The Acquisitions Group

**Huodezu**, or the **Acquisitions Group**, is a fan-created intelligence organization in China. What they want is to become the Majestic-12 of China, and even exceed the achievements of the Americans with Chinese know-how. These attempts have so far attracted some help from an unknown benefactor, which has revolutionized their operation. However, they may have discovered something even more significant and dangerous within China itself.

## Organization

Huodezu seeks to penetrate American secrets related to extraterrestrial technology and activity on Earth, and secure that knowledge for the benefit of the government, military and people of the People’s Republic of China. They have broad powers, but are limited by their technological and organizational deficiencies.

### Scope

Huodezu was created under the broad aegis of the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense (COSTIND), an organization tasked with research and planning for military technologies and weapons systems, as well as making recommendations concerning weapons acquisition to the Central Military Commission. SCOSTIND, the successor to COSTIND, coordinates with a bewildering number of organizations and institutions within the Chinese intelligence community. In the beginning, the section was given low priority by the Central Military Commission, as only a minority was willing to treat the reports given by some intelligence assets of extraterrestrial contact in the USSR and US as kosher. For several years, the work of Huodezu was undertaken by a small number of true believers and those who had been shit-canned from other sections of Chinese intelligence. They were given low priority for resources, but they moved throughout the country investigating UFO sightings and made various failed efforts to penetrate the security of Majestic-12.

After the discovery of the Xiongzhuang-12 Baogao (described below), things changed. Once Ministry of State Security (MSS) assets in the United States verified the veracity of the document, Huodezu found its brief and budget vastly expanded. While Huodezu was largely derived from COSTIND, it recieved given a higher priority and became largely hermetically sealed from the organization in order to maintain secrecy. The Central Military Commission required that the tasks of the Huodezu be performed in blacker than black security, but also able to draw upon the full resources of the Chinese intelligence community. Huodezu is given priority over SCOSTIND and may take advantage of their intelligence and networks of research facilities and front companies, but for the most part they form another section apart. While SCOSTIND still concentrates on acquiring advanced technology from foreign countries, anything related to potential extraterrestrial technology is handed over to Huodezu. Huodezu is now split into a number of different sections with different responsibilities. Each section is in charge of operations in one particularly geographical region: China (including Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan), Americas and Oceania, South and Southeast Asia, North Asia (former Soviet Bloc, Eastern Europe, Japan and the Koreas), Western Europe, the Middle East and North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa. The largest sections are for China and the Americas/Oceania.

### Mission

Huodezu is broadly tasked with detecting, locating and security extraterrestrial technology for the People’s Republic of China. They have no knowledge of the Mythos, and they approach the issue from a materialistic mindset and point of view. According to their mission statement written in the mid-1980’s, while we believe that technologically advanced alien societies have likely achieved Communism, the possibility of advanced technology falling into the hands of imperialist or revisionist powers creates a dangerous variable that could distort the inevitable progression of history towards victory by the socialist bloc. Today, the pragmatic position is that the US achieved 20th century dominance through access to extraterrestrial technological secrets, and securing such secrets is of paramount importance to assuring that the 21st century belongs to China.

Most of Huodezu’s missions take place in the United States, where they concentrate on infiltrating Majestic-12 and its subsidiary organizations. Chinese intelligence tactics differ from those practiced by the Soviets. While the Soviets typically used a small number of agents to get a lot of information, the Chinese prefer an approach where pieces of information are collected piece-meal by many agents and then put together by analysts back home. Another characteristic tactic has been to concentrate on stealing information on second-tier technologies, rather than the cutting edge. These tactics define the ways in which Huodezu has approached penetrating Majestic-12. It remains extremely difficult to avoid detection by LOOKING GLASS, but there are by now a sizeable number of Huodezu agents or pawns in the lower ranks of the Majestic conspiracy, feeding small bits of information back to China. Though the United States is their main target, other sections of Huodezu penetrate other private and governmental organizations they suspect may have access to extraterrestrial technology. This has led to more than a few snark hunts by Huodezu agents based on erroneous information.

The Greater China division of Huodezu is traditionally in charge of investigating UFO sightings, which is a loveless task that exposes plenty of well-meaning agents to all kinds of lunatics. They engage in a fair amount of ARCHINT within their own country, based on stories of mysterious artifacts and evidence of extraterrestrial contact with ancient Chinese civilizations. After a lot of disappointing results (the Dropa Stones and the Baigong Pipes both turned up little of interest), an investigation into old Chinese Republic records of an expedition in the early 1930’s by British explorers led by a man named Clark Ashton Scarsdale has yielded some interesting results and changed the nature of the Greater Chinese division.

### History

In 1986, the Shenyang Division of the 2nd Bureau of Chinese’s military intelligence (tasked with collecting information on the Soviet bloc and Japan) became aware of an extraterrestrial vessel entering Earth's atmosphere and crashing in Russia, followed by a successful recovery of the vessel by the Soviet Union. A GRU SV8 agent known as Yuri Lachenko was co-opted by Chinese military intelligence to provide information on GRU SV8 activities. Planted agents and informants were only able to glean very limited useful information (and a lot of data which they dismissed as fantasy and paranoia, such as investigations into paranormal phenomena and cults), but this episode proved an impetus for further investigation into foreign knowledge of extraterrestrial activity. They studied reports of UFO crashes at Roswell, Aurora and Kecksburg in the United States, Shag Harbour in Canada and Berwyn Mountain and Rendlesham Forest in Britain, as well as other reports from all over the world, both the West and the Communist bloc. In this operation they became aware that at the very least the United States had been somewhat successful in replicating alien technology, and it was likely that the Soviet Union was actively trying on the same path. It became imperative that China narrow the gap with the superpowers on this front, lest she suffer a chronic handicap in the technological arms race.

Not all of the Central Military Commission were convinced, but they deigned to create a section within COSTIND in order to investigate these goings on. The first few years of Huodezu’s existence were marred by ignominy and humiliation, chasing after flying saucers and pawing over out-of-place artifacts while the rest of COSTIND treated them like fools. Serious attempts were made to penetrate Majestic-12, but LOOKING GLASS saw them coming from a mile away. They lost a number of agents, most of whom are presumed dead (though some likely feel into the hands of the OUTLOOK Group). The ones that did come back exhibited signs of having their memories wiped, and were often preemptively removed as agents for fear that the Americans had done some kind of mind control to them. All this made the whole operation look very unsatisfactory to the Central Military Commission, who seriously considered following the advice of the MSS, military intelligence and COSTIND itself and scrapping it entirely.

What changed the game was an investigation of strange lights near some remote Tibetan monasteries. Superiors were later displeased by the inconsistencies and strange details in the reports given, but the end details remained the same. After some strange and unexplained encounters with presumed hostiles, the Huodezu team were captured by local monks. One of the Agents, who spoke Tibetan, reported the monks talking of a sacrifice and far stranger things. However, after a freezing night locked in a small cell of the Buddhist sanctum, the agents found themselves unexpectedly freed, and bodies of the monks in the main hall in prayer positions. The monks appeared to have had their brains surgically removed. In the lap of the head monk sat a book. The book appeared to be an ancient Sanskrit text of Buddhist sutras, but upon translation it was discovered to be a full report on all the assets of the Majestic-12 organization and its subsidiaries.

This text, which was referred to as the Xiongzhuang-12 Baogao (“Majestic-12 Report”), allowed Huodezu for the first time to broke through the LOOKING GLASS. They were able to confirm the information in the Baogao on Majestic installations, personnel and assets through intelligence on the ground. The Central Military Commission were soon convinced of the seriousness and reality of what they had uncovered, and Huodezu both rapidly expanded but was also hermetically sealed from the intelligence community on which it depended. Even if Majestic-12 is taken over by Delta Green or collapses entirely, Huodezu will still maintain its efforts. They have no interest in fighting cults and monsters or even knowing about them so their interest in even an official Delta Green will be limited to (real or perceived) access to alien technology. They have been successful in stealing some information and even technology from Majestic, but the results of experimentation at home have been mixed at best. Attempts to contacted the Grays have yielded no results, although there have been suspicious disappearances. They are convinced their failures are due to a lack of information and so they have been putting renewed energy into penetrating the higher levels.

