 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything One Piece. And today we are here to talk about sword, not sword's plural, but sword singular, which consists of a plurality of members. It's confusing, mysterious, and infinitely intriguing. Much like subscribing to the Grand Line Review, it's confusing because I do bring it up a lot. It's mysterious because I promise you vague regular One Piece content uploaded straight into your YouTube feed. And it is intriguing because of the seductive eyes that this subscribe button is giving you right now. Go on, press it. And please do comment if you're a new member of the Grand Fleet, welcome. Let's jump into this whole thing though. What is sword? Well, sword is a top secret cell of agents who operate as part of the Marines, who they themselves operate under the world government. So I guess you could say that this is an organization that exists within another organization, which is in and of itself part of a larger organization. There's definitely a lot of bureaucracy within the world government and the Marines. And I suppose you could say that's very much part of the reason why sword exists. Because as far as we're aware, sword is a direct action group aimed at bypassing the orders of the world government and potentially even the decision makers of the Marines themselves. And this is because of running theme throughout the entirety of One Piece has been questioning the motives and the actions of the world government, which from the perspective of readers and watchers we know is obviously wildly corrupt. But that aspect also isn't lost on certain Marines and there have been very prominent characters such as Smoker, Fujitora and Kuzan who have questioned what they are being made to do. In fact, it's even gotten to a point where Sakazuki questions the five elder stars but only when they do not act in line with the ideal of absolute justice. So it's a very different situation for the Magmerman. As such though, it was only a matter of time before these thoughts and feelings found a community and that seems to have taken form in sword which is also described as the Kimitsu Tokushibutai or top secret special force. So in many ways you could consider sword the Marine equivalent of a cypher pole cell because they operate on very much the same level of infiltration, intel and action. And with that in mind, this also very much explains the name of the group because they exist to counterbalance the cypher pole agencies run directly by the world government. And in the case of CP zero directly by the world nobles. So speaking of the full name of CP zero is cypher pole Aegis zero. Another very mysterious organization that we still know shockingly a little about actually except that all of their members like to dress in their super fly white outfits. But very notably Aegis is a mythological shield which was stated to be wielded by both Athena and Zeus in the Iliad. And that makes a lot of sense because CP zero act as the direct shield of the world nobles who believe that they themselves are gods. So there is no other name that would do for such an organization. But of course to represent the antithesis of that the name sword was more than appropriate especially since it's just called sword. There's a billion mythical swords or weapons one could have chosen for this group but it's just plain sword. Indicating that this group is representing the best interests and needs of the common people rather than say the needs of the gods. And that is very well presented by two members that we currently know of being Diaz Drake and Kobe who still has no last name. But think about it this way, Kobe was about as common as they come. A terrified captive cabin boy who worked his way up to the rank of captain. Quite impressive really. Although very interestingly if you look at the official English translation on the Viz website when Kobe was introduced as a member of sword he's also introduced as a rare admiral of the Marines. And this is a mistake not by the English translation it was actually a mistake made by Oda which was corrected for the volume release. Kobe is still a captain just in case there's any confusion. However the Viz website currently retains the weekly release of that chapter. But back to filthy commoners. Our leading authority of sword at this point would be Diaz Drake who was the child of an abusive former Marine turned pirate Diaz Barrels. And Drake weirdly enough was rescued from his fate due to Don Quixote Rosinante. And as a grand irony of the situation Drake himself followed in his father's footsteps. First becoming a Marine and then turning to a life of piracy. Except that this piracy decision in retrospect was made so that he could be sent into Kaido's crew as some sort of deep plant. Like a sort of dank algae gradually growing on the underside of Kaido. As such we really cannot undersell just how long sword has existed in this world. I do not think it's a recent addition not even during the time skip. Because Drake went undercover as a pirate and publicly defected from the Marines long, long ago. Which is another strong similarity to how Cypher Paul operates actually. Because if you remember Rob Lucci, Kaku Kullifer and Abluno were undercover for five whole years during their water seven mission. So infiltrating