The Lunar Industrial Complex reaches full operational capacity — permanent human presence on the Moon.
"The High Ground" is what operators call the combined orbital and lunar infrastructure that no single faction fully controls but every faction depends on. The GCOA manages traffic, the NAF and NCB run the two largest extraction operations, the EO provides security contractors, the PCU funds the fuel systems.
Control of the High Ground is the long game every major faction is playing. Conventional warfare on Earth is increasingly a distraction from the real competition.