Why would I join the army if I can’t drive a Gundam!

Chapter 129 They're all quite troublesome!
"Oh, so this is Earth!"

"Yes, Your Excellency, welcome to Earth!"

"It is indeed as beautiful as Brother Dozle said!"

Although the California base had been ravaged by the war, the Zeon forces quickly repaired it after occupying it.

When Kalma arrived, he saw a beautiful seascape where the sky and sea met, and the greenery was lush. However, for the sake of military discipline, the division command had blocked the coastline. As a result, the prostitutes who used to meet the Zeon soldiers on the beach were no longer there, and only a few seagulls were flying around on the beach.

"Commander, please!"

Under the protection of her personal guard, Karma descended the gangway and then involuntarily stomped her foot.

This is almost the subconscious reaction of all space dwellers who have never been to Earth before, after they arrive on Earth. After all, what they are standing on now is no longer an artificial celestial body, but the real earth, which is so vast that it seems to stretch to the horizon.

Kalmar then turned his attention to the honor guard on one side of the airport. An entire squadron of Marine Zakus, gleaming with polish, stood on the side of the runway, while their pilots stood in neat formation beneath their aircraft. The captain at the head of the squadron held a military flag, which was fluttering in the sea breeze.

"Wow, that's really impressive!"

Kalma glanced at the state of the honor guard and then nodded in satisfaction.
Those chosen for his inspection were all veterans of the battlefield. Although their builds varied, their demeanor was uniformly tough. In particular, when Karma walked in, he noticed that each of these machines had several destruction markings on it.

"I've long heard that the Second Division is strong and well-equipped, and today I see that its reputation is truly well-deserved!"

"You flatter me!"

The commander of the 2nd Division would swear that if Karma had heard such rumors, he would run naked around the base. It was all just polite talk. Although young, Karma had no problem with social skills. After a conversation, both officers and soldiers received his encouragement and praise.

However, he was still unaware of the Zeon army's crushing defeat at the front. Even if he wanted to ask, he couldn't resist the enthusiastic hospitality of the officers. After inspecting the guard of honor, Karma only made a brief appearance at the headquarters before being pulled into the auditorium to prepare for an award ceremony that was just short of conferring medals.

"Your Excellency, this medal-awarding ceremony should have been held much earlier, but I thought that your presence would be even more inspiring to the soldiers!"

"Here……"

How could Karma not understand that the other party was trying to curry favor with him? After all, this was a great opportunity to win people's hearts. Even he couldn't help but feel a little smug. So, he went on stage half-heartedly.

The low-ranking Zeon soldiers waiting to receive their medals never expected that it would be Karma Zabi who would award them. Karma's affable demeanor surprised the soldiers even more. When an old soldier who had lost a leg went up on stage, Karma quickly went down and helped him onto the stage.

"There is hope for the revival of Zeon!"

The veterans were so moved that tears streamed down their faces, and the auditorium was filled with the shouts of eager veterans.

After the medal ceremony, a group of well-dressed local dignitaries, guided by the Zion officer, surrounded Kalma. These were collaborators of the local government supported by Zion, and Kalma could not afford to be negligent. Thus, he was semi-forced to be taken to a welcome dinner prepared for him.

With that little wine glass raised, surrounded by beautiful women, Karma completely forgot about inquiring about military matters. It wasn't until the banquet ended that he remembered he should have asked about the military situation.

"What? The attack failed?"

When Karma learned that the raid he thought would be a resounding victory had not only failed, but that an entire brigade of troops had been wiped out, his drunkenness vanished instantly.

However, he didn't say anything accusatory. After all, everyone had a pleasant day, and the Zeon command had shifted all the blame to the Federation forces.

"It's not that our army isn't trying hard enough, it's just that the Federation has Gundam!"

"We lack favorable timing, location, and popular support; failure is inevitable!"

"The guerrillas, composed of federal civilians, harassed our logistics and passed on our intelligence, which led to our defeat!"

The officers even took the opportunity to complain to Karma, saying that valuable transport capacity had been withheld by Mark Baker, and that higher-ups had interfered with the operation's deployment. In short, they claimed that the failure had little to do with them!

If it had been Dozru instead of Kalmar who arrived, he would have coldly ignored these appeals and, incidentally, ordered the military police to send the incompetent officers to a military court, or strip them of their titles and privileges, either sending them to the reserves or to the front lines as privates.

But Garma was different. Despite being stationed in the Zeon capital garrison division for so long, he hadn't fought a single battle. The only intense incident he had experienced was leading troops to disperse a riot caused by a torchlight parade in Zeon after the victory at the Battle of Loum. It was only because of his outstanding military achievements that he was promoted to army commander. In reality, however, he had virtually no combat experience and couldn't detect the excuses in the officers' words.

Thus, the defeat was glossed over by Karma's understanding, and no one was held accountable or punished. However, Dozru, upon learning of this later, couldn't help but sigh, because he felt that Karma had missed a good opportunity to make an example of someone and establish his authority!

Kalmar then learned that the Union Army was amassing hundreds of thousands of troops in the central region of the American theater, clearly preparing to launch a large-scale counter-offensive in the wake of their victory.

This caused the young man to lose his composure for a moment, but it was only for a moment. Soon, Karma realized that this was a good opportunity to make a name for himself. As long as he thwarted this attack, he would have achievements comparable to his older brothers and sisters!

After the other generals dispersed, Kalmar spoke with his staff, officers handpicked by Dozru and Dekind Kalmar, most of whom were highly capable. They quickly offered Kalmar numerous suggestions that he found very useful. These included continuing to inspect the rank-and-file troops to boost morale, overseeing the construction of the defensive lines, and ensuring that military production could not be neglected; the 2nd Division had lost over two hundred mobile suits and needed to be replenished as soon as possible.

