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Maybe Soviet infiltration of the British establishment has been more successful in this timeline. A thousand Kim Philby's, all beavering away against the nation.
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What do you mean? When have the Soviets ever inflitrated any foreign establishment in our and this timeline?
Yes it will be interesting, also the focus of the Comintern do increase communist support in UK. For now the wars in the Middle East the focus, but perhaps we will see how Britain is fearing against Soviet subversions in near updates
Chapter 35.
Chapter 35: Desert Storm.
Retreating Iraqis.
The bullets snapped over their heads, the explosions in the distance quaked the ground. The little armor and vehicles they owned were being picked down by dive bombers. They dived from the clouds firing rockets or autocannons with great precision either on tanks or anti-aircraft guns. Once they vanished into the clouds a second set of larger bombers carpet bombed their axis indiscriminate. Death and carnage was everywhere. Soldiers were fleeing away from the frontlines and the convoys leaving their charcoaled brothers in arms behind and tons of equipment. Some reorganized to put up a fight and crossed into no man's land, but they were taken apart by the armor, machine guns, AA and AT guns positioned on the far side. Once they were pinned down in the open desert the Katyusha rockets opened up and left nothing but desolation. It was five day into the war. The Iraqi defenders were in full retreat in the face of a superior and uncomprosmising enemy toward British Kuwait and Transjordan. But they only had one highway to advance one highway on. This highway was under unwavering enemy bombardment from land and air. It would simply become known as Death's Highway.
Trotsky is turning Iraq into a parking lot for his armored forces.
The Soviets gathered evidence of Iraq violating the treaty they held with the USSR and the Allies. The treaty stipulated that free elections were to be held in Iraq and all parties were allowed. However following the success of the Iraqi Communist Party and the Soviet aggression in Afghanistan and Iran the members of the party faced mass persecution - led on by American and British special operators. Surviving Iraqi communists fled to the now Soviet occupied Iran and instigated terrorist attacks into their homeland. British authorities assured the Iraqi government they would stand by their side in case of a conflict with the USSR. Following the line of the Anglo-American alliance the Iraqi boycotted the entire Internationale for their aggression against peace. Things got out of control. Right wing elements in the Iraqi military leadership agitated for war with British support against the USSR (both to prevent an outright invasion and to take Arabistan from Iran) and shots rang through Bagdad. The Golden Circle failed in a military coup. However they managed to take control of several border units and shots were reported to fired into Iran. The Soviets didn't let this opportunity pass. They demanded British troops to end their "occupation of Iraq" and to restore democracy in Iraq and open up the oil cranes again. They were given a two week deadline. Iraq was close to accepting it, but they were assured by the local British commanders in two week's time they would manage to muster a sizable fleet and expeditionary to make the Soviets think twice. Furthermore, the British commander argued, the Soviet Union giving a two week deadline was a hint of the Soviet military not being ready for yet another invasion, and British intelligence reported the Red Army was busy occupying Iran and nothing hinted of an invasion, and that wanted peace rather than war. He was wrong. It was all a ruse. The Soviets had prepared for the war before the minor crisis, even before the invasion of Afghanistan. Their units had moved into position in secrecy and already knew exactly what to do. On the 9th of September 06:33 local time, not even 24 hours into the deadline, Bagdad was bombed. The Royal Palace was targeted hoping to decapitate the Iraqi leadership. In the and confusion disarray NKVD commandos and Iraqi communists blew up radio stations, warehouses, mined roads and attacked local government officials. Then a massive bomber fleet followed bombing all major cities, roads and airports while fighter bombers and light bombers attacked moving and stationary Iraqi units. Iraq war covered in flames and smoke.
It's on.
Midnight to the 10th Soviet troops recieved their order to attack. Soviet officers fired flare guns that illuminated the Iraqi defenders and added the shock and fear into their attack as thousands of armored vehicles crossed the borders led on by tons of artillery shells and rockets. Soviet fighter bombers flew right past them and blasted with their autocannons and bombs denying any Iraqi advance - or retreat. The British had two airbases in Iraq and these were labeled as high value targets. The British was given the ultimatum to evacuate their personell within morning or they would be caught in the crossfire. The British were stoic however and stayed their ground. The British commander requested the local British forces were to engage the Soviets head on, stalling their massive assault waiting for a coordinated relief force. But the reply never came. Reports flooded in from British advisors and observers that the Iraqi forces was falling behind on every front, one reported "all I see is fire". Soviet armored forces spearheaded straight past the Iraqi static forces, the tactics they developed in Afghanistan and Iran was being utilized to its fullest in the flat terrains of Iraq. The deadline for the British expired and no answer was recieved. On the horizon Soviet Pe light bombers appeared heading straight toward the British base. The British officer remarked that the Soviet pilot didn't fire, instead he fled lowly toward them and gestured them to evacuate the command post. Then he turned around in an exaggerated motion and destroyed the command post on the ground. If this was a noble gesture or one to prevent escalation is up to debate. Hours later the British recieved their order: Evacuate.
The Iraqis were woefully unprepared for war.
The Iraqis was unprepared for the war, and they were on their own. Their strategy involved holding out long enough for the Allies to meditate a peace or intervene. But they would be left in the same position as Iran and Afghanistan; help never came, they were on their own. This would later be called "the Western Betrayal". The British was afterall not this all powerful and omnipresent Empire. The Iraqi bravely mustered their defenses, but with no airforce or armored force to speak of they were no match for the Soviet onslaught. The war neared its third day and Bagdad was within artillery range being pounded from the air and the ground. All over the front Iraqis mustered brave counterattacks, but were subsequently slaughtered. Only in Basrah and further north on a crossing to the vital Tigris river the Iraqi managed to put up some sort if resistance. However they were resoundly beaten back time and time again on the flat desert terrain. To the north in Kurdistan the Iraqi Army and Kurdish militas (excelling in mountain warfare) envisioned a staliant defense in the mountains, holding off the Soviet thrusts toward Mosul and Bagdad. However the Soviets mastered Deep Operations, or Blitzkrieg as it was called by the westerns, and totally ignored them. Their was no operational value in getting bogged up in fighting some mountain troops, these strongholds would be bypassed. The real value was to end the war.
Soviet tank destroyers create the first ever traffic jam in Iraq.
However the massive assault had its limitations in the mostly feudal country. A Soviet tank commander remarked sarcastic "what hold us up is not enemy fire, but traffic jams created by us" and it was a truth to it. The Soviet invasion force got held up due to logistics and the poor infrastructure in Iraq (which had been mostly been destroyed by the Soviet invasion force), there was only sporadic attacks on the Soviet ground forces. The artillery and air force dealt with the Iraqi army in the distance putting up a barrage fire that denied entry toward the Soviet convoys. However Soviet armor was specifically designed to have great crossroad abilities, especially the new T-44. So why didn't they cross the deserts? They were afraid of mines and unforseen Iraqi threats such as imported British and American tanks. But once the engineers and recce teams found no signs of such things the Soviet armored force spread out and attacked with full speed ahead, quoting Patton "lead me, follow me, or get the helld out of my way".
In mother Russia we're used to not having roads and bridges.
But by the Tigris the Iraqis was putting up a resistance. Local commanders realized, saying local as the Iraqi command structure collapsed there was no command and control efforts to speak of, the Tigris river was a vital crossing point. If it was crossed the fertile crescent would fall. Moreover it would enable the Soviets to hold the Euphrates making it impossible for an Iraqi relief into the crescent and in turn encircle both Bagdad and Basrah. The capital couldn't fall, and neither could Basrah the vital port city and only means for a foreign relief force (the Iraqis still believed the British would arrive in full force to Basrah and Kuwait from India). The local Iraqis put up a harsh resistance. Over a bridge anti-tank guns and recoiless rifles were positioned to strike at the incoming Soviet armor crossing the bridge. But they knew standing up head on to the Soviet tanks would be doom. Instead they waited for the first Soviet recon tanks and T-44s to cross the bridge and into the village. Then they blew up the bridge and attacked the forward elements trapped in the village while mortar strikes and AT weapons fired across the bank. The Soviets suffered casualties. Two T-60s had to be abondoned, but the T-44s held up and fought their way out of the village. Soon the village was leveled by rockets and bombers. And to the shock of the Iraqis they saw Soviet tanks cross the river by sea, while others covered them from the far side of the river with engineers setting up an improvised bridge. "It was then I realized we had lost this war from the very beginning" the Iraqi commander said.
Baghad have fallen.
On the 14th Bagdad itself was reached. The city had for days been bombarded with barrages and from the air. The city was left in ruins, but still the Soviet commanders dreaaded the moment they had to engage in close quarters in the metropolitan. The plan actually detailed for the city to be besieged and forced to surrender. However one daring Soviet armored-recon battalion commander realized this would give the Iraqis an oppurtunity to organize their defense, their entire war plan relied upon a swift victory to give neither the Iraqi nor the Allies a chance to organize and mount a defense. He instead reported that he were to probe the defenses of the city, instead he attacked. He drove all the way to the heart of the city where he came under heavy fire. He reported back and the rest of the Mechanized Corps followed in with their T-34s, T-44s and LT-3s and APCs. They took control of the city center and the King of Iraq, but was under heavy fire. 10 Rifle Divisions rushed into the city center, and after a few hours of fighting the city was put under the control of the Iraqi communists and the local police force. It was a short blitz into the city center with great improvisation. A battle that was expected to cost thousands of lives and last for weeks ended with the loss a handful of Soviets and within a few hours. It was if nothing happened.
Another key strategic point will fall.
Further to the south the Iraqi still held the Tigris river despite several Soviet units managing to cross it. This enabled a cordinated Iraqi retreat toward Basrah and Kuwait, however this would result in severe Soviet bombardment and air raids giving the retreat route the name of "Death's Highway". In Basrah the Iraqi forces were fighting valiantly, but the Soviet pressure was immense. A cavalry engaged in the battle, taking advantage in the holes created by the armored forces and filled the gaps with Soviet infantrists as the normal infantrists couldn't keep up with the armor and keep up the momentum. It was only a matter of time before Basrah would fall and seal the southern theater for ever.
The first Soviet troops to enter took a picture of Mosul before its destruction.
Meanwhile to the north the Soviet forces disregarded the stalwart Iraqi defenses. Instead they drove straight toward Mosul. Unlike the commanders in Bagdad they didn't want a siege of the city, but neither did they want a deadly close quarters battle. Instead on the approaches into Mosul all hel reigned upon the ancient city leaving it to nothing but ruins. Soviet troops and armor assaulted the ruined city from the farside of the river.
And now Mosul fell..
