GM numbers and Federation military structure

[Sulendil Zeta]

We talked a lot of Zaku and Zeon, but I do wonder about Federation's grunt MS: GM. How much of it was created in OYW? And does the newly released MG GM 2.0 told us any new info?

I'm also interested of how Federation military structure is. How they organized their MS forces?

[ORegan]

If you go by this topic, third reply, each fleet of ships has 4 squadrons, with 4 ships to a squadron. Each fleet also has a MS battalion made of 4 companies, with 4 teams making a company, with 3 MS to a team.

Though, as Queen Mark points out in the same post, it's to justify the large numbers in Entertainment Bible 39, so it may not actually be like this overall.

[toysdream]

I love this kind of topic, so forgive me if I go on a bit.

The oldest info on production numbers, which is still quoted in all the modern publications, comes from Mobile Suit Variation 3:

42 units of the RGM-79 were produced at Jaburo as a first production model. These are normally called the early type, and were used to organize the first teams. A version with slight changes to details such as armor materials was then produced at six production sites, including Jaburo and the California Base, and 288 units were produced by the end of the war. These are called the later type or combat type.

That gives us a grand total of 330 GM units, which seems surprisingly small even before we start comparing it to other sources that use vastly greater numbers. (For example, Entertainment Bible 39 has the Federation deploying 5200 mobile suits in the Battle of Solomon alone.) It's also pretty teeny compared to the number of Balls, which has been generally accepted as 1200 units ever since that number was stated in Gundam Century.

The most recent sources, such as the MG GM Ver. 2.0 kit manual, try to fudge this by suggesting that these numbers don't include "pre-production machines and custom types" or machines produced at unregistered sites, and that the true "total production run" of the GM series is hard to determine and probably much larger. Nonetheless, they keep clinging to the old MSV numbers, because nobody ever lets go of outdated info in Gundam-land.

We also have numbers for a few spinoffs and variants of the RGM-79. There are said to be more than 50 units of the pre-production RGM-79(G), 58 units of the RGC-80 GM Cannon, and about 50 units combined of the GM Sniper Custom and GM Light Armor (which are converted from standard GMs).


As for organization, the MSV kit manuals originally claimed that the Federation's mobile suit forces were organized into teams of five (just like the final complement of the White Base). This suggests a company of three teams (15 mobile suits) and a battalion of three companies (45 mobile suits), and the original MG GM kit manual included an org chart using exactly this scheme, with one battalion assigned to each fleet.

Although the 15-unit company shows up in quite a lot of novels and publications, it seems hard to square with the animation, or the fact that the animation shows the Federation's warships carrying four mobile suits apiece in their cargo bays. It might be more reasonable to assume that each company consists of four teams of four, with one team carried aboard each ship of the squadron, for a total of 16 GM-type mobile suits. Fifteen, sixteen, what's the difference?

When it comes down to it, though, a lot of this fancy organization tends to fall apart in the heat of battle. During the battles of Solomon and A Baoa Qu, the Federation's mobile suits are divided into GM companies and Ball companies, but by the time they reach the surface of the asteroid fortress they've banded together into assorted mobs of surviving machines that charge ahead willy-nilly.

-- Mark

[domtropen]

Is there any update on the number of Luna II's RGM-79C during OYW? In the past discussions it is said that there might be hundreds built.

[toysdream]

Is there any update on the number of Luna II's RGM-79C during OYW? In the past discussions it is said that there might be hundreds built.

Nope, nothing that I've seen. As I recall, MS Igloo has them reaching the battlefield just in time for the Battle of A Baoa Qu, and it's possible that somebody could do a headcount of the last couple of Igloo episodes and see what kind of ratio of standard GMs to C types is being suggested...

-- Mark

[Gelgoog Jager]

IIRC, by the end of the war the entire Federation space force was reorganized into 3 fleets: Luna II's, Revil's and Tianem's. Since the GM Kai was built at Luna II, could this mean that all or at least most of the MS of the Luna II fleet are RGM-79C?

I also agree that the Federation seems to center their forces in groups of 4 (4 units = 1 team, 4 teams = 1 company, etc.) rather than 3 or 5. Before deploying MS, tank teams are made up 4 units, as shown in MS Igloo 2. When they first deployed MS, they usually sent 3 MS and a Hovertruck, which probably took the spot of the 4th MS since there were few MS available.

