For King and Country

Thanks much, friends and neighbors, for you comments. Let me get to some responses:

cthulhu - Thank you, thank you very much.

therev - the actual banning of the Communist Party is an event that "can" fire in HOI2. The rest is pure.... inventiveness springing forth from the dark recesses of my mind, eh? As for Part Deux, well, Uncle Joe Stalin was never one known for doing things in half measures, so just you wait for the other shoe to drop.

VILenin - retribution shall be coming... or maybe not. Now, if King George gets offed, then this story is gonna go off on a whole different tangent than what I've planned for. Interesting idea. Thanks, man!

Sir Humphrey - Just wait to see what kind of sticking gets done!

prussiablue - It could prove to be helpful to Germany... if it were not for a certain individual who is Head of State in Germany. Remember a ways back, then Prince Albert was not very keen on the idea of allowing Germany to march back into the Rhineland, so the Anglo-German relationship has got a lot of ground to cover before Germany wouldn't have to worry 'bout the Brits.

DW - The backlash will, of course, be French and Russian in flavoring, and possibly from an unexpected corner as well. That shall remain to be seen.

Lord E - Aye, that's the hope, hunt 'em down BEFORE they get into any more mischief.

Funkatronica - Glad you liked that, it was something I worked on for a little while, and I agree that everyone knows this situation well. And if they don't, they will eventually!

Machiavellian & Ghostwriter - thanks and payment shall be rendered... but mayhap in not the way expected.






The next update will be in a couple of days, I'm home with my three wee little lads while my Mrs. is out at a mandatory work meeting, so while my creative juices are flowing, it's kinda hard to write with a 5yr old, a 2 1/2yr old and a 7 month old crawling all over me, know what I mean? Thanks for your patience and you diligent support!


Joe

As tradition held, the burial of a British monarch was a time of as much pomp and circumstance as coronation or a Royal wedding. Dignitaries from all about the Empire and her Dominions came to London to pay their respects to their departed king and his younger brother, as well as preparing to pay homage to the new king at the time of his coronation. Likewise, luminaries from friendly nations spanning the globe came to do the same. The grief felt by the Royal Family was mirrored by their subjects, the passing of two monarchs, both very beloved, within a single year was something not experienced in generations of Britons. To say that London and the surrounding area was flooded with people would be a mild understatement as tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, came to walk past the coffin of the late King laying in state in Windsor Castle.


The reports of the Edward VIII’s assassination coming at the hands of fellow Britons, identifying themselves as members of the Communist Party, had, except for in a few industrial centers somewhat sympathetic to communism, not only brought back the fear of the Red Menace to most citizens of the Empire, but also turned them in to a valuable source of information for the Crown’s search of the remaining men seeking to destroy the Royals of Britain. As day after day of new announcements from the Home Secretary notified the public of the full intent of the communist assassins, even those areas that used to be considered Communist strongholds began to turn from Communist faith, as the wave of anti-Communist feelings reached new heights. With the announcement that the new king, George VI, had decreed the outlawing of the Communist Party, rather than a series of protests, parades of support sprung up throughout the British Isles.

All of which made the man’s dangerous actions, all the more dangerous. I cannot believe I am actually participating in this, Anatoli thought to himself as he cast a quick look over the lip of the roof that he was laying upon. I’m a Rezident, dammit! I run operations, not carry them out, especially one’s as suicidal as this! Thrusting his head back down quickly to avoid detection, London’s former Soviet Rezident Anatoli Gorsky, realized that as much as he would love to continue to complain about his situation, his complaints did no good other than to keep him irritated. He had completely lost control of Red Hammer the minute he returned to England from his meeting with Sergi Khurkhev and Mikhail Bygor. Henry Whiteman and the other leaders of the EWUP had completely restructured Red Hammer after the Soviet expulsion from Great Britain, reducing the Soviet component from one of oversight to one being simply advisory. The results, while spectacular, were far from what Red Hammer had been planned. The resulting fallout from the failure of the operation had completely destroyed all the work done by the Soviets since they were recognized by the Court of St. James, and found the surviving members of the EWUP, and one luckless Anatoli Gorsky, being hunted down like wild dogs by the vengeful MI-5. In move born of desperation and suicidal tendencies, the remaining cadre of the party opted to attempt to complete Red Hammer’s objective, and chose the funeral march of Edward VIII as the time to conduct the operation. As Gorsky had no choice but to stick with the EWUP men, all his preplanned safe houses and escape routes being uncovered by MI-5, hence his participation in the operation, and hence is position on top of the roof of one of the buildings lining the route of the king’s funeral procession. Along with the Soviet NKVD man there were five EWUP gunmen, all armed with rifles or submachine guns and grenades. The building across from Gorsky was similarly possessed as were the buildings to their right and left. Laying on the roof, Gorsky cursed at himself again for allowing himself to be maneuvered into a such a death watch, as he and the other men around him all realized, once they started firing, the likelihood of any of them making it off the roof alive was next to non-existent. Gorsky also cursed at the unfairness of the situation, knowing that even if he were to some how able to get off the roof alive, he could never return home to Russia as his superiors in the NKVD would find him to have botched the operation in the first place or if not that, a liability and or an embarrassment. All of which would cause a bullet to find itself in the back of his head and his body lost in some shallow grave in Siberia. Not really the way that Anatoli had in mind for his life to end.


