American Strategic Deception Bureau

　But as the United States is a country of immigrants, it is common for small villages here to develop into big cities in just a few decades.

　For example, there is a recent real-life case in Nevada, next to California.

　——Didn’t the famous gambling city, Las Vegas, suddenly rise from the Nevada desert in just two or three decades?

　If someone could go back from 1970 to 1930 and see Las Vegas, which had not yet started casinos and gambling at that time - a poor and shabby little village in the desert, it would probably be difficult to associate it with the decadent city of extravagance and luxury and the dazzling pearl of the desert in the future, right?

　If Las Vegas could rise from the desolate and remote desert, why couldn't Morro Bay, with its convenient transportation, become a megacity?

　In short, seeing that Morro Bay had become so popular in such a short time, Fili couldn't help but get interested. He couldn't help but pick up his old job as a CIA agent and imitated Dr. Kissinger who had been with him in the past. He conducted a social survey of this California coastal town.

　Then, he was stunned by the skyrocketing local rents and house prices - in such a short period of time, a group of quick-acting real estate speculators had already entered Morro Bay at the first opportunity, acquired real estate, and driven up house and land prices!

　Well, if you think about it carefully, any investor would

　I will come to stock up on land!

　The reason why banks "borrow umbrellas when it's sunny and take them away when it's raining" when lending is that they cannot be sure of the future prospects and can only operate conservatively.

　But if it can be confirmed that the future development momentum will continue to be good, banks will definitely be generous in investing money in the real estate business in Morro Bay.

　——According to American standards, a city with a population of 4,000 to 5,000 is considered a small city, a city with a population of more than 10,000 is considered a medium-sized city, and a city with a population of more than 100,000 is considered a large city.

　Therefore, many small towns in China would be considered large cities in the United States, while small cities in the United States would only be considered large villages in China.

　As for villages in the United States, they are basically small places with only a few hundred people.

　However, at that time, Morro Bay was still a small rural place, and there were not many ready-made properties. Fortunately, there was a lot of idle land.

　At the same time, because California Highway 1 passes through here and there is a large thermal power plant next to it, the transportation and power supply conditions are also quite good.

　So, now a real estate developer has bought the wasteland near Morro Bay, planning to build a resort and villa area on the land - in the "Night City" of "Cyberpunk 2077", that piece of land is "Haywood" where the protagonist lives!

　Hey, looking at this enthusiastic investment, could it be that they really want to build Night City in the 1970s or 1980s?

　The United States today isn't the decadent nation with lagging infrastructure that it will become. While it no longer possesses the infrastructure mania of the 1930s, when the Empire State Building was built, it's still relatively easy to build infrastructure again, relying on the engineering workforce left over from the construction of the intercontinental highway network.

　At least the construction workers from their heyday are not too old to work, and the civil engineers have not become outdated and eliminated by the market.

　So, Morro Bay real estate seems to have great potential. Should I invest some money there?

　Looking at the new real estate company offices that have sprung up on the streets of the town, Fili couldn't help but think so.

　However, when Fili was in Morro Bay, thinking about his own financial affairs, he didn't know that the whole world was undercurrent.

　For example, at this moment, American intelligence personnel in Japan are conducting a secret investigation to find out whether there is an entrepreneur named "Arasaka Saburo" in Japan today who once shot down 20 American planes while flying a naval carrier-based aircraft and engaged in arms production and mercenary security after the war, but they have found nothing.

　Today, Japan, still bound by its "pacifist constitution," faces significant restrictions on its military production. Japanese-made weapons are completely unable to enter the international market, and Japanese defense companies are unable to secure overseas orders, relying solely on procurement from the Self-Defense Forces. Unfortunately, the Self-Defense Forces are small, do not engage in warfare, and are forced to purchase large quantities of American weapons annually as a sign of loyalty. This leaves them with a very limited supply of remaining arms.

　As a result, even Mitsubishi, a long-established military giant from the imperial era, currently produces only a pitifully small variety and quantity of weapons. How could a new, internationally renowned Japanese military enterprise emerge? As for mercenaries? Which Japanese company would dare employ them these days?

