Neue Belkatsche Reichsmarine

'''NOTE: Do NOT assume ANYTHING about me; just because my fleet in Battleship Craft follows a Belkan (Ace Combat's analogue of Germany) doesn't make me a Germanophile or a Nazi. The content of this article does NOT, in ANY way, reflect upon the writer or ship-builder.'''

I chose that nation because my ships tend to follow the same design features as German and British ships, and there isn't an expy for Britain in the Ace Combat canon (that we know of), so I stuck with Belka.

'''Also, I like a good story, so the I wrote the page on that fleet in-character. It also allows it to stand out a bit from the generic "This is My Navy" type of thing that many people would follow given the choice. Don't like it? Then don't say anything.'''

If you've contacted us, it's for one of 2 things:

1) You're a UN/Allied Surrender Committee here to enforce the Treaty of Lumen by forcing us to surrender our ships.  If this is the case, I'll have to shoot you right now.

2) You are a man/woman of honor, who knows the pain we endured, the humiliation that followed our undeserved defeat, after they already razed our cities to the ground, plundered our resources and ruined our nation's ability to even defend itself properly (granted, we probably would have lost anyway, but they didn't have to humiliate us in the process).  You seek to restore justice to this world, and for that, I welcome you to the Neu Belkatsche Reichsmarine (New Belkan Imperial Navy to those of you who don't know Belkan; don't worry, you'll learn, particularly if you know Osean as Osean was originally a dialect of Belkan).

Oh, how rude of me, allow me to introduce myself, I am Grossadmiral Johann Starke (Grand Admiral to non-Belkans, the Osean equivalent being Admiral of the Navy); granted, this was a rank I gave to myself, my last official rank being Lower Rear Admiral of the Belkan Bundesmarine. My new rank is indicative of my new position of authority: I lead a force of thousands of men and women that were no longer allowed to serve our country due to limitations on the Armed Forces due to the Treaty of Lumen, limiting each branch of our military to no more than 100,000 members, disbanding the Air Force, banning us from the use of submarines and limiting our naval tonnage. No longer welcome as we competed for jobs with civilians, we resolved that we would not be turned into victims, and so we broke into a mothball yard in South Belka (don't tell me it's North Osea; call it that and I'll kill you) and stole some old, mostly barely-seaworthy vessels and made our way to Leasath, which sympathized with our cause and provided  us a home where we can prepare for the day when we will take back Belka's glory, once and for all.

As of now, are force is limited in size, but I will give you a brief summary of the ships in our possession. Most of them are second-hand vessels but some were built in Belka proper. Most of our ships are also aged relivs and thus require overhaul before being listed as combat-worthy.

Current Leadership
Other positions open. Send this person a message to request an application to join and if you have any questions about requirements, guidelines etc.
 * Grossadmiral Johann Starke: Supreme Operational Commander
 * Admiral Der Fleugzeugtrager Karl Schneider: Commander of Aircraft Carriers and all aerial operations
 * Kapitan Siegfried Beckmann: Commander of Wolfpack "Anton" and commanding officer of UA-100

Fast Boats
(None,Yet)

Corvettes
(None, Yet)

Frigates
(None, Yet)

Gespenst-Class Stealth Destroyer
The Gespenst-Class is the most modern vessel in the fleet. A prototype developed in 1995, the Gespenst (Ghost) is virtually undetectable on surface-scanning radar and is difficult to track via submarine-mounted sonar. The whole point of this vessel is anti-submarine warfare, escorting larger vessels, acting as a radar picket and ambushing the enemy at night, taking full advantage of its stealth. This ship was to be handed over to the Osean Navy as per the Treaty of Lumen, but a good friend of mine in the crew staged a mutiny against the Osean officers in command of the vessel and sailed it to Leasath to link up with us. I personally made a point of sending the officers back to Osea...in pieces, perhaps as a symbolic gesture over what they did to Belka.

Examples of this class include:
 * Gespenst

Cruisers
(Non, yet, but a few are under restoration)

Anfang-Class Battlecruiser
The Anfang-Class Battlecruisers were originally not Belkan at all. They were the Erusian Battlecruisers Terrance and Havance, named after two apparently-famous Erusian naval officers that served with our ally in the Osean Continental War (1935-1947). Whilst mostly outdated, as they are Battlecruisers, which by their very nature are rendered obsolete by Fast Battleships, they have nevertheless proven useful due to the way they are deployed. Unlike my predecessors I resist the temptation of using Battlecruisers as ships of the line and instead use them to raid commerce and to cause confusion in the enemy fleets by attacking them from a different side from the main fleet.