Hearing the notes of a funeral dirge drifting through the unseasonably still air caused the men on the roof to stir and clutch their weapons in anticipation. Rolling over to his belly and raising his head slowly above the parapet lip, Gorsky caught himself in awe of the scene playing out below him. While he could mouth the words of how the British were a decadent society of capitalist pigs whose monarchy was nothing more than a cruel oppressor of the proletariat, the sight below him belied those words. The street was lined five and six persons deep all straining to watch the passing procession arrayed in the full regalia of the royalty of the British Empire. First marched the Household Guard approaching atop their gleaming black horses with the weak November sunlight glinting off their polished ceremonial breastplates, helmets and swords, then Grenadier Guard marching in perfect unison silent beneath their bearskin shakos followed by the Guards Band moving in time with the slow march dirge they were playing for their fallen king. After the Guards strode the members of the House of Lords, each dressed in their ceremonial robes of fur and gold chains of office, then the surviving members of the Privy Council and following the Council came the first half of the Life Guards Cavalry, their white mounts in direct contrast with their Household Guard’s black horses. Escorted by the Life Guard came Edward VIII’s coffin, laying upon a large caisson being pulled by eight columns of petty officers of the Royal Navy, each column fourteen men long, the caisson itself escorted by ten Royal Marines, five to a side. Behind the coffin walked the surviving members of the Royal family, the new king, George VI walking exactly five paces behind his brother’s coffin. In the wake of the Royal family came the caisson carrying the twin coffins of the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, Prince Henry and Duchess Alice, being pulled by six columns of ten petty officers and escorted by ten soldiers of the Imperial Grenadiers. Bringing up the rear of the procession rode the second half of the Life Guard and then detachments of every unit of the Crown’s military.



Looking on as the watchers along the street lowered their heads in respect at the passing of Edward’s coffin and then dropped to the knee at the passing of their new king, Gorsky felt the full impact of what the voice in the back of his head had been whispering since before he began planning Red Hammer. The subjects of the British Empire would react quite negatively to any attack on their beloved Monarchy, no matter the words coming from their lips. While the realization was unsettling, the former Rezident shook the feeling, steeling himself for the matter at hand. With a nod to the men about him, Gorsky loosened the firing pin in the two grenades before him and softly worked the bolt on his submachine gun to chamber a round in preparation for firing. Just a few more meters, he thought to himself, and it will all be over.









Next up.... what happens next.

cthulhu - Me thinks you speak a bit to soon, sir. Just wait before passing verdict, eh? (Although I must admit, head of security is shaving things a bit close! )

Catknight - Aye, I agree with you, the West (except for France, gee imagine that, eh? ) would have no problem with Germany opening a can of woop ass on Stalin at this point. However, if that feeling remains as time goes by remains to be seen.

Lord E - Read on, my friend, and find out....

DW - Quite right. The EWUP, and to an extent the Soviets in this reality, simply don't understand Britian's love of its monarchy. They have, however, begun to get a bit of understanding of that love.

Deus - Aye, a more determined enemy to Communism cannot be found at this point. But wait, it's not over yet!



Next update in about...... thirty seconds.....

Red Hammer - Part Deux point one
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Hearing the notes of the Grenadier Guard’s band’s dirge, Drake checked his watch and then nodded to the man next to him. He then turned and looked at the MI-5 man standing next to him. “You’re quite sure that this is where they’re at?”

