United Earth Directorate: Earth's invasion

The United Earth Directorate, or UED, was the government of Earth and the homeworld power from which the terrans of the Koprulu sector were ultimately descended. It was reorganized out of the United Powers League after the discovery of the protoss and the zerg by December 2499, bringing many dissident countries into its fold and taking a proactive, militaristic stance toward alien affairs. Determined to seize control of the wayward human civilizations that had grown from Doran Routhe's failed colonization project, the UED formed a military expeditionary force to end the conflict in the sector by any means necessary, marking the first contact between Earth's government and the lost colonies. (StarCraft: Brood War; StarCraft)

Formation#

The United Earth Directorate was created when the United Powers League was reorganized in the wake of Earth's discovery of the protoss and the zerg in the Koprulu sector. Bringing many dissident nations into its fold, the new government diverted its considerable resources toward studying the aliens and their movements and toward formulating plans to seize control of the human civilizations descended from Doran Routhe's failed colonization project. It spent several months monitoring the sector's factions and gathering data on their strengths and weaknesses. Confident in its ability to counter any protoss or zerg attack and to overcome any local terran resistance, the UED assembled a military expeditionary force to end the sector's conflict by any means necessary. (StarCraft: Brood War; StarCraft)

The Brood War campaign#

When the ruling council learned that a new Overmind was growing on Char, it unanimously dispatched Admiral Gerard DuGalle to enslave the Overmind and use it to overthrow the Terran Dominion and pacify protoss activity. DuGalle himself was uncomfortable with the prospect of using the zerg, feeling they represented an unnecessary risk, and preferred more conventional tactics, justifying the entire campaign as a means of assuring the survival and prosperity of humanity. (StarCraft: Brood War)

The fleet journeyed to the sector with its troops in cryogenic hibernation. Viewing Braxis as a vital step toward dominating the sector, the UED surrounded it with an orbital blockade and clashed with protoss sent to retrieve the Uraj crystal, though Praetor Artanis crippled the blockade and let the protoss fleet slip through. The UED then assaulted Boralis, where Vice Admiral Alexei Stukov's forces made contact with Lieutenant Samir Duran of the Confederate Resistance Forces, the first colonial conscripts of the UED. With access to the Dominion's primary datanet, the UED struck the Dylarian Shipyards, commandeered the bulk of the Dominion's battlecruisers, defeated a reinforcement fleet under General Edmund Duke, and conscripted the surviving Dylarian defenders. (StarCraft: Brood War)

Capturing the Overmind#

The UED found the psi disrupter on Tarsonis, and Duran convinced DuGalle to have it destroyed, though Stukov instead secretly preserved and reconstructed it on Braxis. After a fierce battle on Korhal, the UED besieged Augustgrad and forced Emperor Arcturus Mengsk to request a parlay, but he was rescued by Commander Jim Raynor and a small protoss fleet. The conflict over the psi disrupter ended when Duran killed Stukov and set its core to overload, only for UED troops to shut the reactor down; DuGalle then ordered the disrupter kept at full power around the clock. With its signal scattering the zerg over Char into disarray, the UED penetrated the planet's surface, overcame the Overmind's defenders, and used specially trained medics to administer neurostims that pacified the second Overmind. (StarCraft: Brood War)

Defeat and destruction#

UED control over the zerg proved tenuous. Sarah Kerrigan, aided by Raynor's Raiders and a psi emitter loaned by Mengsk, destroyed the psi disrupter, and her zerg overwhelmed the UED garrison occupying Augustgrad. A UED attempt to retake Tarsonis with enslaved zerg failed when the coordinating scientists were killed, and the UED forces on Char were defeated by Kerrigan's zerg and Dark Prelate Zeratul. The remnants of the fleet fled and made a last stand at Char Aleph alongside Mengsk's fleet and a protoss armada under Artanis. When it became clear he could not overcome Kerrigan at full strength, DuGalle offered terms of surrender; the fleet was permitted to flee toward Earth with a head start, but Kerrigan's forces overtook and eradicated it, and no UED ship made it home to report what had happened. (StarCraft: Brood War)

Aftermath and legacy#

A few isolated pockets of UED remnants remained hidden in the sector, among them surviving goliath pilots of the Spartan Company who endured as mercenaries. The UED's return was widely expected in the sector; as late as 2505 the population of the Terran Dominion still suspected that Earth's government was watching them. UED sympathizer movements operated in secret across the sector, hoping that Earth would one day return to eliminate the zerg and the protoss. (StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty; StarCraft: Ghost: Spectres; StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm; StarCraft Field Manual; StarCraft: Scavengers)

Military and technology#

The UED's military included the UED Expeditionary Fleet, divided into the Atlas Wing and the Cronus Wing. The expeditionary fleet used nearly identical technology and munitions to the Koprulu sector terrans, while drawing on local assets such as the captured Dylarian Shipyards, the Confederate Resistance Forces, and the psi disrupter. Its known leadership included Admiral Gerard DuGalle, Vice Admiral Alexei Stukov, and Lieutenant Rosa Morales. (StarCraft: Brood War; StarCraft Field Manual)