That could work, although the idea that the Federation left all those captured factories gathering dust for a few years and then put them back into operation seems a little iffy. (Not to mention that the Hizack was introduced shortly after 0083, so this leaves us with a pretty small window for using "stock" Zeon machines.)Dendrobium Stamen wrote:My personal logic, tying into my various theories on the state of the Federation economy, is that the Federation Forces burned up a huge amount of post-war reconstruction funding on the various GMs we see in 0083 (amongst many other things), which left them more or less needing to put Zeon's designs and equipment to use in order to fill their frontline MS squadrons, considering the amount of funding which would have been diverted from development and deployment of the GM into rebuilding the fleet (and magic-ing away the damage left by Operation Stardust in under four years). I'm still ironing out those details, to be honest, but the skeleton is there.
Another possibility I'd suggest: In Gundam 0083, most of the Federation forces we see are participating in the naval review. Since the whole point of that review is to show off the Federation's might, one imagines that they'd shift things around to showcase all their shiny homegrown GMs at the review, leaving all those shameful Zeon machines to do the dirty work of actually guarding bases, patrolling, and maintaining security throughout the rest of the Earth Sphere. Gato's physically impossible nuclear attack thus takes a disproportionately heavy toll on the Federation's homegrown machines.
As anecdotal supporting evidence, the MG GM Kai kit manual says that the GMs we see at Torrington Base in Gundam 0083 were only deployed there in April of U.C. 0081, as part of an annual update. It's possible that, up until then, the base was garrisoned mainly with captured Zakus, and that it was only when the new GMs were deployed that these Zeon machines were relegated to serving as aggressor machines.
Other interesting tidbits from the GM Kai manual:
"The continued production of the GM Kai also served as part of the 'Federation Forces Reconstruction Plan' that was subsequently launched by the Federation Forces." (In other words, GM Kai production was already underway when this plan was adopted in October of U.C. 0081, but it then became a major element of the reconstruction plan.)
"Although the RGM-79C GM Kai was produced in considerable numbers, it never really entered combat as a main force machine. This was because it was determined that it had been utterly unable to compete with the assorted old models used by the Delaz Fleet." (The manual adds that this was basically the death knell for the traditional GM. Although it doesn't explicitly say so, this suggests the Hizack might represent a "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" policy on the part of the Federation.)
"Incidentally, in the case of the RGM-79R GM II which was later considered the successor to the RGM-79, it appears that many of the units were RGM-79 GMs which had been produced during the war and then simply upgraded and given an updated model number." (Which we kind of knew already, but it's positioned here as an alternative to producing entirely new GM units, as with the GM Kai.)
-- Mark
