Brotherhood of Nod

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The Brotherhood of Nod, often referred to simply as Nod or The Brotherhood, is a fictional faction which is featured prominently in the Command & Conquer franchise of real-time strategy video games by Westwood Studios and Electronic Arts Los Angeles. Revealed within the fiction of the C&C series to be an ancient and secret society that allegedly predates all but the earliest of civilization's history, the Brotherhood of Nod began to represent a globalized as well as a highly militant Abrahamic cult during the futuristic era in which these games are set; showing the combined characteristics of a vast religious movement, a multi-national corporation and a decentralized nation-state, while being none of the three in itself. The society consistently is shown to be led by a mysterious, charismatic character who is known only as "Kane". Their emblem is a chamfered triangle enclosing a curved scorpion tail, featuring black and red as its main color elements.

Contents 1 Storyline overview 1.1 Founding 1.2 Command & Conquer 1.3 Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun 1.4 Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars 2 Abrahamic references 2.1 Brotherhood philosophy and ideology 3 Organization and hierarchy 4 Military doctrines 5 Technological level 6 References 7 See also 8 External links

Storyline overview

Founding

Exact date unknown; the Win95 manual to the original 1995 Command & Conquer game mentions "exaggerated reports" that place the Brotherhood's founding prior to 1800 BC^[1] -- an ancient origin of Nod which the 2007 Tiberium Wars novel alludes to as well. Throughout the titles of the C&C series, various snippets of evidence are uncovered that cogently suggest this given date to be accurate, among them:

• The ending credits to the original game show a large archaeological artifact made of rock being excavated from a former Nod site, which crudely depicts the scene of the first Abrahamic murder.

• In the prequel Command & Conquer: Red Alert, the Brotherhood of Nod is revealed as the instigator of the Soviet's invasion of Europe during the 1950s,^[2][3][4] with a Brotherhood member of the period stating that the secret society had waited to emerge from the shadows "for centuries".^[5]

• In Command & Conquer: Renegade, an arsenal of medieval swords, armour and shields is discovered inside a Black Hand mansion, which all bear the emblem of Nod.

• Also in Renegade, the Cairo temple of the Brotherhood is shown to house what allegedly is the tomb of Cain's slain brother Abel; its ancient epitaph displaying the Hebrew word "Abel" (הבל) together with the 4th verse of the 4th chapter of the Book of Genesis.

• Kane's apparent agelessness or immortality; the character's basic appearance has remained unchanged over the story's cumulated span of nearly 100 years, and he has survived several seemingly fatal incidents.

Command & Conquer

Main article: Command & Conquer (video game)

Prior to the outbreak of the first war, the Brotherhood was considered a minor terrorist faction by the G7 intelligence agencies.^[1] When a scandal broke out involving major defense contractors however, it was confirmed Nod concealed a substantial military land, air and sea capability across the globe.^[1] Before the Sarajevo headquarters was first identified, Nod was believed to have no central command base, instead operating from multiple individual locations, with posts found in Kuantan, Malaysia; the Ar-Rub' al-Khali desert, Saudi Arabia; Tokyo, Japan and Caen, France.^[1] Also before the first war, Nod backed a number of officially recognized political parties; among the ones mentioned are the Fist of Allah party in Jordan, the United We Stand America party in the United States, and the Albion First! party in the United Kingdom, among several others.^[1] Additionally, they are known to be affiliated with the Irish Republican Party, Islamic Jihad, Khmer Rouge and other groups.^[1]

According to the canonical C&C storyline, Nod was defeated at the hands of the Global Defense Initiative after a three-year lasting world war. To increase support, Kane had devised a plan to blame GDI for the slaughter of the population of Białystok, Poland, with Nod broadcasting manipulated news reports claiming GDI soldiers razed the whole town on the grounds of its citizens being Tiberium smugglers.^[6] This created a scandal that forced the United Nations to cut GDI funding pending an investigation, causing the organization to apparently almost shut down.^[7] Kane however was unaware that this 'investigation' was in fact a hoax planned by the UN.^[8] Since the incursions into GDI territory caused Nod forces to be spread thin, GDI took large areas of Nod territory during their counterstrikes, giving them a decisive advantange. Kane was believed to have been killed at the final stand of the Brotherhood near Sarajevo, seemingly vaporised in the light of GDI's final ion cannon discharge.^[9]

