Break out the cigars!
War is almost here and Winston is there to keep the British in it.
War is almost here and Winston is there to keep the British in it.
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Now the good stuff happens, maybe a certain Captain E. Blackadder needs to be called out of retirement?
Thank God for the beginning of the fun! Quick, get the US and Japan into your alliance! Just do eet!
Who would've thought the war would start over Finland of all places? I sure didn't. :O
We need to put him and his dirty, smelly manservant in charge of the departement of Cunning plans and dirty tricks.
He's Winston Churchill. He doesn't need to make a entrance to make his presence known. You just know.
Btw, did you know that Winston S. Churchill of WW2 fame is likely named after Winston Churchill of English Civil War fame who is not only outshadowed by his son (the Duke of Marlborough) but also by 'our' Winston?
Chapter thirty-three: Doolitov's Raid
The Second Great War did start well before it was officially declared. In the late hours of February 8th, 1940, the Soviet aircraft carrier Sovyetskiy Soyuz and her battlegroup (made up by two heavy and four light cruisers plus a several destroyer flotillas) sailed the Baltic at full speed towards the North Sea. Even if a German Blohm un Voss Bv 138 spotted the battlegroup, no one paid too much attention to it as the Red Banner Baltic Fleet had been regularly doing that kind of sorties since 1936, although the Sovyetskiy Soyuz had been not a regular component of those little games.
No one noticed anything strange in the fact that the battlegroup didn't sail to the Channel, as other Soviet naval groups had done in similar exercises through time, but instead vanished into the North Sea.
A Bv-138C was the first Western witnness of the so-called "Doolitov's Raid".
The aircraft carrier's air goup was not the usual one: she carried twelve Red Air Forces Tupolev SB medium bombers. The plan called for them to bomb military targets in London, and to continue westward to land in Ireland —hoping that the shock and anger created by the attack would compell Downing Street to declare war at once against the Emerald Island. Brilliant as the first stage of the plan was, its second part was plainly silly. Anyway, Stalin had no chance to punish the minds behind the plans because there was never the chance to do so.
To help the bombers to take off from the crowded deck, they were deprived from the dorsal gun turrets and the radios. Once in position, the Sovyetskiy Soyuz began what todays is called Doolitov's Raid.
Some few happy Hurricanes. No one told them that there was a party incoming, but there they were.
Amazingly, the Raid began fairly well. The Sovyetskiy Soyuz launched the bombers and her battlegroup returned to Leningrad, reaching his base thanks for the help provided by the night and the long range fighters of the VVS. The Tupolevs were to flew in groups of two to four aircraft before changing to single file at wavetop level to avoid detection. However, as they were still a few miles away from Anglia's seashore, the Tupolevs encountered nine 79 Squadron Hurricanes led by Squadron Leader Douglas G. Clift.
The Hurricanes were doing a CAP and their pilots were in bad mood. They had to left their warm beds to fly "just in case some foolish Rusky happens to cross Germany to bomb some bombs here". And then, shining in the pale sun of the morning, the RAF boys met the VVS lads. In the melée that followed, the bombers were slaughtered one by one. Just a single bomber managed to slip the mortal ring of fire just to be shot down over London, crashing on Victoria Station.
The last SB of Doolitov falling on Victoria Station, February 10, 1940.
[GAME NOTES: What the heck was a Rusky carrier doing in the North Sean is beyong my imagination -even Peti run out of ideas!-. How she managed to evade my scattered naval bombers -I had a silly moment and decided not to send them massed to avoid an easy victory- is also another mistery. Then I decided not to chase her at once. War was going to be long so, why bother?]
@trekaddict: *a distance voice* War is coming...
Peti, shot that Nerd at once.
Er... Actually it's Ned... Ned Stark, lord of the...
Lord my b****. Off with his head. Without farting, please.
@H.Appleby: If I call Edmund back to active service, you can tell then that the war is lost and the Empire reduced to ashes.
@SovietAmerika: The US? Why? To have another U-571? No, thanks. And Japan has proven to be unreliable, warmonger and too greedy.
@Razgriz 2K9: And good ol' Enewald is missing the fun :laugh:
@Mr. Santiago: "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
@trekaddict -2-: Baldrick won a smelly pension in Flanders. Let keep him quiet.
@Mr. Santiago: He's the actual governor of the charming Bahamas
@Nathan Madien: Like Teddy Roosevelt but without a moustache. This is the age of the non-moustached premiers. Hence why Chamberlain was doomed to fail and Stalin will do so. And De Gaulle too.
