Alliance of Twelve
Encyclopedia
The Alliance of Twelve, with SD-6 being one of its subsidiary cells, is a fictional international organized crime group in the television series Alias
. It is involved in the trade of intelligence
and weapons as well as in blackmail
ing.
The organization was founded by Alain Christophe, once a CIA counterintelligence officer, as well as other former agents of various other intelligence agencies and wealthy individuals investing in the spy trade after the Cold War.
The Alliance of Twelve is an enemy of the United States and a rival to the CIA.
(Sydney translates it as "the section that doesn't exist" in the episode Q&A). These organizational cells are spread over 12 major cities of the world.
The Alliance takes in CIA agents and trains them to believe they are working for the CIA when in reality they are not.
, medical technology, computer advances, and political agendas. Its clients include governments, corporations, wealthy citizens, families.
The Alliance aims to eventually reach world domination through its control over organized crime and the trade of intelligence. According to Jack Bristow
and Arvin Sloane
, the Alliance once wished to change the world when it had achieved this, and rid the world of corruption, but had become bloated and corrupt over the years, diverging from their original vision and focusing instead on profit.
in the episode Q and A, the Alliance of Twelve was responsible for the carbon proxy disaster in 1992, in which an accidental methyl isocyanate
leak at the manufacturer plant in Bangalore, India killed three thousand people and injured another thousand, leaving them disabled. In 1996, near Kyoto, Japan, a bullet train accidentally switched tracks and derailed, killing a hundred and fifty people. The Alliance was also responsible for that disaster. In 2001, the Alliance caused a transport plane in Germany to suffer mechanical failures outside Munich, killing twelve people. The disasters were falsely believed to have been accidents. In truth, some were acts of revenge, others were personal favors to those who helped fund the Alliance. Some were distractions so that local resources were occupied so that SD-4 or SD-7 could infiltrate a building somewhere and retrieve sensitive data.
and based in Los Angeles, is the focus of the first two seasons of Alias. SD-6 pretends to be part of the CIA
and states its objective as "retrieval and study of intelligence both military and industrial throughout the world that is critical to the superiority and survival of the United States of America."
Even its own members, initially including agent Sydney Bristow
, believe it is a black ops division of the CIA and only a handful of senior staff know the truth and are complicit in the deception.
In the first episode of Alias, Sydney learns from her father, Jack
about the organization's true character as a part of The Alliance of Twelve.
During the course of the first season, other heads of the SD cells are eventually shown meeting. Among them was Edward Poole, head of SD-9 (played by Roger Moore
), who manages to convince Sloane to kill fellow SD head Jean Briault to influence an upcoming vote on whether to declare war on Alexander Khasinau
, who has eliminated rival groups FTL and K-Directorate
. Another SD leader is identified by the first name "Ramon," but his last name and his SD cell number are unrevealed.
that would go off if the inner vault had been breached during a security lockdown or for other contingencies. Fail-safe or lockdown procedures could be carried out only by Arvin Sloane, using his right index fingerprint; presumably, other SD cells had similar contingency plans (such as for deterring a CIA raid, which happens in Season 2) that would make it difficult to shut down.
In addition, SD-6 employed an internal security group responsible for investigating and terminating individuals who even know of SD-6's existence, those believed to know about the true nature of SD-6, or those suspected to be Double agent
s or traitors to SD-6. Sydney's fiancée, Danny, was murdered by SD-6's internal security division in Season 1 after Sydney revealed to him that she works for SD-6, believing it to be a part of the CIA.
When Arvin Sloane's wife, Emily
, admits to knowing of the existence of SD-6, Arvin is told to have his wife killed as a test of loyalty. Arvin was able to win a temporary reprieve because of his wife's cancer which would kill her soon; when her cancer is found to be in remission, he is again told that in order to become a "full partner" in The Alliance, he would have to kill his wife. He then faked his wife's death by drugging her wine and putting her in suspended animation.
Having proven his loyalty to the members of The Alliance, he is welcomed as a full partner and injected in the neck with a tracking device and mini-microphone to have his movements and conversations recorded 24/7. Although Sloane was clearly privy to matters that only a handful of men and women knew about, he was clearly not yet part of an 'inner circle' within The Alliance board, suggesting that there is some sense of competition and suspicion among even the SD cells and their leaders.
