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From Warhammer 40k - Lexicanum
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Von von Strab was an even worse military commander than he was a planetary governor: the poorly ordered forces he had at his disposal were quickly overrun and destroyed, and he adopted the tactic of small piecemeal attacks, which were quickly outflanked and destroyed. It was soon obvious that von Strab had underestimated the threat and cunning of the Orks.
Von von Strab had one last secret weapon, a stock of deadly [[virus bombs]] from when the planet was first colonised. When he tried to launch them, most failed due to their age, many missed their targets, some refused to lift off, and the potent virus had weakened with the passing of time. It rent giant holes in the Ork forces, but nothing close to what was needed. Von von Strab retired to his bunker to sulk and he was not seen for a long time.
→Armageddon War
===Armageddon War===
His incompetence was seen right from the very beginning of the [[Second War for Armageddon|second war]]. He was given several warnings about the potential invasion: The [[Imperial Tarot]] gave the same reading of disaster, time after time; [[Navigators]] on incoming freighters warned of a massive warp storm brewing; and the Statue of the [[Emperor]] in [[Hive Helsreach]] wept bloody tears. Von von Strab ignored them all.
Then the hulk [[Alveus Alpha Alpha Sextus]] appeared from the [[warp]] in the [[Armageddon]] system. Instead of sending ships to investigate the hulk, von Strab simply said that no piece of "cosmic flotsam" could threaten his ancestral world.
A typical aristocrat, he did only the minimum he needed to do to satisfy appearances. He complied with the standard instructions in the [[Codex Ministorum]] and notified the [[Administratum]] of the sighting, but that was all. Only after the first [[Ork]]s landed did a distress signal go out, and von Strab then banished the sender of that message, [[Commissar]] [[Yarrick]], to [[Hades Hive]]. Von Strab didn't wish to trouble the [[Imperium]] with this fight, as he was confident he could deal with the Orks himself.
One of the greatest failures for von Strab (and the worst blow to Armageddon) was the destruction of the [[Iron Skulls (Titan Legion)|Iron Skulls Titan Legion]] commanded by [[Princeps|Princeps Prime]] [[Kurtiz Mannheim]]. Von von Strab ordered the [[Titan Legion]] to battle the Orks unsupported and they were soon eradicated by the overwhelming Gargant forces. Earlier, when von Strab had relocated to [[Hive Tartarus]], Mannheim urged von Strab to prepare for invasion of [[Armageddon Secundus]], but he was ignored, proclaiming that the Orks would never breach the equatorial jungles. Two days later the Orks appeared in Armageddon Secudus, pouring from the jungles. Mannheim died when his Titan's reactor went critical, but not before he walked it to the centre of the Ork force and wiped out a huge swath of the greenskins.
Then, when the [[Space Marine]]s arrived and turned back the Ork hordes, Commander [[Dante]] of the [[Blood Angels]] took command, much to the annoyance of von Strab. He was then put under armed guard and house arrest, but escaped in a stolen [[Land Speeder]]. This was found later, badly damaged, but his body was never found. This was the last to be seen of von Strab in the Second War.
