The aftermath of Zero Hour Options

[Anubis]

Europe 2016
The economic crisis that hit Europe in 2008 reached its most dangerous period. Austerity measures were harder than ever and the population in many countries simply couldn’t keep up with them. As a result by mid 2016 riots started in many European countries including Greece, Spain, Portugal or Hungary. The euro-zone was collapsing faster than strong economies could hope to sustain it. As a result Europe suddenly found itself divided with each state trying to save its interests and economy.

Summer 2017
A devastating nuclear attack shocks the world as a good part of downtown Beijing was reduced to a huge radioactive crater. The first global anti-terrorism war has begun. Chinese forces fought to drive the GLA out of their borders, while American forces collided with GLA forces in central Asia and the Middle East. While the conflict was a global one, most of Europe, still crippled under social unrest and political impotence, sought to steer clear of the chaos.

Spring 2018
A second GLA assault begins with a devastating attack on an American military base in Europe. This time better equipped and organized GLA forces manage to drive the Americans out of Europe. Because of its current volatile situation, Europe was an easy target for the GLA. Civil unrest and the overall political rising of the nationalistic left wing allowed GLA commanders to use the population masses in Europe as the tip of their spear. One by one the economic furnaces of Europe started to collapse. With American forces on retreat and Europe turning into an anarchy state, the remaining European authorities turn to China.

Spring 2019
After many terrible battles and thousands of casualties, the last of the GLA forces are driven out of Europe. However the scars left are so deep, that the former European Union simply crumbles. With their own economic and social problems countries like Germany or France simply cannot sustain more than their own needs. With fallen governments and lack of an actual direction, European countries turn to their remaining armed forces to regain control. A join military program is created by late 2019 with the specific role of regaining control and sustaining order.
Within months the program grew and successfully united most of Western Europe under it. In January 2020 the European Joint Strike Force is officially formed.

2020
Seeing how easily the GLA managed to control large masses of the European population, in the aftermath of the GLA uprisings, a huge witch hunt began in Western Europe. Any person who was suspected of having any kind of contact with the GLA was hunted down and arrested. Any form of opposition meant death. In order to provide its citizens with a “refreshed feeling of safety�, most of the European states became police states, with almost total control over their citizen’s daily lives. In the government’s eyes, control was required in order to secure a swift reconstruction of all that was lost, most of important of which was the people’s faith in their governments.
During the ZH war much of the European controlled oil fields and other resource gathering facilities were destroyed either by the GLA as an act of terrorism or by the USA or China as a way to cripple the GLA advance. As a result, Europe was now facing a terrible energy crisis. The remaining coal power plants were not enough and the alternative energy supply sources needed a lot of infrastructure.

Spring 2021
The energy crisis was a huge opportunity for international corporations to come up with ideas and gain worldwide fame for saving Europe. Many proposals we’re sent but a joint project from Z-Tech Industries and Cynopolis Technologies eventually won. The project, now known as ‘The Solar Furnace�, involves harvesting large quantities of raw solar power to solve Europe’s energy crisis. The huge implications of this project interested a lot of world powers, so after a tiring Summit at Bruxelles, all the major international players joined. Eventually, it was decided that Europe would take the lead on the project. EJSF authorities gladly accepted the responsibility and assured the world that they were prepared to take on all of the assumed risks. For the EJSF the furnace project wasn’t merely about solving the energy crisis, it was about improving their overall image (which was greatly devastated by the “witch hunts�). Under a well conceived propagandistic media program, the EJSF was finally successful at their goal of regaining the faith of the European people. Two years later, the first experimental furnace was tested.

When the WEA was created in 2034 they were the only ones left with a strong active space program and the Solar Furnace technology. However they were still at great risk, for everyone else wanted to gain access to this technology. WEA military command decided to move their research facilities inside heavily fortified and heavily armed structures, in order to provide increased defense in case of an enemy assault. These structures proved their usefulness in 2039 when a covert ops team financed by Russian secret services tried to infiltrate what they thought was a “simple WEA research facility�. Without knowing what they were facing, the commando team was obliterated within minutes. Thus these fortified research facilities came to be known as Fortresses due to their incredible durability and firepower.

The Fortress acts as the first tier research facility and also as a heavy defense. It researches all tier 2 technologies and unlocks all tier 2 units and structures. It is armed with a huge photon howitzer and 3 Starburst missiles pods. Due to its high construction cost and a limited number of highly skilled technicians and researchers readily available, a player can build only 1 of these structures at a time.

The Solar Furnace technology research branched out into 2 fields. The first field focused on making the furnace smaller and cheaper to produce. The second field focused on weaponizing this technology. Once again, the work was mainly done by the 2 notorious companies ZTech and Cynopolis. One provided the advanced electronics and the other provided the experimental new materials required. Their most daring project was a defense system capable of mounting not 1 but 2 solar based weapons. The end result was the Apollo Multi-purpose Defense System – named after the Greek sun god.

The Apollo Defense is a tier 3 defense for the Continental Defense sub faction of WEA. It is extremely sturdy but requires a lot of power to function and costs a lot of cash. Its weapons consist of 1 multi-barreled rotary solar cannon on top and 2 Sunflare photon cannons in the middle.

This is it for now. Until next time, cya around.

[CoLT]

In case you didn't get it, when I say that the question does not have an answer yet, it means that giving an answer to such a question would reveal more than what the dev would want at that point in time.