' to the cell-like nature of the Alliance.
Although the server was located on a Boeing 747 plane that was constantly airborne as a security measure, Sydney was able to pose as an escort for the computer technicians onboard during one of its landings and copy all the information from the server. When Jack attempted to go back to SD-6 headquarters to get confirmation that the information was genuine (as the CIA would only have one chance), he was apprehended by the acting head Geiger (Sloane had taken off and was declared MIA by the Alliance) who accused him of being a CIA spy.
Knowing she couldn't go back herself, Sydney called her SD-6 partner Marcus Dixon
to get the confirmation and tells Dixon the true nature of SD-6. With this information, the CIA was able to successfully raid all the offices of various SD cells around the world; Sydney was a part of the CIA team that infiltrated SD-6 headquarters in Los Angeles and rescued her father moments before he would be electrocuted by Geiger. It is then revealed that Sloane had planned the destruction of the Alliance, having a technician bypass the surveillance devices in his neck, and he and Sark
had supplied Sydney with the information the CIA needed to remove The Alliance - after he had cleared out (apparently) all Rambaldi artifacts to his own location outside of SD-6. However, one artifact escaped Sloane's attention. This artifact, the Horizon, had been sought by Prophet Five for thirty years, and was eventually retrieved (after coercing Sydney) by Irina Derevko, who then betrayed Prophet Five, almost four years after the fall of the Alliance.
Alias (TV series)
Alias is an American action television series created by J. J. Abrams which was broadcast on ABC for five seasons, from September 30, 2001 to May 22, 2006...
. It is involved in the trade of intelligence
Intelligence (information gathering)
Intelligence assessment is the development of forecasts of behaviour or recommended courses of action to the leadership of an organization, based on a wide range of available information sources both overt and covert. Assessments are developed in response to requirements declared by the leadership...
and weapons as well as in blackmail
Blackmail
In common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
ing.
The organization was founded by Alain Christophe, once a CIA counterintelligence officer, as well as other former agents of various other intelligence agencies and wealthy individuals investing in the spy trade after the Cold War.
The Alliance of Twelve is an enemy of the United States and a rival to the CIA.
Organizational structure
The Alliance is led by a board of directors.One of them being Arvin Sloane. Some members are from the private sector, but most are former intelligence officers. All of them are wealthy. The organization is divided into 12 sections, named SD-1 through SD-12. "SD" stands for Section Disparue — literally, the section which has disappeared in FrenchFrench language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
(Sydney translates it as "the section that doesn't exist" in the episode Q&A). These organizational cells are spread over 12 major cities of the world.
The Alliance takes in CIA agents and trains them to believe they are working for the CIA when in reality they are not.
Objectives
The purview of the Alliance is the black market trading of weapons, military secrets, industrial intelligenceIndustrial espionage
Industrial espionage, economic espionage or corporate espionage is a form of espionage conducted for commercial purposes instead of purely national security purposes...
, medical technology, computer advances, and political agendas. Its clients include governments, corporations, wealthy citizens, families.
The Alliance aims to eventually reach world domination through its control over organized crime and the trade of intelligence. According to Jack Bristow
Jack Bristow
Jonathan "Jack" Donahue Bristow, played by Victor Garber, is Sydney Bristow's father on the television series Alias. Jack is widely referred to as "Spy Daddy" in Alias fandom, and consistently ranks as one of the most popular characters on the show...
and Arvin Sloane
Arvin Sloane
Arvin Sloane is a fictional character played by Ron Rifkin. He was the former director of SD-6 on the television series, Alias.-Background:...
, the Alliance once wished to change the world when it had achieved this, and rid the world of corruption, but had become bloated and corrupt over the years, diverging from their original vision and focusing instead on profit.
