Battle of Hoth

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Battle of Hoth

A formation of AT-AT walkers approaching Echo Base at Hoth.

Date	3 ABY
Location	Echo Base, Hoth
Result	Imperial victory, destruction of Echo Base, almost the complete destruction of the rebel base military command

Combatants

Galactic Empire

Rebel Alliance

Commanders

Admiral Piett
General Veers
Darth Vader

General Carlist Rieekan
Princess Leia
Luke Skywalker

Strength

9 AT-AT walkers
Several AT-ST walkers
Several AT-AR walkers
Several AT-PT walkers
Snowtroopers
E-Web Repeating blasters
Death Squadron Imperial-class (Mark II) Star Destroyers
Super Star Destroyer Executor
Presumed TIE squadrons
3 Y-85 Titan dropships
total ground strength-12,000

9 Snowspeeders (Rogue Squadron)
Rebel infantry
Several P-Tower Anti-Vehicle Artillery pieces
Several DF.9 Anti-Infantry Batteries (turrets)
Dozens of Repeating Blasters
Gun Sleds
X-Wings
1 KDY v-150 Planetary ion cannon
Theatre Shield
30 GR-45 Medium Transports
Millennium Falcon
total strength-2,000-3000

Casualties

Three AT-ATs plus two Star Destroyers disabled and light infantry casualties 52 KIA, 172 WIA, 0 MIA

17 of 30 starships plus massive infantry losses and all Snowspeeders 1,200-2,000 KIA, 700 - 1,000 captured, about a hundred MIA and several hundred WIA

Major battles of the Galactic Civil War
Yavin - Hoth - Bespin - Endor

The Battle of Hoth is a fictional battle in the 1980 science fiction film Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.

The Empire, in the form of Darth Vader's Death Squadron, has found the main base of the Rebel Alliance on the planet Hoth. All parts of Hoth that are seen in the movie are snow-covered polar climates. The only local fauna seen are tauntauns, which resemble oversized kangaroos with ram horns, and carnivorous beasts called wampas.

Finse, Norway was used as the location for the fictional Hoth in the movie.

1 Prelude
2 Battle of Hoth
3 Other media
4 Trivia
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Prelude

After the Battle of Yavin, Darth Vader became obsessed with finding Luke Skywalker and the hidden Rebel Base. One of the later strategies he used was to disperse probe droids to a number of systems. One of these made its way to Hoth. Upon discovering a structure on the planet, it reported in. Though it was the best lead the Imperial Fleet had found at that point, Fleet Admiral Kendal Ozzel dismissed it, believing it might be smugglers or some other group. However, Darth Vader overruled his decision, certain that the Rebels were hiding there.

The initial assault was met with some misgivings by various Imperial officers. They may have preferred a surprise attack with limited long range orbital bombardment to destroy any gun emplacement, spacecraft and supplies — and then sweep in to capture the survivors. It was this plan which appeared to have the endorsement of Lord Vader, and seemed to be the original battle strategy. However, Admiral Ozzel exited hyperspace too close to the star system and Rebel early-warning sensors detected the fleet. The theatre shield protecting Echo Base was activated, precluding any desirable bombardment. Darth Vader executed Ozzel for his incompetence and promoted Firmus Piett, then-captain of the Executor, to Admiral. Vader then changed the battle plan, and ordered General Veers to begin the surface assault with his elite 501st Legion and Veer's Blizzard Force Team. The 501st Legion participacted in the ground assault as well as the naval blockade. Veer's Blizzard Force Team consisted only of one mechanized division with minimum infantry involvement but it was this division who pushed the primary assault to destroy the rebel's primary shield generators.

The Rebel Alliance never planned to win the battle — their strategy was to commence a rearguard action: the battle only intended to buy as much time as possible for evacuation. As soon as the Imperial Fleet was detected, General Rieekan gave the order to raise the shield and begin the evacuation. This plan had been formulated in advance, with tow-cables outfitted onto the Rebel's Snowspeeders due to a "prediction" that the main portion of the Imperial surface force would consist of AT-ATs, this tactic was overruled, the first five Blizzard Walkers employed heavy reflective armor that prevented tow cables shots, missile and heavy/light turret fire. The first five Blizzard Walkers began the assault in formation while the remaining walkers were spread out only to provide rear cover for the primary assault force by taking out avery aircraft, infantry and gun emplacement.

