History Literature / Frontlines

* In Book 8, Pacific Alliance forces arrive in time to rescue the crew of the NACs Washington, who hold up in Capella after a Lanky Seed Ship damages the Washington's FTL drives.

* TheCavalry: The Ottawa in Book 6 launches a rescue mission to save the colony of New Svalbard from the lankies. While they are forced to raze the colony with nuclear weapons, the Ottawa and her crew are able to evacuate the entire population back to Sol.

* EnemyMine: What's left of Earth's national navies, particularly the NAC and SRA, come together to make one last ditched defense of Earth from the Lankies in the end of book 3. Since then, the alliance has been going strong with the nations of Earth launching a counterattack at Mars.

* StandardSciFiFleet: The Human navies have the standard Drophsipes, Fightercraft (Shrikes), Frigates, Destroyers, Cruisers, and Carriers pre-war. They also have a number of Stealth ships like the stealth orbital combat ship NACS ''Indianapolis'' and various supply vessels. Later and after the battle of Earth, the Human navies introduce battleships and battle carriers that lean towards a more anti-ship role like the Avenger class.

* Curb-StompBattle: Early in the series, the Human militaries are on the receiving end of this from the lankies. They can barely hold back the aliens on the ground and Human space-borne forces continuously keep getting crushed until the Lankies attempt to attack Earth.

* StandardSci-FiFleet: The Human navies have the standard Drophsipes, Fightercraft (Shrikes), Frigates, Destroyers, Cruisers, and Carriers pre-war. They also have a number of Stealth ships like the stealth orbital combat ship NACS ''Indianapolis''. Later and after the battle of Earth, the Human navies introduce battleships and battle carriers that lean towards a more anti-ship role like the Avenger class.

** Senior Sergeant Dmitry Chistyakov, from the SRA.

** In ''Chains of Command'', Major Khaled Masoud asks Andrew to lead a platoon in a mission to go after the remnants of the old NAC government in the distant Leonidas system. Describing the operation as a recon mission for a future Corps attack, Masoud later orders the platoon to attack an enemy airfield. A team of [[spoiler:Masoud's SEALs]] uses the ensuing chaos to [[spoiler:sneak nuclear bombs across the moons' terraformers]], knowing that the enemy forces would engage all their troops against Andrew's platoon. He later uses this to beat the renegade government into surrendering.

** Sergeant Fallon receives a prosthetic left leg made of Titanium alloy after [[spoiler:the Detroit riots]] in the first book. It's much stronger than her old one, which makes her think about having the other one replaced as well.
** Andrew loses two fingers in the third book escaping from the civilian police at Independence Station. Other people can't see the difference, but he can ''feel'' it, as he took too long to go to a doctor after severing the nerves.

** [[spoiler:Sergeant Fallon]] receives a prosthetic left leg made of Titanium alloy after [[spoiler:the Detroit riots]] in the first book. It's much stronger than her old one, which makes her think about having the other one replaced as well.
** [[spoiler:Andrew]] loses two fingers in the third book escaping from the civilian police at Independence Station. Other people can't see the difference, but he can ''feel'' it, as he took too long to go to a doctor after severing the nerves.

* LudicrousSpeed: After the events of the ''Lines of Departure'', the NAC and the SRA create the Orion missiles, giant slabs of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pykrete Pykrete]] attached to an engine that uses the energy release of a hundred nukes, on the rate of one per second, to propel the missiles to speeds up to [[EarthShatteringKaboom 1.3 percent of light speed]], reducing the Lanky ships to vapour.

