Against all Odds: The British Empire in World War Two

Lord Strange Not quite, but these men are worth manytimes their actual numbers.

ColossusCrusher&KiMaSa Sealion is still the official name for the Axis invasion of the UK.

Le Jones Thank you very much.

gaiasabre11 Thank you too.


The SAS is in for interesting times, which is all I can say right now.


El Pip I understand that in OTL Barnes Wallis, the designer of the bouncing bomb and others did quite some experimental work on variable geometry wings, so technical expertise was there. According to Derek Wood's 'Project Cancelled' which is the best source on this I could find ( and for a hefty price, I parted with almost 100€ for this book ) there were many variable-geometry projects. The Lightning VG or Mk.3 for example was intended to replace the normal Lightning in service, hell there was even talk about a VG development of the TSR2! IN this timeline, the VG Lightning will be built to replace the old Lightnings in service and serve well in various roles and marques until the early 90s. As the Typhoon is delayd thanks to the Italians, Fighter Command will then buy the single-seat ADF version of the Tornado as a stopgap measure, which will then be replaced in service by the Typhoon from 2007 onwards. The TSR2 will find a place as a Tactical Bomber with both the RAF and the RN, for which she will be the only Nuclear-Capable combat system. ( Yay for cruise missiles. ) All this is pure speculation now of course. God knows what my preference will be when we actually reach that point.

Below is a better picture.



As for SAS adventures.. I can only refer you to above comment, I'm afraid.

Chapter 103​

15th May 1940, 0:12 AM

Holland

The almost completely empty lorry carrying the SAS patrol and the two 'squids' was driving fast from the exposed airfield, taking them north-east. Ian was sleeping, while Felix was looking out the back with a decidedly bored expression on his face. At the other side Drake was trying not to get caught while he studied them. So far they seemed to be able to handle themselves. He knew they would be nervous about the prospect of actually going to combat, although he had to say, that whoever said he wasn't before any action was a bloody liar. “You said you were in action before?” he asked Felix, not really expecting an answer. “Oh yes. A while back we were ambushed by Jerry while we tried to save the Duke of Windsor.” Drake struggled not to let his surprise show. “You are kidding me, right?” he asked, failing completely at his task. “I thought you were...” “Desk drivers?” Felix interrupted and chuckled. He leaned back and pushed his Beret over his eyes, leaving the Lieutenant to his mysteries. They drove through Amsterdam and generally North-East for about an hour, before the lorry came to a sudden halt at a canal. Everything was pitch dark and they seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. The Major left the cab of the lorry and appeared behind. “The bridge is out, I am afraid we will have cross the small bridge on foot, we will get our next transport.” The British disembarked and assembled. Ian, as an observer not in command although he out-ranked everyone present, stood aside and looked at the Bridge, twisted and torn from what had to be multiple direct hits. At the side a small crossing had been built, only fit for a pedestrians. He swallowed silently, pushing his fears aside and turned on his feels, facing back towards the lorry. Just in time to see the SAS patrol shoulder their backpacks and flipping the safeties on their weapons.

One of them was armed with a Bren Gun, two of the others 'only' carried the new Sten Machine Carbines. Drake on the other hand had realized that holding onto Rosy would be impossible once in combat, as he would have no way of leading his men, so with a heavy heart he had decided to leave her behind and requisition a Sten for himself.. All of them also had FN Hipower automatic pistols as a backup weapon. All in all they were heavily armed for a group of this size. Ian noted that the Bren Gunner had no second man, and also carried at least several spare magazines on his belt, around his chest and probably also in his backpack. From the introductions passed around on the plane, Ian knew that this bull of a man was a former Sergeant in the Polish Army. When Warsaw had been surrounded, his company had been cut from the main body of the Polish Army, and he, along with several others had made it out via Lithuania. After a odyssey through Sweden, Norway and Denmark, he had finally made it to Britain, only to be rejected everywhere because he then spoke no English at all. He had been mulling about in front of the Polish Embassy, when by a chance encounter he had met then-Captain Stirling, who had somehow managed to converse with him and recruited him on the spot. Albin Sobczak had done great strides now and was one of the best SAS troopers, despite his still heavily accented English. Among the others was a Canadian called Ethan Little, a resident of Vancouver who had signed up even before Canada had declared war a day after the British Empire. The third was Welshmen from some unpronounceable village where they had more sheep than people, called Harold Jones, or 312 after the last three characters of his serial number as he was not the only Jones in the Regiment. Suddenly Ian felt pretty naked with only a hand gun and made mental note to acquire something bigger at the earliest opportunity. He looked at Felix, and he knew him good enough to know that his thoughts were pretty much the same. Ian walked over to the Dutch Major who was waiting impatiently for the British to finish whatever they were doing. “Just who are these men?” the Dutch asked. Sticking with the line, Felix, who had joined them took over answering. “The 22nd Regiment.” From the look on the faces of the two Officers the Dutch knew that it was better not to ask any more, and anyway they were ready to move out now. One by one they dashed over the bridge to limit any eventual exposure to the group as a whole. On the other side they found a second lorry which they boarded.

