![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bigbosshardMemory: Nuclear deterrence theory.
Received: Day 125
Form: White marble pawn, cold to the touch. 3/5 uses.
Summary: Metal Gear Solid likes lots of wooooooords especially when it gets on its anti-nuke message.
To 10:45.
The Cold War
[MILLER]
Costa Rica isn't alone. All of Latin America is getting swept up in the superpowers' Cold War. The whole ideological split between East and West... In the end, it's just a greedy scramble for wealth by the ruling classes. The Western bourgeois stand to lose everything if their countries go communist. After all, the communists want to abolish private property altogether. So the capitalist rulers desperately tried to halt the global spread of communism. Hence the phenomenon of red-baiting. And the communists, for their part, didn't exactly stay true to their principles. They tried to escape class-based society, but between Stalin's autocracy and the rise of the nomenklatura, they ended up creating one anyway. Once people have power, they stop caring about equality. That's where communism - where society in general - reaches its limits. The rulers only care about their own gain. The opposing side becomes a risk factor that threatens that profit. And thus the ongoing struggle between capitalism and communism was born.
[SNAKE]
And now nuclear deterrence is part of the picture.
[MILLER]
Exactly.
Nuclear Deterrence and Mutual Assured Destruction
[MILLER]
They say nuclear weapons are the reason we haven't seen conflict on a global scale since World War II. The thought that your opponent might launch nukes against you sort of makes it tough to start an armed conflict. Especially now that they've got inter-continental ballistic missiles. Nowhere is safe.
[SNAKE]
Of course, all that has caused military expenditures to skyrocket...
[MILLER]
Well, the only way to ward off a preemptive strike is to flaunt your own nuclear stockpile. And that's caused their numbers to increase exponentially. Not just with regards to destructive power, but in terms of targeting technology, too. Now they can hit a target halfway across the world with pinpoint accuracy. In a way, the space race was a demonstration of that technological progress.
[SNAKE]
And as a result of all that, we now have mutually assured destruction...
[MILLER]
It's the ultimate form of deterrence. No one's going to launch their nukes knowing they'll be obliterated in return.
[SNAKE]
...I dunno. The chance of somebody hitting the button by mistake is never zero.
The Cold War and Peace
[MILLER]
You're right - even with peace guaranteed by MAD, there's always the risk of an accident.
[SNAKE]
Nobody wants the world to end on account of some machine's malfunctioning.
[MILLER]
On the other hand, thanks to deterrence, we haven't had a world war since 1945. You've gotta admit, it has been pretty peaceful.
[SNAKE]
Not that it matters to us.
[MILLER]
People point at the nuclear arms and space races and call it a Cold War. I say if they're not shooting at each other, why not call it world peace?
[SNAKE]
Doesn't mean war is gone. Look at Korea. Look at Vietnam.
[MILLER]
Well, yeah, but I'm talking in relative terms here. Besides, if war died out completely we'd be SOL.
[SNAKE]
...We're not warmongers.
[MILLER]
And yet we can't survive in a world that's at peace.
[SNAKE]
You've got a point...
The Cuban Missile Crisis
[MILLER]
So it's been more than ten years since the Cuban Missile Crisis, huh?
[SNAKE]
I don't think we'll ever forget it.
[MILLER]
No kidding. Those 13 days starting October 15, 1962 were probably the closest we ever came to all-out nuclear war. The Russians deployed nuclear missiles to Cuba. America responded with a naval blockade. Then Russia shot down an American spy plane... I was still a teenager back then. But I remember what it felt like to be one step away from nuclear war - the adults were freaking out.
[SNAKE]
If it wasn't for the Cuban Missile Crisis, there might never have been an Operation Snake Eater. And...
[MILLER]
What's the matter, Snake? It's not like you to get all hypothetical.
[SNAKE]
Hm... I guess not. It was the reassessment after the Missile Crisis that paved the way for the hotline between Moscow and Washington, and also for Détente. That's irony for you.
Treaty of Tlatelolco
[MILLER]
The Treaty of Tlatelolco was enacted to make Latin America into a nuclear-free zone. It bans the testing, use, manufacture, production, acquisition, storage, and deployment of nuclear weapons. The impetus was pretty obvious: the series of crises triggered by the deployment of nukes in Cuba.
[SNAKE]
Not hard to imagine. Those 13 days had the whole world frozen in fear.
[MILLER]
Of course, the country that started it all - Cuba - hasn't actually ratified it yet.
[SNAKE]
Still, the treaty's backed by over 20 countries. Anyone flouting it risks becoming an international pariah.
[MILLER]
True. OPANAL would investigate, no doubt. I heard they used Japan's Three Non-Nuclear Principles as their model when they drew up the treaty. I think the Treaty of Tlatelolco might have been their way of asking nuclear powers not to use nukes against them. That's the biggest difference between the treaty and the Three Principles. I guess you could call it a fourth principle.
