UNSC Armed Forces: Difference between revisions
From Halopedia, the Halo wiki
No edit summary |
No edit summary |
||
| Line 10: | Line 10: | ||
|role= Defense of the [[Unified Earth Government]] and its colonies | |role= Defense of the [[Unified Earth Government]] and its colonies | ||
|size= | |size= | ||
|command_structure= | |command_structure=[[Unified Earth Government]] | ||
*[[United Nations Space Command]] | |||
**[[UNSC High Command]] | |||
***[[UNSC Security Council]] | |||
****[[UNSC Air Force]] | |||
****[[UNSC Army]] | |||
****[[UNSC Marine Corps]] | |||
****[[UNSC Navy]] | |||
|garrison=Earth and most UEG colonies | |garrison=Earth and most UEG colonies | ||
|garrison_label= | |garrison_label= | ||
| Line 56: | Line 63: | ||
==History== | ==History== | ||
===Interplanetary War=== | ===Interplanetary War=== | ||
{{Main|History of the | {{Main|History of the United Nations Space Command}} | ||
The UNSC Defense Force was | The UNSC Defense Force was created during the [[Interplanetary War]], fighting in a series of brutal conflicts across the Solar System and humanity's space confines between [[2160]] and [[2164]], most prominently among them the Jovian Moons Campaign, the Rain Forest Wars, and a series of battles on [[Mars]].<ref name="xbox">[http://halostory.bungie.org/halostory.timeline.html '''halo.bungie.org''': ''Timeline'']</ref> These encounters were centered around UN clashes with dissident political movements, the most important of which were the [[Koslovics]] and the [[Frieden]]. | ||
===Human-Covenant War=== | The war began with an attack on [[United Nations colonial advisers]] on the moon of [[Io]], one of the moons of [[Jupiter]], but would spread to Mars and parts of [[South America]] in the [[Rain Forest Wars]]. These events culminated in a UN build-up in the mid to late 2160's, which would result in the UN establishing a unified military and a permanent [[Unified Earth Government]] as an ultimate power to lead the human race by [[2170]].<ref name="xbox">[http://halostory.bungie.org/halostory.timeline.html '''halo.bungie.org''': ''Timeline'']</ref> | ||
{{ | |||
===Insurrection=== | |||
In the aftermath of the war, following the invention of the [[Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine]] in the late 2200s and the discovery of [[Slipstream space]], the Unified Earth Government began a colonization programme that saw [[human]]ity spreading out from the [[Sol system]]. The apex of human colonization would come in [[2492]], when more then 800 worlds were inside UNSC territory and a handful of them were under development or had already developed into colonies. By this time, a ring of [[Outer Colonies]] was providing the UEG with the raw materials that made the macro-economy work; the political power, however, remained with the aforementioned [[Inner Colonies]]. The massive difference in wealth distribution and political power, which became a hallmark of humanity by this period, led to new threats of secession from the outer ring. Fearing the consequences of the breakup of the interstellar empire and seeing the benefits of avoiding all-out war to defend their hold on the colonies, the Earth government would embark on the [[SPARTAN-I]]s, the predecessors to the [[SPARTAN-II]] program in [[2491]], beginning with the [[ORION Project]].<ref>'''[[Halo: Contact Harvest]]'''</ref><ref>'''[[Halo: The Fall of Reach]]'''</ref><ref>'''[[Halo: The Cole Protocol]]'''</ref> | |||
===The Human-Covenant War=== | |||
{{main|Human-Covenant War}} | |||
[[2525]] marked the most important turning point in human history; it would mark the beginning of the great technological advancement, the unification of a divided and fractured human race, and the [[Halo: Contact Harvest|first contact]] of humanity and an extra-terrestrial intelligence, the [[Covenant Empire|Covenant]]. It would also see a majority of the Earth government's colony worlds destroyed, and billions of colonists and military personnel slaughtered by orbital plasma bombardment and planetary invasion, known as [[glassing]]. Thus began the Human-Covenant War with the [[First Battle of Harvest]]. Intercepted communications identified the enemy as the Covenant, a caste-driven, theological organization made up of several alien species. The message "''Your destruction is the will of the gods...and we are their instrument''" was broadcast in perfect [[English]].<ref>'''[[Halo: The Fall of Reach]]'''</ref> | |||
