However, the suspicious nature of the Shanghai Crash has led to the United Nations to organize the "Chimera", a covert multi-national task force with cutting edge technological support and free rein to act as necessary.

However, two years later, the involvement and exposure of Zhang Yao, a former Chinese hacker with an Interpol arrest warrant (and Vermaak's aide in his operations), draws the attention of Chimera, whose task force under the command of Colonel Greg C. Schaefer attempts to unsuccessfully intercept her by covertly invading the RDNC at the same the US Army launches their offensive.

The evidence points to a possible collusion between Weyland Defense Corps (A main military supplier for the US Army) and the Yueng Corporation (The company which Yao once worked for before joining the Cartel), using the WDC as a front.

The information is transferred to the US government, which deploys General Wittel to neutralize Damocles (With Schaefer's assistance as an 'observer'), prompting the Cartel to counterattack utilizing experimental orbital weaponry, but Chimera is able to evacuate surviving assets in time.

Simultaneously, the Cartel strikes a blow against Chimera as Veermak is deployed to eliminate captured prisoners and erase retrieved data from a secondary base in South-East Asia.

Knowing that the orbital weapon requires resupplying, Schaefer leads an assault on the Baikonur Cosmodrome with the assistance of the Russian military, securing the Cartel's database, preventing the supplying of the orbital weapon which was intended on striking down the State of the Union address in Washington, D.C. and exposing multiple high-profile US personnel as members of the Cartel, including General Wittel, whom is a high-ranking member of the Olympus Cell, codenamed Hermes.