History Main / RockyMountainRefuge

[[folder:Film -- Live-Action]]

Another major source of inspiration for this trope is the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheyenne_Mountain_Complex Cheyenne Mountain Complex]], a [[ElaborateUndergroundBase massive underground military base]] located just outside of the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado. Tunneled under 2,000 feet of solid granite and protected by gigantic blast doors designed to deflect a 30 megaton strike, the complex was built to serve as the headquarters of NORAD during the UsefulNotes/ColdWar. It is also one of 3 facilities (that we know of) where top government officials, up to and including the President, would take shelter in the event of a nuclear attack. [[note]]The other 2 are Raven Rock in UsefulNotes/{{Pennsylvania}}, and Mount Weather in UsefulNotes/{{Virginia}}.[[/note]] As such, quite a few post-apocalyptic works will feature either Cheyenne Mountain itself or an {{Expy}} of it as the headquarters for whatever government or military survives.

A sub-trope of FallenStatesOfAmerica. Compare and contrast DividedStatesOfAmerica, where the Rocky Mountain States might be just one of many other remnants of the U.S.

* ''ComicBook/ThePunisherTheEnd'', Frank has been locked up in Sing Sing while the world undergoes total thermonuclear war. He could break out but chooses to wait until the radiation isn't immediately fatal to humans, going after a bunker in New York hiding a secret cabal of the world's elite. Despite learning they may well be all that is left of humanity (the last transmission from the President's bunker apparently involved him raping the vice-President to death), Frank kills them all before going outside to await his own death of radiation poisoning.

Another major source of inspiration for this trope is the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheyenne_Mountain_Complex Cheyenne Mountain Complex]], a [[ElaborateUndergroundBase massive underground military base]] located just outside of the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado. Tunneled under 2,000 feet of solid granite and protected by gigantic blast doors designed to deflect a 30 megaton strike, the complex was built to serve as the headquarters of NORAD during the UsefulNotes/ColdWar. It is also one of 3 facilities (that we know of) where top government officials, up to and including the President, would take shelter in the event of a nuclear attack. [[note]]The other 2 are Raven Rock in Pennsylvania, and Mount Weather in Virginia.[[/note]] As such, quite a few post-apocalyptic works will feature either Cheyenne Mountain itself or an {{Expy}} of it as the headquarters for whatever government or military survives.

* A political version of this trope is popular among a subset of right-wing activists in the US. The idea of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Redoubt "American Redoubt"]] has roots dating back to TheNineties, when [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic militia groups]], [[TheFundamentalist Christian fundamentalists]], [[ThoseWackyNazis white nationalists]], [[CrazySurvivalist survivalists]], and disgruntled Californian conservatives started moving to the inland Northwestern states of UsefulNotes/{{Idaho}}, UsefulNotes/{{Montana}}, and UsefulNotes/{{Wyoming}} as well as the rural eastern parts of UsefulNotes/{{Washington}} state and UsefulNotes/{{Oregon}}. However, it was popularized in 2011 by the survivalist blogger James Wesley Rawles, whose essays in support for the idea led to a flurry of right-wing political migration. The logic is that this part of the country, being mostly rural, sparsely populated, rich in natural resources, geologically rugged but lacking in natural hazards, containing relaxed laws towards homesteading and gun ownership, and being politically conservative/libertarian, could not only survive on its own and and easily defend itself from outside attack using its natural barriers, but would be a bastion of [[EverytownAmerica down-home, traditional American values]] even as the rest of America fell apart.

In Real Life, the Rocky Mountains are a large mountain range that forms the "spine" of the North American continent, spanning the U.S. states of UsefulNotes/{{Colorado}}, UsefulNotes/NewMexico, UsefulNotes/{{Utah}}, UsefulNotes/{{Wyoming}}, UsefulNotes/{{Montana}}, UsefulNotes/{{Idaho}}, and UsefulNotes/{{Washington}}, as well as the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. Several other mountain ranges in North America, such as the Cascades (located in northern California, Oregon, Washington, and southern British Columbia), and the Alaska Range (located in, you guessed it, Alaska), are sometimes incorrectly referred to as being part of the Rockies (though all of them are part of the same geological region, the North American Cordillera). Of the 100 highest peaks in the U.S., just over half are located in the Rockies.

In Real Life, the Rocky Mountains are a large mountain range that forms the "spine" of the North American continent, spanning the U.S. states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, and Washington, as well as the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. Several other mountain ranges in North America, such as the Cascades (located in northern California, Oregon, Washington, and southern British Columbia), and the Alaska Range (located in, you guessed it, Alaska), are sometimes incorrectly referred to as being part of the Rockies (though all of them are part of the same geological region, the North American Cordillera). Of the 100 highest peaks in the U.S., just over half are located in the Rockies.

