The Patriots, also known as the La-li-lu-le-lo (or La-Li-Lu-Le-Lo), are a fictional Illuminati-like organization dedicated to creating a new world order, that controls the United States of America in the Metal Gear video game series. The organization's first appearance in the series was Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (altough it is mentioned in Metal Gear Solid as "them" by Colonel Campbell) and their origin was further expounded upon in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Largely through the actions of their secret agent, Revolver Ocelot, the manipulative Patriots are ultimately responsible for almost all of the trials, difficulties, and terrorism faced by the main protagonists of the Metal Gear Solid series (Solid Snake, Raiden, and Big Boss), which arguably makes the Patriots the main antagonists of the series.
The Patriots are presided over by a council of twelve individuals that is known as the "Wisemen's Committee". It is unknown if there is any more depth to their organization than this in terms of hierarchy; however, the Patriots have numerous spies and agents spread throughout the government agencies of the USA. The President of the United States himself is subordinate to them; available information suggests that one must be an agent of the Patriots in order to become President. The fictional Commandant of the Marine Corps, Scott Dolph, knew of their existence, having referred to them as the "La-li-lu-le-lo." A man named "Richard Ames", who was identified as a Secret Service agent, a member of the DIA, and given the rank of "Colonel" at one point, was an agent of the Patriots before his death. Revolver Ocelot is another Patriot spy.
In Metal Gear Solid 3 it is revealed that the Patriots are an off-shoot of a larger international group known as the Philosophers. The Philosophers consisted of the leaders of the United States, the Soviet Union, and the People's Republic of China. Around the outbreak of World War I, they formed a secret pact for unknown reasons, thus creating the Philosophers. By the time World War II had broken out, all of the original members were dead, and the organization ran out of control and began to focus on creating useless wars to keep the masses in line. During World War II, they agreed to pool together their respective countries' financial and military resources in order to defeat the Axis Powers. Nuclear weapons, computers, and the Cobra unit were the results of this pact. However, the father of Colonel Volgin, the villain of Metal Gear Solid 3, was in charge of the money laundering activities of the group, and during the war stole the money they had amassed. In 1964, the events of Metal Gear Solid 3 explain how the U.S. branch of the Philosophers retrieves the money from Volgin. Upon finally acquiring all the money from the various banks throughout the world in 1970, the U.S. branch of the Philosophers split from the international group and became the Patriots. While Metal Gear Solid 3 did explain whom the names on the disc that Otacon and Solid Snake had at the end of Metal Gear Solid 2, it still left the identity or identities of the Patriots at the time of Metal Gear Solid 2 as a mystery. However, Metal Gear Solid 3 established that Ocelot was a Patriot spy during that game, and that he was reporting to the Director of Central Intelligence of the United States.
What are the Patriots
There have also been numerous theories about their origin, since the only piece of information available is at the ending of the game itself when they converse with the main character through his CODEC radio. The Patriots insinuate that they are not quite... human. They appear to have all the characteristics of a disembodied computer AI, but claim to have existed for 200 years as a consciousness developed in the "primordial soup" of the White House. Near the end of Metal Gear Solid 2, they appear as a skull-like visage that briefly flashes on and off in the middle of a codec conversation. One of the strongest theories, backed up by the declaration of the themes for each game by creator Hideo Kojima during the Eł 2004, is that they are beings born out of information and memes.
Of course, there is no real reason to believe anything the Patriots actually say, since they consistently deceive everyone they deal with, including their own agents, such as Revolver Ocelot. It's entirely possible the story of their origins is simply a myth created to mislead the main characters, and dissuade them from pursuing the idea that the Patriots are flesh and blood men who can be found and killed.
Regardless of their true nature, the Patriots have a strong interest in controlling the development of human civilization and evolution, through controlling the information humans accept as fact (in essense, telling them what version of history to believe). Their purpose to create Arsenal Gear is to test the S3 (Selection for Societal Sanity), a system to control and select memes that are supposed to be 'good' for the human race, since natural selection cannot happen in the current information flow where every piece is kept.
| Colonel: | But in the current, digitized world, |
| trivial information is accumulating every second, preserved in all its triteness.
Never fading, always accessible. |
| Rose: | Rumors about petty issues, misinterpretations, slander... |
| Colonel: | All this junk data preserved in an unfiltered state, growing at an alarming rate. |
| Rose: | It will only slow down social progress, reduce the rate of evolution. |
The Meaning of La-li-lu-le-lo
Throughout the Metal Gear Solid games, a number of individuals have referred to the Patriots as the "La-li-lu-le-lo." One theory for the meaning of this name relates to a codec conversation between Emma Emmerich and Raiden during Metal Gear Solid 2:
| Emma: | The alphabet... twenty-six letters, right? It could've been |
| thirty letters. What if the 4 deleted letters were controlled by |
| a program? |
This conversation gives an example of how a secret society - specifically the Patriots - can surpress elements of something as extensive as language itself. This example could very well bear relevence to Hideo Kojima's native language of Japanese: the forty-six characters in the kana syllibaries are known as the gojuu-on, or "fifty sounds." The other four have either been phased out since World War II or simply never existed ("wi" and "we" in the former case, and "yi" and "ye" in the latter).
Romanized Japanese has the same 5 vowels as English - A, E, I, O, U - but traditionally in a different order; A, I, U, E, O. These are pronounced: Ah, Ee, Ooh, Eh, Oh. On the most part, consonants are added to these vowels to construct syllables. For example, add an "R" and you get Ra, Ri, Ru, Re, Ro.
As often demonstrated by Japaense people using "R" instead of "L" sounds when speaking English, there is no "L" consonant in the language. Therefore, the syllables La, Li, Lu, Le and Lo are nonexistent in Japanese.
Although Metal Gear Solid 3 does not specifically link the Philosophers to Japan, it is quite possible that Kojima intended the name La-li-lu-le-lo to represent the Patriots, because of the connotations to suppression of information by a secret society. This is also quite consistent with Emma Emmerich's example/theory of suppressed letters in English.
Why the Patriots are known as the La-li-lu-le-lo is not fully explained as of Metal Gear Solid 3. One theory suggests that some key people have been physically conditioned against speaking of the Patriots, and are instead forced to use the gibberish term La-li-lu-le-lo. For example, Richard Ames in MGS2, who only ever refers to them by this name.
But as early as the events of MGS3, the term is used as an alternative name. Major Zero sets Snake's contact password as "Who are the Patriots?" with the answer being "La-li-lu-le-lo". The significance of this is not fully understood. It may suggest actual Patriot interference in the events of the game. But it is also possible that the phrase was intended as nothing more than a password, which somehow leaked out. Or perhaps, it was just a simple reference to MGS2.
Literary and Cultural References
Both of the Patriots' plans for a new world order, the state of constant war, and the S3 Plan, are derived from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. In the book, the omniscent Party kept the people in line by having them live in a state of constant war with its rivals, so as to give the government fuel to feed paranoia and keep the masses under control. They also constantly retroactively edited newspaper and all other forms of media, making it seem as if the Party was always right.
There has been speculation by fans that the Patriots are a reference to the Skull and Bones, a secret society at Yale University and/or to the Patriot Act due to the powers it gives to the United States government.
(Both notable for their connection to George W. Bush, although it is highly unlikely that Kojima is making a political statement in his games.)
Even more so, people just draw the connection between the Illuminati, which in popular culture, has most recently been seen in Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code and the Ion Storm video game Deus Ex.
External links
Metal Gear Solid 2 Ending Analysis: Meme & Gene