So close, so very close.
Nuclear disarmament in the early nineties took off as the SALT III treaties took effect and for the first time ever a global desire to reduce nuclear arms stockpiles was universal. Sweeping treaties brought the weapons to a fraction of what they were with only the most modern left in the arsenals.
The wave of disengagement impacted other areas. Trade with the Eastern Bloc opened up and living standards in those countries rose, slowing but not removing dissent. The USSR started to become Europe's manufacturing base.
The tensions, of course, still ran deep and in some ways this even created more. China's ruling party resented losing export manufacturing capacity to the USSR while in the corridors of power a hawkish reaction was brewing. The old parties, sidelined by the détente, came back on a wave of belligerence. Soon the armies were massing once again.
Old weapons systems from tanks to aircraft carriers due for retirement or distribution to client states were instead placed into storage, "just in case". Armies started to rise in numbers. Meanwhile the nuclear disarmament crews desperately raced to decommission as many units as possible before their activities were stopped.
So close, but nowhere near close enough.
China went over the USSR border and the fighting was intense and bloody. What the PRC lacked in sophisticated systems they made up in numbers, especially in the remote battle zone. Almost immediately the old international Cold War battle lines re-emerged. While the PRC's troops were committed they couldn't compete against the USSR's modern systems and soon the divisions from the other side of the USSR started to make a substantial difference. To the CCP's horror the Soviet divisions smashed through the lines and started to drive into the heartlands.
A desperate call for help went out and the West started to ship modern systems to China to offset the technology disparity while making severe calls for the USSR to return to the start lines. It did not take long for these systems to reach the lines but due to inadequate training many of them fell into Soviet hands. These systems appalled the Stavka, especially in the areas of optronics and inter-connectivity. Desperate reverse engineering was taking place. Meanwhile the PRC was doing the same thing to upgrade their equipment so as not to be reliant on Western largess. The tide of the war started to turn, more due to extended communications lines than Chinese military prowess.
On the inter-German border the troops stared across at each other at Check Point Charlie and similar areas with sick dread. All sides had started to deploy heavy equipment to forestall a surprise attack.
The Far Eastern Front was a brutal whirlwind of modern warfare. Troops rapidly wore out and for the first time the USSR had to call on the Warsaw Pact nations to honour their defence commitments. Soon non-Soviet troops were cycling through the battle zone with tired troops shuttling through the Western areas to refit and rest. These extra troops made the difference and the Chinese started to buckle, verging on collapse.
As it looked like the USSR was going to annihilate the PRC and extend its borders dramatically south NATO demanded a ceasefire and a return to the pre-1994 borders. The Warsaw Pact ignored them, especially as they considered them to be an un-engaged belligerent. The UN was paralysed as the superpowers simply ignored it and every member of the Permanent Security Council was on one side or the other of the demands.
The world teetered on a knife-edge.
Intelligence estimates suggested that the Warsaw Pact units in the western region were exhausted and unfit. Eager to relieve pressure on the PRC, NATO drove over the inter-German border demanding to reunify Germany. Most NVA units simply surrendered. It was a disastrous mistake.
The USSR; secrecy-obsessed, paranoid and habitually given to misdirection on the principles of "Maskirovka" had massively misled NATO to its readiness. After the first shock of the invasion and the defection of much of the NVA the Warsaw Pact counter-attacked. The fighting was destructive to an extent not experienced in human history, although this was just a foreshadow. Once at the end of German territory the Bundeswher refused to enter Polish territory due to past German invasions, taking much of the weight out of the attack. NATO rapidly activated REFORGER but the Soviet response was seemingly unstoppable. The line was pierced and the Warsaw Pact units drove deep in Germany and towards the French border while amphibious units landed on the coast. What was supposed to be a strategic diversion had erupted into a general European war.
France readied their Hades nuclear systems, preparing to strike as the Eastern Bloc was almost on their border and declaring that was a red nuclear line. Tactical strikes would show the USSR that any further movement west would be followed by a strategic launch of France's now depleted arsenal. The USSR threatened back. However, NATO needed only a small amount of time to finish REFORGER and that time was bought by Spain.
Spanish troops, nearly the whole Spanish army, raced north and east to try and block the advance. The carnage was terrible. Where the best and most advanced NATO troops were holding what lines they could the under-equipped Spanish divisions flung themselves into the gap, holding the line until the French could counter-attack and the rest of NATO slammed into the sides of the salient. American, British and Canadian REFORGER divisions raced in from the coast and hurled the Warsaw Pact units back.
And then China invaded Taiwan.
With the USN and the Red Banner fleets at each other's throats it had simply become obvious to the PRC that Taiwan's protection was gone and soon to be destroyed, and this to them was far more important than the northern border where USSR was visibly pulling units out to desperately send west. The new weapons they had received from the West outclassed the Taiwanese military and soon the fighting on the island was just a perimeter on the eastern extent as the Taiwanese had fanatically contested every inch.
It was at this point that right across the globe smaller powers took the lesson; the super powers could do nothing while they had each other in a death grip. Defence agreements that relied on Soviet might or US power projection were now meaningless, if one of those giants diverted any attention away from their struggle it would be fatal. Wars erupted across the globe. The Korean peninsula erupted in flames and the war-wary Japanese had to desperately send divisions to shore up the line. The Middle East exploded in warfare as the Persian and Arab nations attacked each other and Israel. Turkey couldn't send a spoiling attack into the southern USSR as they found themselves fighting on all sides. In the Mediterranean, Italy and Greece found themselves sending troops north rather than where they had planned to in an effort to relieve the pressure.
