What was the Gundam Project anyway?

The Gundam Project - originally "The Gundam World" - was created by Keith Rhee, who announced it to the world on May 10, 1995 (in this historic newsgroup message). Its goal has always been to provide information about the Mobile Suit Gundam saga to help English-speaking fans better appreciate, understand, and enjoy this fascinating science fiction epic.

In the Gundam Project's early days I pitched in with story synopses and other background material, and when Keith "retired" from Gundam fandom in 1996, I took charge of the site. Rather than use scanned images of other people's art, I resolved to decorate the site with my own work, which eventually led to a multi-year project of hand-drawing dozens upon dozens of giant robots.

Alaska

Declarationon

A statement issued by the Atlantic Federation on February 7, C.E. 70, in the wake of the Tragedy of Copernicus. On behalf of all the PLANT sponsor nations, the Atlantic Federation declared that the attack on Copernicus had been carried out by the PLANTs, and amounted to a declaration of war against Earth and all Naturals. The establishment of the Earth Alliance, a new international organization to replace the defunct United Nations, was announced as part of the Alaska Declaration. Four days later, the Alliance formally declared war against the PLANTs, and the conflict began in earnest.

April Fool Crisis

On April 1, C.E. 70, ZAFT launched the Earth invasion campaign known as Operation Uroboros. As its opening move, ZAFT scattered N-Jammers across the planet's surface, disabling all nuclear powerplants and plunging Earth's nations into a severe energy crisis. This catastrophe, which led to economic collapse and mass starvation, was dubbed the April Fool Crisis.

Battle of Carpentaria

On April 2, C.E. 70, ZAFT set out to establish a terrestrial foothold by dropping the disassembled components of a military base into the friendly territory of the Oceania Union. The site of this new base was the Gulf of Carpentaria, on the northern coast of Australia. The Earth Alliance's Pacific Fleet attempted to stop the ZAFT incursion, but the Battle of Carpentaria ended in a ZAFT victory, and the construction of the Carpentaria Base was successfully completed.

Battle of Jachin Due

On April 17, C.E. 70, the Earth Alliance's 5th and 6th Fleets, dispatched from the moon to attack the PLANT homeland, were intercepted by ZAFT forces near the resource satellite Jachin Due After this first Battle of Jachin Due, the PLANT Supreme Council decided to convert the asteroid itself into a defensive base.

Battle of Victoria

On March 8, C.E. 70, ZAFT launched a hasty invasion of Earth, motivated in part by the need to secure a reliable food supply for the PLANTs (although this motive was greatly exaggerated in the Earth Alliance's reports). The target of the first orbital landing operation was the Victoria spaceport. However, since the operation lacked ground support, the first Battle of Victoria ended in a ZAFT defeat. The lessons learned from this failure inspired the PLANT Supreme Council to draft the battle plan known as Operation Uroboros.

Bloody Valentine

On February 14, C.E. 70, three days after its formal declaration of war, the Earth Alliance carried out its first attack on the PLANTs. Using nuclear missiles which had been secretly loaded aboard the mobile armor carrier Roosevelt, the Alliance forces destroyed the PLANT known as Junius Seven and massacred its 243,721 inhabitants. The Alliance subsequently claimed that Junius Seven had deliberately self-destructed, but the people of the PLANTs knew better, and the Bloody Valentine tragedy became a rallying cry for the young Coordinators who rushed to join the ZAFT forces in the wake of this horrifying act of mass murder.

Casablanca Sea Battle

Following the completion of the Carpentaria Base on May 20, C.E. 70, the ZAFT forces set out to expand their control of Earth. Two days later, a ZAFT submarine carrier fleet was dispatched to the Mediterranean region, and on May 25 this force engaged the Alliance's Mediterranean fleet in a naval battle near Casablanca. The underwater mobile suit GOOhN was introduced into combat during this first Casablanca Sea Battle, which ended in victory for the ZAFT forces. The ZAFT forces then proceeded into the Mediterranean Sea, where they began the construction of the Gibraltar base and launched a southward African offensive.

