People's War

[lordroel]

Sept 23, 2021 18:05:53 GMT James G said:

Twenty-three – The build-up continues


The Coalition was making use of six airbases across West Germany for the mass reinforcement of air power ready to take on the East Germans. Not five years beforehand, there would have been twice as many locations to base aircraft at. However, cutbacks following the collapse of the Eastern Bloc had seen the closure of so many of what was once available across that country. Five of the six filling up with aircraft at the end of June 1995 were on the western side of the Rhine with the sixth right next to Frankfurt. RAF Bruggen & RAF Laarbruch were British facilities practically alongside the Dutch border in the northern reaches of the Rhineland. Further south, close to where the Saar was, the Americans were making great use of Ramstein AB, Sembach AB & Spangdahlem AB; they also had that big presence at Rhein-Main AB which shared its runways with Frankfurt International Airport much closer to the DDR. In terms of combat aircraft, the RAF had added to their pre-deployed force of Tornados and Harriers with more of each as well as some older Jaguars. There remained more Tornados back in the UK with both the strike and air defence versions of that aircraft there. A-10s, F-15s (the fighter version) and F-16s were plentiful at the US Air Force bases. A major deployment was long underway in the Gulf for American air power but they still had the available forces to fill their West German airbases. Rhein-Main was mainly an air logistics hub yet there were F-16s sent there as a forward presence. At each of the half dozen locations, the Americans and British already had many hardened aircraft shelters – which only a direct hit with a penetrating bomb could take out – though there wasn’t enough room for all of the deployed aircraft especially at Rhein-Main. Revetments were hastily build. Concrete and steel plating was used to create blast pens around where aircraft sat in the open under camouflage: that camouflage extended to the revetments too.

The inability of the limited number of sites with West Germany, though also the desire to see a geographic spread of forces to curtail enemy attack options, saw the Coalition deploy aircraft into neighbouring countries. The Belgians, the Danes, the Dutch and the French all kept their own combat aircraft on home soil though with forward deployment closer to where they would see action Bases were opened up for allies too. Up in Denmark, a squadron of Norwegian F-16s arrived down at Skrydstrup AB at the bottom of Jutland to join the Danes who had identical aircraft there and also at Karup AB. There were two Cold War era airbases also on Jutland which the Danes had long held in a stand-by status for use by allies in wartime: Tirstrup AB and Vendel AB. They were opened up to arriving American aircraft as well as two squadrons of Canadian CF-1118 Hornets. A squadron of F-15Es arrived at Soesterberg AB in the Netherlands and another of F-16s went to Volkel AB too. The US Air Force had left the Netherlands only a few years beforehand but returned at Dutch invitation. So too did the Italians who moved up aircraft there with their Tornados (both the IDS and ECR versions) taking a long flight through France to reach their new Dutch bases. The Royal Netherlands Air Force had plenty of multi-role F-16s which were spread throughout their country. Belgium was home to two more of those wartime-ready airbases that the Danes also had. The Americans sent aircraft to Jehonville AB and Weelde AB both. Belgian aircraft were spread across their own national bases though with forward movement to sites in the eastern half of the country leaving them closer to where they expected to see action. The French remained on home soil. Combat aircraft with the Armée de l'Air were across the northeastern region. Plans afoot were for the French to fly mainly above the Czech Republic, less so direct over East Germany, and from where they were positioned, those jets were considered to be close enough. There were a heck of a lot of different Mirage aircraft sitting ready to fly those planned combat missions.

Back in the UK, the RAF had many of their Tornados but the country was also home to American air power. The mixed wing of F-15s at RAF Lakenheath stayed where they were – not forward deploying onto the Continent – and there was too an opening up of further sites. RAF Sculthorpe was also in East Anglia like Lakenheath and that was another one of those Cold War reserve airbases. F-15s and F-16s arrived there while with the same combat wing as them (the 366th Wing) was a squadron of B-1Bs which were deployed to RAF Fairford in the West of England; two squadrons of B-52Hs also went to that facility. RAF Alconbury and RAF Upper Heyford were American airbases closed in recent years yet still regarded as capable of seeing emergency deployments. Into them returned F-111Fs with the EF-111A electronic attack version of that aircraft additionally arriving. At RAF Boscombe Down, down in Southern England where the Americans and the RAF had long used that facility for experimental and secret flights, there was the arrival of a squadron of F-117As. Those stealth strike aircraft arrived at night and were hidden from view; a second squadron flew into Orland AB in the central region of Norway. Those American air units which went to Britain and Norway were all from regular units and so too were many of those deployed elsewhere onto the Continent. However, there was too the arrival of Air Force Reserve units. Others were at Gulf bases but more went to Belgium and Denmark. Into the same two countries, plus also arriving at Leeuwarden AB in the Netherlands, were Air National Guard fighter units. The ANG had a Gulf deployment underway and added to that with one to Europe. Some very good units with brand-new jets arrived as well. The whole of the ANG hadn’t been mobilised back in the United States and those sent to get ready to fight the East Germans had been preparing for unit-only mobilisations ahead of time elsewhere with a change of destination completed with ease.

All of that mass of combat air power was joined by supporting aircraft. There were AWACS aircraft, electronic warfare jets and a lot of tankers. The Americans brought over a lot of the latter though the British, the Canadians, the Dutch, the French and Italians had airborne tankers of their own. Of course, there were many more Americans ones though yet their less-numerous contribution was still valuable. At every airbase made use of, there were those threat counter-measures taken. There were ground troops brought in to protect against what was seen as unlikely yet still possible East German commando threat. The HASs and revetments were in-place to protect aircraft on the ground against the missile threat rather than any East German air attack: again unlikely yet not something that could be completely disregarded. The DDR had already made use of its ballistic missiles to strike throughout Eastern Europe. West Germany and beyond, as far as Denmark, the Low Countries & France, were all within range of them. The Americans and the Dutch both fielded Patriot missile systems. Those had seen action in the Gulf War against Iraq – the Dutch had sent some of theirs to Israel – where what was designed as an anti-air weapon was used to engage ballistic missiles. Claims made in 1991 about the effectiveness of the Patriot had been trashed since then. Nonetheless, much work had been done with the Patriot since them to make it a viable defence for Coalition airbases which the expectation was that the East Germans would target for missile attacks. The West Germans had their own Patriots and those systems would have been welcomed into the Coalition missile defence network. That wasn’t to be though. Independently, they were being deployed elsewhere… yet that movement was still welcomed for it did free up Coalition batteries from that possible role.


The naval build-up continued with less visibility than hundreds upon hundreds of aircraft arriving at land bases. In the North Sea mainly, though with a smaller forward presence in the Danish Straits closer to East Germany, the Coalition assembled warships. There was air power deployed aboard them as well as missiles. New additions to the task forces being built arrived everyday the build-up went on for with a large and clear overreach made in terms of the deployed forces. That was done to make the East Germans take notice though. The international media surely did so when the US Navy sent the massive aircraft carrier USS Enterprise through the English Channel. It could have taken the routing around the British Isles, past the top of Scotland after crossing the North Atlantic, but instead it transited the busy waters of the Straits of Dover. The British and French authorities assisted in making that passage smooth and didn’t interfere with images recorded for broadcast of the Enterprise approaching mainland Europe. USS Dwight D. Eisenhower had been in the North Sea some time before the second carrier arrived. From the two of them flew a huge flotilla of combat aircraft including A-6s, F-14s & FA-18s. They were mobile airbases with their own AWACS aircraft and tankers too. Sea Harriers flown from the Royal Navy’s HMS Illustrious were also ready to see action. They had far less range yet, with tanking, could reach East Germany should the call come. No French carrier joined those three others with the French keeping one of theirs at sea down in the Med. on operations enforcing the maritime embargo against the participants in the Bosnian War; the Americans had the USS George Washington there too. With the carriers, there were cruisers, destroyers, frigates, support ships and submarines. It wasn’t just escort provided but the ability to fire off cruise missiles too from the American vessels. Coalition countries provided naval power there with the French and the Italians joining the Belgians, the Canadians and the Dutch alongside the RN and the USN.

The Danes had their naval forces in home waters to the east of Jutland. A handful of Norwegian vessels were there as well, including a submarine, though most assistance to the Danes came from the Americans and the British. Less-imposing warships were present with destroyers and frigates sent instead of carriers and cruisers. The East Germans had their own navy with a naval air force in support. Counter-action was anticipated in the face of an air campaign against the DDR with it thought likely that a portion of that would occur near to Denmark. The Danes were ready to face that and their allies provided them with significant reinforcements to allow them to defend their territory and interests. Through the Oresund, in sight of land, had gone warships to position themselves ready to see action. Unseen had been the submarines which had gone too.

There had been closures of garrisons for ground forces as well as airbases in West Germany after the Soviets had imploded with the Russians then taking their army home from the other side of the Iron Curtain. However, the cutbacks had been less severe for armies when it came to completely closing their bases. Further scaling back had been in the works yet there remained plentiful locations still open in the middle of 1995 even with reduced forces in-place. No big deployment to complete a build-up of troops took place by the Coalition. The Americans, British and French all had troops in West Germany and kept most of them in-place. There was instead a small movement of some covering forces towards the borders with East Germany and the Czech Republic just in case the DDR decided to go a bit crazy. As part of that, something that the West Germans had no legal ability to stop from happening, Coalition helicopters were deployed much further forward than combat aircraft were. Hanau Army Airfield was a major US Army helicopter site on the opposite side of the famous Fulda Gap and the Americans sent Apache & Cobra gunships, Kiowa scouts & a range of special operations helicopters to there, and then onwards to improvised sites. They were spread across Bavaria and Hessen for patrol tasks but also ready to take action against the East Germans as well as including later aircrew recovery. The British Army and the RAF sent their own helicopters across the Luneburg Heath and elsewhere in the northern parts of West Germany. Their tasks were the same as the Americans though with less available striking power. Much support was given to assisting SAS operational teams engaged in border patrols watching for East German commando activity. Plans were made for aircrew recovery though the British were far more hesitant about having to do that – yet still ready to – than the Americans were. The latter would use specialist fixed wing CSAR aircraft as well as their helicopters yet the RAF had nothing like those AC-130s & MC-130s that the US Air Force had on-hand for that task.

