Battle of Nowa Grudak (1924)
| Battle of Nowa Grudak (1924) | |||||||
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| Part of Kyotakavian-Svogardan Conflict | |||||||
 Union Guard on the Mbersk Road. (19 August 1924) | |||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||
 KLA Union Guard |
 PISF SVDF USC | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
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Regan Klaidev Tomasz Kelskiv Boris Wazkon † Elaria Vodin Katlania Tzekic Mattias Holgav |
Col. Emirus Talian Lt. Col. Terion Gallus † Lt. Col. Eric Malion Uzluz Rex † Breton Kalionox † Ferus Malliox Eurius Nelton † Kaston Kevrani † Alexandra Longian † Darion Zelanius | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
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3,500 7,800 Total: 11,300 |
4,000 8,200 2,500 Total: 14,700 | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
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158 killed, 313 wounded, 14 missing |
582 killed, 796 wounded, 29 missing 7 armoured cars destroyed | ||||||
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3,537 civilians killed and wounded 6,000 arrested | |||||||
The Battle of Nowa Grudak was a street battle that took place throughout late 1924 in Nowa Grudak. Kyotakavian paramilitaries fought their Svozgardan counterparts who were aided (and chiefly directed) by the Protectorate Internal Security Force and was seen as the last major paramilitary battle of the larger, and long-running Svozgardan-Kyotakavian conflict, before the beginning of the Third War for Independence.
Background
Nowa Grudak is one of the most ethnically divided cities in Kyotakavia, with the northern portion of the city being around 52% ethincally Svozgardan. The two sections are almost divided entirely down the Mbersk Road and PISF checkpoints into the north of the city rested almost entirely along it with a permanent presence of approximately 2,000 officers. The southern portion, whilst nominally still under the authority of the PISF, in practice had several major 'bandit-country' regions where Union Guard checkpoints would be the primary authority. Two Union Guard Regiments were drawn almost entirely from the city and had headquarters in the southern portion as well as the command for the 2nd 'Nodstok' Front which totalled around 30,000 soldiers in the entirety of Nodstok. Additionally, the KLA had almost the entirety of its 11th Division in the city, having moved a large oppeartional capacity in Nowa Grudak over the course of the 1920s as recruitment bolstered as a result of the 'collaborationist' government that had won the 1920 election.
Between 1920 and 1924, incidents of violence steadily rose, and in the Kyotakavian nationalist movement, there was a growing desire to 'test' the Svozgardan resolve in the city, and to give the PISF a bloody nose. Additionally, it would show Kyotakavian paramilitary resolve to protect Kyotakavians living in the north of the city, many of whom were prevented from voting in elections by Svozgardan paramilitaries such as the Svozgardan Volunteer Defence Force (SVDF).
As the 1925 election loomed, a general strike was called by the KUWC in response to economic downturn and closures of mines in Nodstok, and the Union Guard Army Council called a meeting in early July to discuss the possibility of moving to conduct military action. The proposal was dismissed narrowly, however two weeks later, the Government called for Svozgardan troops, specifically the PISF, to help them put down the strike. A second, emergency meeting was held, and almost unanimously it was agreed that if the KLA would agree to support the move, a concerted campaign would be undertaken. Three days later at a joint-meeting between the two groups Nodstok Commander's, a guarantee of support would be given.
The shooting of picketers (including KUSSC Representative for Albaniv Georgikov Alexi) in Stenzgord four days later saw KLA intervention that prevented a massacre as PISF officers opened fire, only prevented from overruning the picketers when KLA soldiers who had been sent to observe, acted without orders and charged the PISF, resulting in heavy casualties but providing time for picketers to flee. The move, whilst tactically a failure, and costing the KLA unit dearly, cemented KLA and Union Guard cooperation in Nodstok. PISF forces had been moved out of the city to help tackle the general strike and so rapid planning and preperation was undertaken to commence a campaign in Nowa Grudak at the end of the month.
The Union Guard informed the KLA of its preparations being completed on the 26 July, however agreed to wait until the 29 July as to provide the KLA time to complete its final planning a preparation, which secretly included plans to blow bridges in the west of the city along the Mbersk Road to provide the Union Guard an easier time in their attacks. Two days following, the KLA agreed to commence military operations the next morning and the KLA National Command provided the final approval.
