Norfolk Status: Going Home Time Frame

[RN7]

Originally Posted by Targan

Yes indeed, and the Soviets' weaponised anthrax production is now widely known of too. Literally dozens of TONS of it right up to the end of the Soviet Union. I'd like to point the finger and say 'evil, evil bastards' but I suspect all of the major powers during the Cold War had active biological weapons programs, and may well still have.

Also of note to Targan and our Australian friends is that fact that Australia had a biological weapons programme and intended to use it.

Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet who was the Director of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research, and won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1960 stated that...

"Specifically to the Australian situation, the most effective counter-offensive to threatened invasion by overpopulated Asiatic countries would be directed towards the destruction by biological or chemical means of tropical food crops and the dissemination of infectious disease capable of spreading in tropical but not under Australian conditions."

In 1951 it recommended that chemical and biological warfare research should be authorised to report on the offensive potentiality of biological agents likely to be effective against the local food supplies of South-East Asia and Indonesia.

Australia signed the BWC in 1972 and ended all Australian research into offensive biological weapons. However it should be noted that Australia has advanced research programs in immunology, microbiology and genetic engineering that support an industry providing world class vaccines for domestic use and export. It produces microorganisms on an industrial scale to support industries including agriculture, food technology and brewing. The dual-use nature of these facilities mean that Australia could easily produce biological warfare agents. Some disease research laboratories in Australia own strains of the Ebola virus. The Australian Microbial Resources Research Network lists 37 culture collections, many of which hold samples of pathogenic organisms for legitimate research purposes.

[Targan]

Well the CSIRO and associated government-funded bodies are right up there with the world's best scientists so they'd certainly have the capability. Heck, Australia joined the Blue Streak program with the understanding that we'd get our own nukes at the end, but the US thought Australia was a security risk and that we'd hand all the tech specs to the commies so they blocked it.

We've just commenced hostilities on the European carp and we're about to engage in some pretty nasty biological warfare against those scaly, gill-breathing bastards. Prepare for herpes carp-agedon, fishies!

[StainlessSteelCynic]

I find a lot of this info quite interesting but ultimately, how does it gibe with the canon information? I haven't read the books for some time but knowing full well that when they were written there wasn't as much information available, I feel that any correct info we have found after the fact still needs to be tailored to suit the gameworld - otherwise we start to lose the flavour of the game that attracted us to it in the first place.

[JHart]

Seeing as I've lived in the Hampton Roads area for 30 odd years I thought I'd add my 2 cents.
In reading previous discussions on the board, my assumption follows.
If it is stated in canon that the fleet returning from "Going Home" makes port in Norfolk, it would seem to me that there is something to return to. It is canon that a nuke was dropped with the intent to hit the Atlantic Command HQ located at the Norfolk Naval base. If it was a direct hit, it certainly wouldn't do the base any good, but there are other port facilities, both military and commercial in the Hampton Roads area. Assuming no other nukes are dropped on military or civilian targets in the area, then it is conceivable the fleet would return to Norfolk rather than another port on the Eastern Seaboard.
If it is more than one weapon, the Soviets could sling nukes at some of the following targets:
Major: Newport News Shipbuilding and Norfolk Naval Shipyard (located across the river from Norfolk in Portsmouth) which are still worth hitting in the non all out nuclear exchange presented in the game. Hitting these two targets and hitting Bremerton effectively ends carrier building and major carrier repair for the foreseeable future.
Minor: Southside - Little Creek NAB, Oceana NAS, Chambers Field (part of Norfolk naval station), Ft Story various civilian shipyards. Peninsula - Langley AFB, Ft Eustis, Yorktown NWS, Camp Perry, various civilian shipyards.

Most of the minor targets, with perhaps the exception of the shipyards, wouldn't really be worth hitting in a non all out attack. Most personal, equipment and planes would presumably already be deployed. Whether the Soviets care or not is another story, but in might make a difference in tit for tat exchanges.

In an all out bolt from the blue attack, most of southeast Virginia would be glass. In a tit for tat nuke exchange their is some chance of survival.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by JHart

If it is stated in canon that the fleet returning from "Going Home" makes port in Norfolk, it would seem to me that there is something to return to. It is canon that a nuke was dropped with the intent to hit the Atlantic Command HQ located at the Norfolk Naval base. If it was a direct hit, it certainly wouldn't do the base any good, but there are other port facilities, both military and commercial in the Hampton Roads area.

This is all true. The attack was an airburst (canon) so there's a chance some of the facilities not too close to ground zero would be still at least slightly usable (though the radiation might well put paid to that idea).

Originally Posted by JHart

If it is more than one weapon, the Soviets could sling nukes at some of the following targets:
Major: Newport News Shipbuilding and Norfolk Naval Shipyard (located across the river from Norfolk in Portsmouth) which are still worth hitting in the non all out nuclear exchange presented in the game. Hitting these two targets and hitting Bremerton effectively ends carrier building and major carrier repair for the foreseeable future.

Given the information available to the writers at the time (as SSC has pointed out), it would seem very likely two 500kt warheads were used, although it's possible they believed 250kt warheads were a possibility. The two locations you've identified look like prime targets for one of those warheads, and are certainly close enough to be considered part of the one single strike.

T2K was written in the 1980's while the cold war still "raged" and details were hard to come by. We should not be using information gathered since then to try and explain why the books are written the way they are, but as SSC mentioned, alter what we now know to fit the books.

[Rainbow Six]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

T2K was written in the 1980's while the cold war still "raged" and details were hard to come by. We should not be using information gathered since then to try and explain why the books are written the way they are, but as SSC mentioned, alter what we now know to fit the books.

Thanks for telling me what I should and should not be doing when it comes to how I play T2K Legbreaker, but I think I'll ignore your instructions and continue to interpret information as I wish.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Originally Posted by Rainbow Six

Thanks for telling me what I should and should not be doing when it comes to how I play T2K Legbreaker, but I think I'll ignore your instructions and continue to interpret information as I wish.

Ah, well... perhaps we should all take a step back here and remember that everything posted here is based on personal preferences/beliefs/experience etc. etc. What's good for one may not be so good for another.
I tend to agree with Leg but I also have the opinion that he is not saying "You must all do it my way!" It seems that Western society has manufactured a culture of offence and people feel a need to take offence at the drop of a hat when none was ever intended.

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by Targan

We've just commenced hostilities on the European carp and we're about to engage in some pretty nasty biological warfare against those scaly, gill-breathing bastards. Prepare for herpes carp-agedon, fishies!

But think of all the potential gefilte fish you'll be wasting!!!
On second thought, having tried gefilte fish several times with unfortunate reviews each time, go ahead and massacre 'em!