Why Thrawn's 7th Fleet was Three Times Larger than Normal Imperial Fleets

[Music] hello there friends welcome back to another episode of generation tech my name is allen grand emerald thrawn was easily one of the most capable military officers to ever serve in the galactic empire even amongst his own people the chiss thrawn was considered a savant his analytical capabilities were unmatched and helped him accurately predict his enemy's tactical movements and strategies when thrawn was exiled he arrived in imperial space only armed with his wits his mission was to assess the empire and see if it was a threat to his people or potentially an ally against the many threats that the chiss faced in the chaotic unknown region thrawn was so impressive in their initial meeting that the emperor gave him an opportunity to attend an imperial military academy this led to thrawn's first posting in the empire as a lieutenant and the second weapons officer on a gazante class cruiser known as the blood crow this is just a few years after the rise of the empire roughly 15 years later thrawn was no longer a lieutenant he had risen to the highest rank within the imperial navy and was promoted to the rank of grand admiral by palpatine himself shortly after that he was given responsibility over the mighty seventh fleet now throughout thrawn's military career he was always this outside the box type of thinker whether he was a junior officer or the commander of a fleet thrawn always brought with them a very creative approach to warfare in today's video we're going to take a closer look at his seven fleets and what kind of firepower thrawn actually had at his disposal [Music] the imperial navy was a massive entity the largest branch of the galactic empire sprawling military force and that's because the empire's territory was 99.99999 percent outer space now many different factions had different mentalities on how to approach guarding and securing all of the space the imperial military's view was building a massive military-industrial complex that could also support a massive military it was said that at the height of the imperial military strength the navy had over 25 000 imperial class star destroyers available for deployment now the empire was technically an autocracy with emperor palpatine at the head but because of the sheer size of the galaxy you actually have this large bureaucratic layer that was in between emperor palpatine and then like the troops on the ground emperor palpatine was officially the head of the imperial military and also the imperial navy but for more day-to-day tasks he had the joint chiefs of the galactic empire to help operate the military these individuals were selected from various branches of the military the joint chiefs were essentially an advisory board that would brief the imperial high command which was led by a supreme commander of all imperial military forces and then beneath the supreme commander within the imperial high command was the admiralty who was in charge of administrating the imperial navy this includes coordinating campaigns as well as shaping imperial naval doctrine and acquiring ships and materials now mind you all of these individuals also had to directly report to palpatine as well i'm really surprised that emperor palpatine wasn't killed by the overwhelming amount of bureaucracy he had to deal with now grand emerald thrawn was at a rank where he could have been invited to sit on the admiralty board himself unfortunately there was a lot of controversy about having an alien rank so high in the imperial navy some of the more stubborn and xenophobic military leaders would have had some serious issues working alongside thrawn a number of palestinians to balance these things out a little bit and so even though thrawn enjoyed political protection from the emperor himself it's probably good that thrawn was never placed on the admiralty board because he also clearly had some big problems with imperial navy doctrine and some of that was because of his just culture and upbringing and some of that was just because he had more common sense than the imperial board did thrawn would also become a huge critic for the death star program he lobbied instead for more funding for his own advanced fighter concept known as the defender but more on that later [Music] thrawn would be given the 7th fleet and sent out to the lothal sector his job would be to pacify the local rebel movement that was growing there because imperial doctrine heavily favored the use of battleships an imperial fleet was usually built around at least half a dozen ships of the line like the imperial class star destroyer now most sectors in the galaxy had their own sector fleet depending on how large and important that sector was and how many dangers were basically threatening the lothal sector fleet for instance was about average in size for the empire but pretty large for an outer rim based unit at its core the lafall sector fleet had six imperial class star destroyers along with several smaller support vessels like the arcanum's class cruiser they also had a ground-based contingent of tie fighters lothal was a pretty mineral-rich sector and so the fleet there was mostly assigned to anti-smuggling and anti-piracy operations then you have the not sector fleet which was centered around eight star destroyers um this system included like hoth bespin and burn and con so it was even more important in a lot of ways for the empire's overall strategy then you had the end or sector fleet which was just massive because of course regarding the second death star then you had the numbered fleets which included admiral thrawn's seventh fleet these were mobile fleets which were far less in number they're sort of like a quick reaction force or expeditionary force designed to either reinforce imperial systems that were getting overrun or carry out offensive operations on their own because of the more dangerous and demanding nature of these type of actions you usually had an admiral that was a lot more capable put in charge of these mobile fleets individuals like grand admiral thrawn now grand admiral thrawn would actually take over the 7th fleet from admiral sartan we don't really know much about him but apparently he loses his job to the chiss this is what happened shortly after thrawn's victory at baton so thrawn's seventh fleet was really massive it was not a normal noble fleet in the rebel series when we see the 7th fleet in operation we usually see only smaller detachments like a squadron or task force of isds now because palpatine really liked thrawn and basically saw him as a problem solver his seventh fleet was immobile fleets but on steroids generally