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

Main article: Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

Following the first war, the apparent death of Kane caused the Brotherhood of Nod to factionalize into numerous militia armies.^[10] For several decades, they fought more against themselves, but when Kane revealed himself to be alive thirty years later, Nod reunited and faced off against the Global Defense Initiative anew. Following the official C&C storyline, the Brotherhood suffers a second military defeat against the GDI, hours before the society would have launched a world-altering Tiberium warhead into the Earth's atmosphere.^[11]

The Firestorm expansion portrays the leader of the Black Hand, Anton Slavik, arguing with the Inner Circle of Nod over leadership issues.^[12] Slavik reactivates the "CABAL" AI believing it will prevent Nod from splintering,^[13] but shortly afterwards the CABAL entity suddenly seizes control of Nod cybernetically enhanced's forces and assassinates all of the Inner Circle's members, with the sole exception of Slavik. Ultimately, a desperate GDI and Nod joint assault destroys the CABAL core, eliminating the AI entity as a threat to both factions.^[14] However, the ending cutscene shows the apparently still active AI being displayed in a large hall while overseeing numerous humans held in suspended animation tubes, with one of them holding Kane himself.

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

Main articles: Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars and Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath

The third war begins with the Brotherhood of Nod emerging from the shadows without warning almost twenty years afterwards, disabling GDI's anti-missile capabilities.^[15] The space station GDSS Philadelphia becomes vulnerable to attack and is soon after destroyed by a nuclear missile. Nod subsequently assaults all major GDI installations, yet GDI manages to rally its forces and drives Nod out of the regions.^[16]

Kane and his scientists proved to be working on a liquid Tiberium bomb of unprecedented destructive power.^[17] In response, the GDI turn their attention to Nod's stronghold in Sarajevo, and on the order of Acting Director Redmond Boyle the ion cannon is fired upon the temple complex, which detonates the liquid Tiberium and causes massive destruction throughout Eastern Europe.^[18] This detonation prompts an alien species to invade, who land in the Earth's red zones and begin with the construction of monolithic towers within these areas. After GDI fights off the initial invasion of the "Scrin", they launch strikes on each of these towers. When GDI assaults the tower nearest to completion however, they are held back by Nod, leaving one such tower standing on Earth. Even with the tower standing GDI destroys the Scrin Control Hub which causes all Scrin forces on Earth to die. Kane then claims the alien tower in the name of the Brotherhood.^[19]

Five years after this third world war, an artificial intelligence named "LEGION" arises, with Kane promptly placing a secret army of cyborg soldiers known as the "Marked of Kane" under the entity's command, in order to recover the mysterious Tacitus device from GDI's Cheyenne Mountain facility. Soon after, the Marked launch an unrelenting assault on the heavily fortified military research complex, overrunning GDI's finest defenses and reclaiming the object for Kane.^[20] The final cutscene, titled "Ascendance", shows Kane inserting the Tacitus into LEGION while proclaiming: "LEGION, my child, you are my greatest creation. It is time for you to take center stage; time for you to achieve the purpose for which you were created!" With this, the story of Command & Conquer 3 concludes on a major cliffhanger.

Abrahamic references

Main article: Cain and Abel

Throughout the titles of the Command & Conquer series, Brotherhood of Nod characters of different generations alike have been alluding that Kane is none other than the Abrahamic figure of Cain^[2] -- allegedly the first man in Earth's history to have committed murder according to the scriptures of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Cain and Abel were the two eldest sons of Adam and Eve, born after the Fall of Man when Adam and Eve had been tempted into eating the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The parable is told in the Bible at Genesis 4:1-16, the Qur'an at 5:26-32 and in Moses at 5:16-41. In all versions, Cain, a farmer, commits the first murdering by killing his brother, a shepherd named Abel, after God rejects Cain's sacrifice yet accepts that of Abel. God sought out Cain to ask him where his brother might be, to which Cain replied: "I know not; am I my brother's keeper?" Upon this answer, God cursed Cain to wander the Earth forever, unable to die of old age. Translations of Aramaic and ancient Hebrew texts describe these alleged events,^[21] stating that:

"Cain departed to the Land of Nod. And Adam had another son, whose name was Seth."

