The Second Dominion is a militant multi-nationalist extremist organization based in the regions of Odawara and Himeji of the Threshold, and Destrie and Laterus in the People's Coalition. While made up of multiple sub-factions and cells with different methods and principles, as an organization they fight for the "freedom" of the region they refer to as "The Dominion," made up of the above-listed regions. At the height of their power in the 33rd century, they spanned a great deal of the known galaxy with tens of millions of members, successfully inciting the Threshold Civil War.
Following this, their membership and influence began to wane as Alliance, Threshold, and Coalition forces began to strike at Dominion strongholds, and the Dominion cells spread through the galaxy began to disband. While a shadow of their former selves, it is known that they still hold multiple fortified bases in nondescript asteroids.
Similar to the Andras Dominion from whence they were born, the Second Dominion is known for spreading the ideology of Human Exceptionalism and eugenics, at the cost of the AI and those of minimal genetic alteration respectively. Their poor treatment of both is often cited as one of the major reasons for their waning recruitment, with their general indiscriminate attacks on Alliance, Coalition, and Thresholders alike the cause of their decline of membership. In this, ironically, they actually caused the Coalition and Thresholder forces to realize that they had a common enemy, though both sides are still tense with each other.
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Etymology
Claiming to be descendants, both politically and by heritage, of the Andras Dominion, which they refer to as the First Dominion, the organization took the name of The Second Dominion. The word "Dominion" is of Middle English origin via Old French from the medieval Latin dominio(n-), from Latin dominium, from dominus ‘lord, master,' now meaning "the territory of a sovereign or government."
History
Soon after the fall of the Andras Dominion at the end of the War of the First Dominion, dissenters loyal to Andras continued to fight without any sort of government backing, many of them diffusing into scattered partisan groups, unwilling to give up their cause. These were put down with extreme prejudice, as the tactics used by the insurgents were often ferocious. Several managed to unit under the banner of the Second Dominion after successfully taking over the small colony station of Kioture. They had to flee quickly, but they had found common leadership, direction, and renewed vigor.
The Second Dominion leadership saw a need for survival, and so they made a public statement regarding pacification, which enabled them to rebuke Thresholder military involvement; they ceased claiming responsibility for assaults on government offices and public areas, denouncing them as separatists, though Thresholder intelligence agencies firmly hold to that some of the orders for these attacks were from the leadership of the Second Dominion itself. As the decades wore on, this "new" Second Dominion began attracting more and more people who wanted to refine themselves, have longer, more fruitful lives, and enhance their bodies. These were bolstered by funds and training from Coalition forces sympathetic to their cause, who hoped to get the regions for themselves.
Only once they had gained over twenty-million followers, the Second Dominion began their insurgency in earnest, causing large riots, murdering countless government employees, and laying siege to military bases in passive protests. This culminated in the Threshold Civil War, in which Second Dominion sympathizing politicians managed to hold a vote while rioters kept pro-Thresholders out of the local senate building on Laterus, and Gael soon followed, dragging their nearby planets with them - many reluctantly, some outright rebelling in favor of the Threshold.
For this short while from 2992 to 2994, the Second Dominion was its own government and declared war on the Threshold. With the training, equipment, and funds from the Coalition, the Second Dominion was a more effective fighting force than most would have expected. Much of the regional Threshold Navy and Sentinel was wracked with subversive traitors originating from the regions disabling equipment and murdering their fellow service members.
By the time the Threshold military recovered, Coalition Naval forces had entered the area and secured the Laterus and Gael termini, and began skirmishing with Threshold forces, trading blows, with no decisive victor. With much of the region in full rebellion, Threshold decided to respect their apparently unilateral decision to secede on the condition that all military equipment made by Threshold, and all citizens and their property be allowed to evacuate. While the rebels openly relented, Threshold Intelligence Forces continued to discover and covertly evacuate people and AI for the next twenty years, though the Coalition denied that they had held anyone against their will.
This forceful overtaking, when the Second Dominion had expected to be their own independent nation, left an ill taste for Coalition forces in the Dominion, who declared war on them as well, though without their funding and after being wracked with defeats from the Threshold, the Second Dominion was in no condition to even pretend they knew how to fight, so they spent the following years running, hiding, and recouping their losses in hopes of gaining strength once more.
Structure
The Second Dominion uses a traditional Clandestine Cell System in order to prevent the capture of individual cells from being able to disrupt the entire operation.
Participants
While there are an estimated 2.5 Million members, this is not fully known and there are uncounted numbers of informants and sympathizers.
Objectives
The end goal of the group is the "liberation" of the spheres of Himeji, Odawara, Destrie, and Laterus from their parent nations to reform the former Andras Dominion.
Operations
While propaganda campaigns are nearly continuous from the group throughout international media, the Second Dominion is most proud of their extremist "freedom fighting" actions, be it theft of goods or starships, destruction of the same, or bombings.
Funding
The Second Dominion is locally funded via sympathizers, personal funds, and the sale of stolen goods. It is suspected that many militant members carry out contract work to stay proficient in combat as well as bring in money to the group.