold against Odann for that period. However, events once again turned against them, as the Ceresoran Empire declared war on Savam in Petrial 1891.

From the Savamese point of view this was less unexpected. Although it had been weakened by Odann's neutrality during the Great Verborian War, the Ceresoran-Odannach Alliance remained in place. The wounds still festered in Ceresora, and Savamese intelligence indicated that its intervention was likely (several corps were kept in Dordanie for this eventuality). Motivated by the promise to take control of Verborian land again, Ceresora entered the conflict eagerly, bringing its satellite Cantaire into what was now being called the Grand Alliance. Under considerable pressure from Quesailles, Zeppengeran joined the war just three weeks after Ceresora, launching a major offensive in southern Elland.

Ceresoran attacks forced Savam to redirect forces eastward to protect the industrial core of Dordanie and bolster a defensive force now seen as inadequate. Ceresoran and Cantairean forces launched immediate offensives toward Occois and Sarre as well as across the Védomagne into Benovia. While the Zepnish invasion of southern Elland forced the Grand Alliance to shuttle some troops there, the Savamese were now largely outnumbered.

Nonetheless, at first, the war did not seem to go badly for them. During 1891 the fronts were relatively static, with counter-offensives retaking the territories seized in earlier offensives, both in the east and west. The Battle of Gannsford saw the Savamese regain a foothold near Odann's border. On the eastern front, under the command of the newly promoted Marshal Valentin d'Hoste-Labarre, Savam was successful in repealing Ceresoran offensives in Occois-Garde and eastern Benovia, as well as limiting the allied advance inside Sarre. The Fortress of Marceros proved once again pivotal, withstanding anything that the Cantaireans and Ceresorans could throw at it. Over the course of the war Marceros would be besieged several times, but always remained in Savamese hands, pinning down most of Cantaire's war effort.

1891–92: Waiting for the hammer to fall

The last months of 1891 marked the beginning of a turn in the war. The western Savamese army was under considerable Odannach pressure in western Lower Valdenois. Attacks mounted in strength during Ediface, until the decisive engagement at the Battle of Haut-Vissier in early Nollonger; with the Odannach general Dubhlainn Ó hEidirisceóll for once allowing his tactical acuity to override his more natural instinct towards caution, the Savamese were handily defeated, despite their honour being saved by the heroic actions of general Jules Proudhon. This defeat opened the door for the allies, with Troarn falling within two more weeks, and it allowed Ellish and Odannach forces under Arthur Anderson, one of the younger guns advanced by Meiriston, to take Pontaliens (Pont d’Chélîn), on the shores of Lake Carles, by Conservene.

The Savamese eastern command had problems of its own with which to deal. Although some advances had been made in northern Ceresora and Cantaire – even to the point of recovering the historic strongpoint at Marceros – as the year ran to its end, Ceresoran response was being ramped up into a spearhead attack in the territory around the Sabamic Gate, for centuries the main pathway into the agricultural plains of Dordanie.

With the melting of snows in the spring of 1892 came the main allied offensive, aimed at Savam's core east of Lake Carles. The offensive was divided into three main branches: two would pass Lake Carles from the north and south, with Ó hEidirsceóll aiming his force at Bar, while Meiriston put himself into field command in an advance on Etamps-La-Sainte, with the goal of meeting near Maconfle to progress further east along the Gaste toward Sévinne and Quesailles; the third was tasked with pushing northward to invade Quènie.

Valdenian and Brocquian offensives

The main attack around Lake Carles was fairly successful. Despite clever movement warfare and some tactical successes, Savamese forces could not prevent the allies from besieging Gué-le-Château, the Valdenian capital, starting in late Floridy. Although it could easily be supplied from the lake, the city surrendered on 22 Floridy. The surrender was likely influenced by the decision made by the Savamese military command to fall back on a defensive line further east, judging Gué's position too costly to maintain in the long run. By Estion, allied forces had entered northern Brocquie and were marching toward Bar.

Advances in Sarre

In the south, the allies also met with success, especially after Savamese resistance was broken at the Battle of Husson. On 7 Fabricad, they reached Etamps and encircled the Holy City. A large Savamese garrison remained there, but Meiriston was hesitant to attack Cairony's most sacred site; even the Orthodox clergy was reluctant to support a military assault against Etamps. Eventually, this would prove unnecessary, as Holy Mother Faustine de Maupressons negotiated that she would open the city to the allies if the Savamese garrison could evacuate unharmed with its weapons. Meiriston agreed to this ordered retreat.

In the following months, allied forces continued to advance eastward, coming within reach of Maconfle by Dominy and threatening to join with Cantairean forces as they pushed through Sarre. At the same time, Savam had temporarily managed to halt the northern wing's advance at the First Battle of Bar, buying some much-needed respite over the summer.

