General Peterson Quotes in The Rock (1996)

General Al Kramer: Wait a minute. What is the potential casualty rate for a single rocket armed with VX poison gas, General Peterson?

General Peterson: Sixty or seventy...

Chief of Staff Hayden Sinclair: Well, that's-that's not so bad.

General Peterson: ...thousand. Seventy *thousand* dead.

Chief of Staff Hayden Sinclair: Oh.

General Peterson: One teaspoon of this hits the floor, it's lethal up to... a hundred feet. One teaspoon of this shit detonated in the atmosphere... will kill every living organism in an eight-block radius. Get the point?

FBI Director Womack: What did Hummel mean by your "countermeasure," General?

General Al Kramer: Standard poison is countered by napalm. It burns it up, consumes it upon impact. Now the problem with VX poison gas is that it's designed specifically to withstand napalm, which is where thermite plasma comes in. General Peterson?

General Peterson: Thermite plasma incendiary systems can burn hot enough to consume VX, but they're still in the test phase, it's not operational. Hummel knows this. We are dealing with one smart son of a bitch.

General Al Kramer: What's it going to take to equip a flight of F-18s with thermite plasma within the next thirty-six hours?

General Peterson: An act of God.

General Al Kramer: Excuse me?

General Peterson: ...All right, we can try. But I strongly urge you to consider this as a secondary initiative.