Second Battle of Earth

"Sir, finishing this fight."

- SPARTAN-117

The Second Battle of Earth was a massive Covenant and United Nations Space Command ground, air and space engagement on Earth. It was the second-to-last major battle in the Human-Covenant War.

Background
The Second Battle of Earth is the follow up to the Prophet of Regret's first attack on Earth and Mombasa, Kenya, The First Battle of Earth. It has only been seen as a brief cut scene where the Forerunner Ship exits Slipspace and the Master Chief declares that he is going to "finish the fight." UNSC and Covenant forces appear heavily engaged, though ironically are represented as just large blue and yellow-white explosions above Earth in the cutscene when the Forerunner Ship arrives at Earth (though this is possibly more realistic than actually seeing any ships fighting, as one would hardly be able to see them from the hundreds of kilometers away as depicted). Therefore numbers and details are impossible to currently determine. However, it is apparent that Cairo Station is still intact and Fleet Admiral Hood is still in command of all UNSCDF forces. Considering that he ordered the forces to simply "take out" the Forerunner Ship, the humans probably weren't losing the battle yet.

During the Second Battle of Earth
Ghosts of Onyx expanded on the battle, which was stated to have been going on for two weeks during the Master Chief's disappearance. Spartans 104, 043 and 058 had been conducting commando strikes against the Covenant. These operations included numerous operations in orbit around Earth, stopping a Covenant invasion on Mount Erebus in Antarctica with a HAVOK tactical nuke and stopping Covenant forces on the sea floor off of the Yucatan peninsula. Following these ops, they were deployed to the Centennial Orbital Elevator (also known as Tallo Negro del Maiz) in Havana, Cuba to stop Covenant forces that had gathered around the orbital elevator. They then stopped the Covenant forces, who had captured multiple nuclear warheads, before they could ascend the orbital elevator. The Spartans then ascended the orbital elevator themselves and in the process destroyed one of the Covenant capital ships at the top of the elevator. The three Spartans then left the battle in another Covenant capital ship called the Bloodied Spirit on orders by Fleet Admiral Hood to aid Dr. Catherine Halsey on Onyx.

In the wake of the Flood infestation of High Charity, part of eastern Africa on Earth was overrun by the depleted, but still dangerous Covenant Loyalists. Miranda Keyes explained that after what is assumed to be a protracted battle, the Covenant was able to overcome UNSC defenses. Parts of Eastern Africa were glassed from orbit resulting in 'extreme' military and civilian causalities. In spite of these losses, there were enough significant pockets of UNSC forces in eastern Africa to challenge the Covenant occupiers in space and on the ground, until the Elites arrived with reinforcements. The remaining Covenant forces eventually withdrew from Earth in order to secure the Ark.

UNSC

 * Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood
 * Colonel James Ackerson
 * Commander Miranda Keyes (dead)
 * Commander Richard Lash
 * Lieutenant Commander Julian Waters
 * Lieutenant Commander Xaing Cho
 * Lieutenant Bethany Durruno
 * Lieutenant Joe Yang
 * Lieutenant Junior Grade SPARTAN Fred-104
 * Master Chief Petty Officer SPARTAN John-117 (MIA)
 * Sergeant Major Avery J. Johnson (dead)
 * Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker
 * Gunnery Sergeant Reynolds
 * Petty Officer Second Class SPARTAN Linda-058
 * Petty Officer Second Class SPARTAN Will-043
 * Corporal Benjamín M. Nùñez
 * Lindemuth

Covenant Separatists

 * Arbiter
 * Rtas 'Vadum
 * N'tho 'Sraom
 * Usze 'Taham

Covenant Loyalists

 * High Prophet of Truth (dead)
 * Jiralhanae Chieftain Lepidus

Flood

 * Gravemind(dead)

Forerunner

 * 343 Guilty Spark (destroyed)

Trivia

 * According to a screen viewing a map of Earth, the Covenant have landed in north eastern America, in northern and southern France, a single fleet in South America and one in Germany and several others in Africa.