After intense bombardment from air and land the city fell. The Iraqi and Kurdish defenses was decimated and the Soviet armored forces took control of the area. The area was pacified with Iraqi and Kurdish communist support and the Soviet soldiers was only given time to eat before they were again on the move. Having not slept or rested for days they were given "tank candy" to keep them awake and focused as they moved south to secure the crossings of the Euphrates, completely boxing in the remainder of Iraqi army.
And then Basrah, now it is nothing left in Iraq but sand. And oil of course, but that is not that important..
Two days later Basrah fell. The British contigent in Kuwait was put on high alert and even raided into the contested area. If Kuwait fell it would spell disaster for the British. But the Soviets weren't interested in starting a world war over Kuwait. They were quick to start to cross into the Iraqi heartland from the Euphrates with five mechanized corps crossing the river. The battered and weakened Iraqi division was no match for the battle hardened and technologically superior Soviet tanks. Now for the first time they were supported by the Rifle Divisions who hadn't got into battle yet. "Today is a good day to be an infantrists! No more waiting, now we will show what we are made of!" a Division commander told his men as they attacked the Iraqi defenders in full force. The interior of Iraq was to fall, making a substantial operational success for the Red Army as they were no longer hindered by the Euphrates and Tigris. One cavarly division advanced to the north west along the Euphrates river to take on the retreating Iraqi forces along Death's Highway and secure the eastern crossing of the Euphrates, a Rifle Division was tasked with protecting the weakened Mechanized Corps who took Basrah after intense fighting while five fresh mechanized corps would go to the west and encircle the Iraqi Army
Soviet bombardment of Iraqi positions.
The war was coming to an end. Aggressive and highly mobile Soviet armored units spearheaded the assaults and decacipated the Iraqi forces, while the Rifle Divisions mopped up the defenders. The Soviet forces were highly effective and mass Iraqi desertions were commonplace. A Soviet mechanized infantrist wrote, dissapointed, about his experiences in the war. "We sat in the back of the cramped up BTR for days and days. We sat their with our legs and backs aching. We slept in it, we ate in it we even did our things in it. We were supposed to support our armor, but we never got the chance. Only the machine gunner and the driver got some sporadic action. We were always on the move, we couldn't take any stops to rest or camp or whatever, we had to be on the move constantly. Even when the APC or armor stopped we had to sit in the back cramped up to not lose any time. We sat there, literally just sat there, for days without an end. The only time we got out was when one of the men went mental and shouted he had to "get out get out get out". We looked to the horizon and saw a mighty sight taking us all by awe, the entire horizon was covered in smoke and explosions".
The mop up begins.
20:00 local time on the fighting was in reality over. The operational plans was altered to move toward the British border and trap any Iraqi units who were in the crossfire. The secondary objective was to totally pacify Death's Highway. It was in these last fights that the first true Soviet casualties mounted. The infantrists were softer targets the Iraqis actually managed to take on. Meanwhile in their pursuit of total aggression there was no rearguards to speak, no one to protect their flanks and supply lines. Iraqi soldiers and militias who had been bypassed attacked these supply convoys. Yet it was nothing compared to the losses on the Iraqi side.
Iraq fell, not really a shocker.
On the 19th of September the last of the Iraqi forces surrendered to the Red Army, who in turn installed the Assyrian Yusuf Salman Yusuf as the leader of Iraq. Officially democracy was restored to Iraq and British Imperialism was ended. However in reality it had all been replaced by Soviet occupation and imperialism. The Southern Thrust Strategic Operation was a major success. Iraq fell in less than 10 days with minimal Soviet casualties. Meanwhile the Allies were paralyzed unable to take advantage of the situation and stop the Soviets diplomatically or by force. However a Third World War with the Soviet Union was not wanted by most of the public nor politicians and even soldiers in Britain or America, a mere year following the conclusion of the Second World War. The Soviets had proven the superiority of their offensive doctrines and their T-44 and LT tanks, tanks the Allies had nothing to counter with. In many ways these wars can be looked upon as live exercises toward a war against the Allies, and as a show of power and testing Allied commitment toward Soviet containment.
53000 casualties in the invasions, after WW2 50.000 may not seem as high casualties.
During the Southern Thrust Strategic Operation the Soviets suffered around 53.420 casualties, the majority of them being wounded soldiers. Soviet forces proved they mastered the art of war and could take down entire nations in a matter of days with low casualties. Still lest not forget the fates of those poor souls who fell. In Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq local governments was installed and tasked with running the day to day governance under Soviet "guidance and protection". The decorated heroes, generals and marshals of the invasion returned home to the USSR being welcomed by a parade. It was as if the brutal Soviet invasions to secure their strategic goals and oil supply was over. But while the western world was shocked by such a display of force and paralyzed, and the communist world cheered the return of the heroes the Soviet armies in the Ukraine and in the Middle East turned their eyes. Their gaze was set on the Bosphorous and the Dardanelles...
Soviet soldier inspecting Death's Highway.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
After these rather intense invasions the focus will go a little back toward the Post War settlement of China, and then we'll move forward again looking at 1944.
Now I wonder, are the Allies in the right to avoid war by letting the USSR having a field day?
Retreating Iraqis.
The bullets snapped over their heads, the explosions in the distance quaked the ground. The little armor and vehicles they owned were being picked down by dive bombers. They dived from the clouds firing rockets or autocannons with great precision either on tanks or anti-aircraft guns. Once they vanished into the clouds a second set of larger bombers carpet bombed their axis indiscriminate. Death and carnage was everywhere. Soldiers were fleeing away from the frontlines and the convoys leaving their charcoaled brothers in arms behind and tons of equipment. Some reorganized to put up a fight and crossed into no man's land, but they were taken apart by the armor, machine guns, AA and AT guns positioned on the far side. Once they were pinned down in the open desert the Katyusha rockets opened up and left nothing but desolation. It was five day into the war. The Iraqi defenders were in full retreat in the face of a superior and uncomprosmising enemy toward British Kuwait and Transjordan. But they only had one highway to advance one highway on. This highway was under unwavering enemy bombardment from land and air. It would simply become known as Death's Highway.
Trotsky is turning Iraq into a parking lot for his armored forces.
The Soviets gathered evidence of Iraq violating the treaty they held with the USSR and the Allies. The treaty stipulated that free elections were to be held in Iraq and all parties were allowed. However following the success of the Iraqi Communist Party and the Soviet aggression in Afghanistan and Iran the members of the party faced mass persecution - led on by American and British special operators. Surviving Iraqi communists fled to the now Soviet occupied Iran and instigated terrorist attacks into their homeland. British authorities assured the Iraqi government they would stand by their side in case of a conflict with the USSR. Following the line of the Anglo-American alliance the Iraqi boycotted the entire Internationale for their aggression against peace. Things got out of control. Right wing elements in the Iraqi military leadership agitated for war with British support against the USSR (both to prevent an outright invasion and to take Arabistan from Iran) and shots rang through Bagdad. The Golden Circle failed in a military coup. However they managed to take control of several border units and shots were reported to fired into Iran. The Soviets didn't let this opportunity pass. They demanded British troops to end their "occupation of Iraq" and to restore democracy in Iraq and open up the oil cranes again. They were given a two week deadline. Iraq was close to accepting it, but they were assured by the local British commanders in two week's time they would manage to muster a sizable fleet and expeditionary to make the Soviets think twice. Furthermore, the British commander argued, the Soviet Union giving a two week deadline was a hint of the Soviet military not being ready for yet another invasion, and British intelligence reported the Red Army was busy occupying Iran and nothing hinted of an invasion, and that wanted peace rather than war. He was wrong. It was all a ruse. The Soviets had prepared for the war before the minor crisis, even before the invasion of Afghanistan. Their units had moved into position in secrecy and already knew exactly what to do. On the 9th of September 06:33 local time, not even 24 hours into the deadline, Bagdad was bombed. The Royal Palace was targeted hoping to decapitate the Iraqi leadership. In the and confusion disarray NKVD commandos and Iraqi communists blew up radio stations, warehouses, mined roads and attacked local government officials. Then a massive bomber fleet followed bombing all major cities, roads and airports while fighter bombers and light bombers attacked moving and stationary Iraqi units. Iraq war covered in flames and smoke.
It's on.
Midnight to the 10th Soviet troops recieved their order to attack. Soviet officers fired flare guns that illuminated the Iraqi defenders and added the shock and fear into their attack as thousands of armored vehicles crossed the borders led on by tons of artillery shells and rockets. Soviet fighter bombers flew right past them and blasted with their autocannons and bombs denying any Iraqi advance - or retreat. The British had two airbases in Iraq and these were labeled as high value targets. The British was given the ultimatum to evacuate their personell within morning or they would be caught in the crossfire. The British were stoic however and stayed their ground. The British commander requested the local British forces were to engage the Soviets head on, stalling their massive assault waiting for a coordinated relief force. But the reply never came. Reports flooded in from British advisors and observers that the Iraqi forces was falling behind on every front, one reported "all I see is fire". Soviet armored forces spearheaded straight past the Iraqi static forces, the tactics they developed in Afghanistan and Iran was being utilized to its fullest in the flat terrains of Iraq. The deadline for the British expired and no answer was recieved. On the horizon Soviet Pe light bombers appeared heading straight toward the British base. The British officer remarked that the Soviet pilot didn't fire, instead he fled lowly toward them and gestured them to evacuate the command post. Then he turned around in an exaggerated motion and destroyed the command post on the ground. If this was a noble gesture or one to prevent escalation is up to debate. Hours later the British recieved their order: Evacuate.
The Iraqis were woefully unprepared for war.
The Iraqis was unprepared for the war, and they were on their own. Their strategy involved holding out long enough for the Allies to meditate a peace or intervene. But they would be left in the same position as Iran and Afghanistan; help never came, they were on their own. This would later be called "the Western Betrayal". The British was afterall not this all powerful and omnipresent Empire. The Iraqi bravely mustered their defenses, but with no airforce or armored force to speak of they were no match for the Soviet onslaught. The war neared its third day and Bagdad was within artillery range being pounded from the air and the ground. All over the front Iraqis mustered brave counterattacks, but were subsequently slaughtered. Only in Basrah and further north on a crossing to the vital Tigris river the Iraqi managed to put up some sort if resistance. However they were resoundly beaten back time and time again on the flat desert terrain. To the north in Kurdistan the Iraqi Army and Kurdish militas (excelling in mountain warfare) envisioned a staliant defense in the mountains, holding off the Soviet thrusts toward Mosul and Bagdad. However the Soviets mastered Deep Operations, or Blitzkrieg as it was called by the westerns, and totally ignored them. Their was no operational value in getting bogged up in fighting some mountain troops, these strongholds would be bypassed. The real value was to end the war.