　Besides, there weren't many Japanese ace pilots who had shot down more than 20 American planes and survived until the end of World War II. The US military retrieved a list of names from the files seized from the Navy Ministry after the war, and after checking them one by one, they found no such person as Saburo Arasaka!

　Just when the American intelligence agencies in Japan were feeling very confused and even doubted the accuracy of the intelligence from the British side, some humanities experts who claimed to be "Japan experts" stood up and explained in a serious manner that it was normal that Saburo Arasaka could not be found now!

　Because, unlike Americans, Japanese people often change their names for various reasons.

　For example, a son-in-law has to change his surname when he marries into another family or is adopted as a stepson; he has to change his given name when he is given a courtesy name by an elder or a benefactor; he has to change his given name and surname when he wants to associate himself with a famous family; idols have to take a stage name when they debut, and after using the stage name for a long time, it becomes their real name.

　Even some Japanese people who encounter major setbacks and want to forget the past and pick themselves up again will choose to change their names.

　Just like Tokugawa Ieyasu, who founded the Tokugawa shogunate, was called Matsudaira Motoyasu in his early years, and later he simply changed both his surname and given name.

　There is also Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the Taiko, who changed his surname twice and had three godfathers.

　Since the future Arasaka Saburo is a powerful figure in the world, he may change his name as often as Tokugawa Ieyasu and Toyotomi Hideyoshi.

　So, who knows what the Arasaka Saburo from decades later is called now?

　At the same time, a company's business scope will also change. A military or security giant decades from now might be selling candy.

　For example, when people think of Nestlé today, they often associate it with Nescafé coffee and Nescafé chocolate. However, when Nestlé was first established, its only product was Nestlé cereal. It wasn't until much later that Nestlé began to venture into the coffee industry.

　Also, Michelin's original business was the production of car tires, but later on it was often associated with gourmet food and dining.

　Even for military production, the barriers to entry are not as high as one might imagine. During World War II, Nagoya's canneries switched to producing fighter jets.

　As for the story that Saburo Arasaka once served in the Navy during World War II and flew fighter planes and shot down twenty American planes, it is likely that he made up his own record to gild his reputation after he became successful in his career. It should not be taken seriously at all.

　There are so many similar things!

　Maybe this guy just used his connections to avoid military service by staying home. He never went to the battlefield except to avoid bombings?

　So, who knows what Saburo Arasaka’s name was and what business he was running at this time in 1970?

　(The "Future" magazines and newspapers collected by the British did not provide a detailed introduction to the resume of Saburo Arasaka, the boss of Arasaka Corporation.)

　The Pentagon, the White House, and Capitol Hill were all skeptical of the aforementioned "rationalization." But lacking a better explanation, they simply accepted it, while also further increasing the size of the US military presence in Japan, restricting Japanese military production, and demanding higher costs from Japan for stationing troops.

　At the same time, the Soviet Kremlin inexplicably began a new round of "institutional restructuring." They drastically dismantled the Soviet petrochemical sector and deployed troops to various oil fields and refineries, allowing regular troops to take over security for petrochemical units.

　In short, oil fields and petrochemical companies are absolutely not allowed to set up their own armed security teams!

　There is no way. In the timeline of "Cyberpunk 2077", the glorious Soviet Army's steel torrent was defeated by the security team of Supec, which turned the Soviet Union into a puppet of the giant enterprise Supec, and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was almost hollowed out by an energy company!

　Lenin, how could such absurd things happen in the future?

　Such outrageous "future information" made the Soviet generals feel ashamed, angry and annoyed.

　Therefore, in order to prevent problems before they occur, the Soviet army stated that it would never allow the oil sector to set up its own armed security team.

　It is better to send Soviet troops to oil fields and petrochemical enterprises as security guards to occupy the ecological niche in advance!

　As for the separatist tendencies of the Soviet republics... the Kremlin has no good solution for the time being and can only try its best to be a paperhanger.

