THE COMMANDERS
Colonel-General Leon Orzeski, Commanding Officer, Task Force Wizna, V Legion, Vetus System Garrison.
A native of Poland, Orzeski's first combat experience was in the desert guerrilla war of the Sahara Insurgency, in which the armed forces of the European Union sought to defend its newest member states on the North African coast from armed anti-federal extremists. Records of his service in this war remain classified even nearly seventy years after the events. The war was not a clean one by any standards, particularly as the growing climate crisis threatened European prosperity and survival.
At the outbreak of the Cold War in 2139, Orzeski was a captain in the Polish-led Wizna Battlegroup. His actions in that war are far better documented, and he served with distinction as his unit was gradually expanded to the size of a full task force of over one hundred thousand citizens-at-arms by the end of the war. He fought in every major campaign of the European theatre from Minsk to Suez to Leipzig, as did his unit. By the time victory came in 2145, he had been promoted to lieutenant-colonel.
Orzeski was a poor peacetime soldier, particularly after the foundation of the Alliance. He regarded the cooperation of the nations of Earth with suspicion, thinking that Europe and Africa ought to exploit the new mass effect technologies on their own. This can largely be attributed to his war experience, in which he would have seen many atrocities. He had seen the war in the Americas as a sideshow, largely as the climate conditions meant that very few froze or starved to death in that theatre of the conflict. He was reluctantly transferred to international command with the foundation of the Alliance as one of Europe's contributions to the united human military. Despite his reservations, he determined to defend his homeworld, and by the time of contact with the turians, he had reached the rank of colonel.
The First Contact War cured him of any lingering doubts about his fellow humans, as he saw first-hand the need to unite the species during the Liberation of Shan'xi. His regiment was at the very centre of the offensive to surround the turian occupation force in the colonial capital at New Weinan. His role in that assault as part of a combined effort by Task Force Wizna and elements from the South American Federation saw him promoted, a trend that would continue. He demonstrated a methodical, almost mathematical style of command that determined to wear enemies down before a killing blow. Against the pirates and early batarian attacks of the 2160s, his success rate was nearly perfect and he challenged even the most competent turian commanders during a series of wargames organised in 2173. It was this latter achievement that caught the eye of Alliance High Command and Consul Taro approved his promotion to command of the unit he had served in all of his military life.
By 2176, Orzeski was considering retirement, nearing forty years of military service, but was selected to lead the initial defence of Elysium as part of the grand trap for the batarians. His reaction to this was enthusiastic. The chance to personally avenge Mindoir was one he considered a deep honour, and he set about immediately organising the Alliance forces in the Vetus System in great detail. The already considerable defences of Elysium were bolstered by his arrival, and the "generaloberst" set about planning to lure batarian forces on the ground into ambushes using both cities and Alliance bases as bait. Without the presence of Orzeski and his troops, it is doubtful that Elysium could have held out the twenty four hours required by the Alliance to muster their fleets, and he would prove this decisively in the course of the battle itself.
Elanos Haliat, Chief Commander, Batarian-Terminus Invasion Forces, Overlord of Altakiril.
A former professional soldier from Palaven, Elanos Haliat was once regarded as a good prospect for promotion to the highest levels of citizenship in the Turian Hierarchy. His skill for realpolitik was matched by both his ambition and competence, coloured by an ability to get others to take on risks for him. It was the latter that would eventually force him out of respectable turian society, as his orders caused the deaths of a series of well-placed lieutenants during a minor uprising of colonial separatists in 2162. Unable to advance further, and becoming frustrated with the rigid society of Palaven, he fled to the Terminus Systems, ending up on the highly independent and chaotic world of Altakiril. Within three years of his arrival, he had managed to take control of that planet and surrounding systems through a mix of guile and naked force that came to characterise his rule.
Haliat recruited heavily from exiled and independent turian populations and batarian criminal groups, eventually claiming lordship over six Terminus garden worlds and claiming seven more as allies. This made him the most powerful individual in the Terminus Systems, eclipsing even Aria T'Loak in terms of hard power, a position he guarded jealously with an ever expanding fleet of ships and large mercenary companies. It was the need to maintain this power via raiding that pushed him to greater cooperation with the Batarian Hegemony.
While Haliat raided the Traverse on an almost yearly basis, the Council species were increasingly more difficult to catch unaware, leading to a drop off in revenues that threatened to collapse his fiefdoms. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, humanity soon entered the scene with a frantic colonisation drive that left them vulnerable to just the sort of raiding that he specialised in. By the time of the batarian attack on Mindoir, Haliat was trusted at the highest levels of the Hegemony's government, particularly within the faction of the soon-to-be Arch-Hegemon Ar'dra.
Between 2170 and 2176, his prestige and status both with the Terminus pirate barons and the Batarian Hegemony reached their peak. Still not satisfied, Haliat set about looking for a way to make himself a true galactic leader. When the SSV Amaterasu was destroyed by a gambit of his own making, the turian found his chance. His proposal to attack Elysium as the opening blow of a war to end humanity's independence was crafted perfectly to infect the mind of the Arch-Hegemon. General Gadnalak would later remark that he regretted not following his instincts to shoot the turian when they had first met, so adept was Haliat at manipulating the leader of the batarian species. Had he done so, much would have been different.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Haliat was meant to be a turian in the games. The mission where you encounter him makes that fairly obvious: he speaks like a turian and has a targeting visor like Garrus' own. Not sure why he shows up as human, but I decided to correct this for the story.