All of that air power, plus the additional naval build-up, still hadn’t changed the minds of those in East Berlin as to what they were risking as the final days of June came to a close. Fighting was still being undertaken down in the Czech Republic against Polish forces there and there were additional air strikes into Polish territory. Ballistic missile firings had ceased yet there remained a continuous denial that East Germany had a nuclear weapons programme despite all of the evidence presented by the Coalition to the international community about that. The demands presented and ultimatum threatened at Rotterdam had had little effect. A few dispersal operations had taken place, there had been some exercises conducted and attempts at concealment were underway but that was it. The East Germans hadn’t prepared themselves for war. The belief remained that the Coalition wouldn’t strike, not with the West Germans still utterly opposed to military action. Images that came out of that country of anti-war protests underway and statements from angry politicians were taken as ‘proof’ that no attack was possible due to the threat of military retaliation against West Germany if it was used as a base of operations. The Coalition was making sure that the DDR had a good idea of its assembling strength – broad strokes, not specifics – but the message wasn’t getting through. All that the Coalition was doing, and preparing to do too, driving the West Germans to rage with that, was still regarded as a bluff and just wasn’t having the impact desired.

So we can assume the East German Navy (Volksmarine) is still the size of 1989 and that they did not get the hands on any submarines.

[stevep]

Well still deep denial in the GDR which is going to bite them hard shortly. Unfortunately a lot of innocents are likely to be hurt as well as the regime.

[lordroel]

Found this, if anybody want to go true 95 pages of the East German Armed forces written by RAND: East Germany's Military: Forces and Expenditures

[James G]

Sept 24, 2021 2:19:47 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 23, 2021 18:05:53 GMT James G said:

Twenty-three – The build-up continues


The Coalition was making use of six airbases across West Germany for the mass reinforcement of air power ready to take on the East Germans. Not five years beforehand, there would have been twice as many locations to base aircraft at. However, cutbacks following the collapse of the Eastern Bloc had seen the closure of so many of what was once available across that country. Five of the six filling up with aircraft at the end of June 1995 were on the western side of the Rhine with the sixth right next to Frankfurt. RAF Bruggen & RAF Laarbruch were British facilities practically alongside the Dutch border in the northern reaches of the Rhineland. Further south, close to where the Saar was, the Americans were making great use of Ramstein AB, Sembach AB & Spangdahlem AB; they also had that big presence at Rhein-Main AB which shared its runways with Frankfurt International Airport much closer to the DDR. In terms of combat aircraft, the RAF had added to their pre-deployed force of Tornados and Harriers with more of each as well as some older Jaguars. There remained more Tornados back in the UK with both the strike and air defence versions of that aircraft there. A-10s, F-15s (the fighter version) and F-16s were plentiful at the US Air Force bases. A major deployment was long underway in the Gulf for American air power but they still had the available forces to fill their West German airbases. Rhein-Main was mainly an air logistics hub yet there were F-16s sent there as a forward presence. At each of the half dozen locations, the Americans and British already had many hardened aircraft shelters – which only a direct hit with a penetrating bomb could take out – though there wasn’t enough room for all of the deployed aircraft especially at Rhein-Main. Revetments were hastily build. Concrete and steel plating was used to create blast pens around where aircraft sat in the open under camouflage: that camouflage extended to the revetments too.

The inability of the limited number of sites with West Germany, though also the desire to see a geographic spread of forces to curtail enemy attack options, saw the Coalition deploy aircraft into neighbouring countries. The Belgians, the Danes, the Dutch and the French all kept their own combat aircraft on home soil though with forward deployment closer to where they would see action Bases were opened up for allies too. Up in Denmark, a squadron of Norwegian F-16s arrived down at Skrydstrup AB at the bottom of Jutland to join the Danes who had identical aircraft there and also at Karup AB. There were two Cold War era airbases also on Jutland which the Danes had long held in a stand-by status for use by allies in wartime: Tirstrup AB and Vendel AB. They were opened up to arriving American aircraft as well as two squadrons of Canadian CF-1118 Hornets. A squadron of F-15Es arrived at Soesterberg AB in the Netherlands and another of F-16s went to Volkel AB too. The US Air Force had left the Netherlands only a few years beforehand but returned at Dutch invitation. So too did the Italians who moved up aircraft there with their Tornados (both the IDS and ECR versions) taking a long flight through France to reach their new Dutch bases. The Royal Netherlands Air Force had plenty of multi-role F-16s which were spread throughout their country. Belgium was home to two more of those wartime-ready airbases that the Danes also had. The Americans sent aircraft to Jehonville AB and Weelde AB both. Belgian aircraft were spread across their own national bases though with forward movement to sites in the eastern half of the country leaving them closer to where they expected to see action. The French remained on home soil. Combat aircraft with the Armée de l'Air were across the northeastern region. Plans afoot were for the French to fly mainly above the Czech Republic, less so direct over East Germany, and from where they were positioned, those jets were considered to be close enough. There were a heck of a lot of different Mirage aircraft sitting ready to fly those planned combat missions.

Back in the UK, the RAF had many of their Tornados but the country was also home to American air power. The mixed wing of F-15s at RAF Lakenheath stayed where they were – not forward deploying onto the Continent – and there was too an opening up of further sites. RAF Sculthorpe was also in East Anglia like Lakenheath and that was another one of those Cold War reserve airbases. F-15s and F-16s arrived there while with the same combat wing as them (the 366th Wing) was a squadron of B-1Bs which were deployed to RAF Fairford in the West of England; two squadrons of B-52Hs also went to that facility. RAF Alconbury and RAF Upper Heyford were American airbases closed in recent years yet still regarded as capable of seeing emergency deployments. Into them returned F-111Fs with the EF-111A electronic attack version of that aircraft additionally arriving. At RAF Boscombe Down, down in Southern England where the Americans and the RAF had long used that facility for experimental and secret flights, there was the arrival of a squadron of F-117As. Those stealth strike aircraft arrived at night and were hidden from view; a second squadron flew into Orland AB in the central region of Norway. Those American air units which went to Britain and Norway were all from regular units and so too were many of those deployed elsewhere onto the Continent. However, there was too the arrival of Air Force Reserve units. Others were at Gulf bases but more went to Belgium and Denmark. Into the same two countries, plus also arriving at Leeuwarden AB in the Netherlands, were Air National Guard fighter units. The ANG had a Gulf deployment underway and added to that with one to Europe. Some very good units with brand-new jets arrived as well. The whole of the ANG hadn’t been mobilised back in the United States and those sent to get ready to fight the East Germans had been preparing for unit-only mobilisations ahead of time elsewhere with a change of destination completed with ease.

All of that mass of combat air power was joined by supporting aircraft. There were AWACS aircraft, electronic warfare jets and a lot of tankers. The Americans brought over a lot of the latter though the British, the Canadians, the Dutch, the French and Italians had airborne tankers of their own. Of course, there were many more Americans ones though yet their less-numerous contribution was still valuable. At every airbase made use of, there were those threat counter-measures taken. There were ground troops brought in to protect against what was seen as unlikely yet still possible East German commando threat. The HASs and revetments were in-place to protect aircraft on the ground against the missile threat rather than any East German air attack: again unlikely yet not something that could be completely disregarded. The DDR had already made use of its ballistic missiles to strike throughout Eastern Europe. West Germany and beyond, as far as Denmark, the Low Countries & France, were all within range of them. The Americans and the Dutch both fielded Patriot missile systems. Those had seen action in the Gulf War against Iraq – the Dutch had sent some of theirs to Israel – where what was designed as an anti-air weapon was used to engage ballistic missiles. Claims made in 1991 about the effectiveness of the Patriot had been trashed since then. Nonetheless, much work had been done with the Patriot since them to make it a viable defence for Coalition airbases which the expectation was that the East Germans would target for missile attacks. The West Germans had their own Patriots and those systems would have been welcomed into the Coalition missile defence network. That wasn’t to be though. Independently, they were being deployed elsewhere… yet that movement was still welcomed for it did free up Coalition batteries from that possible role.


The naval build-up continued with less visibility than hundreds upon hundreds of aircraft arriving at land bases. In the North Sea mainly, though with a smaller forward presence in the Danish Straits closer to East Germany, the Coalition assembled warships. There was air power deployed aboard them as well as missiles. New additions to the task forces being built arrived everyday the build-up went on for with a large and clear overreach made in terms of the deployed forces. That was done to make the East Germans take notice though. The international media surely did so when the US Navy sent the massive aircraft carrier USS Enterprise through the English Channel. It could have taken the routing around the British Isles, past the top of Scotland after crossing the North Atlantic, but instead it transited the busy waters of the Straits of Dover. The British and French authorities assisted in making that passage smooth and didn’t interfere with images recorded for broadcast of the Enterprise approaching mainland Europe. USS Dwight D. Eisenhower had been in the North Sea some time before the second carrier arrived. From the two of them flew a huge flotilla of combat aircraft including A-6s, F-14s & FA-18s. They were mobile airbases with their own AWACS aircraft and tankers too. Sea Harriers flown from the Royal Navy’s HMS Illustrious were also ready to see action. They had far less range yet, with tanking, could reach East Germany should the call come. No French carrier joined those three others with the French keeping one of theirs at sea down in the Med. on operations enforcing the maritime embargo against the participants in the Bosnian War; the Americans had the USS George Washington there too. With the carriers, there were cruisers, destroyers, frigates, support ships and submarines. It wasn’t just escort provided but the ability to fire off cruise missiles too from the American vessels. Coalition countries provided naval power there with the French and the Italians joining the Belgians, the Canadians and the Dutch alongside the RN and the USN.

The Danes had their naval forces in home waters to the east of Jutland. A handful of Norwegian vessels were there as well, including a submarine, though most assistance to the Danes came from the Americans and the British. Less-imposing warships were present with destroyers and frigates sent instead of carriers and cruisers. The East Germans had their own navy with a naval air force in support. Counter-action was anticipated in the face of an air campaign against the DDR with it thought likely that a portion of that would occur near to Denmark. The Danes were ready to face that and their allies provided them with significant reinforcements to allow them to defend their territory and interests. Through the Oresund, in sight of land, had gone warships to position themselves ready to see action. Unseen had been the submarines which had gone too.

