- This article or section should be merged with Cosmic Era list of characters
Rau Le Creuset is a fictional character from the popular anime series Mobile Suit Gundam Seed. As Seed takes some of its elements from the original Gundam series, Le Creuset would fall into the position Char Aznable played as an antagonist to the main characters.
About the character
Rau Le Creuset is a unit commander in ZAFT (Zodiac Alliance of Freedom Treaty). Cool, cunning, and highly mysterious, Rau Le Creuset is an adept commander in his field and an excellent mobile suit pilot. He obtains his fame early in the war during the Battle of Yggdrasil, in which he uses his ZGMF-1017 GINN mobile suit to destroy 37 Earth Alliance mobile armors and six warships. This feat earned him the Order of the Nebula, a decoration awarded to ZAFT's most outstanding soldiers. After the Battle of Endymion Crater on the moon, Le Creuset becomes the commander of the newly constructed Nazca-class ship Vesalius. Under his command, ZAFT vessels Vesalius and Gamow attacked the neutral colony Heliopolis, where the military contractor Morgenroete was constructing prototype weapons for the Atlantic Federation.
The raid ended with four of the prototype G weapons being captured by ZAFT and the destruction of Heliopolis itself. The colonies' desruction was due to the utilization of heavy weaponry on both sides of the conflict, as ZAFT tried to capture or destroy the GAT-X105 Strike Gundam as well as the mobile suit carrier, Archangel.
Apart from attempts to take down "The Legged Ship" (as ZAFT codenamed it), he shares a strange connection with Earth Alliance Mobile Armor (MA) pilot Mu La Flaga. However his motives and the face behind the mask, remain a secret.
Further Character Background
Despite his allegiance with ZAFT, Rau bears no loyalty to it. Fortunately his reputation is high enough that the ZAFT Defense Council Chairman, Patrick Zala, revealed to him the real plans for Operation Spitbreak. He betrayed Zala by giving whatever he was told to an informant named Azrael, who eventually is found to be the head of the Azrael Conglomerate, a military supplier to the Atlantic Federation, and the leader of Blue Cosmos. This little betrayal caused a large percentage of ZAFT's earthbound forces to be lost during Operation Spitbreak.
A chance encounter with Mu La Flaga and Kira Yamato in the abandoned colony of Mendel revealed his true identity and motives. Rau Le Creuset is really the genetic clone of Al Da Flaga, Mu La Flaga's father. Considering his own son as nothing, Al Da Flaga conspired with Professor Ulen Hibiki to create several clones of himself, of which La Creuset is one. However, it is an imperfect clone. His imperfection was a lack of telomere that resulted in advanced aging. At first the lack of telomere was intentional, so as to allow Rau to catch up to Mwu in age so that Rau could replace Mwu. Once Rau reached Mwu's age, they attempted to stop the accelerated aging processed but found that they were not able to do so permanently. So Rau was forced to take a special drug that is made to stabilize his aging. If Rau goes too long without taking the medication, he suffers intense pain. Because of the pain of his imperfection, Rau becomes mentally unstable and he decides that Naturals and Coordinators are both unfit for living, and sees to it that the imminent destruction of both parties is accomplished.
To facillitate his plan, he leaks to the Earth Alliance the technology used to create the ZGMF-X10A Freedom Gundam and the ZGMF-X09A Justice Gundam through a disc he entrusted to Flay Allster, a young Earth Alliance soldier (and crew member of Archangel) that he captured during a battle in Alaska. This eventually lead to the reinstitution of nuclear missiles in the Earth Alliance, and the eventual destruction of the ZAFT military asteroid Boaz. With nuclear missiles on the Earth Alliance's side, and the Genesis superweapon on ZAFT's side, it seemed clear that all will end.
In the final battle of the war, Rau piloted the ZGMF-X13A Providence Gundam, the final ZAFT Gundam. Because of the Providence's sheer power, Rau managed to heavily damage Strike and Buster. He also destroyed an escape shuttle that launched from Dominion that contained Flay Alster, after which he has a final battle with Kira Yamato and the Freedom Gundam.
During his fight with Freedom Gundam, in spite of Kira's astonishing power as the Ultimate Coordinator, Rau manages to cripple his Gundam using the powerful DRAGOON System. However, the young Coordinator makes a comeback and,in a desperate attack,mortally wounds Rau, whose suit is, in the end, caught in the blast of the GENESIS laser and destroyed.
Two years have passed since the Second Battle of Jachin Due, but ,with the start of a new war between the Earth Alliance and PLANT and the subsequent use of Nuclear Weapons, Rau's words echo in Kira's mind:"With eyes and hearts filled only with hatred and hands that only know how to pull a trigger in this world..."
Mobile Suits
Apart from being an excellent commander, Rau Le Creuset backs up his intellect through his experience as a mobile suit pilot. Throughout the series, he takes part in various operations, but mostly stays behind on the Vesalius. Like Char, he pilots a mobile suit with ruthless efficiency, all the while doing it without a pilot suit on. Some of the mobile suits that he piloted throughout the series are:
-ZGMF-515 CGUE: Mobile suit issued to ace pilots such as him.
-AMF-101 DINN: Atmospheric flight mobile suit. Used by Rau on Operation Spitbreak.
-ZGMF-600 GuAIZ: Latest ZAFT Mobile Suit incorporated in the last months of the war. Used a silver commander's version. Destroyed by Kira Yamato in the ZGMF-X10A Freedom Gundam.
-ZGMF-X13A Providence Gundam: The last of ZAFT's Gundam designs, equipped with the DRAGOON System funnels. Piloted in the final battle of the war.
Voice Actors
In the Japanese version of Gundam Seed, Rau is voiced by veteran seiyuu Seki Toshihiko, who also voiced Duo Maxwell from Gundam Wing.
The English version(dubbed by the Ocean Group) has the character played by Mark Oliver.
See Also
Mobile Suit Gundam Seed
| 