“Captain Drake,” the security agent said with a hint of exasperation in his voice, “I’ve told you this countless times. The information is rock solid, we had it directly from one of the EWUP men we turned in the last series of raids.”

The military’s institutional distrust of the intelligence community clearly showing on his face, Drake worked the bolt on his brand new Sten submachine gun and after chambering a round screwed a large silencer on the end of the barrel. “Sergeant-Major Llewellyn, since we have no choice but to trust the word of 5, how do you propose we handle this situation?”

The man spoken to, the senior non-commissioned officer in the newly created and still secret group named Security Operations Executive finished preparing his own Sten with a thoughtful look on his face. The S.O.E. was made up of members of all the military branches as well as members of MI-5, MI-6, and Scotland Yard’s Special Branch, and was still coming together as a unit. Many of the counter communist raids conducted since the Clarence House attacks had been conducted by members of the S.O.E., each one bringing the group closer and closer together. Taking the pipe that had been jutting out form his mouth, Sgt-Major Llewellyn replied in a gravelly voice, “If everything is as Agent Cooper has told us, sir, I’d suggest you take those two Marine brutes, Evans and Farquharson, that MI-6 agent Saylor, and Corporal Nym and take this building. Leftenant Cadigan can take Sergeant Pickens, Private Tucker, and the three coppers from Scotland Yard and take the next building over. Marine Leftenant Smythe can take Marines Anderson, Fergueson, Bloudin, and the other two MI-6 agents and take the building across from Leftenant Cadigan’s, and I’ll take the rest of this lot and take the building across from yours.”

“Good idea, Sergeant-Major,” Drake replied, “except, you take Farquharson and I’ll take Sergeant Hamilton from you. I think you’ll need Farquharson’s brute strength more than I will.”

"As you wish, Captain," the grizzeled veteran replied with a small grin.

Stepping from under the overhang where the three men had been hiding, Drake used hand signals to alert the rest of the men the dispositions to be taken, and then motioned the two groups that needed to cross the street toward the sewer entrance in front of his position. As each man passed him, Drake reached out and squeezed a shoulder or patted a back giving silent encouragement for the operation ahead while checking each man’s weapon. The entire platoon had been assigned the newly released Sten submachine gun chambered for 9mm bullets as well as Browning Hi-Power 9mm pistols. Drake and Llewellyn favored the American Cold Model 1911 .45 caliber as their sidearm. In the interest of keep this operation as silent as possible, each man’s Sten was fitted with a sixteen inch metal tube that was to “silence” the sound made by the exploding gases formed when the firing pin ignited each bullet. Each submachine gun was also fitted with a rubber “coat” over the repeating bolt to muffle the sound of the bolt striking the receiver after each round was fired. All in all they made the Sten less easy to handle than if used in actual combat conditions, but the men had all been well trained in the new feel of the Sten, and Drake had no concerns over their effectiveness in eliminating the EWUP men. Each man also, as a very last resort had been issued a new dagger created by Sykes-Fairbin of Sheffield. Measuring at fourteen inches in length, the dagger tapered from three inches at the hilt down to a needle point end and was designed for killings of the intimate kind. The kind that the S.O.E. was specifically being trained to master for the protection of the Empire.

As Sgt-Major Llewellyn followed the last man down the hole, Drake clasped his hand and whispered, “You watch your back, Harry, d’ya hear?”

“You do the same, Malcolm,” the older man replied with the paternal fondness of a senior non-com for his younger commanding officer. “And look, you, don’t you be letting your thirst for revenge on Gordon’s attackers cloud your mind. Get the job done, eliminate these scum, and we’ll meet back at The Red Dragon for a pint or two, eh?”

“Aye, that we’ll do, and you can buy the first round!”

“Bloody hell,” replied Llewellyn with a grin as he dropped down the ladder, “whaddya think I am, a bloomin’ officer?”

Grinning to himself as he turned to the remaining S.O.E. men, Drake checked his weapon one more time and signaling the operation to begin, and then started to silently move into the building holding the last remaining cadre of the EWUP. God willing, he thought to himself with a growl, this will all be over well before the King comes by and the cancerous tumor that is the EWUP will no longer be a viable entity.





Next.... the resolution of Red Hammer.