Insurrectionists

The Insurrection is the proper name given to an undeclared civil war fought between Earth's primary military, scientific, and exploratory agency, the United Nations Space Command and various loosely organized groups of rebels over control of the Outer Colonies for some 43 years, between the year 2494 and 2537. Originally, the breakaway movements started as disquiet against the Colonial Administration Authority's oversight of the Outer Colonies, with the colonists tired of the organization's bureaucracy. It first started as peaceful protests, and after years of frustrating negotiations, some groups began to use more forceful methods, eventually abandoning diplomacy in favor of terrorist tactics.

What had once been widespread support for the Insurrectionists quickly dried up at the outbreak of violence. Though they started out targeting only military and Colonial Administration targets, as the UNSC counterinsurgency operations began more and more innocent people were caught in the crossfire.

By 2524, the Insurrection had claimed millions of lives. The various rebel groups had become extremely adept at creating improvised explosive devices difficult for the UNSC to detect, and therefore stop, and had struck many high profile targets, even in orbit above Reach itself. Opponents of the war believed the simplest solution was to simply give the rebels their autonomy - for the UNSC to pull out, and let the rebels have their independence. However, the value of the colonies made them simply too important to abandon.

Originally confined mostly to a few systems including the Eridanus system, the fighting spread to several other systems during the decades.

History
While the reason for the UNSC's eventual victory was arguably the Great Schism within the Covenant, from the Insurrection came the Magnetic Accelerator Cannon, ships with Titanium-A armor, advances in ship-to-ship warfare tactics, and above all, the SPARTAN-IIs, all of which would prove crucial in humanity's fight against the Covenant

Though, by and large, the Insurrection was over by the end of the Human-Covenant war, several planets continued to defy the UNSC, either by refusing to return to the UNSC fold or by armed hostility. The colony of Venezia, for example, refused to assist the damaged UNSC Ariadne in its orbit, and opened fire on the UNSC Monte Cassino. Venezia would escalate to be a hub of black market trading and Innies living together with Covenant species. At some point however it seems as though the Insurrection resurged evidence being the actions of the New Colonial Alliance.

Operation: TREBUCHET
Beginning in 2513 with a large uprising in the Eridanus system, Operation: TREBUCHET was intended to be a heavy handed fight to bring all dissenting Outer Colonies in line, effectively crushing all resistance to the Earth's authority in the Outer Colonies.

At first the aggressive response was widely accepted, however, as the fight dragged on and the theater of operations expanded, the continuing operation became extremely unpopular with the human civilian population. Operation: TREBUCHET eventually became the central conflict for Earth's premiere fighting force, the UNSC, only being ended with the massive genocide that followed with the Human-Covenant war.

Raid on Camp New Hope
By 2531 United Rebel Front had repeatedly had its operations disrupted by a four-man team of Spartan-II super-soldiers known as Blue Team. The team disrupted URF operations including Station Jefferson, the destroyer URF Origami and a saboteur cell on Reach, as well as an incident in Micronesia, and a high-explosives manufacturing facility at an unspecified location. In response the rebels gathered together three stolen FENRIS Nuclear Warheads at Camp New Hope in a way so sloppy that the Office of Naval Intelligence could not help but notice, then contacted the UNSC and offered to trade the nukes in exchange for medicines for their people suffering from Boren's Syndrome. They then set a trap for Blue Team, whom they anticipated would be sent. They successfully ambushed John-117, Frederic-104, Kelly-087 and Linda-058 using an Antigravity plate, however were unaware of the presence of a fifth Spartan and new addition to the team, Kurt-051, who had avoided the trap. Kurt was able to free the other members of Blue Team and they then retreated from the camp with the recovered warheads before the camp could launch a proper counterattack. Rebel leader General Howard Graves was killed in the process.

Massacre at Eridanus Secundus
On September 12, 2552, Admiral Whitcomb, Fred, John-117, Cortana, Dr. Halsey, and Lieutenant Haverson, aboard theGettysburg-Ascendant Justice, encountered a small rebel base in an asteroid - the same base John had raided 27 years earlier.