　The European Community in Belgium was filled with excitement during this period—future world hegemony would return to Europe! Even the United States would adopt the euro! But at the same time, there was also concern that if the news leaked early, the European Community would be hit by the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union.

　However, despite such concerns, the European Community took advantage of this wave of good news and held a meeting to discuss the early issuance of the euro.

　The Germans were equally excited. Both East and West Germany were more eager for unification, but also more worried.

　Furthermore, housing prices in Hong Kong and Busan have plummeted. In Cyberpunk 2077's timeline, these two cities will not only become ghost towns due to war, but will also be haunted, overrun by roaming AI and robots—more terrifying than Hiroshima and Nagasaki!

　-

　Amidst this chaos, Firi took Marita on a two-day stroll around Morro Bay, climbing Stone Ridge Mountain, featured in Cyberpunk 2077, and watching sea otters cracking shells on the surface of the water and seals sunbathing on the beach.

　Finally, they drove south back to Los Angeles with great satisfaction.

　After arriving in Los Angeles, Ferry thought about it and did not go home to rest directly. Instead, he went to the "Federal Space Force Headquarters" in Pasadena to see Lieutenant Wolf Lee who stayed there and asked him if he had received any tasks or instructions from his superiors recently.

　Lieutenant Wolfe Lee, who was watching TV, drinking coffee and eating donuts, saw the commander coming and quickly wiped his mouth and stood up, saying that everything was normal at the headquarters recently and there was nothing urgent in the backlog of emails, so the commander could take them home and read them slowly.

　However, when he heard that Ferry had just been to Morro Bay, his expression suddenly changed: "Wow! Sir, you and your wife just came back from Morro Bay? Oh, you left just in time! If you were any later, you wouldn't be able to leave! An atomic bomb just exploded there today!"

　What? Atom bomb?

　Following Wolfe's raised finger, Fili looked towards the TV in the room, and indeed, he saw a mushroom cloud slowly rising from the screen...

　Holy crap! Morro Bay got nuked before it even had time to build Night City or Arasaka Tower?

　Chapter 538: Dropping Nuclear Bombs on Each Other as a Show of Goodwill

　On November 11, 1970, a very unlucky day, a group of terrorists very unluckyly detonated a miniature atomic bomb in Morro Bay, California!

　This wasn't because the small fishing village of Morro Bay was worthy of launching a terrorist attack, nor was it because terrorists wanted to travel through time and space to attack Night City, which didn't yet exist. Rather, it was because a smuggling ship was intercepted by the Coast Guard while passing through Morro Bay.

　However, the terrorists on the smuggling ship had incredibly powerful firepower, and the California Coast Guard was unable to capture them for a while, suffering heavy casualties. Consequently, the National Guard was called in to attack the arms smuggling ship with armed helicopters and gunboats.

　As a result, during the fierce battle, the smuggling ship caught fire. The terrorists, who were in desperate situation, went crazy and detonated a nuclear bomb, and died together with them.

　The official personnel had never expected that there was a nuclear bomb on the arms ship, and it was blown to pieces by this atomic bomb with a TNT equivalent of 1000 tons.

　As to what organizations and groups attempted to smuggle atomic bombs from abroad to the United States...the police and the FBI are still investigating.

　At the same time, Morro Bay, not far from the battlefield, was also severely affected, with more than 100 houses blown away.

　Top, the number of casualties is nearly a thousand...

　What’s more crucial is that the local housing prices, which had just skyrocketed, are now likely to plummet like a cliff.

　Well, this nuclear explosion is indeed a panacea for lowering housing prices, but the side effects might be a bit too severe.

　The feeling of rising and falling is more exciting than the roller coaster in the park!

　I wonder how many people will suffer a sudden heart attack, die despite medical treatment, or even die from investment failure?

　"Hey, three months ago, New York was hit by a nuclear bomb, and now it's the West Coast's turn to have a mushroom cloud rising!"

　Watching the news about the Morro Bay nuclear explosion on TV, Fili couldn't help but sigh, "Everyone is equal under a nuclear explosion!"

