Strategic Maneuver Plan

Although Randall staying out of command was a good thing for Amber,

he still wished he had a tactical adviser to help him coordinate.

Unfortunately, Amber looked through everyone on the communications channel and found no one suitable.

Major Randall was out of the question. He had flatly refused Amber's request to help command, saying, "I don't understand how you army people fight."

Isabel was no better. She could handle espionage and field medicine, but leading troops into battle was not her strength.

And the Mobile Infantry under his command, all fired up and raring to go?

Amber had to admit that, for all the flaws he had noticed while working with them,

at least they obeyed orders and attacked whatever target he pointed them at.

They could certainly win a battle when things were going their way.

But if he pulled one of them aside and asked how to lead a Mobile Infantry platoon in an attack on a town,

the soldier would answer at the top of his lungs, brimming with confidence:

"Fight our way from point A to point B, sir!"

Amber helplessly covered his forehead—no, his Tactical Visor.

"Dear God, send me a tactical adviser!"

Of course, that wish was not going to come true anytime soon.

So Amber faced reality and resigned himself to it.

As the convoy headed toward the last waypoint he had marked, Amber's mind kicked into overdrive.

The vehicle was racing across rough, unpaved terrain, jolting Amber around in his seat.

But it did nothing to disrupt his thinking.

Taking Major Randall's information, the current map of friendly and enemy forces, and what he remembered of the Empire's fleet strength together,

Amber made a bold decision.

Capture the Space Elevator.

At first, even Amber had thought the idea was absurd.

But the more carefully he considered it, the more feasible it seemed.

Why had the Federation Military fought so badly on Robert IV in his previous life?

Why had the Federation survivors who turned to guerrilla warfare lasted only six months?

The poor quality of the Federation garrison was certainly a major reason.

But there was no denying that after tactical nuclear strikes by the Empire's Orbital Assault Ships,

the Federation Military had lost nearly eighty percent of its advanced weapons and heavy equipment.

Meanwhile, the Star Dragon Empire's landing forces had relied on airdrops, Aerospace Transports, and, most importantly, the Space Elevator.

to bring in a steady stream of reinforcements and supplies.

They could even deploy armored brigade combat teams, or ABCTs, as complete formations.

With such a vast disparity in combat power,

Even Amber, who supposedly “saw everything and knew everything,” could not have taken a bunch of light infantry head-on against armored forces.

Incidentally, thanks to their vast territories and industrial capacity,

both the Federation and the Star Dragon Empire equipped even their most basic conventional infantry with medium exoskeletons.

They were standard issue, like rifles had been in the old days.

So although infantry units of this era were still called "light infantry,"

there was nothing light about them.

Take the Federation, for example.

A standard Mobile Infantry soldier was supposed to wear a Sabertooth Type 2 medium Exoskeleton powered by a gas turbine and a Metallic Hydrogen Battery Pack.

On top of the Exoskeleton's built-in protection, additional Silicon Carbide Armor Plates covered vital areas.

As for weapons, an 8mm Gauss Rifle was generally mounted on the right-arm rail.

The usual choice for the left-arm rail was either a 20mm Automatic Shotgun or a 40mm Automatic Grenade Launcher.

Both weapons could use a range of ammunition to suit different missions.

A small number of soldiers chose a rocket-powered Combat Stinger instead.

Even fully armed and loaded with ammunition and supplies,

these soldiers could move without restriction. With the gas turbine's powerful output, they could run faster and jump higher.

But even armed to the teeth,

infantry still could not take on true armored forces head-on.

Before Multi-legged Combat Vehicles, main battle tanks, and HCPs, Mobile Infantry were as vulnerable as children.

So in Amber's view, the Federation's crushing defeat on Robert IV in his previous life had been understandable.

Now, though, the situation had changed.

The Federation Military was still the same: devastated by orbital strikes, with light infantry making up its main fighting force.

But the Empire's forces were no longer the ones Amber remembered.

Without the Space Elevator's crucial transport capacity, the Empire's landing forces could not deploy ABCTs as quickly as they had in his previous life.

At present, the Empire's main fighting force on Robert IV was also light infantry, primarily Orbital Paratroopers.

They could receive support from airdropped light Multi-legged Combat Vehicles and HCPs.

But compared with his previous life, their combat power had been greatly reduced.

The reduction was enough to make Amber think it was worth a shot.

There were also two other reasons to choose the Space Elevator as their target.

First, the scattered remnants of the Federation Military had no operational objective. Each group was fighting on its own.

They all knew they needed to break out, but none knew which way to go or how to do it.

If they made the Space Elevator their objective, the Federation survivors would at least have a reason to gather and move toward the equator.

That would keep them from fighting in isolation, only to be cut off, surrounded, and destroyed by Empire forces.

The fleet battle in orbit had wiped out the Federation Defensive Fleet.

Some wreckage had fallen into the atmosphere and burned up, but tens of millions of tons still floated in orbit around Robert IV.

The debris had damaged many Federation Military satellites and greatly slowed the Empire's deployment of tactical reconnaissance satellites.

By the later stages of the ground war, the few tactical reconnaissance satellites in orbit had not detected the movements of the Federation Military survivors at all.

Instead, Empire ground troops pursuing them had been the first to find them.

The wreckage in orbit interfered not only with satellite reconnaissance and communications but also with the effectiveness of the Orbital Assault Ships.

After receiving requests for fire support from ground forces, those Orbital Assault Ships still had to carefully plan their approaches and withdrawals through orbit.

Second, both the actions of Empire forces in Amber's memories and the actions of Empire forces in this life

showed that Empire forces did not want to destroy the Space Elevator.

They wanted to keep the Space Elevator intact and take control of it.

After all, this Heaven-and-Earth Artery linking ground and orbit had enormous transport capacity and would be invaluable during postwar reconstruction.

The Empire also possessed all the technology needed to build a facility on that scale,

but construction would take five to ten years, a steep cost in time.

That made their bottom line clear: if they could capture it, they would not destroy it.

So once Federation troops gathered near the Space Elevator, the Empire's Orbital Assault Ship fleet would have to hold its fire.

Both Tunguska tactical hydrogen bombs and David tactical surface-attack missiles could easily damage the Space Elevator.

The colossal structure relied on centrifugal force to keep thousands of carbon nanotube cables taut.

Once damaged, its entire balance of forces would be disrupted.

The consequences would be catastrophic.

As more and more details fell into place in Amber's mind,

he recorded a massive strategic maneuver plan in his personal terminal's command module.

By physically linking his personal terminal to the Vehicular Terminal, Amber could use the vehicle's computing power to enhance the command module.

"This is as much as I can manage on my own..."

Amber hit save and let out a long breath. The brainstorming session had left him mentally drained.

"Looks like you came up with quite an ambitious operational plan?"

Major Randall had stayed quiet while Amber worked. Now that Amber had finally stopped, he came over.

He might not understand the details of army operations, but he could grasp the broader picture.

"Going all the way from here to the equator... I have to say, that's a bold idea."

Randall did not offer a judgment. Instead, he asked: