United Nations Extraterrestrial Combat Operations Mandate

The United Nations Extraterrestrial Combat Operations Mandate (abbreviated XCOM, sometimes UNXCOM) was a clandestine paramilitary wing of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) whose primary objective was "to defend humanity from enemies known and unknown", though its scope and specific mission parameters varied throughout its lifetime. XCOM was established in 1993 with the convening of the first Global Council in Sapporo, Japan - a meeting of sixteen nations' heads of state and the leadership of their respective UFO-aware intelligence services, which produced the XCOM Charter. By the time of its destruction in 2015, the membership of the Global Council had expanded to include a total of thirty-six signatories (including the sixteen original 1993 fundatory members) which contributed to the organization.

XCOM was activated three times throughout its lifetime, in what were referred to as 'Projects'. The first took place shortly after the drafting of the XCOM Charter in Sapporo in 1993 to contain and eliminate the ongoing alien incursion in the Russian Far East and Manchuria at the time, and largely acted as a coordinating body for the various national-level xenointelligence services active in the area until the threat was considered neutralized later that year. It was activated the second time at the outset of the Second Secret War following the devastating loss of Kiryu-Kai Division in December of 1998, during which XCOM would remain active and consolidate many of the national-level resources into a new globalized structure until the raid on Cydonia in 2002, bringing the war to a close. Throughout the rest of the early 21st Century, XCOM would remain partially active, maintaining a presence on Cydonia until 2009 and operating a number of research stations, mostly focused on monitoring for incoming threats. Its final activation would be in February of 2015 in preparation for the invasion by the Elders, which proved to overwhelm both the clandestine organization and the world's combined conventional military forces alike.