Venezuela (1983: Doomsday)

The birth of National Unity

 * 25 September, 1983.

Oil rich Venezuela was emerged in an economic meltdown by the time of Doomsday. Although constitutionally banned from reelection President Luis Herrera Campins had been a regular sight in the campaign trail in favor of Rafael Caldera, who had attained the presidency two terms before. President Herrera however had no illusions about the december contest: with the economy in a growing bad state, and the people remembering fondly the days of the economic boom of the seventies, the President privately acknowledged to his friends and family that winning in december would be "a stretch."

Then, it happened. All international media just went off the grid. No television, no radio communications, no cables from the embassies and no phone calls from abroad. Sometimes not even static, just eerie silence. Fearing the worst, President Campins and a high level delegation were almost immediately evacuated from Miraflores Palace, to the Presidential Retreat, where the head of the Presidential Guard believed it would be safest for the upper echelons of government. It was on a high level meeting of the cabinet, when the head of the army, Major General Olavarría harshly entered the room with ten other soldiers and diplomatic cypher machine. A low level diplomatic delegation had survived the attacks in Switzerland, and had been reporting almost constantly of the situation in the ground. The Warsaw pact was mostly gone. The United States, were too. Panicked, President Herrera Campins ordered the military to gather as much information as possible and relay it to his Caracas office as soon as possible.

Understanding that there was no "first world" now, President Herrera Campins returned to Caracas, where the rumor mill had already started to flow. Almost immediately he addressed the nation about the situation in the United States and Europe, and announced a temporary suspension of constitutional rights. This managed to keep most of the panicking population indoors and avoided major looting and disturbances for the fist few days. As information kept coming in, the government kept relaying it to a horrified public, who realized that life would be forever altered. Scientists now frequently interviewed on television, warned of a nuclear winter and of catastrophic disasters coming on Venezuela's way on the next few weeks. The government, paralyzed by fear could not react easily to these news, and took almost a whole week to develop a meager plan to defend its citizens from the nuclear fallout. Borrowing a page from WWII, Venezuela began evacuating people to the still in construction "Metro" tunnels underneath Caracas, when radioactive rain started arriving. Thousands in the interior however, suffered when they disregarded the instructions from civil defense, and a nationwide rise in cancer and mutations was seen all over the country.

It was during one of these radiological storms, that President Campins decided not to suspend the December election. He called all the major political players and asked them to sign a binding pact: No matter who would win the election in december, he would be committed to form a unity government that would look over the interests of the most affected. Everyone present on that meeting was on board, and signed without understanding very well what they had gotten into. Venezuela's main source of income, The United States was now absolutely devastated, and although oil production was enough to keep local and regional demands flowing, it was still never enough to keep the economy afloat. Additionally, Venezuela imported a large amount of food from abroad, although the local reserves were well stocked, food would start depleting out early next year. This would call for a major mobilization of people back to the tainted fields and its repercussions would just have to be assumed.

One month after the attacks, the constitutional guarantees were restored. President Campins announced that the election would proceed as scheduled, and a major initiative that would send as much as 100,000 volunteers to work on the fields. At first, many were skeptic of this move by the government, calling it an exaggeration, but as many started to find their favorite groceries missing on the markets, reality started to sink in: If Venezuela did not send people to work, Venezuela would starve. Within days, a massive camping to drive people into fertile land, with the help of miss universes, celebrities and politicians was launched, and by the time of the election, more than 300,000 Venezuelans from all social strata heeded on the call for unity. The government also announced a retroactive incentive to those who had left to farm for the people, and by the time the first crops began to srpout, a new landed aristocracy had risen.