The Nuclear Umbrella
[MILLER]
You know that today, Japan is under the American nuclear umbrella...
[SNAKE]
Right.
[MILLER]
The U.S. vowed to retaliate against any country that launches a nuclear strike against an allied country... That promise deters nuclear attacks against America's allies. Hence the term "nuclear umbrella." But suppose the Russians nuked Tokyo. Would America really nuke Moscow in return? If they did, the Soviet Union would undoubtedly retaliate. Would Washington really be willing to risk having a bomb dropped on itself in order to avenge Japan? ...I'm not so sure.
[SNAKE]
Don't tell me you're still worried about Japan. After all these years?
[MILLER]
It's not that. I just...
[SNAKE]
To be honest, I'm not convinced, either. But Moscow faces the same dilemma. Maybe Washington wouldn't retaliate on Japan's behalf. Then again, maybe it would.
[MILLER]
So you're saying Moscow wouldn't want to risk being attacked, either...
[SNAKE]
The whole concept of nuclear deterrence is entirely hypothetical to begin with. When you get down to it, it's all smoke and mirrors.
The Three Non-Nuclear Principles
[MILLER]
"Japan shall not possess, manufacture, or allow the introduction of nuclear weapons into Japan"... Those are the Three Non-Nuclear Principles set forth by the Japanese government.
[SNAKE]
"Allow the introduction"...? That's funny. Some of the U.S. warships that visit Japanese ports are armed with nukes... Or are you gonna tell me they transfer them at sea onto other ships every time they visit?
[MILLER]
You raise a good point, Snake. But the Japanese government doesn't recognize it as such. The introduction of nuclear weapons into Japanese territory would need to be agreed upon in advance. America hasn't made any such agreements. Therefore, they aren't bringing nukes into Japan.... That's the official excuse.
[SNAKE]
...Doesn't sound like much of an excuse to me.
[MILLER]
I don't blame you. Keep in mind, though, Japan's suffered actual nuclear attacks. Anti-nuke sentiment there runs deeper than you think. I suppose the government's not really in a position to admit that sort of thing.
The Manhattan Project
[SNAKE]
Doc, I'm starting to sense your feelings about nukes are a little different from your colleagues.
[HUEY]
How do you mean?
[SNAKE]
Your little chat with Coldman back there.
[HUEY]
I...told you my father worked on the Manhattan Project, right? You're familiar with it?
[SNAKE]
The basics, yeah. It was the project that kicked off the nuclear age.
[HUEY]
That's right. Some of the finest minds of the 20th century, including multiple Nobel Prize winners, worked on it. They spent over two billion dollars - and that's in 1940's money. It culminated in the successful nuclear test at Alamogordo on July 16, 1945.
[SNAKE]
And the first use in combat a few weeks later. Doc?
[HUEY]
...I can't walk. My spine isn't shaped like everybody else's. I can't move my lower body. So I've never taken a single step, not since I was born.
[SNAKE]
What's that got to do with your dad being in the Manhattan Project?
[HUEY]
As a result of his research, my father was exposed to high doses of radiation. It can't be a coincidence that my chromosomes are messed up. That's... That's why I didn't want for these nukes to be another sword of Damocles. I wanted to give them a real purpose: to be a deterrent against war.
[SNAKE]
Doc...
[HUEY]
And Coldman... We have to stop him. Whatever it takes.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
[HUEY]
August 6, 1945 - Hiroshima. August 9 - Nagasaki.
[SNAKE]
The atom bomb attacks on Japan.
[HUEY]
My father was married to his work. I don't have a single memory of going places or doing stuff with him on weekends. But even as a kid I knew on some level that it was for his family - I respected him. My mother used to tell me all the time, "Your father is a brilliant scientist." "He saved countless American boys from death." "You should be proud of him."
[SNAKE]
Yeah, you could say the war ended because of those bombs...
[HUEY]
When I was in the fifth grade, a Japanese student transferred to our class. She showed me photos of Hiroshima after the bomb. I couldn't believe my eyes. A city of over 350,000 people, reduced to a scorch mark on the ground. By a single atomic bomb. Houses blown off their foundations, burned to ashes... The only things left standing were the skeletons of steel-framed buildings. It wasn't just the buildings. Blackened corpses on the side of the road. Survivors covered head to toe in severe burns... Within a few months, over 70,000 had died in Nagasaki - twice that in Hiroshima. For years after that I couldn't talk to my father - couldn't even stand to look at his face.
[SNAKE]
I know how you feel, Doc. But your father's your father.