There had been closures of garrisons for ground forces as well as airbases in West Germany after the Soviets had imploded with the Russians then taking their army home from the other side of the Iron Curtain. However, the cutbacks had been less severe for armies when it came to completely closing their bases. Further scaling back had been in the works yet there remained plentiful locations still open in the middle of 1995 even with reduced forces in-place. No big deployment to complete a build-up of troops took place by the Coalition. The Americans, British and French all had troops in West Germany and kept most of them in-place. There was instead a small movement of some covering forces towards the borders with East Germany and the Czech Republic just in case the DDR decided to go a bit crazy. As part of that, something that the West Germans had no legal ability to stop from happening, Coalition helicopters were deployed much further forward than combat aircraft were. Hanau Army Airfield was a major US Army helicopter site on the opposite side of the famous Fulda Gap and the Americans sent Apache & Cobra gunships, Kiowa scouts & a range of special operations helicopters to there, and then onwards to improvised sites. They were spread across Bavaria and Hessen for patrol tasks but also ready to take action against the East Germans as well as including later aircrew recovery. The British Army and the RAF sent their own helicopters across the Luneburg Heath and elsewhere in the northern parts of West Germany. Their tasks were the same as the Americans though with less available striking power. Much support was given to assisting SAS operational teams engaged in border patrols watching for East German commando activity. Plans were made for aircrew recovery though the British were far more hesitant about having to do that – yet still ready to – than the Americans were. The latter would use specialist fixed wing CSAR aircraft as well as their helicopters yet the RAF had nothing like those AC-130s & MC-130s that the US Air Force had on-hand for that task.

All of that air power, plus the additional naval build-up, still hadn’t changed the minds of those in East Berlin as to what they were risking as the final days of June came to a close. Fighting was still being undertaken down in the Czech Republic against Polish forces there and there were additional air strikes into Polish territory. Ballistic missile firings had ceased yet there remained a continuous denial that East Germany had a nuclear weapons programme despite all of the evidence presented by the Coalition to the international community about that. The demands presented and ultimatum threatened at Rotterdam had had little effect. A few dispersal operations had taken place, there had been some exercises conducted and attempts at concealment were underway but that was it. The East Germans hadn’t prepared themselves for war. The belief remained that the Coalition wouldn’t strike, not with the West Germans still utterly opposed to military action. Images that came out of that country of anti-war protests underway and statements from angry politicians were taken as ‘proof’ that no attack was possible due to the threat of military retaliation against West Germany if it was used as a base of operations. The Coalition was making sure that the DDR had a good idea of its assembling strength – broad strokes, not specifics – but the message wasn’t getting through. All that the Coalition was doing, and preparing to do too, driving the West Germans to rage with that, was still regarded as a bluff and just wasn’t having the impact desired.

So we can assume the East German Navy (Volksmarine) is still the size of 1989 and that they did not get the hands on any submarines.

Generally so. Corvettes and missile boats. No combat vessel over 500tons.
Ah, they have a sub. Just the one. We'll come to that soon enough.

Sept 24, 2021 10:05:04 GMT stevep said:

Well still deep denial in the GDR which is going to bite them hard shortly. Unfortunately a lot of innocents are likely to be hurt as well as the regime.

The denial will, finally, come to a smashing end.
No matter what each side does to avoid it, civilian lives will be lost. A Scud isn't often accurate and neither is a laser-guided bomb.

[James G]

Twenty-four – They are actually serious?


Britain, France and the United States, the leading powers of the Coalition, could do what they wanted within West Germany because they retained the ‘rights of the conqueror’. A junior minister in the Heseltine Government in the UK used that term in what was meant to be an off-the-record remark to a journalist. His words were leaked and the outcome was just as expected across on the Continent. There was anger at that, that there was still talk of the Nazi past of West Germany. However, the comment, while distasteful, was accurate. Germany had been conquered in 1945 and fifty years later, those who had done so legally held the right to use their armed forces to do whatever they wished within its borders. West Germany was a nation with international recognition (UN membership included), a vibrant democracy and was an economic powerhouse. It was regarded as a free country with sovereignty. That sovereignty was only de facto though, not de jure. No final settlement on the political fate of Germany had been decided at the Potsdam Conference back in ‘45 due to events through the following decades of the Cold War. East and West Germany were technically not fully independent despite having all the characteristics of such countries. When the Coalition decided to fill West German airbases of theirs with aircraft and then deploy ground troops near to the Inner-German Border, they were legally entitled to do that without recourse to the West German government. Air strikes against East Germany could be launched and even an invasion too using West Germany as a base of operations. There was nothing that the government of Schäuble in Bonn could do to stop them. Should the situation have come about where those victors of WW2 had wanted to seize West German military bases, even equipment, they could have done that as well. There was the ability to take over civilian infrastructure in terms of airports, ports and whatever else was needed too. Political considerations and the clear understanding that the civilian situation would explode was part of what kept the Coalition from doing that but, more than that, they just didn’t need to. Should it have been the Soviets or Russians across in the DDR acting in such a manner as the Margot Honecker regime was doing, that might have been needed… though it was unlikely in such a hypothetical situation that the West Germans would have at that point been opposed to war.

The inability to do anything to stop the Coalition preparing for war against their fellow Germans drove the country’s politicians mad yet they moved to accept that that was the way of things when diplomacy failed completely. That wasn’t the case with the ever-growing anti-war movement. When the Coalition took those final steps towards being ready for conflict, so much of it was out in the open. It was a tactic to pile the pressure upon the watching East Germans. However, those in West Germany who were determined to force a halt to the coming war took so much of that personally. Impotent politicians were cursed and action was taken in the streets. Demonstrations and protests occurred across the country including within West Berlin, which wasn’t technically part of West Germany due again to post-WW2 failure to make agreements between the Soviets and the Western Powers. Anti-war actions were coordinated in places yet independent elsewhere. It wasn’t just the ‘usual suspects’ – activists, students, troublemakers – who came out to try and stop the looming certainty of an end to the past fifty years of peace. Ordinary West Germans took part, in many cases joined by others from across Western Europe who travelled to West Germany to take part. There were families and working people involved. In the cities there were anti-war marches and sit-ins where the effect was to cause disruption to civilian life and gain political attention. What was of more significance were the protests which targeted Coalition military activity. Roads which provided access to airbases but also large garrisons too were blocked. There were instances of mass trespass onto military sites where hundreds of people at a time invaded forbidden areas.

Coalition soldiers had complicated ROE when it came to that. They were tasked to use deadly force against possible East German commandos, even one disguised as West German protesters, but what they faced were clearly civilians trying to stop a war. It was a damn difficult situation to face and there was some violence employed at times due to misunderstandings. That only inflamed the situation. The West German authorities tried to maintain law-and-order. At times, that utterly broke down though. Demands coming from Western capitals that that be enforced made Bonn uncomfortable as those sounded very similar to the ones delivered to the DDR too. The state government of Rhineland-Palatinate disputed with federal authorities in Bonn over how far to act on several occasions when protesters invaded American military facilities. A constitutional crisis was the cause of concern by observers though a lot of that was overblown in the media.

While those protests took place, the West German Armed Forces were issued special orders by Schäuble and his government. The Bundeswehr set about preparing to respond to military attacks launched against the country by the DDR lashing out when struck first by the Coalition. Such responses weren’t those of taking part in further attacks eastwards though. Instead, the Bundeswehr was to take measures to protect West Germany. Patriot anti-missile batteries were given deployment orders so that they could move towards West German cities. Soldiers were tasked with search-and-rescue missions and military medical personnel were also made available to treat civilian casualties too. Up in Schleswig-Holstein, instructions went to naval minesweeping assets to be ready to ensure that the country’s Baltic coastline – from Flensburg to Lubeck – could be cleared of mines should those be laid. The Luftwaffe was given orders that they were to defend West German skies against any attacking East German aircraft, even if those were plotted as heading for Coalition military bases. That secret set of preparations were leaked. There were those who were opposed to any West German military action, even complete self-defence, and saw what the Bundeswehr was being tasked to do as a readiness on the part of Schäuble to have the country enter the Coalition via the backdoor. Much was made of those Luftwaffe orders too to shot down aircraft. The government struggled against the backlash of that leak with denials that its military readiness were in fact preparations for war made with all honesty but increasingly less believed by outraged sections of the population.


The fighting within the Moravia & Czech Silesia regions of the Czech Republic ground down to almost a stalemate during the last days of June 1995. The Poles finally managed to hold on to what they had helped secure for the legitimate Czech government of PM Klaus. They couldn’t be dislodged from where they had fallen back to in that countermove to their intervention of Czech rebel forces aided by East German air power. The Poles had their ‘backs to the wall’, but it was their homeland behind them. More than nine-tenths of Czech territory was in the hands of the DDR-supported government in Prague yet there remained a legitimacy which Klaus could claim considering that part of the nation was still under his control. East German air strikes took place on both June 27th & 29th into Poland. There were other air clashes at the same time in Czech skies. Additionally, there was an air engagement above the DDR-Poland border on the 28th, far away from the fighting in the Czech Republic. The conflict had spread to there in a significant expansion yet an inevitable one in hindsight for those involved. Paratroopers sent into the Czech Republic by East Germany remained in combat though the heavier ground forces standing ready in Saxony to make an additional deployment hadn’t moved by that point. There had been previous discussions among the Politburo in East Berlin about the wisdom of doing that. The ability of the Poles to finally be able to make a successful stand turned the hesitancy on its head though. A mixed tank-heavy force from various East German Army units formed into an expeditionary brigade began to move at dawn on the last day of the month. They were ordered to cross over the Czech-DDR border and take on the Poles over on the far side of the Czech Republic.