Sillon de Velcour campaign

Savamese defence was only decisively successful with the third branch of the allied assault, aiming at Quènie. In order to invade the northern state, the allied armies had to cross the barrier formed by the uplands of the Massif Cardussien and the Rindarian Range. The only viable passage was through the Sillon de Velcour, a large valley providing a direct and flat route from Velcour in northern Valdenois to Sainte-Ariane-sur-Gersse in Quènie. The sillon was well known for its strategic importance, and had been heavily fortified for more than five centuries. In the 1880s, Savam had completed a full overhaul of the valley's fortifications, upgrading them to face increasingly powerful modern weapons; the city of Velcour itself was widely considered one of the most formidable fortified city in whole Messenia.

After the fall of Gué-le-Château, allied armies moved north toward the sillon. Contrary to their usually mobile defence, the Savamese did not try to oppose the allies' advance toward Velcour; rather, they locked themselves inside the city's fortifications. As expected, the allies laid siege to the city on 18 Fabricad; the allied command was eager to take Velcour, hoping to score a considerable moral victory over the Savamese.

Considerable resources were invested in taking Velcour down, to little avail. By the end of Estion the city had withstood massive bombardment, yet counter-battery fire continued intensively, and any assault was repelled with great casualties among the besiegers (with the Savamese making one of their first systematic uses of early machine guns). At that point, pressed to move by the successes of the other branches, the allied officers decided to bypass Velcour and advance into the sillon without waiting, leaving a reduced force to maintain the siege, but with no immediate intent on taking the city. Unfortunately, this strategy did not pay off: the sillon was defended by a series of nine major fortresses, most of them within cannon range of each other. Savamese fortifications and determination eventually gained the upper hand in the two-month-long Battle of the Sillon. Forced to fall back on a line south of Velcour, the allies dug in there for the rest of the war. In the end, the allies would never manage to break into the sillon or to take Velcour, even as later on the imperial capital was under siege. The city itself, its defenders, and its inhabitants received the highest military honours after the war.

Stalemate in the east

• 06-07/92 major Canto-Ceresoran offensive Against Tulles (goal to Taurive) - slow advance, with cantairean territory retaken and Tulles falling in 07
• 06-07/92 Cantaire advances with success in Sarre as well
• 07-08/92 Marceros still withstanding assaults
• 09/92 allied advance toward Taurive is stopped
• 10/92 savamese counter offensive toward Sorreti (from Aix) fails
• 11-12/92 fierce battle in southern Benovia, Ceresoan cross védomagne, with St-Juste falling into Ceresoran hands, St Valériane holds
• 02/93 Allied rotation toward Ostelac forces a Savamese counter offensive in Benovia to be rescheduled -- Savam defeat west of Ostelac
• 03/93 Ostelac under siege, Sav forced marches from Aix to Marceros and organise a sortie, attacking along Génestre on eastern bank -> trigger panic retreat of allied away from Ostelac
• 04/93 Savamese dung-in south of Marceros, still threatening Sorreti too but unable to advance toward it, allied forces split: dung-in around Tulles and one branch moves south to protect Cantaire

Push through Middle Gaste

Sation to Conservene 1892

By the autumn of 1892, the Savamese had managed to halt allied advances at the First Battle of Bar and the Battle of the Sillon, but remained vulnerable at Maconfle, which was under siege. Although some movement had taken place during the summer, the allies had attempted no major push along the Gaste, and any Savamese effort to relieve the city had been repelled. Re-supplying the city from the river was also becoming increasingly difficult, as more and more artillery was massed there by the Ellish and Odannaigh.

The second major allied offensive began with the Second Battle of Bar in Sation and Ediface. It was vital for both sides to take good positions before the winter set in and snowfalls made movement warfare impractical (despite the use of railways to transport troops). The Savamese, especially imperial chief of staff Marshal Sixte de Blainville, hoped to be able to defeat the northern corps (composed exclusively of Odannach divisions) to then turn around and relieve Maconfle with their full capacity. However, unknown to the Savamese, Ó hEidirsceóll, commanding the allies, had massed more rifled breech loader guns west of Bar, freshly equipped with brand new percussion-fuse shells. The new advanced artillery gave the Odannaigh a decisive advantage, allowing them to win the engagement and take Bar on 21 Ediface. The fallout in the Savamese high command was savage, with Blainville being forced to step down after a private audience with Empress Virginie.

Soon after the fall of Bar, the northern and southern branches of the Lake Carles offensive made contact at Maconfle in early Ediface 1892, while the Savamese army was retreating through Adaque. The Savamese command was now preparing for defence west of Taurive. A daring evacuation of Maconfle took place in mid-Ediface, before the Gaste river froze and before the city surrendered in early Nollonger, most of its defensive assets having been evacuated eastward. The allied forces continued to progress eastward in Adaque during Nollonger, but remained at least eighty kilometres west of Taurive by Conservene when heavy snowfalls forced both sides to dig in.

Savamese winter counter-offensive

Animare to Metrial 1893

In early Animare 1893, Blainville’s successor Marshal Philippe de Montalban-Dessor (from a cadet branch of the Quènian royal family) launched a surprise counter-offensive through Adaque in the midst of winter. The offensive was led by a freshly formed army, composed of several corps of Transvechian volunteers who had been training in central Dordanie for several months, reinforced by Savamese divisions freshly arrived from Seranian colonies, and by the Imperial Guard. Montalban-Dessor had obtained permission from Empress Virginie to use the guard, an elite force of shock troops, for what he hoped would be a decisive action. He was initially proved right: the Battle of St-Hilaire on 8 Animare saw the surprised Odannach forces collapse and suffer considerable casualties.

