The war room was the central command center of NORAD located in Cheyenne Mountain in El Paso County, Colorado. From here, teams of technicians could monitor instances that threatened the country's air-space. In Marvel Comics, the war room was used to initiate the Doomsmith Scenario - which was a plan designed by "a madman" for an end-of-the world scenario. Implementing the program's directives would automatically launch the country's entire nuclear arsenal.
Count Luchino Nefaria took command of the second team of Ani-Men and surreptitiously had a remote control delivered to the war room facility inside the mountain. When a U.S. Air Force officer unwittingly activated the remote, it activated a spatial portal that enabled Nefaria and the Ani-Men access to the base. Nefaria released an anesthetic gas that rendered all of the base's staff unconscious. Taking control of the base's computer networks, he activated the Doomsmith Scenario, which gave him complete control over the country's missile-defense program. With this, he threatened global destruction unless world leaders agreed to pay him a healthy ransom.
The United States Army immediately responded to this threat, and Lieutenant General Fredericks launched a counter-initiative ground assault against the compromised mountain. The Avengers were unavailable to respond to this titanic threat so Avenger Hank McCoy requested help from his former teammates in the X-Men.