When Admiral Esther McQueen staged her coup against Chairman Rob S. Pierre in 1914 PD, General Speer was in command of all StateSec ground forces in the Republic's capital of Nouveau Paris. After the defection of several of his highest-ranking officers to the rebels, StateSec Chief Oscar Saint-Just ordered Speer to execute "Bank Shot", a nuclear bomb secretly installed in the lowest sub-levels of the Octagon, which McQueen used as her headquarters.