User:Lord Hydronium/Workbench

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The storm commandos were an elite special forces unit of the Imperial Army.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Founding 1.2 Early Galactic Civil War 1.3 Post-Endor operations 2 Organization and role 3 Equipment 4 Members 5 Behind the scenes 6 Appearances 7 Sources 8 Notes and references

[edit] History

[edit] Founding

During the Galactic Civil War, the Rebel Alliance relied on guerrilla warfare in its fight against the Empire, to great success.^[5] After the Rebel uprisings on Gerrard V and Ralltiir, the Imperial Military was forced to reexamine its own strategies, seeing a need for a more focused military unit to complement its method of overwhelming force.^[5] When the Death Star was destroyed by the Alliance at the Battle of Yavin, Emperor Palpatine could no longer deny that the Alliance's techniques were effective. Palpatine decided that the Empire needed a comparable force, trained in similar guerrilla-style tactics.^[6] The Stormtrooper Corps were unable to accommodate such a unit within their existing structure, though.^[7] Inspired by the success of the Republic's shadow troopers,^[8] Palpatine issued a classified executive order approximately two months after Yavin, ordering that a new elite unit be created to respond to the Rebels in kind. Grand Moff Tanniel was given authorization to pick the unit's commanding officer, and he selected Colonel Crix Madine, a fellow graduate of the Raithal Academy.^[1]

Madine was put in charge of forming his new soldiers into units and giving them the instruction they needed in commando tactics,^[7] and the first class of the new storm commandos was sent to advanced training on the planet Carida.^[1] Meanwhile, the Imperial scientist Doctor Nashiak Llalik set about developing the commandos' armor.^[9] Four months after their creation, the existence of the storm commandos was declassified, and the newsfeed Imperial Defense Daily was given the first coverage about the new unit. Within a few weeks, Madine led his new troops on their first missions in the field.^[1] From the beginning, the storm commandos saw tremendous success in dozens of operations against the Rebels. Madine took pride in his units engaging in clean strikes, with no civilian casualties.^[3]

As the year neared its end, trouble on the planet Dentaal came to a head. The revolutionary Dentaal Independence Party overthrew its Imperial governor, Taliff, and declared independence for the planet with the full support of the public.^[2] The storm commandos were ordered to Dentaal to punish the dissidents. With orders passed down from the highest levels of the Empire, the commandos released the Candorian plague across the planet, an incurable disease that would ultimately kill the entire planet's population of over ten billion people.^[3][10] Madine was horrified at what he had done,^[3] and only seven months after the unit's founding, he deserted.^[2] While leading his squad in a wilderness exercise on Dentaal, Madine disappeared into a system of caves;^[11] a search turned up nothing, and the Empire presumed him dead, fallen into one of the cave's kilometers-deep fissures. Madine was replaced as the commanding officer of the storm commandos by Colonel Jenn Smeel.^[2]

[edit] Early Galactic Civil War

In the months following the Battle of Yavin, teams of storm commandos were assigned to acquire useful new technology for the Empire. Several were dispatched to the world of Ralltiir, where a group of scientists had developed a new type of shield generator and were hiding within its confines. When an Imperial named Tycho Celchu learned of these operations and attempted to alert and defect to the Rebellion, a team of commandos caught up with him on Dantooine and took him into custody aboard an Armored Personnel Carrier. Before Celchu could be transported offworld, the Rebel Luke Skywalker arrived and launched a one-man assault on the commando team. Commandos and stormtroopers poured from the APC in an attempt to fight off Skywalker, but he was able to kill them and retrieve Celchu. Due to the information Celchu provided, the Rebellion was able to arrive on Ralltiir in time to intervene in the battle. In the middle of the fighting the Rebel Sarkli defected to the Empire, but the Rebels were able to get hold of the scientists nonetheless and, despite the efforts of the commandos, escaped off-planet with them.^[12]