The Battle
July Campaign
Elements of the 3rd Union Guard Regiment commenced an attack along the western section of the Mbersk Road on the 29 July at 09:00, successfully overrunning a PISF outpost on Jarn Street, killing 3 and wounding 7, before taking up positions along the stretch of the Mbersk Road running down to Katzan Lane. Sporadic firefights broke out into the Svozgardan section, with machine gun fire that overshot, hitting a building down Katzan Lane and injuring two civilians. By 15:15, the first SVDF units had mobilised to support the PISF in an effort to retake the street, however, after a four hour long battle and twenty casualties, the Svozgardan units withdrew to take up barricade positions in anticipation of a further Union Guard push.
Such a move was not to happen however, strict discipline was maintained as Union Guard leadership didn't want to become bogged down in a street-to-street bloodbath running up the roads and back-alleys into the Svozgardan section, resolved instead to test both the SVDF and PISF's ability to respond to such moves. Sniper overwatch was set up in a church on the corner of Katzan by the Union Guard, and at 19:05 Emirus Talian, Chief of the PISF was spotted arriving. After a brief discussion, an attempt was made by the sniper positioned in the church tower to hit Talian, however the shot missed and hit an aide stood less than a meter away.
In response three armoured cars were brought up to renew an attack before nightfall, however the vehicles, proceeding in a column, came to a halt almost immediately as the lead vehicle was struck by a petrol bomb, thrown from the third story window of a house on the street. The house was stormed, and the KLA member inside was killed after shooting and killing the officer who burst through the door. The attack floundered, the armoured car was impossible to move under sustained Union Guard fire and by 22:10, the PISF withdrew to their starting locations. Fifteen minutes later, two battalions of the 5th Union Guard Regiment stormed two forward barricades erected down the Mbersk Road from the positions of the 3rd Regiment, taking fourteen casualties but successfully driving the PISF out from the two mile stretch of the road.
Earlier in the day, a KLA bomb attack destroyed the Tamzkon Bridge in the western portion of the city, cutting off the company of PISF soldiers stationed at an outpost down Redon Road. Immediately following the blast, a subsequent Union Guard attack by the 12th Union Guard Regiment began, approaching from up Mbersk Road and down Redon Road, encircling the troops in the outpost. The PISF commander ordered an armoured car to provide cover from the other side of the bridge, delaying the Union Guard advance for over two hours before a KLA member, armed with a .55 inch anti-tank rifle killed the gunner and forced the driver to abandon the vehicle. Without the support of a machine gun, and running out of ammunition, the PISF soldiers were pushed out of the outpost and forced to ditch their equipment and jump into the Dansk River.
Overnight, the PISF additionally withdrew from other exposed positions across the Mbersk Road and incrementally began bringing up reinforcements. This however was stopped by the early morning as four KLA bombs killed one and disabled three convoys of supplies and men. A fifth bomb was detonated outside the PISF headquarters in northern Nowa Grudak, forcing the evacuation of staff members and necessitating the return of Talian from the Mbersk Road. The chaos created throughout the day of 30 July enabled the 3rd and 5th Regiments to secure almost an entire 5-mile stretch of the road, whilst the 12th Regiment build barricades on the other side of the river from the Tamzkon Bridge.
The SVDF responded to bombing attacks in the north of the city with retaliatory mortar strikes on Union Guard positions, initially seeing some success as a company of the 3rd Regiment broke under an SVDF counter attack along Statsk Street, however the arrival of reinforcing KLA as well as Union Guard leadership Mattias Holgav brought up reinforcements to plug the gap, forcing SVDF paramilitaries to withdraw from the advance after four hours of fighting. Mortar strikes and SVDF skirmishing with the 5th Regiment along the central-eastern section of the road was far less successful however, with the majority of mortars missing their targets and Union Guard having far more cover, turning it into a sniper battle. By the evening of 30 July, the attacks had stopped and PISF had organised a leadership meeting to discuss tactics to reclaim the Mbersk Road.
On the morning of 31 July, the plan was put into effect. Two columns of officers, one from western Nowa Grudak in a Svozgardan exclave would move to the western Mbersk Road held by the 12th Regiment. Simultaneously another column would cross the Rakic Bridge a mile down from the blown Tamzon Bridge, moving along the road to attack from the east. Both would be supported with armoured cars and officers would move street-to-street.
