Gander Confederation

Description
    Humanoid in form, the typical Gander can be readily distinguished by the lack of hair (except for eyebrows) and the bronze color of the skin. At an average of 2.6 meters in height, one can be forgiven for thinking the Gander to be a strong, hardy race. However, their height was the result of the homeworld's gravity of 0.8 G. Because of that gravity and other factors relating to Gander physiology the race was unable to use strikefighters. There was an attempt to develop fighters, but it was found that creating a drive that wouldn't place undue harm on the pilot resulted in a vehicle that was practically the size of a shuttle. As a result the Gander went ahead with the development of the armed pinnace and later the prototype gunboat.
    The Gander homeworld at the time when the reactionless drive was developed had four nation states, each ruling a continent. After arduous negotiations the four nations agreed to form a confederation. To insure that no one nation grew too powerful it was decided that each new colony would be an independent nation and have representation in the newly-formed confederation congress. Developed at the same time, the Confederation Navy was charged with the defense of the race and for exploration of the then recently discovered warp point phenomenon.
    Exploration was particularly fruitful, finding three systems in a row that held habitable planets. The Gander settled on consolidating these new finds. With that completed, and with a much updated fleet to protect the new worlds, the Gander went back exploring and encountered the Ahlon. Diplomatic relations were established and in a short period of time a trade treaty was signed. Though peaceful, the Confederation wanted to ensure its military was as strong as it could reasonably get with the current technology. Work on the armed pinnace convinced them that a somewhat more capable small craft could be developed. That craft turned out to be the prototype gunboat.
    Shortly after upgrading their relationship with the Ahlon to that of a trade and military alliance the Gander discovered a third race - the Cazov. It occurred in the first system the Gander have explored and the initial contact was quick. Two months of discussion lead the Gander to believe that the Cazov were not quite sane. This belief was reinforced when two hidden Cazov destroyer squadrons revealed themselves and separately engaged two Gander patrol groups. Gunboats and armed pinnaces trounced the Cazov ships and forced the two surviving destroyers to retreat, revealing the location of the closed warp point the Cazov used to enter the system. Within a month the Gander mustered their fleet and, with a task force of their Ahlon allies, launched a major probe of the entry warp point.
    It was a rout. The Cazov had heavily fortified their warp point. What pinnaces and gunboats the Gander had gotten through were engaged and destroyed by Cazov 1st generation fighters. Just as important was the fact that the Cazov had antimatter warheads for their missiles. Only a week later the Gander was treated to a warp point assault of their own. Heavily equipped with carriers, the Cazov harried and pushed the allies away from the closed warp point. In the thirteen months that followed the 'system of conflict' as it came to be called saw attack and counterattack. The Gander developed antimatter warheads of their own and shared that knowledge with the Ahlon, but the fighting had reached the warp point leading to the Gander home system. It was there that the Cazov deployed their next surprise.
    Operating almost to their breaking point, the Cazov fleet launched a major warp point assault. The two waves of simultanious transits composed of BB and BC minesweepers, along with 200 regular pinnaces, were destroyed but made a considerable dent in one patch of the Gander minefields. However it was the first use of warp-capable missile pods by the Cazov that came as a complete surprise. All the bases guarding the warp point were destroyed along with those gunboats and armed pinnaces that hadn't been crash-launched. Even a healthy percentage of the gunboats that formed the combat area patrol were destroyed. For a period of four minutes nothing happened, leading the defenders to believe the Cazov had shot their bolt. Nothing was further from the truth. A fresh wave of pods came in, and as soon as they cleared the warp point assault carriers marched in, supported by a mass transit of cruisers and destroyers. Practically all of the reconstituted CAP was destroyed and two more minefield patches were wiped out after all was said and done. The allied Gander and Ahlon ships were defeated, and a final wave of missile pods took care of the majority of gunboats, the rest felled by the blanket of fighters the Cazov spat out of the battleship-hulled assault carriers.
    Ruthlessly using its long-range missile advantage and fighter umbrella, the Cazov fleet demolished the Gander homeworld's space station. Given that the Cazov hailed from a super-terrestoid planet one expected an actual invasion of the planet would've been cause for some deep thinking. Not so for the Cazov. Laden down in hostile environment gear, Cazov ground troops engaged the Gander defenders in a land campaign that lasted for five months. The occupation of Gander was relaxed, but there would always be a large contingent of ground troops in the system. Gander became little more that a supplier of much needed raw materials for the Cazov, who had in the meantime went on to conquer the remaining Gander colony systems. The war for the Gander was over, though their Ahlon allies lasted for only a few more months before they capitulated.
    Later, when the Cazov began suffering severe reverses in their multiple conflicts, an underground Gander movement wrestled control of the homeworld defenses away from the Cazov occupation forces. The ground troops were all killed when their life-support equipment was knocked out and the orbitals (including the small space station) were seized intact. But that left the warp point bases. What the Gander didn't know was that the Cazov, for reasons only known to their demented minds, had recently stationed a small group of tugs in the system. Those tugs moved the bases to within firing range of the homeworld orbitals and exchanged missile and fighter strikes. The small tugs were destroyed, but the Cazov bases wiped out the seized orbitals. But the bases, damaged to a greater or lesser extent and out of missiles, were essentially cut off from resupply for the time being, and the Gander began a crash gunboat production program.
    As it had happened before, the Cazov in general and their leader in particular had a conniption. The three outlaying Gander colony systems, deliberately kept from going up in population so as to be more controllable, were destroyed. Had a battlegroup of superdreadnoughts or even a freighter loaded with missiles been available then the Gander home system would've been nuked. Thankfully, it was at this time that a CPS (Commonwealth of Planetary States) fleet, having fought the Cazov on other fronts, broke into the 'system of conflict' and searched for warp points. The closed warp point leading into the Cazov system was found thanks to an obliging Cazov freighter, the very one tasked to resupply the bases in the Gander system. It was destroyed in short order, and, following the bearing it was on, the CPS found the warp point leading to the Gander system.
    In short, the Gander home system was liberated and became fast allies with the CPS. The Gander were even able to assist the CPS in the invasion the of the Cazov system, though its involvement at the time was limited to long-range gunboat strikes based from the Gander homeworld.

