Antarctic Treaty (Gundam)

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In the fictional Universal Century of the sci-fi mecha anime Mobile Suit Gundam the Antarctic Treaty states that:

all uses of Nuclear weapons are prohibited
all uses of Biological weapons are prohibited
all uses of Chemical weapons are prohibited
dropping space colonies or large asteroids onto Earth is prohibited
all P.O.W. must be treated humanely
all neutral territories must be respected, the neutrality at Side 6, was recognized and respected

1 Events leading to the Treaty
2 Motivations
3 Violations of the treaty
4 Outcome

[edit] Events leading to the Treaty

The Principality of Zeon declared war on the Earth Federation government on January 3rd U.C. 0079, and attacked and gassed entire colonies, killing millions of people. Both sides used nuclear warheads to attack one another.

The Zeon forces attacked with their nuclear-powered MS-05B Zaku I mobile suit units in a Blitzkrieg-style war during their Operation British, but had only 1/30th of the Federation's resources.

The Zeon Forces then attempted to drop an empty Island Three colony onto the Federal Force's General HQ Jaburo in South America. However, the Earth Federal Force routed the colony away and broke it in several pieces. The largest chunk hit Sydney, Australia and wiped out 16% of the continent and created a 300 mile crater.

During the first few weeks of the One Year War, known as the One Week Battle, 3 billion people were dead[1]. On January 31st, U.C. 0079, both sides agreed on the treaty.

[edit] Motivations

The Federation needed the treaty to be signed because:

they had no effective way of defending themselves from colony drops
they knew the Principality's main weakness was the scarcity of mineral resources, and prolonging the war meant taking the lead in mass-production of ships and weapons
they needed time to catch-up with the mobile suit development.

The Principality of Zeon agreed to the treaty in light of the following factors:

the continual use of weapons of mass-destruction were also potentially dangerous to Zeon, as the Federation could retaliate back with NBC strikes.
the banning of weapons of mass-destruction meant that conventional warfare would be the norm; with their new mobile suits, Zeon would have the advantage. The Principality already had a wide advantage in MS development, having successfully deployed their MS-06C Zaku II mobile suit units in real combat, and although the Earth Federation engineers proposed a few similar units, it has not started it's MS development projects, yet.
the treaty allowed the Principality to take the battle front down on the surface of Earth; surface access was considered paramount because in a prolonged war scenario their raw material resources were insufficient, and they soon after started various mining operations on Earth (the biggest being the M'Quve mining operations near Odessa).

[edit] Violations of the treaty

The Antarctic Treaty remained in effect after the end of the war (in UC0080), but was effectively broken many times:

U.C. 0079: Operation Odessa: Zeon CO M'Quve, after realizing the Eastern and Western European theaters were lost, launched a nuclear missile at the advancing Federation forces as he retreated. The missile was successfully intercepted by Amuro Ray in the RX-78-2 Gundam. (This only happens in the Mobile Suit Gundam TV series storyline)
U.C. 0079: In the waning days of the war, Zeon covert ops forces under the command of Zeon commander Killing plan a nuclear strike against the Side 6 colony Libot, where the RX-78NT1 Gundam 'Alex' is under development. Patrolling Federation vessels intercept Killing's forces before the strike can be executed, saving the colony inhabitants.
U.C. 0083: the Federation secretly contracted Anaheim Electronics to develop the RX-78GP02A Physalis Gundam unit; the unit was designed to attack with the Mk.82 tactical nuclear warheads, and was capable of sustaining the shock resulting from such explosions with its massive shield; for this reason all official records of it were subsequently deleted.
U.C. 0083: Operation Stardust: after successfully stealing the GP02A from Federation's Torrington base in Australia, the Delaz Fleet, a remnant group of Gihren Zabi loyalists who refuse to accept defeat in One Year War, violated the Antarctic Treaty by firing a nuclear warhead on the Federation Naval Review, destroying/disabling two thirds of the ships taking part.
U.C. 0083: Operation Stardust: the Delaz Fleet violated the treaty once more by dropping a colony on the North American continent to drastically reduce food production.
U.C. 0085: the 30 Bunch Incident: the Titans taskforce used G3 nerve gas on Side 1's 30th colony, which were actively protesting against Federation's policies, killing all 3 million of it's inhabitants. This inspired the first organized resistance to the Titans.
U.C. 0087: Haman Karn's Neo-Zeon dropped a colony on the city of Dublin, as a show of force and intimidation.
U.C. 0093: Char Aznable's Second Neo-Zeon dropped the space fortress Luna V on the city of Lhasa (Earth Federation's headquarter at the time), as part of a series of attempts to initiate a nuclear winter on planet Earth.
U.C. 0093: Char Aznable attempted to drop the asteroid Axis on Earth, to complete his plan of rendering Earth uninhabitable and forcing the space migration of the whole human race.
U.C. 0093: the Earth Federation's Londo Bell taskforce used nuclear missiles during the space battle to stop the Axis drop on Earth, but failed to destroy the asteroid. The asteroid was later pushed away by a resonating force field generated by Amuro Ray's psychoframe-equipped ν Gundam.
U.C. 0099: the Moon Crisis: a group of Zeon remnants plan to terrorize the Earth Sphere by sabotaging and dropping a large portion of the Moon onto Earth. The plan is foiled by Earth Federal Forces.
U.C. 0100: with the reabsorption of the Republic of Zeon into the Earth Federation, the Antarctic Treaty technically becomes defunct.