The Coalition responded to that deployment, one which they had eyes upon as it began. In a joint statement, the ten nation temporary alliance (NATO members operating outside of that organisation), issued a second ultimatum. It was presented as a reinforcement of the first yet carried with it far more weight and seriousness too. East Germany was given forty-eight hours to agree to the demands issued from Rotterdam earlier in the month. It was to cease its ballistic missile attacks, end its wars against its neighbours and comply with an international de-nuclearisation effort. Agreement to do that had to come within the specified time period. If that didn’t come, than military action was promised in reply to enforce the will of the Coalition upon the DDR.

The Politburo was meeting on the evening of June 30th when the Coalition gave that second, final ultimatum. Leaks coming out of West Germany about military preparations still hadn’t moved them to take the threat from the Coalition seriously… nor had that huge military build-up either. The leadership of the DDR was discussing that deployment of heavy ground forces as the first tanks went over the border into the Czech Republic. All of a sudden, seemingly timed to throw them off-balance, came those coordinated statements from foreign capitals giving them a deadline to act upon. The foreign minister expressed with genuine surprise that the West was actually serious! No one else at the top contested his shock. It left them all stunned. Honecker and Schwanitz were at a loss as to how to respond as the others where. West German objections and obstructions, including the anti-war protests which had been foreseen, were meant to make that impossible. Cuomo and Heseltine were regarded as non-interventionists despite their supposed idle threats previously made. They were meant to be bluffing!

There was no immediate reaction thus made from East Berlin. No ground work had been done as to what to have a spokesman say. Honecker and her top people were thrown into confusion as to what she should say in any address to the nation in reply. Meanwhile, that deadline set by the Coalition, one they had been loath to previously impose upon themselves to back up words with action, was one that was counting downwards. War was assured to occur once the clock was ticking unless the East Germans did the impossible and thoroughly backed down from the situation they only had themselves to blame for being in.

[lordroel]

Sept 24, 2021 16:40:16 GMT James G said:

Twenty-four – They are actually serious?


Britain, France and the United States, the leading powers of the Coalition, could do what they wanted within West Germany because they retained the ‘rights of the conqueror’. A junior minister in the Heseltine Government in the UK used that term in what was meant to be an off-the-record remark to a journalist. His words were leaked and the outcome was just as expected across on the Continent. There was anger at that, that there was still talk of the Nazi past of West Germany. However, the comment, while distasteful, was accurate. Germany had been conquered in 1945 and fifty years later, those who had done so legally held the right to use their armed forces to do whatever they wished within its borders. West Germany was a nation with international recognition (UN membership included), a vibrant democracy and was an economic powerhouse. It was regarded as a free country with sovereignty. That sovereignty was only de facto though, not de jure. No final settlement on the political fate of Germany had been decided at the Potsdam Conference back in ‘45 due to events through the following decades of the Cold War. East and West Germany were technically not fully independent despite having all the characteristics of such countries. When the Coalition decided to fill West German airbases of theirs with aircraft and then deploy ground troops near to the Inner-German Border, they were legally entitled to do that without recourse to the West German government. Air strikes against East Germany could be launched and even an invasion too using West Germany as a base of operations. There was nothing that the government of Schäuble in Bonn could do to stop them. Should the situation have come about where those victors of WW2 had wanted to seize West German military bases, even equipment, they could have done that as well. There was the ability to take over civilian infrastructure in terms of airports, ports and whatever else was needed too. Political considerations and the clear understanding that the civilian situation would explode was part of what kept the Coalition from doing that but, more than that, they just didn’t need to. Should it have been the Soviets or Russians across in the DDR acting in such a manner as the Margot Honecker regime was doing, that might have been needed… though it was unlikely in such a hypothetical situation that the West Germans would have at that point been opposed to war.

The inability to do anything to stop the Coalition preparing for war against their fellow Germans drove the country’s politicians mad yet they moved to accept that that was the way of things when diplomacy failed completely. That wasn’t the case with the ever-growing anti-war movement. When the Coalition took those final steps towards being ready for conflict, so much of it was out in the open. It was a tactic to pile the pressure upon the watching East Germans. However, those in West Germany who were determined to force a halt to the coming war took so much of that personally. Impotent politicians were cursed and action was taken in the streets. Demonstrations and protests occurred across the country including within West Berlin, which wasn’t technically part of West Germany due again to post-WW2 failure to make agreements between the Soviets and the Western Powers. Anti-war actions were coordinated in places yet independent elsewhere. It wasn’t just the ‘usual suspects’ – activists, students, troublemakers – who came out to try and stop the looming certainty of an end to the past fifty years of peace. Ordinary West Germans took part, in many cases joined by others from across Western Europe who travelled to West Germany to take part. There were families and working people involved. In the cities there were anti-war marches and sit-ins where the effect was to cause disruption to civilian life and gain political attention. What was of more significance were the protests which targeted Coalition military activity. Roads which provided access to airbases but also large garrisons too were blocked. There were instances of mass trespass onto military sites where hundreds of people at a time invaded forbidden areas.

Coalition soldiers had complicated ROE when it came to that. They were tasked to use deadly force against possible East German commandos, even one disguised as West German protesters, but what they faced were clearly civilians trying to stop a war. It was a damn difficult situation to face and there was some violence employed at times due to misunderstandings. That only inflamed the situation. The West German authorities tried to maintain law-and-order. At times, that utterly broke down though. Demands coming from Western capitals that that be enforced made Bonn uncomfortable as those sounded very similar to the ones delivered to the DDR too. The state government of Rhineland-Palatinate disputed with federal authorities in Bonn over how far to act on several occasions when protesters invaded American military facilities. A constitutional crisis was the cause of concern by observers though a lot of that was overblown in the media.

While those protests took place, the West German Armed Forces were issued special orders by Schäuble and his government. The Bundeswehr set about preparing to respond to military attacks launched against the country by the DDR lashing out when struck first by the Coalition. Such responses weren’t those of taking part in further attacks eastwards though. Instead, the Bundeswehr was to take measures to protect West Germany. Patriot anti-missile batteries were given deployment orders so that they could move towards West German cities. Soldiers were tasked with search-and-rescue missions and military medical personnel were also made available to treat civilian casualties too. Up in Schleswig-Holstein, instructions went to naval minesweeping assets to be ready to ensure that the country’s Baltic coastline – from Flensburg to Lubeck – could be cleared of mines should those be laid. The Luftwaffe was given orders that they were to defend West German skies against any attacking East German aircraft, even if those were plotted as heading for Coalition military bases. That secret set of preparations were leaked. There were those who were opposed to any West German military action, even complete self-defence, and saw what the Bundeswehr was being tasked to do as a readiness on the part of Schäuble to have the country enter the Coalition via the backdoor. Much was made of those Luftwaffe orders too to shot down aircraft. The government struggled against the backlash of that leak with denials that its military readiness were in fact preparations for war made with all honesty but increasingly less believed by outraged sections of the population.


The fighting within the Moravia & Czech Silesia regions of the Czech Republic ground down to almost a stalemate during the last days of June 1995. The Poles finally managed to hold on to what they had helped secure for the legitimate Czech government of PM Klaus. They couldn’t be dislodged from where they had fallen back to in that countermove to their intervention of Czech rebel forces aided by East German air power. The Poles had their ‘backs to the wall’, but it was their homeland behind them. More than nine-tenths of Czech territory was in the hands of the DDR-supported government in Prague yet there remained a legitimacy which Klaus could claim considering that part of the nation was still under his control. East German air strikes took place on both June 27th & 29th into Poland. There were other air clashes at the same time in Czech skies. Additionally, there was an air engagement above the DDR-Poland border on the 28th, far away from the fighting in the Czech Republic. The conflict had spread to there in a significant expansion yet an inevitable one in hindsight for those involved. Paratroopers sent into the Czech Republic by East Germany remained in combat though the heavier ground forces standing ready in Saxony to make an additional deployment hadn’t moved by that point. There had been previous discussions among the Politburo in East Berlin about the wisdom of doing that. The ability of the Poles to finally be able to make a successful stand turned the hesitancy on its head though. A mixed tank-heavy force from various East German Army units formed into an expeditionary brigade began to move at dawn on the last day of the month. They were ordered to cross over the Czech-DDR border and take on the Poles over on the far side of the Czech Republic.

The Coalition responded to that deployment, one which they had eyes upon as it began. In a joint statement, the ten nation temporary alliance (NATO members operating outside of that organisation), issued a second ultimatum. It was presented as a reinforcement of the first yet carried with it far more weight and seriousness too. East Germany was given forty-eight hours to agree to the demands issued from Rotterdam earlier in the month. It was to cease its ballistic missile attacks, end its wars against its neighbours and comply with an international de-nuclearisation effort. Agreement to do that had to come within the specified time period. If that didn’t come, than military action was promised in reply to enforce the will of the Coalition upon the DDR.

The Politburo was meeting on the evening of June 30th when the Coalition gave that second, final ultimatum. Leaks coming out of West Germany about military preparations still hadn’t moved them to take the threat from the Coalition seriously… nor had that huge military build-up either. The leadership of the DDR was discussing that deployment of heavy ground forces as the first tanks went over the border into the Czech Republic. All of a sudden, seemingly timed to throw them off-balance, came those coordinated statements from foreign capitals giving them a deadline to act upon. The foreign minister expressed with genuine surprise that the West was actually serious! No one else at the top contested his shock. It left them all stunned. Honecker and Schwanitz were at a loss as to how to respond as the others where. West German objections and obstructions, including the anti-war protests which had been foreseen, were meant to make that impossible. Cuomo and Heseltine were regarded as non-interventionists despite their supposed idle threats previously made. They were meant to be bluffing!

There was no immediate reaction thus made from East Berlin. No ground work had been done as to what to have a spokesman say. Honecker and her top people were thrown into confusion as to what she should say in any address to the nation in reply. Meanwhile, that deadline set by the Coalition, one they had been loath to previously impose upon themselves to back up words with action, was one that was counting downwards. War was assured to occur once the clock was ticking unless the East Germans did the impossible and thoroughly backed down from the situation they only had themselves to blame for being in.

James G, first another great update to a great TL, second what time frame are we seeing, days, weeks, months.

[stevep]

Sept 24, 2021 16:44:17 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 24, 2021 16:40:16 GMT James G said:

Twenty-four – They are actually serious?