Actions
According to Sydney BristowSydney Bristow
Sydney Anne Bristow , played by Jennifer Garner, is the main character and protagonist on the television series Alias. She is an American woman with Russian-American family background who works as a spy for the CIA....
in the episode Q and A, the Alliance of Twelve was responsible for the carbon proxy disaster in 1992, in which an accidental methyl isocyanate
Methyl isocyanate
Methyl isocyanate is an organic compound with the molecular formula CH3NCO. Synonyms are isocyanatomethane, methyl carbylamine, and MIC. Methyl isocyanate is an intermediate chemical in the production of carbamate pesticides . It has also been used in the production of rubbers and adhesives...
leak at the manufacturer plant in Bangalore, India killed three thousand people and injured another thousand, leaving them disabled. In 1996, near Kyoto, Japan, a bullet train accidentally switched tracks and derailed, killing a hundred and fifty people. The Alliance was also responsible for that disaster. In 2001, the Alliance caused a transport plane in Germany to suffer mechanical failures outside Munich, killing twelve people. The disasters were falsely believed to have been accidents. In truth, some were acts of revenge, others were personal favors to those who helped fund the Alliance. Some were distractions so that local resources were occupied so that SD-4 or SD-7 could infiltrate a building somewhere and retrieve sensitive data.
SD-6
SD-6, headed by Arvin SloaneArvin Sloane
Arvin Sloane is a fictional character played by Ron Rifkin. He was the former director of SD-6 on the television series, Alias.-Background:...
and based in Los Angeles, is the focus of the first two seasons of Alias. SD-6 pretends to be part of the CIA
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...
and states its objective as "retrieval and study of intelligence both military and industrial throughout the world that is critical to the superiority and survival of the United States of America."
Even its own members, initially including agent Sydney Bristow
Sydney Bristow
Sydney Anne Bristow , played by Jennifer Garner, is the main character and protagonist on the television series Alias. She is an American woman with Russian-American family background who works as a spy for the CIA....
, believe it is a black ops division of the CIA and only a handful of senior staff know the truth and are complicit in the deception.
In the first episode of Alias, Sydney learns from her father, Jack
Jack Bristow
Jonathan "Jack" Donahue Bristow, played by Victor Garber, is Sydney Bristow's father on the television series Alias. Jack is widely referred to as "Spy Daddy" in Alias fandom, and consistently ranks as one of the most popular characters on the show...
about the organization's true character as a part of The Alliance of Twelve.
During the course of the first season, other heads of the SD cells are eventually shown meeting. Among them was Edward Poole, head of SD-9 (played by Roger Moore
Roger Moore
Sir Roger George Moore KBE , is an English actor, perhaps best known for portraying British secret agent James Bond in seven films from 1973 to 1985. He also portrayed Simon Templar in the long-running British television series The Saint.-Early life:Moore was born in Stockwell, London...
), who manages to convince Sloane to kill fellow SD head Jean Briault to influence an upcoming vote on whether to declare war on Alexander Khasinau
Alexander Khasinau
Alexander Khasinau is a fictional character from the American television series Alias. He was played by Derrick O'Connor.Alexander Khasinau is second-in-command of a criminal organization headed by a mysterious figure known as "The Man." Julian Sark, who undertakes a number of missions on behalf of...
, who has eliminated rival groups FTL and K-Directorate
K-Directorate
K-Directorate is a fictional organized crime group in the television series Alias, headquartered in St. Petersburg. It is an enemy of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the Alliance of Twelve. It figures most prominently in the first season....
. Another SD leader is identified by the first name "Ramon," but his last name and his SD cell number are unrevealed.
Of SD-6
SD-6 branch was headquartered in the Credit Dauphine building in Los Angeles, with entry through a special elevator to the sixth sub-level of the building. Every person who entered would be biometrically scanned and visually confirmed. As a security measure, all three areas of the foundations of the building itself were rigged with C-4 explosivesC-4 (explosive)
C4 or Composition C4 is a common variety of the plastic explosive known as Composition C.-Composition and manufacture:C4 is made up of explosives, plastic binder, plasticizer and usually marker or odorizing taggant chemicals such as 2,3-dimethyl-2,3-dinitrobutane to help detect the explosive and...
that would go off if the inner vault had been breached during a security lockdown or for other contingencies. Fail-safe or lockdown procedures could be carried out only by Arvin Sloane, using his right index fingerprint; presumably, other SD cells had similar contingency plans (such as for deterring a CIA raid, which happens in Season 2) that would make it difficult to shut down.