Since the later [[Second Battle of Harvest]] in [[2526]], where a huge human fleet led by [[Vice Admiral]] [[Preston Cole]] barely won against a smaller [[Covenant Empire|Covenant]] fleet in a symbolic "victory" for humanity, the humans' grip on their territories declined significantly in the course of their struggle. The Covenant had managed to capture the majority, if not all of the [[Outer Colonies]], and a portion of the [[Inner Colonies]]. | |||
By this time, the UNSC had overridden the UEG, and thus the central civilian authority throughout the human worlds and Earth itself. Although the central government was more willing to step down, the [[Colonial Administration Authority]] was far more reluctant to this idea, and thus the UNSC stripped it of most of its power. By the middle to late stages of the war, the government of humanity could be more accurately described as an "emergency military" government. | |||
By [[2552]], the UNSC, outnumbered and outgunned, had managed to slow down the Covenant's inexorable progress through former human space, but the situation was dire. In desperation, [[UNSC High Command|HIGHCOM]] ordered a high-risk op, sending the SPARTAN-II super soldiers, the best soldiers ever fielded by humanity, to insert into Covenant space, capture a high-ranking [[San 'Shyuum|Prophet]], and return to UNSC space in an attempt to ransom for a truce. Before the operation began, the Covenant found and destroyed the planet [[Reach]], killing most of the Spartans and a large portion of the UNSCDF, inadvertently stopping the operation and rendering most of the SPARTANs [[MIA]].<ref>'''[[Halo: The Fall of Reach]]'''</ref> | |||
A single ship, the {{UNSCShip|Pillar of Autumn}} managed to escape the planet, with two SPARTANs on board, [[Linda-058]], who was presumably dead in the [[Fall of Reach]] and the [[John-117]]. The ship followed coordinates derived by the A.I. [[Cortana]] to a ringworld known as [[Halo Array|Halo]]. There John-117 destroyed a large Covenant fleet and the ringworld itself. He also encountered a parasitic lifeform known as the [[Flood]], the species that the ring, [[Halo Array|Halo]], had been built to starve. The major side-effect of the activation of the ring would lead to the extinction of all life within three radii of the galactic center. John-117 destroyed the ring, believing it to be too powerful, by detonation of the reactor of the Pillar of Autumn. After hijacking a Covenant Flagship known as the ''[[Ascendant Justice]]'', the SPARTAN reunited with the remaining survivors from Installation 04 and the destruction of Reach and attacked a force of Covenant ships in [[Operation: FIRST STRIKE]], one of the most successful UNSC operations against the Covenant in the entire war.<ref>'''[[Halo: First Strike]]'''</ref> | |||
By October of [[2552]], the Covenant had haphazardly discovered the position of the human home world, Earth, and sent a preliminary task force there, believing it to be the location of the [[Installation 00|Ark]], an ancient Forerunner relic. They encountered staunch resistance, and were initially fended off. Further complications arose from the political and religious crisis that emerged in the wake of a UNSC operation to assassinate the [[Prophet of Regret]], and the secession of the [[Sangheili]] from the hegemony, leading to the [[Great Schism|Covenant Civil War]], further throwing the Covenant into chaos. Nevertheless, by November, what was left of the [[Covenant Loyalists]] had subjugated large parts of Africa, devastating much of the planet. Only their retreat through a Forerunner [[The Portal|portal]] in [[Africa]], and the arrival of the [[Sangheili Fleet]], stopped the utter destruction of the UNSC and Earth itself.<ref>'''[[Halo 2]]''', campaign level, ''[[Cairo Station (Level)|Cairo Station]]''</ref><ref>'''[[Halo 3]]''', campaign level, ''[[Crow's Nest (Level)|Crow's Nest]]''</ref> | |||
