Gwazine-class

The Gwazine-class was a line of battleships produced by the Principality of Zeon.

History

The Principality of Zeon produced many spaceships during the One Year War. The Gwazine-class battleships were the most powerful amongst them. Due to the high production costs and large amount of resources needed to maintain the ship, they were reserved for high-ranking officers.

A Gwazine-class battleship, the Great Degwin, served as the personal flagship of Zeon leader Degwin Sodo Zabi during the War. The Great Degwin was destroyed by friendly fire when Zeon’s Solar Ray struck the Federation fleet that it was engaged in a peace negotiation with. Several other Gwazine-class battleships were deployed in the battle of A Baoa Qu. Two were known to have survived beyond the One Year War.

Gwazine-class battleship

Gwazine-class battleship from MS IGLOO

One of these was the Gwaden, personal flagship of Axis Captain Aiguille Delaz. Captain Delaz withdrew the forces under his command after receiving news that Gihren Zabi had been killed. The fleet under his command became known as the Delaz Fleet. The Gwaden was still in service in UC 0083 and it led the Delaz Fleet in Operation Stardust. The ship was destroyed near the end of the mission.

The other Gwazine-class battleship that survived the One Year War was used by Zenna Zabi and Mineva Lao Zabi to escape the Earth Federation forces.

The eventually Axis forces developed the Gwazine-class into its successor, the Gwadan-class.

Design

The Gwazine-class battleship was designed with high fire power that was unmatched by all ships of its time, including the Earth Federation Magellan-class and Pegasus-class vessels. It was capable of traversing distances as long as that between the Earth and the asteroid belt.

It was also built to support a large complement of up to twenty mobile suits. This gave it a formidable force on hand to dispatch for offensive and defensive actions.

The ship required a large amount of resources to function, so it needed eight external fuel tanks to be mounted on the stern.

Armaments

The Gwazine-class battleship was armed with main guns and secondary guns for ranged attack, and machine guns for anti-aircraft defence.

Main guns

The battleship was mounted with three twin main gun turrets on its top hull. These were its main weapons in battle against enemy ships. However, as these turrets were located only at the top of the ship, their firing range was limited to the topside.

Secondary guns

The Gwazine-class battleship had ten twin secondary gun turrets, with five on each side of the vessel. These provided cover for the bottom and sides of the ship.

Machine guns

There were many 155 mm machine gun turrets on the Gwazine-class ship. These provided anti-aircraft and anti-mobile suit fire. The large number of these turrets gave it a formidable defence against enemy units.

Behind the scenes

Yoshiyuki Tomino was the principal mechanical designer and Kunio Okawara assisted with the cleaning up of the design. Hajime Katoki designed the version seen in Mobile Suit Gundam MS IGLOO.