A tribute to the might and the honour of the Imperial Navy.

The Imperial Navy is one of the armed forces of the Imperium of Man. While the Imperial Guard represents the Imperium's ground forces, the Imperial Navy is responsible for the fleets of starships that maintain order between the stars and planets in the Imperium, as well as engaging threats both inside and outside the Imperium's borders.

During the Great Crusade, both the Imperial Guard and Imperial Navy were originally a single organisation: the Imperial Army. Normally each Imperial Cruiser would have a single Imperial Army Regiment assigned to it. Commanding Officers held command over both their regiment and the warship assigned to them, making a single warship tactically flexible and minimizing the losses in the event of the loss of a starship in the Warp. During the Horus Heresy, however, it appeared that some Traitor regiments used the power of the starships at their disposal in order to forge interstellar empires for themselves in the fire of anarchy. This led to the eventual split between the Imperial Guard and the Imperial Navy, as the Emperor of Mankind himself issued a decree ordering that starships could no longer be commanded by the officers of the Imperial Guard but only by the members of their own service.

On the Imperium's worlds, the Imperial Navy is often referred to as the Holy Fleet. The Ecclesiarchy preaches that the Fleet is an extension of the Emperor and is therefore holy. This is due to the intimate relationship between the Navigators who are able to guide the fleet though the Warp using the psychic beacon emanating from the Golden Throne and the Astronomican. Whether or not the title applies to all vessels in the Imperium is unclear. The Adeptus Mechanicus would also no doubt consider the vessels themselves holy. However, this is due to their own techno-theological beliefs.

Music from the videogame Battlestations Midway, composed by richard Jacques.
Artworks mostly from devianart and the GW official website.

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