(U.C. 0079.01.04 - 0079.01.17) With the outbreak of the One Year War, a team of Zeon technical personnels of all sorts of backgrounds gather on the ship Jotunheim to form the 603 Technical Evaluation Unit, in charge of assessing various prototype weapons. Their first assignment is the testing of the Jormungand, a large and powerful long-range plasma cannon capable of taking out a battleship in single shot. However, the weapon's maiden appearance at the Battle of Loum becomes its last, as a new member of the Zeon arsenal soon arrives to prove the Jormungand obsolete. As Char Aznable's force decimate the Federation armada and the Jormungand completely neglected, Chief Gunnery Officer Lt. Aleksandro Hemme uses the last glory of the doomed serpant to take down a Federation Magellan, ending the Dreadnaught era of the space warfare.

(U.C. 0079.04.29 - 0079.05.11) As the Earth Drop Operations begin, the 603rd is assigned to test the Hildolfr, a transformable mobile tank. The piloting task falls onto Maj. Demeziere Sonnen, a formerly respected tank trainer who is now disgraced and troubled by dope addiction from his own misery after Zeon abandoned armored vehicles in favor of mobile suits. When the team drop into Arizona for field testing, they find the drop zone supply depot destroyed — by a team of Zakus captured by LtC. Federico Czariano's Federation squad. Sonnen is forced into combat with the uncalibrated Hildolfr. The fast and powerful mobile tank proves its mettle by taking out all enemies, but not without the cost of Sonnen's life.