Chapter 435: The World Set on Fire, Part 1 – Hephaestus’s Forge
The world thought that evil had been defeated back in 1944. Everybody thought that with the Angeloi and the Rasas defeated, good had finally triumphed and humanity would finally set aside its war-torn past. But it was not to be. The Soviet Commune set in chain a motion of events that would, forty years later, plunge everybody back into the crucible of war. And now, there was no turning back. The world was at war again, and this time, the loose threads left hanging after the previous war would be tied up. There could only be one master of the world.
Varennikov moved to attack first. The Soviet Army was already the largest army in the world in terms of sheer numbers, outnumbering even the Chinese, Indian, and Roman armies, and most of it was concentrated in the Occupied Territories, where they had gained valuable experience suppressing anti-equalist demonstrations. The Heer, meanwhile, was spread across the Reich’s possessions around the world, and those stationed on the European border were woefully outnumbered and inexperienced. The General Staff knew about this disadvantage, and they had invested heavily into new tactics and better technology to offset it. GPS satellites helped the legions coordinate their response to the initial Soviet invasion, while superior weapons helped inflict massive casualties on the enemy. Although the equalist enemy had the element of surprise on its side, that only lasted for a day. By the end of November 25th, the Reich had scrambled its jets and bombers to retake the skies, while the legions regrouped and counterattacked. The disorganized Soviet divisions, based on outdated technology and not linked together with military satellites, were forced to retreat to the border. Encouraged by this development, the General Staff ordered Operation Hephaestus’s Forge—the liberation of East Germany and the relief of East Berlin—to commence.
A Roman tank near the East German border
As soon as they reached the border, twelve legions, totaling almost four hundred thousand men, were given the order to advance into the Occupied Territories. Roman artillery and jets began bombarding Soviet military installations in Bohemia, Carpathia, and East Germany. Tank and helicopter divisions charged ahead of the main armies and laid waste to the little Soviet resistance on the border. For the first time in forty years, Roman troops entered the Occupied Territories again, this time to liberate it.
Meanwhile, the General Staff launched Operation Prometheus, the plan to retake the northern Caucasus from the Soviets and establish a foothold to retake Taurica and capture Kiev. Here, there was only one legion of thirty thousand men ready to take orders, but the Soviet border was relatively undefended, and the legion was fully armed and ready to fight with the latest technology and tactics. The port city of Novorossiysk, formerly Bata, was the main objective. From there the Caucasian First Legion could retake Crimea and mainland Taurica.
On the seas, Megas Droungarios Chester Nimitz II, son of the World War II hero, mobilized the Kaiserliche Marine. Taking personal command of the Sixth Atlantic Fleet, he ordered the fleet and three others to sail from their ports in Frisia and northwest Germania to the Baltic, where they would lift the blockade of the Oresund and destroy the bulk of the Soviet Navy. All in all, over two hundred ships, including four carrier groups and several World War II-era battleships brought back into service, were deployed to retake the Baltic.
The forces deployed to fight the CSSR was only a fraction of the Reich’s total military strength. The CSSR, on the other hand, already had trouble funding its forces. The initial invasion did not bring the swift victory or Roman capitulation that many party leaders expected. Instead, the Soviet government filed for bankruptcy three days after the start of the war. Varennikov, though, did not slow down his offensive in any way. He merely used the bankruptcy declaration as an excuse to impose rationing on the people and extend martial law. When the Presidium and the Central Committee protested this, he sent troops to dissolve both entities. The Supreme Soviet, which he had previously staffed with yes-men, passed decrees declaring his actions legal. Varennikov had now shut down all opposition in the CSSR.
Now that the economy and internal affairs had been dealt with, Varennikov again turned to dealing with the Reich. He decided to concentrate his forces on the main land border between the Reich and the CSSR in mainland Europe: Bulgaria. The Reich would bleed its men dry in the Occupied Territories. Although Molotov’s official reason for establishing the Occupied Territories was to deromanize Europe, the Occupied Territories now served as an effective barrier between the CSSR and the Reich, meaning that the Reich would have to destroy its own claimed territory just to get to Russia. A thin strip of land running along the Black Sea coast served as a backdoor to the Occupied Territories. Varennikov’s troops thus stormed this corridor on the 29th, attacking the border city of Aegyssus. If the corridor fell, the rest of Bulgaria would also fall, encircling the Roman troops advancing through southern Wallachia and entering the suburbs of Bucharest. That would leave Constantinople wide open and defenseless. Varennikov knew that he had to take Constantinople as soon as possible to cripple the Reich before the Chinese and Indians could mobilize.