Combat Information Center (CIC)

Beneath the main bridge of the Earth Alliance warship Archangel is a secondary command center devoted to data analysis and tactical support. This Combat Information Center has dedicated stations for electronic warfare, enemy search and detection, and field support for the ship's complement of mobile suits and mobile armors. The CIC is supervised by the Archangel's deputy captain and combat commander, Natarle Badgiruel.

Coordinator

A human being whose mental and physical abilities have been enhanced through genetic engineering. Coordinators learn more quickly than normal humans, and their bodies are stronger, faster, and virtually immune to disease. Due to these differences, they have often been viewed with jealousy and mistrust by unmodified Naturals. In recent decades, a worldwide ban on genetic modification and a rising tide of anti-Coordinator sentiment have driven most of Earth's Coordinators to relocate to the orbital settlements known as PLANTs.

The genetic modifications that create a Coordinator can be performed only in the earliest stages of embryonic development. However, these genetic enhancements are then passed on to the Coordinator's children. When normal parents have their children turned into Coordinators, the children are described as first-generation Coordinators, whose own children will then be second-generation Coordinators, and so forth.

The era of the Coordinators began in the year C.E. 15, when George Glenn revealed the secret of his origins and released the necessary genetic engineering techniques onto the worldwide network. However, such genetic modification remained illegal for many years, and so the earliest Coordinators were born and raised in secret. The Coordinator boom started in earnest in C.E. 30, and came to an end with the adoption of the Torino Protocol in C.E. 55, when genetic modification was once again prohibited everywhere on Earth.

Corsica Treaty

An international treaty that governs, among other things, the treatment of civilians during wartime.

Cosmic Era (C.E.)

The new calendar adopted during the age of space exploration in which Gundam Seed takes place. The Cosmic Era calendar was adopted by the United Nations at the end of the Reconstruction War, and the final use of nuclear weapons during the Kashmir conflict was chosen to mark the first year of the new era. Simultaneously with the adoption of this new calendar, the United Nations launched a new space development program. Construction of the fourth-generation international space station Yggdrasil, which had been interrupted by the global war, resumed in C.E. 9, and the following year the foundations of the lunar city Copernicus were laid.

The story of Gundam Seed begins on January 25, C.E. 71, almost one year after the outbreak of open war between the PLANTs and the Earth Alliance.

Desert Tiger

The nickname of ZAFT commander Andrew Waltfeld, who is renowned for his tactical skill and his talent for desert warfare. Waltfeld earned this name with his accomplishments in the Suez Battle of May 30, C.E. 70.

Evidence 01

A mysterious fossil discovered by George Glenn, the first Coordinator, during his voyage to Jupiter aboard the exploration ship Tsiolkovsky. The skeleton preserved within it resembles that of a winged whale, and is seemingly proof of the existence of extraterrestrial life.

Glenn discovered Evidence 01 inside an asteroid in the vicinity of Europa, one of Jupiter's moons, in C.E. 22. Seven years later, Glenn returned to Earth with his discovery, and it was taken to the research colony Zodiac at Lagrange point 5 for intensive examination. The investigators could find no indication that the fossil was a fake and, furthermore, concluded that this creature must have possessed intelligence equal to or greater than that of a terrestrial whale. Their findings served to undermine the authority of the religious leaders who had spearheaded the opposition to genetic modification, and thus indirectly led to public acceptance of Coordinators.

After four decades of research, the origin and meaning of Evidence 01 remain unclear. The fossil itself is currently located inside the PLANT Supreme Council building at Aprilius One, the capital of the PLANTs.

GAT-X series

A line of prototype mobile suits developed by the Atlantic Federation, which bear the designation Gressorial Armament Tactical-eXperimental, the first word of which is a technical term that means "adapted for walking." The designations of the GAT-X machines indicate whether their structural frames are part of the basic X100 series, the specialized X200 series, or the transformable X300 series. These prototype machines are also referred to as Gundams, a nickname devised by Strike Gundam pilot Kira Yamato.