* A political version of this trope is popular among a subset of right-wing activists in the US. The idea of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Redoubt "American Redoubt"]] has roots dating back to TheNineties, when [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic militia groups]], [[TheFundamentalist Christian fundamentalists]], [[ThoseWackyNazis white nationalists]], [[CrazySurvivalist survivalists]], and disgruntled Californian conservatives started moving to the inland Northwestern states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming as well as the rural eastern parts of Washington state and Oregon. However, it was popularized in 2011 by the survivalist blogger James Wesley Rawles, whose essays in support for the idea led to a flurry of right-wing political migration. The logic is that this part of the country, being mostly rural, sparsely populated, rich in natural resources, geologically rugged but lacking in natural hazards, containing relaxed laws towards homesteading and gun ownership, and being politically conservative/libertarian, could not only survive on its own and and easily defend itself from outside attack using its natural barriers, but would be a bastion of [[EverytownAmerica down-home, traditional American values]] even as the rest of America fell apart.

* A political version of this trope is popular among a subset of right-wing activists in the US. The idea of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Redoubt "American Redoubt"]] has roots dating back to TheNineties, when [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic militia groups]], [[TheFundamentalist Christian fundamentalists]], [[ThoseWackyNazis white nationalists]], [[CrazySurvivalist survivalists]], and disgruntled Californian conservatives started moving to the inland Northwestern states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming as well as the rural eastern parts of Washington state and Oregon. However, it was popularized in 2011 by the survivalist blogger James Wesley Rawles, whose essays in support for the idea led to a flurry of right-wing political migration. The logic is that this part of the country, being mostly rural, sparsely populated, rich in natural resources, geologically rugged but lacking in natural hazards, and politically conservative/libertarian, could not only survive on its own and and easily defend itself from outside attack using its natural barriers, but would be a bastion of [[EverytownAmerica down-home, traditional American values]] even as the rest of America fell apart.

* ''ComicBook/ThePunisher'': In "The End", Frank has been locked up in Sing Sing while the world undergoes total thermonuclear war. He could break out but chooses to wait until the radiation isn't immediately fatal to humans, going after a bunker in New York hiding a secret cabal of the world's elite. Despite learning they may well be all that is left of humanity (the last transmission from the President's bunker apparently involved him raping the vice-President to death), Frank kills them all before going outside to await his own death of radiation poisoning.

[[caption-width-right:350:''The Final Stronghold of America since February 6, 1967!''™]]

* ''VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn'': The game takes place AfterTheEnd in what used to be Colorado and Utah. Although it's suggested that there are more human communities further west, the Rocky Mountains are particularly significant to the survival of humanity because beneath Pike's Peak, there is [[spoiler: an ancient facility designed to release cloned humans after the species has otherwise gone extinct. No one actually survived the apocalypse in the Rockies, but humanity was reborn there.]] You can even run around in the now-decrepit Cheyenne Mountain bunker.

[[caption-width-right:350:The Final Stronghold of America since February 6, 1967™.]]

** ''Literature/SixthColumn'' The U.S. is conquered by the superior technology of the Pan Asians. While most of the U.S. population survives (albeit, under the harsh rule of the invaders), the only part left of the U.S. government is a small group of soldiers in a hidden high-tech laboratory in the mountains of Colorado.

* ''Literature/SixthColumn'' by Creator/RobertAHeinlein: The U.S. is conquered by the superior technology of the Pan Asians. While most of the U.S. population survives (albeit, under the harsh rule of the invaders), the only part left of the U.S. government is a small group of soldiers in a hidden high-tech laboratory in the mountains of Colorado.

A cataclysmic event strikes - nuclear war, catastrophic climate change, EMP blackout, asteroid impact, alien invasion, zombie apocalypse, take your pick. The United States federal government, unable to cope with the spreading disaster, [[FallenStatesOfAmerica implodes and fractures]]. American society as we know it disintegrates overnight, giving way to chaos and lawlessness. However, somewhere in the Rocky Mountains region deep within the center of the country, a lone remnant of America stubbornly holds out, shielded from the worst of the chaos around it by the mountains, clinging on for dear life. Whether it's a [[TheRemnant surviving military outpost]], or a [[RagtagBunchOfMisfits ragtag group of civilians]] brought together by fate and happenstance, it is through these individuals that some small vestige of EagleLand will live on, if only in spirit.

* ''Literature/AtlasShrugged'' by Creator/AynRand: As the federal government grows increasingly tyrannical and Orwellian, the mysterious and enigmatic figure known as John Galt convinces free-thinkers, intellectuals, and entrepreneurs from across the nation to runaway to his domain of Galt's Gulch, a remote and isolated hideout in the Colorado Rockies founded and run along the lines of Rand's [[UsefulNotes/{{Objectivism}} Objectivist philosophy]]. It is here where these individuals can safely hide and live their lives in peace and freedom and, once the government collapses from its massive corruption and incompetence, they will reemerge and restore liberty, prosperity, and dignity to the nation. Galt's Gulch is stated by Rand herself to have been based on the town of Ouray, a picturesque town on Colorado's Western Slope nicknamed "the Switzerland of America".

