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Far from Home (2634)
Repleetah is a small habitable planet located in an eponymous star system in the Isaac Quadrant of the Enigma Sector. Isolated from more traveled spacelanes, Repleetah is a bitterly cold world covered with ridged terrain and packed with snow and ice. At the outset of the Terran-Kilrathi War, Repleetah was occupied by research outposts from a variety of worlds including Terrans and Kilrathi. When news of the declaration of war reached the Repleetah, the Terran scientists voted to visit a Kilrathi research facility to establish their neutrality in the hopes that both groups could continue their research. The Kilrathi responded with a surprise biological attack which exterminated the human scientists. In response to the assault, the Terran Confederation and the Empire of Kilrah both quickly deploy marines to the distant system. The battle is soon joined with both forces fighting in full bio-resistant suits. The situation is quickly reduced to an endless stalemate with hundreds killed in each of an endless series of counter-attacks that trade back and forth little territory. Both sides establish operating bases in the planet's caves and trenches between the ridged terrain of Repleetah's icy surface. They settle in for a lengthy conflict.
Kilrah Takes the Initiative: The First Battle of Repleetah (2646-2651)
In 2646, the Kilrathi launched a counter-offensive in response to the Confederation's faltering Epsilon Initiative. The successful effort took both T'Kon Meth and T'Rel Meh and used its momentum to advance to a nominally Confederation-held Repleetah. On 21 March 2646, the comparatively massive Kilrathi expeditionary force arrived to bolster the marines that have been mired in stalemate for almost twelve years. Their ferocious assault breaks the human lines for the first time. The Kilrathi break through to populated outposts, killing 1.2 million civilians in the first phases of the battle. Though the Kilrathi now possess greater personnel and materiel, the situation is nevertheless again a stalemate. With the Kilrathi momentum in the Enigma Sector broken and the strategic value of Repleetah limited, both sides prove unwilling to commit the space forces needed to decisively end the battle. Instead, only ground reinforcements are dispatched to the planet. The Kilrathi attempt to break through the trench warfare using artillery barrages followed by attacks using specialized armor units, laser tanks with enormous drills capable of digging through the snow and breaking into enemy trenches.
Among those battling the Kilrathi armor offensive is Hector Paz who would go on to attend the Wing Commander Academy aboard the TCS Tiger's Claw with Christopher Blair. Paz disobeys his Sargeant's orders to retreat to the next ridge to detonate an explosive charge on a Kilrathi tank. He is badly wounded in the ensuing blast and awakens in a field hospital to find he will be evacuated and can no longer serve with the Marine Corps. The fighting continues for over five years. Morale drops as it becomes clear the galaxy's focus has shifted far from Repleetah. The troops come to believe they can rely only on each other. Paz would later note that "the Marines had one rule when I was with them at Repleetah: nobody gets left behind." First Repleetah ends on 17 October 2651 as the Kilrathi pull out most of their marine forces to support the increased fighting in the Vega Sector. It has been the bloodiest battle of the war to date: in addition to over a million human civilians, 2.7 million troops and seven million Kilrathi are killed in the fighting.
Miles to Go: The Second Battle of Repleetah (2654-2664)
With the Kilrathi leaving only forces to defend their outposts, the fighting is extremely limited for the next three years. On 14 October 2654, timed alongside the start of the new Venice Offensive, the Confederation launches a renewed assault on Repleetah. A Marine combat brigade makes an amphibious assault on the Kilrathi-held portion of the planet. But the assault goes awry when the Confederation's Space Forces commander, believing themselves to be facing a superior enemy force, orders a withdrawal. Although the marines are left without air cover, they are able to stabilize the battle lines on the planet. Second Repleetah begins with a draw; the Confederation's overall gains are negligible and the assault begins three straight years of heavy losses in the most sustained fighting of the war for both sides in endless counter-attacks.
Infuriating the long suffering ground troops, Admiral Sir Geoffrey Tolwyn chooses to decorate the Space Force commander who retreated without evacuating the marines for quick thinking. Lieutenant John "Gash" Dekker of the Terran Confederation Marine Corps arrives on the planet with the combat brigade. In 2664, he is captured by the Kilrathi, interrogated under torture and then shipped to a slave labor mining camp. Ironically, his capture saved him the fate that would soon befall the rest of the marines on Repleetah. Dekker would later say that his time on Repleetah, and not his four years as a POW, was what ended his patriotism for the Confederation.
After 2657, neither side remains willing to reinforce Repleetah. Although supply ships and reinforcements stop arriving in the system entirely, neither force is willing to yield. The fighting goes on year after year despite depleting reserves and supplies. By late 2664, the entire civilian population of the planet is gone and a single human officer survives. Lieutenant Miles D'Arby leads his surviving marines in a desperate final attempt to overrun the few remaining Kilrathi. No one on either side survives this final action.
Epilogue
In time, the name Repleetah would become permanently associated with the concept of an endless, stymied and violent battle. Vice Admiral Daniel Wilford would refer to the 2673 fighting on Circe V as some of the bloodiest fighting he had seen since Repleetah. Human settlement was re-established on Repleetah sometime after 2664. By 2680, Repleetah had left the Terran Confederation and joined the Union of Border Worlds. The speakers at Commodore Blair's memorial service included a Holo-Link from Repleetah.