[HUEY]
If he hadn't worked on that project, my body wouldn't be like this. I could be researching something else. I could have lived a normal life.
The Cuban Missile Crisis
[HUEY]
It wasn't so long ago the world stood on the brink of nuclear war.
[SNAKE]
Just over on the other side of the Caribbean.
[HUEY]
I was 17 at the time. I'd skipped a few grades and was a sophomore at MIT. I remember feeling kind of apathetic about the news that came in every day. It seemed clear to me that as long as they had a grasp of the concept of nuclear deterrence, there was nothing to fear.
[SNAKE]
Either that, or they were fanning that fear on purpose.
[HUEY]
As a way to secure a bigger defense budget...? Heh, I can see that. But if that was their plan, it kind of backfired.
[SNAKE]
Because it ushered in the era of Détente between East and West.
[HUEY]
Coldman's really going to do it this time. Once the nuclear genie is out of the bottle, the yoke of deterrence is going to be meaningless. People will die. Cities will burn. We have to stop him now, before it's too late to turn back.
The Space Race and the Cold War Arms Race
[SNAKE]
So you've been doing nuclear research your whole life?
[HUEY]
No, not really. At first I wanted to be an aerospace engineer. For me, the Sputnik launch was a good shock, not a bad one. I thought the age when science was used for war was over, and that a glorious age of space exploration was dawning. The year I skipped ahead and got into MIT, Gagarin went into orbit, which made me more excited than ever. Of course, even back then, I knew the space race was just another facet of the Cold War...
[SNAKE]
Moscow had a leg up on us, and we were desperate to catch up.
[HUEY]
I know. But for me it was a happy time. I joined NASA - got to do the kind of research I loved. Our nation's prestige hinged on our work. They gave us whatever resources we asked for. I knew you could turn a rocket into an ICBM by fitting it with a nuclear warhead, but that didn't bother me so much. It didn't last long, though. The space and nuclear arms races took up enormous sums of money. America beat Russia to the moon, but that's where it ended.
[SNAKE]
Then came Détente.
[HUEY]
Exactly. NASA's budget was slashed as a result. My father being a nuclear expert and all, they put me to work on a more obvious deterrent: missiles. At NASA, I'd been researching a locomotion system for lunar exploration. Tires aren't suited to driving around on the moon, you know. And that's how I caught Coldman's eye.
The Cold War and Peace
[HUEY]
But you know... there's something I've never been able to figure out. Is the Cold War really a war, or is it really peace...?
[SNAKE]
Doc, what are you...?
[HUEY]
People called it a "cold war," but I disagreed. Sure, nuclear stockpiles are increasing, threats are multiplying, the U.S. and the Soviet Union have enough power to destroy the human race a hundred times over. But nobody's actually being killed. Small-scale conflicts and proxy wars, maybe... But nuclear deterrence has averted another world war. The world's far more peaceful today than it was before. And the breakthroughs we've made in space exploration thanks to Cold War competition - fantastic, don't you think?
[SNAKE]
No... We didn't need to rush into space like that... Going into space may have been mankind's dream, but good people were sacrificed in the scramble.
[HUEY]
...Maybe so. NASA's definitely got some skeletons in its closet...
[SNAKE]
Same goes for the nuclear arms race. Atomic testing has killed civilians and exposed thousands to radiation.
[HUEY]
Believe me, I know... And now this... What peace was I trying to protect, anyway? The more I think about it, the less I understand.
Nuclear Deterrence Theory
[HUEY]
Let's speak in hypotheticals for a minute. Say you wanted to make a clone of yourself...
[SNAKE]
A clone? Para-Medic had the same idea. It's science fiction.
[HUEY]
I'm just hypothesizing here. OK, not a clone, then. You have any kids?
[SNAKE]
Nope.
[HUEY]
Wife?
[SNAKE]
...Never been tied down.
[HUEY]
OK, then... so we're still talking hypotheticals. Say you had a son who'd inherited your genes, someone with the same combat abilities as you. Would you challenge him to a fight?
[SNAKE]
...Hmm. Not to sound cocky, but I wouldn't want to do that. No telling who'd survive.
[HUEY]
I'll bet. You picked up on the Pupa-5000's combat patterns in seconds.
[SNAKE]
Only with your advice, Doc.
[HUEY]
If anybody could learn to do it just by listening, it'd be easy. But you - you're a born soldier. Yeah. You must have been born with genes geared for combat. Soldier genes, if you will.
[SNAKE]
...Genes geared for combat? I don't care how advanced their research is. You can't blame genes for everything.
[HUEY]
Blame genes...? You think it's funny.
[SNAKE]
...What?
[HUEY]
You think genes have nothing to do with this body I was born with?
[SNAKE]
I... I don't know...