@trekaddict: Dunno why, but for a second I imagined that first Winston kicking the arse of Prince Ruppert while repeating "Germans dont' surf!".
The Second Great War did start well before it was officially declared. In the late hours of February 8th, 1940, the Soviet aircraft carrier Sovyetskiy Soyuz and her battlegroup (made up by two heavy and four light cruisers plus a several destroyer flotillas) sailed the Baltic at full speed towards the North Sea. Even if a German Blohm un Voss Bv 138 spotted the battlegroup, no one paid too much attention to it as the Red Banner Baltic Fleet had been regularly doing that kind of sorties since 1936, although the Sovyetskiy Soyuz had been not a regular component of those little games.
No one noticed anything strange in the fact that the battlegroup didn't sail to the Channel, as other Soviet naval groups had done in similar exercises through time, but instead vanished into the North Sea.
A Bv-138C was the first Western witnness of the so-called "Doolitov's Raid".
The aircraft carrier's air goup was not the usual one: she carried twelve Red Air Forces Tupolev SB medium bombers. The plan called for them to bomb military targets in London, and to continue westward to land in Ireland —hoping that the shock and anger created by the attack would compell Downing Street to declare war at once against the Emerald Island. Brilliant as the first stage of the plan was, its second part was plainly silly. Anyway, Stalin had no chance to punish the minds behind the plans because there was never the chance to do so.
To help the bombers to take off from the crowded deck, they were deprived from the dorsal gun turrets and the radios. Once in position, the Sovyetskiy Soyuz began what todays is called Doolitov's Raid.
Some few happy Hurricanes. No one told them that there was a party incoming, but there they were.
The Hurricanes were doing a CAP and their pilots were in bad mood. They had to left their warm beds to fly "just in case some foolish Rusky happens to cross Germany to bomb some bombs here". And then, shining in the pale sun of the morning, the RAF boys met the VVS lads. In the melée that followed, the bombers were slaughtered one by one. Just a single bomber managed to slip the mortal ring of fire just to be shot down over London, crashing on Victoria Station.
The last SB of Doolitov falling on Victoria Station, February 10, 1940.
[GAME NOTES: What the heck was a Rusky carrier doing in the North Sean is beyong my imagination -even Peti run out of ideas!-. How she managed to evade my scattered naval bombers -I had a silly moment and decided not to send them massed to avoid an easy victory- is also another mistery. Then I decided not to chase her at once. War was going to be long so, why bother?]
@trekaddict: *a distance voice* War is coming...
Peti, shot that Nerd at once.
Er... Actually it's Ned... Ned Stark, lord of the...
Lord my b****. Off with his head. Without farting, please.
@H.Appleby: If I call Edmund back to active service, you can tell then that the war is lost and the Empire reduced to ashes.
@SovietAmerika: The US? Why? To have another U-571? No, thanks. And Japan has proven to be unreliable, warmonger and too greedy.
@Razgriz 2K9: And good ol' Enewald is missing the fun :laugh:
@Mr. Santiago: "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
@trekaddict -2-: Baldrick won a smelly pension in Flanders. Let keep him quiet.
@Mr. Santiago: He's the actual governor of the charming Bahamas
@Nathan Madien: Like Teddy Roosevelt but without a moustache. This is the age of the non-moustached premiers. Hence why Chamberlain was doomed to fail and Stalin will do so. And De Gaulle too.
@trekaddict: Dunno why, but for a second I imagined that first Winston kicking the arse of Prince Ruppert while repeating "Germans dont' surf!".
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AH, so the Americans will have to think of something else to hit Japan.
And the Soviets...these silly people. Don't they know that the RN in this TL is likely in a far better shape and that they are most displeased at being caught out like this?
And the Soviets...these silly people. Don't they know that the RN in this TL is likely in a far better shape and that they are most displeased at being caught out like this?
Doolitov's Raid.......... What a hilarious name. Just how did they come up with it in the first place? Doolittle deflected to the Soviets?
You do realise Kurty that if you keep trying to explain the random fleets and inexplicable IA incidents this AAR will soon turn crazy? As in SyNDIzziE crazy? Not saying that's a bad thing, just might not be what you were aiming at.
Still, a fun update either way.
Still, a fun update either way.
brilliant finally the great show begins!!!, this is like the Titanomachy, the war between the Titans and the Olympian gods, an all or nothing battle for survival, ¿will the Empire survive the red onslaught? Peti and our mighty Kurt only knows that
, this is like the Titanomachy, the war between the Titans and the Olympian gods, an all or nothing battle for survival, ¿will the Empire survive the red onslaught? Peti and our mighty Kurt only knows that
For some reason I thought the plane in the last picture was a pair of chairs that had been stuck together and then dropped from on high. Guess that's Russian engineering for you.
