List of Cosmic Era superweapons
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This is a list of fictional superweapons from the Cosmic Era (CE) timeline of the Gundam anime metaseries.
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[edit] Nuclear technologies
After the Bloody Valentine War all military use of these technologies was banned by the Treaty of Junius. This did not, in practice, limit their use on the battlefield.
[edit] Neutron Jammer
The Neutron Jammer or N-Jammer is a device which suppresses nuclear fission reactions by electro-magnetic waves controlling the movement rate of free neutrons (it is possible for power-plants using nuclear fusion, which does not rely on neutron emission, which is unaffected by an N-Jammer, to generate power, however nuclear fusion weapons relies on a nuclear fission reaction to attain the correct temperature for fusion to occur, thus the N-Jammer works on nuclear fusion weapons as well). Its effective range is so great that even a handful of these devices are sufficient to cover the entire Earth, nullifying all nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants on the planet's surface. The N-Jammer also has the side effect of disrupting radio waves, severely restricting the range of radar and conventional communications, and for this reason space warships are equipped with these devices as an electronic countermeasure.
The N-Jammer was originally developed in the PLANTs under the supervision of Supreme Council member Orson White. These devices were first employed in the Bloody Valentine War during the Battle of Yggdrasil at the international space station Yggdrasil on February 22, CE 70. On April 1, CE 70, the ZAFT forces drove countless N-Jammers into Earth's surface as the first phase of their Operation Uroboros campaign. The nations of Earth, which had previously depended on nuclear fission as their primary power source, were plunged into a severe energy crisis called "April Fool's Crisis" as a result. During the winter of CE 70, at least hundreds of thousands of Naturals died on Earth because of lack of energy for heating, due directly to the presence of N-Jammers on Earth.
When the Super Robot Wars series decided to include Mobile Suit Gundam SEED, some pointed out that the presence of N-Jammers would disable other nuclear-powered units. However, since all other Gundam series units use nuclear fusion for power and laser-activated nuclear warheads as weapons, N-Jammers would not affect them.
[edit] Neutron Jammer Canceller
The Neutron Jammer Canceller or N-Jammer Canceller (NJC)is a device used to cancel the effects of the ubiquitous N-Jammers.
ZAFT deployed Neutron-Jammers to disallow the Earth Alliance use of nuclear weaponry and reliable power generation. ZAFT also invented the Neutron Jammer Canceller to cancel this effect in order to use nuclear weapons and nuclear generators. This would mean nearly limitless supply of energy and a complete superiority over other battery powered mobile suits that had to be recharged periodically. N-Jammer Cancellers are first used in ZAFT's ZGMF-X10A Freedom and ZGMF-X09A Justice. Kira Yamato steals the Freedom, equipped with an ultracompact nuclear fission reactor and a N-Jammer Canceller, from a ZAFT base on a PLANT and headed to the JOSH-A base in Alaska on Earth, a flight requiring three days of constant operation, with no need to refuel. In fact, it's not clear that the ZGMF-X10A Freedom and ZGMF-X09A Justice were ever refueled during their operational lives. The "G.U.N.D.A.M" acronym for mobile suits equipped with a N-Jammer Cancellers are Generation Unsubdued Nuclear Drive Assault Module. However, the N-Jammer Canceller has a very limited range that only englobes the mobile suit's nuclear fission reactor and it does not cancel the wide range radio jamming effect of the N-Jammer, however, it acts as an ECCM device on the suits making them able to use radar technologies to seek and lock on other units, as performed in the multi-lock-on scene in the show. The AMF-103 DINN RAVEN also uses the N-Jammer Canceller.
The use of N-Jammer Canceller was banned by the Junius Seven Treaty from military use which ended the Bloody Valentine War thus banning the use of nuclear fission based weapons, but this treaty is later breached by the Earth Forces and later by ZAFT. However, N-Jammer Cancellers were installed at Earth nuclear plants, restoring their operations.
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[edit] Neutron Stampeder
The Neutron Stampeder is an experimental defensive weapon designed by ZAFT to protect against nuclear attacks. The device is mounted on a Nazca-class destroyer, and is nearly as large as the ship itself. When activated, the Neutron Stampeder emits a massive energy wave, which causes any nuclear weapons to prematurely detonate. Unfortunately, the emitters fry themselves after firing, so the weapon can only be fired once.
The Neutron Stampeder was first fielded in CE 73, when it thwarted an Earth Alliance attempt to attack the PLANTs with nuclear missiles, causing the missiles to explode prematurely, also wiping out the Alliance attack fleet with it.
