A Key Event

> "The Red Wars were the most destructive series of conflicts to ever hit Earth in the 21st Century. Not only were billions of lives lost in the process, but much of human society and culture would be changed forever as a result. Even nearly 30 years since the wars ended, the aftermath still affects us all today both in the political, economic, social, militaristic, and physical spheres." - Casey Hartwell, Mayor of Neo Tokyo, 2084
>
>

## Overview

The Red Wars, also known as "The Great Blood Incursions", or "The Time of Rust" were a series of brief global catastrophic wars that ravaged the planet Earth from the years 2049 to 2055. The results the Red Wars brought were so devastating, that as much as 60% of all Earth's life was annilated, both during and months after the wars ended. Not only this, but a major characteristic that these wars brought to the world at the time, was giving the Earth an eerie crimson red, with much of the continents, oceans, and the atmosphere being heavily polluted with Iron Oxide and Sulfur Dioxide, the byproduct chemicals from the infamous Hydrogen-Iron Nuclear Bomb, also known as the "Rust Bomb" that was mainly responsible for 80% of the destruction, but especially for giving the conflicts' name "The Red Wars".

During this time period, major cities like Boston, New York, Berlin Ultima, Beijing, San Francisco, and nearly Neo Tokyo were affected by either singular or multiple nuclear attacks, which by the end of 4th Red Incursion in June 2055, killed up to 5 billion people worldwide. The wars involved major megacorporations and power hungry factions like the OXSIS Corporation, WesTEK, HokoYashi Co, The Gray Sphere, New Honnō-ji Republic, Germanic Confederacy, The Soviet Union, China and the United Provinces of America all vying for control over the precious material Deuterium and Mercury, which were materials that were used extremely common in the manufacturing of rocket engines and fuel, and eventually the first primitive gravitonic drives only five years after the wars ended. Not only was Earth affected, but the other offworld colonies on Earth's moon, Luna, and Mars were partially affected by these catastrophic wars. With millions of Human refugees fleeing their dying homeworld for solace in cities like Tranquility Town and Anoria on Luna, Cydonia City and Olympus Hold on Mars, and even the smaller colony of Delude on Venus.

## 1st Red Incursion (Dec 2049 - Mar 2050)

On the 21st of December, 2049 at exactly 7:49 PM, UPA Intelligence readings detected a trio of M49-K ICBMs being launched from a UPA missile depot originating from the town of Spicegrove in rural Pennsylvania. Upon further analysis, the trajectory of these unauthorized missile launches are supposedly going to hit the cities of Moscow, Berlin Ultima, and Beijing. With this horrifying discovery, intelligence operatives and agents across the country hurry to discuss a plan within the government as to how to prevent these ICBMs from touching down on these cities. Eventually measurements were put into place to counter the missiles from escaping the North American border by using Anti-Missile Swarming Probes, and utilizing Satellites that annilate incoming ICBMs using high-powered lasers and GPS tracking technology. However even with these desperate attempts to stop the missiles from causing a worldwide nuclear war - they failed. At exactly 8:03 PM, the first M49-K ICBM out of the three hit the city of Berlin Ultima, instantly killing 8 million people, with the second and third missiles touching down on Moscow, and Beijing at 8:07 and 8:15 PM, but not before the missile counteracting defense systems tried their go at automatically destroying these ICBMs, with of course to no avail.

The unauthorised launches of these missiles are what many people believe to have been a terrorist attack, a computer glitch, human error, or simply the government finally letting themeselves go wild with pushing the red button in secret. However, as of 2084, there are no reports that are confirming any of these theories, but let it be known that the cause for the most destructive series of conflicts in human history - was all merely an accident.

Within the first fifteen minutes of the events unfolding, news companies and television channels from around the world like WN34 News and WWNN immediately began covering the situation as the events unfolding, with the lunar colonies and later martian colonies beginning to hear of the news from Earth. It is then that at around 8:17 PM, that the Soviet Union decided to perform a counterattack by launching a dozen of their tactical nuclear ICBMs, all carrying Hydrogen-Iron Warheads to several UPA cities like Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, and San Francisco, marking them the first out of the several global powers that would inevitably come to play a part in this war, especially with the corporations being the OXSIS Corporation and WesTEK. Around a few ICBMs were destroyed before they could detonate in their target destination, but a few managed to break through UPA's defense grid and were subsequently detonated in Boston, New York, and San Franscisco. All with a total beginning death toll of 34 million people. Large parts of the cities, mainly the city squares, were immediately annilated in the attacks, with many towering skyscrapers and buildings vaporized or had been oxidized to the point of complete collapse from these the bombs. These first set of attacks are what many historians believe to be the beginning of the 1st Red Incursion, the beginning of the Red Wars.