Fallout: Who fired first?

[Brotherofwill]

In the series of Fallout games, the whole planet was reduced to ashes within 2 hours of nuclear war. It is unknown who initiated it and who fired the first H-bomb.

So who did it? Make some suggestions.

 

[Souplex]

I did. And now everything is all 50sey.

 

[manaman]

I believe the Chinese fired first if I remember the story right. Then again they have intended that to show that you can't always trust what it written down, cause other times they make it clear nobody really knows who fired first.

 

[QuickDEMOL1SHER]

Gaea.
Not only did she fire the first, but she also kept it going!

 

[reg42]

The same time. At the exact same time.
Boom. Just like that.

 

[Axeli]

Is there some point to this other than arguing which is more evil, US or China?

I think Fallout disregards who started the nuclear war and for what reason on purpose. The point of a post-apocalyptic setting usually is that humanity sucks.

 

[Audioave10]

They often don't want to put blame on any one country. Politically correct you know.

 

[seventy7l]

2 hours so maybe it was like oh we i'll fire then you fire okay?
Then the Americans were a second hesitant then China said oops i thought we were firing at 3

 

[Hazy]

I'm going to go with China. Crafty Red bastards.

Wait, isn't that Russia?

Anyway, yeah, I believe it was the Chinese that initiated it. Thanks a lot, guys.

 

[Meggiepants]

It was those crafty Canadians.

The U.S. is Canada's beard.

I figure you aren't supposed to know really. It's a war that resulted in the wasteland. It's all messed up. And it never changes and all that.

 

[Lono Shrugged]

The aliens......


(That'll go down well)

 

[Zacharine]

I think the point is: no one any longer knows and written material surviving the incident and made directly after are too filled with propaganda to be reliable.

That is part of the bleak backstory as far as I'm concerned. The world went to hell, no one remembers exactly why or whose fault it was and the same mistakes get repeaten again and again.

FOs 1, 2 and 3 all convey conflict in some scale or another, and a struggle for survival. And the reasons behind those are the same reasons that sparked the devastation in the first place. Desire for power, greed, overwhelming fear or simply a preparedness to do anything necessary to make the tiny corner you live in slightly more bearable and frak everyone else. Despite the devastations and post-apocalyptic horrors, humanity never changed. And as long as humanity never changes... War never changes.

Also keep in mind the FO2 opening: "The details are trivial and pointless and the reasons, as always, purely human ones."

 

[theSovietConnection]

I think it was the Enclave that fired first in order to initiate the Vault experiments.

 

[Nitpicker of the Wastes]

Han shot first.

According to Enclave records and the SkyNet AI, China shot first. But then again, the Enclave are the local propaganda masters and SkyNet says that it was made using Alien technology and became sentient before it was made, so I guess neither source is horribly relevant.

 

[internetzealot1]

Spoiler: Oh, Im thinking some random element fired in order to initiate both American and Chinese retalliation

Did it for teh lulz

 

[Cody211282]

It was those crafty Canadians.

The U.S. is Canada's beard.

I figure you aren't supposed to know really. It's a war that resulted in the wasteland. It's all messed up. And it never changes and all that.

No Canada is the U.S.'s hat

 

[dmase]

I wanna say some early enclave secret society made all the world's nukes fire at once. Controlling the codes and all that, or maybe released one country's nukes and then rest followed suit.

I think that they might reveal that at some point maybe if they made a game where an American goes to post apocalypse China or something. Actually now that I think about it whenever they make it the story for a player to visit the common wealth and see the institute or another advanced city in post apocalyptica.

ninja'd

 

[Octorok]

The U.S. is Canada's beard.

BAHAHAHAHA! Thankee kindly good madam, have this bag of moneys for giving me a good laugh. Can I use that?

 

[Gilhelmi]

Russia.

With the rise of Red China the Russians became jealous, they thought back to the old USSR and said "If America and China are out of the way, we would be the superpower again". So they attacked both America and China simultaneously using stolen bombs from both sides.

Have I over thought this a bit, maybe.

 

[Blatherscythe]

The U.S and China were not the only superpowers with atomic weapons. Any country with a nuke could have fired it off and every country would have fired theirs in retaliation. In short there are more than two culprits in the case of who started the Great War.