Stalin must be really pissed at the moment. He loses a load of planes and the only thing he manages to destroy is Victoria train station; that in and of itself has probably greatly aided the British war effort...:laugh:
Stalin must be really pissed at the moment. He loses a load of planes and the only thing he manages to destroy is Victoria train station; that in and of itself has probably greatly aided the British war effort...:laugh:
Knowing him, we'll learn later that some important historicall figure happened to be strolling down the station and got killed.
Chapter thirty-four: They came from the skies...
Then, while Moscow released their ultimatum to Helsinki, the first wave of Lisunov Li-2s began to take off. All in all, 450 Li-2s (in fact, most of those planes were PS-84s from Aeroflot taken into military use) and 100 gliders ferried 14,000 Soviet paratroopers to the Karelian Isthmus and to the north of Lake Ladoga. What Stalin aimed to achieve with spreading two airborne divisions in such a difficult and wide area was to open the way of the 7th and 8th Armies in their march to Viipuri and Sortvala, but in the end this action become the swan's song of the Red Airborne Corps.
A Lisunov Li-2: in this ATL, an interesting example of the capabilities of the USSR to copy foreign designs.
The two divisions were parachuted in small groups directly on top of their targets to allow them to capture the perimeter and destroy any local AA guns to allow the landing of the heavy equipment carried by the gliders. As General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley GBE, KCB, DSO & Bar, MC stated in his book Blank round: military failures 1914–1986 "the idea might have been a good one but its planning was an utter failure and its execution a nightmare". The Soviet pilots had all kind of troubles to find their targets in the northern darkness -sometimes nature does take sides- and some air groups arrived too late or too soon to their targets. In the last case the paratroopers were lucky enough to jump without suferring too much the action of the Finnish "Ack-Ack" or the attacks of the fighters of the FAF but without having a single clue about were the heck they were. In the first case, the pilots did manage to be in the right place but their planes were massacred by the murderous AA fire and the action of the few but determined Fokker D.XXI, Bristol Bulldog, Gloster Gladiator, Brewster BW-393 Buffalo, Fiat G.50, and Morane-Saulnier M.S.406 of the Finnish air force.
Finnish Brewster BW-393 Buffalo at Trollhättan, ready to take off.
Thus, while some units were decimated before touching the ground, like one company of the III Battalion, 1st Assault Regiment of the 15th Guards Airborne Division, lost 112 killed out of 126 men; some others were spread all over the area and never managed to muster their whole strenght, like the commander of the II Batallion of the same regiment, which, by the end of the first day of the war, had only at hand four officers, two corporals and 150 men from the original battalion's 600 men.
By the time the Red Army crossed the border, its two Airborne Divisions were no longer a threat to the Finnish defenders. Such a dissapointing perfomance made Stalin to disband the five existing airborne divisions.
Such was the disappointing baptism of fire of the Soviet Armed Forces.
[GAME NOTES: Just imagine: Out of nowhere appear the Soviet air transport fleet and the paras jump... over a charming stack of ten Finnish divisions. End of the story. Beginning of my laughing.
Next chapter will take us to the land battles, I swear it]
@trekaddict: Imaginative as they are, I don't doubt that the Yanks will find a good name for their raid.
Dunno. Apparently the they didn't know neither that the RN is in a very good shape nor that it's no good to waste your Airborne divisions...
@Sumeragi: From a game called Harpoon. There was a battle called Doolitov's Raid: there was a combined attack by a powerful SAG and a pack of Tu-22M bombers against Britain.
@El Pip: I'm not going to do that, but the attack gave me the chance to have a inner joke. Don't panick, there is not going to be SyNdIE sYnDiE stuff in this AAR. I just wanted to show the pitiful efforts of the Russian IA to begin the war.
@The_Unificator: So many questions, just one Peti...
@talt: According to the wiki, it's a Do-17 bomber shot down during the Battle of Britain.
Stalin must be really pissed NOW. Failure to destroy Victoria train station is bad enough, but to prove that the Airborne Forces of the glorious Red Army isn't up to the task... well...
@Nathan Madien: Not really. I just jumped at the chance.
@Mr. Santiago: I'm still looking who to kill. I know it's odd that at this stage of the AAR there have been hardly one of the killings that are a feature of my AARs but I'm really doubtful about when and who. Battles will tell by themselves.
