>>724927351
Keyes maneuvers made it so the colonies and Earth itself would not be immediately raped in case of an invasion. It was a losing battle sure, but they did not immediately lose.

Reach being about a mass evac was fine, if I recall correctly, what the UNSC wanted to pull in the novel was operation red flag, they wanted to grab a prophet to start a negotiation.
What is cool about the novel is a small fragment that is essentially the bomb drop scene from H2, not sure if Fall of Reach was published before or after H2.