Against all Odds: The British Empire in World War Two

Kurt_Steiner said:

And Juanca (aka King Juan Carlos I of Spain) may never meet Sofi (aka Sophia of Greece and Denmark and so forth). I have to reread the sections about Spain.

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I must say I didn't know that!

ViperhawkZ said:

*Echo filter*

AAAALLLLTERNATE HISSSTORYYYYY!!!

D)

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It's not because of my dislike for certain members of the Royal Family but more because I want a free hand with moulding my version of the British Royals without overly stepping on anyone's toes.

Captain Ian Fleming, RN, DSO with bar, leaned back in the chair inside the MI6 safehouse near the Swiss-German border and sighed.

“Oh for gods sake!” Felix yelled with a significant note of humour in his voice, “I know that you hate drinking Coffee but dear god we can't have everything.”

Ian grinned and turned to look at Felix.

“At least if we were to go to northern Germany we'd be able to get a good spot of tea! Up there they are truly civilized.”[1]

“Agreed, but a good cup of Coffee can still be something to enjoy, mate.”

With that Ian decided that there was no point in complaining he leaned back in the chair and went over the mission for the fourteenth time in the last three hours. Going into Germany was one thing, but going that deep into Germany from the south was another. Mind you, it was Hitler's Birthday so at least some of them would be beastly drunk.

One thing that made this easier than their last sojourn into the Fatherland was that Six had very recent intelligence on German procedures and the types of papers they needed, in fact the German authorities had been considerate enough to provide forms, stamps, special types of paper and the special ink in large numbers for MI6 to use when they had vacated Vienna in a hurry so in a way the papers Ian and Felix were using were about as genuine as anything Berlin could produce.

The uniforms they would be wearing on the other hand might be carrying the proper labels and be made from the proper cloth but they came from the hand of a talented and patriotic tailor in London who was doing some side work for the SIS on occasion.

Because of those two things Ian had agreed when M had pointed out that even though Felix was technically known to the RSHA the uniform, the different haircut and the fake glasses he wore were together with the papers were enough to make him no more threatened than Ian himself.

The both of them spoke flawless German, with Felix faint trace of accent being explained by him being a Volksdeutscher, meaning a German who had been born and grown up in foreign Parts (in this case in South-West Africa) and only come back when the Fatherland had called for man of fighting age.


Ian was already wearing the uniform of a Major of Infantry (Felix that of a Captain) with the campaign ribbons, buttons and assorted decoration that made him a Veteran of most of the southern Campaigns from the occupation of Yugoslavia.



Felix glanced at his wristwatch and rose from his chair. “Time to go.” he said, switching to German.

They picked up their bags that were full with the things any German Officer transferring back to a staff position from Austria might have and of which not one single item was of British manufacture except for Felix' 'captured' FN Automatic with eight spare magazines.

Once outside they placed heavy overcoats over their German uniforms and walked into the bushes towards the road that led to the border crossing. Once they reached a spot three miles from that crossing they started looking around for the people they were supposed to meet and it was a testament to their skill that the first sign of their presence was Ian staring into the muzzles of three K31[2] rifles that the MI6 paramilitaries had stolen from various armouries all over northern Switzerland over the last two weeks.


They knew that three more men with guns were waiting on the other side of the road and so, without speaking a word. After ten minutes a car could be heard approaching.

Thanks to several weeks of preparation and intelligence gathering in Bern Station CH had discovered that the German attaché was being re-assigned to the military administration of the occupied Netherlands and that he was driving into Germany with a fellow Officer who was being assigned to the same office.

This had merely eased the insertion into Germany and the hurried changes to the plan had been mostly to Ian's satisfaction. What he didn't like was that they had to go in the first place and in the chosen meeting place but the latter was something he had no influence over.


But then the car was approaching.

Two German Officers whose Uniforms were strangely almost identical to those Ian and Felix wore suddenly found themselves looking into the muzzles of rifles in the hands of men with camouflage paint on their faces. They were removed from their car, as was their luggage and as Ian and Felix drove off a few minutes later they heard two shots in quick succession somewhere in the woods.

The intercept point had been less than five miles from the border and Ian was a good enough driver that they reached the German border in little more than ten minutes. Ian stopped the car at a bend in the road where they could overlook the border.

As far as their eye could see tank traps and a barbed wire fence guarded this part of the border[3] but the most impressive thing was the crossing point. Swiss and German border guards seemed to spend most of their time staring each other down and Felix, normally not given to whistling past the graveyard began to hum a tune[4].

“Are you OK?” Ian asked as he heard it and Felix just nodded.

“Yes, no problem.”

The crossing into Germany went faster and easier than either had expected but diplomatic tags, the uniforms and the early hours of the day made it easy. Both of them were aware that even though they were both armed (Ian carried the Walther PPK he had acquired when they had rescued Felix and Felix carried an old-fashioned P38) they would be dead in seconds if discovered.

