Warplan Bone Chorus

THE KINGDOM OF ARCHEA

Summary for Senior Officers, Magistrates, and Officers of the Crown

Written 430
General Revision 876
Amendments incorporated through 881

Distribution: Officers Commanding; Provincial and Municipal Magistrates; Offices of the Crown; Designated Magical, Ecclesiastical, and Civil Authorities.

I. PURPOSE AND AUTHORITY

WARPLAN BONE CHORUS is the standing plan of the Crown for the coordinated response of the Kingdom to the organized hostile employment of animated dead within Archean territory.

The principal objects of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS are:

Preservation of the Crown and continuity of lawful government.
Preservation of the population and other economically valuable assets of the Kingdom.
Denial to the enemy of human remains suitable for animation.
Containment and destruction of hostile undead formations.
Identification and destruction of the persons, magical establishments, and other means by which such formations are raised, directed, supplied, or otherwise supported.
Maintenance of civil order and restoration of ordinary Crown authority in affected districts.

WARPLAN BONE CHORUS is a plan of the Crown as a whole and shall not be construed solely as a military plan. The War Department shall exercise general coordination upon activation, but all Ministries, provincial and municipal governments, military commands, recognized magical authorities, and such ecclesiastical bodies as may possess useful capabilities shall perform the duties assigned to them in the Plan and its Schedules and Annexes.

This Summary states the principal provisions of the Plan. It does not supersede the detailed instructions, mobilization schedules, tables, district plans, magical protocols, requisition schedules, or departmental annexes promulgated separately.

II. HISTORICAL BASIS

The first WARPLAN BONE CHORUS was prepared following the Righteous War, during which the armies of Archea encountered extensive Orcish employment of animated dead.

The experience of that war demonstrated that necromantic warfare presents difficulties not adequately addressed by ordinary military practice. In particular, the dead of one’s own army and population may constitute a resource available to the enemy; enemy forces may continue to fight after destruction of those who raised them; and apparently defeated territory may remain militarily hazardous so long as substantial repositories of human remains remain unsecured.

The original Plan was accordingly prepared as a record of lessons learned during the Righteous War and as instruction to future generations should the Kingdom again encounter organized necromantic warfare.

The Plan received its present General Revision in 876, following consideration of the Avarenne Necromantic War of 861–866, during which the Kingdom of Avarenne resisted and ultimately destroyed a large army of animated dead.

Reports of Archean observers, testimony of Avarenne officers and civilians, captured documents subsequently made available to the Crown, and the findings of the Royal Commission on the Avarenne War were compared with surviving records of the Righteous War. Where the two experiences differed, the present Plan states the conclusion considered most securely supported.

Commanders are nevertheless reminded that necromancy is an art practiced by intelligent enemies.

The practices of a former enemy are evidence of what may occur. They are not a guarantee of what must occur.

III. ESTABLISHED PRINCIPLES OF NECROMANTIC WARFARE

Experience in the Righteous War and in Avarenne establishes the following principles.

A. Destruction of an Animator Does Not Destroy the Animated

Contrary to widespread popular belief, the destruction of the person who animated a body does not ordinarily cause the animated body to collapse or become inert.

Undead armies previously encountered have commonly depended upon a comparatively small number of persons capable of animation and control. Such persons have also commonly served as officers, organizers, and sources of intelligence to the formations under their direction.

Their destruction is consequently of great military value.

Its effect, however, shall be understood as analogous to the destruction of the headquarters of an ordinary military formation, not the destruction of the formation itself.

Undead deprived of direction may exhibit diminished coordination, inability to respond intelligently to changing circumstances, continued execution of obsolete orders, or other exploitable deficiencies. Nonetheless, they remain hostile forces until individually destroyed or otherwise rendered incapable of action.

Destruction of hostile animators is highly desirable but shall not be mistaken for destruction of the forces animated by them.

B. Destroyed Undead Cannot Again Be Animated

No securely documented case is known to the War Department in which remains that have been animated and subsequently destroyed as an undead combatant have thereafter been successfully animated a second time.

Destruction of an undead soldier is therefore a permanent military loss to the enemy.

Burning, crushing, dismemberment, or other subsequent destruction of an already defeated undead body is not required for the purpose of preventing its reanimation.

