Legions fighting an insurgency.

[TorvaldTheMild]

What legion would be the best at fighting against a guerrilla or insurgent army?  I think it would be the Raven Guard or White Scars on the loyalist side and Alpha Legion or maybe the Night Lords on the traitor side, as they are pretty flexible and never fight bombastically with their full might, more surgical blades than blacksmith hammers.

[Lucerne]

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

[TorvaldTheMild]

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

Not literally actually.  Raven guard literally are guerrilla warfare specialists.  Alpha legion are more on the infiltration and clandestine side of warfare.  No offence intended but I think you are misconstruing what insurgency means.

Edited August 11, 2020 by TorvaldTheMild

[Lucerne]

 

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

Not literally actually.  Raven guard literally are guerrilla warfare specialists.  Alpha legion are more on the infiltration and clandestine side of warfare.  No offence intended but I think you are misconstruing what insurgency means.

 

 

...I'm really not. The Raven Guard are good at hit and run tactics, but the Alpha Legion elevated counter-insurgency to an artform and have it as their roots, to the point where their list of specializations has it stated outright- while the Raven Guard pointedly lack counter-insurgency as an area they're stated to be competent at.

 

https://ibb.co/PYpgcwC

Edited August 11, 2020 by Lucerne

[TorvaldTheMild]

 

 

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

Not literally actually.  Raven guard literally are guerrilla warfare specialists.  Alpha legion are more on the infiltration and clandestine side of warfare.  No offence intended but I think you are misconstruing what insurgency means.

 

 

...I'm really not. The Raven Guard are good at hit and run tactics, but the Alpha Legion elevated counter-insurgency to an artform and have it as their roots, to the point where their list of specializations has it stated outright.

 

https://ibb.co/PYpgcwC

 

What source is that?

[Lucerne]

 

 

 

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

Not literally actually.  Raven guard literally are guerrilla warfare specialists.  Alpha legion are more on the infiltration and clandestine side of warfare.  No offence intended but I think you are misconstruing what insurgency means.

 

 

...I'm really not. The Raven Guard are good at hit and run tactics, but the Alpha Legion elevated counter-insurgency to an artform and have it as their roots, to the point where their list of specializations has it stated outright.

 

 

What source is that?

 

Forge World's books (book 3 of their HH series) which are the definitive source of information about these Legions.

[TorvaldTheMild]

 

 

 

 

Alpha Legion win this one by a landslide. Their specializations literally include insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare.

Not literally actually.  Raven guard literally are guerrilla warfare specialists.  Alpha legion are more on the infiltration and clandestine side of warfare.  No offence intended but I think you are misconstruing what insurgency means.

 

 

...I'm really not. The Raven Guard are good at hit and run tactics, but the Alpha Legion elevated counter-insurgency to an artform and have it as their roots, to the point where their list of specializations has it stated outright.

 

 

What source is that?

 

Forge World's books (book 3 of their HH series) which are the definitive source of information about these Legions.

 

I stand corrected then.  So its a toss up between the Raven Guard and Night Lords.

Edited August 11, 2020 by TorvaldTheMild

[Sothalor]

To put into methodological examples, the Raven Guard would be very good at swiftly removing an insurgencies leaders and figureheads- once they were identified and located. But as real world experience demonstrates, that often is the hard part.

 

The Alpha Legion would be exceptional at destabilizing the very societal background and cultural network an insurgency relies upon for its existence and survival. As shown in FW and BL publications, they're good at getting societies to death spiral themselves into schismatic paranoia.

 

So the Alpha Legion would be great at countering insurgencies, but they also have a tendency towards contemptuous collateral damage. The Raven Guard method, while probably less capable at finding and rooting out the insurgency, would likely leave key societal and infrastructure bedrock intact.

[Llagos_Tyrant]

The Alpha Legion would probably come up with a complicated, but brilliant, plan to infiltrate the insurgency and destroy it from within. This could involve a prolonged period of infiltration and use of 'mortal' assets, in which time the insurgency could pull off seemingly big successes (perhaps even as Alpha Legion ploys in order to advance their agents), but these would be carefully managed to be superficial by the Alpha Legion. At the end, the Alpha Legion operatives might just fracture the insurgency and split it to fight against itself, as a shadow of its (from the outside) apparent strength. Let the factions eat each other, then mop up the rest and move on.