* Discussed in ''Fast Food Nation'' by Eric Schlosser. Schlosser uses the city of Colorado Springs to [[EverytownAmerica represent the U.S.A. as a whole]] while exploring the ins-and-outs of the fast food industry. At one point, he muses about the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and what might be the last remains of American society and culture in the event of the end of the world as we know it:

* ''Literature/TheHungerGames'' series by Creator/SuzanneCollins: In the future, some combination of wars, natural disasters, and rising sea levels wipes out the entire population of the world except for Panem, a [[TheEmpire totalitarian empire]] formed out of the remains of the United States and consisting of The Capitol and its 13 (or 12 by the start of the books) subordinate districts. The Capitol, which enjoys relative peace, stability, and high living standards (albeit at the expense of exploiting and oppressing the districts), is implied to be located in what is currently Salt Lake City, Utah; the Rocky Mountains are visible surrounding the city, and there is a large lake to the west. District 2, located immediately to the southeast of the Capitol, features a gigantic underground military fortress nicknamed "the Nut" by the rebels (because it's a tough nut to crack) that serves as a command center for the Capitol's military forces, and is based on the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.

[[folder:Live-Action Film]]
* ''Film/RedDawn1984'': After the Soviet Union and its allies launch a successful military invasion of the U.S., a group of high-schoolers from Calumet, Colorado form a [[LaResistance resistance movement]] named "the Wolverines" after their school mascot. Striking out from hideouts deep in the Rocky Mountains, they fight a grueling guerilla campaign against the occupation inspired by the Afghan Mujahideen. [[note]]Interestingly, there is a real-life town in Colorado called Calumet, but it's been an abandoned ghost town since even long before TheEighties; the film was originally meant to take place in Calumet, Michigan ([[CreatorProvincialism as one of the producers was from that area]]), but it was changed to Colorado as the film-makers felt Michigan's Upper Peninsula was far too isolated from the rest of the country, and a more centrally-located state would demonstrate just how far the Soviet invasion had reached.[[/note]]
* ''Film/IndependenceDay'': Subverted. The very first thing that the U.S. government does once the aliens arrive on July 2 is to send the Vice President and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to Cheyenne Mountain to keep them safe (they also request [[ActionPolitician President Whitmore]] to go, but he refuses). NORAD is then demolished by the aliens on July 3, effectively decapitating the government beside Whitmore. [[note]]In the novelization, the aliens achieved this with swarms of fighters alone rather than with the larger, WaveMotionGun-equipped City Destroyers, highlighting just how powerful their weaponry is. However, [[AllThereInTheManual supplementary materials]] for [[Film/IndependenceDayResurgence the sequel]] suggest that a City Destroyer was used instead.[[/note]] This means that when Area51 detects a City Destroyer moving towards it and Major Mitchell remarks that the base is partially embedded in a mountain, everybody knows [[OhCrap that this is not going to make any difference]].
* ''Film/{{Interstellar}}'': As the world crumbles from global dust bowls, crop blights, and food shortages, all that's seen remaining of the federal government is NASA, who have relocated to Cheyenne Mountain and are working on a plan to send explorers through a wormhole near Saturn in search of new habitable planets. The Coopers, meanwhile, appear to live in the plains of Eastern Colorado, since they're about a day's drive from Cheyenne Mountain and have Colorado license plates.
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* ''Franchise/{{Stargateverse}}'': Implied in the "Alpha Site" protocol: in case of an alien invasion of Earth, select members of the chain of command (President, Joint Chiefs et al) and other personnel would gather at Stargate Command (located at Cheyenne Mountain), from where they could be safely evacuated to another planet.

* ''VideoGame/FalloutTacticsBrotherhoodOfSteel'': The center of the entire Vault network is Vault 0, located in the Cheyenne Mountain Complex; it was one of the few Vaults not intended to be part of Vault-Tec's experiments carried out at the other Vaults, as that was where the most valuable scientists and advanced technology would be kept. [[spoiler: Though subverted: things went horribly wrong anyway; one of the AI's stored there [[AIIsACrapshoot went rogue]], took over the Vault, and began manufacturing [[RobotWar a robot army to wipe humanity out]]. However, once this AI is defeated,]] Cheyenne Mountain can also become the new base of operations of the titular Brotherhood of Steel, a militant and quasi-religious order descended from U.S. Army soldiers. [[note]]This game now is considered non-canon, though in ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'', Caesar [[BroadStrokes does mention]] encountering a branch of the Brotherhood of Steel in Colorado.[[/note]]

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[[caption-width-right:350:The Final Stronghold of America since February 6, 1967.]]