The Arctic/Antarctic War
*Sniffs* is that... uranium under the ice sheets? I could swear I smell uranium under them ice sheets. Wait... I think there's also some valuable but rare untapped resources such as - oh dinkleschwiemers - OIL.
Russia, USA, EU, UK, China, India and basically everyone else (including private companies) capable of having themselves some covert arctic units: okay boys here are the rules no spitting no scratching no letting the public know about this and no killing the polar bears or penguins - they're endangered after all - and the game works by trying to have as many extraction stations as possible by either seizing them off of the units of other nations or building ones of your own GO GO GO!
The Conflict
Prelude
Some scientists find out that both the Arctic and Antarctic have lots of juicy rare metals in them due to them good ol' Earth magnetasms drawing them into those areas from the mantle, as well as ancient untapped oil reserves. Ice sheets have shrunken back a little, making extraction easier, but overall they're still using some new technology to secretly get that stuff out for either government use or to sell because taxes just ain't providing enough.
Deployment
Covert military units are sent in to build these extraction stations, including some UNDERNEATH (as in in the freezing water) the Arctic ice sheets, to magnetically pull ores from the sea floor (in the antarctic they did this with the regular floor after creating caverns beneath the ice, using magnets after breaking the crap out of the rocks to sort through what does and doesn't have any goodies in it). However, it turned out that sending in a covert unit to kill/capture everyone in an extraction station built by someone else and just using the station for yourself is a whole lot cheaper than building the things and it's not like any of these countries could openly express hostilities when all this stuff is secret and it's around this point that private companies and terrorist groups came into it both as mercenaries and as their own independent factions trying to extract resources for themselves. All sorts of new weapons were tried out (as the relative peace meant that field testing any of the new stuff was difficult) like partially AI-controlled rapid fire sniper-railguns (every single word of that was correct and it's just as devastating as it sounds) and new kinds of "gunpowder" (many of them were liquid or gas) that had tonnes of explosive power per little bit of it there was. This is even where some of the first robotniks and robotnik wearers (exoskeleton robotic armour) were deployed.
Battlefield
Arctic and Antarctic... sooper seekrett.
Conditions
Freezing.
The Engagement
Steps to seizing control of an enemy base:
- Where is it? No seriously the Arctic and Antarctic are massive: deploy lots of drones real high into the sky and hope one of them finds a goodie before getting shot down by another drone.
- Deploy a team to take out those guarding the base and then operate it themselves and send the resources to you by truck or drone. This team can be sent over land, by air, by submarine (Arctic only) or between the ground and the ice sheets in artificial tunnels being made by all sides so that resources can be sent safe from drone strikes. All of these are extremely dangerous.
-Do the attack: minimize use of explosives and try not to damage the base. If possible, kill them before they can make their superiors aware of their situation and pretend to be the guys that were working there before (this may require the torturing of those previously running the place to acquire passwords, as well as the removal of the skin of their finger-tips or hands for them prints) in order to acquire information about the ice tunnels and locations of other bases while giving minimal amounts of ores to the government you're pretending to work for while giving the rest to your own government... let me teach you a lesson in trickery.
Outcome
A few thousand deaths at most (yeah this was very covert and mostly done by machines rather than people), lots of weapons and tactics tested for effectiveness and varying amounts of valuable resources - many of which could be used in the creation of deadly weapons - in the hands of terrorist groups, private companies and nations.
Aftermath
Part of why humanity won against the Goners because it is why ARAMIS (*badass guitar solo sounds*) was such a badass and how nations had such massive stockpiles of such advanced weapons to fight the aliens with... even if those stockpiles were intended for when the Arctic wars went from covert and small-scale to open and HUGE-scale.
Historical Significance
Legacy
"Ewww, remember when we humans used to fight one another over resources?" - A US Space Marine Commander mere moments before getting shot by a UHN sniper trying to seize a planet rich in iron ore that was needed to make big death ships.
In Literature
There are all sorts of writings on it, mostly with regards to "oh how despicable those governments were for fighting secret wars - especially against other humans - am I right CHG" while the CHG looks away with a guilty face as it says "uhhh, sure" while others are focused around the backstories of major military figures in the Human-Goner War, with the Arctic wars being part of said backstories. There are also plenty regarding the military technological and strategic advances made.
Technological Advancement
AIs, railguns, automatic turrets on speedy wheels (smol too), robotniks and some of the first successful exoskeleton combat suits.
Conflict Type
War, Theatre
Start Date
2022
Ending Date
2028
Conflict Result
The Arctic wars ended when the Goners showed up BUUUT it was useful for testing out weapons and creating the veterans needed for the defeat of the reptilian scum.
Location
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