"There is no solution to bring away this plague .... No remedies have been discovered." - Prime Minister Winston Churchill after the fall of London
Prologue pt. 3
Lavrentiy Beria became the new leader of the Soviet Union after Stalin's assassination
Details after the fall of Moscow about the Soviet Union are scarce; most likely a result by Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria, the chief of the NKVD. However, from what concrete evidence I have found in the
Torchwood Institute of Infections, Glasgow (1), I can assume a plausible scenario of events that occurred during and after the fall of Moscow (2). During the Infected Siege of Moscow, the outer perimeter of the city was defended by elements of the Soviet Red Army; the city's outskirts was heavily mined (akin to the level of mining in Berlin) while the city's interior was boasted by the civilian militia, at various areas were NKVD companies and lastly, the Kremlin itself fortified by NKVD units. Essentially, Stalin had his capital defended by his most diehard of Communists (along the lines of the Waffen SS and the defence of the Reichstag). An occurring myth is that Stalin followed what he did during the German attacks on Moscow and refused to leave the Kremlin, believing that
General Ivan Khabarov and his
8th Army will arrive from the north into Moscow and stop the advancing creatures. However, his faith on General Khabarov was found to be hopeless as his army had already collapsed during the infected advance towards Leningrad; whatever remained of the 8th Army and of the Leningrad Front had retreated to Arkhangelsk and were now co-coordinating with the Finns and
Marshal Baron Carl Gustaf Emil. Myth or fact, the decision by Stalin to remain in the city seal his fate and that of Moscow.
The series of events that are talked about next are what I deem as the most plausible given the evidence that has been collected; either through writing or oral reciting. When the first of the mines began to detonate around 11:00pm, the Soviet 2nd Guards Army (part of the Moscow Military District commanded by
Marshal Kirill Meretskov) began their artillery barrage onto the direction of the song as instructed by Stalin's
Order No. 97.
Order No. 97 By The People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR
Moscow, 29 November 1942
The enemy once again advances towards our nation. Fighting is happening throughout the USSR; from the Ukraine to the Don, from north to the river Volga, brave and heroic workers of the people are fighting once again against the enemy, this time, it is not the Fascist German but the despised Capitalist pigs. Against these forces, the enemy has captured already the cities Keiv, Stalingrad, Rostov, Leningrad and other countless towns. Once again, the Armies of the people must remember the slogan of the early past, the same slogan that had led to the defeat of the German invaders. Not a single step back! For every man, woman and child they kill, we, the people will eradicate them tenfold. Can we stand and throw the enemy back toward west? Yes, we can, as our plants and factories in the rear areas are working perfectly and are supplying our army with more and more tanks, planes, artillery and mortars.
We will defend the Motherland even against all odds and when we take our last breath, we will drag the invaders down with us. To save our Motherland, the enemy will know the pain and hatred - so vast - of each person of the Motherland!
The Supreme Command of the Red Army Orders:
1. Military Fronts and Armies should:
a) Under no circumstances, retreat against the enemy.
b) Eradicate or remove from offices those commanders and soldiers that allow themselves or their command to retreat from the front
2. Moscow Defence should:
a) Upon the sound of the mines, unleash against the enemy a barrage of artillery
b) Steadfastness against the enemy as they attack
*Remainder of Order No. 97 has been blacked out*
The People’s Commissar for Defense
Joseph Stalin
Soviet artillery on the outskirts of Moscow complied with Order No. 97
45 minutes - after the fourth barrage of artillery - the explosion of mines stopped while tensions within the 2nd Guards Army were still high. Through hours 1 to 2, there is almost no record of what happens. The "lost hour", as dubbed by the members of the T.I.I.G. happened after the fourth artillery barrage and prior to the engagement of infecteds via an offensive by the 2nd Guards. Obviously, somehow, some of the infected the survived managed to attack the advance echelon of the 2nd Guards, who in turn retreated back to the HQ of the
7th Guards Tank Division and thus the infection was spread from there. After the 'lost hour' the Kremlin (or Stalin) ordered an offensive to be launched into the area where the 7th Guards Divisions (denoted as 7.G.T/D) was. Known as the Midnight Attack (the actual attack started on 12:40 am), the soldiers of the 2nd G. Army began their march towards the HQ of the 7. G. T/D where they promptly engaged the infected. Conservative estimates of the number of infected ranges from 750,000 to over 4.5 million by the Russian government in
Novosibirsk against the 500,000 Soviets in the 2nd G. Army (3). Other than that fact provided by the Russian government, little more is known about the Midnight Attack; what we do know, the 2nd G. Army collapsed under the attacks by the infected - with around 700 to 1,000 who retreated back to Moscow (and were quickly executed) and 200 - 300 that miraculously escaped and arrived at the Crimea; which - by that time - was defended by
Admiral Filipp Sergeyevich Oktyabrskiy, commander of the Black Sea Fleet and the de facto commander of the
Separate Coastal Army (4).
