Duchy of Beraxis

The Duchy of Beraxis is one of the founding members of the Sulsuan Protectorate, and the primary governing body of Beraxis and its colonies. Founded in 721 BC by Duke Aluth'Taan I, it possesses a long history as a cultural superpower within Mithadorn society and remains the primary exporter of music, cuisine, and art within the allied states of the Protectorate.

Known for its bitter rivalries with the Socialist Republic of Laeros and Ulaouan Union, the Duchy of Beraxis is one of the most fiercely independent members within the Protectorate, although the Proposals for Independence of 2760, 2840, and 2948 all failed to pass, and the Duchy remains loyal to the alliance it helped establish.

The Duchy of Beraxis is responsible for the conception of the Ecline, Solstice and Soyat classes seen within the Protectorate Navy.

Colonisation of Beraxis
Beraxis was first colonised in 803BC by an expeditionary fleet of independent mithadorn settlers from the pre-Sulsuan League states, under the direct control of the Sulsua. As the first extra-solar mithadorn colony, the leadership of the colony fell into the hands of a small, privileged ruling class of wealthy elites. This small social class soon developed into a proto-nobility constituted of wealthy and politically powerful individuals and their families.

As the colony of Beraxis continued to develop, grow, and expand to cover the globe, its proto-nobility expanded and developed with it, slowly but surely growing its power and cementing its power with the formation of several royal dynasties. Beraxis became a de facto independent world ruled by its aristocratic elite in 770BC, with the planet becoming split between rival families and their subjects, vaguely reminiscent of a technologically advanced mirror of medieval Sulsua.

Though the homeworld still ruled Beraxis according to law, life upon Beraxis was largely disconnected with Sulsua, with only the nobility, now in control of most legal institutions, including the local government, aware that Beraxis remained a subject of the mithadorn homeworld.

Secession
In 722BC, the colony of Beraxis officially declared its desire for legal independence from Sulsua, threatening to fight for the right of complete freedom from the homeworld if denied. As Sulsua, at the time, lacked the means to force the colonies subjecthood upon it, and Beraxis was already effectively independent, Sulsua granted Beraxis official sovereign status as an independent galactic power, allowing the colony to govern itself independently from Sulsuan law and oversight.

Founding of the Duchy
Granted its formal independence, the future of Beraxis became uncertain. In 721BC, Duke Aluth'Taan I called for a meeting of Beraxis' noble families at his estate in the capital city of Sryla. Drafting legislation to formally grant each noble sovereignty over their territories under a federal government, the Duchy of Beraxis was officially founded with the Signage of the Peers.

This document recognised the House of Beraxis as the federal aristocratic authority of the planet, and the various Dukes and Duchesses and their families as the rulers of the various territories of the planet. Although these territories were originally viewed as mostly independent in their own right, due to the confederal nature of the Duchy, reforms in 681BC cemented the House of Beraxis as a far stronger federal authority, granting it the power to revoke the right of territory to self-government, and enforcing select global laws and tithes to pay for necessary institutions to enforce said laws, such as the Royal Beraxian Forces.

Alliance of Mithadorn Systems
In order to ensure peace with the other mithadorn states, the Duchy of Beraxis became one of the signatories of the Alliance of Mithadorn systems, founded in 721 to ensure peace between the increasingly disparate and hostile mithadorn star-nations as they declared, and were granted, independence from the Sulsuan League.

Envisioned as an intergovernmental body to maintain positive diplomatic relations between the increasingly diverse and rivalrous mithadorn states, the Duchy supported the Alliance openly. Trading with many of its sister-states, the Duchy began to spread its art, food, and culture across mithadorn worlds unaffiliated with its aristocratic government. Relations soon became embittered towards the Socialist Republic of Laeros, cutting all diplomatic and trade ties with Laeros soon after. Efforts by the Alliance to mend the rift between Beraxis and Laeros only caused further ideological and political tensions between the two groups.

Expanding the Realm
As the economic potential of the Duchy began to grow, the aristocratic families of Beraxis began to lead expeditions to terraform and colonise other worlds within the Kalis System. Leading a major effort to pioneer previously theoretical methods of terraforming worlds, the melting of Bankadus's ice caps and resultant habitable planet launched the Duchy of Beraxis into fame within the Alliance as the first mithadorn state to successfully terraform a planet.

During this time, relations with the Ulaouan Union began to sour as the Union began to build closer ties with the Socialist Republic of Laeros.

