Operation Log

The First Strike on Altis | Poseidon Crisis Ep. 2

A stolen AAN press van carries an opposition strike team through an AAF checkpoint and into the attack that destroys the Northern Radar Installation.

March 28, 2026

Published

March 27, 2026

Series

The Poseidon Crisis

YouTube

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Episode Brief

Episode 2 turns the murder of an AAN news crew in Kavala into the opening move of a direct armed operation. What first appears in the reporting as a grim but still ambiguous attack is revealed here as a planned infiltration built around the stolen press van, the dead crew’s equipment, and advance coordination that makes the deception possible.

The mission follows Andreas Markakis, Niko Lykos, and an Altian Opposition Networks strike element moving toward the Northern Radar Installation under the cover of that stolen AAN vehicle. From the opening dialogue, the disguise feels unstable. Lykos criticizes the way Markakis is driving, warning him that he looks too tense and too military to pass as a tired AAN journalist. That unease sets the tone for the whole infiltration: the van may read as press from a distance, but the men inside know they are relying on performance, timing, and somebody else’s prior arrangements.

Before reaching the objective, the team is rattled by a larger-than-expected AAF presence near a house on the route. That sight almost causes the operation to turn back. Instead, they continue to the checkpoint, relying on prior coordination that had already put an AAN crew in position and left the route vulnerable to exploitation. The gamble works. The checkpoint soldiers confirm that a press team is expected, inspect the vehicle, find nothing, and wave them through. Lykos then makes clear what Markakis had only partly understood: The Turk had already arranged the conditions that made the deception viable.

Once they reach the base of the hill below the radar site, the deception begins to collapse. Markakis approaches the AAF personnel as if the interview is real, but a medic asks to see the team’s press credentials. Without a believable way through, Markakis returns to the back of the van and tells the team the attack has to start immediately. He opens the fight by throwing a grenade at the gun truck and destroying the Humvee armed with a .50 caliber weapon, after which the strike team clears the nearby AAF troops and repels reinforcements moving down from the hill.

From there, the mission becomes a full assault. As the team pushes away from the road, Lykos reveals that the van itself has been rigged with explosives to destroy evidence if necessary. The strike force then moves uphill, works around the radar position from the left rather than attacking straight into it, clears the area, plants demolition charges on the installation, and prepares to hold against the response. Additional AAF forces arrive from the same position that had worried them earlier, confirming the site was more heavily covered than anticipated. Markakis tries repeatedly to disable the incoming vehicle with anti-armor fire before finally destroying it, and the opposition force holds long enough for the charges and the van blast to complete the mission.

The escape is improvised under pressure. Rather than trying to break contact on foot, Markakis commandeers an AAF truck at the top of the hill and uses it to punch through forces still moving uphill. The surviving fighters withdraw in the captured vehicle while the installation is left destroyed behind them.

Operational Outcome

Objective completed: The Northern Radar Installation is destroyed.
Opposition losses: Five Altian Opposition Network fighters are killed and left behind during the withdrawal.
AAF losses: Roughly twelve killed, eighteen wounded, and two listed missing in the destruction at the site.
Strategic impact: The attack marks a major escalation from unrest and covert organization into a direct, organized strike against state military infrastructure.

Why It Matters

This operation gives shape to the warning signs described in AAN News Crew Killed in Kavala as Van and Equipment Vanish. The article reports a murder and a missing vehicle. The episode reveals the operational logic behind both. The stolen van is not a loose end but a tool, and the deaths in Kavala are part of the chain of events that allows the opposition to strike an AAF installation under cover of press access on the morning of April 6, 2025.

It also establishes Markakis and Lykos as central field figures in the early Poseidon Crisis. Their cell is no longer acting like a loose protest network or an improvised militant group. By the end of the episode, they have demonstrated planning, deception, anti-armor capability, evidence destruction, and the willingness to absorb casualties in exchange for a strategic blow against the Republic.