Soviet tank destroyers create the first ever traffic jam in Iraq.
However the massive assault had its limitations in the mostly feudal country. A Soviet tank commander remarked sarcastic "what hold us up is not enemy fire, but traffic jams created by us" and it was a truth to it. The Soviet invasion force got held up due to logistics and the poor infrastructure in Iraq (which had been mostly been destroyed by the Soviet invasion force), there was only sporadic attacks on the Soviet ground forces. The artillery and air force dealt with the Iraqi army in the distance putting up a barrage fire that denied entry toward the Soviet convoys. However Soviet armor was specifically designed to have great crossroad abilities, especially the new T-44. So why didn't they cross the deserts? They were afraid of mines and unforseen Iraqi threats such as imported British and American tanks. But once the engineers and recce teams found no signs of such things the Soviet armored force spread out and attacked with full speed ahead, quoting Patton "lead me, follow me, or get the helld out of my way".
In mother Russia we're used to not having roads and bridges.
But by the Tigris the Iraqis was putting up a resistance. Local commanders realized, saying local as the Iraqi command structure collapsed there was no command and control efforts to speak of, the Tigris river was a vital crossing point. If it was crossed the fertile crescent would fall. Moreover it would enable the Soviets to hold the Euphrates making it impossible for an Iraqi relief into the crescent and in turn encircle both Bagdad and Basrah. The capital couldn't fall, and neither could Basrah the vital port city and only means for a foreign relief force (the Iraqis still believed the British would arrive in full force to Basrah and Kuwait from India). The local Iraqis put up a harsh resistance. Over a bridge anti-tank guns and recoiless rifles were positioned to strike at the incoming Soviet armor crossing the bridge. But they knew standing up head on to the Soviet tanks would be doom. Instead they waited for the first Soviet recon tanks and T-44s to cross the bridge and into the village. Then they blew up the bridge and attacked the forward elements trapped in the village while mortar strikes and AT weapons fired across the bank. The Soviets suffered casualties. Two T-60s had to be abondoned, but the T-44s held up and fought their way out of the village. Soon the village was leveled by rockets and bombers. And to the shock of the Iraqis they saw Soviet tanks cross the river by sea, while others covered them from the far side of the river with engineers setting up an improvised bridge. "It was then I realized we had lost this war from the very beginning" the Iraqi commander said.
Baghad have fallen.
On the 14th Bagdad itself was reached. The city had for days been bombarded with barrages and from the air. The city was left in ruins, but still the Soviet commanders dreaaded the moment they had to engage in close quarters in the metropolitan. The plan actually detailed for the city to be besieged and forced to surrender. However one daring Soviet armored-recon battalion commander realized this would give the Iraqis an oppurtunity to organize their defense, their entire war plan relied upon a swift victory to give neither the Iraqi nor the Allies a chance to organize and mount a defense. He instead reported that he were to probe the defenses of the city, instead he attacked. He drove all the way to the heart of the city where he came under heavy fire. He reported back and the rest of the Mechanized Corps followed in with their T-34s, T-44s and LT-3s and APCs. They took control of the city center and the King of Iraq, but was under heavy fire. 10 Rifle Divisions rushed into the city center, and after a few hours of fighting the city was put under the control of the Iraqi communists and the local police force. It was a short blitz into the city center with great improvisation. A battle that was expected to cost thousands of lives and last for weeks ended with the loss a handful of Soviets and within a few hours. It was if nothing happened.
Another key strategic point will fall.
Further to the south the Iraqi still held the Tigris river despite several Soviet units managing to cross it. This enabled a cordinated Iraqi retreat toward Basrah and Kuwait, however this would result in severe Soviet bombardment and air raids giving the retreat route the name of "Death's Highway". In Basrah the Iraqi forces were fighting valiantly, but the Soviet pressure was immense. A cavalry engaged in the battle, taking advantage in the holes created by the armored forces and filled the gaps with Soviet infantrists as the normal infantrists couldn't keep up with the armor and keep up the momentum. It was only a matter of time before Basrah would fall and seal the southern theater for ever.
The first Soviet troops to enter took a picture of Mosul before its destruction.
Meanwhile to the north the Soviet forces disregarded the stalwart Iraqi defenses. Instead they drove straight toward Mosul. Unlike the commanders in Bagdad they didn't want a siege of the city, but neither did they want a deadly close quarters battle. Instead on the approaches into Mosul all hel reigned upon the ancient city leaving it to nothing but ruins. Soviet troops and armor assaulted the ruined city from the farside of the river.
And now Mosul fell..
After intense bombardment from air and land the city fell. The Iraqi and Kurdish defenses was decimated and the Soviet armored forces took control of the area. The area was pacified with Iraqi and Kurdish communist support and the Soviet soldiers was only given time to eat before they were again on the move. Having not slept or rested for days they were given "tank candy" to keep them awake and focused as they moved south to secure the crossings of the Euphrates, completely boxing in the remainder of Iraqi army.
And then Basrah, now it is nothing left in Iraq but sand. And oil of course, but that is not that important..
Two days later Basrah fell. The British contigent in Kuwait was put on high alert and even raided into the contested area. If Kuwait fell it would spell disaster for the British. But the Soviets weren't interested in starting a world war over Kuwait. They were quick to start to cross into the Iraqi heartland from the Euphrates with five mechanized corps crossing the river. The battered and weakened Iraqi division was no match for the battle hardened and technologically superior Soviet tanks. Now for the first time they were supported by the Rifle Divisions who hadn't got into battle yet. "Today is a good day to be an infantrists! No more waiting, now we will show what we are made of!" a Division commander told his men as they attacked the Iraqi defenders in full force. The interior of Iraq was to fall, making a substantial operational success for the Red Army as they were no longer hindered by the Euphrates and Tigris. One cavarly division advanced to the north west along the Euphrates river to take on the retreating Iraqi forces along Death's Highway and secure the eastern crossing of the Euphrates, a Rifle Division was tasked with protecting the weakened Mechanized Corps who took Basrah after intense fighting while five fresh mechanized corps would go to the west and encircle the Iraqi Army
Soviet bombardment of Iraqi positions.
The war was coming to an end. Aggressive and highly mobile Soviet armored units spearheaded the assaults and decacipated the Iraqi forces, while the Rifle Divisions mopped up the defenders. The Soviet forces were highly effective and mass Iraqi desertions were commonplace. A Soviet mechanized infantrist wrote, dissapointed, about his experiences in the war. "We sat in the back of the cramped up BTR for days and days. We sat their with our legs and backs aching. We slept in it, we ate in it we even did our things in it. We were supposed to support our armor, but we never got the chance. Only the machine gunner and the driver got some sporadic action. We were always on the move, we couldn't take any stops to rest or camp or whatever, we had to be on the move constantly. Even when the APC or armor stopped we had to sit in the back cramped up to not lose any time. We sat there, literally just sat there, for days without an end. The only time we got out was when one of the men went mental and shouted he had to "get out get out get out". We looked to the horizon and saw a mighty sight taking us all by awe, the entire horizon was covered in smoke and explosions".
The mop up begins.
20:00 local time on the fighting was in reality over. The operational plans was altered to move toward the British border and trap any Iraqi units who were in the crossfire. The secondary objective was to totally pacify Death's Highway. It was in these last fights that the first true Soviet casualties mounted. The infantrists were softer targets the Iraqis actually managed to take on. Meanwhile in their pursuit of total aggression there was no rearguards to speak, no one to protect their flanks and supply lines. Iraqi soldiers and militias who had been bypassed attacked these supply convoys. Yet it was nothing compared to the losses on the Iraqi side.
Iraq fell, not really a shocker.
On the 19th of September the last of the Iraqi forces surrendered to the Red Army, who in turn installed the Assyrian Yusuf Salman Yusuf as the leader of Iraq. Officially democracy was restored to Iraq and British Imperialism was ended. However in reality it had all been replaced by Soviet occupation and imperialism. The Southern Thrust Strategic Operation was a major success. Iraq fell in less than 10 days with minimal Soviet casualties. Meanwhile the Allies were paralyzed unable to take advantage of the situation and stop the Soviets diplomatically or by force. However a Third World War with the Soviet Union was not wanted by most of the public nor politicians and even soldiers in Britain or America, a mere year following the conclusion of the Second World War. The Soviets had proven the superiority of their offensive doctrines and their T-44 and LT tanks, tanks the Allies had nothing to counter with. In many ways these wars can be looked upon as live exercises toward a war against the Allies, and as a show of power and testing Allied commitment toward Soviet containment.
53000 casualties in the invasions, after WW2 50.000 may not seem as high casualties.
During the Southern Thrust Strategic Operation the Soviets suffered around 53.420 casualties, the majority of them being wounded soldiers. Soviet forces proved they mastered the art of war and could take down entire nations in a matter of days with low casualties. Still lest not forget the fates of those poor souls who fell. In Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq local governments was installed and tasked with running the day to day governance under Soviet "guidance and protection". The decorated heroes, generals and marshals of the invasion returned home to the USSR being welcomed by a parade. It was as if the brutal Soviet invasions to secure their strategic goals and oil supply was over. But while the western world was shocked by such a display of force and paralyzed, and the communist world cheered the return of the heroes the Soviet armies in the Ukraine and in the Middle East turned their eyes. Their gaze was set on the Bosphorous and the Dardanelles...
Soviet soldier inspecting Death's Highway.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
After these rather intense invasions the focus will go a little back toward the Post War settlement of China, and then we'll move forward again looking at 1944.
Now I wonder, are the Allies in the right to avoid war by letting the USSR having a field day?
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I imagine the desert borders could get rather tense now - not to mention the NW Frontier of the Raj.
Why? I suppose Britain and the Raj won't mind being surrounded by Commies in Europe and the Middle East
but yes, it is a tense world, like a rubberband reaching its limit, it remain to be seen when it bursts.
I'm honestly surprised the Allies didn't attack you. You had better be careful, considering fighting against Britain means a multi-front war.
Welcome to the forums, and believe me I am really surprised too. I was just waiting for the UK or anyone else to intervene, but my gamble turned out to be safe in the end. I just had to really rush into the wars and take victory points and don't care for much else. Now Britain will obviously not be any issue for the glorious USSR.
Okay they might be a hindarence, all I hope for us that my puppet states can work as buffer states. But UK have focuses that grant them wargoals against communist Scandinavian, Benelux and Middle-Eastern countries. So we'll see who declares war first.