 

The Raven Guard though would likely methodically and patiently hunt it. Gathering intelligence, turning the insurgent attacks into self-inflicted ambushes, striking critical targets, and denying them supplies while assassinating their leaders. The insurgency would suffer high casulaties and morale would drop rapidly, as supplies dried up and any semblance of an officer cadre was eliminated. Eventually, its last remnants would be hunted and ambushed or it would just break up and the guilty parties would be caught or assassinated. Insurgency over, move on.

 

Both would be extremely effective. That said, I feel like the Raven Guard might take the time to address the cause of the insurgency if they could and correct or alleviate the underlying conditions. I'm not so sure the Alpha Legion would involve themselves beyond playing with the insurgency until it died before moving on.

 

I wouldn't let the Night Lords anywhere near an insurgency to quell it. They'd flay the innocent and the guilty and all of their relatives, and some of their friends and their dogs, and in a generation or two you'd have another insurgency. They'd be too likely to inflict collateral damage - and if you're not worried about collateral damage and just want a general purge, you'd be more apt to send in the World Eaters.

[TorvaldTheMild]

The Alpha Legion would probably come up with a complicated, but brilliant, plan to infiltrate the insurgency and destroy it from within. This could involve a prolonged period of infiltration and use of 'mortal' assets, in which time the insurgency could pull off seemingly big successes (perhaps even as Alpha Legion ploys in order to advance their agents), but these would be carefully managed to be superficial by the Alpha Legion. At the end, the Alpha Legion operatives might just fracture the insurgency and split it to fight against itself, as a shadow of its (from the outside) apparent strength. Let the factions eat each other, then mop up the rest and move on.

 

The Raven Guard though would likely methodically and patiently hunt it. Gathering intelligence, turning the insurgent attacks into self-inflicted ambushes, striking critical targets, and denying them supplies while assassinating their leaders. The insurgency would suffer high casulaties and morale would drop rapidly, as supplies dried up and any semblance of an officer cadre was eliminated. Eventually, its last remnants would be hunted and ambushed or it would just break up and the guilty parties would be caught or assassinated. Insurgency over, move on.

 

Both would be extremely effective. That said, I feel like the Raven Guard might take the time to address the cause of the insurgency if they could and correct or alleviate the underlying conditions. I'm not so sure the Alpha Legion would involve themselves beyond playing with the insurgency until it died before moving on.

 

I wouldn't let the Night Lords anywhere near an insurgency to quell it. They'd flay the innocent and the guilty and all of their relatives, and some of their friends and their dogs, and in a generation or two you'd have another insurgency. They'd be too likely to inflict collateral damage - and if you're not worried about collateral damage and just want a general purge, you'd be more apt to send in the World Eaters.

Well the Night Lords are specialists in infiltration.

[Lucerne]

The Alpha Legion would probably come up with a complicated, but brilliant, plan to infiltrate the insurgency and destroy it from within. This could involve a prolonged period of infiltration and use of 'mortal' assets, in which time the insurgency could pull off seemingly big successes (perhaps even as Alpha Legion ploys in order to advance their agents), but these would be carefully managed to be superficial by the Alpha Legion. At the end, the Alpha Legion operatives might just fracture the insurgency and split it to fight against itself, as a shadow of its (from the outside) apparent strength. Let the factions eat each other, then mop up the rest and move on.

 

The Raven Guard though would likely methodically and patiently hunt it. Gathering intelligence, turning the insurgent attacks into self-inflicted ambushes, striking critical targets, and denying them supplies while assassinating their leaders. The insurgency would suffer high casulaties and morale would drop rapidly, as supplies dried up and any semblance of an officer cadre was eliminated. Eventually, its last remnants would be hunted and ambushed or it would just break up and the guilty parties would be caught or assassinated. Insurgency over, move on.

 

Both would be extremely effective. That said, I feel like the Raven Guard might take the time to address the cause of the insurgency if they could and correct or alleviate the underlying conditions. I'm not so sure the Alpha Legion would involve themselves beyond playing with the insurgency until it died before moving on.

 

I wouldn't let the Night Lords anywhere near an insurgency to quell it. They'd flay the innocent and the guilty and all of their relatives, and some of their friends and their dogs, and in a generation or two you'd have another insurgency. They'd be too likely to inflict collateral damage - and if you're not worried about collateral damage and just want a general purge, you'd be more apt to send in the World Eaters.