Drake was the last to climb aboard. He leaned back against the canvas and was immediately asleep, desperate to catch up on what he had missed that night. He slept until the lorry stopped at a military cam just east of Leeuwarden. They disembarked again, and here the proximity of the front was clear. In the north and east artillery was rumbling, and a constant stream of ambulances passed on the road in front of the small camp. In the pre-dawn light, Drake could see constant flashes on the horizon, and suddenly remembered the description of his father's days in the trenches. It was artillery, constantly hammering away. He instinctively grabbed the butt of his Sten even firmer as he walked behind the Dutch Officer into a small hut, hidden from prying eyes and German Divebombers by heavy camouflage netting. Inside the six Brits saw a tired Officer on the telephone, hurriedly talking with the person on the other end. He slammed the phone back down and looked at Drake and Ian, who were at the front of the group with a weary expression. “Who the fuck are you?” he yelled, only to almost immediately back down. “Sorry, Mr..” “Lieutenant Drake, Sir, 22nd Regiment, Royal Parachute Corps. These Commander Fleming and Lt. Commander Leiter, they are here to 'observe'.” “Lt. General de Klerck, 12th Infantry. I gather you are here because of our guests?” “Indeed we are.” Drake said and handed over the written orders he had received before setting off from Hereford. Deciding not to comment on the British numbers, as he, despite the honour it entailed, was quite desperate to get his guests to safety, wondering what they had done in this part of the country in the first place. “Follow me, please.” The three Officers followed le Klerck, who led them through a door to a small assembly of siderooms, presumably his quarters. “What has been told to you?” “Only that we are to escort some high-ranking members of your Royal Family to Amsterdam and then to the United Kingdom.” Drake said. De Klerck snorted and said with a disturbingly sadistic grin. “That figures. 'Some high-ranking member' allright. Gentlemen, you are to escort none other than Queen Wilhelmina and her daughter.” This stopped the British soldiers dead in their tracks. De Klerck turned around and said, with a strangely amused look on his face: “I gather you really weren't told then. I mean what do you expect? We can can't spare the forces, as much as this pains me, and we can't give this job to the French, because last time they had to do with Royalty, they chopped their heads off.”

They stopped in front of a small door, and de Klerck said: “Her Majesty is currently in a manor house about a mile west of here, guarded by a company of my best men. I am a loyal servant as much as the next man, but I'd rather use these Soldiers at the front you see. It's not going well there you see. The Belgians, French and your own Forces stopped them in the south, but it seems they are shifting forces north to knock us out first, and our Forces can't hold the line forever.” He then opened the door and grabbed a set of papers bearing the letterhead, insignia and motto of the House of Oranje. He then rummaged through the top drawer of the desk in the room and retrieved a small package. “Give these papers and the package to the Captain commanding the guard. He will know that you are genuine and take you to her Majesty.” “Do you expect any trouble?” Felix asked, beating the others by a fraction of a second. “We have had trouble with infiltrators from the day they attacked us, and we decided not to take any risks.” He then guided the group back outside, where the rest of 12 Patrol was idling about, not sure what to do. “Rise up, Gentlemen, we have work to do.” The British Soldiers grabbed their pack and soon the six British were walking along a small side path at a brisk pace. Drake was up front, while Sobczak took the rear. Ian and Felix were behind Ethan little who was third in the row. Felix was nervously fingering his FN Hipower that he had traded in for his 1911 Colt after it had proven to be impossible to acquire ammunition for it. “Nervous?” Ian asked with a wide grin on his face. “I bloody well am you know.” Felix turned his head and looked at Ian. “Hell, this is a bit different than when we went to France, this is a bloody war, not some blokes with a Vickers.” “I hear you on that one. Still, we should turn out fine.” Felix replied with a snort. “You better will be. My sister is fucking scary when she's mad.”