the crew of an Emperor of the Sea would take quite the effort. And it just explains so much because for as long as we've known Drake he's been gunning straight for Kaido. Just prior to the time skip he attacks Scotch a member of the beast pirates on purpose simply to get Kaido Senpai's attention. Then after joining the beast pirates Drake quashed a rebellion led by Caribo in a very, very long cover story where Drake was literally the only thing of interest. I'm sorry but nobody, nobody needed 46 straight cover pages of Caribo. I have nothing against swamp creatures but that's too much. In terms of leadership though it would seem that Drake is the man who heads up sword because he is introduced as the captain of sword rather than Kobe who was stated to be a member of sword despite the fact that Kobe's Marine rank is captain. With that said I find it very difficult to believe that Drake was the man who founded the sword organization because it would just be such a ballsy maneuver for a rear admiral to incite such an internal operation and also to have others willingly follow his directive. I think it's far more likely that this was an initiative proposed from a much higher ranking Marine and Drake was put in command of the cell. And one of the more fascinating pieces of evidence for this comes from Kobe's discussion with Drake where he states that the Navy won't be interfering on Wano and I quote, just as we planned which could just be an innocent reading of the situation at hand or it could signal that sword is being operated by someone with far greater power to make such a plan. And honestly the first thought that pops into my mind would be Fujitora. He's clearly not a fan of the world government. I mean the dude literally blinded himself in response to the various evils and corruptions he witnessed. I suppose that's not necessarily on the part of the world government but let's be real most of them are there. Fujitora is the kind of man who has the power to make this sort of plan though because he was spearheading the whole abolish the warlords agenda. He organized the meeting between King Riku and King Cobra and himself to implement this plan and he succeeded. Meaning that Fujitora was effectively the one responsible for the fact that the Marines now have to dedicate their forces to apprehending the warlords and thus being unable to act on Wano. So all I'm saying is that things line up very nicely for him and also Fujitora is a sword user. So count on someone like him to name the organization sword. With that said, there's also a pretty big problem with Fujitora being the man who instigated sword which is that he only joined the Marines during the time skip and Drake's actions would imply that this initiative existed pre-time skip because once again a man like Drake does not abandon the Marines with ease simply due to the hatred of his father's actions. And I guess it's not impossible for Fujitora to be in on sword but looking at it it's pretty unlikely that he was the instigator. In which case the next most likely candidate would probably be Kuzan. Mostly because he has very, very good reason to be working against the world government having witnessed many an atrocity himself most notably the Ohara genocide. He also has or at least had vested interest in power in forming the direction of the Marines which is why he so actively opposed Sarkazuki taking the fleet out of opposition. And as much as Kuzan is a proponent of lazy justice he is very invested in making this world a better place. And in this sword example this may even explain the highly mysterious circumstances under which Kuzan has become associated with the Blackbeard Pirates after leaving the Marines. He could very easily be another plant in an Emperor's crew just as Drake is with Kaido. And in addition to this Kuzan is also quite a close associate of Monkey D. Garp which is relevant because Kobe was trained by Garp and that may be how Kobe managed to find himself on the sword radar to begin with. Having mentioned Garp there is some merit to the idea that he may have founded sword as well but it does seem a lot less likely just going by what we know of him. He's not wildly active in his opposition to the world government. In fact, his role in the series has been a very, very passive one. And while that may have changed after the events of the Paramount Law you know, witnessing the death of Ace and not doing anything about it Garp you could have done something but whatever the case the issue still stands that sword likely existed prior to that event. So I don't think it's Garp personally but maybe. In which case we should also consider then fleet Admiral Sengoku. He is probably the most intelligent of Marines that we've ever known and I would not put it past him to commence the strategic initiative mostly due to the idea that he identifies much more with the Kuzan Fujitora branch of justice than the other Hada Sakazuki style. And Sengoku is in a position where he is intimately familiar with the grand corruption of the world government. And I've brought up his name a few times now but I also don't think it's entirely out of the question to dismiss Sakazuki. He has a very aggressive approach to power so starting his own task force to take action rather than simply wait for orders from the