Corporate Nuclear Rivalry
Selected Timeline
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2155
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Soyuz-Mikoyan tests fusion bomb at Site 7, Luna.
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2158
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Exxon-Mitsui test fusion bomb at Orientale
Test Site.
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2160s
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System-wide nuclear rearmament.
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2169
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Signing of the Vienna Accords.
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2173
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2186
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Ceres outpost recognised as an independent nation.
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2180s
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First Earth-Belt Cold War.
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On 3 February 2155 the System was shaken by a press
conference given by the Selenography Group at LIT.
They reported that their network of seismographs had
recorded an unusual event on 17-18 January 2155.
Analysis of the seismic waves indicated that they
originated from a highly compact source with a rapid
energy output of approximately 10 to 15 megatons.
Furthermore there was a 90% likelihood that the point
of origin was within the confines of Soyuz-Mikoyan's
secretive Site 7 on the Lunar farside, at an estimated
depth of 10km. The selenographers reached 'the
inescapable conclusion that Soyuz-Mikoyan has tested a
high energy weapon, almost certainly a fusion bomb'.
Three days after the LIT press conference,
Soyuz-Mikoyan issued a release stating that it had
detonated a laser-ignited fusion test device with a
measured yield of 14 megatons. The device was the
prototype for a series of 'clean' fusion explosives for civil
engineering applications. The release ended by stating
that Soyuz-Mikoyan intended to abide by all the terms
of the 2073 "Treaty on Peaceful Applications of Nuclear
Technology". Independent experts soon noted that the
megacorporation was not a signatory of this or any
other treaty restricting the use of nuclear weapons.
Many nations on Earth reacted with outrage and
demanded that Soyuz-Mikoyan allow immediate access
to all its nuclear facilities by independent inspectors.
Only the EF and the UN, however, had the power to
force such access; the former was entirely reliant on the
goodwill of the metanationals and the latter was owned
by them. Soyuz-Mikoyan did actually allow limited
inspection of its nuclear operations with UNDTC experts
touring under the supervision of the corporation's own
staff, but nobody was convinced by the charade. The
reality of the situation was that the metanationals were
de facto superpowers and could act with impunity.
The market value of Soyuz-Mikoyan soared.
In August 2158, Exxon-Mitsui stated that it intended to
challenge Soyuz-Mikoyan's 'economically indefensible
monopoly on civil fusion explosives'. A multi-megaton
explosion in what is now the Orientale Test Site
followed six weeks later. Late in that year, a joint
operation by the UNDTC, the CIA and EF intelligence
uncovered a plan to sell information on laser isotope
separation to the Aldrin People's Corporate Republic;
the technology could only be used to build dirty
fission-triggered weapons unsuitable for civilian
applications. The corporate arms race had started.
The 2160s were a time of System-wide nuclear
rearmament. By the end of that decade it was estimated
that the combined arsenals of humanity contained both
more and more powerful nuclear warheads than ever
before. The limited stockpiles maintained by the EF,
California-Cascadia, the PCRC, Greater Azania and the
American Alliance were soon dwarfed by the strategic
nuclear forces controlled by the largest corporations.
Alongside the nuclear buildup, the major polities quietly
began to construct deep-space weapons platforms,
delivery systems, torchships, early-warning networks and
other military assets.
On 3 September 2173 the asteroid 1011 Laodamia, a
body 7km across, was shattered in a blast estimated at
1 gigaton. Several gamma ray observatories across the
System accidentally observed the event and recorded a
gamma ray spike at 511keV: the electron-positron
annihilation line. Laodamia had been claimed by
Shikomi Zaibatsu, but the Ceres Combine denied all
knowledge of the circumstances of the blast and
emphatically denied that it was developing antimatter
annihilation weapons.
Following the Laodamia incident the major polities
cranked their weapons development programmes up to
full speed. Sol System's Golden Age began to plunge
headlong towards disaster and ruin. By 2180 three of
the Ceres Combine corporations, the Aldrin PCR and the
top five of Earth's metanational corporations had
demonstrated a nuclear capability. Sol System was now
the home of nineteen nuclear powers. Military analysts
estimated that twelve of these had significant numbers
of warheads deployed on warships and stations across
the System. The scale of redundancy guaranteed that
massive retaliation against targets in Cis-Luna and the
Belt would still be possible after any attack. A fragile
peace was maintained only by the balance of terror.
The economic and political landscape of the System
shifted profoundly in the aftermath of Cerean
independence. The complex web of political rivalries
within the System slowly began to polarise into a
two-way confrontation between the Belt Zaibatsus and
Cis-Luna. For the first time Earth was faced with an
external threat that was capable of the complete
destruction of its civilization. Whilst the security arms of
the transnationals made preparations for war, the Terran
intelligentsia began to speak of the possibility, indeed
the necessity, of détente with the Zaibatsus. The
alternatives were too terrible to contemplate.
[détentiste bloc ascendant on Earth, brief thaw in cold war]
As a coda to all this, Shikomi Zaibatsu revealed in 2190
that the Laodamia blast had resulted from an industrial
accident at its Bulk Antimatter Containment Facility. A
Zaibatsu commission had reported shortly afterward
that the technology was inherently flawed and the
programme had been discontinued. But the avalanche
had already started.
Cis-Luna:
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Now
The future of Ad Astra