At least it will make for good reading!Welcome to the forums, and believe me I am really surprised too. I was just waiting for the UK or anyone else to intervene, but my gamble turned out to be safe in the end. I just had to really rush into the wars and take victory points and don't care for much else. Now Britain will obviously not be any issue for the glorious USSR.
You utter twit.
At this point...well, it depends really. It could become an exceptionally nasty ground and air war in the Middle East that might even spread into India and Russia. On the other hand, the Allies at this point have basically admitted they don't exist anymore as a unified military force and are now just defending their own (literal) turf and that's it. So Syria might well go smoothly. Turkey...I think would be a step too far for right now but who know? The British are the only ones who can stop you right now. The Americans are far too far away and are quite unconcerned with imperial matters in the Middle East (they probably don't quite realise exactly how much oil is there...since no one at the time did).
Good points. If IIRC Saudi Arabia and US became friends in 44 or 45. Syria is part of the Allies, Turkey isn't. So USSR have claims against Turkey, but need to justify. If the Allies guarantee Turkey, the USSR will back down. If not, It's war.
At this point I suspect that the Soviets could be at the gates of Westminster and the British still wouldn't declare war.
Haha brilliant, perhaps we should give it a try down the line
Indeed, that was always the fear OTL, that the Russians would invade Europe in such a way that it would be impossible to combat them. Salami tactics, that sort of thing. Using such methods, they could get to the English Channel disturbing easily. Even in our own timeline, Western Europe was not held very strongly by NATO. In this timeline, the pretence of security has simply never been put in place. The only thing stopping the complete collapses of the allies in Europe is the fact that Russia cannot easily invade the U.K. And never quickly enough to get a surrender without an intense fight.
So I forget this AAR for a couple of weeks, and suddenly the world is all but red. Good job.
Yes it will be intense. UK and US have a stronger navy, but can they withstand a surprise attack? I can imagine if the USSR manage to invade it can be very intense in the London area. If the assault get bogged down, then the Allied naval advantage and US reinforcements ticking in may result in another OTL Stalingrad or this AARs invasion of Japan.
For Salami, don't We have Italy?
but Yes, the Soviets have been trying for years to topple Norway and Poland. Poland, Bulgaria and "Yugoslavia" are likely to fall. However Norway, Greece and the Netherlands may be troubling bulges in Soviet controlled Europe.. So they need to be dealt with quickly.So I forget this AAR for a couple of weeks, and suddenly the world is all but red. Good job.
Welcome back
But is it red enough?
Post War: China.
Post War: Domesticating the Tiger.
Mao is said to get a total makeover on the 8th of March.
China entered the war with Japan fractured, but in their common struggle they founded a United Front against Japan. However due to Japanese military advances and aggressive politics, combined with help from neither the Comintern nor the Allies, the United Front soon fell to Japan occupation. As China was reorganized into Japanese needs and would fight on the side of their former adversary during the world war, Chinese communists fled to the USSR while democrats fled to the western powers. The former KMT fell to insignificance as they failed to safeguard the middle kingdom from the Rising Sun, and foreign powers wanted to bet on the safe horse. However when Trotsky and his supporters took control over the USSR in '38, the Stalin loyal Mao too were pushed aside. When the CCP returned and took control of large swaths of China, aided by Soviet and French occupation troops, Mao was kept as the official head of state due to his popularity, however the real leadership of the new People's Republic was in the hands of Moscow loyal agents..
Chen as with Trotsky being exiled, and they became close buds.
The change of power can be traced back to the exile of Trotsky and Chen Duxiu. Chen was one of the founders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and was a central part in the revolution that overthrew the Qing dynasty and the later democratization of China. Later on he was one of the key figures in establishing the CCP, however this was not to last. Following the rise of Stalin, and the purges, a new line was established in both the USSR and in Communist China. Stalin attacked the former Leninist leadership in the USSR and Mao supported this new Stalinist line. Chen who was opposed to the Stalinist line and openly opposed to Mao was soon pushed out of the party leadership and was soon forced to exile following the Long March. It was in this exile he formed close bonds with Trotsky and joined the International Opposition against Stalin and in Chen's case Stalin. Then in '38 an awakward situation was created as Mao was exiled to Moscow due to the Japanese occupation of China, and Chen was welcomed to Moscow by his partner Trotsky. Mao fearing for his life fell into the line of Chen and Trotsky, however his life was only saved by the grace of his popularity among the Chinese Red Army and the peasantry. Chen was groomed as being the new leader of Communist China, however he was to succumb to sickness in 1942 a single year before the sun set over Japan.
Mao and Ming appereantly being close friends.
Mao's position appeared to be secure at first glance, however there was another contender to the throne. Wang Ming. Ming was through the 30s a senior figure within the CCP and he, as with Chen, opposed Mao's new line and criticized him for deviating from Orthodox Marxist thinking. With the return of Trotsky this power struggle can be seen in the contex of a wider struggle. A struggle between Trotskyism and Stalinism, between the USSR, through the Fourth International, and the CCP. Naturally Ming fell under the wings of both Trotsky and Chen who needed an established figure in opposition to Mao. With the death of Chen and the defeat of Japan Ming's position was mostly secured in the CCP and China at large. Mao was reduced to a mere figurehead, whereas the followers of Chen and Ming was given key positions in the party leadership and the new government. Ming was promoted to the head of government, the party and effectively the de-facto leader of the PRC. Under his leadership the new Maoist doctrine was largely discarded, instead Marxist Orthodoxy became the official state religion so to speak. In practice this meant that the newly founded People's Republic of China (also known as Chinese Soviet Republic) was put under Soviet leadership and largely depended upon Soviet economic aid and direction. This bond would only be further cemented with the return of the Soviet advisors..
The influential foreign advisors to China and the Soviet trained 28 Bolsheviks.
Foreign advisors was determinal during the early days of the Communist Controlled China. Among them were the German Otto Braun (crazy smile) and the Soviet advisors of Pavel Mif (crazy hair) and Grigory Voitinsky. However they quickly fell out of grace with the CCP as their advise was.. poor resulting in the deaths of thousands of Communist soldiers and the near extinction of the Chinese Red Army, resulting the Long March. This in turn led to the popularity of Mao who was seen as their saviour, while the foreign advisors and the Soviet trained 28 Bolsheviks (where Ming was their unofficial leader) was seen as damaging to the communist cause. This led to the exile of foreign advisors, and upon their return to the USSR Stalin's paranoia increased. Some were seen as foreign agents, while others were seen as Trotskyist agents. In short this shifted these advisors to the left toward Trotsky, and upon his return the position of Ming and the 28 Bolsheviks was strengthened, which again led to the strengthening of the foreign advisors. When most of China fell to the communists these advisors, among others, were made into full fledging political commissars and they were given the task to oversee China transforming into a true socialist society. During the Congress of the Internationale it was decided the CCP was to cede its authority to these commissars. In effect the PRC was reduced to a Soviet puppet state.
We can't allow anyone to challenge our take on socialism.
However all of China wasn't under the control of the communist. In southern and central China an alternative was set up: the social democrat Zhang Lan. Following the liberation from Japan he managed to unite moderate socialists, communists and democrats in a grand coalition. This coalition would in turn be aided by the US and Japan to purge of radical elements and invite exiled leftist KMT elements. A process of democratization was started with the support of the US and Japan (who was now democratic). However the US was still skeptical to this new Republic of China due to their communist and socialist leanings. However the Republic of China became a real counterweight toward the People's Republic of China and would go on with their vision of socialism. They embarked upon creating a welfare state and to transform the economy into a "Socialist Market Economy", mostly being based upon agricultural cooperatives. However the PRC and USSR saw a grave threat in this Republic and started to inflitrate the Chinese Democratic League. Many hardliners in the USSR and PRC (such as Mao) egged on to a war with South China. However South China was under the protection of Japan, and a war with Japan would drag USA into the war. Reunification of China through violent means was discarded as official policy during the Congress as it was decided that communist revolutions in Europe, and not Asia, was to be the main objective for the Internationale. However China was still a powderkeg read to explode, with both blocs having vested interests to secure the massive nations for themself..
Remnants of the Warlord Era, at least they got their independence secured.
To the farthest south of China, neither Communists nor Democrats managed to secure their position. This was mostly due to the Republic of China laying claims to Yunnan and Guangxi. The USSR knew their influence only reached so far, instead they supported these two former warlords to remain independent from the Republic of China, and instead rely upon Japan. This would in turn weaken South China and cause national uproar as it was seen as an extension of the Japanese occupation. Border conflicts soon erupted in Guangxi between the now Independent Guangxi Republic, Republic of China and the People's Republic China. The United States of America sent a peace keeping force to occupy most of the resource rich Guangxi - and to contain communism. This of course led to many Chinese seeing the Americans as foreign occupiers and led to greater sympathies with the PRC who was seen as the only state capable of ending US occupation. China could at any moment fall into a conflict between the landlocked South China and North China with its claim on the resource rich coast. If either side invaded the other, there was a real risk of open conflict between the USA and USSR over Chinese primacy.*
Korea is also split with each of the halves backed by a superpower.
However the conflict between East and West was not limited to China. As in China, Korea was split between a communist north and a US backed south. During the Paris Treaties it was agreed upon by the US and the USSR that the Korean Peninsula was to be split between two occupation zones on the 38th parallel. The south was kept under American occupation, however the north was given nominal independence by the USSR. But Kim Il-Sung, a mythical figure, refused to abide by the requirments of the Internationale. Alltough they would join into a military alliance with the USSR, they refused to abide by the terms of the Congress. According to Kim and the North Koreans, Korean unification was up to the Koreans and not the Soviets nor the Americans. This spoke to the hearts of the South Koreans who hoped for national liberation, but also to hardline Chinese and Soviets who hoped for North Korea to invade South Korea, and potentially spread communism to all of Asia. Volunteers in the thousands from the USSR and PRC streamed toward Korea who was backed up by Soviet arms. They hoped this Korean Wildcard would be the spark to a war of liberation in the Far East.**
Korean soldiers rehearsing with Soviet weapons on an invasion of the south.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Okay so Republic of China and the warlords are Dominions of Japan, and USA annexed some parts of Guangxi. Exciting and confusing times.
**Korea was released as communists. I do not know if another nation did it or if it is scripted. Anyway it is kina cool as I forgot about Korea and wanted to make a north and south Korea. And as USA now annexed south Korea and north Korea being communist, the situation is actually the same as it was in our timeline. So that is fascinating. Manchuria still have a one province state as you can see.. in universe it is a part of the PRC.
Okay so this is the last of the - planned - post war updates. It was just to give a little glimpse into the Chinese situation and to explain why China was made a puppet of the USSR, which will likely not result in a Sino-Soviet split as we saw in our timeline, mostly because Mao is under the control of Moscow loyal communists and foreign political commissars. Next update should be regarding the rest of 1944.