[HUEY]
...Look, that fear of facing someone of equal ability in combat... Imagine that on a strategic scale. That's the concept of nuclear deterrence. The idea is, when all sides are armed with the destructive power of nuclear weapons, they'll avoid nuclear war in order to prevent mutual annihilation.
[SNAKE]
Doesn't sound all that sophisticated to me.
[HUEY]
Exactly! It's so simple in principle. But because it's so simple, whether or not it works properly depends on the people involved. In that sense, what we're looking at now is a malfunction in deterrence theory.
[SNAKE]
Coldman...
[HUEY]
You got it. Please, Snake, don't let deterrence die.
Nuclear Terrorism
[HUEY]
Nuclear deterrence means preventing the use of nuclear weapons in conflicts between states. But what about other situations?
[SNAKE]
Like what?
[HUEY]
Terrorism has been on the rise in recent years, from separatist movements to far-left extremists. What would happen if nuclear weapons fell into terrorist hands? Without a state - that is, without territory of their own - the chances of having nukes used against them are slim. They have no reason to fear a nuclear strike. Conversely, they have no reason to hesitate to use nukes against their adversaries.
[SNAKE]
You've got a point. All the ICBMs and strategic bombers in the world amount to nothing against a terrorist group.
[HUEY]
Right! Of course, this is all still hypothetical. Countries keep their nukes under tight watch - there's no immediate danger of terrorists getting their hands on them. But the day may come when the proposition of nuclear terrorism makes nuclear deterrence theory a dead letter.
[SNAKE]
Nuclear terrorism... Interesting.
Damage from a Nuclear Missile
[HUEY]
What are we going to do, Snake? If Peace Walker attacks Mother Base...
[SNAKE]
Relax. We've got the entire MSF out to make sure that doesn't happen.
[HUEY]
Yeah, but... Peace Walker's missiles have one-megaton warheads. The fireball alone'd be a mile in diameter. Everything in the vicinity of ground zero will be vaporized by the heat rays. Then there's the blast, which travels at hundreds of miles per hour. And the fires. And the...
[SNAKE]
The huge dose of radiation from the initial nuclear reaction.
[HUEY]
That too. There won't be a single survivor.
[SNAKE]
Yeah, I'm aware of that. Look, Doc, you made that thing. You know better than anybody what it's capable of. Right now you've got to give me a rational, scientific estimate of the damage. If we're talking about a nuclear explosion, it's more that just MSF's problem.
[HUEY]
You're right Snake, sorry about that... Like I was saying, Mother Base would be wiped out. Any ships in the area could be caught in the blast, too. We'd need to send out a warning. The thing to worry about most is the fallout.
[SNAKE]
The dust of death...
[HUEY]
If it goes off over water, the particles will be smaller than with an explosion over land, so the wind will scatter the fallout over a wider area. Clouds will form around the salt crystals in the seawater, causing contaminated rain to fall downwind.
[SNAKE]
Yeah, got a taste of that myself.
[HUEY]
On Bikini Atoll? That's right, the 1954 Castle Bravo test created fallout 300 miles downwind. Poisoned a lot of local residents and ships, so I hear. The yield of Peace Walker's warheads isn't that big, but the amount of fallout will largely depend on weather conditions. It's impossible to make a quick and easy estimate.
[SNAKE]
...If it gets into the trade winds, it could come straight to Costa Rica.
[HUEY]
What was it Coldman was saying? About leaving people "free to help out"? He's out of his mind. What does he think's going to happen? When they get hit by rain containing high concentrations of fallout, a lot of them will die from the external exposure alone. The rain will seep into the ground, contaminating the water supply and crops. When they ingest the stuff, the internal exposure starts. Strontium-90 and cesium-137 have half-lives of around 30 years - the effects stay with you your entire life. Leukemia, cataracts, dermatitis, cancer... And it affects reproduction, too.
[SNAKE]
...I know.
[HUEY]
Even today, 30 years after World War II, thousands of people still suffer from exposure to the bomb. We can't let Coldman create more of them just to prove his point. ...I know it sounds crazy, but I created Peace Walker so that that kind of thing would never happen again.
[SNAKE]
Don't worry, Doc. We'll stop it, one way or another.
Nuclear Tests
[CÉCILE]
France conducted its first successful nuclear test in the Algerian Sahara in 1960.
[SNAKE]
A lot of French scientists took part in the Manhattan Project. They defected to America to escape wartime occupation.
[CÉCILE]
Correct. And once the war was over, they returned to France and continued their own atomic research. President de Gaulle did not want to have to rely on an American nuclear umbrella for protection.
[SNAKE]
Thus making France the world's fourth nuclear power.
[CÉCILE]
Some say the test's success pacified the Algerian rebels. The civil war was undoubtedly held in check. But never have I equated nuclear weapons with peace.
Received: Day 125
Form: White marble pawn, cold to the touch. 3/5 uses.
Summary: Metal Gear Solid likes lots of wooooooords especially when it gets on its anti-nuke message.
To 10:45.
The Cold War
[MILLER]
Costa Rica isn't alone. All of Latin America is getting swept up in the superpowers' Cold War. The whole ideological split between East and West... In the end, it's just a greedy scramble for wealth by the ruling classes. The Western bourgeois stand to lose everything if their countries go communist. After all, the communists want to abolish private property altogether. So the capitalist rulers desperately tried to halt the global spread of communism. Hence the phenomenon of red-baiting. And the communists, for their part, didn't exactly stay true to their principles. They tried to escape class-based society, but between Stalin's autocracy and the rise of the nomenklatura, they ended up creating one anyway. Once people have power, they stop caring about equality. That's where communism - where society in general - reaches its limits. The rulers only care about their own gain. The opposing side becomes a risk factor that threatens that profit. And thus the ongoing struggle between capitalism and communism was born.
[SNAKE]
And now nuclear deterrence is part of the picture.
[MILLER]
Exactly.
Nuclear Deterrence and Mutual Assured Destruction
[MILLER]
They say nuclear weapons are the reason we haven't seen conflict on a global scale since World War II. The thought that your opponent might launch nukes against you sort of makes it tough to start an armed conflict. Especially now that they've got inter-continental ballistic missiles. Nowhere is safe.
[SNAKE]
Of course, all that has caused military expenditures to skyrocket...
[MILLER]
Well, the only way to ward off a preemptive strike is to flaunt your own nuclear stockpile. And that's caused their numbers to increase exponentially. Not just with regards to destructive power, but in terms of targeting technology, too. Now they can hit a target halfway across the world with pinpoint accuracy. In a way, the space race was a demonstration of that technological progress.
[SNAKE]
And as a result of all that, we now have mutually assured destruction...
[MILLER]
It's the ultimate form of deterrence. No one's going to launch their nukes knowing they'll be obliterated in return.
[SNAKE]
...I dunno. The chance of somebody hitting the button by mistake is never zero.
The Cold War and Peace
[MILLER]
You're right - even with peace guaranteed by MAD, there's always the risk of an accident.
[SNAKE]
Nobody wants the world to end on account of some machine's malfunctioning.
[MILLER]
On the other hand, thanks to deterrence, we haven't had a world war since 1945. You've gotta admit, it has been pretty peaceful.
[SNAKE]
Not that it matters to us.
[MILLER]
People point at the nuclear arms and space races and call it a Cold War. I say if they're not shooting at each other, why not call it world peace?
[SNAKE]
Doesn't mean war is gone. Look at Korea. Look at Vietnam.
[MILLER]
Well, yeah, but I'm talking in relative terms here. Besides, if war died out completely we'd be SOL.
[SNAKE]
...We're not warmongers.
[MILLER]
And yet we can't survive in a world that's at peace.
[SNAKE]
You've got a point...
The Cuban Missile Crisis
[MILLER]
So it's been more than ten years since the Cuban Missile Crisis, huh?
[SNAKE]
I don't think we'll ever forget it.
[MILLER]
No kidding. Those 13 days starting October 15, 1962 were probably the closest we ever came to all-out nuclear war. The Russians deployed nuclear missiles to Cuba. America responded with a naval blockade. Then Russia shot down an American spy plane... I was still a teenager back then. But I remember what it felt like to be one step away from nuclear war - the adults were freaking out.
[SNAKE]
If it wasn't for the Cuban Missile Crisis, there might never have been an Operation Snake Eater. And...
[MILLER]
What's the matter, Snake? It's not like you to get all hypothetical.
[SNAKE]
Hm... I guess not. It was the reassessment after the Missile Crisis that paved the way for the hotline between Moscow and Washington, and also for Détente. That's irony for you.
Treaty of Tlatelolco
[MILLER]
The Treaty of Tlatelolco was enacted to make Latin America into a nuclear-free zone. It bans the testing, use, manufacture, production, acquisition, storage, and deployment of nuclear weapons. The impetus was pretty obvious: the series of crises triggered by the deployment of nukes in Cuba.
[SNAKE]
Not hard to imagine. Those 13 days had the whole world frozen in fear.
[MILLER]
Of course, the country that started it all - Cuba - hasn't actually ratified it yet.
[SNAKE]
Still, the treaty's backed by over 20 countries. Anyone flouting it risks becoming an international pariah.
[MILLER]
True. OPANAL would investigate, no doubt. I heard they used Japan's Three Non-Nuclear Principles as their model when they drew up the treaty. I think the Treaty of Tlatelolco might have been their way of asking nuclear powers not to use nukes against them. That's the biggest difference between the treaty and the Three Principles. I guess you could call it a fourth principle.
