The Griffons too, had been planning. Operation Diarchy [Overlord was taken, and "Operation murder some ponies, nuke Canterlot and T-bag the princesses" was too long and obvious.] would go forth.

With an extensive spy network behind them, they managed to even find out when the Equestrian commanders needed to pick up their kids from flute lessons, and if they knew that, they would certainly know the best place to attack. And the best place to attack was the St. Hoofman harbor. This was no beach, and nobody in his right mind would attack. It was the muster point of the Equestrian navy, and anything that even attempted to come in would be obliterated by thousands of tonnage in ordnance. But despite that, this was the best place to invade.

Clearly their intel was just plain wrong. What was the second best place to attack?

Ah yes, the beautiful island city of Manehatten. It would be yet another months long, bloody battle of Stalliongrad, and that was JUST what EVERYBODY needed. What was the third place?

HORSESHOE BAY? Nobody in right in the head would attack there! It's LITERALLY RIGHT NEXT TO BALTIMARE! Like I said, just EVERYBODY needed a repeat of Stalliongrad! Right?

Well, it turns out that Baltimare and the surrounding area was almost COMPLETELY unfortified, other than the usual bunkers and [Please, dear god, please, somebody find a pun name for this, I know you're out there.] Czech hedgehogs. This was where they would attack.

Now, how could they convince Canterlot that they were aiming for the other two?

Well, first they bribed every single high ranking Equestrian counterespionage officers to their side that they could. What's the destruction of your motherland for a few bucks? Then, with this vast network of bribed officials, they told them all to go look at how undefended and helpless Manehatten was. They oughta look into that!

And when they did, SOMEBODY "Leaked" that there would be a diversionary attack at Horseshoe bay, but the REAL attacks would be at Manehatten and St. Hoofman. The counterespionage was HORRIFIED! Even the non-bribed were fooled! This HAD to be reported to Canterlot!

So, NOW there was no need to create fancy diversions and tricks and film reels for Equestria to "capture", because, hey, if you got a legion of bribed, stupid, bad at their job spies, all believeing what you want the to believe, and no scouts coming within eyeshot of your coast to disprove it, you have GOT IT MADE!

But this wouldn't prevent them from fortifying Horseshoe bay. There would be an attack, however diversionary, there. So, to lull the Equestrians into a false sense of security, they made a rather large hurricane that would "Surely" prevent the Griffons from crossing for another month. This was just not the case, and it was much weaker than it first appeared, and had to be supplied clouds just to keep running, even over water. This could be easily detected as a fraud, so they made sure to tamper with the Equestrian weather equipment, although some were worried that whacking them with a large wrench several times crossed the line from "Covert sabotage" to "Demolition". And so, with no flyers coming within AA range, and the Equestrians thinking they had some downtime, they managed to assemble the largest foreign Invasion force IN THE WORLD, much less to ever set foot in Equestria. So, all this managed to delay the Equestrian counter-espionage.

And what a delay it was! First, the officers marched straight into Canterlot and had a Pegasus fly right up to Celestia's window, with a note requesting more budget for troops and defenses, then a note, reminding her of the first one. They debated hotly for a few hours as to whether or not to send a third note reminding her of the second, but this was shot down. SURELY she wouldn't be stupid enough to forget it when it was LITERALLY DELIVERED TO HER ON A SILVER PLATTER.

*Cough Cough*

Anyways, a minute passed, then an hour, then several. Then, at midnight, a messenger with a note:

"We're sorry, but we have been unable to process your letter at this time. Please write again later."

So, pissed off at getting a half-assed response from Canterlot, they tried again. This time with a four-pony team carrying a 20 pound bag up into the air and shoving it through Celestia's balcony. Inside the bag were HUNDREDS of copies of the same note. This time, they didn't even get A response. They tried over and over. They tried paper airplanes, they tried carpet bombing the note all over Canterlot, they tried to force their way into the court [No luck, Imperial Guard answers only to Equestrian Intelligence Service (EIS), not Counter-Espionage, and nobody was in anyways.], they tried to write it in the sky, they tried to write in on the ground, they tried the John Cusack method, where they loudly played a boombox outside her balcony and tried to shout it to her, and they even enlisted the help of the mane six, but evidently Celestia only responds to letters involving friendship.

And then, the Diarchy left on vacation. And the Canterlot Nobles [Who were in charge until the princesses returned] happened to not like the commander of Counter-Espionage, and they would REFUSE to cooperate with him. There would not be more mines on the beaches for a while.

And the griffons had assembled quite a force. Engineers, Shock troopers, Marines, Airborne [A large component of their invasion], Infantry, Mechanized, Armor, Artillery, and Sleeper cells within Equestria were all prepared for the attack. This was almost every single soldier in Gryphgen, ready for invasion, and that's not to COUNT the Zebrakin [From the East] Draconian [From the Southeast],Changeling [From the South], and Saddle Arabian [From the South] that had all queued up to kick Equestria's ass. This would surely be the end of Equestria, if the invasion was completely unprepared for.

Sadly for the griffons, It's allies had not been so careful at being secretive in their preparations.

Author's Note

Next time on the Equestrian History channel: Preparations [Part three]