(OOC: OOC-Thread Here.)
Some 45 nautical miles south of the island republic of Malta, the 20,000 ton landing ship Tonnerre of the Gallian Marine Nationale kept station tranquilly in the bobbing waves. She was part of Standing Naval Force Mediterranean, NATO and EDA's naval presence in what was once called Mare Nostrum - Our Sea by the Romagnans. In fact, the flag of STANAVFORMED was on Tonnerre today, a radical change compared to the four decades the Gallian military spent detached from the NATO command structure.
This had come about in 2011 when the Libyan theatre exploded. Since then, and the cessation of immediate hostilities STANAVFORMED had been busy as bees keeping the Libyan pressure cooker from escalating again into all-out warfare. In 2016 alone, five years since the late President-for-Life El-Said lit the fuse on his powder keg, NATO had stopped at least a dozen vessels smuggling arms to the simmering conflict and ferried thousands of refugees away from it, its land forces keeping the Democratic Republic of Libya afloat in at least Tripolitania and parts of Fezzan while Cyrenaica was essentially ceded to forces still loyal to the former Saidist regime. This stalemate endured as long as neither party had the military force competent or sufficient enough to force a breakthrough despite the NATO peacekeepers.
In mid-2018 however, NATO forces started drawing down from Libya, in preparation for the eventuality that the Saderan theatre required more forces, creating what the Saidist loyalists perceived to be a temporary power vacuum as the European forces gradually started leaving the country. This was an opportunity General Hosni Muammar El-Said, cousin of the deceased ex-president and now de facto leader of the Saidist faction was not blind to, and he set into motion plans to take advantage of the apparent absence of forces more competent than his own.
However, the preparations for this, the reunification of the former Libyan Arab Republic under the banner of an El-Said again was thwarted in part by the absolutely horrible condition General El-Said found his forces in. To rebuild his forces to a reasonable enough level to challenge the forces of the Democratic Republic of Libya took two years, helped along significantly with extensive pleading and begging to Moscow. Now, he had 2 fully equipped motor-rifle brigades and a tank brigade, plus an anti-aircraft rocket regiment lavishly outfitted with the latest and greatest in the Orussian arsenal, who even added a brigade of "volunteers" to boot. The reconstituted Libyan Arab Air Force now had a paper force of four fighter squadrons and one transport.
It was this force of fighters that were now tasked with firing the opening shot of the war that will see the western imperialists driven out of his country, or so Hosni hoped.
By the dawn's early light a four ship formation of Fulcrums lifted off from Benina International, heading westbound.
Some 300 nautical miles of cruising at the economic speed later the lead aircraft dropped down to sea level and armed. Not even a dozen minute later the radar room of Tonnerre burst into activity as she detected the inbound flight. Even before Surcouf, their designated escort could hail the incoming unknowns though a total of eight missiles were detected on launch.
The captain of the 20,000 ton Tonnerre immediately threw his vessel into a hard turn to port in a cloud of countermeasures, while Surcouf engaged the incoming vampires. The two vessels combined brought five out of eight missiles down in a flurry of AA missile and gunfire. Of the remaining three, two went wide for the decoys, the last one however smashed into Tonnerre's hull just below the bridge.
The rocket fuel immediately ignited a fairly significant fire in the onboard hospital which had to be subsequently sealed. Fortunately however, it appears to the damage control team fighting the blaze that the main missile warhead had failed to explode, limiting the damage done to where it had impacted. The roof of the CIC below was a little heated but that appears to have been the extent of it. Of course, with the hospital out of commission they had to locate a new casualty receiving station in the mess deck. Otherwise, and despite the smoke and fire belching out of her side, Tonnerre still appeared to be fightable as a ship. Opting for caution however, her captain wheeled the ship around so the wind blew the fire out to sea and when that was eventually suppressed set course for Malta for the emergency repairs he expected. A message was of course sent out on the international emergency channel, but not a mayday given that his ship was in no danger of sinking.
"All channels... Foxtrot, Alpha, Tango, Oscar calling. Our position is Grid Reference Charlie November 3759. We have been struck by one missile on our starboard side. Onboard medical facilities are inoperative. Requesting assistance."