The eastern advance was cheered by nearby Svozgardan residents as it cross over the river before rifle fire from across the bridge forced people to retreat into their houses and officers to take to the ground. For the next three hours, sporadic rifle fire would slow the advance before a .55 anti-tank round blew the engine out of the lead armoured car, blocking the bridge whilst the PISF attempted to clear it under fire. The southern advance ran into immediate difficulties, as a large picket from the ongoing strike protested along the route. The streets were blocked with vehicles and sandbags and several rocks were thrown at officers who attempted to push the crowd back and as a result the advance was extremely slow, making them an easy target for the KLA. Two molotovs were thrown less than 1 mile into the advance, torching one of the armoured cars before a pipe bomb, set up behind one barricade, flipped the lead vehicle and killed four officers, resulting in retaliatory fire into the crowd. By now the southern push had completely stalled, and sniping efforts from Union Guard and KLA members in buildings forced the PISF to withdraw over the course of the day.
By sunset, the push on both fronts had completely failed, and very little progress had been made for almost no reward, a second meeting of PISF leadership would be called, with a plan hammered out to rely on night time raids of Headquarters, rather than assaulting the forward positions of the Union Guard and KLA. It reflected a move from the PISF, less as a simple military force, and more towards military policing, a task that had received little training but was decided was the only practical way for the PISF to achieve success against the paramilitaries who could rely on plenty of public support to hamper efforts of advance.
August Campaign
Following the Mbersk Road car-bombing, and the effective decapitation of the USC that the attack delivered, a series of other bombings would take place, not aimed at the assassination of specific people, but to disrupt Svozgardan infrastructure and supply routes, with particular attention paid to PISF Precincts with four being hit by attacks over the course of the 2 - 15 August. Two car bombs were also detonated at a local garage in the north of the city, destroying thirteen PISF cars and causing thousands in damage.
Throughout the period, the PISF was engaged in running street battles with the Union Guard over the Mbersk Road, driving the 3rd Regiment from the western Mbersk Road on the 6 August, only to be pushed out again on the 15 August, suffering heavily in repeated attempts to break out from southern enclaves and retake the destroyed Tamzkon Bridge. The east saw brutal house-to-house fighting over the fortnight of the 6 to 15 August, with up to a hundred houses being torched over the course of the fighting and heavy economic damage inflicted in the area. The SVDF also ramped up mortar attacks during this period up but began to roll them back following a friendly fire incident on the 14 August when a mortar fired by the SDVF struck a PISF vehicle driving along the Mbersk Road, blowing it apart and killing all occupants instantly.
Further down Mbersk; in the west, engineering attempts to repair the Tamzkon Bridge were driven off by the Union Guard three times. There was also a second bombing at the Rakic Bridge just down the Mbersk Road which killed six and wounded nearly fifty and by the end of the 10 August, PISF attempts to retake the western portion of the Mbersk Road had been abandoned, with heavy casualties and two of five bridges destroyed. SVDF mortar attacks in the west were far more sporadic, and aimed usually at Union Guard positions rather than civilian targets, but a shortage of ammunition, poor communication and terrible coordination, especially between paramilitaries and the PISF, meant that attacks were rarely concentrated at the same time, and the few times they did, they were either light, or so poorly aimed as to force the PISF back themselves due to risk of friendly fire (with an incident involving a dud mortar round landing beside the vehicle of a PISF commander resulting in a brief breaking off of cooperation between the SVDF and PISF).
The KLA commenced a bombing campaign in the south of the city as well as its anti-infrastructure campaign in the north, attacking PISF precincts and checkpoints through the fortnight. Up to thirty such positions were attacked by the 15 August and PISF killed and wounded numbered nearly 100 in that period alone which even now in the battle was placing a severe drain on the ability of the PISF to continue to conduct operations in the south of the city, with the number of raids against KLA headquarters falling off dramatically as enclave Svozgardan communities became increasingly isolated around PISF precincts. Bomb attacks were also made against SLA leadership during this period, with at least one other SLA politician Markus Aurelius, representative for a List Seat, being killed by a KLA bomb attack on the 13 August when the vehicle he was riding in drove over a planted KLA bomb.