In addition, they sought to win over local people, form auxiliary forces to alleviate the shortage of troops, continue to establish concentration camps, and suppress anti-Zion activities...

All these matters were listed in Karma's notebook, and only now did Karma realize that being the commander of the Earth Front Army was no easy task.

At this moment, the North American Front's forces numbered nearly 400,000, and when the European Front and independent resource extraction forces were included, the total approached one million. In other words, Karmazabi had become the de facto ruler of these one million people.

Since taking office, he has had countless documents to sign and countless reports to review. In fact, this can be considered a test by his senior Zeon generals, because many documents do not actually require Karma's approval and can be handled by his subordinates. However, in order to increase the workload of the younger generation, these unnecessary things were sent over.

Fortunately, Kalmar's military academy education was not in vain; he arrived with the full complement of an entire army group headquarters. After completing the transition and adaptation process, he quickly extricated himself from the busy paperwork.

After escaping, Garma did a lot of things that gave the generals headaches. Perhaps the previous awarding of medals inspired him, so much so that for a period of time afterward, Garma's favorite thing to do was to lead his guards to inspect and comfort the grassroots troops on the Zeon front.

On the very first day, he went to the central front!
This terrified the generals so much they almost wet themselves. They knew that the central front was no safe place. The Zeon army's defenses were flat and undefended, with many possible directions to break through. If any infiltrated small units ran into Karma, they could all prepare to lose their heads!
Not content with just inspecting the troops, this old man even had the sudden urge to personally lead a team to wipe out the Federation guerrilla forces currently active in the Zeon-occupied territories.

There were naturally Federation guerrilla forces in the Zeon-occupied territories. These Federation troops were either remnants who failed to escape during the Zeon offensive or special forces that the Federation later sent into the occupied territories. In short, although these Federation troops were in enemy territory, they were exceptionally active and almost never stopped launching attacks against the Zeon forces.

By day, they would set up checkpoints; by night, they would blow up walls. They would either set up roadside bombs to ambush transport convoys or lie in wait outside the airport using infrared man-portable grenades to attempt sneak attacks. Some even had a ruthless penchant for ambushing Zeon soldiers who went out to find local masseuses for massages. They would focus on local establishments, infiltrate them, and then rush in and open fire once the Zeon soldiers were naked, causing the Zeon forces considerable headaches.

Therefore, after Mark Bay arrived, the Zeon army began to build concentration camps on a large scale to detain unstable elements, and the more concentration camps were built, the more guerrilla groups emerged.

Now, there are dozens of guerrilla groups operating in the Zeon-controlled areas, and their equipment is becoming increasingly sophisticated. Some guerrilla groups even have GMs and captured Zakukai.

Moreover, these guys, relying on their familiarity with the terrain, waged guerrilla warfare in the mountains, striking and running away, making it impossible for the Zeon army's mopping-up forces to find them.

Karma then made eliminating the guerrillas his primary objective. After all, the situation at the front was relatively stable, and he couldn't offer much help for the time being. So, naturally, he could only cause trouble for the guerrillas!

"This guy is really young!"

Upon hearing that the enemy was going to personally lead the expedition, several Zeon generals rushed to the command post to try to stop them. However, Karma was faster than them. The group had just entered the base gate when Karma, riding Gallup, had already rushed out of the hangar.

However, Kalmar was not unprepared for the guerrillas. In fact, he was quite well-prepared. He had learned his lesson from the strategic deception he had suffered at military school with Makarius, and now he was putting that tactic into practice.

The first step was to release false information to the guerrillas and then set a trap for them. To this end, Kalmar mobilized the undead legion, which was regarded as cannon fodder by the regular army. This unit had many organizational structures, but their status was basically the same. To put it bluntly, it was like an ancient slave army.

Garma would have the undead army disguise themselves as the main Zeon forces, waiting for the guerrillas to attack. He would then lead his elite troops to keep track and monitor the perimeter. He even used the heavy space carrier ACA-01 Gau-class, which the Zeon army had built to make up for the lack of manpower.

Using aerial surveillance, ground tracking, and the undead troops used as bait, Kalmar quickly located several secret bases of Federation guerrilla groups within a few days.

Then, he himself directly piloted the Zaku 2FS, also known as the Zaku Commander Type, into the battle. Although his piloting skills were only average, the pilots around Karma were mostly elite. Ordinary guerrillas were no match for the mopping-up forces. Guerrillas with mobile suits could rely on the presence of mobile suits to buy time and have a chance to break through. Forces without mobile suits could only fight to the death.

However, this desperate gamble was just a brief burst of energy; it couldn't inflict any fatal damage on the Royal Guard, or even wound their mechs.

Soon, a steady stream of victory reports were sent out.

These battle reports would occasionally slip into the hands of the Federal Army through certain special channels.

"Has Kalmazabi arrived in North America?"

Markarius didn't seem to mind the crumpled newspaper that was delivered to him. After reading it over and over again, he couldn't help but slap his thigh with laughter.

"Good, good, good. This little brat seems to only remember the good times and not the bad ones!"

Marcarius had thought that given the current situation in North America, Karma would not be released by Dejin, but he did not expect that the old man Dejin would actually be willing to let her go, so he naturally had to seize this opportunity!
So he simply contacted Major General Koun at the Gabro base and asked him how long it would take for Amuro to send his G3 Gundam to Earth.

"Do you want the Gundam or the Amuro Ray?"

"I want both. I heard Amuro is already an ace, so I specially found him a suitable opponent on Earth!"

Marcarius summoned Amuro to kill Karma, but it's unknown whether Char, who was driven away by Amuro, will reappear.

Thinking of this, Makarius suddenly had another idea!

(End of this chapter)