Dying in the 90's

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Introduction

Dying in a 90's is an alternative history project which explores a world where the Norwegian Rocket Incident started a nuclear war between the United States and the Russian Federation which came to be know as the Nuclear War of 95. This project is set in 2020 and explores how the world has been affected over the last twenty five years.

Point of Divergence

On January 25, 1995, a team of Norwegian and US scientists launched a rocket specifically designed to study the northern lights from Andøya Rocket Range. Before the launch, the team had notified thirty other countries including Russia, but for an unknown reason the message did not reach Russian radar technicians. Not so long after the rocket was launched it was detected by the Olenegorsk early-warning radar station in Murmansk Oblast. To the radar operators, the rocket appeared similar in speed and flight pattern to a US Navy submarine-launched Trident missile, leading the Russian military to initially misinterpret the rocket's trajectory as representing the precursor to a possible attack by missiles from submarines.

Nuclear missiles being launched 1/25/1995

This event resulted in a full alert being passed up through the military chain of command all the way to President Boris Yeltsin, who was notified and the "nuclear briefcase" (known in Russia as Cheget) used to authorize nuclear launch was automatically activated. Yeltsin activated his "nuclear keys" for the first time. During this period Yeltsin had ingested large amounts of alcohol only a few minutes ago and was not in his right mind. As a result of the alert, Russian submarine commanders were ordered to go into a state of combat readiness and prepare for nuclear retaliation. Soon thereafter, the Russian Federation launched a full-on nuclear attack on the United States and its allies resulting in the breakout of global nuclear war that hit targets all over the globe. This event become know as the Nuclear War of 95.

In this short period of time, thirty eight thousand nuclear missiles were launched by both sides: some were shot down, but many hit their targets. Military bases, airports, sea ports, power plants, dams, and important or densely populated cities. The aftermath released tons of deadly radiation. The fire from the cities spread into forests, starting massive wildfires that raised clouds of smoke which mixed with the atmosphere. This brought on further damage and badly polluted the environment with radiation and toxic ash. In many areas the land became badly irradiated and the air pollution dropped drastically. This also started a two week long nuclear winter that killed crops globally resulting in the Great Nuclear Famine.

Many years later

Now it's 2020, and the 25th anniversary of the war is taking place. The world is a very different place. The late 1990's and early 2000's were regarded as the worst few years in humanity's history. Countries that were involved in the war were reduced to broken warlord states. Most of the land these warlord states are located in is heavily irradiated, causing short lifespans and a high infant mortality rate. Countries that were near places that were hit had to deal with minor radioactive fallout and large amount of refugees. A nuclear winter covered the world for a few months, which killed crops and caused massive famines.