George Glenn

The first Coordinator. Born 16 years before the start of the Cosmic Era, George Glenn was the product of advanced genetic engineering techniques which endowed him with mental and physical abilities far beyond those of naturally born humans. By age 20, he had already been nominated for a Nobel Prize, and he went on to become an ace pilot and a star employee of the Atlantic Federation's Federal Aeronautics and Space Administration (FASA). In C.E. 15, Glenn set off on a mission to Jupiter aboard the exploration ship Tsiolkovsky, and as he departed he revealed his secret to the world and released the genetic engineering technology used to create him onto the worldwide networks.

Glenn's journey to Jupiter was to produce even further controversy. In the vicinity of the moon Europa, he discovered the fossil later known as Evidence 01, which appeared to prove the existence of extraterrestrial life. Following his return to Earth in C.E. 29, Glenn devoted himself to the study of this fossil at the research colony Zodiac, and in C.E. 38 he announced a new concept for space colony construction which was used to create the PLANTs. In C.E. 53, Glenn was assassinated by a young Natural who was angry that he hadn't been born a Coordinator, an event which further increased the gulf of suspicion and distrust between Naturals and Coordinators.

Grimaldi Front

On May 3, C.E. 70, ZAFT launched an offensive whose ultimate target was the Earth Alliance's Ptolemaeus lunar base. The moon was soon divided into ZAFT and Alliance territory, with the boundary between the two marked by the Grimaldi Crater, and the lunar frontline was thus known as the Grimaldi Front.

Skirmishing continued along the Grimaldi Front for roughly a month, culminating in a fierce battle at the Endymion Crater, the site of a major Alliance resource base. The Alliance forces ultimately used a Cyclops System to destroy their own base, wiping out friend and foe alike. The Alliance's 3rd Fleet was destroyed in this battle, along with its elite mobile armor corps, while the ZAFT forces sustained losses so severe that they were forced to abandon the Grimaldi Front and withdraw from the moon.

Both sides sought to salvage individual tales of heroism from their losses in the Endymion Crater battle. Mu La Flaga, the only survivor of the 3rd Fleet's elite Moebius Zero mobile armor corps, was acclaimed as the "Hawk of Endymion" for shooting down five GINN mobile suits. And Rau Le Creuset of ZAFT, then commander of the Laurasia-class frigate Galvani, was rewarded for his accomplishments by being placed in command of the newly constructed Nazca-class destroyer Vesalius.

Gundam

A nickname for the advanced GAT-X series mobile suits developed by the Atlantic Federation. Kira Yamato creates this name when he reads the words "General Unilateral Neuro-link Dispersive Autonomic Maneuver system" on the Strike Gundam's startup screen, but other Atlantic Federation personnel simply use the codename "G" to refer to these mobile suits. Though the five prototype Gundams developed at the resource satellite Heliopolis vary greatly in their armament and abilities, they all share certain key features, notably their projectile-resistant Phase Shift Armor.

Habilis

A mass driver facility located at the Victoria spaceport in eastern Africa. The Habilis mass driver was jointly developed by the Eurasian Republic and the South African Union.

Hawk of Endymion

The nickname of Earth Alliance ace pilot Mu La Flaga, which is echoed by the white feather that serves as his personal emblem. Mu earned this title by shooting down five GINN mobile suits during the final battle of the Grimaldi Front, which took place around the moon's Endymion Crater. This battle also left Mu as the last survivor of the Alliance's elite Moebius Zero mobile armor corps.

Kaguya

A mass driver facility owned and operated by the Orb Union. The Kaguya mass driver is anchored to a small island to the northeast of Onogoro, and extends for roughly 50 kilometers over open water.

The name Kaguya is borrowed from a princess in Japanese mythology who was raised on Earth and then departed for the moon.

Lagrange point

An area of gravitational stability created by the interactions of a planet and its satellite. These points are named after Joseph Louis Lagrange, the 18th-century mathematician who first predicted their existence. There are five such regions in the Earth-moon system, referred to as L1 through L5, which make ideal sites for space colonies. [See Map of Space]

In the Cosmic Era, the largest clusters of space colonies are located at L4 and L5, which lie along the moon's orbital path, 60 degrees to either side of the moon itself. These regions are more stable than L1, L2, and L3, which respectively lie in front of, behind, and 180 degrees opposite the moon.