Now if you want a more lengthy explanation of how the communists came to power, I'll be a party booper and just say that the Red Army managed to gain control over these areas and not the other areas as in Korea. The update was more to outline the weird Chinese situation and why the PRC are so loyal to the USSR and won't start a civil war on its own. (And speculations for Waking the Tiger: Wang Ming being Orthodox Marxist path (the path taken by the PRC here), Mao the Maoist path (duh) and Zhang Lan being social democracy).The specific details I leave up to the reader
Mao is said to get a total makeover on the 8th of March.
China entered the war with Japan fractured, but in their common struggle they founded a United Front against Japan. However due to Japanese military advances and aggressive politics, combined with help from neither the Comintern nor the Allies, the United Front soon fell to Japan occupation. As China was reorganized into Japanese needs and would fight on the side of their former adversary during the world war, Chinese communists fled to the USSR while democrats fled to the western powers. The former KMT fell to insignificance as they failed to safeguard the middle kingdom from the Rising Sun, and foreign powers wanted to bet on the safe horse. However when Trotsky and his supporters took control over the USSR in '38, the Stalin loyal Mao too were pushed aside. When the CCP returned and took control of large swaths of China, aided by Soviet and French occupation troops, Mao was kept as the official head of state due to his popularity, however the real leadership of the new People's Republic was in the hands of Moscow loyal agents..
Chen as with Trotsky being exiled, and they became close buds.
The change of power can be traced back to the exile of Trotsky and Chen Duxiu. Chen was one of the founders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and was a central part in the revolution that overthrew the Qing dynasty and the later democratization of China. Later on he was one of the key figures in establishing the CCP, however this was not to last. Following the rise of Stalin, and the purges, a new line was established in both the USSR and in Communist China. Stalin attacked the former Leninist leadership in the USSR and Mao supported this new Stalinist line. Chen who was opposed to the Stalinist line and openly opposed to Mao was soon pushed out of the party leadership and was soon forced to exile following the Long March. It was in this exile he formed close bonds with Trotsky and joined the International Opposition against Stalin and in Chen's case Stalin. Then in '38 an awakward situation was created as Mao was exiled to Moscow due to the Japanese occupation of China, and Chen was welcomed to Moscow by his partner Trotsky. Mao fearing for his life fell into the line of Chen and Trotsky, however his life was only saved by the grace of his popularity among the Chinese Red Army and the peasantry. Chen was groomed as being the new leader of Communist China, however he was to succumb to sickness in 1942 a single year before the sun set over Japan.
Mao and Ming appereantly being close friends.
Mao's position appeared to be secure at first glance, however there was another contender to the throne. Wang Ming. Ming was through the 30s a senior figure within the CCP and he, as with Chen, opposed Mao's new line and criticized him for deviating from Orthodox Marxist thinking. With the return of Trotsky this power struggle can be seen in the contex of a wider struggle. A struggle between Trotskyism and Stalinism, between the USSR, through the Fourth International, and the CCP. Naturally Ming fell under the wings of both Trotsky and Chen who needed an established figure in opposition to Mao. With the death of Chen and the defeat of Japan Ming's position was mostly secured in the CCP and China at large. Mao was reduced to a mere figurehead, whereas the followers of Chen and Ming was given key positions in the party leadership and the new government. Ming was promoted to the head of government, the party and effectively the de-facto leader of the PRC. Under his leadership the new Maoist doctrine was largely discarded, instead Marxist Orthodoxy became the official state religion so to speak. In practice this meant that the newly founded People's Republic of China (also known as Chinese Soviet Republic) was put under Soviet leadership and largely depended upon Soviet economic aid and direction. This bond would only be further cemented with the return of the Soviet advisors..
The influential foreign advisors to China and the Soviet trained 28 Bolsheviks.
Foreign advisors was determinal during the early days of the Communist Controlled China. Among them were the German Otto Braun (crazy smile) and the Soviet advisors of Pavel Mif (crazy hair) and Grigory Voitinsky. However they quickly fell out of grace with the CCP as their advise was.. poor resulting in the deaths of thousands of Communist soldiers and the near extinction of the Chinese Red Army, resulting the Long March. This in turn led to the popularity of Mao who was seen as their saviour, while the foreign advisors and the Soviet trained 28 Bolsheviks (where Ming was their unofficial leader) was seen as damaging to the communist cause. This led to the exile of foreign advisors, and upon their return to the USSR Stalin's paranoia increased. Some were seen as foreign agents, while others were seen as Trotskyist agents. In short this shifted these advisors to the left toward Trotsky, and upon his return the position of Ming and the 28 Bolsheviks was strengthened, which again led to the strengthening of the foreign advisors. When most of China fell to the communists these advisors, among others, were made into full fledging political commissars and they were given the task to oversee China transforming into a true socialist society. During the Congress of the Internationale it was decided the CCP was to cede its authority to these commissars. In effect the PRC was reduced to a Soviet puppet state.
We can't allow anyone to challenge our take on socialism.
However all of China wasn't under the control of the communist. In southern and central China an alternative was set up: the social democrat Zhang Lan. Following the liberation from Japan he managed to unite moderate socialists, communists and democrats in a grand coalition. This coalition would in turn be aided by the US and Japan to purge of radical elements and invite exiled leftist KMT elements. A process of democratization was started with the support of the US and Japan (who was now democratic). However the US was still skeptical to this new Republic of China due to their communist and socialist leanings. However the Republic of China became a real counterweight toward the People's Republic of China and would go on with their vision of socialism. They embarked upon creating a welfare state and to transform the economy into a "Socialist Market Economy", mostly being based upon agricultural cooperatives. However the PRC and USSR saw a grave threat in this Republic and started to inflitrate the Chinese Democratic League. Many hardliners in the USSR and PRC (such as Mao) egged on to a war with South China. However South China was under the protection of Japan, and a war with Japan would drag USA into the war. Reunification of China through violent means was discarded as official policy during the Congress as it was decided that communist revolutions in Europe, and not Asia, was to be the main objective for the Internationale. However China was still a powderkeg read to explode, with both blocs having vested interests to secure the massive nations for themself..
Remnants of the Warlord Era, at least they got their independence secured.
To the farthest south of China, neither Communists nor Democrats managed to secure their position. This was mostly due to the Republic of China laying claims to Yunnan and Guangxi. The USSR knew their influence only reached so far, instead they supported these two former warlords to remain independent from the Republic of China, and instead rely upon Japan. This would in turn weaken South China and cause national uproar as it was seen as an extension of the Japanese occupation. Border conflicts soon erupted in Guangxi between the now Independent Guangxi Republic, Republic of China and the People's Republic China. The United States of America sent a peace keeping force to occupy most of the resource rich Guangxi - and to contain communism. This of course led to many Chinese seeing the Americans as foreign occupiers and led to greater sympathies with the PRC who was seen as the only state capable of ending US occupation. China could at any moment fall into a conflict between the landlocked South China and North China with its claim on the resource rich coast. If either side invaded the other, there was a real risk of open conflict between the USA and USSR over Chinese primacy.*
Korea is also split with each of the halves backed by a superpower.
However the conflict between East and West was not limited to China. As in China, Korea was split between a communist north and a US backed south. During the Paris Treaties it was agreed upon by the US and the USSR that the Korean Peninsula was to be split between two occupation zones on the 38th parallel. The south was kept under American occupation, however the north was given nominal independence by the USSR. But Kim Il-Sung, a mythical figure, refused to abide by the requirments of the Internationale. Alltough they would join into a military alliance with the USSR, they refused to abide by the terms of the Congress. According to Kim and the North Koreans, Korean unification was up to the Koreans and not the Soviets nor the Americans. This spoke to the hearts of the South Koreans who hoped for national liberation, but also to hardline Chinese and Soviets who hoped for North Korea to invade South Korea, and potentially spread communism to all of Asia. Volunteers in the thousands from the USSR and PRC streamed toward Korea who was backed up by Soviet arms. They hoped this Korean Wildcard would be the spark to a war of liberation in the Far East.**
Korean soldiers rehearsing with Soviet weapons on an invasion of the south.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Okay so Republic of China and the warlords are Dominions of Japan, and USA annexed some parts of Guangxi. Exciting and confusing times.
**Korea was released as communists. I do not know if another nation did it or if it is scripted. Anyway it is kina cool as I forgot about Korea and wanted to make a north and south Korea. And as USA now annexed south Korea and north Korea being communist, the situation is actually the same as it was in our timeline. So that is fascinating. Manchuria still have a one province state as you can see.. in universe it is a part of the PRC.
Okay so this is the last of the - planned - post war updates. It was just to give a little glimpse into the Chinese situation and to explain why China was made a puppet of the USSR, which will likely not result in a Sino-Soviet split as we saw in our timeline, mostly because Mao is under the control of Moscow loyal communists and foreign political commissars. Next update should be regarding the rest of 1944.
Now if you want a more lengthy explanation of how the communists came to power, I'll be a party booper and just say that the Red Army managed to gain control over these areas and not the other areas as in Korea. The update was more to outline the weird Chinese situation and why the PRC are so loyal to the USSR and won't start a civil war on its own. (And speculations for Waking the Tiger: Wang Ming being Orthodox Marxist path (the path taken by the PRC here), Mao the Maoist path (duh) and Zhang Lan being social democracy).The specific details I leave up to the reader
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True true. I kinda hope the New patch will work. Then most of the chinese people change making for greater confusion.
Chapter 36.
Chapter 36: Crisis.
The Red Army will liberate the world..
Fall of 1944. Trotsky was at the apex of his power. Despite his initial shaky ground his feet was firmly planted within society and he held the party in a tight grip. None dared to challenge the supposedly all-mighty leader of the arguably most powerful nation on earth, perhaps in history. Trotsky was the man who'd saved Russia from total collapse and he was one of the original revolutionaries. Now he'd enabled the fires of revolution to spread across the entire European continent and through most of Asia. He became some sort of living mythical person, beloved by the people for liberating them and restoring Russia's greatness - a country that had a few years earlier been considered backwards and was remembered only for its humiliations. Now after taking down the Axis he was seen as a greater hero, a larger than life person, as he openly challenged the old great powers and in turn humiliated them. The people would follow Trotsky. With his position more secure than ever he laid out the foundation of further democratization (on his terms of course) of society and economic reforms. His first action was to announce he would start a program to rehabilitate and release those who'd been imprisoned under Stalin - granted they accepted the official party line, after an extensive course of re-schooling and that they were revolutionaries of the socialist persuasion. However for the ordinary worker their greatest "gift" as Trotsky called it, a gift to celebrate the victories in the middle east, was the re-introduction of the 8 hour and vacation to all workers. For future economic and political reforms, Trotsky simply told his respective ministers: Do it. They were to come up with reforms that pleased Trotsky (and the looming Soviet figures who coveted Trotsky's position) and the people. Failure was simply put not an option.
