This, apparently, is what General Preston felt he had to destroy. Needless to say, there was a feeling of proud determination among the forces of the Labour Party that surrounded Preston's base. Their spirits were high. They weren't far from Murmamn City, and so the troops were able to see their friends and families rather frequently. Indeed, children often ventured to the front lines with baked goods and fine rum to remind them that the people, and the Labour Party, were behind them. But over the last few hours, there was a new excitement among the troops. When Ulyanov had announced in his recent pamphlet that it was the "last chance to surrender" for General Preston, General Hood, and their men, they knew what it meant—the offensive was finally going to take place. General Preston, logically, would be the first to be targeted—he was a part of the evil triumvirate with Cale and Stomwell, the last vestige of the capitalist villainy that had been vanquished from Baltimn. He had to go.

The Labour Party troops, tanks, and artillery were ready to move on Preston's base when the General made his unexpected attack. Or rather, tried to. Ten shells pelted Ulyanov's lines, in some cases ripping through tents or a speeder here or there, and in all cases planting themselves firmly in the ground. But nothing happened. No explosions, no mushroom clouds, no radiation. For whatever reason, the nuclear weapons didn't work (see Rule 2.1). Perhaps they were simply too old. Or perhaps sanity had prevailed and someone had long ago disarmed the weapons without General Preston's knowledge. Whatever the reason, there would be no nuclear fallout on Baltimn. It was a good thing for Preston, too—if his own troops had seen him using nuclear weapons, no doubt they would walk out on this madman. There simply could not be enough insane individuals in Preston's ranks who would be willing to burn Baltimn to save it.

The order went out to the Labour Party troops within a matter of moments to return fire. The artillery was already in place and prepared to fire, and fire it did. The MPTL-2a launchers pounded the base and the plateau on which it was situated with proton torpedoes, as Ulyanov's men continuously reloaded them to assure a continuous bombardment. This would go on, and on, and on. Preston's base was awash with a constant, frightening thunder of explosions that tore through duracrete and, surely, would melt the steel in his troop's spines. Ulyanov's troops continued the fearsome bombardment without relent, seeing in the flash of the artillery the faces of the men, women, and children murdered by Drasek Cale in the Murmamn City Massacre. Or, perhaps, the beautiful capitol building scarred from the savage bombardment that General Preston had subjected it to. Or, perhaps, they heard echoes of the explosion that Stomwell had caused to destroy all of the money that they had worked their whole lives to save.

Some of Ulyanov's troops cried as they loaded proton torpedo after proton torpedo into the MPTL's—not tears of fear, like Preston's men, but tears of mourning as they fought to put this dark chapter in their lives, and in the history of Baltimn, behind them once and for all.

Meanwhile, probe droids and reconnaisance units monitored the perimeters of both bases for any attempt to flank the Labour forces or to evacuate troops from one base to the other (land mines and barbed wire fences had been placed between the two bases for this purpose, and sensors had been put in place to detect any tunnelling underground). For now, only Preston's base was under attack. Labour forces continued to surround General Hood's base as well, but they waited. Ulyanov still hoped to avoid a confrontation with them if possible, and perhaps the complete destruction of General Preston would persuade them to surrender peacefully. Time would tell. For now, the shelling of Preston's base continued.

Preston, of course, had backup plans. After all, he planned to go down fighting, even if that meant he fought to the last man. He was, one might say, a tad insane. It was easy for him, who was inside the plateau in the underground portion, to give orders and the like. He was not up top manning the artillery and defensive emplacements and was not staring Ulyanov's soldiers in the face. As such, he and his command staff fared well enough. Up top though, men bled and died, likely inflicting heavy casualties amongst the Labor Party as well.

The nets had their disadvantages, however. MPTL's were designed as mobile artillery (indeed, this is what the "M" stood for), but here they were compelled to remain stationary under the protection of the nets. The nets were also not impregnable by any means; they were intended for use against starships, not ordinance—indeed, they had been appropriated from Baltimn's navy, not its army—and the explosions that would ensue from Preston's bombardment would be sure to shred the nets themselves (although this would be worse if they were conventional explosive shells rather than Preston's concussion missiles). The protection that they afforded, thus, was only temporary. However, this would still require multiple direct hits on the same location to eventually hit the MPTL's. This was a challenging feat from 20 kilometers away with Clone Wars era artillery.