The Nuclear Umbrella
[MILLER]
You know that today, Japan is under the American nuclear umbrella...
[SNAKE]
Right.
[MILLER]
The U.S. vowed to retaliate against any country that launches a nuclear strike against an allied country... That promise deters nuclear attacks against America's allies. Hence the term "nuclear umbrella." But suppose the Russians nuked Tokyo. Would America really nuke Moscow in return? If they did, the Soviet Union would undoubtedly retaliate. Would Washington really be willing to risk having a bomb dropped on itself in order to avenge Japan? ...I'm not so sure.
[SNAKE]
Don't tell me you're still worried about Japan. After all these years?
[MILLER]
It's not that. I just...
[SNAKE]
To be honest, I'm not convinced, either. But Moscow faces the same dilemma. Maybe Washington wouldn't retaliate on Japan's behalf. Then again, maybe it would.
[MILLER]
So you're saying Moscow wouldn't want to risk being attacked, either...
[SNAKE]
The whole concept of nuclear deterrence is entirely hypothetical to begin with. When you get down to it, it's all smoke and mirrors.
The Three Non-Nuclear Principles
[MILLER]
"Japan shall not possess, manufacture, or allow the introduction of nuclear weapons into Japan"... Those are the Three Non-Nuclear Principles set forth by the Japanese government.
[SNAKE]
"Allow the introduction"...? That's funny. Some of the U.S. warships that visit Japanese ports are armed with nukes... Or are you gonna tell me they transfer them at sea onto other ships every time they visit?
[MILLER]
You raise a good point, Snake. But the Japanese government doesn't recognize it as such. The introduction of nuclear weapons into Japanese territory would need to be agreed upon in advance. America hasn't made any such agreements. Therefore, they aren't bringing nukes into Japan.... That's the official excuse.
[SNAKE]
...Doesn't sound like much of an excuse to me.
[MILLER]
I don't blame you. Keep in mind, though, Japan's suffered actual nuclear attacks. Anti-nuke sentiment there runs deeper than you think. I suppose the government's not really in a position to admit that sort of thing.
The Manhattan Project
[SNAKE]
Doc, I'm starting to sense your feelings about nukes are a little different from your colleagues.
[HUEY]
How do you mean?
[SNAKE]
Your little chat with Coldman back there.
[HUEY]
I...told you my father worked on the Manhattan Project, right? You're familiar with it?
[SNAKE]
The basics, yeah. It was the project that kicked off the nuclear age.
[HUEY]
That's right. Some of the finest minds of the 20th century, including multiple Nobel Prize winners, worked on it. They spent over two billion dollars - and that's in 1940's money. It culminated in the successful nuclear test at Alamogordo on July 16, 1945.
[SNAKE]
And the first use in combat a few weeks later. Doc?
[HUEY]
...I can't walk. My spine isn't shaped like everybody else's. I can't move my lower body. So I've never taken a single step, not since I was born.
[SNAKE]
What's that got to do with your dad being in the Manhattan Project?
[HUEY]
As a result of his research, my father was exposed to high doses of radiation. It can't be a coincidence that my chromosomes are messed up. That's... That's why I didn't want for these nukes to be another sword of Damocles. I wanted to give them a real purpose: to be a deterrent against war.
[SNAKE]
Doc...
[HUEY]
And Coldman... We have to stop him. Whatever it takes.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
[HUEY]
August 6, 1945 - Hiroshima. August 9 - Nagasaki.
[SNAKE]
The atom bomb attacks on Japan.
[HUEY]
My father was married to his work. I don't have a single memory of going places or doing stuff with him on weekends. But even as a kid I knew on some level that it was for his family - I respected him. My mother used to tell me all the time, "Your father is a brilliant scientist." "He saved countless American boys from death." "You should be proud of him."
[SNAKE]
Yeah, you could say the war ended because of those bombs...
[HUEY]
When I was in the fifth grade, a Japanese student transferred to our class. She showed me photos of Hiroshima after the bomb. I couldn't believe my eyes. A city of over 350,000 people, reduced to a scorch mark on the ground. By a single atomic bomb. Houses blown off their foundations, burned to ashes... The only things left standing were the skeletons of steel-framed buildings. It wasn't just the buildings. Blackened corpses on the side of the road. Survivors covered head to toe in severe burns... Within a few months, over 70,000 had died in Nagasaki - twice that in Hiroshima. For years after that I couldn't talk to my father - couldn't even stand to look at his face.
[SNAKE]
I know how you feel, Doc. But your father's your father.
[HUEY]
If he hadn't worked on that project, my body wouldn't be like this. I could be researching something else. I could have lived a normal life.
