73

From the very beginning of her reign, Kamea had decided that Coromodir V, the old Espinosa home-world, not touched by the civil war, and now directly controlled world by her family, would have its already impressive (impressive for the Reaches that is) industrial infrastructure expanded, while Coromodir VI, the capital world, was going to be restored to a non industrially-polluted world.

At first, progress was very slow, in no small part because of the lack of funds. But bit by bit and after a while with my help, when I located as many of my companies as possible in Coromodir V, the world evolved to a very respectable industrial powerhouse. At first, in the civilian side, but bit by bit, the infrastructure and support industries for a military-industrial complex were created. Now, in the early 50s, the results were evident.

Thanks to the investments of the Arano-Bassot family in Coromodir V, the production line of the Shogun SHG-2H started in February 3052 instead of in New Vandenberg.

Coromodir V in 3052 also had operational production lines for the Karnov VTOL, the production license had been secured in 3028, the Cobra VTOL in its Command and MASH variants and the Vector VTOL in its Scout, EW and Attack variants. Two production lines of industrial 'Mechs also went operational in February 3052.

While the Cobra being an old and common design was no problem with its license, the Vector was a General Motors one. Luckily for Arano-Bassot, they had a very good relation with GM, so negotiating the license of production was relatively easy.

The fact that, except for the Shogun, which was produced by the local VMI branch, all these designs were VTOLs produced by a new industrial group, Coromodir Heavy Industries, Ltd (totally controlled by the Arano-Bassot family).

In Coromodir V, industries capable of supporting the production of 'Mechs, ASFs and other diverse military equipment had been built, with only the assembly lines missing, since only the one for the Shogun was available.

Thanks to the big investments in the shipyard in Mechdur, it was foreseen that in 3055, it would be able to produce 3 Pintos and 4 Invaders per year, keeping 6 other slips available for maintenance.

To solve the problems with the terrorist groups of the Maskirovka / Death Commandos units, the TDF resorted to hire several groups of mercenaries specialized in counter-insurgency operations (COIN). Less known and discreet than the large units that used ''Mechs, these mercenary forces like all specialized forces had their use. Fortunately, several groups were available in early 3052, and although they had to pay a (relatively) higher price because some didn't want to go to Periphery, all the available units were hired by the Taurian Concordat.

By this time a new wave of pirates had started to target the Concordat JumpShips. Every tentative of protecting them with military DropShips and / or armored marines failed. The pirates apparently had too good information and didn't target the protected ships. Since no one from crew returned or no member of these pirate groups was captured, no information on them was available, but the TMI suspected because of their efficiency that they were Capellan sponsored.

In retaliation for these operations and the insurgence groups, both suspected of being Capellan sponsored, Thomas authorized TTI to help HildCo Interplanetary in St Ives to (re)build the production lines of the Pillager PLG-3Z, something that the Federated Commonwealth has not helped the small nation with. The price of said help was the production rights of the advanced Assault 'Mech for TTI, turning them into the second company to produce Assault 'Mechs in the Concordat.

VMI was Thomas' first choice but the political in-fight inside the Concordat forced him to select TTI, that not only was based on Taurus, but also was not controlled by the Arano-Bassot.

Due to the implosion of Comstar and by association of the MRB, MRBC succeeded it with a base in Outreach, basically the same as Jean-Luc remembered.

The second generation of ground defenses i the Concordat was a bigger fortress with a pair or two of Heavy NPPCs, greatly improving the capability of defending the word they were installed in against light WarShips. Ground-based batteries of Killer Whale capital missiles started to be installed at the same time, even if for now they were in small numbers and only in strategic worlds, providing an extra capability against any orbital menace.

News of a new civil war in the FWL began to circulate in March 3052.

From what was known, in early March 3052, units from Regulus had tried to capture WoB WarShips in the Gibson system. Tried and failed. In retaliation, WoB WarShips had executed an orbital bombing of Regulus shortly after, showing to everyone what the Word of Blake really was, that is a group of trigger-happy bastards. The escalation, as well as the number of deaths caused, led many to rise up against such action, and against the WoB, in the Parliament in Atreus. Shortly after, the FWL was again involved in a civil war, with the forces loyal to Thomas and supported by the WoB being the only ones with WarShips. 

But not everything was going well for the loyalists and the WoB. One of their WarShips, the WoBS Herald of Retribution, an Aegis class Heavy Cruiser, was destroyed by a violent attack executed by several squadrons of ASFs in retaliation for Regulus and if rumors were to be believed with the use of several Alamos.