[Notes: I admit that I changed Drake's gun because when I wrote the last chapter I forgot that neither the Larkspur nor the Clansman or Bowman have been invented yet. Shame on me.]

humancalculator The War Office plans to adopt the FN Hipower as the standard sidearm for all the services, which is relatively easy to do since the Belgians have lisenced it to the UK. If you tell that anyone I'll have to kill you. Official Secrets act you know.

BritishImperial They will watch out for them.

gaiasabre11 Coincidence I am afraid. May I ask which one it is?

Lord Strange Indeed. After all it is a British Special Unit.

gaiasabre11 :rofl:

El Pip I probably should have been clearer. The Dutch didn't even tell London it was the Queen, if the Foreign Office had known, they would have send the entire 22 SAS, not just one patrol. It's just the usual cock-up.

As for the future, I have had several long discussions with a mate who is ex-estonian Army and a gun nut for most of his life, and we agreed on the most likely course for personal weaponry for the rest of the century. If you are a fan of the SA-80 though...

Kurt_Steiner Hehe, the next one the Brits are likely to have in RL will also be called Charles so lets make it a Tudor king instead.

nickvorp Thank you.

Chapter 104​

15th May 1940, 7:30 AM

Somewhere in the Northern Netherlands, about two miles from the front

The Dutch Infantry Company guarding the Queen was determined to fight to the death should either the Germans or the Soviets come here, but many would still have preferred to fight at the front. But then again, it would come here any day now. It amazed many how long the Dutch Army was holding the enemy so far, but as of late the progress made by the enemy became more and more each day. The Dutch Army was conducting a fighting retreat towards the so-called “Fortress Holland, a series of field defences anchored on Amsterdam and the rivers in the area. In a way it was lucky that the Axis Powers had attacked when they did, because they had caught the Dutch Army at a time when it was unusually large. Only a year back, it fielded only a meagre eight Divisions, mostly thanks to a chronical shortage of equipment, but the alliance between the Soviet Union and Germany, deemed the most likely enemies, the Army had been drastically enlarged, and by May 1940 it fielded 15 Divisions, less than the Belgians, but still much more than what had existed before the unholy alliance. This however was unknown to the SAS troopers and the company of Dutch Infantry guarding Queen Wilhelmina. In fact, and in the spirit of this ad-hoc mission no one had thought of informing the guards that the British were finally coming in. The guards were nervous, and had already had their brush with a group of German Airborne troops that had been scattered to this area. The Captain in command of the Company, and as a matter of fact most of his troops, hadn't slept for almost four days now, which is an explanation for what followed.

12 Patrol and the two guests from the Royal Navy were slowly approaching the perimeter the dutch were manning a line of trees around the area, and Drake signalled for the group to halt behind a bend in the road. “We will just approach them in the open and...” he was interrupted when a salvo of machine gun fire cut through the air above their heads, forcing the British to go to the ground in a ditch at the side of the road. “Fuckin'ell LT, they mistake us fer Axies!” Jones yelled over the roar of the machine gun. “Shut up, 312 and gimme that white hanky your lady sent you!” Drake yelled back. He received what he wanted and grabbed one of the spare Bren barrels from Sobczak and tied it to one end. He waved this improvised white flag in the view of the Dutch gunners, and sure enough the fire stopped. Drake slowly raised his head and when the fire did not resume, he stood up, followed by the rest of the group. The British walked towards the Dutch perimeter, their hands away from their bodies. Ian and Felix took up the rear this time, and both were rather pleased about how Drake was dealing with the situation, even more so when he talked to the perimeter guards, easily gaining them access with the signed papers. “It seems they want us to follow them.” This was however not to be. As soon as they had passed the perimeter line, a man in the uniform of a Dutch Army Captain came running from the villa, with a dishevelled uniform and generally the appearance of a man who was very close to the breaking point, followed by many more men with rifles in their hands, all a response to the gunfire. He started to yell around until someone pointed him in the direction of the British that were standing around with somewhat embarrassed expressions. He approached Drake, who was obviously in command and looked him up and down before asking: “Where is the rest of your group?” It took Drake several minutes that yes, this was all that had been sent, and no he was not joking. After a while the Dutch Captain gave up. “I guess you want to know what arrangements have been made?” Drake just nodded and had his group waiting on the small patch of gravel in front of the main entrance to the villa while he followed the Dutch Captain. Ian and Felix were standing around, looking over the area and the uncomfortably vast expanse of open ground. The Villa stood on an open patch of grass, about fifty yards from the treeline. On the open ground Ian could see three British-built 75mm Anti-Air guns, hidden under camouflage netting and disguised as large bushes. Almost disappearing behind the villa was a shed, presumably containing either horses or vehicles, in which direction Drake and the Dutch were heading off. “So Ian, do you think we should see if we could nick something to shoot from the dutchies? Even if it's only one of these blasted Austrian Rifles.”