[edit] Hyper-Deuterion Nuclear Reactor
The Hyper-Deuterion Nuclear Reactor is a hybrid system created by ZAFT (and also used by the Clyne Faction) which combines a nuclear fission reactor with the deuterion technology. These two generators complement each other and thus in theory never power down. The deuterion system functions like a battery which stores the power coming from the nuclear fission reactor and then converts it into electricity. Thanks to this Hyper-Deuterion Nuclear Reactors are more powerful and efficient than conventional nuclear fission reactors. The Hyper-Deuterion Nuclear Reactor is currently used by the ZGMF-X3000Q Providence ZAKU, ZGMF-X42S Destiny, ZGMF-X666S Legend, ZGMF-X19A Infinite Justice and ZGMF-X20A Strike Freedom. Despite all using the same reactor the "G.U.N.D.A.M" acronym for the Destiny and Legend is Gunnery United Nuclear-Deuterion Advanced Maneuver while the acronym for the Infinite Justice and Strike Freedom is Generation Unsubdued Nuclear Drive Assault Module complex.
The reason for the difference in the OS between the Destiny and Legend and the Strike Freedom and Infinite Justice is because the Destiny and Legend were developed by ZAFT and received an operating system upgrade, based on the operating system of the Impulse, while the Strike Freedom and Infinite Justice, who were developed by the Clyne Faction, kept, customized, and upgraded the operating system versions of the previous Freedom and Justice.
[edit] GENESIS
GENESIS (Gamma Emission by Nuclear Explosion Stimulate Inducing System) is a huge gamma ray cannon built under the orders of Patrick Zala as ZAFT's ultimate weapon. GENESIS uses multiple nuclear devices with Neutron Jammer Cancellers to produce a massive burst of gamma radiation, which is reflected back by an external alignment mirror and focused by a second mirror into a laser beam. This laser is sufficiently powerful that if it were to hit the Earth, a great part of the surface would be destroyed and nearly all life on the planet would be exterminated. It causes human bodies closest to the shot to inflate and explode. The external mirror is severely damaged in the blast and must be replaced for another shot to be fired. GENESIS is also protected by multiple layers of Phase Shift armor and can be concealed by Mirage Colloid. The weapon is stationed behind the ZAFT space fortress Jachin Due and thus protected by not only the ZAFT garrison but by the satellite itself.
GENESIS is first deployed in September CE 71 after the nuclear attack of the Earth Alliance on ZAFT’s other space fortress, Boaz. With its first shot it destroys a great part of the Alliance’s fleet and thus forcing them to retreat for a short time. On the next day the superweapon fires its second shot on the Ptolemaeus lunar base not only destroying it completely but also wiping out over half of the Earth Alliance reinforcements fleet. The third shot is intended by Patrick Zala to fire on Earth (the target being Washington D.C., capital of the Atlantic Federation) but before it is able to fire, Patrick Zala was shot by one of his officers. Patrick’s son Athrun Zala flies his ZGMF-X09A Justice inside the weapon, where he detonates his mobile suit, thus destroying GENESIS shortly before it is able to emit the destructive burst. Only a small amount of energy is emitted which destroys the badly damaged ZGMF-X13A Providence.
Originally GENESIS was intended to be used as a propulsion system for ships to reach far away places in the solar system.
[edit] GENESIS Alpha
GENESIS Alpha is another GENESIS unit (perhaps created before the one used by Patrick Zala) which is at first under the command of ZAFT member Ash Grey. Like its sister unit it is equipped with multiple layers of Phase Shift and a Mirage Colloid cloaking device. Ash uses it to give his ZGMF-X11A Regenerate a boost which allows the suit to travel at very high speed. Nevertheless Ash is defeated and GENESIS Alpha is taken over by the Serpent Tail, who at first try to destroy it but later it becomes the base of the Junk Guild. The Junk Guild ship ReHOME uses it after the war to fly to Mars. At one point the Earth Alliance invaded GENESIS Alpha and found the ZGMF-X12A Testament in it, which they then took with them. In late CE 73, an alliance of the Junk Guild, the Serpent Tail and Rondo Mina Sahaku uses GENESIS Alpha in a failed attempt to avert the "Break the World" terrorist attack by pushing the remains of Junius Seven away from Earth. However, Ash Grey, now a brainwashed Earth Alliance pilot, uses the RGX-00 Testament's Mirage Colloid virus spreader to alter their targeting data, nearly causing the Junk Guild to fire GENESIS Alpha at Earth instead. While this potential disaster is averted, in a later battle Ash breaks free of his brainwashing and causes GENESIS Alpha to destroy an Earth Alliance base just before committing suicide. In response, the Alliance stages a full-scale attack on GENESIS Alpha, but the Junk Guild abandons the base, activating a self-destruct system to prevent its capture.
