The curious case of the RTX-44

[Rex]

I want to preface this with the fact that, as far as I can tell, Bandai wants the animated Origin episodes to fit as cleanly as possible in to the original series, while still staying as true to the Origin as possible. So, I am going to try to do the same. I believe it is possible to, with very little stretch, make the technology timeline of The Origin anime, IGLOO, and original Gundam work.

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There's very little information on the RTX-44, what can probably be dubbed the very first Guntank design.

If I have my timeline right, the M61 was put in to service in 0061, as the Federation's newest tank.

The RTX-65 is put in to service in 0065, as a new show of force, although in very limited quantities. It almost seems designed, to me, as weapon to scare the colonies.

The RTX-44 SHOULD have been designed somewhere in between there, but it's name suggests it was designed in UC 0044. It supposedly wasn't even built until 0078, and those that were built were eventually modified very heavily in the RTX-440's we see in MS IGLOO.

As far as I can tell, there is no information on Federation land vehicles BEFORE the M61.

I have read that the Dabude was a rejected design by the Federation, moth balled and stored in Russia, where Zeon eventually got a hold of them... Although I don't recall where I read this. This is the only information I can find concerning potentially pre-0061 Federation ground vehicles, as this suggests to me they were older designs.. Or they may have just failed to compete against the other land ship designs and had been tucked away recently, for all I know. So, maybe I'm wrong on that assessment. But if I'm not, perhaps the RTX-44 was originally some kind of bridge between an old Federation tank design and the Dabude, or a complimentary escort vehicle, was scrapped, and then revived in the early 60's and revised as the Federation began considering upping the size of its tanks.

Supposedly, the RTX-44 played a role in the Guncannon's development, which was designed in 77, but didn't seem to be fielded until later. We know the early RCX-76 was considered a failure, and I wonder if something they learned from constructing and testing the RTX-44, and its eventual switch in to the RTX-440, helped them improve the RX-77-2 such as that it now could perform as well as we see in the original series.

If the Guncannon line was being viewed as a MBT for some time, then it'd of been seen as a competitor to the Guntank line as well. It feels like at the time of the RX-75-4 and the RX-77-1A, the Federation had clearly decided to continue both and divide their roles.. but the RX-77-1A was obviously struggling as a design. What do you guys think might've been learned from the RTX-44 that helped them fix the RX-77-2 so as to not suffer the same issues that plagued the RX-77-A1?

All in all, it seems like a very complicated and murky development line / process.. and I feel like we should take the effort to try and clean it up and make sense of it as best we can. Is there any information about the RTX-44 that I'm missing? Any images of it? Anything at all.

Is there anything in the RTX-44's history which we think we can probably consider safely retconned out of canon?

It feels strange to me that such a crucial point in development has so little data on it.

[BrentD15]

It feels strange to me that such a crucial point in development has so little data on it.

Things like this happen when material like Origin decide to mess around with canon.

[JEFFPIATT]

the old msv profile has the units deployed on March 20, U.C. 0078 but the Origin replaced it with the RTX-65.
http://gundam.wikia.com/wiki/RTX-65_Guntank_Early_Type