speaking mobile fleets are going to feature the most modern and heavily armed vessels in the navy these are essentially vanguard units but the seventh was one of the largest mobile fleets in the imperial navy had nine imperial one class star destroyers an additional 16 imperial class 2 star destroyers as well this included thrawn's own personal ship the chimera a class 1 isd once thrawn reached the rank of commodore he was gifted this ship as was common for the more talented officers within the imperial navy for continuity and familiarity reasons the chimera would actually follow thrawn throughout the rest of his career and serve as his command ship now the only major difference between a class 1 and class 2 imperial class star destroyer is that the latter version has a comms tower in between the two bridge deflector shield generators instead of a tractor beam assembly now at 1.6 kilometers or one mile in length these behemoths were massive floating cities armed to the teeth with weapons and placements the isd was actually at the heart of the imperial naval doctrine the isd was first and foremost a battleship which means it used its 68 turbo laser batteries and 60 ion cannon emplacements to blast the enemy into submission exchanging broadsides at line of sight ranges might seem a bit antiquated for space battles but this was the empire's policy now thrawn clearly was not interested in massing his fleet in large parade formations in exchanging fire in this way with his enemies as a chess commander he was more used to fighting numerically superior enemies and he was oftentimes outgunned thrawn was actually very used to outmaneuvering his enemies and using subterfuge now asds weren't just weapons platforms though they were usually equipped with an entire legion of stormtroopers along with their motor pool heavy weapons and transport vessels these star destroyers could also deploy around a wing of starfighters usually separated into three squadrons a bit disappointing for a ship of this size but most of the starfighters were the basic thai variants that were only useful for short-range interception these starfighters were supposed to bolster the relatively weak point defense systems on board of these battleships and so really if you take a look at imperial naval doctrine the isds were kind of like these self-contained tactical assault groups the destroyer itself could serve as a forward operations base which could stay in orbit if say the enemy's anti-air defenses are still intact everything an offensive operation could need including shuttles heavy armor reconnaissance and of course infantry could be deployed from an isd and also housed there and on top of that you also have the terrifyingly powerful and accurate fire support from the star destroyer itself on top of that an isd was usually deployed with a wide range of support vessels like a carrier group the isds themselves were quite vulnerable to enemy fighters and long-range guided munitions like the ones the separators used to use the seventh lead had at least if not more 12 arcadians class command cruisers these were 230 meter long light cruisers that dated back from the republic era they filled a variety of different roles from commanding smaller patrol units to even serving as a specialized communications vessel for the larger fleets the arkadin's class was far more powerful than any rebel carillion-style corvette like the cr-90 or the hammerhead the seventh fleet also had at least nine gazante class cruisers these were essentially civilian freighters that were outfitted for patrol duty as a cost efficient replacement for the arcadians class the gazante class cruiser was able to lift heavier weapons like atats into battle which was actually quite convenient at a tactical level thrawn also had access to four dreadnought class heavy cruisers these were pre-clone wars era capital ships which were extremely durable and well armed for the time they most likely had to undergo some kind of modernization program to stay up to date with imperial protocol and lastly thrawn had access to two interdictor class star destroyers these were technically heavy cruisers at around 1129 meters in length they were only armed with 20 quad laser cannons and a single squadron of tie fighters most of the resources and energy on the ship were redirected to its four gravity well projectors which were able to prevent ships from jumping into hyperspace and at the same time pulled them out of hyperspace the chiss actually had access to this type of technology and so thrawn was very familiar with using gravity wells to bottleneck and trap enemy fleets a perfect counter to the rebels who oftentimes try to run away into hyperspace when facing the imperial navy's numerical advantage thrawn would also use the seventh fleet as a testing bed for his own tied defender line of advanced star fighters these star fighters were equipped with almost every feature you could want in a tie fighter this included shields a hyperdrive more laser cannons more armor and of course a munitions launcher but ultimately these tie fighters cost five times more than a standard tie animal thrawn's chest mentality of quality over quantity just did not fit into the larger imperial naval doctrine for star fighters now when thrawn arrived to the lol fall sector he was also given control of the lothfall sector fleet which was under the command of cassius constantine admiral cass's constantine was relatively incompetent sector fleet commanders were usually less capable than mobile fleet commanders and that's because they're mostly in charge of security or defensive operations many of these individuals also became quite corrupt because of their natural authority over their host systems these fleet commanders were also responsible for logistics and so they needed to create contracts with local suppliers to fuel and maintain their fleets and so taking bribes and gifts from suppliers was very common so admiral thrawn's mobile fleet was around three to four times the size of your average imperial naval fleet it just shows you how much trust palpatine had in thrawn and how much damage those freaking space whales did to the imperial moon well guys let me know in the comment section below what you think about admiral thrawn's fleet was it too large for the chiss to control or not also guys don't forget to subscribe and hit that notification button down below so you don't miss out on the rest of our awesome content as usual my name is alan and my allegiance is to the republic to democracy

Channel: Generation Tech

Views: 324,274

Keywords: generation tech, star wars

Id: OBxL0ZH9E7Q

Length: 12min 21sec (741 seconds)

Published: Fri May 20 2022