In a direct correlation, the manual of the original Command & Conquer game lists a quote by the Kane character, with the source being cited a fictional Interpol file designated as "#GEN4:16".^[1] This again is a direct reference to Genesis 4:16, which reads;

"And Cain went out from the presence of The Lord, and dwelt in the Land of Nod, on the east of Eden."

Additionally, in the title of Command & Conquer: Renegade, the player discovers an underground sarcophagus located near Cairo, Egypt, its epitaph depicting and describing Abel's slaying, and with Kane stating that the coffin contained his remains. The character also appears either immortal or ageless, as its actions are shown to span over 100 years (as of the latest installment in the C&C franchise), yet Kane seems to have not aged a day since his first canonical appearance as Joseph Stalin's mysterious advisor in the 1950s settings of Command & Conquer: Red Alert.^[2][3][4]

Brotherhood philosophy and ideology

Further information: Land of Nod

The parable of Cain and Abel has been explored in many scriptures and literary works over the course of history, which according to Kane actor Joseph D. Kucan served as inspiration for original C&C designer Eydie Laramore when she created the world views of the "Brotherhood of Nod" faction.^[22][1] In line with the fate of the Cain figure within this ancient parable of the Abrahamic religions, Nod political rhetoric has tended to closely identify the fictional quasi-cult, quasi-state organization with the downtrodden and impoverished peoples of the world.^[23][24]

The Brotherhood of Nod was found to maintain strong ties with most global extremist and terrorist organizations,^[25] gradually rallying the disillusioned and disenfranchised from across racial, social, cultural and ideological spectrums to a unified, quasi-religious to religious Abrahamic society, which stands in highly militant opposition to the democratic and industrialized world.^[26]

Throughout the games of the Tiberium story arc, Nod has been shown as viewing the aggressive exploration as well as application of the alien Tiberium substance as the key to achieving its ideals and goals in this endeavour.^[27]

This backstory is furthered by Electronic Arts Los Angeles in Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, where it is mentioned that the Brotherhood views itself "as the agent of change for a world in the throes of transition to a new order, the representative of the poor and the oppressed, and a foil to the previously unchecked power of GDI".^[28]

The precise nature of the Brotherhood of Nod's long-term goals, however, never has truly been unveiled throughout the storylines,^[29] and has consistently remained shrouded by a mysterious and religious referencing to "ascension" and "transformation".^[30][31]

From the point of view of the "international community", which typically is represented by the Global Defense Initiative faction in the games of the Tiberium story arc, the Brotherhood of Nod constitutes "a quasi-state, quasi-terrorist organization", seeking to "unite the third-world nations under a pseudo-religious political platform with imperialist tendencies".^[1] This profile further states that GDI holds the Brotherhood to be "a popular neo-fascist, anti-West movement vying for total domination of the world's peoples and resources".^[1] In Tiberium Wars, it additionally is mentioned that GDI views Nod as "a dangerous, virulent and inexplicably self-sustaining terrorist group obsessed with accelerating the worst ecological catastrophe in history".^[28]

Organization and hierarchy

The "Brotherhood of Nod" initially constituted a religious to quasi-religious secret society which is estimated to be nearly four millennia of age,^[1][25][32] of which the core organization is very sophisticated and high-tech in nature.^[28] After its emergence from the shadows, however, as portrayed in the original Command & Conquer game, the society began to grow exponentially in its membership and available infrastructure, and started exhibiting the combined characteristics of a vast religious movement, a multi-national corporation and a nation-state that has been decentralized and scattered across the continents, in ways reminiscent of Christian Christendom or an Islamic Caliphate.^[26] By the era portrayed in Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, the continued spread of Tiberium, and the industrialized world's subsequent retreat to the so-called "blue zone" territories, caused Nod to operate virtually unchallenged in those regions of the world designated as "yellow zones",^[33] which still harbored most of the world's population.