Then, while Moscow released their ultimatum to Helsinki, the first wave of Lisunov Li-2s began to take off. All in all, 450 Li-2s (in fact, most of those planes were PS-84s from Aeroflot taken into military use) and 100 gliders ferried 14,000 Soviet paratroopers to the Karelian Isthmus and to the north of Lake Ladoga. What Stalin aimed to achieve with spreading two airborne divisions in such a difficult and wide area was to open the way of the 7th and 8th Armies in their march to Viipuri and Sortvala, but in the end this action become the swan's song of the Red Airborne Corps.
A Lisunov Li-2: in this ATL, an interesting example of the capabilities of the USSR to copy foreign designs.
The two divisions were parachuted in small groups directly on top of their targets to allow them to capture the perimeter and destroy any local AA guns to allow the landing of the heavy equipment carried by the gliders. As General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley GBE, KCB, DSO & Bar, MC stated in his book Blank round: military failures 1914–1986 "the idea might have been a good one but its planning was an utter failure and its execution a nightmare". The Soviet pilots had all kind of troubles to find their targets in the northern darkness -sometimes nature does take sides- and some air groups arrived too late or too soon to their targets. In the last case the paratroopers were lucky enough to jump without suferring too much the action of the Finnish "Ack-Ack" or the attacks of the fighters of the FAF but without having a single clue about were the heck they were. In the first case, the pilots did manage to be in the right place but their planes were massacred by the murderous AA fire and the action of the few but determined Fokker D.XXI, Bristol Bulldog, Gloster Gladiator, Brewster BW-393 Buffalo, Fiat G.50, and Morane-Saulnier M.S.406 of the Finnish air force.
Finnish Brewster BW-393 Buffalo at Trollhättan, ready to take off.
Thus, while some units were decimated before touching the ground, like one company of the III Battalion, 1st Assault Regiment of the 15th Guards Airborne Division, lost 112 killed out of 126 men; some others were spread all over the area and never managed to muster their whole strenght, like the commander of the II Batallion of the same regiment, which, by the end of the first day of the war, had only at hand four officers, two corporals and 150 men from the original battalion's 600 men.
By the time the Red Army crossed the border, its two Airborne Divisions were no longer a threat to the Finnish defenders. Such a dissapointing perfomance made Stalin to disband the five existing airborne divisions.
Such was the disappointing baptism of fire of the Soviet Armed Forces.
[GAME NOTES: Just imagine: Out of nowhere appear the Soviet air transport fleet and the paras jump... over a charming stack of ten Finnish divisions. End of the story. Beginning of my laughing.
Next chapter will take us to the land battles, I swear it]
@trekaddict: Imaginative as they are, I don't doubt that the Yanks will find a good name for their raid.
Dunno. Apparently the they didn't know neither that the RN is in a very good shape nor that it's no good to waste your Airborne divisions...
@Sumeragi: From a game called Harpoon. There was a battle called Doolitov's Raid: there was a combined attack by a powerful SAG and a pack of Tu-22M bombers against Britain.
@El Pip: I'm not going to do that, but the attack gave me the chance to have a inner joke. Don't panick, there is not going to be SyNdIE sYnDiE stuff in this AAR. I just wanted to show the pitiful efforts of the Russian IA to begin the war.
@The_Unificator: So many questions, just one Peti...
@talt: According to the wiki, it's a Do-17 bomber shot down during the Battle of Britain.
Stalin must be really pissed NOW. Failure to destroy Victoria train station is bad enough, but to prove that the Airborne Forces of the glorious Red Army isn't up to the task... well...
@Nathan Madien: Not really. I just jumped at the chance.
@Mr. Santiago: I'm still looking who to kill. I know it's odd that at this stage of the AAR there have been hardly one of the killings that are a feature of my AARs but I'm really doubtful about when and who. Battles will tell by themselves.
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I think I speak for all of us when I say that I expect the other branches of the Soviet Armed Forces to follow the fine example set by their fellow paratroopers and drop dead.
It would save a lot of time and money.
It would save a lot of time and money.
1) How on earth did you make the AI build and drop paras?
2) BWAHAHAH. The Red Army... fun times to read...
3) A lot of fighters in the FAF. Too many for easy supply. Now, there's this company in the UK, a subsidiary of Vickers I believe, who are reported to be quite good at fighters...
4) Will there still be British Paras?
2) BWAHAHAH. The Red Army... fun times to read...
3) A lot of fighters in the FAF. Too many for easy supply. Now, there's this company in the UK, a subsidiary of Vickers I believe, who are reported to be quite good at fighters...
4) Will there still be British Paras?