Bruce Bernstein
Bruce Lee Bernstein | |
|---|---|
| Personal | |
| Affiliation | Draconis Combine |
| Career | |
| Rank | Tai-sho[1] |
Bruce Lee Bernstein was the commanding officer of the Third Proserpina Hussars as of 3025.[1]
History
Tai-sho Bernstein, serving with the Third Proserpina Hussars, was stationed on Galedon in 3025.[1]
Wapakoneta
During the Fourth Succession War, Bernstein's Third Hussars and Tarsus Bodoli's Twelfth Galedon Regulars were dispatched to strike at the Federated Suns world of Wapakoneta in late 3028. The defending Beta and Delta Regiments of Wolf's Dragoons launched the first attack, using Beta's Third Company to draw the bulk of the Hussars/Regualrs force away from their budding airfield in order to eliminate the Combine's aerospace superiority. In a bit of mixed fortune for Bernstein and Bodoli, the entire mercenary force was wiped out in the attempt but over two-thirds of their aerospace fighters were destroyed on the ground when the Third Company's command lance made a suicidal assault against their under-defended airfield. Enraged, the two Combine commanders exhorted their troops to treat the Dragoons forces with no mercy and marched off to find and destroy the remainders of the two opposing regiments.[2]
An ambush from the Third Company of the Dragoons' Delta Regiment failed to stop the Combine's march, and the mercenary unit's commanding officer was killed in a vicious battle against Bodoli's Regulars amidst a raging forest fire, but the next three months went by with no further pitched battles. It eventually became apparent to Bernstein that the mercenaries had split into smaller-sized units in order to more effectively launch hit-and-fade attacks against their more numerous foes but Bodoli, who held seniority and thus retained overall command, refused to allow the Third Hussars to break into similar-sized hunting forces. In late November, Bernstein gave up trying to persuade Bodoli to change course and the Third Hussars split off from the Twelfth Regulars in order to enact their own methods of war-fighting. This move paid off for Bernstein when, on 29 November, the Third Hussars came up behind Beta Regiment's Fourth Company and nearly annihilated the mercenary force in the midst of an assault on an unsuspecting Regulars company.[2]
After hounding the Dragoons for another week, a trio of Bernstein's companies located and began hunting down the Fifth Company of Beta Regiment. After an hour of chasing the Fifth Company, the Hussars were lead into both a minefield and the entirety of the sixty remaining mercenary BattleMechs. The following battle, coined the Fight for Ploven's Fields, cost Bernstein's men nearly half of their engaged machines and forced the Hussars to rejoin the Twelfth Regulars in order to rest and refit.[2]
As the fighting continued into 3029, the combined Regulars/Hussars force managed to isolate the remaining Dragoons forces in the mountain city of Hannibal. A lengthy period of orbital bombardment quickly turned the city into rubble, although the Dragoons' troops survived with no notable losses due to Hannibal's extensive underground mining infrastructure. An attempted 9 May assault against Hannibal's wealthiest residential district quickly went awry, as the rubble left behind by the Combine's bombardment provided the mercenary 'Mechs with plenty of cover and concealment. After the loss of seven 'Mechs, Tai-sho Bodoli ordered both the Hussars and Regulars to retreat.[3]
The next major assault began on 21 May, with Bernstein's Hussars clashing with the Dragoons defenders in a large park that had previously been dedicated to year-round ice sculptures before the bombardment had destroyed them all. The Hussars flooded reinforcements into the area and the pinned Dragoons made the decision to retreat into the city's underground tunnels rather than wait for their own reinforcements. As the Hussars pursued their opponents, they unwittingly allowed themselves to be lured into a section of tunnels that had been extensively rigged with explosives, with their only saving grace being that the Hussars noticed the trap early enough to force a premature detonation. The collapse of the tunnels destroyed almost three lances of Hussars BattleMechs but the desperate Dragoons had buried three of their own men, including the diversion's commander Captain Ramon Magdaleno.[3]
After the Combine once more retreated from the city, conflict between the two sides came to a half with the arrival of a major snowstorm that prevented any additional offensive operations. When the storm ended on 28 June, the Regulars and Hussars cautiously advanced into Hannibal only to discover that the mercenaries had left Wapakoneta under the cover of the storm two days before. While victorious in conquering Wapakoneta and destroying over half of the Dragoons' fielded regiments, the Combine could not claim to have landed a killing blow in the course of the fighting for the planet.[3]