The Imperial planet of Krieg is a toxic, radioactive Death World and the homeworld of the grim and fatalistic Imperial Guard Regiments known collectively as the Death Korps of Krieg.
History
In 433.M40, the Autarch of the Hive World of Krieg in the Segmentum Tempestus declared himself independent from the Imperium of Man and renounced the Emperor of Mankind as his divine master. Krieg then became locked in a civil war between the Renegades and the Loyalists. Much of Krieg quickly fell to the rebels except for the hive city of Ferrograd which came under the command of the now infamous Colonel Jurten of the 83rd Krieg Regiment of the Imperial Guard. Under strict orders to not let Krieg fall to the enemy but with the promise that no Imperial liberation fleet on the scale that was needed to invade a planet was available, Jurten decided that Krieg would either belong to the Emperor or to no one. On the day of the feast of the Emperor's Ascension, Jurten unleashed a counter-attack against the rebels making use of thermonuclear weapons intended to purge the world of all Heretics. For days, Krieg was engulfed by an ocean of nuclear fire. Krieg's ecosystem collapsed under the radioactive onslaught and the planet was eventually engulfed in a frigid nuclear winter. But the civil war dragged on, year after year, decade after decade, with each side locked in a bloody, grinding stalemate marked by intensive trench warfare in the planet's blasted, radioactive wastes. The survivors of Jurten's nuclear purge were forced to exist in underground bunkers or deep in the radioactive chem-wastes of Krieg, as their descendants do to this day. Despite the self-annihilation of their homeworld, Loyalist troops slowly retook their world inch by inch over the course of 500 Terran years. From this experience were born the Regiments of the Death Korps of Krieg, soldiers who were used to the most grinding and debilitating of battlefield conditions. Krieg was finally returned to unquestioned Imperial rule in 949.M40 when the last of the rebel strongholds was finally eliminated.
As penance for the Autarch's heresy, the Death Korps Regiments each embarked on their own quest for absolution, constantly requesting transfers from Imperial High Command to the most lethal Imperial war zones throughout the galaxy. Every soldier in the Death Korps is proud of their individual regiments part in the purification of Krieg and they despise the cowardice of lesser men who would flinch from such acts. The regimental creed is to eradicate Heresy and weakness wherever it is found in the Imperium and on numerous occasions Death Korps forces have been reprimanded for their excessive use of force and unsanctioned genocidal campaigns against those they even suspect of being disloyal to the Emperor.
The Imperial Guardsmen of the Death Korps are fearless warriors, never flinching even in the face of sudden death, which they see as atonement for their world's ancient rebellion against the Imperium. They see their deaths in war as a penance for the Heresy of their ancestors. Death Korps commanders also possess this mindset and take a highly analytical approach to warfare, seeing the troops they command as a means to "buy" victory, effectively "spending" their men in order to grind down their opponents. This is due to their perception that the lives of their men are worth little in the Emperor's sight, so mired in sin are their souls. They are dedicated trench and siege warfare masters, and often use battalions of Death Riders, a local form of Imperial Guard Rough Riders, who are used widely by the Guard for rapid and highly mobile attacks. However, the Death Riders do not ride normal steeds like their fellow Imperial Guard Rough Riders; rather, the Death Riders use either heavily "re-built" steeds who make use of cybernetic implants to increase their endurance in battle, or even a totally robotic steed.
Appearance-wise, the troops of the Death Korps are similar to those found in the Regiments of the IMperial Guard's Armageddon Steel Legion, but the troops of te Death Korps wear greatcoats instead of trench coats, prefer much darker colours, make use of Lasguns and the masks of their Grenadiers make use of a skull motif. Of all the regiments of the Imperial Guard, the Death Korps' troops are the most gloomy and dark, both in appearance and in spirit.
It should also be noted that Krieg raises an unusually large number of regiments for so devastated a planet. This is because of the use of the "Vitae Womb" artificial birthing techniques allowing for faster reproduction, which Krieg has been granted special dispensation to use by the High Lords of Terra due to the steely and determined nature of its troops and its unswerving loyalty to the Emperor. Use of this artificial birthing technology is generally prohibited throughout the Imperium for reasons unknown by the Adeptus Mechanicus, the custodians of the Imperium's technological lore. This may be why Death Korps troops are so rarely seen without their characteristic gas masks, to cover up any mutations or infirmities which may have developed as a result of Krieg's unusual reproduction techniques and highly radioactive environment.
Inspiration
The troops of the Death Korps of Krieg are based on the Imperial German Army of World War I and the Wehrmacht of World War II. Krieg itself is simply the German word for war.
Sources
- Codex: Imperial Guard (3rd Edition, 2nd Codex)
- Warhammer 40,000 Rulebook (5th Edition), p. 116
- Imperial Armour Volume Five - The Siege of Vraks - Part One
- Imperial Armour Volume Six - The Siege of Vraks - Part Two
- Imperial Armour Volume Seven - The Siege of Vraks - Part Three