of the natural born human nations, primarily the Eurasians and the Atlantic Federation, and a natural human supremacist group known as Blue Cosmos with its slogan, "For the preservation of our blue and pure world". The Earth Forces are not a unified alliance, and infighting and mistrust exist between their various nation states. The second major Earth nation is the Orb Union, a staunchly politically neutral and isolationist nation located on small Pacific Ocean islands ruled by a hereditary monarchy and still contains Coordinator citizens. Two major events precede the story, known as the Bloody Valentine tragedy that initiated war between the PLANTS and the Earth Forces when one of the PLANT space stations, Junius-7, is destroyed by a nuclear bomb. The second event is the counterattack by the PLANTS that buries Neutron Jammers deep into Earth's crust that halts all nuclear reactions and long range radar and radio, causing most areas of earth to go without electricity or communication, and requiring mobile suits to rely on rechargeable batteries. The PLANTS are a technological power house, developing many new technologies that give them equal power to Earth despite their very small population. It is the invention of the Mobile Suits that give their military the edge in the beginning of the war. The story begins in the neutral Orb Union owned space colony Heliopolis, where five advanced mobile suits for the Earth Forces war effort are developed in secret in exchange of sharing of their technical data with the neutral Orb Union military. Additionally, Heliopolis constructs a unique carrier battleship, the Archangel, to base the five mobile suits from for the Earth Forces. The colony is attacked by ZAFT forces, the military of the PLANTS, with the objective of stealing the new units. During the incursion an Orb Union student and Coordinator named Kira Yamato, upon seeing his friends in danger, pilots the GAT-X105 Strike mobile suit to fend off the invaders but the colony is critically damaged in the ensuing fight. As Heliopolis disintegrates, the survivors board the Archangel, and begin their journey to the Alliance base in Alaska. During the journey to Earth, Kira pilots the Strike to counter a series of attacks by ZAFT but is seemingly killed by his childhood friend, ZAFT soldier Athrun Zala, during one of their battles in which he also is nearly killed. Kira survives the attack and is taken by a