Mandelbrot Incident

In C.E. 68, the PLANT Supreme Council formally decided to seek political autonomy and economic independence, and made secret arrangements with the United States of South America and the Oceania Union to exchange manufactured goods for vital food supplies. That same year, a cargo convoy carrying food from South America to the PLANTs was destroyed, claiming the lives of hundreds of Coordinators. This event, referred to as the Mandelbrot Incident after one of the vessels involved, further increased tensions between the PLANTs and their disgruntled sponsor nations, and led to the reorganization of ZAFT into a military force.

Natural

A naturally born human being, who has not undergone the process of genetic enhancement that creates Coordinators. In the Cosmic Era, genetic engineering is also used to correct hereditary genetic defects, but people who have merely received this kind of corrective modification are considered to be Naturals rather than true Coordinators. For the most part Naturals regard Coordinators with envy and resentment, and these attitudes have led to widespread persecution - and, in some cases, radical anti-Coordinator activities like those of the terror group Blue Cosmos.

Operation Uroboros

The Earth invasion campaign launched by ZAFT in the early stages of the war. The operation plan, devised on March 15, C.E. 70, had three major objectives - securing military bases on Earth's surface, trapping the Alliance forces on Earth by capturing the spaceports and mass driver facilities located around the planet's equator, and scattering N-Jammers around the planet to prevent the use of nuclear weapons and cut off supplies of fission energy.

Operation Uroboros began on April 1, C.E. 70, with the mass deployment of N-Jammers across the planet's surface. The following day ZAFT forces descended to Earth and laid the foundations of the Carpentaria Base. However, the operation's remaining objective proved harder to achieve, and at the start of C.E. 71 the ZAFT forces are still striving to capture or destroy the Alliance's remaining equatorial spaceports at Kaohsiung, Victoria, and Panama.

Order of the Nebula

A decoration awarded to ZAFT's most outstanding soldiers. Rau Le Creuset was awarded this honor after the Yggdrasil battle on February 22, C.E. 70, in which he used his GINN mobile suit to destroy 37 mobile armors and six warships.

Porta Panama

A mass driver facility located at the Panama spaceport in Central America. The Porta Panama mass driver was jointly developed by the Atlantic Federation and the United States of South America.

Productive
Location
Ally on
Nexus
Technology
(PLANT)

A new type of space settlement, created chiefly by Coordinators. Roughly 120 of these constructs are gathered at Lagrange point 5, a gravitationally stable area in Earth orbit, and these settlements have become a new homeland for Coordinators fleeing the persecution they experienced on Earth. As their name suggests, the PLANTs were created to serve as research and manufacturing sites, but their unique design also enables them to recreate a lush natural environment, with abundant vegetation and open water.

These hourglass-style structures consist of two disc-shaped living areas, each ten kilometers in diameter, which rotate around a central hub to produce artificial gravity. Each living area is anchored to the hub by a 30-kilometer central shaft and a network of high-tension strings, and a high-speed elevator runs up the central shaft to provide access to the hub. A set of external mirrors, attached to the central hub, are used to reflect sunlight into the inner surfaces of the living areas.

The PLANTs are grouped into twelve sectors, or "cities," each with its own scientific or industrial specialty. These cities are named after the months of the Roman calendar, and each is made up of roughly ten individual PLANT settlements, which are referred to as Januarius One, Januarius Two, and so forth.

The construction of the PLANTs began in C.E. 38, with funding supplied by the Atlantic Federation, the Eurasian Federation, and the Republic of East Asia. The PLANT settlements were initially managed by a directorate controlled by these sponsor nations, but in C.E. 53 their inhabitants formed a PLANT Supreme Council to represent them in their dealings with the directorate. With the start of open hostilities between the PLANTs and the Earth Alliance in C.E. 70, the PLANTs effectively became an independent nation, governed solely by the Supreme Council.