Further north, the main force of Operation Hephaestus’s Forge entered East Berlin on the 30th, where the first major battle of the war began between DDR and Roman troops. Although the DDR force outnumbered the Romans by seven thousand men, the Romans were better equipped and had more modern technology, while the DDR troops were mostly conscripts armed with outdated weapons and tactics. Roman troops also entered Bucharest, where they met little resistance from the locals, who welcomed them as saviors.
Roman tanks in Wallachia
While the Romans attacked three Occupied Territories capitals simultaneously, the Soviets continued their attack in the Balkans. Eighty thousand men now assaulted Aegyssus, with another twenty thousand reinforcements on the way. Another fourteen thousand men attacked a border town in Illyria, planning to drive down to the Adriatic coast and split the Reich in two (coincidentally, they planned to carry out this split at the town of Split). Another one hundred thousand men advanced towards Bucharest, vastly outnumbering the fourteen thousand Romans besieging it.
As December began, the UTR, while again affirming its separation from the Warsaw Pact, issued a declaration of war on the Kingdom of Kanata, bringing it into the war against the Central Powers forces. The Union politburo also agreed to send aid and military support to the Eimerican Commune and the CSSA in their wars against Fusang and Kanata. Varennikov also sent out envoys to Tenochtitlan, hoping that the mildly left-leaning but highly nationalistic Mexican government of Zolton Huicton would help the Warsaw Pact. His diplomats promised Zolton a share in the postwar spoils, offering the territories of Mayapan, the UPM, the Free Aztlan State, southern Fusang, and northern Tawantinsuyu to Mexico in exchange for entering the war on the Soviet side. Zolton, though, politely declined the offer, declaring Mexico’s neutrality in this war. He would instead send financial aid and equipment to the Warsaw Pact, as he was fiercely anti-Roman.
On December 2, Chancellor Jiang of China issued a general mobilization order, which had last been given during World War II. He called for all Chinese to do their “patriotic duty” and fight off the Soviet menace. Everything that the Chinese people had worked for now came to this fateful moment, when they were finally at war with the evil equalists. Jiang, though, was cautious in his strategy. The Soviets had been his people’s bogeyman for the last forty years, giving the junta legitimacy as the defender of Chinese civilization. If it was destroyed too quickly to be replaced, Jiang could have a real problem on his hands. He ordered his generals to come up with a plan that would both destroy the Soviets and give him a legitimate reason to continue the junta.
In the Reich, the economy geared up for total war. Important industries were encouraged to devote as many resources as possible to the war effort. Factories came to life on a scale not seen since World War II. Car factories began producing tanks and planes. Technology plants began producing satellite components, radios, and military computers. Kaiser Otto went on the air to speak to the people, calling for them to put aside their differences and their ambitions to defend the Reich and Roman civilization. Millions of Romans answered the call. Recruitment centers went into overdrive to process the thousands of men and women showing up every hour. Those who didn’t want to serve on the front lines instead applied for the Red Cross or other noncombatant roles. The Reich needed every citizen to participate in the war effort.
New recruits board a transport plane for the front lines
And yet there were still those who refused to support the war effort. The pacifist movement, despite being dramatically reduced due to the wave of patriotism and jingoism that swept over the Roman people, was still a significant force on student campuses, and protests took place in several major universities calling for a peaceful resolution to the war before nuclear weapons could be used by either side. Many students burned their draft cards as their parents had during the Siam War. There were also a few conscientious objectors in the armed forces. Unlike their predecessors in the last two world wars, their wishes were respected, and they were placed in noncombatant roles. They could still serve their country that way.
On the high seas, the Kaiserliche Marine entered the Oresund. The Soviet ships had withdrawn from the Oresund back to the Baltic coast, leaving a DDR fleet of fifty ships to guard the strategic passage. The Danes, seeking redemption for their role in the First World War and their subjugation in the Second World War, attacked the East German ships before the Roman fleets could get into position. Fortunately, the DDR ships were disorganized and outdated, and Nimitz II was surprised to arrive in the Oresund to see the Danes winning the battle, the Vikings’ modern longships effortlessly pushing back the enemy. Superior Roman firepower soon arrived to help finish off the East Germans. The carrier groups launched their fighters, which easily dispatched the Warsaw Pact MiGs over Denmark. Minesweepers disposed of the mines blocking the Kiel Canal, and more ships sailed up through the canal to flank the East German ships.
SMS Oberdonau opens fire with its main batteries during the Battle of Jutland, in what would be one of the last naval battles featuring battleships.
