The War Against Al-Qatala is a major conflict prominently featured in the Special Ops mode and Multiplayer Seasonal Events of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and Call of Duty: Warzone. It takes place after the campaign's story.
Background[]
Hunt for the Wolf[]
- Main article: Hunt for the Wolf
In the wake of the attack at Picadilly Circus, British special forces, led by Captain Price, raided a townhouse occupied by members of the Al-Qatala in Camden Town, London, England. In doing so, they recovered vital intelligence that allowed them to pinpoint the location of Omar "The Wolf" Sulaman.
Passing off the intelligence to American forces, Alex Keller joined up with Griggs and his Demon Dogs and began fighting their way through the city of Rammaza, Urzikstan, encountering heavy resistance along the way before finally reaching the hospital where the Sulaman was hiding. Sulaman held three Marines captive and planned to execute them on film. The Demon Dogs successfully rescued the Marines and captured Sulaman, transporting him to the American embassy where he was to await extraction and eventual interrogation.
Having caught wind about their leader's location, Al-Qatala forces - led by Jamal "The Butcher" Rahar began laying siege to the American embassy, eventually breaching the perimeter. Members of the staff began destroying vital documents in the event the embassy fell into AQ hands. Price and Garrick arrived at the embassy to take custody of Sulaman but their Helo was shot down. The two landed on the roof, surviving the crash, though the Helo crew did not. Making their way to the basement, the duo encountered the Butcher holding a father and son hostage hoping to force the embassy personnel into opening the doors. When they refused, knowing it would lead to all of their deaths, the Butcher executed both hostages. Having finally reached the basement safe room and reunited with their allies, Price directed Garrick to lead the Ambassador to their location as they needed his keycard access to leave the embassy for the nearby Ambassador's residence. The Ambassador, however, was gunned down by an AQ militant while trying to lock a door. Instead, Garrick guided the Ambassador's assistant, Stacy Davidson, to safety. Finally reaching the southern compound of the embassy where the Ambassador's residence was located, the team and remaining Marine forces mounted a desperate defense against overwhelming numbers of AQ militants, with temporary support of an armed UAV. Unfortunately, during the fighting, AQ was able to break through the perimeter and extract Sulaman custody.
Hunt for the Butcher[]
- Main article: Hunt for the Butcher
The release of the gas had put a major strain between US and ULF relations as America believed that their allies had been playing them for fools. Angered, the US cut off support for the militia and much of the remaining ULF was forced to go underground. With the US and Russia on the verge of war and knowing that Hadir planned to attack Russia with chemical weaponry, CIA agent Kate Laswell and John Price discussed how to stop him. After arguing over whether to warn Moscow or to allow the attacks carry on without intervention, Price suggested his own plan. Deciding to take an unsanctioned "business trip" into St. Petersburg, Russia, Price received the unofficial backing of Laswell and contacted his old friend, Nikolai for local assistance.
Meeting up with Nikolai in Russia, the team observed the Butcher arriving nearby for a conference with a local AQ cell. Mobilising quickly, the team chased him throughout the streets of St. Petersburg where civilian casualties increased as they went along, with the chase finally ending when Nikolai hits the Butcher with his vehicle. Over the next few hours, Price and Yegor interrogated the Butcher to no avail. Price eventually called for Garrick to bring in "the package" which Nikolai had retrieved. This package was the Butcher's wife and son who served as "bargaining chips" in the interrogation. The arrival of the Butcher's family finally caused him to break down and reveal Hadir's location. Afterward, Garrick left the Butcher unharmed, wounded him, or killed him, based on the player's actions. Russian security forces were tipped off by Nikolai, leading them to recover a stockpile of the gas and the Butcher's family.