Attacks against politicians in Kyotakavian nationalist parties also increased. An attempt was made to assassinate Regan Klaidev with an improvised, horizontal mortar. The attack on the building where Klaidev was failed however, the first bomb struck the roof, blasting a hole and collapsing the ceiling on top of two men. Ironically, Klaidev refused to leave and instead attempted to help the two, which meant the second mortar, which struck the front entrance and killed Klaidev's aide who had tried to convince him to move to shelter, failed to kill him. The third shot miss-fired, dropping in the street before the SVDF attackers fled. Johaan Calstaunas was also subject to a plot of assassination as the two men stormed his office in Kyoti and were subdued by armed Union Guard soldiers assigned to protection duty. It would be the only assassination attempt conducted inside of Kyotakavia proper for the duration of the battle.
Mbersk Road car-bombing
Three days after the street battles had begun, on the 1 August, Alexandra Longian, an SLA Representative for a list seat and overall Commander of the United Svozgarda Corps paramilitary, visited a forward USC post along the Mbersk Road's western section, stopping for five minutes to converse with local commanders. During that time, KLA member Josiv Celkov ducked into her car and planted a 5-pound bomb under the car before fleeing the scene with the help of KLA observers. Longian climbed back into the car with the local commander, intending to drive up Mbersk Road, before turning into the Svozgardan section of the city and driving to the USC headquarters.
The car departed only seven minutes after the bomb was planted, driving parallel to the Mbersk Road. After four minutes Longian ordered the car to pause, stopping to converse with a USC commander at the intersection of the Tazmir and Kafan Roads. The bomb detonated only a few seconds later, propelling Longian out of the car, blowing out the back, killing all three passengers and sending shrapnel flying. The commander who had approached the vehicle was killed, and eight others were wounded.
The brazen nature of the attack shocked the Svozgardans; the SVDF would seek to step up its assassination campaign in response, meeting very little success as thirteen mortar rounds launched in the evening killed thirteen civilians but no KLA or Union Guard personnel, the USC on the other hand became engaged in a five month leadership struggle which left the paramilitary with no direct command. Local USC commanders resorted to taking action without direct orders, launching a wave of reprisal attacks which mostly failed, killing only 1 KLA member, and injuring numerous civilians. Local commanders who did not begin operating under their own command, instead merged into the SVDF, significantly weakening the USC.
Atzan Lane bombing
On the 27 August 1924, Deputy Chief of the PISF, Lieutenant Colonel Terion Gallus entered a meeting with the SVDF Eastern and Western Commanders; Uzluz Rex and Breton Kalionox, at the Atzan Loyalist Club in Northern Nowa Grudak. It was arranged as a planning meeting between the PISF and SVDF, to arrange and plan a strategy to push the Union Guard out of Mbresk Road and a total of 13 SVDF and PISF senior officers were in attendance. After brief introductions, Terion, Uzlus and Breton entered the second floor office where 4 SVDF, and 2 PISF attendees were in discussion. Three minutes later, a 25-pound explosive device, planted by the KLA two hours prior, detonated, killing all 9 people in the room immediately. A guard stationed outside the bathroom opposite the room was also killed, as well as 2 civilians who were walking past the building when the bomb went off. A total of 38 people were injured, of which 21 were SVDF members, and windows of the neighbouring building were blown whilst the second floor collapsed onto the first.
The bombing would be the only time the KLA successful killed a member of PISF leadership, but the attack had crippled the SVDF and threw the succession of the Western and Eastern commands into disarray for nearly a month. It was the second time that the KLA had managed to kill commanding figures in the Svozgardan paramilitary movement in just one month and reprisal mortar attacks were conducted on the 28 and 29 of August.
For the PISF the assassination was a complete farce. It blatantly exposed the close cooperation of the PISF with Svozgardan paramilitaries, destroying the last of their credibility with Kyotakavians in the north of the city, and the latent security issues in the SVDF meant that the PISF significantly scaled back its intelligence passing with the SVDF, indeed for the rest of the battle the PISF leadership did not personally meet the SVDF again.
Vozyn Ambush
On the 30 August, 16 PISF officers successfully ambushed a 10 man KLA patrol escorting the KLA Nowa Grudak Southern Command leadership Lieutenant General Boris Wazkon and Major General Elaria Vodin. Whilst driving down down Vozyn Lane, in the south of the city early in the morning, the lead car was disabled by an anti-tank bullet fired by a PISF officer in the building next door, blowing the engine block apart and forcing the 2 men inside to bail out. Both were struck by gunfire and killed as the remaining PISF officers stormed out of the buildings both sides of the road, opening fire on the KLA as they tried to pull out. The vehicle in the rear was hit a total of thirty-five times, failing to hit either the driver or passenger, however the second to last vehicle was struck by another anti-tank round that destroyed the front suspension and rendered it immobile.