The Raven Guard's most notable counter-insurgency was Istvaan. They're great at removing the short term symptoms but honestly not so much at social engineeing- their specializations are pretty much noting they're great at troubleshooting. The AL are likely to cause a more permanent end to the issue, possibly without even needing to directly exert themselves. Note that their involvement in one of Horus's campaigns against a rebel seems to have been "the rebel's fleets, underlings and worlds just vanish without a trace".

Edited August 11, 2020 by Lucerne

[Llagos_Tyrant]

That's a fair point on the Raven Guard at Istvaan. Definitely not the most permanent resolution, and does undercut my point about trying to address the causes of unrest. I'm still not sure the Alpha Legion would stick around long enough to manipulate events to resolve the underlying causes, but maybe I'm assuming their too proud to do so whereas the Raven Guard seem to strike me as me sympathetic towards standard Imperial populace.

 

That said though, if you're trying to just deal with an insurgency, then are they likely to have fleets and whole worlds? Maybe I had pictured the insurgency differently, as more of a planet or city bound force with much less sophistacted methods to resist Imperial domination. Whatever the scale of the insurgency, if the Alpha Legion solution to an insurgency is up to and including making worlds vanish, then isn't that too permanent of an end to the issue? At that point you're again dealing with significant collateral damage beyond the insurgency as a military organization.

 

I know there would be a lot of examples below that threshold, but it's not clear that the Raven Guard would not be just as effective with different means. We shouldn't put too high a value on defeating an insurgency by any means when measuring the success of defeating an insurgency should account for the collateral damage averted - or you could unleash any legion to annihilate resistance.

 

Edit: I grant you the Night Lords are experts at infiltration, and that they would be a devastating force - but the effectiveness of the Night Lords as a counter-insurgency force could be considered lessened by their focus on inflicting terror and trauma, and the likely collateral damage we can predict.

 

I don't have the Horus Heresy books to reference with me, but I'm not sure there is an answer that one Legion is best. The Alpha Legion, Raven Guard and Night Lords may all be effective, but it's hard to say one is above the others (although I would say if I were an Imperial Commander, I'd send the Alpha Legion or Raven Guard before resorting to the Night Lords).

Edited August 12, 2020 by Llagos_Tyrant

[TorvaldTheMild]

 

The Alpha Legion would probably come up with a complicated, but brilliant, plan to infiltrate the insurgency and destroy it from within. This could involve a prolonged period of infiltration and use of 'mortal' assets, in which time the insurgency could pull off seemingly big successes (perhaps even as Alpha Legion ploys in order to advance their agents), but these would be carefully managed to be superficial by the Alpha Legion. At the end, the Alpha Legion operatives might just fracture the insurgency and split it to fight against itself, as a shadow of its (from the outside) apparent strength. Let the factions eat each other, then mop up the rest and move on.

 

The Raven Guard though would likely methodically and patiently hunt it. Gathering intelligence, turning the insurgent attacks into self-inflicted ambushes, striking critical targets, and denying them supplies while assassinating their leaders. The insurgency would suffer high casulaties and morale would drop rapidly, as supplies dried up and any semblance of an officer cadre was eliminated. Eventually, its last remnants would be hunted and ambushed or it would just break up and the guilty parties would be caught or assassinated. Insurgency over, move on.

 

Both would be extremely effective. That said, I feel like the Raven Guard might take the time to address the cause of the insurgency if they could and correct or alleviate the underlying conditions. I'm not so sure the Alpha Legion would involve themselves beyond playing with the insurgency until it died before moving on.

 

I wouldn't let the Night Lords anywhere near an insurgency to quell it. They'd flay the innocent and the guilty and all of their relatives, and some of their friends and their dogs, and in a generation or two you'd have another insurgency. They'd be too likely to inflict collateral damage - and if you're not worried about collateral damage and just want a general purge, you'd be more apt to send in the World Eaters.

The Raven Guard's most notable counter-insurgency was Istvaan. They're great at removing the short term symptoms but honestly not so much at social engineeing- their specializations are pretty much noting they're great at troubleshooting. The AL are likely to cause a more permanent end to the issue, possibly without even needing to directly exert themselves. Note that their involvement in one of Horus's campaigns against a rebel seems to have been "the rebel's fleets, underlings and worlds just vanish without a trace".

 

That's not true unless you are not asserting that that was their only real counter-insurgency, which the rest of your comment implies.  