Fall of Roman Barkov[]
- Main article: Hunt for Roman Barkov
Hadir, after betraying the ULF, led elements of Al-Qatala and stormed Barkov's mansion in an attempt to find the rogue general. Hadir, however, had an ulterior motive that he kept secret from his newfound allies - he wanted to find information on the rogue general's gas factory, so that his country, and more specifically, his sister would not have to keep suffering under the threat of Russian gas. Despite successfully storming the grounds, they only encountered members of his family and began torturing them in an effort to find Barkov's whereabouts. Captain Price and Kyle Garrick, having interrogated the Butcher, made their own way to the grounds in an attempt to either capture or kill Hadir. Outnumbered ten to one, the two SAS operators quietly began making their way through the grounds in an attempt to find Hadir's location. Finally, having located Hadir, they proceeded to extract him, but not before encountering heavy resistance from arriving Russian forces.
While transferring Hadir, they were intercepted by Laswell who forced Price to hand over Hadir to the Russian government. Before being transferred, though, Hadir handed over the information on the gas factory that he had gathered to Price. Laswell offered her support to Price who decided to head to Urzikstan in hopes of rallying support from the ULF and Farah. Understanding that any attack by Western powers on Russian forces would amount to open war, Price successfully convinced Farah to involve her ULF forces - providing plausible deniability in the event of accusations - to provide manpower for the attack.
Laswell provided an armed UAV and an IFV for extra firepower to support the allied forces in the attack. The allied forces with the extra firepower, were able to fight their way to the gas factory quickly with Alex directing drone strikes at Russian forces. The allied forces decided to split up, Garrick and Price heading off to place explosives at the pipelines, while Farah, Alex, and other ULF fighters fought their way through the factory to, linking up with Nikolai on the way to gather explosives. However, as they were nearing their objective, a heavily armored trooper ambushed the Farah and Alex and their explosive detonator was damaged in the fight. After reaching the manufacturing plant, Alex decided to stay behind to manually trigger the explosives, likely at the cost of his own life, deeming himself less important than Farah who still had a liberation force to lead. Reluctantly, she agreed to his decision and left to try and stop Barkov who was escaping the facility via helicopter. Farah hid within the cargo on his helicopter and was able to sneak up on Barkov, stabbing him repeatedly, avenging her father's and mother's death as well as the deaths of the countless other Urzikstani civilians who had died under his oppressive regime.
With overwhelming evidence suggesting that Barkov had committed war crimes, Russia denounced the mad general and recalled their remaining forces from Urzikstan.
Early Counter-Terrorism missions[]
- Main article: Operations (Special Ops)
Prior to the invasion of Verdansk, Coalition and Allegiance forces conducted covert operations to repel Al- Qatala's further influence in different territories. Unfortunately, both groups came into contact with each other, and unaware of each other's motives, initiated hostilities incurring casualties on both sides. These operations included Operation Empty House in Azhir Cave, Operation Door Kick/Sanctum conducted at Aniyah Palace, and Operation Interloper/Hotspring at the Sokolov Mining and Lumber facility.
Invasion of Verdansk[]
- Main article: Invasion of Verdansk
In the aftermath of Barkov's death, Al Qatala - with funding from their new benefactor in Russia and led by a mysterious leader, was able to mobilise into an army and utilised tanks and helicopters during their rapid invasion into the city of Verdansk. Russia, caught off guard by the invasion, desperately attempted to stem the tide of it but lost control of the city. Western powers, having previously cooperated with Russia to rebuild Verdansk, also took special interest into the new development of Al Qatala and agreed to cooperate with them - forming Armistice, a multinational coalition of Special Operators from both sides of the aisle. Control of operations was handed over to a joint command of Laswell and Sergeant Kamarov. Laswell brought invaluable experience from her previous operations against Al Qatala in Urzikstan and was joined by Captain Price, who led field operations in the country.
However, despite this newfound cooperation, there was still some underlying tension within Armistice due to a lack of trust between the operators.
Course of War[]
Armistice Operations[]
- Main article: Operations (Special Ops)
Laswell and Kamarov launched several operations aimed at crippling Al-Qatala's access to weapons, funds, intelligence, and hardware by eliminating high value targets within the Al-Qatala's network in Verdansk. These efforts became the only line of defense preventing the terrorist organization from pushing through to Urzikstan.