A gunfight ensued between the two sides. In three minutes over four-hundred rounds were fired, 8 KLA paramiliataries were killed, amongst them was Boris who was found dead at the rear of the second car. The ambush represented the only successful assassination attempt against a leadership figure in the KLA by the PISF. 7 PISF officers suffered injury, including 2 life-threatening wounds, and the PISF Officers were forced to seize civilian vehicles to bus casualties to the nearest precinct, furthermore 3 of the KLA, chief among them, Boris' Deputy Elaria Vodin, escaped, the latter of which clambered into the rearmost car as it drove away.
Following the ambush, there were multiple claims made that the PISF had not, on strict orders, attempted take prisoners, with unconfirmed witness reports claiming that they had shot at least two KLA whilst attempting to surrender. The PISF stringently denied that any Officers had fired on a legitimate surrender, reporting that KLA members had initially gestured their intention to surrender before resuming fire when Officers stepped out of cover. Regardless of the truth, the result of ambush was the enactment of a 'No Prisoner' policy by the KLA and regardless of the veracity of claims, the story of the attack notably reduced the willingness of KLA members to surrender in gunfights, and for the duration of the battle, KLA paramilitaries rarely agreed to an offer of surrender.
Outside of its immediate impact, unlike the assassination of SVDF leadership three days prior, the KLA Southern Nowa Grudak Command did not suffer from major leadership turmoil, and Vodin succeeded Wazkon as the head of the command a day later. KLA leadership was strictly hierarchical, and much more centralised behind a main command unlike Svozgardan paramilitaries which usually revolved around personal loyalty to specific commanders who were expected to draw up their own units. This meant that the assassination of senior leaders had a far lesser effect on the overall command of Kyotakavian paramilitary units and ultimately meant that the few successful assassinations pulled off by the PISF and SVDF ultimately had a far lesser impact on the KLA and Union Guard whose organised structures (with the National Command and Army Council respectively) enabled them to quickly promote successors.
The reaction to the ambush in the PISF was considerably muted. Whilst they had successfully killed a KLA commander, there had been no severe turmoil in paramilitary leadership and the officers had suffered heavy casualties. The fact that officers had been forced to commandeer vehicles also presented a concern as despite requests for support the Kyotakavian police had allegedly acted sluggishly, in effect allowing the KLA to engage the PISF in battle. The aftermath resulted in a significant re-consideration of police tactics as whilst the PISF had not initially considered the KLA a truly organised force its resilience when faced with set-backs as well as the seamless transition of command to an assigned successor led PISF Commander Emirius Tallion to lament; "if only our own countrymen could be so disciplined." The result of the ambush was ultimately that the PISF decided against using similar tactics again, and in the south of the city their police forces would be almost entirely holed up in precincts and their surrounding areas for the duration of the battle.
September Campaign
Following the Vozyn Ambush, there was a brief lull in fighting. Between the 2-11 September there were few major clashes along the Mbersk Road, and Svozgardan mortar attacks, which had become a staple of the battle, were reduced substantially as resupply was organised over the border, primarily done so to reduce the danger of assassination which had done an immense amount of damage to paramilitary (and especially SVDF) logistical and command structures. Sniping continued along the stretches of the road, but the tentative quiet was held, for over a week until the resumption of PISF operations on the 12 September.
Utilising armoured cars, the PISF launched a raid into the predominantly Kyotakavian Alvano estate in north-western Nowa Grudak. Almost 800 officers, supported by 30 armoured cars, rolled into the area ostensibly to search for paramilitary supply caches and arrest leading community members. The raid was composed of four columns, and whilst Union Guard positions were overrun in the north, east and north-west with the PISF seizing numerous caches, a stern KLA defence in the south badly bloodied the fourth convoy, killing and wounding approximately 20 officers, and disabling 3 armoured cars. The brief reprieve provided by the defence allowed KLA paramilitaries to move north. The eastern PISF was then ambushed as it came through the junction between the Stavikos and Blovikic roads. In 8 minutes of combat, over 4,000 rounds were fired, and numerous casualties were registered on both sides, however the PISF was forced to withdraw back down the main road and would not be able to proceed for at least another week.
