Upon reaching my quarters, I sank into the chair and let myself relax. Everything had gone even better than I'd expected. We'd avoided losses—well, major losses. Seventeen wounded clones, six dead—two full crews from the TX-130 tanks. The tankers had fulfilled their duty with honor, shooting down two C-9979 landing barges, but they themselves had fallen viktim to Vulture droids. On the narrow ledge of the landing platform, the repulsor vehicles had no room to maneuver…
And yet the clones felt no regret—only satisfaction in a job well done.
Yeah… it's a curious situation.
The Jedi—the "guardians of peace," the "backbone of the Republic"—fight shoulder to shoulder with men no one truly cares about… All the clones know how to do is wage war. I can see it: they avoid talking about what comes after. They simply wouldn't survive without war; peaceful life isn't meant for them. At best, they might become farmers, or work in a factory.
But even that life would be short. They are poor, and no one needs them.
And still they fight—for the Republic, for democracy.
Strange, isn't it? They're at the very bottom of the barrel, yet they don't even know it. But perhaps that's precisely why they call themselves brothers—warriors—because only that bond allows them to endure what no one else could bear. Perhaps they are the finest men I have ever known…
I poured myself half a finger of some harsh liquor and, silently toasting the empty air, continued my reflections.
The clash with Ventress had gone… smoothly. Ahsoka was no longer inferior to her—at the very least, she matched her, and in some aspects even surpassed her. Our bond gave us a significant edge as well: we could exchange messages without our opponent understanding a thing. It made our movements tighter, more coordinated.
And, after all, there were two of us.
As for Rotta, everything was in order. The Huttlet was healthy and lively. All that remained was to deliver him to his father on Tatooine—and avoid running into Dooku along the way. After that, other Jedi would arrive—Obi-Wan among them: who better than him to negotiate with the Hutts? After all… the Council doesn't really have another option. It's not as if they'd send Windu, for Force's sake. With his temperament and open disdain for criminal elements, the Republic might as well declare war on the Hutts outright—the consequences would likely be less severe.
After this, I hope we'll head back to Coruscant. It's time to rest a little, to regain our strength.
I stretched out on the bunk, but sleep wouldn't come. So I decided to continue my "education." Returning to the desk, I activated the datapad. It was time to finish my acquaintance with the notes of the Rinaun family. In fact, over all this time I had nearly finished exploring that imposing work. Only the final section remained—compiled by Commander Rinaun's great-uncle, Davuatin. Opening the document, I dimmed the cabin lights and began to read…
Eight hours slipped by unnoticed. Closing the file at last, I leaned back in my chair with a quiet sigh. Well then. A great deal of time spent, an enormous volume of material read. From all the data that might prove useful—both what I had downloaded from the Jedi Archives and what I had gleaned from the Rinaun family records—I had assembled a coherent picture in my mind.
There were exactly two conclusions.
First: fleet tactics in the GFFA are quite well developed—at any rate, better than on Earth.
Well, what did we have, really? Crude triremes with their rams, then centuries of hugging the coastline. The golden age—and at the same time the swan song—of naval tactics was the Age of Sail. When the armadas of England, France, Spain, Portugal roamed the seas, clashing in brutal yet beautiful battles.
Yes…
And then everything accelerated. The age of steam arrived, only to be overtaken swiftly by the age of oil. The fleet's swan song was the Battle of Jutland—the last great clash of battlefleets—after which everything began to unravel. Aviation emerged. The American fleet at Pearl Harbor. Marat in Leningrad. Yamato, torn apart by dozens of torpedoes and bombs. Tirpitz, crippled by submarine attacks. Bismarck, hounded down by a pack of jackals…
Naval technology could not keep pace with military progress. Radars were imperfect; targeting systems even more so. And once they improved, missiles followed—ushering in an era in which traditional fleet engagements became obsolete. All of it became simply unnecessary: now there was the ability to strike an enemy hundreds of miles away.