### Theme

It is often easy in the West to view the rising power and influence of China with fear and foreboding, without taking into account how the situation would be seen from the point of view of the other side. The Chinese watched the awesome power of the US military grind enemies to dust in Desert Storm in the 1990s. The United States spends many times more on its military than the Chinese do. The US has a global network of allies, many of which are strong in their own right, maintains bases around the world and has the great ability to project power on Earth. The technological superiority of the US military is overwhelming and despite China’s frantic efforts to catch up, it is still generations behind. The United States poses a much greater threat to China than it does to the US. And making matters worse, the United States has had access to extraterrestrial technology acquired from the Grays for over half a century.

And yet, China rises. Despite an almost constant stream of books about the inevitable collapse of the Chinese government, the Chinese Communist Party remains in firm control of the country even though capitalists can now be Party members. The economy continues to grow at a high rate unimaginable elsewhere. China invests in space travel, aircraft carriers, stealth fighters, big budget films, designer clothes. While Chinese companies are expanding overseas, the Chinese military is on the grow and considering an ever-expanding region of East Asia as its sphere of influence by right. To Americans, China can almost resemble a combination of fear of the USSR with paranoia about Japanese economic ascendancy in the 1980s. Now the sinister party cadre and the inscrutable Asian investor are the same man. But for China, it is only as it should be. They know with increasing confidence that they are a power that can say no, a power that will never be humiliated again.

That combination of fear and growing confidence is what provides the theme of Huodezu, perhaps summed up as desperate ambition (or hubris?). Huodezu is working for the glory and power of the People’s Republic of China. They believe that by gaining access to alien technology they will be able to better bridge the power gap between them and the West, in order to finally receive recognition of a truly global power worthy of respect and adulation. A side benefit of this would be Chinese military and political domination over Asia, a Monroe doctrine of their own. They have access to a massive amount of resources from their state, but they feel they have fallen behind in the race and are desperate to catch up. They dream of becoming like Majestic-12, even if they don’t know it. The danger inherent in this dream comes from the knowledge that they don’t know what Majestic-12 became when it began to tamper with alien forces. They say to be careful what you wish for.

## Primary sources

### “Directive on Policy Regarding Vehicles, Life Forms and Technology of Extraterrestrial Origin”

Published October 1989.

> 1. The Working Principles on Extraterrestrial Life Forms
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> - According to the Marxist-Leninist principles of scientific socialism, the development of sentient species must be similar throughout the universe. Any species that has achieved interstellar transport is also likely to have successfully attained Communism.
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> - The lack of direct contact by extraterrestrial communists or socialists does not represent a denial of the above principle. It is likely any observing beings possess a principle of non-interference.
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> - The possibility of extraterrestrials whose technological development has outpaced their historical development cannot be ruled out. The threat of interstellar imperialism or exploitation must be steadfastly guarded against.
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> 2. International Situation
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> - Over the course of the last century, there have been a multitude of reported sightings and contact events with objects and beings of extraterrestrial origin both on the domestic and international fronts. The majority of these are likely erroneous. However, there has been a failure to treat these reports in a scientific manner by the state organs.
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> - The object recovered in January 1986 near Dal’negorsk by Soviet Air Defense Forces has been confirmed by informants as being of extraterrestrial origin. Reports indicate that the object may possess unusual defensive capabilities. Requests for information were rebuffed by the Soviets.
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> - In the context of the setbacks in the development of socialism due to Gorbachev’s “new thinking”, the potential for advanced technology of an extraterrestrial nature in the hands of imperialists or revisionists threatens to create severe setbacks for the development of socialism.
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> 3. Policy regarding Extraterrestrial Vehicles, Lifeforms and Technology
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> - The default position to be assumed towards sentient life forms of extraterrestrial origin shall be friendly and in good faith.
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> - In the case of extraterrestrial life forms of hostile, reactionary or imperialist intent, the present international environment can be compared to that of the Americas prior to the arrival of Columbus in 1492, when imperialist European powers wiped out and enslaved the native Mexicans and South Americans who were at an earlier stage of historical development.
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> - We must expand efforts to collect and analyze technical and social data related to extraterrestrials, their technological achievements, their social development and their possible interactions with domestic or foreign factions or powers.
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> - We should form an organization that can pursue these missions both on the domestic front and abroad while maintaining cover. Access to resources from both military and civilian intelligence organs will be necessary. While Party oversight will be necessary, certain freedom of movement must be maintained.
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