Operation Light Snow

Operation Light Snow (ICY 956) was an offensive operation of the Humankind Empire of Abh against the Four Nations Alliance, fought in the territories of the United Mankind and the Kingdom Ilsyr in the Great War. The objective was to retake territories occupied by the United Mankind following their Operations Amphitryon and Herkules and to meet up with the forces of Operation Hunter.

Background
The war started out as a two pronged attack by the Three Nations Alliance that successfully seized the strategic gates of Kingdom Ilsyr. Given the opportunity following Operation Phantom Flame, the Empire intended to reclaim these territories while pressuring the main alliance and United Mankind fleets who were now encircled. Operation Hunter would apply the pressure and seize United Mankind territory while a large fleet organized under Abriel Dubeusec would destroy any enemies found in former Abh territory.

Implementation
While the majority of Imperial Forces were assigned to Operation Hunter, a smaller force was to take the lesser strategic route and retake the Sords of the 12th Ring. These forces form Operation Light Snow. The Three Nations Alliance were compelled to withdraw and prepare a key strategic defense of their own positions following their deceive defeat after Operation Phantom Flame. This left numerous positions in the now occupied 12th Ring severely undermanned for their defense. The exception appeared to be Vascotton, which held a fuel production facility which the Alliance deemed important enough to reinforce and maintain a sizable presence.

Kryb King, Imperial Admiral Dubeusec chose to try to isolate pockets of resistance rather than spread his force out to seize numerous systems at once. Given this, his priority targets were Vascotton and Boraash. Hyde would be retaken last.

Battle of Sarukusu
System Vascotton had formed the staging area for Operation Iolaos which secretly built up to the Battle of Goslauth. While the gate leading to Area Itoum 533 would not be secured in this fight, Sarukusu formed a point where the Alliance hoped to halt the Abh advance through occupied territory. Despite being under-strength, they put up determined resistance, damaging and slowing the vanguard units of Snow Crystal. Dubeusec, knowing the desperate situation the enemy was in decided not to await reinforcements from Operation Hunter and would press his advantage in numbers and organization. Upon seeing the true size of the Abh force, the local garrison surrendered as to avoid being destroyed in detail. With no effective resistance Vascotton would be free to be taken soon thereafter.

Aftermath
In the midst of the operations, the Hyde system had declared independence from the Humankind Empire of Abh and had been supplied weapons and technology to attempt to rearm themselves and effectively resist the Empire on their own in the even the system ever left Alliance hands. They were nominally independent from the United Mankind; however, the Peacekeeping Corps generally dictated policy, operating a puppet government in the system until compelled to abandon Hyde. Martine truly became independent for a short time thereafter, but soon, their space was reoccupied and Abh security forces landed in an attempt to re-establish order. Terrorism and guerrilla warfare against the Empire would persist until the Martine Gate War Games.

The other systems that held key gates that would have given the Alliance access to striking Abh positions from the rear were retaken quickly. The Alliance given the Battle of Skaresh and Operation Phantom Flame never had time to mass forces to exploit their position to strike the Abh rear and harass fleets or supply convoys. With this, Dubeusec eliminated a significant strategic threat to the empire and helped secure the Laburec's new plans of grand offensives against each member nation of the Three Nations Alliance.

Territories retaken

 * Vascotton system
 * Hyde system
 * Boraash system