The UNSC and Covenant Separatist forces launched a joint operation to destroy the Covenant Loyalists once and for all at the Ark, stopping the installation from firing the Halos, killing the Covenant's last remaining leader, the [[Prophet of Truth]], and destroying the bulk of the Loyalists' remaining forces. On March 3, [[2553]], the Human-Covenant War officially ended in a victory for the UNSC and the Covenant Separatists, but at a high price, with most major military outposts destroyed except for Earth. An estimated twenty-three billion human civilians were killed between 2525 and 2553.<ref>'''[[Halo 3]]'''</ref> | |||
==Organization== | ==Organization== | ||
| Line 69: | Line 93: | ||
==Rank Structure== | ==Rank Structure== | ||
Large numbers of men and women are employed by the UNSC Defense Force. Servicepeople hold ranks, which are divided between officers and enlisted. | |||
{{UNSC Officer Ranks}} | {{UNSC Officer Ranks}} | ||
{{UNSC Enlisted Ranks}} | {{UNSC Enlisted Ranks}} | ||
==Equipment== | ==Equipment== | ||
Unlike the Covenant, UNSCDF military technology is still based on comparatively primitive mechanisms - projectile weaponry, wheeled vehicles, and combustion engines. The UNSCDF's grasp of scientific concepts is far more advanced than the Covenant, but turning these concepts into functional machinery has proven more problematic. Recently, the UNSC has introduced a variety of Covenant-derived technologies into their arsenal: gravity plating aboard ships, [[energy shields]] to protect SPARTAN-II soldiers, and limited use of [[Directed Energy Weapons|directed energy weapons]], usually lasers, for example, the [[ | Unlike the Covenant, UNSCDF military technology is still based on comparatively primitive mechanisms - projectile weaponry, wheeled vehicles, and combustion engines. The UNSCDF's grasp of scientific concepts is far more advanced than the Covenant, but turning these concepts into functional machinery has proven more problematic. Recently, the UNSC has introduced a variety of Covenant-derived technologies into their arsenal: gravity plating aboard ships, [[energy shields]] to protect SPARTAN-II soldiers, and limited use of [[Directed Energy Weapons|directed energy weapons]], usually lasers, for example, the [[M6 Grindell/Galilean Nonlinear Rifle]], though the Covenant still retain their technological advantage. | ||
UNSC starship weaponry is based around [[Archer Missile|missiles]] and [[Magnetic Accelerator Cannon]]s. Their technological inferiority in the face of the Covenant means that it was often necessary for the UNSC to have a three-to-one numerical advantage against them in ship-to-ship combat. The UNSC also possesses a weapon of mass destruction in the form of the [[NOVA bomb]]. | UNSC starship weaponry is based around [[Archer Missile|missiles]] and [[Magnetic Accelerator Cannon]]s. Their technological inferiority in the face of the Covenant means that it was often necessary for the UNSC to have a three-to-one numerical advantage against them in ship-to-ship combat. The UNSC also possesses a weapon of mass destruction in the form of the [[NOVA bomb]]. | ||
| Line 104: | Line 128: | ||
*'''[[Athens Station]]'''<ref>'''[[Halo 2]]''', campaign level, ''[[Cairo Station (Level)]]''</ref> | *'''[[Athens Station]]'''<ref>'''[[Halo 2]]''', campaign level, ''[[Cairo Station (Level)]]''</ref> | ||
*'''[[Nassau Station]]''' | *'''[[Nassau Station]]''' | ||
==List of appearances== | ==List of appearances== | ||
Revision as of 12:31, November 5, 2011
Template:Infobox Military Unit
The United Nations Space Command Defense Force (abbreviated UNSCDF) is the defensive military force of the United Nations Space Command, consisting of the Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, and Navy, which serve as a joint air, land, and space force. [1]
History
Interplanetary War
- Main article: History of the United Nations Space Command
The UNSC Defense Force was created during the Interplanetary War, fighting in a series of brutal conflicts across the Solar System and humanity's space confines between 2160 and 2164, most prominently among them the Jovian Moons Campaign, the Rain Forest Wars, and a series of battles on Mars.[2] These encounters were centered around UN clashes with dissident political movements, the most important of which were the Koslovics and the Frieden.