Edited August 12, 2020 by TorvaldTheMild

[MegaVolt87]

Surely its the NL, whole systems just surrender outright when a fleet transitions in system because of their rep alone. Every insurgant is suddenly an Imperial resistance fighter when the NL show up lol.

[Llagos_Tyrant]

 

The Raven Guard's most notable counter-insurgency was Istvaan. They're great at removing the short term symptoms but honestly not so much at social engineeing- their specializations are pretty much noting they're great at troubleshooting. The AL are likely to cause a more permanent end to the issue, possibly without even needing to directly exert themselves. Note that their involvement in one of Horus's campaigns against a rebel seems to have been "the rebel's fleets, underlings and worlds just vanish without a trace".

That's not true.

 

 

I think Lucerne is referring to when the Raven Guard brought Istvaan III to compliance. Lexicanum notes that the invasion of Istvaan III was overseen by the Raven Guard led by Corax himself. Despite a lightning-fast surgical strike against the Isstvanians' infrastructure, the residents put up fierce resistance against over 800 companies of Raven Guard. Eventually, the capital "Choral City" was bombed into ruins and the Istvaanians surrendered.

 

I don't have the Horus Heresy books to check, but it may be that this was more of a conventional resistance rather than an insurgency.

 

Surely its the NL, whole systems just surrender outright when a fleet transitions in system because of their rep alone. Every insurgant is suddenly an Imperial resistance fighter when the NL show up lol.

 

 

Maybe when they show up, but wait until they leave 

Edited August 12, 2020 by Llagos_Tyrant

[MegaVolt87]

Surely its the NL, whole systems just surrender outright when a fleet transitions in system because of their rep alone. Every insurgant is suddenly an Imperial resistance fighter when the NL show up lol.

 

 

Maybe when they show up, but wait until they leave :teehee:

 

Yeah, but would you want the risk of testing their patience by coming back though? ;)

[Noserenda]

The Legions as a rule are drastically awful at dealing with insurgency, which is why they get followed up by Iterators and the like to smooth over the damage. The only way most of them could effectively remove one is by utterly destroying or displacing the entire populace and bringing in new settlers to take over. Which is more a function of the Imperium being monstrous than the Legions.

The Alpha Legion are the exception only because thats the focus of the Legion, presumably deliberately as part of the Emperors plan for the Trefoil legions being particularly unusual. 

The Raven guard could run an insurgency beautifully but being an insurgent is a surprisingly different job to being a counter insurgent and their over familiarity married to their transhuman mode of warfare means they will be taking the wrong tack, what insurgents worry about most of the time is not actually what defeats insurgencies permanently. Killing insurgents just breeds insurgents after all. Which is exactly what happened on Istvaan and ill bet a bunch of other worlds too if the Heresy hadnt erupted. 

[b1soul]

Alpha legion are basically the CIA of 40K. Their whole schtick is manipulating others to destabilise the target. You'd think they'd also be best at countering similar tactics.

[Brofist]

I know this isn't a traditional 'take', but the Iron Warriors are called out specifically in their Book 3 entry as specializing in "Retribution and Counter-Insurgency Campaigns"

[TorvaldTheMild]

I know this isn't a traditional 'take', but the Iron Warriors are called out specifically in their Book 3 entry as specializing in "Retribution and Counter-Insurgency Campaigns"

Doesn't surprise me.

[The Scorpion]

I'm surprised that no one has mentionned the Night Lords, or evn the Word Bearers. Insurgency guerillas tend to be heavily based on morale.

[Kizzdougs]

These are the "Observed Strategic Tendencies" of each of the Legions as they are listed in the Black Books. As you can see, a number of them have strategic tendencies that are directly applicable to counter insurgency operations. Bear in mind that these are just "observed tendencies" and the preferred modus operandi of said Legions. The Legions were all capable of fighting in many different ways.

 

 

Dark Angels: Combined arms and multi-spectra warfare, Exterminatus and purgation campaigns, extended independent void operations.

 

Emperor’s Children: Combined arms warfare, the use of complex manoeuvre and discursive tactical planning, asymmetrical assault.

 

Iron Warriors: Siege warfare, coordinated mass-theatre warfare, armoured assault, planetary decimation, attrition, retribution and counterinsurgency campaigns.

 

White Scars: Shock assault, high mobility warfare, harrowing actions and extended unsupported operations within hostile domains.