Such disposal remains desirable where circumstances permit for purposes of sanitation, civil confidence, maintenance of clear roads and fields, and prevention of unnecessary alarm.

C. The Unanimated Dead Remain an Enemy Resource

The same security does not apply to persons who die without having previously been animated and destroyed.

Archean military dead, civilian dead, abandoned enemy dead, bodies within cemeteries and crypts, and human remains from older burials must all be considered potential military resources available to a necromantic enemy until rendered unsuitable for animation.

The distinction is fundamental:

Our dead are potential enemy soldiers. His destroyed soldiers are dead.

IV. STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

Upon activation of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS, all Crown authorities shall direct their efforts toward five principal objectives:

FIRST: Preserve the Crown, continuity of government, the living population, and other economically valuable assets.

SECOND: Deny friendly and civilian dead to the enemy by prompt destruction of remains.

THIRD: Contain, divide where practicable, and destroy hostile undead formations.

FOURTH: Identify, locate, capture or destroy hostile animators, commanders, magical establishments, communications, sources of intelligence, and other means by which undead forces are organized and directed.

FIFTH: Maintain civil order and restore ordinary Crown administration progressively as affected territory is cleared.

No commander or magistrate shall pursue one of these objects in a manner which unnecessarily defeats another.

In particular, measures intended to deny bodies to the enemy shall not be undertaken where their immediate execution can reasonably be expected to produce a greater number of Archean dead.

V. DEGREES OF ACTIVATION

WARPLAN BONE CHORUS may be activated at three degrees.

BONE CHORUS WATCH

WATCH shall be declared where credible evidence indicates a substantial possibility of hostile organized necromantic activity affecting Archean territory.

Upon declaration of WATCH:

military, magical, civil, and ecclesiastical authorities shall review their assigned responsibilities;
designated forces and personnel shall be warned for possible mobilization;
inventories of fuel, transport, magical materials, and other required supplies shall be reviewed;
known cemeteries, crypts, ossuaries, plague pits, battlefields, and other substantial repositories of human remains shall be identified or their existing records verified;
authorities shall prepare for rapid implementation of BONE CHORUS PARTIAL.

WATCH does not of itself impose extraordinary restrictions upon ordinary funerary practices.

BONE CHORUS PARTIAL

PARTIAL shall be declared where hostile animation has been confirmed, or where the Crown judges such activity sufficiently imminent to require extraordinary precautions.

PARTIAL may apply to the whole Kingdom or to designated districts.

Upon declaration of PARTIAL:

all deaths within affected districts shall be registered promptly with the Crown;
cemeteries and other repositories of human remains shall be placed under regular surveillance;
disturbance of graves, disappearance of bodies, or unexplained movement near secured burial grounds shall be reported immediately;
hospitals, temples, undertakers, prisons, military establishments, and other institutions regularly possessing human remains shall adopt the reporting and security procedures prescribed in the appropriate Annex;
cremation shall be encouraged where consistent with local religious and customary practice;
designated military formations, magical personnel, civil authorities, and auxiliary organizations shall mobilize as directed.

BONE CHORUS GENERAL

GENERAL shall be declared where organized necromantic warfare exists within Archea or is judged immediately imminent.

GENERAL constitutes full activation of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS and authorizes all measures prescribed below and in its supporting Annexes.

GENERAL may be proclaimed nationally or within designated theaters while other portions of the Kingdom remain under WATCH or PARTIAL.

VI. MILITARY AND MAGICAL OPERATIONS

Upon activation, military forces shall give priority to defense of concentrations of population, maintenance of essential communications and transport routes, containment and destruction of hostile undead formations, and attack upon enemy command and magical capabilities.

Commanders shall not assume that undead forces will conform to the limitations of ordinary troops with respect to fatigue, hunger, fear, darkness, weather, or willingness to accept casualties.

Archean Military Dead

The bodies of Archean personnel killed in areas subject to hostile necromantic activity must be destroyed without delay.

Recovery for customary burial is not authorized. Destruction of the remains is mandatory, subject only to the exception stated below.

Destruction shall be deferred only where the officer commanding determines that attempting it would probably result in additional Archean deaths and thereby furnish the enemy with more usable remains than would be denied to him.

Commanders shall incorporate destruction of friendly dead into plans for withdrawal from positions threatened with capture.

No position shall be considered successfully evacuated while Archean dead which can be destroyed without disproportionate additional loss remain available for enemy use.