In addition, SD-6 employed an internal security group responsible for investigating and terminating individuals who even know of SD-6's existence, those believed to know about the true nature of SD-6, or those suspected to be Double agent
Double agent
A double agent, commonly abbreviated referral of double secret agent, is a counterintelligence term used to designate an employee of a secret service or organization, whose primary aim is to spy on the target organization, but who in fact is a member of that same target organization oneself. They...
s or traitors to SD-6. Sydney's fiancée, Danny, was murdered by SD-6's internal security division in Season 1 after Sydney revealed to him that she works for SD-6, believing it to be a part of the CIA.
Of The Alliance
In addition to the cell-like nature of Section Disparu, which presumably allows the termination of entire SD cells in the event that it is wholly compromised, the Alliance of Twelve is an utterly ruthless organization that constantly suspects and conduct surveillance of even its head members.When Arvin Sloane's wife, Emily
Emily Sloane
Emily Sloane is a fictional character from the American television series Alias. She was portrayed by Amy Irving.-Biography:Emily Sloane was married to SD-6 head Arvin Sloane for more than 30 years. Little is known of her life outside of her marriage to Arvin. She had worked for the State...
, admits to knowing of the existence of SD-6, Arvin is told to have his wife killed as a test of loyalty. Arvin was able to win a temporary reprieve because of his wife's cancer which would kill her soon; when her cancer is found to be in remission, he is again told that in order to become a "full partner" in The Alliance, he would have to kill his wife. He then faked his wife's death by drugging her wine and putting her in suspended animation.
Having proven his loyalty to the members of The Alliance, he is welcomed as a full partner and injected in the neck with a tracking device and mini-microphone to have his movements and conversations recorded 24/7. Although Sloane was clearly privy to matters that only a handful of men and women knew about, he was clearly not yet part of an 'inner circle' within The Alliance board, suggesting that there is some sense of competition and suspicion among even the SD cells and their leaders.
The end of The Alliance
The Alliance came to an end in the middle of Season 2 (Episode 13, "Phase One") of Alias when Sydney stumbles upon information, with Sark's aid, that leads her and Vaughn to believe there is one master server, server 47 (in keeping with the Rambaldi sub-plot of the show, where 47 is a key number in Rambaldi's works), which could potentially have all the information the CIA would need to shut down all of the SD cells simultaneously, thus acting as a sort of 'silver bulletSilver bullet
In folklore, the silver bullet is supposed to be the only kind of bullet for firearms that is effective against a werewolf, witch, or other monsters...
' to the cell-like nature of the Alliance.
Although the server was located on a Boeing 747 plane that was constantly airborne as a security measure, Sydney was able to pose as an escort for the computer technicians onboard during one of its landings and copy all the information from the server. When Jack attempted to go back to SD-6 headquarters to get confirmation that the information was genuine (as the CIA would only have one chance), he was apprehended by the acting head Geiger (Sloane had taken off and was declared MIA by the Alliance) who accused him of being a CIA spy.
Knowing she couldn't go back herself, Sydney called her SD-6 partner Marcus Dixon
Marcus Dixon (Alias)
Marcus R. Dixon is a fictional character on the television series, Alias. He has been one of Sydney Bristow's coworkers and the CIA's Director of Joint Task Force. He is portrayed by Carl Lumbly.-Character biography:...
to get the confirmation and tells Dixon the true nature of SD-6. With this information, the CIA was able to successfully raid all the offices of various SD cells around the world; Sydney was a part of the CIA team that infiltrated SD-6 headquarters in Los Angeles and rescued her father moments before he would be electrocuted by Geiger. It is then revealed that Sloane had planned the destruction of the Alliance, having a technician bypass the surveillance devices in his neck, and he and Sark
Julian Sark
Julian Sark is a recurring fictional character portrayed by David Anders on the ABC television series Alias. The series follows Sydney Bristow, an operative working for an organization called SD-6 which she believes is a covert branch of the Central Intelligence Agency...
had supplied Sydney with the information the CIA needed to remove The Alliance - after he had cleared out (apparently) all Rambaldi artifacts to his own location outside of SD-6. However, one artifact escaped Sloane's attention. This artifact, the Horizon, had been sought by Prophet Five for thirty years, and was eventually retrieved (after coercing Sydney) by Irina Derevko, who then betrayed Prophet Five, almost four years after the fall of the Alliance.