I own nothing of Star Wars, or its characters, or the various names just my OCs and love of the Star Wars franchise owned by Disney formally owned by George Lucas.
Prologue: Any commander worth their salt will put specialized units on the ground to recon a planet before committing their entire force. This is where the LRRPPs [Long Range Reconnaissance Planetary Patrol] come into play.
Missions consisted of one to two week long patrols with minimal support. During the Clone wars the success of failure of the Republic's planetary campaigns was due to initial insertion and information gathered by theses elite six man teams. Due to their unique mission requirements they were granted great flexibility in personnel, gear, equipment, weapons, and team leaders. All teams consisted of only Sargents and and were never lead by Jedi.
These units were so specialized that they were even open to non-clones. Due to their activities on such critical missions, access to such information any and all records on these men were kept top secret. In fact these units were kept so secret only select officers were made aware of their existence. The general public of the Republic was also never aware of these men. Only a select few would later learn of the LRRPPs. It is unknown how many clones and non-clone humans were a part of these teams or how many died on their deadly missions of absolute secrecy.
These men were only known to their commanders as The LRRPPS and the Separates who named them the men with the painted faces for most of the time they wore camouflage face paint. Their fellow brothers in arms were unaware that their own brothers were LRRPPs and those who were privileged with such information were sworn to absolute secrecy of being aware of the existence of the team members.
The names of these men, unit names, and call signs have been changed to protect their identities. The official number of LRRP Units was about 20 or so but the number is not exact. A particular LRRPP unit was attached to the 501st legion commanded by General Anakin Skywalker [Call Sign Gauntlent]. Their official units name was 3rd company 121st Military Police Battalion which was also a real MP unit. There were a total of 36 clones with a few non clone humans in this LRRP unit. There were a total of six teams in each recon unit not counting gunship crews. Each team totaled six men. The LRRPP units conducted a little over 800,000 missions many more carried a classified rating so it never existed over the course of The Clone Wars.
Ages: clones are actually ten years old in clone years but are physically in early to mid-twenties. The Grand Army of the Republic is open to non-cone humans as enlisted. 17 is the youngest that any non-clone species or human can enlist in the Grand Army of The Republic. However since the military is about 95 percent of clones the enlistment numbers from other sources outside of Kemino are almost nonexistence; unless you count the Jedi and their Padawans who are pressed into service. Records
Each one of these men are experts in their field but are also trained in the other team members field in the event one is wounded or killed the others can do their job as well.
The LRRPPs first real test during the Clone Wars was fighting to just exist, because frankly the Grand Army of The Republic was slow in recognizing the need for true recon teams. ARC troopers are not real recon teams because their mission is go behind enemy lines and attack large areas on mass such as an airfields or bases.
The LRRPs job was strictly sneak and peak. Meaning collect information but under no circumstances are they to engage the enemy. After the first three months of the war the Grand Army of The Republic had hard won victories but the casualty [dead and wounded] rates were 60-70 percent. [A company in the Grand Army of The republic is between 150 -250 men strong so a company of 150 with 60 percent casualties would lose 90 men and a company of 250 that had 70 percent casualties would lose around 175men].
Even though this is the reason why an army of clones was created in the first place no army can continue to be combat effective with losses such as these. Another way had to be found to fight the Separatist. Separatist forces were mostly made up of droids and were incapable of having any fear and once an assault started they would not stop until every single droid was destroyed.
Separatists knew that their battle droids were not even close to the quality of clone troopers so they had to use guerrilla warfare tactics. Hence the reason for these teams. The LRRPPs conducted many high casualty causing ambushed to Separatist forces, captured high-ranking Separatist officers, the elimination of high ranking Separatist officers and officials.
All LRRPs are considered combat veterans after their first patrol.
[Author's note I am new to the fan fic scene and depending on the fed back on this Prolog will determine how often updates will or not happen. The actual story will start in Prologue Part 2