world government would be completely in line with his character. However, one thing I can't quite reconcile in this scenario is why he would have selected Kobe to be a member. These two have such oppositional stances that it makes me strongly believe that sword is a group functioning without the knowledge of Sakazuki but at the same time it's definitely not impossible for the voice of absolute justice to be taking absolute direct action like this. And I do think that about covers it for leadership options unless it was someone completely left field like a vice admiral or something. But it is almost certainly someone that we actually know. It's also not the end of membership speculation either. I've stated before that if Kuzo and Fuji Toro weren't founders of sword then they seem very likely to be natural members because they are both working towards the same sort of justice-y goodness. But I would also like to throw Smoker's name into the hat here because aside from Kobe, Smoker is probably the Marine that we have gotten to know most intimately and his sense of justice is far more aligned with our protagonistic pirates than what the world government represents. Whilst he effectively leads an entire rogue unit being the G5 Marine, so he is a pretty perfect candidate. He also seems to be a trusted confidant of both Kuzo and Fuji Toro. So if one was to put together a list of like the most trustworthy Marines ever you would think that Smoker would be a part of that. And by extension, you could also perhaps speculate on Toshigi. She certainly has the right views for such thing. Although I can see a scenario where Smoker is keeping her in the dark for protection. I mean that's if Smoker ended up being part of things to begin with. It's a sprawling thought here. Also a maybe surprise candidate, Helmepo. If Kobe is a sword member, I really don't see why Helmepo wouldn't be. He really is quite a competent Marine these days and he and Kobe are pretty much tied at the hip. He may have once been a blonde cockwomble, but he's a pretty cool guy these days. Helmepo has changed. Kobe gets all the credit for the whole glow up thing, but the true success story here is definitely Helmepo. And another thing worth mentioning would be Drake's crew. I will say that we know almost nothing about these guys except for the one fact that they do indeed exist. And also they wear very fancy hats much like the captain. I really do wish we knew a bit more about them like if they were all Marines who turned traitor and followed Drake and are thus an extension of sword or if Drake found a legitimate following of pirates on his journey. Either way, probably doesn't matter. You'd assume that their loyalties would remain with both Drake and I suppose sword now. And also here's a bit of a wild card contender for sword, Trafalgar Law. Now I take no credit for this thought whatsoever. This actually spawned from another one piece YouTuber named Randy Troy in mid 2020. I'll have a link to the video in the description below if you would like to delve into it, but it highlights a couple of connections that never really considered too much prior to this. One of which is that Law's mental figure, Rosinante, was an undercover Marine, and thus it's not completely unthinkable for Law to follow in his footsteps. This theory also highlights a lot of, I suppose you call them parallels between Law and Drake, such as the fact that they basically share a flashback and that Law's first interaction series was with Drake. Although the selling point of the whole idea is the very crack comment that Law's ship is a submarine. In case you missed it, it is a submarine. And there's a lot more than that as well. It's definitely not the worst theory I've ever heard on the internet. What is the ultimate goal of Sword though? It's actually really difficult to say it because if it was something as simple as bringing down the four emperors, which is anything but simple, I probably shouldn't have used that word to describe that action. But if that were the case, then there wouldn't be such a need to act separately from Marine leadership and the world government because, well, they all share those goals. So it's very possible that Sword was founded to be a counterforce of the world government in a very similar manner to that of the revolutionary army. And I'm not necessarily suggesting that the two are working in tandem, but their concerns are both very much directed towards that same central destination. And during the final saga of the series, if there was going to be a mechanism to flip all of our protagonist Marines onto Luffy's side for whatever this final war thing is going to be, then I suspect that Sword is the seed that we've planted for that. When this world erupts into post-101 told chaos, Sword is going to need to make a choice, perhaps even choices, plural. But for now, we can only wait and watch for them to act. But what do you guys think? Please do leave your thoughts in the comments below or even join my Discord server. And if you'd like to see more videos like this, then please do go and check out some of my other content or even subscribe to the channel for more glorious One Piece business uploaded straight into your YouTube feeds. But for now, this has been the Grand Line Review and I'll see you next time.