The Divide

The Divide is a violent land torn apart by quakes and skin-flaying windstorms to the northwest of the Mojave.

Background
Before the Great War, the land now known as the Divide was home to Hopeville and Ashton: a missile base and a city under its protection. Apart from being a major element of the ballistic defense matrix, Hopeville was also the subject of a major Big MT research project concerning meteorology; a project that apparently ended in a disaster, spawning the horrible dust storms the Divide is infamous for. Beside the project, Big MT was also a partner in different enterprises: at one point, the entire local hippie commune that protested outside Hopeville against the ongoing Sino-American War were rounded up by special riot control officiers wearing a new model of L.A.P.D. riot armor, the whole regulated by the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment wearing a recognizable helmet and a more advanced riot armor, shipped off them to the Big Mountain Research and Development Center as test subjects.

The Great War apparently surprised the soldiers here, as the ICBMs never left their missile silos. It is possible that the aforementioned backfiring meteorological experiment has resulted in the soldiers here dying or fleeing before the American missiles could take flight. A silence fell across the land. For two centuries the soil of the Divide lay undisturbed by human presence. However, eventually, a small survivalist community established itself in the area, led by the Courier. Kept alive by the Courier, it prospered, and more settlers moved into the new city. It prospered enough in fact, to draw the attention of the New California Republic, who began to annex it swiftly for a newly established supply line across the treacherous Divide into the Mojave Wasteland.

This drew the attention of the Caesar's Legion, which, in its bid to take the Mojave, attempted to cut the new supply line (Long 15 and New Canaan was the two first), sending Frumentarii and assassins to explore the area after a sizeable force of legionaries struck against the Republic's forces located there. But this war did not destroy the settlement. It was the work of the Courier, returning to the Divide again and delivering a package from Navarro by order of the NCR, containing a copy of ED-E to the Divide, a short time before the NCR and the Legion jumped to each other's throat. When this device was activated by the inhabitants, it sent a signal to the dormant nuclear missiles lying in the silos beneath the ground. They began detonating one after another, causing massive earthquakes, spliting the earth apart, cracking and twisting the landscape. Entire companies of NCR soldiers in the Divide were trapped together with their Legion foes. The disaster created the Divide as it exists now: a wind-beaten maze of twisting canyons, skin-flaying dust storms and horrific abominations.

The Divide twisted the surviving NCR and Legion. As the winds flayed their skin and radiation ghoulified them, they became the marked men: skinless horrors fueled by hatred and rage for everything around them. Outside the Divide, the disaster became a blessing in disguise for the Legion: cutting off NCR supply lines along Death Valley Road and the Carson Pass Highway, it granted Caesar's Legion time to recover after their loss in the First Battle of Hoover Dam. However, it also gave birth to the greatest danger to the post-War civilization of the American Southwest: Ulysses. The Divide disaster both traumatized and inspired him as he learned the impact a single person, the Courier, can have on history.

Ulysses was determined to reshape the post-apocalyptic world single handedly, much like the Courier reshaped the Divide by unleashing nuclear fire on it. At some point before the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, Ulysses contacts the Courier via a single message: the coordinates for the Canyon wreckage west of Primm, and the words "Courier Six. -Ulysses", wanting to destroy their new home in his reshaping process of America before their eyes, as the Courier did for him with the Divide. The Courier answered the call and confronted Ulysses at the Divide. There, under the Old World flag and the torn skies, the two decided the fate of America.

Layout
Contains undetonated warheads, most likely nuclear warheads within ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles), which would be safe in an isolated location which the area around Hopeville seems to be.

Appearances
The Divide is mentioned in Fallout: New Vegas, and all its add-ons (Dead Money, Honest Hearts, and Old World Blues) and its map is shown in Old World Blues. It appears in the add-on Lonesome Road.

Behind the scenes

 * Before the release of Lonesome Road, Chris Avellone's Twitter avatar showed the Divide.