Description
This monument marks the sacrifice of all those who died or were injured in the Battle of Iyen-Oursta.
Let peace prevail and nevermore war darken these stars.
The climactic battle of the Gallente-Caldari War was fought over the system of Iyen-Oursta in late BYC10. An outlying colony system that had attempted to remain neutral in what was effectively an interstellar civil war, Iyen-Oursta was viewed as strategically important by both the Gallente and Caldari. Inevitably, both sides moved to secure the system for their own and a major battle was the result. The battle is historically notable as the first battle in which capsule-controlled vessels were used in large numbers by a non-Jovian empire.
Both sides were confident of victory and thus were willing to throw everything they had into the battle. The Gallente committed a huge armada of drones and their carrier vessels. The Caldari deployed their latest advanced frigates, newly-equipped with the capsule technology provided them by the Jove. The ensuing battle was the second-largest seen in New Eden to date, eclipsed in scale and destruction only by the Battle of Vak-Atioth fought between the Amarr and Jove.
The Battle of Iyen-Oursta raged for a whole day, with running engagements across the system as each side attempted to strike a decisive blow. During a lapse in the action following 15 hours of constant fighting, the Caldari withdrew their remaining forces in good order, leaving the battlefield to the Gallente drone fleets. The Federation naturally claimed victory as the side retaining control of the system. The Caldari also claimed victory on the basis of inflicting considerably greater losses on the Gallente heavy vessels than their own frigate fleets had received.
Strategically, while the Gallente achieved their objective, it had come at a much higher price than they had anticipated. For their part, the Caldari had counted on capsule-controlled frigates to give them a clear edge but were unable to press the advantage. Ultimately, the Caldari frigates were able to block subsequent attempts by the Gallente to mount decisive offensives, but they could not overwhelm the sheer industrial capacity of the Federation and its ability to rebuild drone fleets.
With a swift victory elusive and no way to break the strategic stalemate, the Gallente-Caldari War turned into a long, distant series of skirmishes along the borders and in disputed systems. Life in core systems became focused on rebuilding the State and Federation, while maintaining enough of a war effort to satisfy patriotic sentiment on both sides. There was little thought of suing for peace and the war faded into the background, sometimes reduced to a cold stalemate, sometimes erupting in some limited border struggle.
In the end, the state of war was reduced to a formality, with even the occasional raiding winding down as the core empires became focused on the foundation of CONCORD and the establishment of interstellar agreements. By YC12, it was clear to CONCORD diplomats that a peace agreement could be brokered. Six months of talks bore fruit as it became clear that neither side wished to continue the war, and certainly nobody wished to have another Battle of Iyen-Oursta. With the Treaty of Tierijev peace was signed in that other oft-disputed system, but in reality Iyen-Oursta was the system where the Gallente-Caldari War truly ended.