The war began with an attack on United Nations colonial advisers on the moon of Io, one of the moons of Jupiter, but would spread to Mars and parts of South America in the Rain Forest Wars. These events culminated in a UN build-up in the mid to late 2160's, which would result in the UN establishing a unified military and a permanent Unified Earth Government as an ultimate power to lead the human race by 2170.[2]
Insurrection
In the aftermath of the war, following the invention of the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine in the late 2200s and the discovery of Slipstream space, the Unified Earth Government began a colonization programme that saw humanity spreading out from the Sol system. The apex of human colonization would come in 2492, when more then 800 worlds were inside UNSC territory and a handful of them were under development or had already developed into colonies. By this time, a ring of Outer Colonies was providing the UEG with the raw materials that made the macro-economy work; the political power, however, remained with the aforementioned Inner Colonies. The massive difference in wealth distribution and political power, which became a hallmark of humanity by this period, led to new threats of secession from the outer ring. Fearing the consequences of the breakup of the interstellar empire and seeing the benefits of avoiding all-out war to defend their hold on the colonies, the Earth government would embark on the SPARTAN-Is, the predecessors to the SPARTAN-II program in 2491, beginning with the ORION Project.[3][4][5]
The Human-Covenant War
- Main article: Human-Covenant War
2525 marked the most important turning point in human history; it would mark the beginning of the great technological advancement, the unification of a divided and fractured human race, and the first contact of humanity and an extra-terrestrial intelligence, the Covenant. It would also see a majority of the Earth government's colony worlds destroyed, and billions of colonists and military personnel slaughtered by orbital plasma bombardment and planetary invasion, known as glassing. Thus began the Human-Covenant War with the First Battle of Harvest. Intercepted communications identified the enemy as the Covenant, a caste-driven, theological organization made up of several alien species. The message "Your destruction is the will of the gods...and we are their instrument" was broadcast in perfect English.[6]
Since the later Second Battle of Harvest in 2526, where a huge human fleet led by Vice Admiral Preston Cole barely won against a smaller Covenant fleet in a symbolic "victory" for humanity, the humans' grip on their territories declined significantly in the course of their struggle. The Covenant had managed to capture the majority, if not all of the Outer Colonies, and a portion of the Inner Colonies.
By this time, the UNSC had overridden the UEG, and thus the central civilian authority throughout the human worlds and Earth itself. Although the central government was more willing to step down, the Colonial Administration Authority was far more reluctant to this idea, and thus the UNSC stripped it of most of its power. By the middle to late stages of the war, the government of humanity could be more accurately described as an "emergency military" government.
By 2552, the UNSC, outnumbered and outgunned, had managed to slow down the Covenant's inexorable progress through former human space, but the situation was dire. In desperation, HIGHCOM ordered a high-risk op, sending the SPARTAN-II super soldiers, the best soldiers ever fielded by humanity, to insert into Covenant space, capture a high-ranking Prophet, and return to UNSC space in an attempt to ransom for a truce. Before the operation began, the Covenant found and destroyed the planet Reach, killing most of the Spartans and a large portion of the UNSCDF, inadvertently stopping the operation and rendering most of the SPARTANs MIA.[7]
A single ship, the UNSC Pillar of Autumn managed to escape the planet, with two SPARTANs on board, Linda-058, who was presumably dead in the Fall of Reach and the John-117. The ship followed coordinates derived by the A.I. Cortana to a ringworld known as Halo. There John-117 destroyed a large Covenant fleet and the ringworld itself. He also encountered a parasitic lifeform known as the Flood, the species that the ring, Halo, had been built to starve. The major side-effect of the activation of the ring would lead to the extinction of all life within three radii of the galactic center. John-117 destroyed the ring, believing it to be too powerful, by detonation of the reactor of the Pillar of Autumn. After hijacking a Covenant Flagship known as the Ascendant Justice, the SPARTAN reunited with the remaining survivors from Installation 04 and the destruction of Reach and attacked a force of Covenant ships in Operation: FIRST STRIKE, one of the most successful UNSC operations against the Covenant in the entire war.[8]
By October of 2552, the Covenant had haphazardly discovered the position of the human home world, Earth, and sent a preliminary task force there, believing it to be the location of the Ark, an ancient Forerunner relic. They encountered staunch resistance, and were initially fended off. Further complications arose from the political and religious crisis that emerged in the wake of a UNSC operation to assassinate the Prophet of Regret, and the secession of the Sangheili from the hegemony, leading to the Covenant Civil War, further throwing the Covenant into chaos. Nevertheless, by November, what was left of the Covenant Loyalists had subjugated large parts of Africa, devastating much of the planet. Only their retreat through a Forerunner portal in Africa, and the arrival of the Sangheili Fleet, stopped the utter destruction of the UNSC and Earth itself.[9][10]
The UNSC and Covenant Separatist forces launched a joint operation to destroy the Covenant Loyalists once and for all at the Ark, stopping the installation from firing the Halos, killing the Covenant's last remaining leader, the Prophet of Truth, and destroying the bulk of the Loyalists' remaining forces. On March 3, 2553, the Human-Covenant War officially ended in a victory for the UNSC and the Covenant Separatists, but at a high price, with most major military outposts destroyed except for Earth. An estimated twenty-three billion human civilians were killed between 2525 and 2553.[11]
Organization
The Defense Force takes orders from the Unified Earth Government. The professional, controlling body of the UNSCDF is the [[UNSC High Command (HIGHCOM), headed by the UNSC Security Council.[12] Within HIGHCOM are a number of administrative commands, including PERSCOM, the UNSC Medical Corps and the Engineering Corps.[13][14] Committees such as the Operational Test and Evaluation Center and the UNSC Ordnance Committee ensure quality in Defense Force equipment and personnel.