“Huh?” Ian snapped out of his thoughts and turned around to Felix. “I said, old friend, that we should perhaps try and talk these dutchies out of a few of their rifles. I have a feeling that we will need them.” Ian nodded and said: “Good idea, mate. After all, I feel a bit naked with only my trusty old Webley.” They then left notice with the 'lounging' SAS troopers where they were going and went off to find someone who could be persuaded to give them two rifles and a decent pile of rounds to go with them. It didn't take them long. In a small shed behind the villa that they had not noticed before, the Dutch had a huge stockpile of weapons and ammunition, enough for almost a regiment. It didn't take them long to talk the corporal there who spoke broken English, out of two of the rifles an enough ammunition to last them a week. Although they were not used to carry the monstrously big packs the SAS had, they were more than able to carry the additional weight. Once outside, they struggled to make themselves familiar with the unfamiliar weapon. Felix closely examined the straight-pull bolt, and inserted the full clip of 8x56 rounds. He worked the action and remarked to Ian, who was testing out the sights: “I still prefer the Lee-Enfield.” Ian lowered his own rifle and answered in a low voice, lest someone was nearby: “We'd be hard put to fire even half as fast with this piece of junk. But beggars can't be choosers methinks.” “I hear you, buddy.” With this Ian realized something that had been nagging at him pretty much since he had known Felix, and that had become glaringly apparent when he had started to go out with Felix' sister. “Do you realize Felix, that you are finally learning the fine art form of 'the King's own English?'” Felix' head whipped around and Ian saw with amusement how Felix seemed to consider what Ian had said. “What do you expect, Ian? I am around you limeys all day.” They both laughed and walked back to where the rest of the group was waiting. All around the British troops their Dutch counterparts were preparing the area for something, and Ian suspected that they were planning on making a stand here, not that it was the best ground to do so, but they were here so they probably decided to make the best of it.

When Drake returned to the front yard, he came to the same conclusion. “Rise and shine, Gentlemen, we have work to do. 312, Sobczak, go behind the house. Wait for me there, I'll be with you shorlty. Little, you speak German, so I want you to go with the Captain here and obtain all the intelligence they have.” After a series of “Yes, Sir”s, Drake turned to Ian and Felix. “Her Majesty apparently wants to see us all. She asked for the Officers of her escort, and from what I hear you two have experience in dealing with royalty, no?” Ian and Felix just grinned and followed the Lieutenant inside. They deposited their weapons and most of their kit with a member of the Dutch Royal Guard, and after being instructed on the proper protocol, they entered.



[Notes: I am military controlling the Armies of the low countries at this point, and I am gradually being pushed back. I do not pull these forces back on my own accord. Basically I have massed all these forces in the front provinces and stay there until the AI kicks me out. Also, while this update is shorter than usual, I will try and make it up with the next one. ]

BritishImperial said:

i can understand the Dutchman's wariness but he seems awfully unproffesional for a man chosen to guard royalty. lets hope his fighting skills are up to it when jerry and ivan arrive.

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Well, if your country were about to be overrun and you hadn't slept much for a week, you'd be a bit strange too.