Britain, France and the United States, the leading powers of the Coalition, could do what they wanted within West Germany because they retained the ‘rights of the conqueror’. A junior minister in the Heseltine Government in the UK used that term in what was meant to be an off-the-record remark to a journalist. His words were leaked and the outcome was just as expected across on the Continent. There was anger at that, that there was still talk of the Nazi past of West Germany. However, the comment, while distasteful, was accurate. Germany had been conquered in 1945 and fifty years later, those who had done so legally held the right to use their armed forces to do whatever they wished within its borders. West Germany was a nation with international recognition (UN membership included), a vibrant democracy and was an economic powerhouse. It was regarded as a free country with sovereignty. That sovereignty was only de facto though, not de jure. No final settlement on the political fate of Germany had been decided at the Potsdam Conference back in ‘45 due to events through the following decades of the Cold War. East and West Germany were technically not fully independent despite having all the characteristics of such countries. When the Coalition decided to fill West German airbases of theirs with aircraft and then deploy ground troops near to the Inner-German Border, they were legally entitled to do that without recourse to the West German government. Air strikes against East Germany could be launched and even an invasion too using West Germany as a base of operations. There was nothing that the government of Schäuble in Bonn could do to stop them. Should the situation have come about where those victors of WW2 had wanted to seize West German military bases, even equipment, they could have done that as well. There was the ability to take over civilian infrastructure in terms of airports, ports and whatever else was needed too. Political considerations and the clear understanding that the civilian situation would explode was part of what kept the Coalition from doing that but, more than that, they just didn’t need to. Should it have been the Soviets or Russians across in the DDR acting in such a manner as the Margot Honecker regime was doing, that might have been needed… though it was unlikely in such a hypothetical situation that the West Germans would have at that point been opposed to war.

The inability to do anything to stop the Coalition preparing for war against their fellow Germans drove the country’s politicians mad yet they moved to accept that that was the way of things when diplomacy failed completely. That wasn’t the case with the ever-growing anti-war movement. When the Coalition took those final steps towards being ready for conflict, so much of it was out in the open. It was a tactic to pile the pressure upon the watching East Germans. However, those in West Germany who were determined to force a halt to the coming war took so much of that personally. Impotent politicians were cursed and action was taken in the streets. Demonstrations and protests occurred across the country including within West Berlin, which wasn’t technically part of West Germany due again to post-WW2 failure to make agreements between the Soviets and the Western Powers. Anti-war actions were coordinated in places yet independent elsewhere. It wasn’t just the ‘usual suspects’ – activists, students, troublemakers – who came out to try and stop the looming certainty of an end to the past fifty years of peace. Ordinary West Germans took part, in many cases joined by others from across Western Europe who travelled to West Germany to take part. There were families and working people involved. In the cities there were anti-war marches and sit-ins where the effect was to cause disruption to civilian life and gain political attention. What was of more significance were the protests which targeted Coalition military activity. Roads which provided access to airbases but also large garrisons too were blocked. There were instances of mass trespass onto military sites where hundreds of people at a time invaded forbidden areas.

Coalition soldiers had complicated ROE when it came to that. They were tasked to use deadly force against possible East German commandos, even one disguised as West German protesters, but what they faced were clearly civilians trying to stop a war. It was a damn difficult situation to face and there was some violence employed at times due to misunderstandings. That only inflamed the situation. The West German authorities tried to maintain law-and-order. At times, that utterly broke down though. Demands coming from Western capitals that that be enforced made Bonn uncomfortable as those sounded very similar to the ones delivered to the DDR too. The state government of Rhineland-Palatinate disputed with federal authorities in Bonn over how far to act on several occasions when protesters invaded American military facilities. A constitutional crisis was the cause of concern by observers though a lot of that was overblown in the media.

While those protests took place, the West German Armed Forces were issued special orders by Schäuble and his government. The Bundeswehr set about preparing to respond to military attacks launched against the country by the DDR lashing out when struck first by the Coalition. Such responses weren’t those of taking part in further attacks eastwards though. Instead, the Bundeswehr was to take measures to protect West Germany. Patriot anti-missile batteries were given deployment orders so that they could move towards West German cities. Soldiers were tasked with search-and-rescue missions and military medical personnel were also made available to treat civilian casualties too. Up in Schleswig-Holstein, instructions went to naval minesweeping assets to be ready to ensure that the country’s Baltic coastline – from Flensburg to Lubeck – could be cleared of mines should those be laid. The Luftwaffe was given orders that they were to defend West German skies against any attacking East German aircraft, even if those were plotted as heading for Coalition military bases. That secret set of preparations were leaked. There were those who were opposed to any West German military action, even complete self-defence, and saw what the Bundeswehr was being tasked to do as a readiness on the part of Schäuble to have the country enter the Coalition via the backdoor. Much was made of those Luftwaffe orders too to shot down aircraft. The government struggled against the backlash of that leak with denials that its military readiness were in fact preparations for war made with all honesty but increasingly less believed by outraged sections of the population.


The fighting within the Moravia & Czech Silesia regions of the Czech Republic ground down to almost a stalemate during the last days of June 1995. The Poles finally managed to hold on to what they had helped secure for the legitimate Czech government of PM Klaus. They couldn’t be dislodged from where they had fallen back to in that countermove to their intervention of Czech rebel forces aided by East German air power. The Poles had their ‘backs to the wall’, but it was their homeland behind them. More than nine-tenths of Czech territory was in the hands of the DDR-supported government in Prague yet there remained a legitimacy which Klaus could claim considering that part of the nation was still under his control. East German air strikes took place on both June 27th & 29th into Poland. There were other air clashes at the same time in Czech skies. Additionally, there was an air engagement above the DDR-Poland border on the 28th, far away from the fighting in the Czech Republic. The conflict had spread to there in a significant expansion yet an inevitable one in hindsight for those involved. Paratroopers sent into the Czech Republic by East Germany remained in combat though the heavier ground forces standing ready in Saxony to make an additional deployment hadn’t moved by that point. There had been previous discussions among the Politburo in East Berlin about the wisdom of doing that. The ability of the Poles to finally be able to make a successful stand turned the hesitancy on its head though. A mixed tank-heavy force from various East German Army units formed into an expeditionary brigade began to move at dawn on the last day of the month. They were ordered to cross over the Czech-DDR border and take on the Poles over on the far side of the Czech Republic.

The Coalition responded to that deployment, one which they had eyes upon as it began. In a joint statement, the ten nation temporary alliance (NATO members operating outside of that organisation), issued a second ultimatum. It was presented as a reinforcement of the first yet carried with it far more weight and seriousness too. East Germany was given forty-eight hours to agree to the demands issued from Rotterdam earlier in the month. It was to cease its ballistic missile attacks, end its wars against its neighbours and comply with an international de-nuclearisation effort. Agreement to do that had to come within the specified time period. If that didn’t come, than military action was promised in reply to enforce the will of the Coalition upon the DDR.

The Politburo was meeting on the evening of June 30th when the Coalition gave that second, final ultimatum. Leaks coming out of West Germany about military preparations still hadn’t moved them to take the threat from the Coalition seriously… nor had that huge military build-up either. The leadership of the DDR was discussing that deployment of heavy ground forces as the first tanks went over the border into the Czech Republic. All of a sudden, seemingly timed to throw them off-balance, came those coordinated statements from foreign capitals giving them a deadline to act upon. The foreign minister expressed with genuine surprise that the West was actually serious! No one else at the top contested his shock. It left them all stunned. Honecker and Schwanitz were at a loss as to how to respond as the others where. West German objections and obstructions, including the anti-war protests which had been foreseen, were meant to make that impossible. Cuomo and Heseltine were regarded as non-interventionists despite their supposed idle threats previously made. They were meant to be bluffing!

There was no immediate reaction thus made from East Berlin. No ground work had been done as to what to have a spokesman say. Honecker and her top people were thrown into confusion as to what she should say in any address to the nation in reply. Meanwhile, that deadline set by the Coalition, one they had been loath to previously impose upon themselves to back up words with action, was one that was counting downwards. War was assured to occur once the clock was ticking unless the East Germans did the impossible and thoroughly backed down from the situation they only had themselves to blame for being in.

James G , first another great update to a great TL, second what time frame are we seeing, days, weeks, months.

  Well, unless someone blinks and backs down big time which seems highly unlikely, its pretty much 48 hours before a lot more fireworks go off.  How long that lasts could be days or weeks but I suspect not months as the GDR simply doesn't have the resources for a long war against the bulk of NATO plus Poland and the Czech Republic.  What could be the awkward longer term impact is what happens with W Germany and NATO as a whole.  You could see it reacting to eastern attacks by joining the alliance or seeking to end its status as a 'conquered' state and even leave NATO.  Plus how it relates to E Germany afterwards?  How much of that James will cover I don't know.

[lordroel]

Sept 24, 2021 16:40:16 GMT James G said:

Twenty-four – They are actually serious?

There was no immediate reaction thus made from East Berlin. No ground work had been done as to what to have a spokesman say. Honecker and her top people were thrown into confusion as to what she should say in any address to the nation in reply. Meanwhile, that deadline set by the Coalition, one they had been loath to previously impose upon themselves to back up words with action, was one that was counting downwards. War was assured to occur once the clock was ticking unless the East Germans did the impossible and thoroughly backed down from the situation they only had themselves to blame for being in.

Time for Honecker and her goonies to head towards Bunker 17/5001 which i think but James has to confirm is still unknown to NATO as OTL.

[James G]

Sept 24, 2021 16:44:17 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 24, 2021 16:40:16 GMT James G said:

Twenty-four – They are actually serious?


