Year Zero Committee
| Year Zero Committee | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Dates of operation | March 4, 2000–present |
| Split from | Individuals Tending Towards Savagery |
| Country |  Entropan |
| Motives | Fight against civilisation and scientific and technological progress |
| Headquarters | Maledonia |
| Active regions | Entropan |
| Ideology | Anarcho-primitivism Anti-tech radicalism Eco-extremism Anti-civilisation Anarcho-nihilism |
| Notable attacks | Arson, suicide bombings, letter bombs, bombings, armed attacks |
| Status | Active |
| Size | 1,700 (estimate, 2023) |
| Opponents | Government of Entropan |
| Designated as a terrorist group by | Entropan |
The Year Zero Committee (Šebukel: Ar Null Stivra, ANS), is a self-defined anti-civilisation paramilitary organisation in Entropan. It was formed as a splinter group from Individuals Tending Towards Savagery in 2000, as a result of disagreements regarding whether violent action targeting scientific research was permissible for anti-civilisation and anarcho-primitivist groups. The Year Zero Committee's primary belief is in the political notion of Year Zero, which represents a drastic de-industrialisation, fought for through guerilla warfare against scientific and technological progress, with the goal of destabilising and discrediting the advance of technology as much as possible.
From 2000 to 2003, the Year Zero Committee engaged in a targeted set of bombings against university teachers dedicated to teaching nanotechnology and other related sciences in various university centres around Entropan. Since then, in response to the Entropanian Government's heightened security around university research centres, it has been engaging in irregular bombings and arson attacks against life sciences institutes and companies operating in the financial sector, with several attacks claiming the lives of hundreds of civilians.
On 9 December 2013, their political wing, the Rewilding Commission, became the first political party since 1853 to be banned in Entropan, due to it acting as a "legitimate way through which the Year Zero Committee receives funding and finance".
Contents
Formation and structure
In 1991, Jakab Vilmos and several other members of the anti-civilisation group Individuals Tending Toward Savagery (ISTMV) formed the Action Commission, an internal group within the organisation. While they shared the same general goals as ISTMV, the Action Commission believed that the most effective method of combatting civilisation and technological progress was through acts of violence targeted against researchers in emerging disciplines in science and technology, with the primary goal of discrediting progress itself to the public, in an attempt to slow it down. It was in the Action Commission's communiques where the political notion of "Year Zero" originated from, with the group going further than ISTMV and advocating for the wholesale abolition of symbolic thought (language, number, art, and the concept of time), in pursuit of returning to "Year Zero".
For the next 9 years, the Action Commission remained a part of the ISTMV, holding its own counter-meetings and creating an official magazine for the organisation, A Vada Radikalist (Jackian: The Wild Radicalist). During this time, the Action Commission would claim several attacks around Entropan as their own, including the stabbing of neuroscientist Arthur Hauger on 13 June 1996, drawing police attention to ISTMV and its activities, but with no connection found between the Action Commission and the activities. However, on January 9 2000, a credible link was found between the Action Commission and a letter bomb directed to the head of the Department of Engineering at the University of Holan. In response to this, and in fear of police retaliation against its activities, despite initially defending the Action Commission, the ISTMV eventually expelled dozens of members of the Action Commission, leading to these expelled members forming the Year Zero Committee.
The structure of the organisation was initially disparate, disconnected, and informal, but once membership grew, an organisational structure took shape, albeit informally. There are seven divisions of the ANS, covering regions of Entropan, each with their own primary meeting location through which the group organises its activities. However, since the police raid on their Mogyoróskan headquarters in July 2016, it is likely that some of these meeting locations have become inactive, replaced with online chat-rooms.
Ideology
On January 9 2000, ANS published a statement on the blog of Individuals Tending Towards Savagery (ISTMV) explaining why it split from the organisation. This statement has become known as the foundation for the ideological basis of ANS. In the post, it outlined its ideological basis, and explained how the group differed from the ISTMV at a fundamental and tactical basis.