Examples of this class include:
 * Anfang
 * Cresence

Waldreich-Class Heavy Battleship
This vessel is easily the oldest ship in the fleet, originally being an Osean Dreadnought built in 1917 as one of two projects, one for a "Maximum Battleship", and the other as an "All-or-Nothing Battleship", the latter becoming Osea's Pennsylvania-Class, whilst the former was canceled when it was nearly completed, and never given a proper name. The ship was sold for scrap in 1919, but the scrappers found that it would be more profitable if they instead sold the ship to somebody else instead of scrapping it, and found their customer in Leasath (Belka would've purchased the ship but at the time we were in the middle of fighting a Civil War and there was no money to spare on capital ships, with ammunition, small arms, early tanks and aircraft taking up most of the budget at the time). The vessel was modernized in 1941, but mostly sat in disrepair from 1954 onwards; when we arrived in Leasath, the ship was a rusting hulk, which Leasath gladly gave to us since they didn't want it themselves. Needless to say, we've repaired the vessel, and it now stands as the most powerful Battleship in the fleet, if not the world.

((OOC Note: I'm tempted to downgrade this ship as the matchmaker for online matches wants to classify this vessel as a VIP, when in reality it would probably be at the very top of level 6 in the matchmaker in terms of combat capability; seriously Phyzios, why not make a couple more levels before VIP, maybes levels 1 through 9 and THEN VIP would work instead of 1 through 6))

Examples of this class include:
 * Waldreich

Hydra-Class Fast Battleship
The Hydra-Class Fast Battleship is another foreign-built Battleship, originally being one built by Fato for a Yuktoasian nation, the People's Republic of Verusia, originally as a Batlecruiser in the late 1940s for coastal defense, but converted into a Fast Battleship later on. Like Waldreich, this ship was sold to Leasath, but unlike Waldreich was well-maintained, and it costed us quite a lot  to acquire the vessel ourselves.

Overall, we do not use this ship in the traditional sense of a Battleship; instead, we use it as an anti-aircraft platform for the fleet, or when needed, in roles similar to the Anfang-Class Battlecruiser, as whilst its armor and defensive weaponry is potent, its main battery is not as powerful as other Battleships in service.

Examples of this class include:
 * Hydra

Taifun-Class Fast Battleship


The Taifun-Class is an indigenous Belkan-made Battleship dating back to the late forties, considered a follow-up to the mostly-failed H-Series of Heavy Battleships and the somewhat more-successful Dinsmark-Class (the Dinsmark herself remains in service with Belka's post-war Navy on condition that all nuclear warheads for the ship's outdated Tomahawk Mk.I cruise missiles be handed over to the Allies). This ship was actually quite successful, but three of them were sunk by the Osean Navy (now the Osean Maritime Self-Defense Force) in the Belkan War, with only one remaining, critically damaged. Most of her weapons were beyond rapir, the serviceable ones being cannabalized to bring the Waldreich up to operational status.

Since then, this vessel has been rebuilt to conform to my own philosophy on the modern deployment of the Battleship, as whilst Aircraft Carriers have taken over the primary strike role, the old ships of the line still have some purposes to them.

In Taifun's case, the ship has been rebuilt as an "escort battleship" in the same class as Hydra, intended to escort other ships in the fleet by providing additional cover against various forms of attack. To this end the Taifun has been fitted with a main battery of no less than twenty-four 38 cm guns in six quadruple mountings, the armament of SIX Dinsmark-class Battleships. In addition, it has a formidable anti-aircraft battery, Phalanx CIWS to counter anti-ship missiles and, unusual for a battleship, ASW capability in the form of eight Hedgehog Multiple-Spigot Mortars, four of them amidships and two each on the bow and stern.

Examples of this class include:
 * Taifun
 * Zyklon (translated as  "Cyclone" so as not to be confused with Zyklon B, an infamous chemical weapon; sunk by Osean bombers carrying Tallboy bombs in November, 1945)*
 * Hurrikan (sunk by Osean bombers carrying Tallboy bombs in November, 1945)*
 * Sturm (disabled by an Osean submarine in January, 1946; scuttled by the crew; raised in 1948 by the Oseans, refloated and sunk during an atomic test)*

Stier-Class Heavy Battleship
The Stier-Class is an interesting example of what happens when a ship changes hands enough times. Originally, she started as a Battlecruiser, was converted into an Aircraft Carrier, BACK into a Battlecruiser, into a Fast Battleship, back into a Battlecruiser AGAIN before finally ending up as, of all things, an oil tanker. Once we finally managed to track down all of the parts to put this magnificent vessel back together, the Stier has become the most powerful warship in the fleet, with ruinous power compared to the typical Battleship.