The Cuban Missile Crisis
[HUEY]
It wasn't so long ago the world stood on the brink of nuclear war.
[SNAKE]
Just over on the other side of the Caribbean.
[HUEY]
I was 17 at the time. I'd skipped a few grades and was a sophomore at MIT. I remember feeling kind of apathetic about the news that came in every day. It seemed clear to me that as long as they had a grasp of the concept of nuclear deterrence, there was nothing to fear.
[SNAKE]
Either that, or they were fanning that fear on purpose.
[HUEY]
As a way to secure a bigger defense budget...? Heh, I can see that. But if that was their plan, it kind of backfired.
[SNAKE]
Because it ushered in the era of Détente between East and West.
[HUEY]
Coldman's really going to do it this time. Once the nuclear genie is out of the bottle, the yoke of deterrence is going to be meaningless. People will die. Cities will burn. We have to stop him now, before it's too late to turn back.
The Space Race and the Cold War Arms Race
[SNAKE]
So you've been doing nuclear research your whole life?
[HUEY]
No, not really. At first I wanted to be an aerospace engineer. For me, the Sputnik launch was a good shock, not a bad one. I thought the age when science was used for war was over, and that a glorious age of space exploration was dawning. The year I skipped ahead and got into MIT, Gagarin went into orbit, which made me more excited than ever. Of course, even back then, I knew the space race was just another facet of the Cold War...
[SNAKE]
Moscow had a leg up on us, and we were desperate to catch up.
[HUEY]
I know. But for me it was a happy time. I joined NASA - got to do the kind of research I loved. Our nation's prestige hinged on our work. They gave us whatever resources we asked for. I knew you could turn a rocket into an ICBM by fitting it with a nuclear warhead, but that didn't bother me so much. It didn't last long, though. The space and nuclear arms races took up enormous sums of money. America beat Russia to the moon, but that's where it ended.
[SNAKE]
Then came Détente.
[HUEY]
Exactly. NASA's budget was slashed as a result. My father being a nuclear expert and all, they put me to work on a more obvious deterrent: missiles. At NASA, I'd been researching a locomotion system for lunar exploration. Tires aren't suited to driving around on the moon, you know. And that's how I caught Coldman's eye.
The Cold War and Peace
[HUEY]
But you know... there's something I've never been able to figure out. Is the Cold War really a war, or is it really peace...?
[SNAKE]
Doc, what are you...?
[HUEY]
People called it a "cold war," but I disagreed. Sure, nuclear stockpiles are increasing, threats are multiplying, the U.S. and the Soviet Union have enough power to destroy the human race a hundred times over. But nobody's actually being killed. Small-scale conflicts and proxy wars, maybe... But nuclear deterrence has averted another world war. The world's far more peaceful today than it was before. And the breakthroughs we've made in space exploration thanks to Cold War competition - fantastic, don't you think?
[SNAKE]
No... We didn't need to rush into space like that... Going into space may have been mankind's dream, but good people were sacrificed in the scramble.
[HUEY]
...Maybe so. NASA's definitely got some skeletons in its closet...
[SNAKE]
Same goes for the nuclear arms race. Atomic testing has killed civilians and exposed thousands to radiation.
[HUEY]
Believe me, I know... And now this... What peace was I trying to protect, anyway? The more I think about it, the less I understand.
Nuclear Deterrence Theory
[HUEY]
Let's speak in hypotheticals for a minute. Say you wanted to make a clone of yourself...
[SNAKE]
A clone? Para-Medic had the same idea. It's science fiction.
[HUEY]
I'm just hypothesizing here. OK, not a clone, then. You have any kids?
[SNAKE]
Nope.
[HUEY]
Wife?
[SNAKE]
...Never been tied down.
[HUEY]
OK, then... so we're still talking hypotheticals. Say you had a son who'd inherited your genes, someone with the same combat abilities as you. Would you challenge him to a fight?
[SNAKE]
...Hmm. Not to sound cocky, but I wouldn't want to do that. No telling who'd survive.
[HUEY]
I'll bet. You picked up on the Pupa-5000's combat patterns in seconds.
[SNAKE]
Only with your advice, Doc.
[HUEY]
If anybody could learn to do it just by listening, it'd be easy. But you - you're a born soldier. Yeah. You must have been born with genes geared for combat. Soldier genes, if you will.
[SNAKE]
...Genes geared for combat? I don't care how advanced their research is. You can't blame genes for everything.
[HUEY]
Blame genes...? You think it's funny.
[SNAKE]
...What?
[HUEY]
You think genes have nothing to do with this body I was born with?
[SNAKE]
I... I don't know...