Britain, France and the United States, the leading powers of the Coalition, could do what they wanted within West Germany because they retained the ‘rights of the conqueror’. A junior minister in the Heseltine Government in the UK used that term in what was meant to be an off-the-record remark to a journalist. His words were leaked and the outcome was just as expected across on the Continent. There was anger at that, that there was still talk of the Nazi past of West Germany. However, the comment, while distasteful, was accurate. Germany had been conquered in 1945 and fifty years later, those who had done so legally held the right to use their armed forces to do whatever they wished within its borders. West Germany was a nation with international recognition (UN membership included), a vibrant democracy and was an economic powerhouse. It was regarded as a free country with sovereignty. That sovereignty was only de facto though, not de jure. No final settlement on the political fate of Germany had been decided at the Potsdam Conference back in ‘45 due to events through the following decades of the Cold War. East and West Germany were technically not fully independent despite having all the characteristics of such countries. When the Coalition decided to fill West German airbases of theirs with aircraft and then deploy ground troops near to the Inner-German Border, they were legally entitled to do that without recourse to the West German government. Air strikes against East Germany could be launched and even an invasion too using West Germany as a base of operations. There was nothing that the government of Schäuble in Bonn could do to stop them. Should the situation have come about where those victors of WW2 had wanted to seize West German military bases, even equipment, they could have done that as well. There was the ability to take over civilian infrastructure in terms of airports, ports and whatever else was needed too. Political considerations and the clear understanding that the civilian situation would explode was part of what kept the Coalition from doing that but, more than that, they just didn’t need to. Should it have been the Soviets or Russians across in the DDR acting in such a manner as the Margot Honecker regime was doing, that might have been needed… though it was unlikely in such a hypothetical situation that the West Germans would have at that point been opposed to war.

The inability to do anything to stop the Coalition preparing for war against their fellow Germans drove the country’s politicians mad yet they moved to accept that that was the way of things when diplomacy failed completely. That wasn’t the case with the ever-growing anti-war movement. When the Coalition took those final steps towards being ready for conflict, so much of it was out in the open. It was a tactic to pile the pressure upon the watching East Germans. However, those in West Germany who were determined to force a halt to the coming war took so much of that personally. Impotent politicians were cursed and action was taken in the streets. Demonstrations and protests occurred across the country including within West Berlin, which wasn’t technically part of West Germany due again to post-WW2 failure to make agreements between the Soviets and the Western Powers. Anti-war actions were coordinated in places yet independent elsewhere. It wasn’t just the ‘usual suspects’ – activists, students, troublemakers – who came out to try and stop the looming certainty of an end to the past fifty years of peace. Ordinary West Germans took part, in many cases joined by others from across Western Europe who travelled to West Germany to take part. There were families and working people involved. In the cities there were anti-war marches and sit-ins where the effect was to cause disruption to civilian life and gain political attention. What was of more significance were the protests which targeted Coalition military activity. Roads which provided access to airbases but also large garrisons too were blocked. There were instances of mass trespass onto military sites where hundreds of people at a time invaded forbidden areas.

Coalition soldiers had complicated ROE when it came to that. They were tasked to use deadly force against possible East German commandos, even one disguised as West German protesters, but what they faced were clearly civilians trying to stop a war. It was a damn difficult situation to face and there was some violence employed at times due to misunderstandings. That only inflamed the situation. The West German authorities tried to maintain law-and-order. At times, that utterly broke down though. Demands coming from Western capitals that that be enforced made Bonn uncomfortable as those sounded very similar to the ones delivered to the DDR too. The state government of Rhineland-Palatinate disputed with federal authorities in Bonn over how far to act on several occasions when protesters invaded American military facilities. A constitutional crisis was the cause of concern by observers though a lot of that was overblown in the media.

While those protests took place, the West German Armed Forces were issued special orders by Schäuble and his government. The Bundeswehr set about preparing to respond to military attacks launched against the country by the DDR lashing out when struck first by the Coalition. Such responses weren’t those of taking part in further attacks eastwards though. Instead, the Bundeswehr was to take measures to protect West Germany. Patriot anti-missile batteries were given deployment orders so that they could move towards West German cities. Soldiers were tasked with search-and-rescue missions and military medical personnel were also made available to treat civilian casualties too. Up in Schleswig-Holstein, instructions went to naval minesweeping assets to be ready to ensure that the country’s Baltic coastline – from Flensburg to Lubeck – could be cleared of mines should those be laid. The Luftwaffe was given orders that they were to defend West German skies against any attacking East German aircraft, even if those were plotted as heading for Coalition military bases. That secret set of preparations were leaked. There were those who were opposed to any West German military action, even complete self-defence, and saw what the Bundeswehr was being tasked to do as a readiness on the part of Schäuble to have the country enter the Coalition via the backdoor. Much was made of those Luftwaffe orders too to shot down aircraft. The government struggled against the backlash of that leak with denials that its military readiness were in fact preparations for war made with all honesty but increasingly less believed by outraged sections of the population.


The fighting within the Moravia & Czech Silesia regions of the Czech Republic ground down to almost a stalemate during the last days of June 1995. The Poles finally managed to hold on to what they had helped secure for the legitimate Czech government of PM Klaus. They couldn’t be dislodged from where they had fallen back to in that countermove to their intervention of Czech rebel forces aided by East German air power. The Poles had their ‘backs to the wall’, but it was their homeland behind them. More than nine-tenths of Czech territory was in the hands of the DDR-supported government in Prague yet there remained a legitimacy which Klaus could claim considering that part of the nation was still under his control. East German air strikes took place on both June 27th & 29th into Poland. There were other air clashes at the same time in Czech skies. Additionally, there was an air engagement above the DDR-Poland border on the 28th, far away from the fighting in the Czech Republic. The conflict had spread to there in a significant expansion yet an inevitable one in hindsight for those involved. Paratroopers sent into the Czech Republic by East Germany remained in combat though the heavier ground forces standing ready in Saxony to make an additional deployment hadn’t moved by that point. There had been previous discussions among the Politburo in East Berlin about the wisdom of doing that. The ability of the Poles to finally be able to make a successful stand turned the hesitancy on its head though. A mixed tank-heavy force from various East German Army units formed into an expeditionary brigade began to move at dawn on the last day of the month. They were ordered to cross over the Czech-DDR border and take on the Poles over on the far side of the Czech Republic.

The Coalition responded to that deployment, one which they had eyes upon as it began. In a joint statement, the ten nation temporary alliance (NATO members operating outside of that organisation), issued a second ultimatum. It was presented as a reinforcement of the first yet carried with it far more weight and seriousness too. East Germany was given forty-eight hours to agree to the demands issued from Rotterdam earlier in the month. It was to cease its ballistic missile attacks, end its wars against its neighbours and comply with an international de-nuclearisation effort. Agreement to do that had to come within the specified time period. If that didn’t come, than military action was promised in reply to enforce the will of the Coalition upon the DDR.

The Politburo was meeting on the evening of June 30th when the Coalition gave that second, final ultimatum. Leaks coming out of West Germany about military preparations still hadn’t moved them to take the threat from the Coalition seriously… nor had that huge military build-up either. The leadership of the DDR was discussing that deployment of heavy ground forces as the first tanks went over the border into the Czech Republic. All of a sudden, seemingly timed to throw them off-balance, came those coordinated statements from foreign capitals giving them a deadline to act upon. The foreign minister expressed with genuine surprise that the West was actually serious! No one else at the top contested his shock. It left them all stunned. Honecker and Schwanitz were at a loss as to how to respond as the others where. West German objections and obstructions, including the anti-war protests which had been foreseen, were meant to make that impossible. Cuomo and Heseltine were regarded as non-interventionists despite their supposed idle threats previously made. They were meant to be bluffing!

There was no immediate reaction thus made from East Berlin. No ground work had been done as to what to have a spokesman say. Honecker and her top people were thrown into confusion as to what she should say in any address to the nation in reply. Meanwhile, that deadline set by the Coalition, one they had been loath to previously impose upon themselves to back up words with action, was one that was counting downwards. War was assured to occur once the clock was ticking unless the East Germans did the impossible and thoroughly backed down from the situation they only had themselves to blame for being in.

James G , first another great update to a great TL, second what time frame are we seeing, days, weeks, months.

Thank you.
The Coalition predicts after a week of air activity, especially the planned first three nights of intensive strikes, East Germany will give in.
The conflict I have planned will be longer than that

Sept 25, 2021 10:43:59 GMT stevep said:

  Well, unless someone blinks and backs down big time which seems highly unlikely, its pretty much 48 hours before a lot more fireworks go off.  How long that lasts could be days or weeks but I suspect not months as the GDR simply doesn't have the resources for a long war against the bulk of NATO plus Poland and the Czech Republic.  What could be the awkward longer term impact is what happens with W Germany and NATO as a whole.  You could see it reacting to eastern attacks by joining the alliance or seeking to end its status as a 'conquered' state and even leave NATO.  Plus how it relates to E Germany afterwards?  How much of that James will cover I don't know.

No one will be blinking: too many committed on each side for that.
That depends. A targeted military-only attack is going to be difficult to bring down the DDR. With the right circumstances, that can be suffered. The overstretch for the regime is a problem, as you highlight, and that will cause problems for holding on in the face of so much they will get hit with.
I have yet to plan in my mind long-term matters like that. West Germany will get more and more upset though, blaming East German actions on the Coalition too.

Sept 25, 2021 11:14:51 GMT lordroel said:

Time for Honecker and her goonies to head towards Bunker 17/5001 which i think but James has to confirm is still unknown to NATO as OTL.

Great find! I knew there was a bunker I had once read of but couldn't recall it.
That bunker isn't on the target list. We will say ITTL it is currently unknown.
There are some other bunkers, military command ones, which the Americans are planning to drop Deep Throats into though.

[James G]

Twenty-five – Darkness


East Germany’s military, the Volksarmee, hit the panic button. Immediate, urgent preparations to defend the DDR from an incoming military attack with only a little notice were put into effect. That included the beginnings of a mobilisation as well as the shutting down of all active electronic signals which were detectable to outside sources. EMCON – emission control – was enforced. The use of radios was banned and there was the additional shutting down of much of the radar network apart from specific sites. Communications would take place by fixed land links, below ground ones especially, and also the use of physical messengers was employed. The limited numbers of radars left active were just enough to maintain enough coverage of the skies with those used switched on and off too. A darkness fell across East Germany, one where it was meant to keep those seeking to attack the country from having a good understanding of its military activities so as to allow the EMCON to hide those mobilisations beginning. That mobilisation began in a hurry and with the Volksarmee leadership hoping that all of the satellites, stand-off reconnaissance aircraft and listening posts of the Coalition wouldn’t be able to see much of what was going on in the darkness imposed.