** Senior Sergeant Dmitry Chistyakov, from the SRA,

** The SRA is an alliance of [[RedsWithRockets Russia]] and [[UsefulNotes/ChineseWithChopperSupport China]], along with Indians and Koreans. For the first year of the war against the Lankies, [[IdiotBall they didn't believe the Lankies existed]], and even when one of their colonies was wiped out, they still continued to attack NAC colonies instead of seeking an alliance against the Lankies. They don't treat their troops very well, with their rations being several times worse then those of the NAC, and they willingly use high explosive weaponry inside their own civilian settlements. At the same time, they have upstanding characters like Korean General Park, the commanding officer of the SRA component of the fleet that escaped to Formalhaut, and who readily allies with the NAC contingent and even provides access to the SRA Alcubierre node. The SRA is also the home of Senior Sergeant Dmitriy Chistyakov, who becomes fast friends with Andrew and who fights alongside him on several occasions.

** Averted when fighting with the Lankies, as nukes are generally the most effective weapon against Lanky seed ships until the creation of the [[spoiler:Orion Missiles]].

* SergeantRock: Sgt. Fallon, a rare ''living'' Medal of Honor recipient and legend among the corps.

* AcePilot: A lot of drop ship pilots are, but Andrew's wife, Lieutenant Diana Halley, is one of the best. She is repeatedly described as a natural drop ship pilot and among her awards are several Silver Stars and Distinguished Flying Crosses for bravery in combat. She even does a long tour as a combat flight instructor and is one of the few pilots cleared to fly the most advanced dropship in the fleet, the 160th SOAR's Blackfly.

** The [[FictionalGenevaConventions Svalbard Accords]] ban the use of nukes, kinetic weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction by the power blocs of Earth, including the NAC and SRA.

* BattleStar: Human ships usually carry a complement of aerospace craft, primarily transports, and are heavily armed with railguns and missiles. Carriers and the newer Avenger class carry both dropsips and Shrike Attack craft, along with their arsenal of Particle cannons, Orion nukes, nuclear missiles, and railguns.

* TheCavalry: The Ottowa in Book 6 launches a rescue mission to save the colony of New Svalbard from the lankies. While they are forced to raze the colony with nuclear weapons, the Ottowa and her crew are able to evacuate the entire population back to Sol.

* {{Conscription}}: Averted. Military service is voluntary. In the first book potencial recruits have to apply for the position, with only ten percent of all applicants being accepted into the Armed Forces of the NAC.

* CoolStarship: Most prominent are the stealth orbital combat ship NACS ''Indianapolis'', on which Andrew spends half the 3rd book on a recon mission and the Super Carrier NACS ''Regulus'', which serves as the flagship of Earth's defensive fleet at the Battle of Earth. The battleships NACS ''Agincourt'' and the SRA's ''Archangelsk'' also count, as the first two ships specifically designed to fight Lanky seed ships toe-to-toe.

* EnemyMine: What's left of Earth's national navies, particularly the NAC and SRA, come together to make one last ditched defence of Earth from the Lankies in the end of book 3. Since then, the alliance has been going strong with the nations of Earth launching a counterattack at Mars.

** The SRA is an alliance of [[RedsWithRockets Russia]] and [[UsefulNotes/ChineseWithChopperSupport China]], along with Indians and Koreans. For the first year of the war against the Lankies, [[IdiotBall they didn't believe the Lankies existed]], and even when one of their colonies was wiped out, they still continued to attack NAC colonies instead of seeking an alliance against the Lankies. They don't treat their troops very well, with their rations being several times worse then those of the NAC, and they willingly use high explosive weaponry inside their own civilian settlements. At the same time, they have upstanding characters like Korean General Park, the commanding officer of the SRA component of the fleet that escaped to Fomalhaut, and who readily allies with the NAC contingent and even provides access to the SRA Alcubierre node. The SRA is also the home of Senior Sergeant Dmitriy Chistyakov, who becomes fast friends with Andrew and who fights alongside him on several occasions.

* {{Conscription}}: Averted. Military service is voluntary. In the first book potencial recruits have to apply for the position, with only ten percent of all apllicants being accepted into the Armed Forces of the NAC.