Mithadorn Colonial Wars
When it was discovered in 1220 that the Kodath Liberation Movement was being covertly supported by the Ulaouan Union and the Socialist Republic of Laeros through smuggling of weapons, armour, and vehicles, the Duchy of Beraxis promised to support the Elysian Empire against its longstanding political and ideological rival and their accused puppet-government in the Ulaouan Union.

While the Mithadorn Colonial Wars were, initially, contained to the planet of Kodath, and the surrounding star systems, after only a month of fighting, it had drawn in additional combatants from nearly every mithadorn state.

As the war raged on, causing countless casualties, atrocities and war crimes became more and more commonplace, with the Berxanain bombardment of Tiasira becoming a particular infamous demonstration of the Duchy's brutality. The attacks left the capital and many major cities in ruins, decimating industries, cutting power, and wasting farmlands that led to the near-collapse of the entire planet.

Further fighting exhausted the Duchy's capacities to fight, causing the Duchy to capitulate in 1233, seceding from the war.

Government
The Duchy of Beraxis operates as a federal parliamentary aristocracy ruled by the dukes and duchesses of various planets and their internal territories.

The Duchy's primary governing body, the House of Beraxis, acts as the central federal authority and as a parliament. Membership to the House of Beraxis is granted internally by appointment or else by heredity function. Each potential minister of the government required to be a member of the Duchy, and cannot be granted to nobles of lesser rank.

Although each territory is ruled by a duke or duchess, the House has the constitutional authority to suspend a constituent territory's government by invoking gross mismanagement or civil unrest, or to adopt national legislation that overrides or infringe on the constituent territory's powers by invoking the central government's constitutional authority, thus keeping members of the Duchy in line.

The House Authority acts as a policing force within the House of Beraxis, constituted from forty appointed dukes and duchesses, whose duty is to which scrutinises the actions of the Cabinet, as well as remove rogue ministers from the cabinet. Controlling a large military force comprised of soldiers loyal to members of the House Authority, whose agents are rotated in and out with their respective duke or duchess. This force is expected to act to remove members of the cabinet deemed unfit to rule. Should the House Authority see fit to expel one of its current members, their forces will be removed from the Authority's forces and replaced with the appointment of a replacement from the cabinet.

Military
The Beraxan Armed Forces, also known as the Royal Beraxan Forces make up the military services responsible for the defence of the Duchy of Beraxis and her colony-worlds. Since the formal independence of the Duchy of Beraxis, the Beraxan Armed Forces have been involved in several major wars and peacekeeping efforts; most notably the Mithadorn Colonial Wars, and the campaign against Loakt'Lariah's Whitecrown Syndicate.

Repeatedly emerging victorious from conflicts has allowed the Duchy of Beraxis to establish itself as one of the mithadorn's leading military powers.

Structure
Operating under the jurisdiction of the House of Beraxis, rather than any individual Duke or Duchess, the Commander-in-Chief of the Beraxan Armed Forces is always the head of the House Authority, the Duchy's internal security bureau.

The Beraxan Armed Forces consist of: the Royal Beraxan Navy, a black-skies navy with a fleet of 135 commissioned naval cruisers, together with the Beraxan Marines, a highly specialised light infantry force; the Beraxan Army, Beraxis' principal land warfare branch; and the Beraxan Air Force, a technologically sophisticated air force with a diverse operational fleet consisting of both fixed-wing and rotary aircraft.

The Beraxan Armed Forces comprise of 546,500 enlisted servicemen, 360,430 volunteer reserves, and 70,820 other officers.

Beraxan Navy
The Royal Beraxan Navy is the interstellar naval warfare force of the Beraxan Armed Forces. Between 1666 and 2101, it vied for supremacy against the Laerisian Navy, before becoming the most powerful mithadorn navy in 2110. This naval supremacy lasted until 2213, in which it was overtaken by the Sulsuan League's naval forces as the foremost powerful navy in mithadorn history.

The Beraxan navy is comprised of nine dreadnoughts, three starfighter carriers, eighteen cruisers, and eighteen destroyers, split across three main fleets. The Beraxan navy has also begun construction of its first Titan-class warship, the RBS Blade of Beraxis.

Personnel
Conscription is still used in the Duchy of Beraxis, with terms of service lasting for twelve months. Deferments are provided to undergraduate and graduate students, men solely supporting disabled relatives, and parents of at least two children. Sons and brothers of servicemen killed or disabled during their military service, are released from conscription.

Of the total forces within the Duchy of Beraxis, half of all personnel are conscripts, while the other half are contract servicemen and volunteers.