Furious, the USA and its Pacific Rim allies struck hard to relieve the pressure on Taiwan. Landings poured into the eastern Chinese coast as the PRC realised they had massively underestimated the USA's response to this treachery.
In Poland, just as NATO had done earlier in Germany, the Warsaw Pact fought tooth and nail for every metre of ground. Earlier predictions that the Eastern Bloc would disintegrate proved false as the Eastern European peoples rallied to their flags despite the nature's of their governments. Still, the Warsaw Pact was tiring. They had lost The Battle of Germany and now seemed to be losing The Battle of Poland. NATO pushed right up to Warsaw, landed troops in the Gdansk estuary and swung around to the south towards the USSR border.
In 1998 NATO troops from every contingent nation arrived outside of Warsaw to begin the siege.
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The Siege of Warsaw saw fighting not seen since Stalingrad.
Warsaw was the centre of the Polish military complex, a win here would knock Poland out of the war. The Soviets instructed the Poles to evacuate their capital, declare it an Open City and retreat over the Byelorussian border. The Poles responded that they would die to the last soldier defending their homeland. They dug in and the Warsaw Pact nations sent troops for this ideologically vital battle.
NATO was in a bind, they too were now in a similar situation the Warsaw Pact had been in when they were on the French border. Winter was closing in and the supply lines were long. In the Vistula Estuary the Soviets were doing well due to that nearly every single vehicle they fielded was amphibious and while the various NATO marine and airborne units were fighting like lions the situation was in doubt. Between Warsaw and Krakow they thrust in to try and outflank the city, but they were getting perilously close to the USSR border - an uncross-able red line.
The three long campaigns; the Reunification of Germany, the Invasion of Germany and the Invasion of Poland had used up munitions and wasted resources at a rate never before seen or ever expected by even the most pessimistic logistician. The air forces were almost entirely gone and aviation units were being reshaped into "temporary" rear area security units. The various special forces had vanished in constant missions that had virtually wiped them out. Worse, specialist munitions like missiles had been expended. The troops were even brewing alcohol to fuel their vehicles and both sides were training horse cavalry. At this point both side's industry was starting to create inventive solutions to shortages. To top it all off winter had just begun.
Warsawa covers both banks of the Wisla river and the Poles decided to try and keep NATO at arm's length if at all possible. They had shifted onto total war footing when the first NATO units arrived over the border and every single man and woman had been called up. Now that the vast bulk of their industry was overrun the Polish population was a fighting force, either in support of on the front lines.
The USA formed the striking mass of the attack and the assault moved up from the direction of the Łódź. It struck the first outer defensive line and the last aerial assets of both sides were annihilated as the Poles were pushed slowly back. On the northern sector Bundeswehr, French and British troops swung round to put pressure on the defenders but struck Soviet armour and stalled. To the south the second echelon of US troops along with equal Canadian forces and backed by Spanish, Benelux and a Scandinavian expeditionary force fended off Soviet, Hungarian, Czech and Romanian forces that developed a strong drive out of Radom.
To the north the NATO light forces tried striking south but stalled as the opposing Warsaw Pact light forces forced them into running battles. Still, the NATO drive from all directions were resolute and despite savage fighting they were in the suburbs by the first snows.
The next eight months was an unending grind of fighting ranging from house to house urban warfare to static trench lines. The Poles were as always fanatic in their defence and troop morale would drop when Polish units moved into the lines opposite them. Rings of bunkers, all dug deep into the soil and only facing the flanks so they couldn't be targeted with directly, were manned to the last soldier. Doggedly the NATO ring tightened, pushing through the burnt-out buildings, past the wrecks and over the dead. The final fighting was intense brawling in the rubble with the Vistula almost in sight. Some units penetrated to the mangled bridges. Acts of heroism punctuated the battle on both sides and as the armies started to collapse from the effort the fighting slowed.
On the southern edge of the battle front the NATO forces broke through. Unable to penetrate into the rear area, they swept along the line trying to find a gap and went straight over the Byelorussian border, only to meet the 3rd Shock Tank Army coming west from its long journey from the China front. The tired NATO troops could only initially stare in awe as they saw a sea of soviet armour coming their way. The siege was untenable and a general retreat was called, the troops pulling out in good order.
No one knows to this day who did it first.
"There is no such thing as a "tactical strike". Any nuclear launch will be met with a strategic response". - William R. Van Cleave and S. T. Cohen, 1977-78 doctrinal manual "The Army in the Field".
The missiles climbed out of their silos, arced away from their mobile TELARS and clawed out of the water from the few remaining SSBs. All over the world countless people died in thunderous flashes. Equal amounts were horrifically maimed. Electronic systems everywhere overloaded and they chips simply melted, even those not connected to anything. Power lines developed insane levels of voltage spikes, making them irreparable just like much of the machinery.
The deaths were staggering but the war ground on. Tactical strikes to delay the enemy were launched and counter-launched. The governments disappeared in a white flash and no one was left to stop the war. The supply lines, if they were spared the nuclear fire, couldn't move. Slowly, some of the troops and some of the civilians recovered. The fragmented NATO units, stuck far in Poland, soon saw that they still had an existential problem - the 3rd Shock Army was still largely intact and true to their last orders were rolling towards them.
Time was short. As every thing movable rolled out west and anything immovable was destroyed as best as possible the NATO units fell back but the 3rd Shock Army with its radiation-protected equipment seemed unstoppable. Volunteers were called for and amalgamated into the 5th Infantry Division (mech).
The 5th turned at bay in the town of Kalisz and prepared to sell their lives dearly so the other units could retreat over the Oder and destroy the bridges behind them.
This message was last edited by the GM at 08:55, Wed 17 Mar 2021.