The ''Frontlines'' series is a (currently) 7 book MilitaryScienceFiction series written by German-American author Marko Kloos. The books are set in the {{Dystopia}}n universe of the 22nd century, where Earth is overpopulated and countries spend taxpayer money on space fleets and colonizing far off worlds instead of on infrastructure. They follow the career of Andrew Grayson, a young man from a [[UrbanHellscape Public Residence Cluster]] located in Boston who joins the military of the [[ExpandedStatesOfAmerica North American Commonwealth]] for the same two reasons everyone else does: real food instead of [[NauseaFuel soy-based and recycled proteins]] and the paycheck a soldier gets as a lump sum at the end of his or her service.

** The NAC, despite being home to Andrew and his family and friends, is not a particularly nice country. They have no qualms about using lethal military force to put down PRC food riots or stranding a fleet full of troops and 10,000 civilians on an ice moon with not enough food. Is is also home to people like the unnamed brigadier general who tried to use his SI troopers to steal civilian food stores. The icing on the cake, however is the fact that NAC leadership abandoned Earth and fled to the Leonidas system with all of the NAC's heaviest warships.

* NuclearWeaponsTaboo: The [[FictionalGenevaConventions Svalbard Accords]] ban the use of nukes, kinetic weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction by the power blocs of Earth, including the NAC and SRA.

* {{Conscription}}: Averted. Military service is voluntary. In the first book potencial recruits have to aplly for the position, with only ten percent of all apllicants being accepted into the Armed Forces of the NAC.

** Averted when fighting with the Lankies, as nukes are generally the most effective weapon against Lanky seed ships until the creation of the [[spoiler:Orion Missiles]].

The ''Frontlines'' series is a (currently) 6 book MilitaryScienceFiction series written by German-American author Marko Kloos. The books are set in the {{Dystopia}}n universe of the 22nd century, where Earth is overpopulated and countries spend taxpayer money on space fleets and colonizing far off worlds instead of on infrastructure. They follow the career of Andrew Grayson, a young man from a [[UrbanHellscape Public Residence Cluster]] located in Boston who joins the military of the [[ExpandedStatesOfAmerica North American Commonwealth]] for the same two reasons everyone else does: real food instead of [[NauseaFuel soy-based and recycled proteins]] and the paycheck a soldier gets as a lump sum at the end of his or her service.

** The NAC, despite being home to Andrew and his family and friends, is not a particularly nice country. They have no qualms about using lethal military force to put down PRC food riots or stranding a fleet full of troops and 10,000 civilians on an ice moon with not enough food. Is is also home to people like the unnamed brigadier general who tried to use his SI troopers to steal civilian food stores. The icing on the cake, however is the fact that NAC leadership abandoned Earth and fled to the Leonidas system with all of the NAC's heaviest warships.

* Conscription: Averted. Military service is voluntary. In the first book potencial recruits have to aplly for the position, with only ten percent of all apllicants being accepted into the Armed Forces of the NAC.

As is [[TropesAreTools usually the case with these sorts of stories]], Andrew gets a lot more than he's bargained for. Instead of what he expected (fighting the [[DirtyCommunists Sino-Russian Alliance]] for control of colony worlds), he gets a front row seat to FirstContact with the [[AttackOfThe50FootWhatever Lankies]], 20 meter tall, nigh-unkillable aliens seemingly determined to exterminate humanity.

* CoolPlane: Dropships are basically troop ships designed to also act as close air support for the troops they drop from orbit. The Blackfly class takes the cake as a stealth variant piloted by the very best pilots in the force.

* Ace Pilot: A lot of drop ship pilots are, but Andrew's wife, Lieutenant Diana Halley, is one of the best. She is repeatedly described as a natural drop ship pilot and among her awards are several Silver Stars and Distinguished Flying Crosses for bravery in combat. She even does a long tour as a combat flight instructor and is one of the few pilots cleared to fly the most advanced dropship in the fleet, the 160th SOAR's Blackfly.