After a tentative agreement, Whitcomb convinced Jiles, the governor, to house their battered ships and repair them. Soon, a Covenant ship arrived. Whitcomb quickly destroyed it, but at the loss of their last functional turret, showing that there was most likely more Covenant ships coming. Afterwards the rebels, knowing they couldn't face what was coming alone, set to work on repairing the ships. The two ships are repaired enough that they have some ability to fight back, but a Covenant fleet showed up before repairs could be finished. Whitcomb, feeling it was his duty to warn Earth first and being unable to take on a whole fleet, initiated a Slipspace jump, leaving the helpless rebels behind for the Covenant. Presumably the Covenant destroyed the base and the rebels.

Kidnapping at Eridanus Secundus
In the year 2525, a SPARTAN-II team, led by John-117, went on a mission to infiltrate and capture rebel leader Colonel Robert Watts. The Spartans sneaked on board via the Laden. Once on board, they located a cargo that contained luxury items such as Sweet William Cigars and champagne, verifying Watts' presence.

After boarding the rebel base, they neutralized the guards in their path and eventually found their way to Watts. They successfully killed his guards, and sedated Watts long enough for them to escape. Using explosives, they blasted their way out, leaving dozens of civilians dead.

Preston Cole and the Bellicose
In June 2501, an insurgent captured UNSC frigate, the Bellicose was pursued for the third time by the UNSC Gorgon, commanded by Preston Cole, into the Theta Ursae Majoris System. After a chase and battle, in which the Bellerphonmanaged to dodge a MAC round using excellent tactics, the Gorgon was contacted by the Bellerphon, renamed theBellicose. A short exchange of taunting messages followed, and then Cole let the Bellicose escape. After laying traps in five systems over a course of three months, Cole had yet to find the captured ship. Several months later, Cole was married to Lyrenne Castilla, who was also pregnant.

In June of 2503, eight months after Cole's marriage to Castilla, Admiral Harold Stanforth sent Cole a transmission telling him that ONI uncovered the civilian identity of the captain of the Bellicose - Lyrenne Castilla, spying on Cole. Cole went to confirm this, and found that Castilla had robbed him of everything, leaving only a printout of the exchange they had between the Bellicose and Gorgon. In January of next year, four Destroyers engaged the Bellicose in the Theta Ursae Majoris system, and reported that the ship was caught in the gravitational pull of the gas giant, and destroyed.

Cole faced a court-martial for conspiring with the enemy and giving Castilla knowledge of UNSC slipspace upgrades, and possible execution. However, Harold Stanforth stepped in and vouched for him, and Cole was merely relocated to Earth with a desk job. The Bellicose survived, however, and remained in the shadows until eventually reappearing with an Insurrectionist fleet, dealing the Covenant a crippling blow in the Battle of Psi Serpentis.

The Callisto Incident
The Callisto Incident was what effectively started the war between the UNSC and Insurrectionists. The UNSC Callisto, a corvette, was captured by Insurrectionists when boarding merchant vessels, and all UNSC crew aboard it were killed. In response, the UNSC sent a Battle Group of three destroyers: the UNSC Jericho, the UNSC Buenos Aires, and the UNSCLas Vegas.

On March 2, 2494, the battle group eventually found the Callisto in the 26 Draconis system. All of the ships fired six Ares Missiles at the renegade destroyer. However, the Callisto managed to avoid destruction by maneuvering behind an asteroid. The insurrectionists then detonated a nuke hidden inside the asteroid before hand, launching the debris toward the UNSC ships.

The Buenos Aires was engulfed in the explosion and destroyed, and the other two ships were seriously damaged.Second Lieutenant Preston Cole, as the only living or conscious officer aboard the bridge of the Las Vegas, took control of the vessel. He signaled the Callisto, activating the ship's distress signal and requested medical aid for the wounded. When the Callisto docked with the Las Vegas in order to take command of the ship, Cole launched the ship's last Ares Missile, which had been moved by the crew to the docking bay, directly into the Callisto, critically damaging the Callisto. Cole then bluffed by opening the empty missile silos on his ship and ordered the Callisto to surrender and allow Las Vegas's AI to take control.

The Outer Colony Insurgency
While the widespread fighting in the Outer Colonies did not start until 2494, there had been multiple isolated rebellions for some time. This led the UNSC to resurrect the ORION Projectin 2491, to combat the increasing threat posed by civil uprisings. In 2492, the UNSC usedNuclear Weapons to put down a rebellion on the colony of Far Isle. In the end, there were many separate cases that led the insurrectionists to adopt more aggressive tactics.

Known Insurgent Groups

 * HOTH
 * REV
 * The Legion