Facilities Occupied By Zeon During The OYW

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Gelgoog Jager
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Facilities Occupied By Zeon During The OYW

With Gundam Thunderbolt continuing unto its second season, I went to check again some old sources said about the Zeon attacks on the other Sides early during the OYW. One particular point of interest for me was the supposed capture of factories on other space colonies, some of which were even used to produce Zeon MS.

First things first, here are some quotes from Mark's site that can provide some insight of exactly what I'm talking about. To get started, there's a mention that indicates that from before their conception, MS were going to be employed to capture and guard occupied facilities:

It was determined that it would be necessary to apply the concepts of worker spacesuits in order to achieve high-level capabilities such as approach, attack, and constructing and guarding facilities after occupation.

http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/arch ... extra.html

Now some quotes that directly mention Zeon capturing some the factories from other Sides:

The guerilla operations performed by the Zaku didn't stop with simple destructive operations, but extended into many areas. Examples of these missions included the removal of pro-Federation powers from the vicinity of Side 3, the securing of supply routes, and the capture of factory plants and other production facilities belonging to other Sides.

...

The first use of Zaku forces in combat was in July of U.C. 0077, when they provided armed support for a revolution at Side 6. Going on to expand Zeon's territory on the lunar surface and capture other Sides' space factories, they continued to produce results far beyond expectations.


http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/arch ... ntury.html

After the One Week Battle, the Zeon forces began producing mobile suits and other weapons in the factory blocks of occupied colonies, and meanwhile the development of new mobile suits began back in the homeland.

http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/archive/msv1.html

The last one would imply that as new MS were developed at Side 3 and close bases (for example Granada), current/older models continued production at the captured factory blocks from space colonies at Sides 1, 2 and 4.

But here's the part I missed last time I checked:

For one week after the outbreak of war, from the occupation of the colonies to Operation British, the Zeon forces continued their violent offensive. Had a peace conference been held between the Principality of Zeon and the Earth Federation directly after the occupation of the colonies, the war might have ended at that point.

...

Only the space fleet commanded by General Revil and stationed at Side 5 had been able to counter the attacks of the Zeon forces during the outbreak of war. Thus only Side 5 had escaped Zeon occupation.


http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/archive/msv1.html

These last few paragraphs actually make it sound like Zeon not only did not destroyed the colonies on the other Sides or just captured their factory blocks, but it actually sounds like Zeon actually occupied these colonies, possibly in a similar fashion of how it occupied territories on Earth.

As it has been pointed out in other discussions, despite the claims that Zeon used nuclear weapons and GG gas indiscriminately during the war, actual animated depictions of the early events of the OYW seem to indicate otherwise: the Zaku units equipped with nuclear rounds seem to be absent altogether, to the extent that the supposed NBC protection that the MS-06C was supposed to have, which was supposed to provide some minimal degree of protection for such tactics, has been largely disregarded and instead the differences between the MS-06C and MS-06F are now largely considered to be simply minor overall improvements on the design.

On the other hand, the attacks with GG gas seems to have been limited to the colonies that were going to be used for Operation British, more specifically said to have been ordered as a gas attack that would just knock out the population of the colonies unconscious after which the Zeon soldiers would remove them from the colony and proceed with the colony drop operation (something which admittedly sounds ridiculous, but supposedly is the reason Cima's forces were shocked after carrying out the operation and realizing that they had actually killed the population).

Then there's the fact that by Zeta Gundam, the other Sides seem to have been repopulated in the span of 7 years, not to mention Quess' infamous mention of the population being 11 million by U.C. 0093, in other words, back to pre-OYW figures. Being far, we do see a couple of destroyed colonies, namely the one used for the Moon colony drop and the test target for the Argama's Hyper Mega Cannon, but comparatively speaking, these seem to be the exception rather than the rule.

Another type of facility Zeon captured in the space were lunar mass drivers:

The Zeon forces launched a two-front blitzkrieg land offensive against the Federation Forces, who were still in a state of chaos due to the colony drop. One part of this offensive was a direct invasion of North America, where the Federation Forces had sustained a devastating blow, and the other was the kind of technological guerilla warfare of which only the Zeon forces were capable. Using underground mass drivers which had been converted for military use, they carried out wide-area carpet bombing from the lunar surface onto China and the former Soviet Union.
These underground mass drivers were better protected than exposed types. Since the Federation Forces could no longer use nuclear weapons, the ground bombing continued for a long period before the mass drivers were destroyed by Federation Forces counterattacks.


http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/arch ... ntury.html

This claim seems to indicate that Zeon's presence of the Moon extended beyond Granada. While it's uncertain where these mass driver were actually located (the only one whose location could have been mentioned is the one used in Gundam 0081 for PS3), such claim would also give ground to assume that more facilities around the moon could have been captured and used for production of weapons and possibly even MS (Granada is none to have been the main production site for some MS such as the MS-06F2 and MS-09B/MS-09R).

Lastly, while California Base may be the most known production facilities for Zeon MS on Earth, I'm inclined to think that other facilities elsewhere could have been used for weapon and even MS production. Leaving aside Odessa for a moment, the best candidates are likely on the former Soviet Union territories, from which Zeon supposedly captured unfinished weapons and completed them using their technology, in a similar fashion to the submarines captured at California Base. The Dabude might be the most known of these weapons, which was built from an artillery platform prototype. IIRC, the Weasel armored car and the Gunship Heli from 08th MS teams are supposedly other examples of such captured/modified soviet designs. And as we know, some experimental weapons were built in some other minor bases, such as the Asparas and Rhinoceros.

Going back to Odessa, while I would like to consider it a candidate for being a development/production site, the lack of mentions of the EF capturing such facilities after retaking Odessa, unlike the retake of California Base, does raises some question on whether M'Quve actually pushed some weapon development at the base or rather concentrated all his efforts into mining resources for the Zeon homeland. A quote from Mark's site seems to give a nod in this direction:

This division (M'Quve corps) was made up mainly of engineering and technical units, and had few combat units.

http://www.ultimatemark.com/gundam/archive/msv2.html

Some of the few Zeon MS that were only found in Europe would include the MS-07C-3 and YMS-09J, but neither is actually said to have been developed there, rather just deployed and tested respectively. I don't know if units such as the MS-08TX/N or even the MS-07B M'Quve custom, might have at least been modified at Odessa, even if the base units were built elsewhere.

In conclusion, Zeon's grasp on space might have extended far beyond their main bases (Solomon Granada, etc.) and even on Earth captured facilities were used to increase the production capabilities of Zeon forces.

Personally, I would like to find out if MS-06J units like those from MS Igloo 2, which are purely ground units since they even lack sole thrusters, could have been produced in such captured facilities on Earth to overcome the lack of sufficient MS on all fronts. A twist such as those units skipping sole thrusters for instead incorporating rubber on their feet soles (a feature that that was meant to be implemented on the Zaku series, but which had to be discarded due to the imposed EF's trade restrictions) would be an even more interesting turn of events and would go in line with other improvements Zeon made to their military gear after landing on Earth and obtaining more resources, facilities, designs and even testing grounds.
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