Not that the MPTL's were that much more sophisticated. Indeed, Baltimn was not a wealthy world—not anymore, at least, thanks to the thievery of the former Senator Stomwell and his banker friends who plundered the planet—but the MPTL's were, by now, considered antiquated, certainly compared to Imperial artillery. But they were less antiquated than Preston's SPHA-C's and, one therefore assumes, would have a marginally superior range (particularly since both concussion missiles and proton torpedoes were self propelled ordinance, but proton torpedoes were considerably lighter). This would work to Labour's advantage in this battle, and, indeed, this is why Ulyanov scoured the few MPTL's that Baltimn did have in its other bases and arsenals and brought them here.

The Labour Party troops and tanks, however, were positioned considerably closer to Preston's base than the MPTL's were. They were close enough to the plateau that they were beneath the lowest, direct angle of fire that Preston could bring to bear on them, and also close enough that firing at them in a high, parabolic arc would be impractical—they would have to shoot too high, where the concussion missiles would be at the mercy of the wind and end up being as much a danger to Preston's own base as to the Labour troops. The Labour forces, too, had made use of Connor nets, which also served as camoflauge, and which afforded them limited protection from artillery, mortars, and grenades. From here, they fired mortars at close range into the known positions of Preston's artillery (which were unlikely to be 36 but, rather, closer to 15 or 20), as did the MPTL's from a distance.

And so the bombardment continued. Proton torpedoes, it should be noted, were designed to explode in a concentrated, directed blast, and since most of these would be landing at a steep angle, this would eventually pose a danger to Preston's bunker under the base, inside the plateau. It certainly posed a danger to Preston's barracks, arsenals, garages, tanks and, notably, his AT-AA's.

All of this could be avoided, of course. Ulyanov was, in this sense, something of a failure as a ruthless dictator. He could simply fire one shot at Preston's base from the Liberator-class cruiser or the Assault Frigate in orbit over Baltimn and destroy it along with the plateau on which it was situated. But there were complications in this; namely, the soldiers in these bases were from Baltimn and had friends and family whose support Ulyanov would prefer. Thus, he had to at least make a show of giving them a chance to surrender. And indeed, he did expect quite a few of them to surrender when this savage bombardment was finished in a few hours, even if Preston himself did not. Then, no one could say that Ulyanov didn't give them a chance. Then, he could finish them.

If, that is, the Devaronian and Falleen crews on his ships in orbit had no qualms about using what could be seen as unreasonable force. A big "if" indeed. But Ulyanov would see to that if and when the time came. For now, the bombardment went on with only few casualties among the Labour Forces.

The SPHA-Cs were purely being used in a defensive role to defeat enemy incoming warheads. They did not need to have the range advantage over Ulyanov's artillery as they had a height advantage, one that would serve them well enough for the time being. It was his foremost ranks of troops and soldiers that were huddled closest to the base that would see the worst. Under attack from the mobile artillery, which did indeed use solid shot, the Labor Party tanks and soldiers would receive the benefit of being pounded briefly; that is, until three of the mobile artillery positions were taken out by mortar fire and one of the MPTL-2a launchers exploded due to incompetent loaders, taking with it an SPHA-C in fratricide.

Preston's bunker, being in the center of the plateau and quite deep, below sea level, was hardly an issue of assault at the moment. Of course, the slaughter of the men atop the plateau sickened some of his officers, but Preston himself had no plan to surrender. It ended quite abruptly; an inglorious end for Preston, as one of his subordinates, Lieutenant Colonel Kiso Hamane, drew his blaster and shot the half-insane General in the back of the head before transmitting to the forces atop to cease fire on the Labor Party soldiers. His second transmission was meant for Ulyanov.

"Minister Ulyanov, this is Lieutenant Colonel Hamane. I am currently in charge of the forces within this base and I have ordered them to stop firing. General Preston is dead a... casualty, of this senseless fight. In return for our surrender, I ask only that the men not wishing to remain on Baltimn be given safe passage offworld."