Take Kojima's batallion for example:

They received 24 MS, which were only enough to form 6 teams of 4 MS, but by including the Hovertrucks, we have 8 teams of 4 units each, which could make up 2 companies.

Then, we also have examples of some MS teams after the war moved back to space, and Federation MS were more available:

The Scarlet Team from was composed of 8 MS which might have been divided in 2 teams.

And unless I've misundertood, the inmortal team was also made up of 4 MS during the One Year War: Lt Burning and the other 3 guys that arrived as reinforcements to go after Gato.

In MS Igloo we actually see many teams of 3 units, either Balls or GMs, but many of these teams seem to be newly formed and most of them are from before the Federation began sending their fleets to space, so this could be an attempt to stretch their available units, unitl the main force arrives or Luna II has produced more units.

There's another case of 2 Salamis carrying 6 Balls while on patrol on the moon. One Ball pilot mentions that many of their guys arrived the previous day. Considering that they had no MS and actually carried their 6 Balls in 2 Salamis, which each had 6 racks for Balls (total capacity 12), I wouldn't be surprised if they were unable to get enough units to complete their teams.

Also, if this fleet was meant to only carry 6 Balls, they could have swapped the parts of the other Salamis, removing the Ball racks and placing back the 6th main gun and the 6-tube missile launchers, to give it back its regular firepower. They would need any extra edge considering that it would be far more likely for them to run into Zeon MS, than being lucky enough to run into Zeon's only Mobile Pod using fleet .

[Gelmax]

The discrepancies from what sources say about how the MS forces were organized and how they were generally grouped in animation seem to originate from several differences between the sources and what we actually saw. First of all, space forces suffered from insufficient carrying capacity - other than the few Pegasus-class vessels, the only ship the Federation had capable of carrying a full 5 mobile suits during the OYW was the Columbus-class transport, while under the Vinson Plan, Salamis-class vessels held 3 MS and Magellans seem to have held 4. Additionally, it's often unclear how special-purpose units were counted into the organization (for example, using the example of the Kojima Battalion given above - where did the Guntanks come in? Were they organized into a MS team?), and this universal organization probably didn't apply to special groups and task forces like the Scarlet Team as it seems to apply mostly to large groups such as fleets.

That said, it's hard to verify because the utter chaos of the late OYW made it utterly impossible to reliably implement any kind of large-scale organization - it's entirely possible that whatever organization scheme was decided on during the war was never actually implemented on a large scale until after the war ended, when they finally had both the numbers and the time to worry about such things.

[mcred23]

while under the Vinson Plan, Salamis-class vessels held 3 MS and Magellans seem to have held 4.

Minor nitpick, but both Vinson Plan Salamis and Magellan class ships could carry four MS in their internal hangers.

Additionally, it's often unclear how special-purpose units were counted into the organization (for example, using the example of the Kojima Battalion given above - where did the Guntanks come in? Were they organized into a MS team?)

Well, Kojima Battalion's organization has always been fairly clear: The two MS companies (Accounting for their 24 RX-79[G] and RGM-79[G] units, as well as their Hovertrucks) and an anti-MS infantry infantry company. All the other units, namely the GM Snipers and Guntanks, only appear when other units are obviously involved, and they don't appear to be a part of Kojima Battalion at all. Rather, they seem to be some other unit under Ryar's command, and are just working with Kojima Battalion for obvious reasons.

[toysdream]

IIRC, by the end of the war the entire Federation space force was reorganized into 3 fleets: Luna II's, Revil's and Tianem's. Since the GM Kai was built at Luna II, could this mean that all or at least most of the MS of the Luna II fleet are RGM-79C?

My impression is that the MSV books, which gave us this three-fleet breakdown, are using "Luna II fleet" to refer to Wakkein's fleet which spearheads the attack on Solomon. In that case, it would appear to be using regular RGM-79 units, but I suppose this could always be retconned somewhere down the line.

In MS Igloo we actually see many teams of 3 units, either Balls or GMs, but many of these teams seem to be newly formed and most of them are from before the Federation began sending their fleets to space, so this could be an attempt to stretch their available units, unitl the main force arrives or Luna II has produced more units.

Not to mention that MS Igloo marches to its own drummer in many respects. The creators seem to love those three-man teams, so three-man teams we get. I suppose we could rationalize this by saying that they later switched to teams of four based on combat experience...

