Two kilometers west of Astrakhan, southern Russia.

Heinz Gustov fired several shots in the general direction of the Soviet positions to his east as artillery rounds crashed somewhere to his left. The constant rattle of rifles and machine guns hammered at his ear drums. Shouts, screams, wails of pain. The smell of death in the air, a stench of fear and sweat, blood, and spilled bowel contents. He didn't even look to see if he hit anything, instead throwing his body to the ground to hug the rich earth of Russia. His field gray uniform had long ago blended in with the local terrain, with blood and grease to add a variety of color.

This business of infantry warfare was not, he decided, for him. Ever since his panzer had taken a round in the side from a T-34 he'd been slogging along with the panzergrenadiers who had been accompanying his unit. Headquarters was supposed to be sending him a new panzer, but replacements had been hard to come by since the war ended. That brought a grim smile to his dirt smeared, war weary, face. This was the most violent peace he'd ever known. Hitler and Beria had agreed to end the war but both had apparently forgot to inform the commanders in southern Russia. The fighting here had most certainly not stopped. Heinz had been in Astrakhan with his panzer and his old crew not long ago. But then the Russians had pushed them back to the west. A day ago Heinz had lost his crew, to no fault of his own. They'd accounted for three T-34's in their aging Mk4 panzer before being flanked by several of the more numerous Soviet vehicles. If those new Cougars hadn't arrived over that ridge he would have been gunned down crawling from the shattered remnants of his panzer.

More gunfire, closer in, drew his attention back to the situation at hand. The Russians were moving forward in staggered order, their sub-machineguns spewing lead in wasteful torrents of death. A few rounds kicked up dirt not far from him. Taking no notice, he brought his rifle to his shoulder and began firing careful, aimed, shots. A flight of tank-busting Stukas roared overhead just then, their 30mm cannons ripping great swaths in the ranks of the advancing Russians. Not long after the Soviet rush came to a staggering, bloody, halt. Heinz collapsed back into the soft earth and thanked God, not for the first time, for the lovely Stukas and their 30mm cannon.

An hour later a man came running along the line where Heinz, and his fellow ground sloggers, had taken firing positions. The man seemed to have mastered the art of running at a crouch, and the cratered and chaotic terrain slowed him very little.

"Its over" he shouted. "Its over". He repeated the words over and over with no further explanation as he ran down the length of the line and then passed out of sight. He noticed it then. A blaring lack of artillery fire. Only scattered small arms fire pierced an otherwise calm, sunny, afternoon. Then he saw a Russian approaching from the east with a white blanket hung limply on a stick he'd managed to find somewhere. It took him two minutes to cross the no-man's land where dozens of his comrades had died not more than an hour ago trying to cross the same terrain.

He arrived not far to his Heinz's right. "I have good Vodka for sale" the Russian stated flatly in horrendously accented German. Heinz allowed himself a genuine smile for the first time since he'd seen his wife, months ago on leave. He wasn't going to get a new panzer after all. His smile widened.

Two days after the official cease-fire the fighting stops close to Astrakhan where both sides had been making last-minute pushes to gain strategic territory around the city. When the last artillery shells fall in the region the Germans hold territory within 2km of the city's outskirts. Astrakhan will be a border city. Fighting continues to the southwest where Red Army forces in the isolated Crimean peninsula are refusing to surrender in spite of radio communications from Moscow.

The recently-born Republic of Chechnya formally signs a treaty with Germany. The treaty outlines a broad swath of territory in the Caucasus that is to be granted to Chechnya in exchange for Chechnya joining the Axis Powers. Most of the central region of the Caucasus falls under Chechen control, giving the Muslim peoples there an independent nation. Germany annexes the northern half of the Caucasus while Turkey annexes the extreme south, including the vital Baku oil fields. Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, is the scene of day-long celebrations.

German forces, transferred from the north, smash into the Crimean peninsula with a grim determination to end the war once and for all. Moscow declares that the resisting units in the Crimean peninsula are "Rebels", giving the Axis Powers the go-ahead to smash the forces there. Beria has made a calculation that the 200,000 soldiers trapped in the Crimea and the port of Sevastopol are not worth renewed war with Germany and the Axis Powers.

Crimean resistance begins to collapse as entire units surrender to the advancing Axis forces.

Sevastopol falls and the last resisting units have surrendered, ending the brief extension of the Eurasian War.

The Axis Powers and the Soviet Union sign a formal Armistice that officially ends the Eurasian War. The Armistice specifies that the frontiers between the Soviet Union and the Axis Powers will be marked by a 10km demilitarized zone. Also, the Soviet Union is banned from building any ships in their northern ports other than coastal patrol vessels. This measure, which Beria reluctantly agrees to, is to ensure German domination of the Baltic and Barents Sea. The Kriegsmarine can now focus all of its attention to the west. Hitler is disappointed at not getting  northern Sweden back, but he feels he can grab it back at a later time. For now, he wants to end the war so he can focus on strengthening the Greater Reich he has forged.