As the Battle of Jutland (the Danes insisted that the battle be called that to reflect their contributions there) raged, Empress Sita ordered the general mobilization of the Imperial Indian Armed Forces. Mobilization was a controversial move, as it had last been implemented during the reign of the madman Gandhi. But Sita emphasized that it was necessary, as the current Indian troops stationed in Turkestan and on the Caspian coast were not prepared to hold off the Soviet invasion without more reinforcements. The Turkish Army was barely enough to defend its own country, and the Chinese were busy in Siberia. If the Caspian was lost, that left Persia and Afghanistan, not to mention Turkestan, open to Soviet invasion. Then the Soviets could push down to the Gulf and into the Punjab and Mesopotamia. The draft was needed to hold the line against the enemy.
Sita’s mobilization order, as expected, caused panic in the Indian economy. The Indian economy was not as easily geared towards total war as the Roman economy was. The prevailing mood in Indian society at the time was that war was bad and that India should forsake militarism. Nobody wanted a return to the madness of Gandhi forty years ago. But here it was again. India was at war again, against the Soviets again no less. Investors sold off stocks in large numbers, precipitating a collapse of the Indian stock market. Mumbai’s stock exchange crashed just a week after the order was announced, throwing the Indian economy—and mobilization efforts—into disarray.
The collapse of Mumbai’s stock exchange had consequences that rippled across the economies of the free world. Inflation skyrocketed, driving up prices and reducing the value of currencies. The Roman economy was not spared. Anticipating that the same thing could happen to the Frankfurt stock exchange, Kohl quickly approved a fiscal stimulus package to prevent the economy from tanking too much, hoping to ride out the storm.
More Soviet troops advanced through the Black Sea corridor. There were now over two hundred and fifty thousand troops assaulting the fortifications along the coast, while another hundred thousand troops advanced towards Bucharest. Megas Domestikos Mihailo Princip gave the order to retreat into southern Bulgaria, but the legion in Bucharest came under attack before it could retreat. Within days, over half of the legion was killed, and the survivors were trapped in the city as Soviet artillery and air support blasted away at their positions, indiscriminately killing civilians around them. Another legion on the border successfully retreated in time.
Further north, Operation Hephaestus’s Forge gained its first success at Meiningen, the first Occupied Territories city to be liberated. The occupation took just two and a half weeks, thanks to the locals helping throw out the East German garrison and welcoming the Roman liberators with open arms. More victories would soon follow. The Soviet Army and its DDR henchmen were nowhere to be seen. However, Roman satellites and spy planes showed that the bulk of the Soviet Army was concentrated in Siberia and in the Balkans, with a few divisions attacking Illyria and Austria.
Worse was to come further south. In Dacia, the trapped Roman legion in Bucharest was massacred to the last man, and large parts of the city were reduced to rubble. Only 913 out of over a hundred and twenty thousand Soviets were killed. Fifteen thousand men, the entire main legion in the eastern Balkans, had been annihilated. Four days later, Aegyssus was the first Roman theme to fall to the CSSR.
Things weren’t that bad, though. Operation Hephaestus’s Forge was a huge success in both East Germany and Bohemia. Several cities had already been liberated, and dozens more would follow soon enough. Roman troops pushed into Prague, while the bulk of the liberation force approached the suburbs of East Berlin. The Reich met little resistance here. If they could just retake East Germany and crush Poland and Bohemia before the Soviets steamrolled into Illyria and Bulgaria, they might be able to force Varennikov to come to terms. In the north, Finnish and Tsarist troops advanced through Karelia, and the latter consolidated its hold over the Kola region while the Finns advanced towards Leningrad. Kanatan reinforcements were ready to back up the attack on Leningrad.
Finnish and Tsarist tank divisions coordinating an offensive against Soviet defenses north of Leningrad
On the high seas, the Battle of Jutland was a resounding Central Powers success. Admiral Miklos Horthy II, commanding a joint Roman-Kanatan-Danish fleet, oversaw the routing of the DDR forces, sinking over sixty percent of the enemy fleet. Thirty-one ships lay at the bottom of the Oresund as Christmas approached. Twenty-one Kanatan and Danish ships were sunk on the Central Powers side, two of them transports that had gotten in the way.
However, that all changed on the afternoon of December 22, when Varennikov ordered Operation Danube Liberation to begin. With the bulk of Roman forces concentrated in either East Germany or Bulgaria, the General Staff was caught unprepared when tens of thousands of Soviet troops and armor divisions attacked the Roman forces in Pressburg. The real Warsaw Pact offensive came in Austria and the Balkans, where numerous Carpathian, Dacian, Bohemian, and Soviet divisions punched through the Roman lines and invaded Austria just west of Vienna, easily brushing aside the weak police units. With their southern flank clear, hundreds of thousands of Soviets blitzed into the barely defended Illyrian and Bulgarian borders, easily destroying local Imperial Guard units and police. Roman troops attacking Pressburg and Budapest suddenly found their supply lines cut off by Soviet jets asserting superiority over Austria and Illyria.
Vienna was under siege yet again.
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