　However, despite the devastation suffered by the small town hit by the nuclear bomb, after the Vietnam War in this dimension went nuclear, global nuclear proliferation was inevitable. And it was only a matter of time before non-governmental violent groups gained control of nuclear weapons: too many miniature nuclear bombs had been lost on the battlefield!

　So, in the past year, besides the UK, the US, and Spain, other countries have also suffered numerous nuclear attacks. The Soviet Union alone suffered three such attacks—two of which were when the bombs were seized while being smuggled, and the third when someone successfully transported an atomic bomb to Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, intending to explode it and make a big news. However, due to the poor quality of the homemade timer, the bomb was a dud, preventing any major incident.

　In South Africa, where racial conflicts are intense, after the white South African regime bombed black settlements with nuclear bombs, the South African black resistance movement "Spear of the Nation" also obtained miniature atomic bombs. However, due to the lack of long-range bombing capabilities, they buried the atomic bombs in their own villages and used them as nuclear mines.

　Finally, in an ambush battle in October 1970, a South African paratrooper battalion was collectively sublimated in the "brilliant radiation", and an armored company that cooperated in the battle was severely damaged, and all its members were sent to the hospital - it seemed that South Africa's Centurion tanks could not withstand the nuclear radiation.

　In addition, Turkey's Kurdistan Workers' Party also used its own miniature nuclear bombs to carry out a "warning nuclear explosion" at a military base outside the Turkish capital Ankara, killing thousands of people, in order to threaten the Ankara government to sue for peace, and also claimed that this was a "goodwill gesture."

　As a guerrilla, I have nuclear weapons, while your government forces do not. Yet, I haven't directly bombed your capital with an atomic bomb. Instead, after conducting a "warning nuclear detonation," I've politely offered to negotiate with you. If this isn't goodwill, what is it?

　Just based on the mushroom cloud rising on the outskirts of Ankara, it shouldn't be too much for the Kurds to want to fight for "quasi-independence" treatment, right?

　Alas, a certain country has nuclear bombs, but the bombs are not in the hands of the government... What could be more terrifying than this in the world?

　Next, Brazil's wealthy tycoons have begun to look for ways to acquire nuclear bombs in order to compete for water resources, land, and run for parliamentary seats, and are trying to "drop nuclear bombs on each other as a sign of goodwill (intimidation)" - Brazilian police just seized a smuggled nuclear bomb not long ago, which allowed Brazil to instantly join the nuclear club and become a nuclear-armed country: such an outrageous way of possessing nuclear weapons is not sure whether it should be considered lucky or shameful.

　Imagine that criminals are so martial that they play with nuclear bombs, and the police are so weak that they can't even use guns. What kind of hell is this?

　In short, regarding the current situation of widespread nuclear proliferation, non-governmental organizations are certainly excited and overjoyed.

　But the bigwigs in the academic circles around the world and the critics in the news media feel quite sour.

　A Japanese commentator wrote in a newspaper, "In the past, nuclear bombs were often seen as doomsday weapons that ended wars, or at least the final decisive weapon in the struggle for supremacy among major powers. But now, the atomic bomb has become a lowly weapon that even guerrillas can equip!"

　And the truth is, the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, have both discovered that as more and more countries and organizations possess nuclear weapons, the deterrent effect of their massive nuclear arsenals is decreasing. When the day comes when gangs from all over the world are throwing nuclear bombs at each other to fight for territory...

　It seems that the nuclear deterrence of the United States and the Soviet Union against the world is about to become a joke, right?

　Therefore, after the end of the Fourth Middle East War and the Second American Civil War, General Secretary Brezhnev and President Nixon had several telephone conversations in an attempt to promote an international conference on nuclear non-proliferation around the world to limit the indiscriminate use of nuclear bombs.

　Lieutenant Wolfe Lee expressed pessimism about the prospects of this matter. He reasoned that if the US government hadn't been able to take back the muskets it had sold to the Indians, forcing them to use stone axes to counter the rifles of the cowboys, then how could the US and Soviet Union, with their ulterior motives, possibly take back the vast number of nuclear bombs already spread across the globe? Even if the US and the Soviet Union could reach an agreement to ban the sale of nuclear weapons, would other countries capable of producing them agree?