The greatest authority within the Brotherhood appears to always have been "Kane", who is viewed by many of his followers as well as by Kane himself as a prophet and Messiah to humanity.^[9][34] The closest to the figure of Kane are his chosen, who have been hand-picked from amongst the current generations of his followers and who represent the highest governing body within the fictional faction-- the Inner Circle of Nod.

The Black Hand

The Black Hand is a feared and prestigious echelon of warrior priests who serve as both a type of religious police as well as the ritual executioners of Kane's choice enemies.^[35][36] Introduced in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun's expansion pack Firestorm, the Black Hand are shown as being comprised out of Kane's wardens in all matters which concern the spiritual fortitude and internal stability of the Brotherhood; being the congregation of those who possess unwavering loyalty and unquestioning obedience to the prophecy of Nod.^[35] As such, the Black Hand are tasked with distributing and proselytizing of the word of Kane, as well as maintaining discipline among the ranks of the Brotherhood.^[35] Rumored to date back to shortly after Nod's own emergence as a globalized quasi-state in the modern world, the Black Hand maintain a parallel organization within the Brotherhood with political, religious and military wings.^[35] Despite this, the order kept a surprisingly low profile prior to the era portrayed in Tiberium Wars; shrouding their rituals, beliefs, and, to the world beyond Nod, their very existence in a veil of secrecy.^[35] The Black Hand became a playable faction in the expansion to Tiberium Wars, titled Kane's Wrath.^[37]

A connection between real-life historical events and the fictional Black Hand of the C&C games exists as well -- on June 28, 1914, at Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a Serb nationalist belonging to a group called the "Black Hand" assassinated Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, an event often attributed with having triggered World War I. Coincidentally, the second prelate of the Black Hand in the C&C universe, Anton Slavik, was revealed to be a character of Serbian origin who also was known as "The Serbian Wolf".^[38]

Sarajevo and Cairo

During the course of the Tiberium story arc, the Brotherhood of Nod is revealed to place a significant level of interest in the two regions of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Cairo, Egypt.^[39] The reason behind these sites consistently being focal points for Nod activity in the successive storylines is a mystery.^[39] However, in Command & Conquer: Renegade, the temple of Nod near the city of Cairo was discovered to house an ancient underground tomb allegedly belonging to the Abrahamic figure of Abel, with the Kane character stating the site represents ground most hallowed. In Tiberian Sun, Cairo additionally is revealed to be the location where a world-altering Tiberium warhead was being manufactured by the Brotherhood.^[40] In Tiberium Wars, this same region is found to conceal the Nod facility from which the nuclear strike against GDI's GDSS Philadelphia command station was launched.^[41]

Likewise, for reasons which are unclear, the site of Sarajevo is continuously shown to be the cradle for the Brotherhood of Nod's main base of operations as well as their primary religious infrastructure, and is referred to as "Temple Prime" by the era portrayed in Tiberium Wars.^[39][42]

Military doctrines

It is more important for us to employ intelligent combined-arms tactics than it is for GDI because it is the Pen that is mightier than the Sword. And we are both the Pen and the Sword when skilled modern armies are commanded by intelligent strategies brought upon by a true military strategist... —Black Hand leader Anton Slavik

The military philosophy of the Brotherhood of Nod faction has typically been centered around the concepts of stealth and mobility; preferring outmaneuvering enemies, guerrilla warfare, highly advanced hit-and-run tactics and subterfuge over direct confrontations.^[26][43][44] Nod's armies are infamous for deploying various forms of high technology in unique tandem with fanatical loyalty, and utilize a deceptively dangerous combination of low-tech, poorly trained militant forces with relatively fewer but elite and highly trained troops, who in turn have been equipped with state of the art communications gear and the most advanced weapon systems available.^[43][26] Military hardware of the Brotherhood often mirrors that doctrine; maneuverable and expendable vehicles tend to be designed to draw attention and enemy fire away from powerful and lethal higher tier equipment.^[43]

Long-range weaponry is prevalent, executing surprise attacks and hit-and-run strategies on unprotected parts of enemy infrastructure, or long range bombardment with ballistic missiles.^[43] Civilian casualties are not a concern. Nod's disregard for international ethics guidelines has also led to the extensive usage of napalm varieties, eugenic and cybernetic enhancements to troops, a rogue nuclear arsenal and radically advanced Tiberium-based equipment and weaponry.^[26]

