The Minbari were closing in, they had been advancing in on the outer colonies for a while now, and ever since the war had begun and it became clear as day there was little that EarthForce could do against the aliens, humanity had begun evacuating its outer colonies. EarthGov and EarthForce had been aware for some time the Minbari civilisation was arranged around a caste system, and that included a warrior caste. It was theorised the Minbari were using that approach in their strategy, wiping out the warriors first and then coming back for the afters.

How did the war begin?

Earth had been gaining more influence as they had been exploring the galaxy, they had combined their forces with the rest of the League of Non-Aligned worlds who'd been battered down by an advanced conquering warlike race, called the Dilgar. The Dilgar's homeworld was in danger of being destroyed by their sun, which was due to go supernova. The Dilgar, determined to survive, had begun a campaign of interstellar violence and even genocide, experts in genetic warfare and were not afraid of enslaving populations of planets with drugs.

EarthForce had joined the fight and their aid had turned the tide, and they had pushed the Dilgar back to their homeworld, plundering pieces of Dilgar technology along the way, until the entire species was doomed to be wiped out. Once the Dilgar were defeated, the humans became valued friends to so many races, or so they thought. Many races were open to dialogues and allowing humans access to their resources to help them expand further into the galaxy, with agreements where the different powers had something coming their way in payment. However, not all races liked humanity and refused to help, or were hostile.

As they expanded, the humans learnt of other races who were a mystery; they had heard stories of the shadowy Vorlons, who owned and ran a chunk of the galaxy and did not like to be bothered, already ships sent into Vorlon space had not returned.

But the humans had heard of another, advanced race called the Minbari and they had learnt they were powerful. EarthDome wanted to know, as more and more rumours came their way about the Minbari if they were a threat. They consulted the Centauri, their first space allies, and they were told to simply send one ship as too many would be a threat, but EarthForce wanted a show of force, designed to show the Minbari that while they were no threat and meant no harm, they were prepared to fight.

Their first big mistake.

Their second mistake was to send a captain who was prone to panicking under pressure and was bad at first contacts and was more concerned with personal glory and recognition, which clouded his common sense. The moment Captain Jankowski's squadron approached Minbari space, he assumed that a small force of Minbari ships nearby was looking for him, not realising the Minbari did not care about humans beyond hearing about them from time to time themselves.

Jankowski's next big mistake came when he foolishly gave the order to move his squadron closer to Minbari space, which didn't go unnoticed by the aliens, who intercepted them. The Minbari then made a mistake themselves, they underestimated how advanced their scanning beams were and how it would affect the fairly primitive sensors of the humans, who immediately panicked and believed they were being attacked.

The Minbari then made another mistake, although it was understandable. And it was not the mistake of the Centauri, but of Captain Jankowski, who'd been given an info pack by the Centauri Ambassador, who'd promised to provide Earth with all information the Centauri had of the Minbari, which included details that the Minbari greeted other races by showing their weapons to show what they were capable of. But in an act of questionable judgement and an unhealthy dose of arrogance, Jankowski did not read it. So he opened fire.

The Minbari were taken by surprise, and their beloved leader was killed.

The Minbari declared war. And now humanity was being pushed back, as more and more of them were being killed by the Minbari's more powerful weapons and how the humans could not lock on with their weapons and hurt the Minbari ships, thanks to stealth fields generated by the Minbari.

The Dilgar had technology comparable to the Centauri, but research into the technology had been slow and while it had led to more advanced designs of EarthForce ships, while they were able to better hold their own against the Minbari, and they were capable of a pseudo lock, they were still barely a match for the Minbari.

Fortunately, common sense had led to Earth evacuating their colonies as diplomatic channels were met with static. The Minbari refused to listen to surrender offers, to peace talks.

As the Minbari closed in on the various worlds under the control of the Earth Alliance, the planets were evacuated and the small squadrons were left to slow the Minbari down and give the other colonies nearby time to escape.

It was for the survival of the human race they did that.