Mideast Meltdown

The Mideast Meltdown of 1997, also called the Suicide War, was the name for a series of nuclear conflicts in the Middle East near the end of the 20th century. It occurred among the aftereffects of the Crash of '94 and in the midst of the Collapse, which saw the large-scale unraveling of Western civilization.

History
The events of the 1997 Iran-Iraq War resulted in large losses for United States military assets in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia owing to a massive intelligence failure.

Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Chad, and the Arab Emirates were reduced to radioactive slag by nuclear warfare.

The resulting conflicts in the region would see oil prices skyrocket as world oil supply was cut in half. Shortly after, the United States co-opted the entire island of Oahu "to ensure the security of Hawaii and the rest of the nation."

Outcome
Much of the Middle East, excluding the nations of Egypt, Syria, and Israel, was reduced to radioactive glass-like fields, the nations excluded from the conflict having survived due to being in already-ruined states. Due to the use of thermonuclear weapons, radioactive fallout from the war spread worldwide.

Legacy
By the 2020s, the impacted areas had become safe enough for scavengers, as well as other individuals willing to traverse them, to scavenge and collect hardware and valuables from the ruined fields. By 2045, with the influence of corporations being fractured and reduced by the legacy of the Fourth Corporate War, interested allies and blocs came together to take control of the regions destroyed in the Meltdown, for the purposes of mining and resource gathering, forcing many Middle Eastern nations to reform and attempt to resist the invading groups.

By 2077 the fallout created by the "Suicide War" caused annual radioactive sandstorms in the ruins of Syria, Iraq, and Iran that dropped irradiated dust onto Turkey, the Mediterranean, and Europe.