SPARTAN-II program

Project: SPARTAN-II is part of the ongoing Spartan Program. Headed by Dr. Catherine Halsey of ONI, Section 3, and Chief Petty Officer Mendez of the UNSC armed forces, the program turned ordinary civilian children into the most capable fighting force that has ever been seen in battle. The Spartan II Program had its roots its predecessor the Spartan 1 Program which started in 2494. In 2517, the children selected for the program were chosen based on their strength, height, weight, and various other criteria on which would serve the SPARTAN-II project best. These children were then taken to Reach where they began their physical training by CPO Mendez at 5-7 years of age. They trained as Marines, and after seven years, they began their treatments for physical augmentation. Some of these augmentations, which caused about half of them to die and a few others were discharged from military service due to horrible side effects caused by the procedure. Those who recovered completely went on to receive further training and went on to become the current team of Spartans.

Project SPARTAN-II was created in conjunction with Project MJOLNIR so that, once combined, the Spartans in their MJOLNIR armor would be the ultimate soldiers.

Purpose of Project SPARTAN-II

The future of the UNSC looked bleak, as of 2525. ONI projections of the outer colonies concluded that their extreme instability would result in massive rebellion within twenty years unless drastic military action was taken. The SPARTAN-II soldiers were designed to be a perfect pinpoint strike force, preventing massive civilian casualties and perhaps, even a civil war, should rebellions surface. They were designed to quell insurrection.

Ironically, the appearance of The Covenant reversed their mission. After the emergence of the new threat, the Spartan soldiers fought to save every human life they possibly could from its clutches. They, along with humanity fought valiantly, but their numbers have slowly dwindled. Even though the Spartans were supersoldiers, there were still only so many of them compared to the hordes of Covenant they face. This may have prompted the UNSC to start a new generation of supersoldiers codenamed Spartan III.

Before The Battle of Reach and the destruction of the UNSC Pillar of Autumn at Installation 04, the UNSC planned to have the Spartans capture a Covenant ship, in order to locate High Charity. There, they would capture a Prophet, and force an end to the war. They did not know that High Charity was a mobile station, rather than a planet in a fixed system of space. That mission was aborted after Reach fell and most of the Spartans were assumed killed. Even in posession of the Ascendant Justice, it was a virtual suicide mission in light of the circumstances. The Master Chief was convinced to abort the mission. Apparently it was a good idea, because according to Dr. Halsey's profile on Covenant society, the capture of a Prophet would escalate the war.

Later, when the Master Chief had an opportunity to capture the High Prophet of Regret, he did not. There are several proposed reasons for this. First, he had recieved a direct order from Commander Miranda Keyes to kill the Prophet. Second, the Covenant knew the location of Earth and there was no place left for the humans to hold such an important prisoner. Third, the Chief had no backup and it would have been extremely difficult for him to capture the Prophet with its Honor Guard surrounding him and hundreds more Covenant soldiers en route.

Augmentation Procedures

Main article: Spartan Augmentation Procedures

Admiral Ysionris Jeromi of the research station Hopeful documented the following experimental procedures on Bonobo Chimpanzees. These operations were later performed on the Spartan soldiers:

• Carbide ceramic ossification
• Muscular enhancement injections
• Catalytic thyroid implant
• Occipital capillary reversal
• Superconducting fabrication of neural dendrites

Last known surviving Spartans IIs

Although some did perish in their escape from Reach and after the first strike lead by John-117, the last known surviving Spartan IIs are: John-117, Kelly-087, Fred-104, Linda-058 and Maria-062.

Section Two of the Office of Naval Intelligence has made a significant effort to keep the reports of Spartan soldier's deaths a secret. They created the Spartan MIA Protocol, and this created a strong feeling among the general populace that Spartans were invincible and could not die. The effort has been largely successful in deceiving the human population.

Note: Fortunately, we cannot assume that every Spartan assumed MIA or KIA is actually dead. Notice that many of them dissappeared under dire circumstances. Li-008, Anton-044, Vinh-030, Spartan-James (number unknown), and Joshua-029 are examples. They are assumed dead but the other characters did not actually witness these Spartans die. This is so that the game developers can have the space to develop any potential plot points if they want to. If there are more stories to come, there will continue to be many loose ends.

Several contextual errors concerning the number of remaining Spartans exist. In Fall of the Reach, it is cited that 68 children were in the program two years after its initiation. It is possible the other 7 had been injured in some way and were remaining at camp, but no mention of this is made. After the augmentation process all 75 have somehow reappeared, with 30 of them killed during augmentation, 12 hurt too much to continue, and 33 succesfully surviving the project. These errors continue through the novels with other members, such as Sam and Kurt, being listed as dead, as well at least six others either missing or on missions too far to be reached, but the remaining number of Spartans on Reach does not reflect that number. Bungie has cited that these only seem to be errors, and all will be clear in more time.

There is also a discrepancy between the number of Spartans at Reach. Page 260 of "The Fall of Reach" states that there were three spartans designated "Gray Team" who were in "fields of battle too distant to be easily recalled, though they could have died since Ghosts of Onyx stated that those three Spartans did not contact Command for a year.

Finally, it remains yet to be determined if Cassandra is an actual Spartan or not.