Reconstruction War

At the end of the A.D. era, the exhaustion of Earth's petroleum resources and worsening environmental pollution brought about a worldwide economic collapse. The world's nations formed economic blocs, dividing the planet into a handful of major powers. Increasing ethnic and religious strife soon led to a third world war, known as the Reconstruction War, in which the world's nations were merged and reorganized. The conflict continued to escalate until nuclear weapons were employed on the frontlines of central Asia's Kashmir region. The resulting shock motivated the combatants to resolve their conflicts peacefully, and the Reconstruction War eventually came to an end in the year C.E. 9.

space colony

An artificial structure which reproduces Earth-like living conditions in space. Simulated gravity is produced by the rotation of the colony, which generates a powerful centrifugal force across its inner walls. Since these colonies are floating in Earth orbit, outside the planet's gravity well, their inhabitants can travel to and from other celestial bodies without expending large amounts of energy.

There are several different types of space colony, including older models like the resource satellite Heliopolis, a massive cylinder which relies on a central axial shaft to provide structural support. Many such colonies were constructed at Lagrange points 3 and 4, but they were eventually rendered obsolete by the new PLANT settlements, and most of these older colonies were destroyed in the early months of the war.

Suez Battle

On May 30, C.E. 70, ZAFT and Earth Alliance forces met in battle at El Alamein, in northern Africa. The ZAFT forces were hard-pressed by a massive Eurasian Republic tank corps but, thanks to their BuCUE mobile suits and the cunning tactics of Andrew Waltfeld, this Suez Battle ended in a ZAFT victory.

Torino Protocol

An international agreement adopted in C.E. 55, in the wake of George Glenn's assassination and the Type S2 influenza outbreak, which prohibited genetic modification anywhere on Earth.

Type S influenza

A new strain of the influenza virus which appeared during the last years of the A.D. calendar. Together with the destruction of the Reconstruction War, this disease produced massive casualties, and its later reappearance in the form of the Type S2 strain caused worldwide panic.

Type S2 influenza

A mutant form of the Type S influenza virus, immune to all existing vaccines, which appeared in C.E. 54. Rumors quickly spread that the Type S2 virus was created by Coordinators as revenge for the assassination of George Glenn a year earlier, while religious authorities claimed it was divine punishment for humanity's genetic tampering. The Type S2 outbreak once again turned public opinion against genetic modification, leading to the adoption of the Torino Protocol and increased anti-Coordinator sentiments.

A vaccine for the Type S2 virus was developed at the end of C.E. 55, thanks to the scientists of the Februarius City PLANTs. Even though it was the Coordinators who brought an end to the plague, public opinion remained hostile, and those Coordinators who still remained on Earth began leaving for the relative safety of the PLANTs.

8th Fleet

An Earth Alliance space fleet stationed at the Ptolemaeus lunar base. The 8th Fleet is led by Admiral Lewis Halberton, the primary proponent of the Gundam development project, who commands the fleet from his flagship Menelaos.

African Community

An economic and military cooperative formed by the nations of the northern half of the African continent. Friendly to the PLANTs and hostile to the Earth Alliance, the African Community is now effectively ZAFT territory. Nonetheless, a handful of local resistance groups, like the Desert Dawn group based in the Libyan desert, continue to fight a guerilla war against the ZAFT occupation.

Atlantic Federation

This nation is the dominant power in the Earth Alliance, and the creator of the Archangel and the prototype Gundams. Before the war, the Atlantic Federation was the most influential of the sponsor nations which funded the construction of the PLANTs and then forced their Coordinator inhabitants into economic bondage. When the leadership of the United Nations was wiped out by a terror attack at the lunar city of Copernicus, the Atlantic Federation took the lead in organizing the Earth Alliance and issuing a declaration of war against the PLANTs.

The Atlantic Federation was originally formed from the nations of Britain and North America, but its territory now includes all of Central and South America as well, since the independent United States of South America was annexed by the Earth Alliance at the start of the war against the PLANTs. Its major military base, the JOSH-A facility in Alaska, doubles as the headquarters of the Earth Alliance forces.

Blue Cosmos

The most radical of the anti-Coordinator activist groups formed by resentful Naturals. According to the Blue Cosmos ideology, genetic modification is a violation of the natural order, and all Coordinators must be exterminated "for the preservation of our blue and pure world."

