Planetary warfare: Difference between revisions

The Human-Covenant War brought a screeching halt to most Insurrection activity, though small, stubborn cells would continue to cause the UNSC headaches through the conflict. On the whole, though, humanity as a whole had to contend with the military juggernaut of a technologically advanced, numerically superior, previously unknown alien hegemony that embarked, in 2525, on a war of total extermination against the human species for religious reasons. While the UNSC was heavily outmatched in space, human forces tended to fare much better on the ground against Covenant infantry, armored fighting vehicles and aircraft, though the Covenant’s sheer numbers still tended to overwhelm human planetary forces. Even when the UNSC could score decisive victories on a planet’s surface, the overwhelming technological advantage the Covenant had in space meant that these were usually short-lived, buying time for the UNSC Navy to evacuate as many civilians as they could before the plasma bombardment. The Fall of Reach marked the second-largest campaign of the conflict, and the most devastating one for the Covenant, which lost a considerable portion of the forces it deployed to conquer the planet through heavy human resistance, including widespread Spartan deployments across the planet. The largest campaign would be the Battle of Earth, which saw humanity’s space forces smashed early in the conflict, and the invasion of several locations across the planet before the Covenant withdrew to occupy East Africa. Battles would also be fought on the surface of several artificial planets: UNSC forces from the Spirit of Fire would fight the Covenant on [[Shield World 0459]] in 2531; the Covenant would fight resistance forces from the UNSC Pillar of Autumn in September, 2552 on the surface of [[Alpha Halo]], and later escaped Flood forces; the UNSC In Amber Clad would follow a Covenant Assault Carrier from Earth to [[Delta Halo]], deploying its forces on its surface to secure the Activation Index and assassinate the Prophet of Regret; and after a tentative alliance, UNSC and Sangheili forces would pursue the Prophet of Truth’s forces through a Forerunner portal in East Africa to [[The Ark]], where UNSC ground forces secured a Cartographer facility to locate the Installation’s Control Room, and a combined human-Sangheili strike killed the Prophet of Truth, ending the war.