Operation Headhunter[]
- Main article: Operation Headhunter
Team "Arm-4" was sent by Case Officer Kate Laswell and Sergeant Kamarov to find intel about Almalik's warehouses in Verdansk. After eliminating several Al-Qatala's lieutenants, the team discovered Almalik used scramblers to protect his communication and hide the warehouses. They found the scramblers near the Verdansk stadium and pulled all relevant data before destroying them. They destroyed enemy armor and ground troops sent by Almalik before exfiltrating from the area.
Operation Kuvalda[]
- Main article: Operation Kuvalda
Using the data recovered from the scramblers, Armistice located all the warehouses belonging to Almalik in Verdansk. Several Armistice teams were deployed to attack all the warehouses at once.
Team "Arm-4" was sent to the Arklov Peak military base, Almalik's base of operations and primary storage facility. The team infiltrated the base and accessed the data server to find and mark weapons stockpiles for missile strikes. Arm-4 also found ballistic missiles inside the hangar. After the team was exfilled, the military base was destroyed, killing Almalik in the process.
Operation Just Reward[]
- Main article: Operation Just Reward
Following the death of Almalik, Arm-4 went after The Banker, a British financier who headed Al-Qatala's financial operation, laundering their money through a system of crypto server farms and controlling Verdansk's local bank in order to weaponize generated profits. Arm-4 was sent to Downtown Tavorsk District to shut down this operation. Tracking down the Banker's agents, they used intel gathered from each agent's phone to locate and secure one of the Banker's top lieutenants. From this lieutenant, they were able to locate and shut down one of the Banker's key systems, locking out his access to hundreds of millions of their funds.
Operation Strongbox[]
- Main article: Operation Strongbox
After having loated the servers used by the banker and frozen his assets, the Arm-4 team moved to the Acropolis National Bank in Tavorsk District where they cut into the bank's vault, retrieved a crypto key, and eliminated the Banker. They then defended against attacks by heavy mortar fire and Al-Qatala infantry before being extracted from the roof.
Operation Harbinger[]
- Main article: Operation Harbinger
Arm-4 team was sent northern Verdansk to find more intel about El Traficante, a smuggler allied with Al-Qatala, after a source inside the terrorist organization, codenamed MAGE, reported El Traficante was moving something big across Verdansk. After searching through several safehouses, Arm-4 uncovered a huge amount of money and documents linked to an account tied to El Traficante.
The team proceeded to a hotel where MAGE was held hostage. AQ forces attempted to extract him via convoy but were intercepted by Arm-4 who rescued MAGE. The team brought MAGE to the extraction zone where they attached to him a Fulton Device for his exfil. They then regrouped in a nearby safehouse.
Operation Brimstone[]
- Main article: Operation Brimstone
After retrieving MAGE, the gathered intel revealed that El Traficante was planning to move a massive shipment of weapons across Verdansk by train. The Arm-4 team infiltrated the Quarry nearby their safehouse under mortar fire. Fighting through Al-Qatala forces, they disrupted several communication arrays to prevent any calls for backup. The team then eliminated three high value targets who guarded the terminal keys for the train control room, allowing them to call in the train.
Once the train arrived at the loading platform, the team opened the doors and rigged explosives to the shipments before proceeding to exfil. While waiting for extraction, they managed to shoot down El Traficante's helicopter before he could escape, killing him in the process. Once the team was secured, the train shipment was destroyed.
Operation Paladin[]
- Main article: Operation Paladin
The Arm-4 team was sent to rescue Doctor Linda Morales, a volunteer physician in Verdansk. She was taken hostage by Al-Qatala after she informed Armistice that Mr. Z was using medical shipments from the World Humanitarian Project to move weapons into the city.