　But Firi felt that President Nixon's efforts to promote nuclear non-proliferation were similar to the international anti-drug campaign.

　The goal is not to eliminate nuclear bombs from all conflict fronts around the world, nor is it to require small countries and organizations that have just obtained nuclear bombs to surrender them - this is simply impossible. Instead, it is to reduce the frequency of use of nuclear bombs as much as possible to prevent the nuclear arsenals of major powers from losing their deterrent power.

　In the final analysis, this is to maintain the hegemony dividend of nuclear-armed countries and not to let nuclear bombs become a common existence.

　in.

　"Indeed, it would be nearly impossible to recover all the nuclear bombs scattered around the world. However, if we simply ask countries capable of producing nuclear bombs to stop selling them abroad, then there is still hope that it can be accomplished."

　Phiri commented, "Although secret deals under the surface are likely to continue, relying on a ban to raise the price and status of nuclear weapons again caters to the collective interests of the entire 'nuclear club' and is likely to be achieved."

　At the very least, nuclear bombs should be a "national treasure" that cannot be used lightly, rather than a cheap item that gangs can toss around when fighting over territory..."

　Nowadays, due to the impact of the Vietnam War and the Middle East War, nuclear bombs seem to be exploding everywhere on the earth, and mushroom clouds are everywhere.

　However, apart from the nuclear weapons that the United States and the Soviet Union proactively provided to other countries, the nuclear bombs currently flowing into the international arms black market are basically just "inventory" lost on the battlefield. Their total number is limited, and will become less and less with the passage of time and the use of various forces.

　——After all, atomic bombs also have a shelf life, and most buyers who get them probably don’t have enough maintenance capabilities.

　If the five permanent members of the United Nations can sit down and seriously negotiate, it will still be possible to control nuclear proliferation at the source.

　After all, the barrier to producing a nuclear bomb remains high these days. Only a handful of countries worldwide are capable of independently enriching uranium-235 and producing large quantities of plutonium. As long as the US and the Soviet Union can reach an agreement on nuclear non-proliferation, China and France will likely not object (the UK has already disarmed itself and handed over its nuclear arsenal to the US).

　Just like in the 18th and 19th centuries, although white people had been selling guns to Native Americans (Indians) for their own interests and there was no way to ban it, they all adhered to one bottom line: never sell artillery to Indians!

　And, miraculously, this bottom line persisted until the end of the westward movement and all Indian tribes were driven into reservations.

　Similarly, for the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the most effective use of nuclear weapons is definitely not to plant mushrooms all over the world, but to use the deterrent power of nuclear weapons to resist the intimidation of other nuclear-armed countries, oppress the vast majority of non-nuclear countries, and seek additional benefits in diplomatic negotiations...

　Just as Fili was chatting with his only "official" subordinate, there was a sudden commotion on the street outside the window. Fili opened the window curiously and looked out, and found that the street was crowded with people and was packed with the parade.

　At the front of the parade was a rather eye-catching group of muscular, naked men—some were bare-buttocks, some were wearing only shorts, waving the American flag, jumping and dancing, and shouting various "love and peace" slogans. A band played music behind them, providing accompaniment.

　Is this... a gay parade from the early days of the LGBT movement? No, they don't seem to be flying rainbow flags!

　Ferry scratched his head in confusion and turned to ask Lieutenant Wolfe Lee, who replied, "Ah, that's the draft dodger's victory parade, sir. Don't you know? President Nixon recently issued a pardon, declaring all American citizens who have dodged the draft within the past ten years to be innocent. So all those draft dodgers who were hiding are now coming out to celebrate!"

　……

　(A sudden thought: if Hitler had not succeeded in his job change and was sent back to the Austro-Hungarian Empire to serve in the military, what would history have been like?)

　But there were still many young Americans whose families were broke. They didn't want to serve in the military and die on the front lines in Vietnam, but they didn't have the money to live a carefree life abroad, and they didn't have the connections to falsify medical records or transfer to the reserves. So what was they to do?