Now rallied Union Guard regiments, bolstered by the arrival of the 19th Battalion (12th Regiment), resumed a counter offensive northwards, initially catching the PISF columns off-guard and stalling the attack. By the evening of the 12 September however, the PISF had resumed a slow but steady advance. The following day, the rest of the 12th Regiment moved into the western Svozgardan enclave, overruning a police station and killing 7 officers, freeing several prisoners. This assault prompted a resumption of the PISF advance, far less cautious than the day before and which was far more fiercely resisted. KLA paramilitaries had set up two mortar positions in the centre of the estate, and began dropping mortar rounds onto the main routes of advance for the PISF. Additionally, local mobilisation dramatically slowed the advance with over 300 being arrested for crimes ranging from obstruction of justice to terrorism as PISF armoured cars were regularly hit with molotov cocktails, severely damaging the majority of them by the end of the day.
By the morning of the 13 September, the advance had been thoroughly blunted. PISF columns began a staggered withdrawal back along their points of advance. Whilst regularly mortar attacks and paramilitary harassment were undertaken, the withdrawal was broadly bloodless for the PISF, and by the end of the day they had pulled out of the Alvano Estate and instead looked to set up a blockade to prevent the movement of arms and personnel into the community.
October Campaign
November Campaign
December Campaign
Tostan Club Shooting
On the 17 December, the SVDF Eastern Commander, Kaston Kevrani entered the Tostan Club, often visited by SVDF and USC members, in order to speak to to the Mbersk Road West Brigadier Valus Kerian. As he entered the club at 11:12, two cars containing a total of 8 KLA members, drove up Tostan Street and parked both vehicles two buildings down from the club before waiting. After three minutes had passed, all 8 climbed out of the car and jogged down the sidewalk to the club, pushing their way past people in front of them, and burst through the front door armed with pistols, grenades and molotov cocktails. All 8 opened fire into the club, moving through the ground floor and throwing grenades into rooms as they went past. 2 moved upstairs; throwing molotov cocktails into two offices on the second floor before firing a total of twenty rounds through the walls and door. Kevrani as well as two other junior SVDF commanders were killed in the downstairs backroom when three men burst through the door firing semi-automatic pistols at close range, hitting Kevrani a total of eight times.
After four minutes of shooting, all 8 men, with one injury, fled the building, taking small arms fire from three SVDF members who had been in a local café five doors down. A total of thirty shots were fired in the street, with no hits to either side until the KLA fled back to the cars before driving away. They left 13 dead, and 28 injured SVDF and USC members inside the club whilst a fire raged on the second floor, destroying almost five hundred intelligence documents which had been passed to the group by the PISF just a week earlier. It was the largest single loss of life in an assassination attack for the SVDF, and yet again the SVDF Eastern found itself leaderless as well as having lost numerous other junior and senior officers over the last five months of fighting.
The KLA ran a PISF checkpoint approaching the Mbersk Road, hitting and injuring one civilian in the process, and firing wildly into the guard post, ultimately hitting no one, whilst the already injured KLA member was hit by a stray rifle round just below the elbow which lodged itself into the back of the seat in front of him. The attack was ultimately hailed as a success at the KLA headquarters, with Vice-Brigadier Kostiv allegedly remarking that they'd "put the entire SVDF leadership into the ground" with the attack.
Polling Day violence
Polling day was broadly a quieter affair across most of the city, however several notable instances of violence still occured. At around 2:30pm two SVDF mortar teams fired rounds towards at a polling station off Wolnst Street, deep in the south of the city. All rounds missed, however it sent a clear indication of threat to Kyotakavian polling stations and stirred a response from the KLA who had otherwise restricted themselves to along the Mbersk Road for the day. A further mortar attack was directed to a polling station on Ulsk Lane at around 3pm, and then two more towards a further on Qersk Street at 3:30pm, killing five and thirteen respectively.