Submarines became another gravedigger of the fleet. Operating beyond the visible plane of battle, they shifted naval warfare away from clashes between surface ships and toward anti-submarine defense. As I recall, a single modern aircraft carrier now requires at least one cruiser, a dozen destroyers, a pair of submarines, and a hundred aircraft and helicopters for protection. Add to that the entire support flotilla…
Here, in this Galaxy, there is no such concept as "underwater," and there is simply no true equivalent to submarines. Yes, there are questionable stealth projects—but a couple of experimental vessels across the entire Galaxy is hardly worth mentioning. Meanwhile, fleet engagements here have evolved rapidly and aggressively. It may be odd to compare naval and space warfare, but there are no better analogies available.
The earliest starships—both civilian craft and formidable warships—were initially fitted only with sheet-metal armor, intended to protect against micrometeoroids, space debris, and the artillery of enemy vessels. With the advent and proliferation of energy weapons, that plating took on a distinctive "mirror-like" finish. Although so-called mirror armor did not last long—such ships, for example, existed in the empire of Xim the Despot—it nevertheless became a hallmark of warships, and the fashion for reflectivity endured. The chromed hulls of Naboo's ships and yachts are a tribute to those ancient traditions.
Energy weapons appeared fairly quickly, and since shipboard reactors could generate sufficient power to sustain them, it was only natural that such armaments became standard on ships. However, other weapons systems—mass drivers among them—offered serious competition.
At first, ships relied solely on armor, but soon it was joined by energy shielding: deflector shields, designed to counter energy weapons, and particle shields, intended to protect against mass drivers, kinetic projectiles, and missiles. Gradually, the role of shields expanded, yet for nearly fifteen thousand years armor remained the only truly reliable protection for starships. A vessel's survivability depended primarily on the rational distribution of armor plating, its thickness, and the quality of the materials used.
Roughly eight thousand years ago, sentient engineers realized that by reducing the mass of armor while maintaining overall dimensions, they could enlarge the reactor and strengthen the shields. Ship ergonomics began to change, and with them came a pendulum effect. Whenever deflector power began to exceed the offensive capabilities of blasters and turbolasers, shipyards rushed to produce vessels bristling with mass drivers and missile launchers. In response, particle shields were upgraded, nullifying the advantages of kinetic weaponry. In certain periods, ships carried both types of weapons and both varieties of shields. On some classes, mass drivers persisted regardless. A few thousand years before Revan—and even earlier—they were the only truly effective means of planetary bombardment: turbolasers simply lacked the necessary output.
Progress, however, never stood still. Everything improved. Targeting systems. Armor. Engines.Weapons.
Energy weapons made a tremendous leap forward. The firepower of turbolasers increased many times over, surpassing that of mass drivers. Moreover, for the same volume and power allocation, more turbolasers could be installed. By my rough calculations, at present a single kilometer-long mass driver capable of accelerating a projectile to six kilometers per second consumes as much energy as forty-eight standard turbolasers—or a dozen heavy ones—operating at stable output. The result speaks for itself.
This… hm-m, revolution began roughly four thousand years ago, and by the time of Ruusan, ships had taken on the general form I see today. Or rather, the form they had prior to the Naboo blockade. Now, however, a new cycle of development has begun—bringing with it new tactical doctrines…
For reasons I cannot entirely explain, much of that doctrine still resembles traditional naval warfare, though there are important distinctions. Here, the plane of battle is the entirety of space. Ships possess immense maneuverability and staggering firepower. Therefore, over the course of thirty thousand years, fleet tactics have advanced far beyond anything we ever achieved.
And yet the system falters—for one simple reason: no one possesses practical experience anymore. Large warships had not been built in significant numbers for a very long time, and at the outbreak of this war, no one truly knew how to employ them in combat. Matters are somewhat better with smaller ships and starfighters…but only somewhat.