''The Short Victorious War'' is a
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
novel by American writer
David Weber
David Mark Weber (born October 24, 1952) is an American science fiction and fantasy author. He has written several science-fiction and fantasy books series, the best known of which is the Honor Harrington science-fiction series. His first nove ...
, first published in 1994. It is the third book in the
Honor Harrington
The Honorverse is a military science fiction book series, its two subseries, two prequel series, and anthologies created by David Weber and published by Baen Books. They are centered on the space navy career of the principal protagonist H ...
series.
Its title comes from a quotation by
Vyacheslav von Plehve
Vyacheslav Konstantinovich von Plehve ( rus, Вячесла́в (Wenzel (Славик)) из Плевны Константи́нович фон Пле́ве, p=vʲɪtɕɪˈslaf fɐn ˈplʲevʲɪ; – ) served as a director of Imperial Russ ...
in reference to the
Russo-Japanese War
The Russo-Japanese War ( ja, 日露戦争, Nichiro sensō, Japanese-Russian War; russian: Ру́сско-япóнская войнá, Rússko-yapónskaya voyná) was fought between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire during 1904 and 1 ...
: "What this country needs is a short, victorious war to stem the tide of revolution." That quotation is one of the novel's two
epigraphs; the other is a quotation from
Robert Wilson Lynd
Robert Wilson Lynd (''Irish: Roibéard Ó Floinn''; 20 April 1879 – 6 October 1949) was an Irish writer, editor of poetry, urbane literary essayist, socialist and Irish nationalist.
Early life
He was born in Belfast to Robert John Lynd, a P ...
: "The belief in the possibility of a short decisive war appears to be one of the most ancient and dangerous of human illusions."
Plot summary
The People's Republic of Haven finds itself teetering at the edge of economic disaster. Unable to maintain its massive
welfare state
A welfare state is a form of government in which the state (or a well-established network of social institutions) protects and promotes the economic and social well-being of its citizens, based upon the principles of equal opportunity, equita ...
in the face of
inflation
In economics, inflation is an increase in the general price level of goods and services in an economy. When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services; consequently, inflation corresponds to a reduct ...
and
deficit and with opposition to the government getting bolder, the leaders of the People's Republic decide to resort to war against Manticore. A short, victorious war, they believe, will both distract the
proles from their current economic problems and allow them to use the riches of the Manticore system to prop up their welfare state.
Meanwhile, Honor returns to duty after injuries she sustained in ''
The Honor of the Queen'' to command the brand-new
battlecruiser HMS ''Nike'', the pride of the Royal Manticoran Navy, with some of her old crew aboard and with her old Academy friend
Michelle Henke as executive officer. But on their way to her post, the engineers of the ''Nike'' discover a flaw in one of her fusion reactors, which hampers her first operational deployment to the critical Manticoran base at Hancock Station.
Honor spends the time her ship is in dock by beginning her first real romantic relationship with the senior engineering officer of Hancock Station's maintenance facility, Captain Junior Grade
Paul Tankersley.
The Havenites start the war Honor had been struggling to prevent in the previous books. Their plan is to launch probing missions on Manticoran Alliance members to push the Alliance into re-deploying its forces to create weak points and allow them to strike at Manticore directly.
They are aided greatly in this through the use of Project Argus, stealthy sensor platforms purchased from the Solarian League and planted in Alliance systems to watch the movements of Manticore forces. Havenite ships on ballistic courses with no active systems are able to collect the data dumps from the sensor platforms without being detected by Manticore forces. When Admiral Sarnow's superior deploys most of Hancock Station's ships to other star systems to guard against further Havenite provocation, the Argus net allows the Havenites to see this weakness in the Manticore position, and they decide to attack Hancock Station in force.
Honor joins Admiral Mark Sarnow's fleet alongside her old enemy,
Pavel Young. With most of the Royal Manticoran Navy deployed elsewhere to prevent the Havenite provocations, Honor and Admiral Sarnow find themselves forced to defend Hancock Station from a vastly superior Havenite armada. With the help of Honor's unorthodox tactics, the task force is able to hold off the Havenites for long enough for reinforcements to arrive. In the final stages of the battle Pavel Young, startled by an impact on his ship and technically in command of the formation, orders the formation to scatter. Honor, realizing the battle can still be won by quickly closing Manticore reinforcements, reassembles the fleet, resulting in a crushing Havenite defeat. At the end of the novel, Young is removed from command, placed under arrest and is to be court-martialed at Manticore. Capt. Tankersley is promoted to Captain of the List and ordered back to Manticore aboard ''Nike'' for reassignment.
After the first disastrous battles of the war, three Havenite revolutionaries—
Robert S. Pierre,
Oscar Saint-Just
This is a list of fictional characters appearing in the stories set in the Honor Harrington universe or Honorverse, a best-selling series of over twenty military science fiction novels and anthologies invented and written by David Weber.
The stori ...
, and
Cordelia Ransom—lead the overthrow of their "Legislaturalist" government by killing hereditary President Harris and nearly his entire government during his birthday celebration with an air strike by shuttles of the Havenite Navy. They blame the killings on the Navy, and using the fear of a possible military coup form a "Committee of Public Safety" to rule the People's Republic "until a new government can be formed". They begin a purge of senior military officers and political figures to cement their rule.
This novel is much less Honor-centered than the previous two, and the war is depicted from many perspectives.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Short Victorious War, The
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American science fiction novels
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Honorverse books
1994 American novels
1994 science fiction novels