The Luftwaffe completes its first successful test launch of the A-1 rocket. The rocket, with its liquid fueled booster and ballistic range of 100km, is the most advanced rocket made to date. Wernher von Braun, the leader of the Luftwaffe rocket project, has high hopes for his ambitious A-2 rocket. The A-2 will be the fully-refined mass-produced version of the A-1 with a range of 400km and capable of being launched from mobile launchers or fixed launch sites. Further off are plans for the A-3 which may incorporate 2 or 3 stages and have a range of as much as 900km. The new weapon has the intelligence agencies of the western powers in a frenzy, the rocket scares them. And they have nothing on the horizon to match it anytime soon. In the U.S. the services of an aging Robert Goddard are being put to use to help kick start a rocket development program.

Italy begins increasing the size of its garrisons in Libya and Ethiopia. In a speech Mussolini refers to north-Africa as "land destined to be ruled by the Italian people" and calls the Mediterranean an "Italian lake", boasting of Italy's increasingly powerful and modernized navy. With the Eurasian war over Mussolini is feeling anxious to flex his muscles in regions he perceives to be in the Italian sphere of influence.

Germany begins to officially "gear down" its army as hundreds of thousands of men return to the civilian sector. All emergency wartime economic decrees are rescinded and Germany begins returning to a normal peace-time economic footing. Analysts forecast massive growth for Germany in the coming years as her new conquests are absorbed into the Reich and new resources begin to be exploited. Other Axis Power nations are expected to undergo similar  economic growth.

With the war over and the German economy roaring to life the circle of officers and anti-Nazis from throughout Germany meet and agree to dissolve their conspiracy. Hitler may be a fool, but he has won the war. The plot against Hitler is over, for now anyway.

German intelligence is directed by Reinhard Heydrich, leader of the SD and the Gestapo, to begin covertly supporting pro-fascist elements around the globe, from South America to Britain.

In a high level Nazi gathering in Munich, Himmler gleefully announces the "end of the Jewish problem". All Jews in German-occupied Europe have either fled, been herded into still-operating concentration camps, or been "liquidated". The SS and Gestapo are now free to turn towards the vastly more numerous Slavic population. Hitler's vision is for the Slavs to be a "underclass of slaves and menial laborers" working for "an Aryan upper-class" in the eastern "living space". A rough timetable of 10 years is agreed upon to achieve this vision. Also, though Germany does not directly control the internal affairs of other Axis Powers nations it can, and is, exerting heavy pressure for them to take similar measures against Jews. In the Ukraine massive pogroms are already taking place and in Romania there is an ongoing "ethnic cleansing" of Jews. The western powers can see what is happening but they can do nothing but sit back and watch. Many of the surviving Jews of eastern and central Europe have fled to the Soviet Union where they are "welcomed" as a much needed source of anti-nazi support. Many Jews have also fled into France and Britain where calls for a Jewish state in Palestine are beginning to grow in strength and number.

I know the above sounds harsh but the situation I describe above IS what would have happened if the Germans had won in the east. It is tragic but there is no way of avoiding it if I want to keep the timeline plausible.

Herman Goering gives the official go-ahead for full-scale development of an operational jet fighter to be derived from existing early jet prototypes. Jet bombers are also on the drawing boards.

France begins construction of a string of radar stations behind the Maginot line and in northern France. The technology for the radar stations came straight from Britain who has made its latest radar technology available to them. German intelligence assets are beginning to get a clear picture of the British and French radar technologies and the Germans are furiously working on their own radar systems.

In Britain the first fully electrical computational machine is completed for use in British code-breaking efforts.

In China the truce between communists and nationalists has broken down and full scale civil war is erupting. Japan begins making preparations to take advantage of the internal turmoil in China.

German military "advisors" begin arriving in Iraq along with German panzers and aircraft. It is the first sign that Iraq is going to be full partner in the Axis Powers and not just a member by name only. Britain and France are forced to continue bulking up their forces in the middle-east to counter the growing Axis threat to the region. Persia has already begun to distance itself from Britain in order to appease the Axis Powers.

German researchers complete their own electronic calculation machine. Newspapers in the west hail it as the "Nazi Brain". It is different from the British machine in that is a general purpose programmable computer rather than a single purpose electronic number cruncher. Several teams of government and private researchers are also close to creating electronic computational devices in the U.S.

The German aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin makes its first trip outside of the North Sea, steaming on a "round the world" trip with a full compliment of naval fighters and bombers to highlight German naval strength. The ship will make its first stop in New York. The British still have a roughly 8 to 1 advantage in total naval power. But the Kriegsmarine is growing rapidly, especially with the war over and the German economy exploding. The U.S., with its six new Essex class carriers coming on line, is not particularly impressed by the German carrier, though the German naval aircraft are undoubtedly superior to aging U.S. naval aircraft.