After the team managed to rescue Morales, she told them that a deal was happening at the airfield. The team was then deployed nearby to escort a friendly APC, Havoc 2-0, to the airfield. The team encountered several weapon crates containing Chem-Bio weapons derived from Roman Barkov's chlorine gas. Fighting against a large amount of AQ forces, they discovered a nuclear warhead that was missing its core before exfilling.
Operation Crosswind[]
- Main article: Operation Crosswind
Using Doctor Linda Morales' intel, the Arm-4 team infiltrated the Verdansk Airport occupied by Al-Qatalah forces. They deactivated the comms array, preventing the AQ forces in the airport from calling for reinforcements. The team then boarded the hijacked plane before it took off and made their way to the cargo hold. They recovered the nuclear core before escaping the doomed plane. After fighting through Al-Qatala forces in the scrapyard near the airport, they exfilled the area with the core.
With the successful execution of these eight Operations, Armistice teams were able to neutralize Al-Qatala's support network in Verdansk. They also collected further data on the "Immortal Lion", who was revealed to be Khaled Al-Asad. However, he and Victor Zakhaev were still at large, with more of their weapons scattered across Verdansk, thus still representing a large threat to the region.
Operation: Rapid Sunder[]
During an Armistice operation in Verdansk, Al-Asad released massive amounts of poisonous gas into the city. Following this, tensions arose between the Armistice operatives who started fighting among themselves to survive.
Lieutenant Simon "Ghost Riley, a member of Task Force 141 stationed in Verdansk, reported several blue on blue incidents and requested reinforcements of operators he could trust.
Operation: Rust[]
Somewhere at a classified location, Riley infiltrated an Al-Qatala oil yard controlled by Zakahev's forces and was contacted by Price, who revealed that the released gas in Verdansk was the same found at the crash site in Faridah and proved to be the death blow to the fragile alliance between Coalition and Allegiance factions, thus resulting in the dissolution of Armistice. He also reveals that this had been engineered by Zakhaev to reignite tensions between both factions.
During the raid, Riley reunited with a fire team sent by Price to assist him, including Alex Keller, who had survived the explosion in Barkov's gas factory but lost his left leg in the process and had it replaced with a prosthetic.
New Threats[]
After leaving the oil yard, Riley assisted remaining operators with intelligence he gathered. This led the operators throughout the city of Verdansk as well as its bunkers, where, among other discoveries, a subway system was found. Zakhaev and Al-Qatala had been using the tunnels to travel undetected in the city.
Sometime later, Shadow Company infiltrated the Acropolis National Stadium after the Allegiance had intercepted Al-Qatala radio chatter from within. Shadow Company blew the roof of the stadium off using explosives, searching for Zakhaev. This, unfortunately, was a dry hole.
After discovering the subway system in Verdansk, Farah and "Nikolai," now Chimera operators of the Allegiance, infiltrated the tunnels. The pair discovered that Al-Qatala had not been using the trains, but instead traveled on foot through the tunnels. Farah killed several hostile troops who were heading towards Nikolai, while he powered a train for use by operators. Farah then radioed to Price that she and Nikolai managed to get the train running, as Price then radioed Griggs to stand by.
Having finally discovered the location of the nuclear-tipped ballistic missile, Cpt. Price led elements of Task Force 141 and Griggs's Demon Dogs unit in a desperate attempt to eliminate Zakhaev and disarm the nuke. With Demon Dog forces sealing off the perimeter around the launch site, Alex and Karim were sent in to distract Zakhaev's forces, while Price personally killed Zakhaev, throwing him to his death into the silo. However, prior to his death, Zakhaev had been able to initiate the launch sequence. Price radioed Nikolai for the disarm codes and narrowly managed to deactivate the missile before its launch.
As Alex and Karim finished off the remaining resistance in the launch site, Task Force 141 reassembled on the dam, overseeing the continuing battle between Allegiance and Coalition forces. Simon "Ghost" Riley noted that the war wasn't over, to which Price concurred. Johnny "Soap" MacTavish radioed the group requesting further assistance near the coast of Verdansk. The Task Force then parachuted off the dam to regroup with their fellow operator.
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