A good way to celebrate peace is to create more guns.
Moving onwards. Instead of lasting peace the Second World War would only bring about greater tension and an arm race. Like the Great War it failed to be "the war to end all wars". Instead it only enabled further wars of direct continuation. Further advances was made in artillery technology, specifically AT and AA guns. Among the anti-tank guns the Soviet employed the 45mm M42 and the 57mm ZiS-2. The M42 was well used, but proved to not be effective against Panthers and Tigers, it was however projected it could knock out or disrupt lighter Allied armor, however it was simply not enough. The anti-tank rounds was upgraded to penetrate thicker armor. However it was the ZiS-2 gun that would be the prime tank killer. It's shells was highly effective managing to penetrate up to 90mm of armor and with a semi-automatic function it could fire as many as 25 rounds per minute. With the new and improved AT rounds its features would become even deadlier, and caputred American and British tanks from the Southern Thrust proved it could penetrate any of the Allied tanks.
On top of that the many Soviet AA-guns also got upgrades. The various ligth AA guns (25mm, 37mm and 45mm, mostly effective to disrupt modern air forces and surpressing infantry and light armor) and the heavier guns (76mm and 85mm, in addition to creating a formidable flak defense being excellent tank killers) was given new radar systems to better track and predict enemy airforces. Their barrels and munitions was also given upgrades to substain their fire with greater proficiency and do more damage.
Who do these Turks think they are holding us locked up in the Black Sea?
September was coming to an end and despite the Southern Thrust Strategic Operation coming to a close the day before, Trotsky ordered his military to prepare for a war with Turkey. This war had been brewing for a while in what was known as the "Strait Crisis". The gateway between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean was of significant importance, both to control trade and to detirmine who could enter and leave the two seas. The Soviets recognized that Turkey allowed British and American vessels to access these straits (violating treaties)* endagering the Soviet powerbase around the Black Sea. And during WW2 the increasingly nationalist Turkey allowed Axis naval forces to access the Black Sea, but the Red Fleet was confined to Sevastopol. Moreover in a potential war against the Allies the Mediterranean approach to the Black Sea and the Balkans needed to be controlled. This was simply put a matter of national security. Meanwhile the British, naturally, feared that if the Soviets gained control of these straits it would endanger not only Greece, but their hold on the Mediterranean and a two sprung attack on the vital Suez Canal; one from the straits and one from Iraq. The Soviets regularly sat down with American officials (the fact that the British was left out signified their lessened importance, and the exclusion of Turkey that it was a play between two superpowers) to solve the issue peacefully as the Turkish refused to allow Soviet military vessels to have access, while allowing non-Black Sea vessels to enter the Black Sea without the Soviets having a say in it. Their position was that they should be allowed to cooperate with the Turkish on who was to enter the Black Sea and to let their vessels flow through. Then the situation escalated further as the battleship of USS Missouri (the feared Mighty Mo) was allowed to pass through. The official US explanation was that it was simply delivering the mortuary urn of the late Turkish Ambassador home. However the Soviets brushed off these claims saying it was blatant American provocation and show of force, and further Turkish violation of the 1936 treaties. The situation escalated and negotiations between the USA and USSR broke down.
They're a step up at least.
The Soviet armored force was slowly being mechanized as the infantrists in the heavy and medium armored brigades was becoming fully mechanized. Furthermore all the Mechanized Corps was now solely outfitted with T-34s and T-44s.** This greatly increased the strenght and mobility of the Red Army, however the aging BTR M1941 and BA-30s needed to be upgraded for better speed, mobility and protection. The solution was the BTR M1943. Based upon the US M-42 halftrack and German halftracks it would come in two versions, one with a standard machine gun and another one with an AT-gun, giving it the ability to take a much more aggressive stance in armored operations. The underlying idea was to continue on the work during the Southern Thrust and let the APCs conduct offensive operations and assisst the tanks rather than just being a mediumof transportation.
We'll give you a show of force!
The Crisis escalated further. The 7th of October the Soviets presented a note to the Turkish Foreign Ministry which expressed that the way Turkey was handling the straits no longer represented the security interests of its fellow Black Sea nations. It concluded that the regime of the straits was no longer reliable and demanded that the Montreux Treaty be re-examined and rewritten in a new international conference, or the USSR would be forced to take action. The Red Fleet increased its naval presence in the Black Sea, having Soviet vessels perform maneuvers near Turkish shores. The ground troops taking part in the Southern Thrust was dispatched to the eastern Soviet-Turkish border, while the communist nations of the Balkans was putting their forces on high alert. The United States responded by sending a naval task force toward the Mediterranean and reinforce the British fleet there. Despite the US and British having qualms about the situation, they refused to reaffirm their support to Turkey, claiming it to be an internal matter between the USSR and Turkey. Part of this can be explained by that Roosevelt was in the middle of an election, being too hard on the Soviets now could lose him votes, being too soft could cost him votes aswell. Still the US Secretary of State sent a telegram to his British counterpart saying "In our opinion the primary objective of the Soviet Union is to obtain control over Turkey. We believe that if the Soviet Union succeeds in introducing into Turkey armed forces with the ostensible purpose of enforcing the joint control of the Straits, the Soviet Union will use these forces in order to obtain control over Turkey…. In our opinion, therefore, the time has come when we must decide that we shall resist with all means at our disposal any Soviet aggression and in particular, because the case of Turkey would be so clear, any Soviet aggression against Turkey. In carrying this policy our words and acts will only carry conviction to the Soviet Union if they are formulated against the background of an inner conviction and determination on our part that we cannot permit Turkey to become the object of Soviet aggression."
These new bathtub toys will help us run through the straits.
The expansion of the Red Fleet was well underway. First of the Kronstadt Battlecruisers was finished and sent off to the Black Sea, and only one of the dreaded Superheavy Battleships remained. This new and improved Red Fleet would be a modern fleet, however it would still lag behind the British and Americans in numbers and quality. Despite this it was amply used in Soviet propaganda as a way to prove the Soviet position as a superpower and it, as the Soviet media was unchallenged, portrayed it as the most powerful navy on the globe, ready to take on the decadent Royal Navy who enforced imperialist oppression across the world.
Pew pew.
In October of 1944 the direction of the rocket and diversity programs was concluded. Sergei Kurolev was to focus on rockets to improve the Katyusha rocket systems, rather than far fetched (as it was seen as by then) programs to create cruise missiles and ballistic missiles.
Again this is just for scientific and peaceful reasons!
With the first Soviet nuclear reactor in Moscow now being capable of enriching uranium, three new sites was ordered. They were to be codenamed Arzamas-16, Sverdlovsk-44 and Chelyabinsk-40. Mostly located in the desolate areas to the east of the Urals the Arzamas-16 would be tasked with atomic weapon research and design and warhead assembly, Sverdlovsk-44 would enrich uranium and Chelyabinsk-40 would prouce plutonium and produce components. This was of course all very hush hush and was located in closed Atomgrads, none were to enter or leave. The Belgians also proved determinal to all of this as they held vast uranium deposits in Congo, and talks was held that Belgian could run a paralell program with the Soviets, German scientists also flocked to these Atomgrads giving their expertise as they had developed nuclear reactors of their own. Still the road to a nuclear weapon was far into the future, all the Soviets could hope for was that the US hadn't acquired a weapon of mass destruction on their own..
Turkey are clearly the ones preparing for war... The Soviet Union have no record of toppling and invading neighbouring countries..
Then the crisis evolved further. Soviet manuevers grew bolder. The Soviet Airforce amassed and flew onward to Turkey daily and nightly. As Trotsky toured Georgia and Armenia to personally rouse his men in case of a war, a Soviet submarine was caught trying to get past the straits. It was revealed it malfunctioned and had to resurface. Turkish coastguard rushed toward the immobilized submarine, but the submarine hailed them three times ordering them to turn around. But the coast guard didn't listen. With its mounted cannon it fired three warning shots. Two of them went above them, but the third went straight through the pipe of one of the Turkish vessels. The message was clear: back off. The Turkish vessels stopped, but refused to turn around. They demanded the submarine to surrender, but the crew turned it down. Instead a large contigent of Soviet fighter-bombers and naval bombers circled around them until they ran out of fuel, then another contigent would replace them and then those who refueled would turn around. It was an impressive sight. The Soviets upped up their naval manuevers and overtly violated Turkish naval borders, with bombers even heading straight toward known Turkish naval bases, dropping leaflets encouraging their desertion and a social revolution.
Then on the night to the 9th the Kronstadt battlecruiser was followed by 8 destroyers. Led on by fighters and bombers (who paved the way with close warning shots) they openly ran into the straits and dispersed the Turkish coastal guard. The destroyers secured the submarine, however the commander of the Kronstandt was ballsy. He went on into the Aegan Sea and stood face to face with the lead American battleship there. Both warships lined to take up shots, both firing warning shots. The American admiral wrote in his diary "there I was, staring down my opponent. Both of us having the power to start a third world war or keep the fragile peace". Then two Soviet fighters dropped down from the cloud breaking the awkward silence. But they maintained radio silence and was on an attack course, but they broke away without firing a single shot. Meanwhile Kronstadt had turned around in the cover of the mist and the fighters and returned to the Black Sea. It was a close call, but mostly a show of force. The Soviet Union was not afraid to project its power. The next day Trotsky heared about the incident and rattled his troops. The truth was twisted a litte, and it was said the Kronstadt turned around the American battlefleet when it was to enter the Black Sea, and the immobilized submarine was said to be attacked by the Turks. Trotsky gave his soldiers a clear message: The Americans and the Turkish are out to get us.
A later dramatiation of the assassination.
The increasingly nationalist, bordering fascist, population of Turkey was fed up with the Soviet aggression. Words came out that during his visit to Armenia, Trotsky was assassinated by a Turkmen. Emboldened by the assassination of the devil himself a holy war was declared on the Soviet Union. For their oppression of muslims in their own borders and their crusades in Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and soon to be Turkey. It was confusing, the Soviet Union was labeled both as Christian Crusaders and militant Atheists. Inside the USSR several radical and dissatisfied people in Turkestan attacked the Soviet authorities there, in a strange move the Cossacks who felt threatened by the Soviets also rose up and demanded their autonomy. In Turkey the people took to the streets and attacked the consultates and embassy of the USSR, demonstrations turned into violence, and the Soviet ambassador and NKVD liason was assassinated. Despite the Turkish government putting own the rebellion, the damage was done. It turned out Trotsky survived the assassination attempt, the assailant tried to end him with an ice-pick (as Stalin ended his days) but failed as an officer shot him with ten shots. The NKVD quickly concluded the assassin was employed by the Turkish and claimed they had the evidence to back it up.