What happened at the East German Navy base at Rostock wasn’t something that could be hidden though. There was urgent action undertaken there – and at other smaller facilities elsewhere beside the Baltic – to get naval vessels out to sea. It would take some time to have them do that, but work was underway to flood the coastline with warships. In addition, preparations were made to get the Oder to sea. Tied up alongside the quays at the Gehlsdorf anchorage outside of Rostock proper was the lone submarine that was in East German service. It had been purchased from the Russians in 1991 with a delivery only the year beforehand following a long work-up period for her crew who had been trained in the Baltic by the Russian Navy. The Oder was a Type-877 submarine, better known by the NATO codename ‘Kilo’. To the naval staff at Rostock, the entire submarine programme (the Oder was meant to be the first of a fleet of four boats) was a waste of time, money and resources. The DDR’s political leadership saw things differently and imagined that a flotilla of submarines could significantly help to defend the nation from external attack. With only one Kilo in service as July 1995 began, any ability to do that was very limited indeed. The submarine would be put to sea though and sent out to challenge the Coalition naval forces gathering off the coast in position to attack East Germany. Getting the Oder out was no easy task but the naval staff believed that they would be able to do so before that countdown issued by the Coalition reached zero. Torpedoes, mines and short-range surface-to-air missiles were loaded aboard along with fuel and provisions. The submarine was being sent off to see conflict and there were many who didn’t actually expect to witness the Oder ever return. From high above, an American reconnaissance satellite with its systems looking downwards recorded images of the activity at Rostock and there would be an alert sent out afterwards that the East Germans were getting that vessel ready to see action. It wouldn’t turn up unexpected when it went to sea.

The Grenztruppen was in usual circumstances part of the Interior Ministry. Sudden national mobilisation brought the DDR’s extensive border guard force under control of the Volksarmee though. Already a highly-militarised organisation, Grenztruppen elements spread across the nation’s frontiers, including all the way around the edges of West Berlin too, began answering to military instructions. Heavy equipment not usually in front-line service but stored for a day when it might be needed, such as mortars and missile systems, were pulled from storage and issued to border guards units. Orders came for those deployed around West Berlin and also down the Inner-German Border: seal all crossing points. That was done. It wasn’t a very taxing task due to there being few of them and the complete control around such locations that the Grenztruppen maintained. Where road, rail and canal links went through to West Germany, all of the infrastructure that the border guards had to secure them were located back from the frontier itself. Pre-established emergency procedures were followed in the closure. The crossing points were shut down for good. A West German media team at the famous Helmstedt–Marienborn crossing (known to NATO as Checkpoint Alpha) captured video images at distance of what the East Germans did over on their own side. Barriers were slid into place, machine gun posts set up in the open and soldiers deployed into combat positions. From inside West Berlin, more journalists and camera crews were present when Checkpoints Bravo & Charlie were closed along with other smaller access routes in and out of West Berlin. East German border guards in full combat gear and carrying extensive personal weaponry barred the way through them. That city deep in the heart of the DDR had all of its ground links cut off suddenly. The city was left isolated from contact with East Berlin pretty quickly.

The air corridors into West Berlin weren’t something that neither the border guards nor the regular military could close down without direct physical action on their part that would lead to an early start to armed conflict. There were three of them which linked the two Germany’s together. MiGs were put into the sky yet they didn’t make an overt effort to force their closure by opening fire. Nonetheless, pressure had been put on civilian aircraft making use of them ahead of time and that continued. West German airlines were barred from those routes by post-WW2 restrictions and so too those of other nations apart from Britain, France and the United States. Following the Coalition issuing its final ultimatum upon the DDR regime, the airlines which made regular use of the air corridors decided that they themselves would effectively close them by no longer flying into West Berlin. They didn’t want to risk their aircraft, crews and passengers due to previous East German activity followed up by the Coalition declaring that they would soon be war. Ahead of that self-quarantine coming into place, and at the strenuous urging of national governments, final flights in and out of West Berlin were made though. Those weren’t regular commercial flights but instead an evacuation was undertaken. Airliners were dispatched to the city’s air facilities to pull of military family members from the garrisons of the Western Powers, diplomatic personnel and also the civilians of those countries too. There was a rush by many West Berliners themselves to get on those aircraft as well. That put an immense strain upon the authorities on the ground who had instructions that German residents of the city themselves weren’t to board the aircraft. Unsettling scenes to be broadcast around the world went out during that air evacuation. That caused significant upset in Bonn due to the heavy-handed approach made. In addition, what happened in West Berlin didn’t cover East Berlin. There were citizens and diplomats of Coalition countries on that side of the Berlin Wall. Fewer in number, they were in far more danger than those in West Berlin. No way out of East Berlin was available for them though, not with the DDR sealing off its borders.


It was lunchtime on July 1st before Margot Honecker made a public appearance. Sixteen of those forty-eight hours given to her regime to do as the Coalition demanded had passed by that point. She spoke from inside the brand-new State Council Building within East Berlin. That complex had only been finished earlier in the year and was located inside the historic Mitte district of the divided Berlin where the Rotes Rathaus had been. The DDR had torn down the ‘Red Townhall’ and put up a new, modern building for government functions in an act decried across the West Germany as a blatant act of ‘culture vandalism’. The building project had had severe cost overruns and seen worker’s actions take place too (put down harshly by Stasi paramilitaries) which had slowed things considerably. Impressive as the building was, the need for it had seen questions asked about that… to say nothing of the complaints made about the destruction to what it had replaced.

The East German leader utterly rejected the second ultimatum issued by the Coalition.

She pointed to international law on the matter of countries issuing threats of military action against another and asserted that an attack on the German Democratic Republic would be completely illegal. Denials and defences were made once more of actions undertaken by her government. There was no East German nuclear programme, Honecker declared. The DDR hadn’t been responsible for that ballistic missile attack upon the Czech city of Ostrava. Polish military aggression inside the Czech Republic was being met by DDR defence of that country’s legitimate government at the express request of Prague. There were no territorial ambitions that East Germany had and the country was following international law in aiding a neighbour being invaded by another seeking to annex part of it.

Honecker moved onto claims made about the ‘real reason’ which the Coalition was seeking to undertake military action against her nation. There were desires in Western capitals about dismantling socialism in East Germany and replacing it with a capitalist colony such as what they had done elsewhere in Eastern Europe, and were also trying to do with Russia as well. The comment on Russia would later come back to bite Honecker on the behind – they wouldn’t like that in Moscow – though that was unforeseen at the time. The focus in what she said was on what she claimed the West was seeking to do with the DDR. Its economy would be dismantled and its people enslaved to Western capitalism with the abolishment of the people’s democracy currently in practice. There were lies being told and the truth twisted by the Coalition so that they could undertake what they had long wanted to do since 1989. Resistance to that must come!

A state of emergency was declared. The nation was under threat and Honecker called upon her fellow East Germans to prepare themselves for a ‘people’s war’. She asked of them that they stand ready to defend the country. Air and missile attacks would be followed by a ground invasion, the general secretary alleged, and everyone within the country was being called upon to defeat that attempt. Finishing up with what her statement, Honecker then once more promised military retaliation for any attack launched against East Germany. Her country would respond to military action and those would be disproportionate as well. The West Germans, its government and people, was called upon to take notice of that promise with Honecker adding that they could stop a conflict to shatter fifty years of peace should they wish to via more demonstrations & protests. People power in the West had the chance of stopping so many losses all round.

[lordroel]

Sept 26, 2021 11:32:27 GMT James G said:

Twenty-five – Darkness

The Oder was a Type-877 submarine, better known by the NATO codename ‘Kilo’. To the naval staff at Rostock, the entire submarine programme (the Oder was meant to be the first of a fleet of four boats) was a waste of time, money and resources. The DDR’s political leadership saw things differently and imagined that a flotilla of submarines could significantly help to defend the nation from external attack. With only one Kilo in service as July 1995 began, any ability to do that was very limited indeed. The submarine would be put to sea though and sent out to challenge the Coalition naval forces gathering off the coast in position to attack East Germany. Getting the Oder out was no easy task but the naval staff believed that they would be able to do so before that countdown issued by the Coalition reached zero. Torpedoes, mines and short-range surface-to-air missiles were loaded aboard along with fuel and provisions. The submarine was being sent off to see conflict and there were many who didn’t actually expect to witness the Oder ever return. From high above, an American reconnaissance satellite with its systems looking downwards recorded images of the activity at Rostock and there would be an alert sent out afterwards that the East Germans were getting that vessel ready to see action. It wouldn’t turn up unexpected when it went to sea.

First another good update James G.

Secondly time is running out for round 2 of the battle of Germany.

And last i have a feeling the Oder might have some successes in the war.

[stevep]

  James G ,

  Well she's got one thing right with that last point, trying to incite more activity in W Germany to oppose the conflict.  Won't stop the allied attacks but could cause problems all around later on.

  In terms of the bunker would the allies want to decapitate the political leadership anyway?  If they do that who do they negotiate with as their avowed intent isn't regime change?  Plus the resultant scramble for power inside the GDR would be a lottery as to who gained power and you could end up with someone even more fanatical.

[James G]

Sept 26, 2021 11:43:28 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 26, 2021 11:32:27 GMT James G said:

Twenty-five – Darkness

The Oder was a Type-877 submarine, better known by the NATO codename ‘Kilo’. To the naval staff at Rostock, the entire submarine programme (the Oder was meant to be the first of a fleet of four boats) was a waste of time, money and resources. The DDR’s political leadership saw things differently and imagined that a flotilla of submarines could significantly help to defend the nation from external attack. With only one Kilo in service as July 1995 began, any ability to do that was very limited indeed. The submarine would be put to sea though and sent out to challenge the Coalition naval forces gathering off the coast in position to attack East Germany. Getting the Oder out was no easy task but the naval staff believed that they would be able to do so before that countdown issued by the Coalition reached zero. Torpedoes, mines and short-range surface-to-air missiles were loaded aboard along with fuel and provisions. The submarine was being sent off to see conflict and there were many who didn’t actually expect to witness the Oder ever return. From high above, an American reconnaissance satellite with its systems looking downwards recorded images of the activity at Rostock and there would be an alert sent out afterwards that the East Germans were getting that vessel ready to see action. It wouldn’t turn up unexpected when it went to sea.