Over the next few weeks the Savamese progressed past Adaque and turned north-west toward Bar. At this point, the Savamese command was faced with a decisive choice: Ó hEidirsceóll was regrouping near Bar and presented a tempting target, but to the south-west were the mostly Ellish forces under the command of Meiriston, who had been wintering around Maconfle. Rightly aware of the danger to his flank if he pursued Ó hEidirsceóll, Montalban-Dessor turned again to march against Maconfle. After several days of encircling manoeuvres, the Savamese and Ellish forces met near the village of La Herse-en-Brocquie on 21 Animare. The battle, fought within a maddening blizzard (and remembered for it as la bataille de la tempête), was another success for the Savamese. The Ellish army was broken and retreated hastily, partially toward the city itself, and toward the north along the shore of Lake Carles. The Savamese immediately moved to encircle the northern approaches of Maconfle.

Allied reversal

Floridy to Estion 1893

While Meiriston’s force had taken some damage, it remained in good order initially as far as Litoine before backing upriver towards Bar to link up with the army under Ó hEidirsceóll. Meiriston now argued that, with the Savamese under pressure in the south from a revived Ceresoran and Cantairean threat, what was now required was a concentrated press eastward – initially towards Sévinne, but ultimately to take the war to Quesailles itself. The Belle-Ésperance Council, which took place in the Bar hotel of that name on 3 Animare, was lengthy, with Ó hEidirsceóil characteristically cautious and dubious; but the firm backing of the Ceresoran general Petru de Curceanu, now in overall command in the south, convinced him that such an approach would be feasible.

• Reversal in middle gaste, Savames collapse
• 06/93 Taurive taken
• Allied victory in Cantaire south of Marceros, Savamese retreat to Marceros which holds; allied forces unable to push north however

Siege of Sévinne

Dominy 1893

Siege of Quesailles

Empery to Ediface 1893

• Counter-offensive from Poignes (lead by Hoste-Labarre) during siege of Quesailles, Taurive retaken (09/93), mitigates the defeat.

Armistice

• Fighting ceases on 12 Ediface

Campaigns in Inner Joriscia

Inner Joriscia provided a secondary front for the Embute War after Ceresora joined the conflict in 1891. Following the conclusion of the Great Verborian War, Savam had considerably extended its influence over the northern Steppe, displacing Ceresoran clients and allies. The situation had been stabilised following the 1873 joint intervention against the Holy Respublic, but by the 1890s Savam was using its vassal the Elmiesian Principality to disrupt Ceresoran interests in south-western Translacunia and in the Bronislavid Commandery.

Aftermath

Savam's losses at the Treaty of Ráth:      Ceded to Elland      Ceded to Ceresora      Ceded to Cantaire      Ceded to Brex-Sarre      Ceded to Saint-Calvin      Emilia formed

The Treaty of Ráth formally ended the war in 28 Ediface 1893, recognizing the Grand Alliance as the victors of the conflict. Subsequently, a considerable portion of Savam's western territories was built into a number of buffer states between Savam and the the victorious powers, either by enlarging existing neutral or Grand Alliance-aligned nations such as Brex-Sarre and Cantaire, or by creating new states ex nihilo with the formation of Emilia from the former Savamese Lower Valdenois, the southern half of the Kingdom of Valdenois. The treaty also nullified all Zepnish territorial gains made into Elland during the later stages of the war and returned the border to its pre-war state.

In Savam, the shock of the defeat triggered the period known as the Labarrist Age, with the election of d'Hoste-Labarre, the eastern front commander-in-chief, to the viceregal office. Under Labarre's leadership, Savam rebuilt its position in Messenia by accelerating its industrialisation and by favouring diplomatic expansion instead of military adventures. The Empire became more centralised, with statism taking precedence over liberalism. Politically, the respublic was extended, with the creation of the quartiles franchise system and the direct election of the Viceroy, allowing a larger share of the population to vote. At the same time, civil liberties were extended (such as allowing the freedom to strike) and social welfare programs created (including national retirement schemes).

Opinion on the war in Zeppengeran was decidedly mixed. The issues which had delayed Zepnish entry into the war also raised questions as to its army’s combat effectiveness; however, it performed well above expectations and made substantial inroads into the Northmark region, forcing an Ellish army poorly equipped for the task to fight on two fronts for extended periods. The war effort did much to bolster Zepnish confidence in its ability to act in its own interests in the manner of the great power which it claimed to be. The gains made Zepnish involvement in the conflict very popular at home, and the restoration of the status quo ante bellum in the south caused public outrage in Zeppengeran, along with furious exchanges in the Diet as the government sought to defend the outcome from Ráth; a significant body of opinion in subsequent years has seen the Second Northern War as a futile waste of lives and resources.