It defined itself as anti-civilisation, accusing scientific and technological progress of being the primary agents responsible for the destruction of ecosystems and the development of a society which distances itself from nature. They represent an opposition to civilised society, revolutionary leftism, and the "Techno-Industrial System", only seeking to fight for individual autonomy. They differ themselves from the ISTMV in the belief that sporadic violence against those that they identified as responsible for technological progress, without remorse, was the best way to achieve the goal of reversing technological progress. They believe in the political notion of Year Zero, an ideal state in which technological and scientific progress is reversed to the extent to which is necessary for a return to a conception of the ideal primitive man, going further than the ISTMV and other related anti-civilisation groups in condemning agricultural civilisation, calling for a return to humanity as hunter-gatherers, abolishing concepts such as language, number, art, and the concept of time, viewing them as inherently oppressive.
The initial justification for their methodology, as outlined in their first and second communiques, was that those who they initially targeted - university teachers and researchers developing advanced technologies, such as nanotechnology - were agents of technological change, willing participants in the "Techno-Industrial System". Later, in 2013, after the ANS began committing suicide bombings and incendiary attacks, they published several more communiques, broadening their moral justification for violence to take account of "Collateral" - the hundreds of unaffiliated civilians killed by the attacks - these actions being justified through the deaths weighing on the conscience of those who were, particularly, targeted.
The ANS has claimed to have extended its influence from Entropan to several other Ecrosian states, including Tirol, Svedonia, Quebecshire, and Montesayette, but this internationalisation is not corroborated by facts and there are no ANS-claimed attacks in countries outside of Entropan.
History
Timeline of attacks
Affiliations
The Year Zero Committee maintains several affiliations, both domestic and international. In a communique published on September 9 2008, it alleged to meeting with several sympathetic elected representatives of the Green Party in private, discussing relations between the two organisations, but left because of the "exceedingly electoralist" attitude of the Green representatives. The Green Party has repeatedly and vociferously denied this allegation, often with its leadership being at the forefront of demanding prosecution for ANS activities, calling the allegations "desperate nonsense peddled by a terrorist group that craves attention", stating that any members found to have engaged with the ANS, in any manner, or any members who share the anti-civilisation ideology of the organisation, would be immediately expelled from the party, and reported to the police for further questioning on their involvement with the group.
Likimas
On 8 April 2001, Ajakanistani anarcho-primitivist party Likimas announced official affiliation with the ANS, and the Rewilding Commission. It would contribute to legal funds against imprisoned members of the ANS, and annual meetings were scheduled between the two organisations in Zheleboksarsk, Ajakanistan. Throughout the duration of their affiliation, Likimas faced calls to sever relations with the ANS as a whole, both domestically, and internationally, with strained relations between Entropan and Ajakanistan as a result of this. On 7 June 2013, as a result of the Vászoly Square bombings, Likimas officially severed ties with the ANS, stating in a publication that it was "horrified by the callousness of this brutal action, claiming the lives of hundreds and doing nothing against the Techno-Industrial System but further the worship of its machinations". However, since then, several officials from Likimas have been found to have met with the ANS and funded their activities, causing several Ajakanistani parties to claim that they exchanged a formal relationship with an informal one.
Other governments
A common claim levied by political parties in Entropan is that the Year Zero Committee is funded from abroad, with the intent of destabilising Entropan, limiting development and growth. While there is no evidence for this claim, it has been repeated across the political spectrum. On 28 April 2003, the Law & Justice Party claimed that the letter bombings by the ANS were directly funded by Quebecshire, stating in a publication that "it would be advantageous for them if Entropan's life sciences industry was on its knees". The Law & Justice Party repeated this claim on several occasions, with variations (on 9 November 2005, Jackson was claimed to finance the ANS; on 18 January 2006, Terranihil; on 19 September 2017, Zloveshchiy), prompting criticism from other political parties, including the Social Democratic Party, for alleged racist sentiment behind these claims.
The Progressive Socialist Party has suggested that CODECO-allied countries finance the ANS, although it has been less direct in its claims than the Law & Justice Party. On 19 July 2011, Progressive Socialist leader Dobos Renáta claimed in a speech after an ANS bomb failed to go off in central Maledonia that "there are certain powers to the south of Ecros that would delight in seeing development in Entropan stifled", repeating this claim again in 2015 in an interview with A Sentinel, saying that "The question isn't whether we will prosecute [the ANS], the question is whether we will find out what foreign Romerists are funding them, and bring them to justice".
