When you sent our soldiers to Vietnam without the proper weapons to win the war, you underestimated your enemy. Do it with this enemy and it won't be some skirmish halfway across the globe. This time, it will be for our homes, our streets and by the time you see the need for my program, it'll been too late and you would've lost two wars in one lifetime. 
- —Bolivar Trask[src]
History
Doctor Bolivar Trask was the CEO of Trask Industries in the early 1970s. Spurred on by a belief that mutants would one day rise up and exterminate Humans (Homo sapiens), Trask created the Sentinel program, a line of robotic weapons designed to hunt down and kill mutants in preparation for that day. After conducting experiments on various mutants, including Brotherhood members Azazel and Angel, Trask became the target of the vengeful, shape-shifting mutant Mystique. Although Wolverine, Charles Xavier, Henry McCoy, and Magneto were successful in preventing the assassination, their actions inadvertently exposed the existence of mutants to the world. Trask managed to escape back from Paris and returned to Washington. Playing on President Richard Nixon's fears, he gained the support he needed for his Sentinel program after he assured the President that his robots were made out of a non-metallic polymer and were therefore impervious to Magneto's abilities.
Later, at Trask Industries, Trask analyzed a sample of Mystique's blood collected from Paris and realized that capturing her could help his Sentinels evolve and adapt to any mutant power. He also confides in William Stryker of how he admires mutants for their abilities and how he hopes that humanity will become united against them.
At the Sentinels' unveiling at the White House, Trask was unaware that Magneto had covertly slipped pieces of metal within the Sentinels, enabling him to control them, prompting an attack on the audience. Trask was herded into the presidential bunker along with Nixon and his cabinet. His mutant detector then discovered Mystique in their midst and she was quickly seized. Trask insisted that they spare her because he needed her. Then suddenly, the bunker was lifted to the surface by Magneto, who intended to execute all present on live television. However, Nixon walked out to sacrifice himself, but Trask noticed that another Nixon was right beside him. It was in fact Mystique in disguise, who shot Magneto with a plastic gun, stunning him. She turned to shoot Trask, but Xavier convinced her not to.
With the world having seen Mystique save the President's life, the Sentinel program was cancelled and Trask was arrested for selling military secrets, thus averting the dystopian future his creations would bring about.[1]Notes
- Peter Dinklage portrays Trask in X-Men: Days of Future Past.
See Also
- 1 appearance(s) of Bolivar Trask (Earth-TRN414)
- 2 image(s) of Bolivar Trask (Earth-TRN414)
- 1 quotation(s) by or about Bolivar Trask (Earth-TRN414)