Palpatine kept several commandos stationed at his retreat on Naboo during the war.^[13] When Darth Vader formed the Imperial Death Squadron in 3 ABY to track down the base of the Rebellion, storm commandos were among the many types of specialized stormtrooper units assigned to join his fleet as well.^[14] Later that year, Crix Madine and Wedge Antilles led an attack on a prison orbiting Bakura to free a group of scientists captured during the Battle of Hoth. Sarkli took his Imperial escort carrier into the battle, then leapt away to Geonosis. When Madine and Antilles followed, Sarkli and his commandos sprung the trap by bringing a fleet of carriers and their starfighters to bear against the Rebel forces. Sarkli's vessel was shot down, forcing him to evacuate to the planet's surface, and the Rebels emerged victorious. Commandos serving aboard three escort carriers were later pressed into duty at the Fondor Shipyards when Madine and Antilles launched another attack, this time to destroy an Executor-class Star Dreadnought under construction there. Again, the Imperial forces lost.^[12]

In 4 ABY, the Rebellion massed for an assault on the Death Star II orbiting Endor. Storm commandos, Sarkli among them, were deployed to the planet's surface to defend the shield generator bunker that protected the Death Star.^[12] Though intended to be a trap for the Rebels, the battle turned into a rout for the Empire, and Palpatine was killed in the fighting aboard the Death Star. On the planet, the Rebel forces under the command of General Han Solo, with the help of the native Ewoks, were able to take out the Empire's walkers and subdue its infantry forces outside the bunker.^[15] General Solo then tricked the commanding officer of the bunker to open its doors and ambushed his troops. As he moved into the bunker to set detonation charges, the storm commandos still inside fought back every step of the way. They were unsuccessful, and Sarkli's last-ditch attempt to stop Solo fared no better, ending in his death. After clearing the bunker, Solo set off the charges and the shield was brought down, allowing the Rebels to destroy the Death Star.^[12]

[edit] Post-Endor operations

In the wake at the events of Endor, the city of Coronet on Corellia rejected Imperial rule. The Imperial General Weir sought to punish the populace, and a week after Endor he launched an assault on the city. Among Weir's forces were the storm commandos. As part of the opening salvo on the city, snipers from that unit were deployed to the city's high places. A pair of them launched a rocket attack on a nearby cantina, but amongst the cantina's patrons were Luke Skywalker and the members of Rogue Squadron. Skywalker, armed with only a lightsaber, made it to the commandos' position under the covering fire of his squadmates, waylaying their attack shortly before the rest of Weir's forces came pouring into the city. When he felt his point had been made with sufficient damage to the city, Weir withdrew his forces from Coronet.^[16]

[edit] Organization and role

Storm commandos were trained in the guerrilla tactics favored by the Rebel Alliance. Selected from the Empire's top stormtroopers, commandos were given expert-level training in hit-and-fade methods of warfare. Whereas regular stormtrooper units were used in large-scale battles, commandos were deployed for small-scale situations.^[6] The storm commandos were used in a variety of tasks, including breaking sieges, strikes against Rebels, extracting persons of interest to the Empire, and pre-assault operations on invasion and Base Delta Zero targets.^[6][7] Commandos were trained to operate on a number of specialized terrains;^[6] they were very self-sufficient, and could look after the state of their own gear and health.^[7] The unit received a ferocious reputation for its work.^[6] Alliance Special Forces came to respect the abilities of their counterparts,^[5] and storm commandos were one of the few stormtrooper units that SpecForce saw as a threat.^[7]

Storm commandos were classified as a branch of the Imperial Army.^[17] A single unit of storm commandos could comprise between four and forty soldiers.^[5] A quarter of them were standard "line" units, and another quarter assault units trained in artillery and vehicle combat. A quarter of the commandos were saboteur units specializing in demolitions and stealth; planting vehicle bombs was a particularly effective technique of theirs, useful to prevent a target from escaping. The last quarter consisted of tech units with expertise in repairing gear, jury-rigging devices, sabotage, and surveilling targets.^[6][5] Storm commandos were never numerous, even compared to other Army special operations units,^[7] and even up to the end of the Galactic Civil War they remained a rare sight.^[5]