They won't see us sneaking in behind..
There was now little hope for peaceful resolution to the Strait Crisis. USA tried to intervene and meditate a peace, however they lost their influence as Congress blocked any attempts for a US intervention, and the public turned against the Turkish following the acts of terror in Turkey and the USSR. The Soviet plan was simple. They counted on the Turkish seeing the massive Soviet buildup to the east. Despite the major ground force assembling, the mountains of Turkey was in favor of the defender. Meanwhile to the west Turkey was protected by the neutral nation of Bulgaria and the Allied nation of Greece. Simply put an invasion had to come from the east and the Turkish counted on the British and American fleets coming to their aid. However the Soviets devised a plan of their own. Let the Turkish hold these perceptions and navally invady from the Ukraine and pacifiy the straits before the British or Americans have a chance to intervene. A war against the USSR in Turkey would be hopeless if the Soviets quickly took control of the straits, and that would lead to a swift backdoor conquest of Turkey. The plans was set into motion, a massive invasion from east. But it was a deception for the real attack in the south. It would also be a hallmark for the Soviets as it would be their first independent large scale naval invasion.
The (U)SSRs are getting a tad greedy aren't they?
The Strait Crisis was made only worse with Armenian and Georgian demands of an integration of their claimed territories. It was claimed these areas was stolen from them, however the leadership of the USSR never offically supported or debuffed these claims. It gave them yet another casus belli and turn the public against Turkey. Reports, both fabricated and half-truths, poured in claiming Turkish aggression against Armenian, Georgian and Orthodox minorities in eastern Anatolia. This actually led to some sympathies outside of the USSR. The Armenian and Georgian SSRs claimed they wanted to protect their fellow brothers and sisters and restore order to the region.
This got nothing to do with the current situation, we want peace.
For the impending war the aging tank destroyer and assault gun arsenal of the Red Army was improved. Moreoever the AA batteries was modernized further with even newer radards and target systems, as well as auto-loading mechanisms for the heavy AA guns. The Red Army was no longer the outdated and undersupplied force they had been when they entered the war, they were now a top modern force to be reckoned with.
The American election was polarized, and its effects will be felt by the entire world.
All the while the USA was in the middle of an election. For the Republicans General MacArthur was elected as the Republican candidate. He was seen by many as the conservative choice, and his military status made many believe he was the right man for the job. The right man to contain communism and safeguard America. His runningmate was the more moderate New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey. The Democrats re-ran Roosevelt and Truman, which created much controversy as no President had ever been seated for three terms, following in the traditions of Washington. Now he was running for a fourth term! Roosevelt and Truman came initally out strongly, saying only they could provide lasting peace and security. Moreoever the liberal Democratic and progressive Republican Fair Deal program was well recieved. However with the early death of Wendell Wilkie the Fair Deal coalition fell apart, and as the situation on the world stage worsened, the focus moved away from providing education, jobs and healthcare to all and to extend a hardline over the Red Menace to keep it in check. The Fair Deal program was blocked and had to be watered down in the election. The coming results was expected to be very narrow between Roosevelt and MacArthur and the American society was becoming more polarized. This only worsened when the American economy started to hit a wall following their loss of potential oil supplies and their complete removal from European markets and Trotskyists elements seized power in the many socialist parties in America. They weren't expected to gain a fair share of the popular vote, but they were nevertheless organized and ready to spread chaos in the election and polarized society, of course they were funded by the Soviets and NKVD.
Soviet soldiers cross into Turkey from Armenia, perhaps for a vacation...
But the election of USA wasn't center stage for the world. Alleged Turkish fascist militias attacked Soviet border patrols. The Soviets claimed these attacks was ordered by the Turkish central government, and demanded that Turkey was to restore order and give up the straits in a joint Soviet-Turkish controlled zone. They were given a 24 hour deadline. No answer was given, and so on 8:00 local time the Soviet troops invaded Turkey. The Straits Crisis evolved into open conflict.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Turkey give the Allies military access, at least during the war, that is also from a game perspective dangerous.
**I'll provide a full Soviet OOB later on. But the Mechanized Corps (main armored division) do now have 6 medium tank batallions and four motorised batallions. The medium and heavy armored brigades are now outfitted with two mechanized infantry batallions eached, and are slowly becoming solely medium and heavy armored.
So hopefully my efforts to explain why the war happened make sense. And the election in USA is around the corner, it would be cool if we can see MacArthur and his pipe instead of Roosevel.
The Red Army will liberate the world..
Fall of 1944. Trotsky was at the apex of his power. Despite his initial shaky ground his feet was firmly planted within society and he held the party in a tight grip. None dared to challenge the supposedly all-mighty leader of the arguably most powerful nation on earth, perhaps in history. Trotsky was the man who'd saved Russia from total collapse and he was one of the original revolutionaries. Now he'd enabled the fires of revolution to spread across the entire European continent and through most of Asia. He became some sort of living mythical person, beloved by the people for liberating them and restoring Russia's greatness - a country that had a few years earlier been considered backwards and was remembered only for its humiliations. Now after taking down the Axis he was seen as a greater hero, a larger than life person, as he openly challenged the old great powers and in turn humiliated them. The people would follow Trotsky. With his position more secure than ever he laid out the foundation of further democratization (on his terms of course) of society and economic reforms. His first action was to announce he would start a program to rehabilitate and release those who'd been imprisoned under Stalin - granted they accepted the official party line, after an extensive course of re-schooling and that they were revolutionaries of the socialist persuasion. However for the ordinary worker their greatest "gift" as Trotsky called it, a gift to celebrate the victories in the middle east, was the re-introduction of the 8 hour and vacation to all workers. For future economic and political reforms, Trotsky simply told his respective ministers: Do it. They were to come up with reforms that pleased Trotsky (and the looming Soviet figures who coveted Trotsky's position) and the people. Failure was simply put not an option.
A good way to celebrate peace is to create more guns.
Moving onwards. Instead of lasting peace the Second World War would only bring about greater tension and an arm race. Like the Great War it failed to be "the war to end all wars". Instead it only enabled further wars of direct continuation. Further advances was made in artillery technology, specifically AT and AA guns. Among the anti-tank guns the Soviet employed the 45mm M42 and the 57mm ZiS-2. The M42 was well used, but proved to not be effective against Panthers and Tigers, it was however projected it could knock out or disrupt lighter Allied armor, however it was simply not enough. The anti-tank rounds was upgraded to penetrate thicker armor. However it was the ZiS-2 gun that would be the prime tank killer. It's shells was highly effective managing to penetrate up to 90mm of armor and with a semi-automatic function it could fire as many as 25 rounds per minute. With the new and improved AT rounds its features would become even deadlier, and caputred American and British tanks from the Southern Thrust proved it could penetrate any of the Allied tanks.
On top of that the many Soviet AA-guns also got upgrades. The various ligth AA guns (25mm, 37mm and 45mm, mostly effective to disrupt modern air forces and surpressing infantry and light armor) and the heavier guns (76mm and 85mm, in addition to creating a formidable flak defense being excellent tank killers) was given new radar systems to better track and predict enemy airforces. Their barrels and munitions was also given upgrades to substain their fire with greater proficiency and do more damage.
Who do these Turks think they are holding us locked up in the Black Sea?
September was coming to an end and despite the Southern Thrust Strategic Operation coming to a close the day before, Trotsky ordered his military to prepare for a war with Turkey. This war had been brewing for a while in what was known as the "Strait Crisis". The gateway between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean was of significant importance, both to control trade and to detirmine who could enter and leave the two seas. The Soviets recognized that Turkey allowed British and American vessels to access these straits (violating treaties)* endagering the Soviet powerbase around the Black Sea. And during WW2 the increasingly nationalist Turkey allowed Axis naval forces to access the Black Sea, but the Red Fleet was confined to Sevastopol. Moreover in a potential war against the Allies the Mediterranean approach to the Black Sea and the Balkans needed to be controlled. This was simply put a matter of national security. Meanwhile the British, naturally, feared that if the Soviets gained control of these straits it would endanger not only Greece, but their hold on the Mediterranean and a two sprung attack on the vital Suez Canal; one from the straits and one from Iraq. The Soviets regularly sat down with American officials (the fact that the British was left out signified their lessened importance, and the exclusion of Turkey that it was a play between two superpowers) to solve the issue peacefully as the Turkish refused to allow Soviet military vessels to have access, while allowing non-Black Sea vessels to enter the Black Sea without the Soviets having a say in it. Their position was that they should be allowed to cooperate with the Turkish on who was to enter the Black Sea and to let their vessels flow through. Then the situation escalated further as the battleship of USS Missouri (the feared Mighty Mo) was allowed to pass through. The official US explanation was that it was simply delivering the mortuary urn of the late Turkish Ambassador home. However the Soviets brushed off these claims saying it was blatant American provocation and show of force, and further Turkish violation of the 1936 treaties. The situation escalated and negotiations between the USA and USSR broke down.
They're a step up at least.
The Soviet armored force was slowly being mechanized as the infantrists in the heavy and medium armored brigades was becoming fully mechanized. Furthermore all the Mechanized Corps was now solely outfitted with T-34s and T-44s.** This greatly increased the strenght and mobility of the Red Army, however the aging BTR M1941 and BA-30s needed to be upgraded for better speed, mobility and protection. The solution was the BTR M1943. Based upon the US M-42 halftrack and German halftracks it would come in two versions, one with a standard machine gun and another one with an AT-gun, giving it the ability to take a much more aggressive stance in armored operations. The underlying idea was to continue on the work during the Southern Thrust and let the APCs conduct offensive operations and assisst the tanks rather than just being a mediumof transportation.
We'll give you a show of force!