Hostile Undead Dead

Destroyed undead require no further destruction for military purposes.

Where circumstances permit, their remains shall nevertheless be removed from roads, settlements, agricultural land, and other places where their continued presence interferes with Crown activity or alarms the population.

Collection and destruction of such remains, ordinarily by burning, should wherever practicable be performed by civilian auxiliaries under military supervision rather than by combat troops required elsewhere.

Visible destruction of defeated undead has repeatedly demonstrated substantial value in restoring confidence among affected populations.

Unanimated Enemy Dead

Bodies of enemy personnel who have not previously been animated shall be treated as any other newly dead persons and destroyed where practicable. Commanders are reminded that an enemy necromancer is unlikely to distinguish between the remains of an Archean soldier and those of his former allies.

Magical Operations

Designated magical authorities shall undertake:

detection and localization of necromantic activity;
identification of unfamiliar means of animation or control;
counteraction of hostile magic;
protection of military headquarters and critical Crown establishments;
magical reconnaissance and support of operations against hostile animators;
examination of captured materials and destroyed undead;
development and rapid dissemination of theater-specific countermeasures.

Unfamiliar undead shall be investigated rather than presumed to possess the characteristics of those encountered during the Righteous or Avarenne Wars.

VII. DENIAL OF HUMAN REMAINS

Denial of suitable remains to the enemy is a principal operation under WARPLAN BONE CHORUS and not a matter of ordinary funerary administration.

Under WATCH

Authorities shall identify cemeteries, crypts, ossuaries, charnel grounds, plague pits, historic battlefields, private burial grounds where known, and other substantial concentrations of human remains.

Plans shall be prepared for their surveillance, guarding, evacuation where appropriate, exhumation, or destruction should PARTIAL or GENERAL be declared.

Under PARTIAL

All deaths shall be registered.

Burial grounds shall be inspected regularly and suspicious activity reported immediately.

Cremation shall be encouraged, particularly in districts near confirmed necromantic activity.

Local authorities shall identify previously unrecorded or abandoned burial grounds and shall request the assistance of inhabitants possessing relevant local knowledge.

Under GENERAL

All persons dying within an affected district shall be cremated as soon as practicable.

Ordinary burial is suspended.

Existing cemeteries, crypts, ossuaries, and other accessible repositories of human remains shall be systematically exhumed and the remains destroyed.

Priority shall be determined principally by proximity to hostile forces. Work shall commence with repositories nearest the front or other confirmed necromantic activity and proceed rearward as personnel, fuel, transport, and security permit.

Burial grounds awaiting exhumation and destruction shall be inspected not less than once daily and guarded where circumstances warrant.

Civil and religious objection to compulsory cremation and disturbance of established burial grounds is anticipated. Magistrates, clergy, and other authorities shall seek voluntary cooperation where practicable and shall explain the military necessity of these measures.

Such objections shall not, however, impede measures necessary to deny manpower to the enemy.

VIII. CIVIL GOVERNMENT AND MOBILIZATION OF THE KINGDOM

Ordinary government shall continue for as long and as widely as circumstances permit.

The requirements of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS shall be met through existing institutions wherever possible rather than through creation of substitute authorities.

The Treasury shall provide extraordinary funds required for Crown operations and shall coordinate emergency taxation, conscription, requisition of private property and supplies, and other measures required to mobilize the resources of the Kingdom.

The War Department shall establish military priorities and communicate requirements for manpower, transport, supplies, construction, and other resources.

Authorities responsible for roads, bridges, canals, transport, and public works shall maintain military and evacuation routes; provide fortifications and emergency works; and assist in provision of fuel, transport, labor, and facilities required for destruction of remains.

Authorities responsible for public health shall continue care of the living while implementing extraordinary procedures for registration, custody, and disposal of the dead.

Authorities responsible for justice and civil order shall suppress looting, interference with military operations, concealment or unauthorized disposal of bodies, unlawful entry into secured burial grounds, and other acts prejudicial to the Plan.

Local authorities shall maintain, so far as circumstances permit, current records of population, deaths, refugees, available labor, transport animals, wagons, food, fuel, and burial grounds.

Private horses, vehicles, buildings, foodstuffs, fuel, tools, land, and other property may be requisitioned as authorized by the Crown.