The Confederated Space Navy (CSN)
    The CSN had, at the time of contact with the Cazov, been a fleet of cruisers backed up by a small number of superdreadnoughts and a significant number of dedicated armed pinnace/gunboat carriers. No ship smaller than a heavy cruiser was built, and all ships that didn't carried pinnaces had a majority of their external ordnance racks replaced with gunboat racks. Gunboats were seen as a manned version of long range missiles, inflicting as much damage as possible on major enemy combatants before the battelines made contact. The CSN had considered retiring their armed pinnaces, but after seeing Cazov fighters in action they kept them in service. The wide firing arcs of the armed pinnaces internal weapons made up for their inherent slower speed, plus they served as useful 'escorts' for the gunboats. No thought was given in deploying a copy of the Ahlon AFSC. Such craft were more capable as fighters than either gunboat or pinnace, but they couldn't be used to attack ships.
    In regards to warships, the CSN was clearly one that favored missile-armed combatants. The only exception was the Pike class battlecruiser. Operating more or less independently of the battleline, squadrons of Pikes were expected to engage any approaching enemy ships with spinal force beams. When the range was right, the capital tractor beams would capture enemy ships for immediate destruction. Cazov ships, especially the gun missile armed destroyers, would maneuver to say out of the limited firing arcs of the Pikes while at the same time deliver unopposed missiles salvos. While the Gander did develop anti matter warheads and fielded an effective anti-fighter escort ship it was felt that the lack of a general-purpose combatant similar to the Ahlon Secretary class was a weakness that the CSN failed to correct.
    Technically, the CSN achieved Tech Level 11 in the war's fifth month. Command datalink and point defense were given priority, followed by capital bombardment, second generation standard and enhanced drivefield missiles and second generation armed pinnaces. Only 20 % of the active fleet and 15% of the home system warp point bases were refitted with command datalink when the Cazov launched their decisive assault.

Warships	Bases	Mobile Shipyards and Repair Ships
Carriers	Tug	Minelayers and Sweepers
Auxiliaries	Transports	Survey Ship