[edit] Equipment

Developed by Doctor Nashiak Llalik of COMPNOR's Science group,^[9] storm commando armor was produced by Imperial Munitions. Commando armor was based off that of the Empire's scout troopers. It was lightweight and nonrestrictive, but provided plenty of protection nonetheless. Their armor was made out of the material reflec, a polymer created around the time of their conception that could bend sensor rays away from the commando, rendering them practically invisible to light-based scans. To augment their stealth capabilities, storm commando armor had a thin layer of sound baffling in it, rendering them more sound-absorbent and allowing a commando to move with less noise. As commandos usually operated in darkness, their armor was customarily black without any insignia. The helmets, which were blast-reinforced like the armor, had ultraviolet night vision that made it easier for commandos to work in the dark. Commandos wore a two-piece temperature controlling body glove underneath their armor, also in black. Storm commando armor was classified as a military secret, and illegal possession of it was punishable by life imprisonment or execution.^[6] An alternate design of armor was worn by certain groups of storm commandos.^[12]

A standard storm commando was armed with a blaster pistol and blaster carbine. Their armor contained a pouch for explosives. Commandos were outfitted with the standard stormtrooper utility belt, and kept a survival kit on them containing rations, medpacs, emergency power cells, and a spare comlink. Commando specialists had additional equipment to suit their specific tasks. Assault units carried 2 concussion grenades apiece, and a heavier weapon of the unit commander's choice; if speed was a necessity, lighter weapons like grenade launchers or a light repeater would be chosen. Saboteurs carried detonite—about three satchels for every other trooper—and sometimes thermal detonators. Tech units were equipped with communication gear, computer probes, and other tools useful for the sabotage or surveillance of a target.^[6]

Storm commandos made use of a number of vehicles and starships in their work. Armored Personnel Carriers saw use among their ranks, both for protection in a hot zone and as a way to transport prisoners. In space, the commandos had exclusive use of Imperial escort carriers, a class of armed vessel capable of transporting TIE fighters.^[12]

[edit] Members

The Imperial general Weir, who kept storm commandos as part of his forces, wore storm commando armor himself on the field of battle.^[16]

[edit] Behind the scenes

[edit] Appearances

• Star Wars: Rebellion
• "Galaxywide NewsNets" - Star Wars Adventure Journal 4 (Mentioned only)
• "Galaxywide NewsNets" - Star Wars Adventure Journal 5 (Mentioned only)
• Star Wars: Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike
• "Combat Moon" - Star Wars Adventure Journal 9
• "Small Favors" - Star Wars Adventure Journal 12
• Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided
• Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (First appearance) (Retcon)
• X-wing: Rogue Leader
• X-wing: Rogue Squadron (First appearance before retcon)
• Darksaber (Mentioned only)

[edit] Sources

• Galaxy Guide 5: Return of the Jedi (First mentioned)
• Galaxy Guide 9: Fragments from the Rim (First identified as storm commandos)
• Alliance Intelligence Reports
• The Truce at Bakura Sourcebook
• Galaxy Guide 3: The Empire Strikes Back, second edition
• Rules of Engagement: The Rebel SpecForce Handbook
• Instant Adventures
• Cynabar's Fantastic Technology: Droids
• Gundark's Fantastic Technology: Personal Gear
• Rebellion Era Sourcebook
• The New Essential Guide to Characters
• The New Essential Chronology
• The Force Unleashed Campaign Guide
•  Storm commandos in the Databank
•  Madine, General Crix in the Databank
•  Utapau shadow troopers in the Databank

[edit] Notes and references

Category:Imperial military units Category:Stormtrooper variants