User:BellicoseIntellect/Special Actions Battalion for Engagement and Reconnaissance

The Special Actions Battalion for Engagement and Reconnaissance (the more-frequently used acronym of which is SABER)was a program designed to create a battalion of roughly 500 special forces operators able to combat the remaining Covenant factions following the Human Covenant War which ended in 2553. A spiritual predecessor to the SPARTAN III program, the operators in the SABER program were biologically augmented to increase speed, strength and mental abilities in order to become the premier black ops force of the UNSC.

An End to the "Golden Age"
Following the end of the Human Covenant War in 2553, the new-born Intergalactic Confederacy, which was comprised of the human race and the majority of the Covenant species, experienced a "Golden Age of Restoration" in which both groups were able to rebuild using shared technologies and ideas. The "True Sons", the group of Covenant that did not join the Confederacy, and the Intergalactic Confederacy agreed to sign a treaty preventing violence against one another for 100 years. This treaty was signed in 2556.

On February 3rd, 2601 a lone Covenant frigate appeared from a Slipspace jump in orbit over the Confederate colony of Hope IV. The frigate then proceeded to glass every major population center on the colony, wiping out 90% of the human and alien population. Rear Admiral Jakob Van Buren, believing that the attack was planned by alien leaders in the Confederacy, tasked the top members of ONI to create an all-human defense force "to act as vanguards to defend humanity from the impending return of its greatest enemy." And so, sometime in the Fall of 2601, preparations began on Project: SABER.