The primary portion of the retreat, as revealed by Princess Leia, was to use a group of Rebel transport ships, escorted by two X-Wings under the cover of planet-based ion cannon shots to clear the way.

[edit] Battle of Hoth

The Imperial forces consisted of at nine AT-ATs and several AT-STs as well as ground troops. According to the Inside the Worlds of The Original Trilogy factbook, the force also included a number of AT-AR and AT-PT walkers. This Imperial Force was deployed by 3 Y-85 Titan Dropships; though the dropships did not appear in The Empire Strikes Back, they were mentioned in the ITW: OT factbook. The Rebels employed "snowspeeders" (modified T-47 Speeders), led by Luke Skywalker, and they had trench lines of anti-vehicle artillery and anti-personnel batteries (turrets) to fight a delaying action.

The Rebel troops discovered that their anti-personnel turrets and anti-vehicle batteries were unable to pierce the Imperial armour. The T-47 snowspeeder squadron, also finding their blasters ineffective, used their rear tow cables to wrap around the AT-ATs' legs, tripping them up and rendering them useless. Furthermore, in an act that centered out the Emperor's concern of him being a growing potential threat as a Jedi Knight, Luke single-handedly destroyed another by grappling up to the AT-AT's belly and throwing a concussion grenade in its power cells. Despite the escape of all senior personnel, the loss in material and men proved a disaster for the Rebel Alliance and the Empire had won its first major strategic victory after the destruction of the Death Star.

The elite snowtroopers, part of Lord Vader's elite 501st Legion ("Vader's Fist"), were designated the Blizzard Force Team, assigned to Major General Maximillian Veers and the Imperial Navy. This stormtrooper battalion was well trained in combat on snow-covered worlds as well to be able to perform their missions as quickly as possible, which proved lethal to the Rebellion.

The Imperial assault was primarily aimed at destroying the Rebels' primary power generators. This would shut down the theatre shield protecting the base from orbital bombardment. General Maximilian Veers led the assault and crushed the Rebels' defenses, later destroying the power generators. Once that had succeeded, Imperial forces could then deploy snowtroopers into Echo Base itself.

Approximately thirty GR-45 Medium Transports belonging to the Rebel Alliance, along with the Millennium Falcon, managed to take off but seventeen transports were destroyed by the Imperial naval squadron blockading the planet. The Falcon escaped by hiding in an asteroid field.

The battle was not without loss for the Empire: Imperial-class Star Destroyer Tyrant was disabled and heavily damaged by the planetary ion cannon, three AT-ATs were destroyed, along with most of their troops, by the Rebels and more were lost to the treacherous ice floes giving way. Despite forcing the Rebels to flee, they were unable to destroy all of the fleeing ships and Lord Vader failed in what he considered a primary objective, capturing Luke Skywalker.

[edit] Other media

The novelization of The Empire Strikes Back had an alternate conclusion to the battle where the mortally wounded Hobbie Klivian rams his speeder into Veers's AT-AT, killing them both. In later Expanded Universe titles, both Veers and Hobbie appear post-Hoth and well.

The full Battle of Hoth explained here showed much more devastating losses for the Rebel Alliance than what was seen in the movie The Empire Strikes Back; particularly since the movie showed none of the evacuating transports getting destroyed.

In the Expanded Universe timeline of battles, the Battle of Hoth occurred before Gall and after Thyferra.

In the video game Star Wars Battlefront II, the very last level of the campaign is called Our Finest Hour. The level allows the player to take control of the Empire in the Battle of Hoth. In this level, the Empire destroys the Rebels' last transport, and finally the Rebels did not retreat. Later, the Rebellion is destroyed once and for all. The only Rebels that escaped were the ones in the Millennium Falcon, but that was not enough to start a second Rebellion. While this is the apparent ending of the game, it should be noted that during opening montage for the level the storyteller says that the vision for victory "might only have been mirage." This could be interpreted in the way that the stormtroopers only thought they had crushed and believed that order had been restored to the galaxy once and for all.

The online film site atomfilms.com has a video entitled "Starwars: Battle for Hoth"[1], which tells the story of the Hoth battle in the style of a real historical documentary, complete with historic qoutes, pictures, interviews with "experts" on the subject, and writings from participants on both sides. Despite the comedic and parody intent of the authors, the video is an accurate depiction of events that took place in the film.

[edit] Trivia

In an issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly, a reporter asked one of the makers of Battlefront 2 if it was "possible to make a Star Wars game without a Hoth level."