Operation: DEPTH CHARGE

Operation: DEPTH CHARGE (aka The Amenthes Retaking) is one of the more famous declassified Peacekeeper operations during the Herschel Insurrection.

Overview
Early on during the Herschel Insurrection a key ESPF shipyard was targeted by enemy forces and quietly infiltrated to stifle Peacekeeper military development, halting the construction of the ESSP-C700 Da Vinci-class before it could be launched to reinforce Peacekeeper forces. While UESF intelligence did not managed to fully ascertain the Insurrectionist's true motives behind taking the plant, Federation forces were less concerned about the orbital facility containing the incomplete ships, but more about the capture of the manufacturing plant on the surface. More specifically, the plant was entirely capable of constructing SR beam weapons for mobile suits (then powered by a pre-charged capacitor) or spacecraft and turn the tide of war against the UESF.

During the initial attack, Insurrectionist forces were under the belief they had successfully cut the ground-side facility's communications and would have enough time to repurpose the facility's defences and support MS to defend it from attackers. While they did manage to assume control of the facility's defence systems and use it to fend off local ESPF forces, a small group of technicians had managed to covertly send a distress call before their capture. With the ESPF scrambling its forces faster than normal, tactical analysts projected that a head-on assault or siege would have heavy casualties, and risked the lives of the hostages. Instead the decision was made for a covert hybrid assault, using both mechanised forces and infantry to perform an infiltration and blitzkrieg-style attack.

In order to provide the maximum advantage for the mobile suit strike team, the infantry unit deployed consisted of AEROSTAR marines, using stealth insertion techniques to land several kilometres away from the facility, then infiltrate the plant to sabotage its defences using Icarus Suits. Meanwhile in geostationary orbit the Ironside-class Ark Royal prepared to deploy a team of Spec Ops Valiants. In a synchronised strike coordinated via surface-to-orbit laser-comms, the MS team was launched in several atmospheric entry pods towards the facility, coinciding with systematic disruption and destruction of the facility's long-range sensors and defences.

During the seven-minute window to landing, enemy mobile suits were relayed false data planted by the AEROSTAR team as they prepared to breach the facility itself, using the chaos of the mobile suit attack to successfully enter and take it back.