Civilian auxiliaries shall be organized as required for:

construction and maintenance of defensive works;
movement of supplies;
assistance to refugees;
graveyard surveillance;
exhumation and destruction of remains;
construction and tending of cremation fires;
collection and disposal of destroyed undead;
other labor not requiring the employment of trained soldiers.

Combat against active undead formations remains the responsibility of military forces except in circumstances of immediate necessity.

IX. DUTIES OF THE POPULATION

Subjects of the Crown within areas subject to WARPLAN BONE CHORUS shall:

report sightings of undead or suspected necromantic activity;
report deaths as directed;
report missing bodies, opened graves, disturbed crypts, or other unexplained interference with human remains;
comply with orders concerning cremation and other disposal of the dead;
identify private, forgotten, or unrecorded burial places known to them;
comply promptly with lawful evacuation and movement orders;
remain clear of military operations, secured graveyards, and areas declared unsafe;
surrender property lawfully requisitioned for Crown use;
perform auxiliary service when lawfully conscripted;
refrain from unauthorized attempts to recover persons or property from territory occupied by hostile undead.

Persons separated from Crown authority should give first priority to preservation of life and avoidance of unnecessary casualties.

The creation of additional dead strengthens the enemy.

X. PUBLIC INFORMATION AND MAINTENANCE OF CONFIDENCE

Experience demonstrates that rumor concerning animated dead frequently travels more rapidly than reliable information and may produce flight, disorder, abandonment of useful property, interference with military movement, and other consequences favorable to the enemy.

Crown authorities shall therefore disseminate accurate information whenever military considerations permit.

Particular emphasis shall be given to the following established facts:

Undead can be permanently destroyed.

An undead creature once destroyed cannot, on the evidence presently available, be animated again.

The destruction of an animator impairs the enemy but does not destroy the undead already raised.

Every body denied to the enemy limits his ability to replace his losses.

Destroyed undead should, where practicable, be publicly removed and burned. Although unnecessary to prevent renewed animation, this practice has proved useful in demonstrating to affected populations that defeated undead are permanently harmless.

False reports likely to cause public disorder shall be corrected promptly.

XI. INTELLIGENCE AND ADAPTATION

All military, magical, and civil authorities shall regard the acquisition of information concerning the enemy as an essential part of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS.

Particular effort shall be made to determine:

who or what is performing animation;
what remains can be animated;
the rate at which new forces can be raised;
the means and effective distance by which undead are directed;
the degree of intelligence displayed by different forms;
the effects produced by loss of animators and commanders;
the means by which each encountered form may be permanently destroyed;
the existence of capabilities not recorded during the Righteous War or the Avarenne Necromantic War.

Captured documents, magical instruments, unusual remains, reports of witnesses, and observations of enemy behavior shall be transmitted promptly to the authorities designated in the Intelligence Annex.

Doctrine shall be amended in the field when reliable evidence demonstrates that an enemy does not conform to the assumptions of this Plan.

No provision of WARPLAN BONE CHORUS shall be interpreted as requiring an officer to persist in an assumption which observation has demonstrated to be false.

XII. RECOVERY AND TERMINATION

The defeat or disappearance of an organized undead force does not of itself establish that a district is secure.

Before restoration of ordinary conditions, Crown authorities shall, according to circumstances:

search for remaining active undead;
locate and destroy missing bodies;
inspect cemeteries and other repositories of remains;
complete necessary destruction of the newly and previously dead;
investigate evidence of continuing necromantic activity;
restore roads, communications, water supplies, markets, and other essential services;
reestablish ordinary civil administration;
return displaced populations in an orderly manner.

Restrictions imposed under GENERAL and PARTIAL shall be withdrawn progressively as military circumstances permit.

CONCLUSION

The following instruction appeared in the original WARPLAN BONE CHORUS prepared from the experience of the Righteous War. It was retained without amendment by the Royal Commission following the Avarenne Necromantic War and remains the governing principle of this Plan:

The enemy’s principal advantage is that he may make war with our dead. His principal disadvantage is that he cannot replace what we destroy except from the dead we permit him to obtain.

The preservation of the living, the denial of the dead, and the destruction of the risen are therefore not separate duties.

They are the same duty.

BY ORDER OF THE CROWN
WAR DEPARTMENT
KINGDOM OF ARCHEA