Blue Cosmos was originally an environmental pressure group, but after the revelation of George Glenn's secret in C.E. 15, the organization launched a campaign of terror and assassination against Coordinators and the medical professionals who were working to create them. It is believed that the group is supported by the Azrael Conglomerate, a powerful industrial concern which is one of the Atlantic Federation's major military contractors.

Desert Dawn

A resistance group based in northern Africa, in modern-day Libya, which fights against the ZAFT forces who have effectively taken control of the African Community. The group is led by the grizzled guerilla fighter Sahib Ashman, and its members are recruited from local towns like Tassil and Moula, as well as the city of Banadiya.

Earth Alliance

An international coalition formed by the PLANT sponsor nations and their terrestrial allies to battle the forces of ZAFT. The Earth Alliance is not a single political entity, but rather a collaboration between several individual nations, which regard each other as potential adversaries even though they are currently united against a common foe. The dominant powers within the Earth Alliance are the Atlantic Federation, the Eurasian Federation, and the Republic of East Asia, all three of which invested heavily in the construction of the PLANTs. The South African Union and the United States of South America are junior partners in the Alliance, with the latter having been forcibly annexed by the Atlantic Federation at the start of the war.

The Earth Alliance was formally established on February 7, C.E. 70, two days after final negotiations between the PLANTs and the sponsor nations were disrupted by a terror bombing at the lunar city of Copernicus. The Alliance was created as a successor to the former United Nations, whose leadership was wiped out in the Copernicus attack, and like its predecessor it's nominally an international organization headed by a moderate secretary-general. However, in practice it's little more than a military alliance dominated by the Atlantic Federation and its fellow PLANT sponsor nations.

The Alliance is headquartered at the JOSH-A base in Alaska. At the beginning of C.E. 71 its other major strongholds include the Kaohsiung spaceport in Taiwan, the Panama spaceport in Central America, the Victoria spaceport in eastern Africa, and the Ptolemaeus lunar base.

Equatorial Union

An economic union made up of several equatorial nations in Southeast Asia. Each member of the Equatorial Union follows its own independent course where military and diplomatic matters are concerned, and although the union itself is neutral in the current conflict, its member nations have economic dealings with both the PLANTs and the Earth Alliance.

Eurasian Federation

One of the leading powers within the Earth Alliance, this nation is a longtime rival, and now uneasy ally, of the Atlantic Federation. Originally formed from the nations of Europe and northern Asia, the Eurasian Federation is governed by a federal council dominated by the nations of the European region. Among its strategic assets is the space fortress Artemis, located at Lagrange point 3.

Kingdom of Scandinavia

One of Earth's smaller neutral nations. This is the birthplace of PLANT Supreme Council chairman Siegel Clyne.

Martius Arsenals (MA)

A company based in the PLANTs of Martius City which develops and produces weapons for the ZAFT forces. MA is the creator of the heavy swords used by the GINN and CGUE, and later goes on to reproduce the beam sabers and beam rifles used by the Earth Alliance's prototype Gundams for use by ZAFT's own mobile suits.

Maius Military Industries (MMI)

A company based in the PLANTs of Maius City, where the GINN was first placed into production, which develops and produces weapons for the ZAFT forces. MMI specializes in machine guns, railguns, and Close-In Weapons Systems (CIWS).

Morgenroete, Inc.

A semi-nationalized munitions company based in the Orb Union, which also maintains facilities at the resource satellite Heliopolis. Although its primary clients are the armed forces of the neutral nation Orb, Morgenroete has been secretly collaborating with the Atlantic Federation on its Gundam development project and on the construction of the warship Archangel. On January 20, C.E. 71, five prototype Gundam mobile suits are rolled out at the company's Heliopolis factory, and five days later the facility is attacked by ZAFT commandos, drawing Kira Yamato and his friends into the conflict.

Oceania Union

A union whose territory encompasses the Australian continent and its neighboring nations. Since it wasn't one of the sponsor nations that profited from the economic exploitation of the PLANTs, the Oceania Union was quick to ally itself with them as tensions increased between the PLANTs and their terrestrial sponsors. In C.E. 68 the Oceania Union agreed to covertly exchange shipments of food and manufactured goods with the PLANTs, and on February 20, C.E. 70, it formally declared its support for the PLANTs in their struggle against the Earth Alliance. The Oceania Union went on to host the Carpentaria Base, ZAFT's first terrestrial stronghold.