The Crisis escalated further. The 7th of October the Soviets presented a note to the Turkish Foreign Ministry which expressed that the way Turkey was handling the straits no longer represented the security interests of its fellow Black Sea nations. It concluded that the regime of the straits was no longer reliable and demanded that the Montreux Treaty be re-examined and rewritten in a new international conference, or the USSR would be forced to take action. The Red Fleet increased its naval presence in the Black Sea, having Soviet vessels perform maneuvers near Turkish shores. The ground troops taking part in the Southern Thrust was dispatched to the eastern Soviet-Turkish border, while the communist nations of the Balkans was putting their forces on high alert. The United States responded by sending a naval task force toward the Mediterranean and reinforce the British fleet there. Despite the US and British having qualms about the situation, they refused to reaffirm their support to Turkey, claiming it to be an internal matter between the USSR and Turkey. Part of this can be explained by that Roosevelt was in the middle of an election, being too hard on the Soviets now could lose him votes, being too soft could cost him votes aswell. Still the US Secretary of State sent a telegram to his British counterpart saying "In our opinion the primary objective of the Soviet Union is to obtain control over Turkey. We believe that if the Soviet Union succeeds in introducing into Turkey armed forces with the ostensible purpose of enforcing the joint control of the Straits, the Soviet Union will use these forces in order to obtain control over Turkey…. In our opinion, therefore, the time has come when we must decide that we shall resist with all means at our disposal any Soviet aggression and in particular, because the case of Turkey would be so clear, any Soviet aggression against Turkey. In carrying this policy our words and acts will only carry conviction to the Soviet Union if they are formulated against the background of an inner conviction and determination on our part that we cannot permit Turkey to become the object of Soviet aggression."
These new bathtub toys will help us run through the straits.
The expansion of the Red Fleet was well underway. First of the Kronstadt Battlecruisers was finished and sent off to the Black Sea, and only one of the dreaded Superheavy Battleships remained. This new and improved Red Fleet would be a modern fleet, however it would still lag behind the British and Americans in numbers and quality. Despite this it was amply used in Soviet propaganda as a way to prove the Soviet position as a superpower and it, as the Soviet media was unchallenged, portrayed it as the most powerful navy on the globe, ready to take on the decadent Royal Navy who enforced imperialist oppression across the world.
Pew pew.
In October of 1944 the direction of the rocket and diversity programs was concluded. Sergei Kurolev was to focus on rockets to improve the Katyusha rocket systems, rather than far fetched (as it was seen as by then) programs to create cruise missiles and ballistic missiles.
Again this is just for scientific and peaceful reasons!
With the first Soviet nuclear reactor in Moscow now being capable of enriching uranium, three new sites was ordered. They were to be codenamed Arzamas-16, Sverdlovsk-44 and Chelyabinsk-40. Mostly located in the desolate areas to the east of the Urals the Arzamas-16 would be tasked with atomic weapon research and design and warhead assembly, Sverdlovsk-44 would enrich uranium and Chelyabinsk-40 would prouce plutonium and produce components. This was of course all very hush hush and was located in closed Atomgrads, none were to enter or leave. The Belgians also proved determinal to all of this as they held vast uranium deposits in Congo, and talks was held that Belgian could run a paralell program with the Soviets, German scientists also flocked to these Atomgrads giving their expertise as they had developed nuclear reactors of their own. Still the road to a nuclear weapon was far into the future, all the Soviets could hope for was that the US hadn't acquired a weapon of mass destruction on their own..
Turkey are clearly the ones preparing for war... The Soviet Union have no record of toppling and invading neighbouring countries..
Then the crisis evolved further. Soviet manuevers grew bolder. The Soviet Airforce amassed and flew onward to Turkey daily and nightly. As Trotsky toured Georgia and Armenia to personally rouse his men in case of a war, a Soviet submarine was caught trying to get past the straits. It was revealed it malfunctioned and had to resurface. Turkish coastguard rushed toward the immobilized submarine, but the submarine hailed them three times ordering them to turn around. But the coast guard didn't listen. With its mounted cannon it fired three warning shots. Two of them went above them, but the third went straight through the pipe of one of the Turkish vessels. The message was clear: back off. The Turkish vessels stopped, but refused to turn around. They demanded the submarine to surrender, but the crew turned it down. Instead a large contigent of Soviet fighter-bombers and naval bombers circled around them until they ran out of fuel, then another contigent would replace them and then those who refueled would turn around. It was an impressive sight. The Soviets upped up their naval manuevers and overtly violated Turkish naval borders, with bombers even heading straight toward known Turkish naval bases, dropping leaflets encouraging their desertion and a social revolution.
Then on the night to the 9th the Kronstadt battlecruiser was followed by 8 destroyers. Led on by fighters and bombers (who paved the way with close warning shots) they openly ran into the straits and dispersed the Turkish coastal guard. The destroyers secured the submarine, however the commander of the Kronstandt was ballsy. He went on into the Aegan Sea and stood face to face with the lead American battleship there. Both warships lined to take up shots, both firing warning shots. The American admiral wrote in his diary "there I was, staring down my opponent. Both of us having the power to start a third world war or keep the fragile peace". Then two Soviet fighters dropped down from the cloud breaking the awkward silence. But they maintained radio silence and was on an attack course, but they broke away without firing a single shot. Meanwhile Kronstadt had turned around in the cover of the mist and the fighters and returned to the Black Sea. It was a close call, but mostly a show of force. The Soviet Union was not afraid to project its power. The next day Trotsky heared about the incident and rattled his troops. The truth was twisted a litte, and it was said the Kronstadt turned around the American battlefleet when it was to enter the Black Sea, and the immobilized submarine was said to be attacked by the Turks. Trotsky gave his soldiers a clear message: The Americans and the Turkish are out to get us.
A later dramatiation of the assassination.
The increasingly nationalist, bordering fascist, population of Turkey was fed up with the Soviet aggression. Words came out that during his visit to Armenia, Trotsky was assassinated by a Turkmen. Emboldened by the assassination of the devil himself a holy war was declared on the Soviet Union. For their oppression of muslims in their own borders and their crusades in Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and soon to be Turkey. It was confusing, the Soviet Union was labeled both as Christian Crusaders and militant Atheists. Inside the USSR several radical and dissatisfied people in Turkestan attacked the Soviet authorities there, in a strange move the Cossacks who felt threatened by the Soviets also rose up and demanded their autonomy. In Turkey the people took to the streets and attacked the consultates and embassy of the USSR, demonstrations turned into violence, and the Soviet ambassador and NKVD liason was assassinated. Despite the Turkish government putting own the rebellion, the damage was done. It turned out Trotsky survived the assassination attempt, the assailant tried to end him with an ice-pick (as Stalin ended his days) but failed as an officer shot him with ten shots. The NKVD quickly concluded the assassin was employed by the Turkish and claimed they had the evidence to back it up.
They won't see us sneaking in behind..
There was now little hope for peaceful resolution to the Strait Crisis. USA tried to intervene and meditate a peace, however they lost their influence as Congress blocked any attempts for a US intervention, and the public turned against the Turkish following the acts of terror in Turkey and the USSR. The Soviet plan was simple. They counted on the Turkish seeing the massive Soviet buildup to the east. Despite the major ground force assembling, the mountains of Turkey was in favor of the defender. Meanwhile to the west Turkey was protected by the neutral nation of Bulgaria and the Allied nation of Greece. Simply put an invasion had to come from the east and the Turkish counted on the British and American fleets coming to their aid. However the Soviets devised a plan of their own. Let the Turkish hold these perceptions and navally invady from the Ukraine and pacifiy the straits before the British or Americans have a chance to intervene. A war against the USSR in Turkey would be hopeless if the Soviets quickly took control of the straits, and that would lead to a swift backdoor conquest of Turkey. The plans was set into motion, a massive invasion from east. But it was a deception for the real attack in the south. It would also be a hallmark for the Soviets as it would be their first independent large scale naval invasion.
The (U)SSRs are getting a tad greedy aren't they?
The Strait Crisis was made only worse with Armenian and Georgian demands of an integration of their claimed territories. It was claimed these areas was stolen from them, however the leadership of the USSR never offically supported or debuffed these claims. It gave them yet another casus belli and turn the public against Turkey. Reports, both fabricated and half-truths, poured in claiming Turkish aggression against Armenian, Georgian and Orthodox minorities in eastern Anatolia. This actually led to some sympathies outside of the USSR. The Armenian and Georgian SSRs claimed they wanted to protect their fellow brothers and sisters and restore order to the region.
This got nothing to do with the current situation, we want peace.
For the impending war the aging tank destroyer and assault gun arsenal of the Red Army was improved. Moreoever the AA batteries was modernized further with even newer radards and target systems, as well as auto-loading mechanisms for the heavy AA guns. The Red Army was no longer the outdated and undersupplied force they had been when they entered the war, they were now a top modern force to be reckoned with.
The American election was polarized, and its effects will be felt by the entire world.
All the while the USA was in the middle of an election. For the Republicans General MacArthur was elected as the Republican candidate. He was seen by many as the conservative choice, and his military status made many believe he was the right man for the job. The right man to contain communism and safeguard America. His runningmate was the more moderate New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey. The Democrats re-ran Roosevelt and Truman, which created much controversy as no President had ever been seated for three terms, following in the traditions of Washington. Now he was running for a fourth term! Roosevelt and Truman came initally out strongly, saying only they could provide lasting peace and security. Moreoever the liberal Democratic and progressive Republican Fair Deal program was well recieved. However with the early death of Wendell Wilkie the Fair Deal coalition fell apart, and as the situation on the world stage worsened, the focus moved away from providing education, jobs and healthcare to all and to extend a hardline over the Red Menace to keep it in check. The Fair Deal program was blocked and had to be watered down in the election. The coming results was expected to be very narrow between Roosevelt and MacArthur and the American society was becoming more polarized. This only worsened when the American economy started to hit a wall following their loss of potential oil supplies and their complete removal from European markets and Trotskyists elements seized power in the many socialist parties in America. They weren't expected to gain a fair share of the popular vote, but they were nevertheless organized and ready to spread chaos in the election and polarized society, of course they were funded by the Soviets and NKVD.
Soviet soldiers cross into Turkey from Armenia, perhaps for a vacation...
But the election of USA wasn't center stage for the world. Alleged Turkish fascist militias attacked Soviet border patrols. The Soviets claimed these attacks was ordered by the Turkish central government, and demanded that Turkey was to restore order and give up the straits in a joint Soviet-Turkish controlled zone. They were given a 24 hour deadline. No answer was given, and so on 8:00 local time the Soviet troops invaded Turkey. The Straits Crisis evolved into open conflict.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Turkey give the Allies military access, at least during the war, that is also from a game perspective dangerous.
**I'll provide a full Soviet OOB later on. But the Mechanized Corps (main armored division) do now have 6 medium tank batallions and four motorised batallions. The medium and heavy armored brigades are now outfitted with two mechanized infantry batallions eached, and are slowly becoming solely medium and heavy armored.
So hopefully my efforts to explain why the war happened make sense. And the election in USA is around the corner, it would be cool if we can see MacArthur and his pipe instead of Roosevel.
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