XE wins backing for reborn religious armed force

The spiritual leader of the Clone Star Empire, Ayatollah Clone XE, has won backing from Oojok for a resurrected religious based armed force and more importantly has secured 270 million zarks to kickstart development of the force which will be known as the Oojok Holy Brigade or OHB. The OHB will be much smaller than the old, and controversial, Religious Police which formed a legion strength force with dedicated space ships at its height. The OHB will contain "6-10 regiments, mostly infantry but with at least one armoured regiment" according to insiders.

Whereas the old RP was intended as a "full spectrum" bolster to the regular HCS and ensure the "spiritual purity" of Clones the OHB will be mostly concerned with defending religious sites and providing a ceremonial and actual bodyguard to Oojok and senior clerics. It is possibly in future though that the OHB could provide a back-up for the regular HCS though this is thought unlikely for some time.

With a number of HCS regiments due for disbanding there will be plenty of potential trained recruits for the OHB which XE is hoping to have operational by 2113.

• Winter Candle, the final DDS exercise of 2111, has begun with 2 Panther 35As performing a 3 day reconnaissance mission with their tactical reconnaissance module with the task group flagship A304E Fleming performing real-time data analysis and direction.