Oppose
Militancy &
Neutralize
Invasion
Enforcer
(OMNI Enforcer)
 

The formal name of the Earth Alliance's military forces, which are more commonly referred to as the Earth Alliance Forces, or simply Earth Forces.

Orb Union

An island nation in the southern Pacific Ocean, which possesses considerable industrial and military power despite its small size and lack of natural resources. Its assets include high technology, an abundant supply of geothermal energy thanks to its numerous active volcanoes, and a policy of nondiscrimination against Coordinators which has enriched Orb's talent pool. The Orb Union also has its own mass driver and controls its own space colony, the resource satellite Heliopolis.

In Orb's complex political system, power is shared between an elected assembly and representatives of the five noble families who originally ruled over the islands. Its chief representative, Uzumi Nara Athha, declared the nation neutral at the beginning of the current conflict. However, there are policy disagreements among the noble families, and some of them are secretly assisting the Atlantic Federation with its Gundam development project in order to borrow its technology for Orb's own armed forces.

PLANT
Supreme Council

The executive committee which governs the PLANTs and controls the ZAFT forces. The dozen members of this supreme council serve as elected representatives of the twelve sectors, or "cities," into which the PLANTs are grouped. The council itself meets at Aprilius One, the administrative capital of the PLANTs.

Each member of the council is assigned to one of its five specialized committees - Administrative, Diplomatic, Judicial, Legislative, or National Defense. Each of these committees has its own chairman, and the overall council is currently chaired by Siegel Clyne. The council is also divided along political lines, with a roughly even split between radicals who seek to escalate the war, and moderates who hope to end the conflict through negotiation. At the beginning of C.E. 71, the council's membership is as follows:

Republic of East Asia

The third major power within the Earth Alliance. Along with the Atlantic Federation and Eurasian Federation, the Republic of East Asia was one of the primary sponsors of the PLANT construction project. Though its political influence is no match for that of the Alliance's leading powers, its large population gives it a high industrial production capacity. Originally made up of the modern-day nations of China, Japan, and Korea, the Republic of East Asia encompasses much of the Asian region.

South African Union

The fourth member of the Earth Alliance is a collective formed by the nations of southern Africa. Unlike the Alliance's other member nations, the South African Union was not a sponsor of the PLANT construction project, and thus has no economic stake in the conflict. Instead, its participation in the war appears to have been motivated by its antagonism towards the PLANT-aligned African Community. However, the South African Union has fared badly in the fighting, and is now in the process of dropping out.

United States of South America

A nation which formerly controlled much of Central and South America, and collaborated with the Atlantic Federation in the construction of the Porta Panama mass driver. Before the outbreak of war, the United States of South America had aligned itself with the PLANTs and made arrangements to covertly exchange shipments of food and manufactured goods, and it refused to join the Earth Alliance once open hostilities began. On February 19, C.E. 70, Alliance forces launched an armed invasion of this nation, and its territory was annexed by the Atlantic Federation.

Zodiac
Alliance of
Freedom
Treaty
(ZAFT)

The military forces of the PLANTs. ZAFT is a militia made up of civilian volunteers, and the organization has no formal rank structure, so its members are instead addressed by descriptive titles like "commander" and "captain." The ZAFT forces are organized into independent teams named after their commanders, and much like the modern-day U.S. Marines these teams can operate equally well on land, at sea, in air, or in outer space. Since ZAFT's membership is made up of genetically enhanced Coordinators, its forces are more than a match for the numerically superior Earth Alliance.

ZAFT was originally a political organization called the Zodiac Alliance, which was founded in C.E. 50 by Siegel Clyne and Patrick Zala. The Zodiac Alliance took on its present name in C.E. 65, and three years later it was reorganized to become an explicitly military organization equipped with the revolutionary new weapons known as mobile suits. The ZAFT forces are currently subject to the authority of the PLANT Supreme Council, and report directly to the National Defense Committee chaired by Patrick Zala.

Back • Home • Next