A fifth mortar attack against a polling station on Jaron Street at just past 4pm was interrupted after the first two rounds as a section of the KLA's 2nd Division threw pipe bombs and molotovs into mortar pits having snuck their way through PISF checkpoints and past SVDF sentries. The attack on the mortar pits caused a major explosion, with the likely cause being a grenade landing in one of the open boxes or mortar ammunition. An explosion rocked the street nearby, and all 11 SVDF members as well as 1 KLA were killed in the explosion. Major fires broke out in nearby buildings, likely as a result of shrapnel of burning derbies thrown by the blast, and efforts to combat the blaze would take the best part of four hours.
In the south of the city, PISF officers attending multiple polling stations were forced out by the arrival of KLA and Union Guard troops. Whilst most withdrew before fighting began, at least two adjacent to Mbersk Road saw ferocious fighting for several hours, being ultimately overrun. Along the Mbersk Road, polling stations were manned by Union Guard personnel, whilst in the north at least one was overrun by KLA militia who torched the station in a heavily ethnically-Svozgardan area. Turnout among Svozgardan voters was significantly suppressed, and the constituency seat that they held in Nowa Grudak was lost, largely attributed to the violence and threat of attack.
Aftermath
Nearly 3,000 people were killed over the course of the battle, with over half being civilians.
The Mbersk Road stretch of Nowa Grudak was devastated by the fighting with hundreds of businesses being shut. Even several months after, roads remained blocked and there were lingering fights between the forces. The PISF had fully withdrawn themselves from the south except for a few enclaves, and paramilitaries had taken control of the majority of the city. Regular mortar attacks continued for several weeks until the evening of 5 February, and violence had not fully subsided until well into the month, however major fighting was long ended. The local economy was brought to a standstill by the battle and ethnic tensions were significantly inflamed. By the end of February, almost all Svozgardans not currently living in a majority Svozgardan area, had moved to do so, and Mbersk, previously a fairly diverse area, had become almost entirely Kyotakavian as businesses and people moved away.
The battle highlighted the inability of the PISF to handle the situation, and additionally laid plainly bare that the Kyotakavian Police would take the side of Kyotakavian paramilitaries. Whilst PISF forces had made brief incursions into the south of the city, the essential cutting off of the north from the south by seizing the Mbersk Road proved to many in the nationalist leadership that the Kyotakavians could hold out against the state security forces and most importantly were capable of inflicting pitched battle defeats against the Svozgardans. In Svozgarda, serious military discussions were undertaken pertaining to an armed response to the battle, and a majority of the home-based military leadership supported a proposed military campaign in 1926 to put down paramilitary forces. This was met with major skepticism from many veterans of the battle, who privately remarked that the Kyotakavian nationalists had shown a remarkable aptitude in sustained urban conflict and evidently would be willing to stubbornly defend their communities if pushed to it.
For Security Forces, the battle was a complete embarrassment, the PISF had found themselves woefully under-prepared and having chronically underestimated the Kyotakavians and their paramilitary strength. In private correspondence after the battle Emirus Talian, the PISF commander for the duration of the battle; noted that the Kyotakavians had "displayed a remarkably resilient organisation as well as strong tactical capabilities." The KLA had displayed again it's resilience in a guerrilla campaign as well as its commitment to work with other nationalist groups in Kyotakavia. Especially concerning for Talian was their ability to conduct an effective campaign in majority-Svozgardan areas. Whilst the KLA were a relatively known quantity in terms of their quality, the recently bolstered Union Guard had conducted itself remarkably, shoring up internal support for Katlania whose joint Kyotakavian-Svozgardan heritage had to this point remained a sticking point in the Army Council. She had shown that she could effectively mold the paramilitary into an effective military force with strength not only in defence, but also to coordinate and execute complex attacks on entrenched positions.
Casualties
A total of 2,716 people were killed over the course of the battle, making it one of the bloodiest of the wider conflict and especially noted for the high number of civilian casualties resulting from indiscriminate mortar attacks that had become a staple of the SVDF by August 1924. This means that the majority of casualties were focused in the southern portion of the city, specifically civilians who were killed by bombardment with very few KLA or Union Guard members killed during such attacks.
Actual casualties resulting from firefights during street battles remained relatively low, only around 35% of all paramilitary and security force casualties came from such engagements with the majority being caused by the KLA bombing campaign that targeted either specific leadership figures, or local Headquarters.