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[edit] Neo-GENESIS
In CE 74, a third GENESIS unit is built within the ZAFT mobile space fortress Messiah, called Neo-GENESIS. It is smaller than the other two units but still packs a lot of power. Neo-GENESIS would be fired twice, once at the Orb Fleet attacking Requiem, which destroyed about half of the fleet, and the other at the Archangel and Eternal, which instead destroyed two Nazca-class battleships, the Albose and the Barton, both being part of ZAFT's Lunar fleet. Neo-GENESIS, alongside the mobile fortress Messiah, are destroyed at the end of Second Bloody Valentine War by Kira Yamato's ZGMF-X20A Strike Freedom. A notable feature to Neo-GENESIS is that it's the only one out of all three units that does not require its mirror to be replaced, thus making it able to fire more rapidly than its predecessors. However, Neo-GENESIS still needs to be charged beforehand. Because of the lack of the need to replace the mirror and that it's mounted on the space fortress Messiah, the Neo-GENESIS is more mobile and thus more of a danger to any enemy troops due to it being able to reposition itself for better effect on the battlefield whilst firing at a much faster rate than earlier types.
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[edit] High-powered microwaves
[edit] Cyclops System
The Cyclops System is a powerful microwave weapon devised by the Earth Alliance, which consists of a large array of dish emitters. Once activated, the Cyclops System rapidly heats the water that makes up about 70% of the human body, as well as the propellant and ammunition supplies of mobile suits. Ultimately the intense radiation heat will destroy even buildings and the array itself. To conceal these weapons, the Earth Alliance builds them beneath their own bases as a self-destruct mechanism. The Cyclops System was used twice during the Bloody Valentine War, once to destroy the Endymion Crater lunar base, which was being overrun by ZAFT forces, and once in a trap at the Earth Alliance military headquarters in Alaska during the Battle of JOSH-A, when Atlantic Federation leaders deliberately sacrificed their unwitting Eurasian Federation comrades to wipe out at least 80% of all ZAFT forces participating in the battle.
[edit] Nibelung
The Nibelung is a massive fixed anti-aircraft cannon positioned to defend Heaven's Base, the Atlantic Federation military headquarters in Iceland. The Nibelung is concealed beneath a false mountain and, when revealed, points directly upward to target any units being dropped from space. It consists of a single tall spire within a concave array of mirrors, which scatter the beams fired from the spire into a wide cone that annihilates everything in flight above Heaven's Base. It is unknown how it really works but from the sight of it, it seems to be some sort of combination of ZAFT's GENESIS and the Cyclops System. The Nibelung is used to great effect against a ZAFT space drop operation during the Battle of Heaven's Base.
[edit] Mirage Colloid guided
[edit] Requiem
Requiem, designated as an "Orbital All-Aspect Tactical Cannon", is a superweapon created by the Earth Alliance. Located at the Daedalus lunar base on the dark side of the moon, Requiem is a huge cannon that fires a pale green energy beam. Numerous relay stations, built from abandoned O'Neill cylinder space colonies with their end caps removed, use large Geschmeidig Panzer arrays to alter the beam's trajectory. Using different combinations of these arrays, Requiem can be fired at targets anywhere on the Earth and the PLANTs with deadly accuracy.
After Lord Djibril escaped from Orb to the Daedalus base, he intended to use this new weapon to wipe out the Supreme Council in PLANT's capital Aprilius One. However, one of the relay stations, Gounod, was discovered by a ZAFT task force led by Yzak Joule. Requiem was fired in the middle of the battle between the ZAFT task force and the Earth Alliance space fleet defending the Gounod relay station. Damage to the Gounod caused by the Joule Squadron slightly altered the trajectory of the beam, and as a result Requiem missed its intended target. Instead, the beam directly hit and destroyed Januarius 1 through 4 and caused December 7 and 8 to collapse, leading to the deaths of over a million Coordinators. Afterward, the Joule Squadron destroyed the Gounod relay station, but Requiem's design is such that other stations can still be used to aim its beam at PLANT. So ZAFT launched a heavy attack on another relay station (which was strongly protected by the Earth Alliance forces), while the Minerva attacked the Daedalus lunar base in order to destroy the Requiem itself. While Rey Za Burrel and Shinn Asuka of the Minerva destroyed the mobile units protecting the base, Lunamaria Hawke destroyed the control room of Requiem, killing the Earth Alliance operators just before they could fire the weapon again.
Afterwards ZAFT takes control over Requiem and uses it to destroy the Arzachel lunar base of the Earth Alliance as well as a some of their fleet. Also it is shown that the beam emitter is equipped with positron reflector units. However, it is unknown if this is part of the original Alliance design or if it is a new addition by ZAFT. Just before the next shot could be fired at Orb, the Requiem was destroyed by the ORB-01 Akatsuki and ZGMF-X19A Infinite Justice, when both units destroyed the main energy core.
The Requiem has five relay stations in total, and three of them are named "Gounod", "Fauré" and "Czerny". These names, given to the relay stations, are all from music composers who composed requiem masses, a religious music work for the dead, usually played during funerals.
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