User:WarCrimes/16th Light Commando Battalion

The 16th Light Commando Battalion was one of four lightly armed, specially trained experimental battalions of the UNSC's Light Commando Brigade.

History
After the fall of Harvest in 2525 the United Nations Space Command begun taking in Marine Corps recruits for light special forces infantry to bridge the gap between traditional UNSC Marines and Orbital Drop Shock Troopers.

The 2nd, 9th, 15th and 16th Light Commando Battalions were pulled together numbering a total of 496 servicemen and women. They were trained on Mars and then Reach

Training and formation
After Basic, all four small battalions were subjected to advanced and gruelling ODST and Marine training to have a similar effect to the later Spartan III's on the battlefield, where teams as small as 4 would lay down their lives taking as many as thousands of covenant infantry with them albeit making the war to come substantially easier.

Recruits were trained in everything from E.O.D and C.Q.C to Long ranged shooting and advanced driving skills in all possible environments and situations.

Here the 16th Lt-Cdo Bn would be put to charge by Captain Owen Alley, a decorated soldier from Harvest and the Insurrection. Subordinate to him would be:

and
 * 1st Lieutenant Eddy Balton (M Company)
 * Lieutenant Jim Sykes (N Company)
 * Lieutenant Li Mesner (O Company)
 * Lieutenant Roy Stanley (P Company)

Operational History
After their year long course, the 124 Commando's of the 16th Light Commando Battalion would be some of the first contacts with the covenant on and off planets including Sigma Octanus V, Reach, Madrigal and Earth.

The Defence of Mass Relay Five
Their most telling confrontation was Reach, when the UNSC begun to lose control over the planet, the 16th Lt-Cdo Bn was disembarked from the UNSC Pillar of Autumn and sent to retake the mass relay station in the Ettinum Territory to allow communications in that region to come back online for the civilian evacuation - a location called Drought Hills where the Covenant loyalists had wasted no time massacring the civilian operators of.

Prior to retaking the station early at 6:01am there was only a small covenant infantry force occupying the station and the 16th drew them downhill into a trap of plastic explosives wiping out all but a few soon to be covenant prisoners.

The 124 men and women went on to retake the station at the cost of 5 minor and 1 major casualty.

After clearing the surface and interiors of the base below the array, the battalion reactivated the station and begun drawing masses of covenant forces to their position. As the day went on into the evening, the force of 118 was reinforced by three UH-144 Falcons and a D77-TC Pelican of the 91st Strike Wing, however, the Pelican took too long to unload its cargo and was struck three times by Banshee fire sending the flaming wreck into the ground killing all on board and wounding more Commandos. After the first day of fighting 90 were standing with 12 wounded and 22 dead.

For the next five days the 16th would sustain more casualties from plasma strafing and infantry reducing the force of standing men to 56 with 30 wounded.

Finally, on the seventh day of the defence, the civilian evacuation was complete and the Battalion was ordered to surrender the base and retreat, however, with nearly no air support or exo-assets, the wounded unable to walk would be left behind to detonate planted explosives on advancing covenant with the final 34 men and women heading into the sewers.

After the ensuring explosions above the 34 survivors trekked within a dark and hazardous sewer way station eventually emerging at dawn to watch a distant Reach city burn under the glassing of a cruiser.

The battalion, now a company sized force made up of what remained from the other four companies found Warthog transport on an abandoned makeshift UNSC fire base at a farmstead. The troops would finally be spotted by a Pelican and their position relayed to a Spartan III team that would fly in and evacuate the commandos by Pelican from a hilltop ending their war on Reach.

After Reach
After the events of Reach the battalion, what was left of it, was returned to Earth and discharged, however Lieutenants Mesner and Stanley were granted permission to enlist more men and women from civilian populations. Mesner was promoted to 1st Lieutenant and would rebuild the battalion into the 16th Independent Commando Company at a full strength of 62. The Company would have two months of rest before voluntary redeployment on covert operations with ODST's and even Spartan III's earning the respect of marines and cyborgs alike.

Legacy
The 16th Light Commando Battalion would be the only surviving experimental special forces unit of the Light Commando Brigade and the most decorated.

It would stand as the only unit in the History of the UNSC to hold a position against the covenant in heavy combat for as long as it did.

Surviving members would go on to form a part of the post-war association of veterans and relatives and would prompt the UNSC to dissolve its experimental and expendable battalions project.

Known members

 * Captain Owen Alley (KIA)
 * 1st Lieutenant Eddy Balton (KIA)
 * Lieutenant Jim Sykes (KIA)
 * Lieutenant Li Mesner
 * Lieutenant Roy Stanley
 * Sargent Henry Bresnan (KIA)
 * Sargent Noel Wells
 * Staff Sargent Yousef Bakk
 * Corporal S. Jones
 * Lance Corporal Lisa Ellens
 * Private First Class Nick Gatting
 * Private Trevor Barker
 * Private Vicky Van-Lour (KIA)