Responsibility
Approximately 59% of civilian casualties were killed by Svozgardan loyalists, 13% by security forces and 38% by Kyotakavian nationalists. The SVDF was responsible for around 31% of all casualties, and the KLA responsible for around 26%.
| Responsible party | Paramilitary | Security forces | Civilians |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kyotakavian paramilitaries | |||
| KLA | 306 | 61 | 303 |
| Union Guard | 102 | 111 | 257 |
| Svozgardan security forces | |||
| PISF | 89 | N/A | 260 |
| Svozgardan paramilitaries | |||
| SVDF | 57 | 2 | 754 |
| USC | 12 | 0 | 402 |
| Total | 158 Kyotakavian paramilitaries408 Svozgardan paramilitaries174 security force members1,976 civilians | ||
Assassinations
Throughout the battle, both sides made numerous attempts to assassinate the leadership of paramilitary and security forces of their opponents. Svozgardan security forces rarely made explicit assassination attempts, preferring instead to to storming headquarters or stage ambushes of senior figures. Because of their use of police tactics it can be hard to accurately assess how many were explicitly assassination attempts though such a distinction was not widely made by Kyotakavian paramilitaries. The PISF successfully ambushed the Southern KLA Commander Boris Wazkon in August 1924 and killed three senior KLA members during a costly storming of the Northern HQ on Mbersk Road. Both the SVDF and USC made multiple attempts on KLA Leadership throughout the battle; notably including four bombing attempts made against Regan Klaidev leader of the NLP, in a single day. Success for Svozgardan paramilitaries was sporadic throughout the conflict as a lack of resources, intelligence and general inexperience in urban hit-and-run combat meant that attempts were often uncoordinated, underplanned and rarely dangerous. These issues were further compounded due to the reluctance of KLA leadership to venture outside of majority Kyotakavian communities in the Southern portion of the city where the SVDF and USC had to content with local resistance and KLA observers who could raise the alarm in plenty of time. The difficulties in operating south of the Mbersk Road lead to the Svozgardan paramilitaries leaning increasingly on indiscriminate mortar attacks which whilst carrying a high civilian cost, were rarely effective in delivering precision strikes on top of KLA command centres.
Kyotakavian paramilitaries saw far more success than their Svozgardan counterparts; whilst the Union Guard generally limited efforts to 'pot-shot' sniping of individual personnel and as a result saw much more limited success, they nonetheless successfully assassinated Eurius Nelton, the successor to SVDF East Commander Breton Kalionox, when he was shot by an unknown Union Guard sniper when he left his Headquarters. The KLA on the other hand regularly made bombing attempts on the senior leadership of both security forces and paramilitaries; targeting PISF Colonel Emirus Talian at least seven times, though with no success. Talian's evasion of assassination was an exception rather than the rule for Svozgardan personal as at least nineteen bombing attacks made against paramilitary leadership figures killed or incapacitated numerous senior personnel. The KLA bombing campaign is widely held as responsible for the decapitation of the SVDF leadership following the Atzan Lane bombing in late-August which killed both the Western and Eastern SVDF commanders as well as the Deputy Chief of the PISF. The bombing left the SVDF Eastern Command functionally leaderless for a large part of the battle and the death of the Deputy Chief of the PISF was a major source of embarrassment for the Svozgardan's, leading to far greater reluctance from the PISF to commit resources in support of paramilitaries.
By the end of the battle, so effective was the KLA assassination campaign that by the end of the conflict, they had killed 4 SVDF Commanders, the USC Commander-in-Chief and the Deputy Chief of the PISF, at least 39 other senior commanders in both the security forces and paramilitaries, and a numerous junior officers which had functionally decapitated the entirety of the SVDF Eastern Command, and left the Western SVDF suffering severe leadership shortages.
| Responsible party | Attempts | Successful | Success Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kyotakavian paramilitaries | |||
| KLA | 29 | 19 | 65.5% |
| Union Guard | 6 | 1 | 16.7% |
| Svozgardan security forces | |||
| PISF | 9 | 2 | 22.2% |
| Svozgardan paramilitaries | |||
| SVDF | 41 | 3 | 7.3% |
| USC | 18 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Total | 93 | ||
Politicians Assassinated
- Alexandra Longian, SLA, Representative for List Seat - Killed 1 August 1924
- Markus Aurelius, SLA, Representative for List Seat - Killed 13 August 1924
- Stephan Brazkov, Alliance, Representative for Nowa Grudak East - Killed 22 September 1924