[HUEY]
...Look, that fear of facing someone of equal ability in combat... Imagine that on a strategic scale. That's the concept of nuclear deterrence. The idea is, when all sides are armed with the destructive power of nuclear weapons, they'll avoid nuclear war in order to prevent mutual annihilation.
[SNAKE]
Doesn't sound all that sophisticated to me.
[HUEY]
Exactly! It's so simple in principle. But because it's so simple, whether or not it works properly depends on the people involved. In that sense, what we're looking at now is a malfunction in deterrence theory.
[SNAKE]
Coldman...
[HUEY]
You got it. Please, Snake, don't let deterrence die.
Nuclear Terrorism
[HUEY]
Nuclear deterrence means preventing the use of nuclear weapons in conflicts between states. But what about other situations?
[SNAKE]
Like what?
[HUEY]
Terrorism has been on the rise in recent years, from separatist movements to far-left extremists. What would happen if nuclear weapons fell into terrorist hands? Without a state - that is, without territory of their own - the chances of having nukes used against them are slim. They have no reason to fear a nuclear strike. Conversely, they have no reason to hesitate to use nukes against their adversaries.
[SNAKE]
You've got a point. All the ICBMs and strategic bombers in the world amount to nothing against a terrorist group.
[HUEY]
Right! Of course, this is all still hypothetical. Countries keep their nukes under tight watch - there's no immediate danger of terrorists getting their hands on them. But the day may come when the proposition of nuclear terrorism makes nuclear deterrence theory a dead letter.
[SNAKE]
Nuclear terrorism... Interesting.
Damage from a Nuclear Missile
[HUEY]
What are we going to do, Snake? If Peace Walker attacks Mother Base...
[SNAKE]
Relax. We've got the entire MSF out to make sure that doesn't happen.
[HUEY]
Yeah, but... Peace Walker's missiles have one-megaton warheads. The fireball alone'd be a mile in diameter. Everything in the vicinity of ground zero will be vaporized by the heat rays. Then there's the blast, which travels at hundreds of miles per hour. And the fires. And the...
[SNAKE]
The huge dose of radiation from the initial nuclear reaction.
[HUEY]
That too. There won't be a single survivor.
[SNAKE]
Yeah, I'm aware of that. Look, Doc, you made that thing. You know better than anybody what it's capable of. Right now you've got to give me a rational, scientific estimate of the damage. If we're talking about a nuclear explosion, it's more that just MSF's problem.
[HUEY]
You're right Snake, sorry about that... Like I was saying, Mother Base would be wiped out. Any ships in the area could be caught in the blast, too. We'd need to send out a warning. The thing to worry about most is the fallout.
[SNAKE]
The dust of death...
[HUEY]
If it goes off over water, the particles will be smaller than with an explosion over land, so the wind will scatter the fallout over a wider area. Clouds will form around the salt crystals in the seawater, causing contaminated rain to fall downwind.
[SNAKE]
Yeah, got a taste of that myself.
[HUEY]
On Bikini Atoll? That's right, the 1954 Castle Bravo test created fallout 300 miles downwind. Poisoned a lot of local residents and ships, so I hear. The yield of Peace Walker's warheads isn't that big, but the amount of fallout will largely depend on weather conditions. It's impossible to make a quick and easy estimate.
[SNAKE]
...If it gets into the trade winds, it could come straight to Costa Rica.
[HUEY]
What was it Coldman was saying? About leaving people "free to help out"? He's out of his mind. What does he think's going to happen? When they get hit by rain containing high concentrations of fallout, a lot of them will die from the external exposure alone. The rain will seep into the ground, contaminating the water supply and crops. When they ingest the stuff, the internal exposure starts. Strontium-90 and cesium-137 have half-lives of around 30 years - the effects stay with you your entire life. Leukemia, cataracts, dermatitis, cancer... And it affects reproduction, too.
[SNAKE]
...I know.
[HUEY]
Even today, 30 years after World War II, thousands of people still suffer from exposure to the bomb. We can't let Coldman create more of them just to prove his point. ...I know it sounds crazy, but I created Peace Walker so that that kind of thing would never happen again.
[SNAKE]
Don't worry, Doc. We'll stop it, one way or another.
Nuclear Tests
[CÉCILE]
France conducted its first successful nuclear test in the Algerian Sahara in 1960.
[SNAKE]
A lot of French scientists took part in the Manhattan Project. They defected to America to escape wartime occupation.
[CÉCILE]
Correct. And once the war was over, they returned to France and continued their own atomic research. President de Gaulle did not want to have to rely on an American nuclear umbrella for protection.
[SNAKE]
Thus making France the world's fourth nuclear power.
[CÉCILE]
Some say the test's success pacified the Algerian rebels. The civil war was undoubtedly held in check. But never have I equated nuclear weapons with peace.