First another good update James G .

Secondly time is running out for round 2 of the battle of Germany.

And last i have a feeling the Oder might have some successes in the war.

Thank you.
It is. Tick-tock goes the clock.
Ah, yes. It will have an adventure indeed.

Sept 26, 2021 14:06:53 GMT stevep said:

  James G ,

  Well she's got one thing right with that last point, trying to incite more activity in W Germany to oppose the conflict.  Won't stop the allied attacks but could cause problems all around later on.

  In terms of the bunker would the allies want to decapitate the political leadership anyway?  If they do that who do they negotiate with as their avowed intent isn't regime change?  Plus the resultant scramble for power inside the GDR would be a lottery as to who gained power and you could end up with someone even more fanatical.

That protest movement will grow beyond WG borders as well.
Yep, I agree: no direct strike on the political leadership figures themselves. Cuomo said he didn't want to break the DDR because the West would have to fix it. Bringing down the regime isn't a goal thus why there was the change to the initial target list that focused a lot on smashing the regime.  

[James G]

Twenty-six – Shadow boxing


The deadline for East German acquiescence to the Coalition’s demands ran out at 8pm (Central European time) on July 2nd. The night before that though the skies above the DDR were filled with aircraft. The LSK put their aircraft up, a lot of them. MiG-21s, -23s and -29s criss-crossed the black skies running fighter patrol missions. In addition, other MiG-23s as well as some of the Sukhoi-22s too undertook mock strike missions where they raced towards the Inner-German Border seemingly on strike missions going west. Those were cut off short of the border with the aircraft involved returning to base ahead of going into West Germany. The air missions were done with ground-based radar control for them though with near radio silence. EMCON was still maintained even with all of those aircraft in the skies. To do that in darkness was dangerous. The risk of a mid-air collision was high. A MiG did make a crash landing coming home to one of the many dispersed airbases that the LSK was operating from though otherwise the night was quite the success for East German air operations. Back under Soviet domination, the LSK had always been held in high regard (compared to other Warsaw Pact air forces) but what they managed to do during the night of July 1st was something special. They displayed an ability to operate in what could have been a hostile environment and coordinate extremely well. Air operations took place en masse from all of those scattered sites that the LSK had moved its aircraft too with a high degree of operational capability: few aircraft were unable to get airborne due to technical issues despite being away from their regular bases. Radar stations came online and then switched off again when they were supposed to with those in action being mobile ones. The aircrews up didn’t know that they were unwittingly part of another exercise too. SAM operators, themselves mobile, tracked the fighters in the skies above. There was a tight ‘weapons hold’ order in-place to make sure that they didn’t fire on friendly aircraft yet they tracked the aircraft and lined up shots. One separate missile team was busy on a different task where they used their own radars more extensively than others did in an authorised breaking of EMCON for them. Coalition aircraft flying above the south of West Germany were tracked and lit-up by their long-range systems. There was only one stage away from firing left for those operators who had firm orders not to do so unless a clear violation was made that had the hallmarks of an incoming attack.

Coalition aircraft were in West German skies while the East Germans were busy over their own. Shadow boxing took place with American and other allied aircraft flying missions to defend against any incursion by the LSK. Those mock attack runs made by fighter-bombers which flew low-level, high-speed runs towards West Germany brought about a reaction where interceptors positioned themselves ahead of that. Two layers of defences were employed each time with fighters out ahead and then more behind ready to get in the way of a larger covering incursion made by all of those fighters also flying about if the mock missions turned out to be real. The Coalition controlled their air activity by the use of AWACS aircraft. The US Air Force, RAF, Armée de l'Air and US Navy all had airborne radar aircraft flying to assist in the tracking of East German aircraft as well as fighter control. Coordination between them and the Coalition aircraft involved was something long practised. Moreover, several of the NATO-operated AWACS aircraft were flying as well. Those jets in the colours of the Luxembourg Air Force – but belonging to NATO as a whole – were up above West Germany and were also monitoring what the LSK was up to. The West Germans and the Southern European members of NATO (apart from the Italians who were in the Coalition) had no aircrew within them on those missions but they were on a NATO mission and flying out of a base on West German soil as well. The task was purely the defence of a NATO country, that being West Germany, even if that country was at odds with its allies over what was soon to happen with East Germany.

In the early hours of the following morning, when many aircraft were back on the ground, the Americans sent one of their specialist stand-off reconnaissance aircraft on an important mission around the edge of East Germany. An iconic U-2 spyplane was used with the aircraft making a flight out of RAF Mildenhall in Britain and then flying an overwater mission above the North Sea before entering West German airspace. It went southwards first while staying a good distance back from the Inner-German Border. There was no need to overfly the DDR directly due to the equipment carried. A sideways looking airborne radar (SLAR) was employed to gather a great deal of intelligence while peering inwards into East Germany. The aircraft crossed into Czech airspace and overflew that country at high speed before then swinging around to go north across Poland too. A final turn was made once it was out over the Baltic where the last leg of the circle made around the DDR was to be completed. The SLAR kept on recording information for later analysis as the U-2 went along the northern coastline while remaining outside of East German airspace and up pretty damn high too.

A SAM launch took place. It was one of those potent SA-10 Grumbles which was lofted and sent tearing towards the U-2. Detected onboard, and by several electronic warfare aircraft flying elsewhere, the SAM closed in fast. It didn’t catch the American spyplane though. The U-2 turned away, increased speed and successfully evaded that attack launched against it. The reconnaissance mission was near completed by that point with the rest of it written off ahead of the U-2 making a return back to its temporary base in Britain. That missile hadn’t come anywhere near the aircraft and had fallen into the sea afterwards. It was a clear attack though, a warning shot launched against the Coalition. Should it have hit the U-2, there would have been an armed response made but there was no shoot-down which occurred so set into motion such a chain of subsequent events. Coalition commanders and afterwards political leaders were informed. That news didn’t bring about any real significant change in plans made for what at that time was the remaining seventeen hours of deadline imposed by East Germany. The DDR regime had missiles such as those and were going to try to defend themselves. Nonetheless, Operation Allied Sword was still to take place.


Citizens of West Berlin witnessed the soldiers garrisoned in their city begin to take up defensive positions to fight off any attack to seize it by the East Germans. A rapid air evacuation had taken out Westerners but left those who lived in the city surrounded by East Germany. The fears of war coming to where they lived were already exceedingly high before the American, British and French troops within the confines of West Berlin started to make a deployment. LIVE OAK had been the codename given to a planning group established all the way back in 1958 for joint coordination to defend the city. Plans had changed over the years and the threat had significantly receded since the Soviet Union had imploded, yet the trio of allied garrisons had remained committed to working together if there ever came a need to. The recent reinforcement of the troops within the city, doubling their combat strength, allowed for much of the defensive plan to be put into place.

Every inch of West Berlin couldn’t be defended. No plans, all those stretching back to when Khrushchev had made that diplomatic effort at the end of the Fifties to force the West out of the city, had ever foreseen that. The city was surrounded on all sides and full of access points for a multi-axis attack. Twice as many, three times the number of troops would be needed to make an effort like that and it would be ultimately doomed to failure regardless because the ground was too much to cover. More than that, West Berlin as a whole just wasn’t somewhere that could be thoroughly defended due to the terrain in-play.

The American, British & French soldiers who deployed out of their garrisons into defensive positions instead focused upon a confined area of the city. The airports at Tegel and Tempelhof were within that though RAF Gatow wasn’t. Exposed regions in the northern, western and southern portions would be abandoned yet there would be a hold attempted along the eastern side almost all the way up to where the Berlin Wall ran through the middle. Areas such as Spandau and Zehlendorf were outside of that; Charlottenburg, Kreuzberg, Tiergarten and Wedding would be held onto. There had come a post-Soviet leak of their own wartime plans to sent armoured columns through the very middle of West Berlin in twin lateral movements, which would have gone across much of the British Sector in the centre, to split the defenders in a Cold War scenario in half. Whether any East German plans were to follow that it was unknown yet that was considered a sound strategy for an offensive to overrun the city. Just back from both the Brandenburg Gate and near to the Olympic Stadium too, the defenders had anti-armour missile teams ready to defeat an effort like that. Heavy man-portable weaponry was issued widely to the city’s defenders. What they didn’t have was tanks though nor any other proper armoured vehicles. A fight for West Berlin would be conducted by those on the defence operating on foot. They set about fortifying defensive positions with multiple fall-back points as well.

Margot Honecker hadn’t issued any threats against West Berlin. The Coalition had observation over the Potsdam garrison for a full division of the East German Army and where the Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Division was centralised at Adlershof within East Berlin. Both were targets for air strikes as part of Operation Allied Sword. Elements of the Grenztruppen around the city were also being watched from afar. Those DDR forces posed an imminent threat to the city with a seizure likely to involve some, if not all of them. However, there was no movement observed beyond certain border guards deployments with those not overtly staging for an attack. Efforts were made to look for secretive, hidden preparations but none appeared to be on the cards. The East Germans, despite war staring them in the face and the promises made to lash out against West Germany, didn’t appear to be getting ready to storm West Berlin. Regardless, the defenders positioned themselves to repel that. A deception was feared with that. There was a lot done out of the public eye yet West German media teams still broadcast images of soldiers making their deployments. They were getting ready to have the fight of their lives should the city come in the firing line.

[lordroel]

Sept 26, 2021 18:23:22 GMT James G said:

Sept 26, 2021 11:43:28 GMT lordroel said:

First another good update James G .

Secondly time is running out for round 2 of the battle of Germany.

And last i have a feeling the Oder might have some successes in the war.

Thank you.
It is. Tick-tock goes the clock.
Ah, yes. It will have an adventure indeed.

Should i wish it good luck ore is that bad routing for the enemy.