Another notable way in which the Brotherhood engages its enemy is through misinformation warfare and hate-mongering.^[29] For example, Nod was able to obstruct and fight the GDI indirectly by triggering a massive public scandal regarding the massacre of civilians in Białystok, Poland during the first war; supposedly committed by GDI soldiers.^[6] This incident forced the United Nations Security Council to suspend all funding for the Global Defense Initiative pending the outcome of an official investigation into the organization's activities.^[7] A second such instance of mass media manipulation by the Brotherhood was when operatives of the Black Hand razed the central refuge of The Forgotten during the second war while using procured GDI equipment; rallying the mutant population to Nod's cause through their subsequent media reports.^[45][46]

Technological level

In certain fields, the Brotherhood of Nod consistently is portrayed as technologically superior to its Global Defense Initiative adversary;^[43] an organization backed by and effectively operated on behalf of the United Nations, and more specifically, the G8+5 economically and technologically developed countries of the world.^[47] It is not fully revealed how Nod achieved this unique level in human technological prowess, though it is implied throughout the various game titles to be in part because of their initial monopoly and monopsony on Tiberium, which provided them with vast amounts of wealth, both financially and scientifically, and an alleged access to and study of extraterrestrial technology.^[48][49][50] During the course of the series, the Brotherhood is revealed to have constructed, to own, and to operate many state-of-the-art research institutes, and to hire out research teams globally. Often, these institutes and related facilities are kept highly secret, and are hidden from academia and especially from national and international bioethics committees. It is revealed that routinely speculative and occasionally unsafe human experimentation, generally performed upon Nod volunteers, prisoners of war, and occupied civilian populations, is commonplace at Nod research facilities.^[51] Some technologies the Brotherhood has devoted particular attention to include lasers, directed-energy weapons, bioweapons, chemical weapons, nuclear weapons, advanced robotics, artificial intelligence, theoretical anti-gravity, active camouflage, advanced sustainable electricity generation, reprogenetics, eugenics, cybernetics, and its offshoot, brain-computer interfaces.^[43]

This is in addition to a great deal of aggressive research into Tiberium and alleged extraterrestrial artifacts, which was often crossed-over with the aforementioned fields for various purposes.

References

See also

• Land of Nod
• Cain and Abel
• Kane (Command & Conquer)
• Nod characters of Command & Conquer
• Tiberium

External links

• http://www.kanelives.org/ - Official fansite of the Kane character, sponsored by Electronic Arts
• PlanetCnC Encyclopedia - Extensive C&C storyline compilation at Gamespy, detailing the Brotherhood of Nod's initial rise
• Wikia has a wiki on this subject at Command & Conquer

v • d • e Command & Conquer franchise Video games Main universe: Command & Conquer (The Covert Operations) · Red Alert (Counterstrike & Aftermath) · Tiberian Sun (Firestorm) · Renegade · Tiberium Wars (Kane's Wrath) Spin-offs: Sole Survivor · Red Alert 2 (Yuri's Revenge) · Generals (Zero Hour) · Red Alert 3 Playable factions Tiberian series: Brotherhood of Nod · Global Defense Initiative · Scrin Red Alert series: Allied Nations · Soviet Union · Empire of the Rising Sun Generals series: United States of America · People's Republic of China · Global Liberation Army Characters Tiberian series: Nod characters · GDI characters · Kane Red Alert series: Allied characters · Imperial characters · Soviet characters · Yuri Modifications   Modding in C&C · A Path Beyond · Blitzkrieg II · Cold War Crisis · Mental Omega · ShockWave · Mideast Crisis 2 · CNC Fallout Miscellaneous   Tiberium · The First Decade · Tiberium Wars (novel) · Tiberium (video game) · Discography · List of media · Misc factions Companies Developers Westwood Studios (1992–2002) · EA Pacific (2002–2003) · EA Los Angeles (2003—) Publishers Virgin Interactive (1992–1998) · EA Games (1998–2005) · Electronic Arts (2005—)

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