 

Space Wolves: Shock assault, search and destroy, pursuit operations, punitive and excoriation campaigns.

 

Imperial Fists: Ship-borne assaults and boarding actions, defensive and fortification operations in extremis, stronghold assaults, the conquest and forced compliance of void-fairing civilisations.

 

Night Lords: Punitive actions, decimation, enforced pacification, terror assaults, psychological warfare.

 

Blood Angels: High intensity warfare, strategic decapitation strikes, planetary interdiction campaigns, multi-vector and sub-orbital attack.

 

Iron Hands: Armoured and high intensity warfare, line breaker attacks, planetary pacification and suppression campaigns, anti-materiel operations.

 

World Eaters: Shock assault, planet-killer and Exterminates operations, close-quarters actions (space hulk purgation, boarding operations, line breaker attacks, ‘forlorn hope’ objective assaults).

 

Ultramarines: Mass assault, targeted decimation, planetary interdiction, liberation and limited theatre compliance campaigns.

 

Death Guard: Heavy infantry assault, attritional warfare, hazard/death zone warfare, xenos eradication and purgation operations.

 

Thousand Sons: Psychic warfare, precision assaults, misdirection, lore culling, macro-coordination multi-theatre campaigns.

 

Word Bearers: Mass assault, policing actions, gnoetic purgation, suppression of ideological revolt.

 

Sons of Horus: Shock assault, harrowing actions and strategic decapitation strikes.

 

Salamanders: High intensity or asymmetric warfare, zone mortalis engagements, planetary interdiction, liberation and defensive operations.

 

Raven Guard: Rapid deployment operations, strategic interdiction operations, reconnaissance in force, guerrilla actions, low-collateral damage imperative compliance operations.

 

Alpha Legion: Surprise assault, sabotage, infiltration, insurgency and counter-insurgency warfare, multi-vector attack, interplanetary pursuit and decimation campaigns, and deep-range raiding operations.

 

 

As most people have pointed out, the Alpha Legion would probably be the most likely Legion to involve themselves with counter insurgency. Then again the Alpha Legion would probably rely on their human operatives (who were all extraordinary individuals) and local assets to deal with most insurgencies. 

 

The Raven Guard are another obvious choice, and the Thousands Sons would also be a fantastic counter insurgency force. A single Athanaean could probably unravel most insurgency operations without too much trouble.

 

Personally, I think all of the Legions would be highly capable of countering an insurgency. People seem to forget just how capable the astartes are. They are trained and experienced in all aspects of war. The most experienced (during the Great Crusade) are over 200 years old, have fought a huge variety of different xenos species and off shoot human civilisations, have eidetic memories and access to the combined tactical/strategic knowledge of thousands of years of human conflict.

 

The thing is that most insurgencies would not be worthy of Legion attention and would either be left to local forces or Imperial Army. It would have to be a pretty serious insurgency that threatened a strategically vital world or network of worlds to warrant Legion intervention. If a Legion was sent to deal with an insurgency they would probably deal with it in an extremely brutal manner in the name of expediency (they've got bigger things to deal with) and to set an example. The Legions were made to conquer the galaxy, not deal with insurrectionists, and they've got a pretty tight schedule to follow. 

 

So I think all of the Legions would be highly capable of performing counter insurgency operations, I just don't think that many of them would bother.

[Gorgoff]

Ask the people of Olympia how much Iron Warriors bothered about such things.

Oh wait....

Edited August 12, 2020 by Gorgoff

[Bung]

If you look at Wikipedia and other sites which deal with history and read a bit a about different inurgencies you will see that the ruleing nations had different aproaches to fight such insurgencies.

The same would apply to the 30k / 40k universe.

 

Different legions will apply different strategies, the question is what is your goal you want to achieve.

Pure terror, compliance, something else?

 

I think one of the best examples not with insurgencies but with the conquest of a world and different aproaches is found at the start of the novel Praetors of Dorn where you see the difference in Alpharius and Dorn and how they would bring a world into the Imperium.

The same would apply to other theaters of war.

[Gorgoff]

If you look at Wikipedia and other sites which deal with history [...] you will see that the ruleing nations had different aproaches to fight such insurgencies.

 

Or, you know, went to school for more than 5 years. :D

 

But yes, sure, the different legions had different ways of dealing with those foolish enough opposing the imperium. Luckily it's good described in the books how the legions did that.

Bung already meantioned one.

Perturabo is another book where it is described.