With the defeat of the 2nd G. Army, Moscow was mostly undefended and by 5 - 6 am in the morning, the first of the infected began to approach the capital. The desperate defense by the Muscovites to protect their beloved capital resulted in either a heroic or stubborn waste of lives point of view of the
Infected Siege of Moscow (depending on how the reader views it). The defenders - now mostly the civilian militia held off the infected for almost 2 hours - some suggest that these defenders discovered that a clear shot to the head would result in permanent death which was how they were able to holdout for such a period of time. However, with or without this discovery, the outer limits of the city fell to the infected and they began their march to the heart of Moscow as the defenders frantically scrambled to form a defense.
The ruins of a street of buildings in Moscow
This next event is purely in the authors views through his interpretation of the evidence. What happens next is subject to immense controversy but from what I can interpreted, the Soviet NKVD Head, Beria broke into the office of Stalin and summarily executed him for 'crimes against the people'. After the sudden assassination of Stalin, Beria was announced the new leader of the Soviet Union (if there were any objections, then it was no voiced) and with the surviving cabinet under Stalin which included Foreign Minister Molotov and Chief of the Red Army Staff
Marshal Aleksandr Vasilevsky escaped the besieged city via the Trans-Siberian Railroad to the Omsk and later the new capital Novosibirsk. Moscow would fall just 2 hours after the escape by Beria.
I've attached to this, a transcript of a possible survivor of the Infected Siege of Moscow. The validity of her story has never been validated. However, as she is the only one to come forward, there is little to go on.
"My name is Vera Vasiliev, I was born in Moscow on October 1934. On the night of the attack on Moscow in 1947, I was having supper with my parents and my two older brothers. That was when the sirens came on; my father and both my brothers quickly stopped ending and ran out to join the others [the civilian militia]. My mother remained at home with me and told me to quickly finish eating, then go to my room and she will be there shortly. Inside, I heard the sound of explosions and gunfire and screaming - everytime cuddling closer to my mother. That was when we heard the door to my house open; my mother screamed but we heard the sound of my father telling us to get dressed and telling us that we're leaving. When both my mother and I got dressed, we headed to my father and I noticed something was wrong, I asked my father - and I remember this event clearly.
I asked him, "Papa, where is Alexi [the youngest brother] ?" My father just simply said, "Alexi was brave." I did not understand why he said that or why my mother was crying - I would later find out - and we proceeded towards the back of our house where our neighbor [an old man, Vera can't recall his name] was sitting on top of a tank. My father said it was borrowed and that we would return it later. Next thing I knew, something was rustling around the branches, a growl was heard and my mother shrieked. My brother began to aim his gun at the creature and shot him in the chest but yet he kept on inching closer. My father yelled at my brother "The Head! The Head! Shoot the head!" but Gregory [the surviving brother] was scared and froze, papa took the gun and quickly shot the creature in the head and it dropped. I blacked out and woke up in the afternoon resting on the back of the tank I think; papa was sitting beside me and said that I was tired and told me to go to sleep. Before I went to sleep, I saw a thick stretch of smoke in the direction of Moscow."
(1) - The Torchwood Institute of Infections was founded in 1950 after the infection began to appear in cases within the Great Britain. The First confirmed case - "Patient Zero" - appeared in Dover, the site of the original breakout.
(2) - Out of all the Infected Battles, the one in Moscow had the least amount of information about it.
(3) - The Russian State (also known as Siberia or Russia) released very little information regarding Moscow. As such, I presume that they do have information about it but are not willing to release it.
(4) - The Separate Coastal Army was first employed against the Germans during their attack Sevastopol in 1941 - '42. Later, the command of the Army was shifted to Admiral Oktyabrskiy merely because he was the most senior ranking officer in the State of the Crimea.