The UNSCDF is comprised of the UNSC Army, the UNSC Navy, the UNSC Air Force, and the UNSC Marine Corps. Control of the Navy is exercised by the UNSC Naval Command, which contains UNSC Fleet Command, the Logistical Operations Command, the Office of Naval Intelligence, and the Naval Special Warfare Command. The UNSC Army and Marine Corps are administered by the Unified Ground Command. Within the Air Force are a number of major commands tasked with different administrative and operational roles. Among these are the Air Combat Command, which is tasked with gaining air superiority and providing support for ground forces, and the Air Mobility Command, which contains Air Mobility Express, assigned to airlift materiél and personnel during wartime.[15][16] Operational control is exercised through regional CENTCOMs, which have responsibility over certain areas of space.[17]
Rank Structure
Large numbers of men and women are employed by the UNSC Defense Force. Servicepeople hold ranks, which are divided between officers and enlisted. Template:UNSC Officer Ranks Template:UNSC Enlisted Ranks
Equipment
Unlike the Covenant, UNSCDF military technology is still based on comparatively primitive mechanisms - projectile weaponry, wheeled vehicles, and combustion engines. The UNSCDF's grasp of scientific concepts is far more advanced than the Covenant, but turning these concepts into functional machinery has proven more problematic. Recently, the UNSC has introduced a variety of Covenant-derived technologies into their arsenal: gravity plating aboard ships, energy shields to protect SPARTAN-II soldiers, and limited use of directed energy weapons, usually lasers, for example, the M6 Grindell/Galilean Nonlinear Rifle, though the Covenant still retain their technological advantage.
UNSC starship weaponry is based around missiles and Magnetic Accelerator Cannons. Their technological inferiority in the face of the Covenant means that it was often necessary for the UNSC to have a three-to-one numerical advantage against them in ship-to-ship combat. The UNSC also possesses a weapon of mass destruction in the form of the NOVA bomb.
The UNSC also appears to maintain a seaborne surface navy on planets with large bodies of water, such as Earth. At the very least, they had aircraft carriers available to provide air support in the form of Pelicans and F99 UCAVs.
Military bases
- Main article: Military base
- Fort York
- Fort Deen
- Roosevelt Military Base
- Crow's Nest
- Firebase Bravo[18]
- Camp Hathcock[18]
- Camp Independence[19]
- Chawla Base[20]
- Diego Garcia[21]
- Segundo Terra[22]
- Camp Currahee[22]
- Outpost C9[21]
- Rat's Nest
- Sabre Program Launch/Research Range
- Sword Base
Orbital defense platforms
List of appearances
Sources
- ^ HBO Interview with Frank O'Connor and Robert McLees
- ^ a b halo.bungie.org: Timeline
- ^ Halo: Contact Harvest
- ^ Halo: The Fall of Reach
- ^ Halo: The Cole Protocol
- ^ Halo: The Fall of Reach
- ^ Halo: The Fall of Reach
- ^ Halo: First Strike
- ^ Halo 2, campaign level, Cairo Station
- ^ Halo 3, campaign level, Crow's Nest
- ^ Halo 3
- ^ Halo: First Strike
- ^ Halo: The Fall of Reach, page 138
- ^ Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, page 123
- ^ Halo: Reach
- ^ "The Free Dictionary" article on 'AMX'
- ^ Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, page 34
- ^ a b Halo: The Fall of Reach
- ^ Halo: First Strike
- ^ I Love Bees
- ^ a b Halo 2
- ^ a b Halo: Ghosts of Onyx
- ^ Halo 2, campaign level, Cairo Station (Level)
- ^ Halo 2, campaign level, Cairo Station (Level)
- ^ Halo 2, campaign level, Cairo Station (Level)