First of all, space forces suffered from insufficient carrying capacity - other than the few Pegasus-class vessels, the only ship the Federation had capable of carrying a full 5 mobile suits during the OYW was the Columbus-class transport

I think the Columbus can probably carry a lot more than five, although this is complicated by the fact that we never actually see them carrying any mobile suits in the animation.

while under the Vinson Plan, Salamis-class vessels held 3 MS and Magellans seem to have held 4.

I think both ships can carry at least four mobile suits. The Gundam Officials encyclopedia puts the capacity of both ship types at four machines; we see four GMs jumping out of a Salamis in episode 42 of the original series, and the Gundam Museum program guide also says it can carry four GMs.

As for the Kojima Battalion, I'd agree with mcred23 that the Guntanks and GM Snipers appear to be attached to Lyer's regiment, rather than the Kojima Battalion itself.

-- Mark

[Gelmax]

while under the Vinson Plan, Salamis-class vessels held 3 MS and Magellans seem to have held 4.

I think both ships can carry at least four mobile suits. The Gundam Officials encyclopedia puts the capacity of both ship types at four machines; we see four GMs jumping out of a Salamis in episode 42 of the original series, and the Gundam Museum program guide also says it can carry four GMs.

As for the Kojima Battalion, I'd agree with mcred23 that the Guntanks and GM Snipers appear to be attached to Lyer's regiment, rather than the Kojima Battalion itself.

-- Mark

Can you link me to those sources? I'm not doubting you, but I've had a heck of a time finding any reliable sources that actually had such information; the numbers I gave were based on the Gihren's Greed strategy games and confirmed by Wikipedia because most of the other sources I could find barely even mentioned the Vinson Plan.

[toysdream]

Can you link me to those sources? I'm not doubting you, but I've had a heck of a time finding any reliable sources that actually had such information; the numbers I gave were based on the Gihren's Greed strategy games and confirmed by Wikipedia because most of the other sources I could find barely even mentioned the Vinson Plan.

Gundam Officials (note the plural "Officials") and the Gundam Museum program guide are printed reference books, not online sources. I'm afraid you'll just have to take my word for it.

But Gihren's Greed is a particularly poor source for this sort of thing because each "mobile suit" slot aboard a warship can store either one unique machine or a team of three mass-produced units. Thus the White Base, with six slots, can carry up to 18 GMs. In any case, the numbers are chosen for game balance, not anime accuracy; the Dolos has only 15 slots, for a maximum of 45 mass-produced machines. The Gihren's Greed game parameters were never meant to reflect actual carrying capacity, and shouldn't be used that way.

-- Mark

[Gelgoog Jager]

Dalong.net recently added full scans of a book of the "One Year War", which seems to also include a lot of info about ships, including the Columbus, and a lot of other info.

The only drawback: it seems to be in chinese.

[toysdream]

Dalong.net recently added full scans of a book of the "One Year War", which seems to also include a lot of info about ships, including the Columbus, and a lot of other info.

The only drawback: it seems to be in chinese.

The original books are in Japanese. I think Deacon posted some stuff about them when they originally came out.

These books have some interesting org charts and fleet breakdowns, based on the figures from Entertainment Bible 39, as well as a lot of really nice art. But the historical descriptions, machine specs, et cetera are pretty much just rehashes of what was already published in the Gundam Officials encyclopedia and add very little new info. That's very much true of the ship descriptions, which are taken straight from Gundam Officials, which in turn just rehashed what was written in the thirty-year-old Roman Album books.

-- Mark

[Sulendil Zeta]

Dalong.net recently added full scans of a book of the "One Year War", which seems to also include a lot of info about ships, including the Columbus, and a lot of other info.

The only drawback: it seems to be in chinese.

Actually, it's Korean, not Chinese.

BTW, thanks for the answer,Mark! I don't mind if you go and write a long post: I love to read them.

So back to GM, can anyone explain to me the technological tree of GM? For example, let's take GM Striker from Harmony of Gundam. I heard it's developed from RGM-79C. Is that true? And how many types of those "pre-production machines and custom types" have been identified?

EDIT: Now I reread your post Mark, I still can't believe how few GM are compared to Zeon's MS. It makes me wonder how many MS exactly on both side who participate in the Battle of A Bao Qu.