If there was one thing that would make their job easier and validate the near two months of preparations it was that the priority petrol coupons that the late two German Officers had been eligible for were dirt easy to fake if one had the resources of MI6's forgery department at hand and both of them took a perverse pleasure in using up petrol made from Soviet Oil that had to be carted in from the Caucasus, refined in refineries that were increasingly the centre of attention for RAF Bomber Command and then barrel down the Highways as fast as the pre-war BMW would go.

The drive took them near four hours but eventually they reached the outskirts of a medium-sized industrial town. As they came in they saw that the rail yard was busy but that was hardly surprising, there were several major metal-working and textile companies headquartered here and sooner or later the station would be visited by Bomber or Strike Command.


It was one of the old Imperial Cities that had been directly under the control of the Holy Roman Emperor until 1806 and as they drove in they could see a city gate, one of the few remnants of the old wall beyond a few street names. They all noted the large barracks that before the war had held a Cavalry Regiment but that were now used by the German Territorial Army to train replacements for the units that were sent to the front in increasing numbers.

Most of the town was adorned with the Swastika Flag and the crowds that moved through the streets were the best cover they could wish for. The town had a considerable rivalry with a nearby town that boasted about being smarter (by virtue of having one of the oldest Universities in this part of Germany) whilst the first town considered itself to be richer (by virtue of it's industry). It was still be biggest town in the area and so many of the rural communities catered to it in spite of fierce but also good-natured local rivalries.

On the approach Ian had been surprised to note the many wineries in the area but they were not here to indulge themselves. On the way up from the Swiss border they had had to pass no less than seventeen checkpoints but Felix had noted with amusement evident in his face that the German Field Police were far too busy conducting ambulances and lorries loaded with troops going in opposite directions to even superficially check a car that was not only coming right across the biggest route on which German units from France were transferred into Austria but that was also having diplomatic tags.


They both had to admit though, selecting this day and this sort of town for the meeting had been a stroke of genius.

“So, where to go?” Ian said. Felix was acting as navigator and gave him directions that led them out of town to a spot on a hill that overlooked the town nestled between it and the edge of a low mountain range. On the other Hill they could see the remnants of a medieval Castle with the naked eye and as they waited.


After almost another hour a black Mercedes wound it's way through the trees and they could see two people inside. It stopped and the man in the back stepped out.

He was tall, with black hair and had his arm in a sling. He was wearing a uniform not unlike Ian's with the rank insignia of a Lieutenant Colonel and he made a mock salute with his left, uninjured hand.

It was clear that neither group fully trusted the other so Ian stepped forward. But the German spoke first, with an accent that would have identified him as someone coming from Bavaria.

“Since we are all still free men I gather that you really are who you seem to be. I am Oberstleutnant von Stauffenberg. My... superiors want to talk to yours.”



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Comments, questions, rotten Tomatoes?

[1] It's true! Up there the fisheads drink tea, there even is a teabag throwing championship.

[2] Straight-pull Bolt-action rifle. Ugly as sin but used in regular service until 1958.

[3] And no one recently tried to jump it on a motorbike.

[4] I do have to admit when I wrote that scene the “Great Escape” theme played in my head.

stevep - They believe it's time to end it but between the Soviets and certain expectations by HM's Government it might not be that easy. Besides, the war hasn't totally gone to the crapper yet. The game actually has an event for both a successful and failed assassination of the Austrian though they rarely trigger for the AI.

The two Germans belonged to the German Embassy in Switzerland.

I PMed you about the tune.

Kurt_Steiner - There's still plenty of ways to be strafed, only not by the Desert Air Force. His career is radically different.

Agent Larkin - Ah yes, Das Boot... probably the best U-Boat Film of all time. Das Boot wipes the floor with U-571 and then shoots it into the sun with a slingshot. *spits at U-571*

That certain Erwin survives the war, but I think it's not a big spoiler to say that he's still controversial enough to never actually seek and/or get a post in the Bundeswehr, or politics. He'll do what Mannstein and the others did, retire and write his Memoirs. The closest we got was one of Guderian's sons being the General Inspector of the Armed Forces, the highest Uniformed Office we have.

EDIT: OT: Many more moons ago than I care to remember I had the privilege to actually go into the internal set they used to film the scenes aboard the sub. Damn those things were cramped...

Not only them, but quite a few other countries as well.

Anyway, due to an unexpected increase in my bank account I plan to migrate my system from WinXP to Win7 over the next couple of days, so it's more than likely it will take some time for me to get up and running again. That said, there is still one update coming in some time today.

Btw Marcus, have you read the part where HMS Thunderchild fights the Japanese to cover a Hong Kong Evac Convoy?

Lord Strange said:

This entire Universe is fantastic AH-wank.

It's truly made of awesome.

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Not so much in Asia. Without really meaning it I created a Univers where a lot of the crap that happened IOTL in Europe after the war happens in Asia. China is the biggest looser of this TL by far. No way they reach a billion any time soon.....

Poor, poor China....

So, Win7 is installed (and thank god it comes with basic drivers for all my hardware), first and only time I activated Internet Explorer (to download Firefox) is behind me, I am officially reachable again.

Alas, this is a family forum, so yeah...

And there might well be a Thunderchild memorial.