The name Stier comes from the name of a town that dates back to medieval times, with a large castle overlooking it that has significance in the legend of a mysterious demon of the northern seas, and an associated fairy tale. It used to be the capital of the Kingdom of Waldreich before being annexed into the Principality of Belka in the late 19th-Century and was a beautiful forest region (hence the name; "Waldreich" means "Forest Empire"), until some idiot in the "Chair Force" (a durogatory term for an Air Force to the unversed, similar to "Swabbies" for the Navy, "Jarheads" for the Marines and "Ground Pounders" for the Army) decided to drop seven tactical nukes on our OWN TERRITORY to stop the Allied advance, and for what? The defeat that came out of it being MORE humiliating than it would've been otherwise!

--Deep Breathing-- Pull yourself together now...sorry about that; a momentary lapse of self-control that I assure you is over as of now.

Examples of this class include:
 * Stier

Leviathan-Class Supercarrier
The Leviathan is overall the largest vessel in the fleet, but of course, this is no surprise as at one point, Leviathan was a Battleship, the largest one in the world in-fact, with the intent of being an analogue to the Yamato-Class. Later on, she was converted into a large Aircraft Carrier for the Erusian Navy, then sold to Belka in 1981 and given extensive upgrades.

As this vessel is our only carrier, she is used sparingly, and when she's used, only with a heavy escort.

Examples of this class include:
 * Leviathan

Graf Zepellin-Class Aircraft Carrier
The Graf Zepellin-class was the first aircraft carrier ever built by Belka. A moderately-successful design, the sturdy construction of the vessel allowed it to remain in reserve duty all the way into 1995, primarily for training purposes. However, with reinforcing of the top deck, this carrier is now cleared for frontline service; its smaller size compared to Leviathan makes this ship a much harder target for anti-ship missiles, and its aircraft capacity, while small, is not to be taken for granted.

Of this class of Carrier, only one, the Hechte, has survived, the others being sunk in the early-late 1940s.

Examples of this class include:
 * Graf Zepellin (sunk in May, 1942 by Dive Bombers from the Osean Carrier Vulture)*
 * Waldreich (damaged in August, 1943, by Torpedo Bombers from the Osean Carrier Kestral and returned to port; prevented from leaving along with the rest of the 1st Fleet by a submarine blockade of the port at Cresence Islands; scuttled in April, 1947 to prevent capture; raised in October and moved to deeper water as it was blocking the harbor's entrance)*
 * Sabel (surrendered to the Oseans in 1947; sunk as part of atomic testing the following year)*
 * Hechte

Submarines
Note: Submarines are not given a name for their class, so to speak, and are referred to by numbers; however, the crews of these submarines are allowed, and are, in fact, encouraged, to name their submarines themselves to use whilst communicating with other submarines in the fleet or wolfpack, confusing anyone who may attempt to eavesdrop and try to locate them.

UA-1A-Class Attack Submarine
The Angriffunterseeboot (Attack Submarine in layman's terms), type 1-Anton is the oldest submarine class to serve in the Belkan Bundesmarine at the time of the Belkan War. Essentially, the UA-1A is an upgraded Type VIIC U-Boat from the 1940s, equipped with a better deck gun, advanced targetting systems for surface-mounted weapons, minelayers and an additional pair of torpedo tubes for armament. Non-armament upgrades include new, more fuel-efficient diesels and improved batteries and air scrubbers, allowing the UA-1A to run submerged for nearly a week. at a time, far superior to the mere hours the original model could spend. The last upgrade to the class is an extension of the rear of the sail, which besides providing additional balance is capable of storing a single short-ranged SLBM for a surprise attack on ground installations. While an outdated design, the inherent silence of a diesel-electric submarine makes the UA-1A the best possible platform for ambushing enemy vessels.

As most of Belka's submarines were forcibly decommissioned, the UA-1A is now a very rare sight indeed, but our fleet possesses one such vessel ourselves, the UA-100, commanded by who was once the best submarine commander in the entire Bundesmarine and the top "Submarine Ace" of the Belkan War on either side.

However, some of these submarines had been sold to Leasath long ago, and have now been reacquired and upgraded.

Examples of this class include:

Wolfpack Anton
 * UA-100
 * UA-98
 * UA-331
 * UA-569
 * UA-94
 * UA-406
 * UA-124
 * UA-364

Albatros-Class Hospital Ship
The Albatros-Class Hospital Ship was formerly an aircraft carrier back in the 1940s, then was converted into a passenger liner, and finally was mothballed; however, we commandeered the stricken vessel and converted it into a hospital ship as per the St.Ark Conventions' guidelines. Unfortunately, as we are considered terrorists by some, this ship has been fired on before. That being said, I refuse to violate the Conventions by giving the ship defensive armament, as sinking the Albatros would be an international faux paux for the perpatrator, possibly leading to a war we can use to restore Belka's might.

Examples of this class include:
 * Albatros