[domtropen]

That depends on how many GM-C enters combat [can be a lot], and the number of GMs that are neither B or C [eg. GM Cannon, GM Sniper Custom, GM Lightarmor, Guncannon types, etc] entering combat combined may reach 50-100s.

[toysdream]

So back to GM, can anyone explain to me the technological tree of GM? For example, let's take GM Striker from Harmony of Gundam. I heard it's developed from RGM-79C. Is that true? And how many types of those "pre-production machines and custom types" have been identified?

Tracing the lines of descent is tricky - it's kind of a moving target, because the folks who write the Japanese-language sources are still trying to figure out what to make of the variants that appeared in Gundam 00, never mind The 08th MS Team.

At this point, the party line seems to be something like this:

* RGM-79(G) is developed at Jaburo, before test data from the RX-78 is obtained. The MG kit manuals indicate that the RX-79(G) is based on this machine, which surprises me because I always assumed it was the other way around.

* Meanwhile, the RGM-79(E) is developed at Luna II, using early test data from the RX-78. This machine enters production at the end of the war as the RGM-79C, which also served as the basis for the GM Striker.

* After Jaburo gets the Gundam test data, production of the standard RGM-79 begins. This is the basis for most of the later variants.

* There's also another family of improved D and G types, which spawned the GM Sniper II. This line appears to have died out at the end of the war, with the C type becoming the postwar standard.

EDIT: Now I reread your post Mark, I still can't believe how few GM are compared to Zeon's MS. It makes me wonder how many MS exactly on both side who participate in the Battle of A Bao Qu.

The number of GMs may not be that small by comparison - it all depends on how many mobile suits the Zeons have. Some MSV sources, for example, say that Solomon's fighting strength was about 400 operational mobile suits. Against that, a few hundred GMs and Balls could be an even match.

As for the Battle of A Baoa Qu, we only get a good look at one of the Federation's three fleets - the Luzal fleet, AKA the First Battalion, which consists of about 25 ships (according to the dialogue). Aside from the White Base and the flagship Luzal, these are all Salamis cruisers, which we know can carry four GMs apiece. In the original series, we only see mobile suits riding on the hulls of Magellan-class battleships, which are bigger and have more flat surfaces. Thus, since the Luzal isn't carrying any mobile suits on its hull and the rest of the ships don't have that option, this fleet probably has about a hundred GMs in total. It also seems to have at least as many Balls, although it's not really clear how these are transported, so we're probably looking at 200+ mobile suits for this fleet alone.

During the initial attack on A Baoa Qu's N Field (where the other two Federation fleets attack), the Zeon forces seem to consist mainly of mobile suits deployed from the Dolos. I count about a hundred Zeon machines launching from the Dolos in one establishing shot, and this likewise suggests that the fighting on each side of the fortress - N Field and S Field - involves hundreds of mobile suits on each side.

Beyond that, we can't tell much else from the animation, but I think that's enough to dismiss the MSV-era GM production figures as too low and the battle headcounts from Entertainment Bible 39 as ridiculously high. Pretty much the only A Baoa Qu-related number I've seen that strikes me as vaguely plausible is the claim from the 1/144 ReGelg kit manual that 67 Gelgoogs entered combat at A Baoa Qu.

-- Mark

[bluemax151]

* RGM-79(G) is developed at Jaburo, before test data from the RX-78 is obtained. The MG kit manuals indicate that the RX-79(G) is based on this machine, which surprises me because I always assumed it was the other way around.

-- Mark

I swear I read somewhere that the extra features from the RX-79[G] were deleted on the RGM-79[G] for cost saving reasons. Wouldn't it be impossible to delete/omit features that weren't even conceived/designed yet?

[toysdream]

I swear I read somewhere that the extra features from the RX-79[G] were deleted on the RGM-79[G] for cost saving reasons. Wouldn't it be impossible to delete/omit features that weren't even conceived/designed yet?

Yep. So if the Gundam is actually based on the GM in this case, then the claim you mention would have to be wrong, wouldn't it?

I'm still looking through my books for more info on this, but so far they all seem remarkably coy about which machine was developed from which. In some cases, it's claimed that they were developed more or less simultaneously, which seems rather weird. Rival mass production candidates, perhaps?

At any rate, we do have one other example of a Gundam derived from a GM - the RAG-79-G1 Gundam Marine Type, which is an upgrade of the Aqua GM.

-- Mark