THE FREE RASALHAGUE REPUBLIC: History

ORIGINS:

Rasalhague Military District, Draconis Combine

In 3029, the Lyran Commonwealth invited Rasalhague resistance leaders to a meeting on Tamar. The Tamar talks lasted for three weeks, during which time the rebels learned of the existence of the Tyr Regiment, a unit of assault 'Mechs sponsored and trained by the LCAF but manned by Rasalhagian exiles. The unit shared the name of the underground movement in the Rasalhague Military District. The secret regiment had made a stunning appearance on Kirchbach, prompting a revolt among the people. At the Tamar meeting, the Rasalhague resistance leaders coordinated plans for uprisings with projected LCAF invasions. Archon Katrina Steiner also signed the Intention of the Free Rasalhague Peoples, a document that recognized the Tyr as the official Rasalhague government-in-exile.

During the Fourth War, Tyr members provided the Lyran military with details on terrain, targets, and enemy location. Its members also undertook hundreds of commando missions deep behind enemy lines to disrupt DCMS communication and logistics. The Tyr BattleMech regiment played an equally important role in the Commonwealth's war effort.

REVOLT:

The war's end did not bring about the creation of a free Rasalhague, as the Tyr had hoped. For one thing, the Lyrans had not conquered all the worlds the Tyr wanted, including Rasalhague. Indeed, many Tyr members believed that the Lyrans had stopped short of conquering all the former Principality worlds purely to prevent the rebels from forming a sovereign state.

The disgruntled Tyr members became even angrier when Lyran planetary administrators arrived on the conquered worlds. Under orders from Duke Selvin Kelswa of the Tamar Pact, they took over from the military administrators without acknowledging the Tyr or its claim to rule. In their frustration and anger, several extremist Tyr groups bombed government buildings on seven worlds in February 3031, injuring one planetary administrator. Despite objections by Commonwealth officials, Duke Kelswa reacted by ordering the arrest of the Tyr leaders, most of whom were on Tamar at the time. He then ordered mass trials, in which the Tyr leaders were convicted in a mockery of the Lyran judicial process.

By the time Archon Steiner learned of the situation, the trials were over. The Tyr leaders had been languishing in Tamar jails for a week while the aggressive Tamar Pact police forces brutally mishandled demonstrations and riots on the conquered worlds. Infuriated, the Archon freed the Tyr leadership, publicly berated the Duke of Tamar for overstepping his authority, and apologized to the Tyr in hopes of salvaging some good will.

The damage caused by Duke Kelswa could not be undone, however, and the Archon saw that the newly conquered Rasalhague worlds would never consent to join the Commonwealth. The best she could hope for was to continue negotiations with the Tyr so that the leaders of a new Rasalhague state would lean more toward the Commonwealth than toward the Draconis Combine.

[EDITOR'S NOTE: Though the report by Precentor Riis does not acknowledge ComStar's role in bringing about an independent Rasalhague, he surely must know about it. As a close ally of Primus Waterly and the most powerful ComStar official in the area, Precentor Riis almost certainly played a key role in the arrangements, if not the actual negotiations, that gave birth to the Republic.]

When the Draconis Combine found itself fighting against its own people as well as the Lyran Commonwealth during the Fourth War, Kurita leaders began to look for a solution to the problem of Rasalhague resistance. They found one and it was ingenious. By supporting Rasalhague independence, the Draconis Combine simultaneously removed a thorn from its side, embarrassed the Lyran Commonwealth into giving up most of its captured worlds, and created a buffer state between the Combine and the newly formidable Lyrans.