In a cramped, smoky, command room in a bunker beneath the dreary and strangely empty streets of downtown London; His Majesty King George VI stood with Prime Minister Winston Churchill and a host of high level civilian and military functionaries looking a map showing the Empire's grand strategic situation. The situation, clearly, was not good.

Stalemate in Scandinavia and North Africa. Daily missile attacks on London and the rest of southern Britain. German submarines prowling the Atlantic shipping lanes and hindering the flow of supplies from the Americas. Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong lost in the Pacific. Despite it all, Winston Churchill remained upbeat, gesturing towards Iraq and Malaysia while explaining how the Empire would soon be back on the offensive.

How long could the Empire whether this storm? How long would the British people tolerate the "Rain of Steel" and constant news of defeat and stalemate on every front? How much longer before the Empire would be forced to ask for terms for an armistice? For now the people remained behind Churchill, but labor was beginning to agitate for "peace with honor" and the British people were growing weary.

Everything hinged on Churchill's pet projects, his offensives on far flung frontiers. Any positive news would bolster the spirits of the Empire, would give his subjects some hope for victory. The King, in top hat and suit, silently hoped for something, some victory, somewhere.


In the mountains of Austria, in the elaborate estate called the 'Eagle's Nest', Adolph Hitler looked as intense as ever despite his growing signs of aging and weariness. Surrounded by his generals and high level party officials, he declared the war all but won.

"One more defeat and the British will beg us for peace" he confidently declared, gesturing with his good arm  towards the ornate map hanging on the wall before them. "Push them back in Norway, back in Libya, back everywhere, we will grind them into dust and they will come to us". Men nodded and spoke in agreement while the Führer turned his attention to a more eastern part of the map, where the hated communists and their subhuman Slavic masses still lurked as an ominous threat.

"Then we deal with the real threat once and for all".


It was hot and muggy in Washington D.C. and President Thomas Dewey wondered if Autumn would ever arrive this year. Arrayed before him in the Oval Office were the secretary of war, the chiefs of the general staff, and a general by the name of Dwight D. Eisenhower. All of them looked excited, and the feeling was contagious.

The war was going well since the disasters of that first year, and things might soon be going even better.


Lavrenti Beria very nearly trembled with eagerness, his lust for vengeance seemed to grow daily. Day after day his generals assured him that the Red Army would be ready, and day after day his spies assured him that the Germans and Japanese suspected nothing. Oh, they knew the Soviet Union remained a threat, but thus far they hadn't noticed the slow and ongoing buildup along certain sectors of their shared borders.

Justice for the workers and peasants and soldiers would soon be at hand and it couldn't come too soon. The suffering of the Soviet people would be made to have meaning, and they would love him for it.


The mood in the Tokyo war room was somber. These men would not, could not, panic; but they knew the growing seriousness of the situation. Honor dictated that they fight on, honor drove them to strive for victory despite the odds. They had wounded the giant at Pearl Harbor and stung him again in Panama, but the giant was well awake and rampaging in the Pacific.

The Solomons, they agreed, were lost; as was the rest of the south Pacific. The fight there would now be one of time, time to fortify the central Pacific islands, time to further secure the home islands, time to prepare in Malaysia and Siberia and everywhere else.

There was still, they thought, the chance for a decisive naval victory - probably in the central Pacific. Orders would be issued, fleets shifted. Above all the islands in the South Pacific would be held for as long as possible no matter the costs. Honor required it, those garrisons would do their duty for the Emperor.



British forces in North Africa are on the move again, this time withdrawing to the east with panzers right behind them. After seeing his lines shredded in several locations, Wavell has decided to withdraw east to Gazala where his lines of supply will be much shorter and less vulnerable to German air power. In the skies above central-northern Libya, a fierce duel continues with neither side able to claim total control. Guderian, expecting to maintain the
initiative, commands his officers to 'Drive them all the way to Tobruk!'.


In the largest single, coordinated, ballistic missile attack of the war - no less than 250 A2 and A3 missiles land in London within a three hour period. The missiles, the latest models with a circular radius of error of about half a kilometer, mostly land in and around central London. Indeed, the sheer number of missile impacts actually sets off a moderate firestorm causing the most damage to London since the Luftwaffe stopped large-scale bombing earlier in the war. This concentrated attack is the latest effort in Hitler's plans to bring the British to their knees so he can turn his attention back to the Soviets. On the same day three A4 missiles impact in, or close to, cities in northern Scotland that had been out of the effective range of the A2 and A3. This is the first use of the A4 in the war.

To put this attack in perspective, a "normal" day in London during the "Rain of Steel" will see no more than a dozen or so ballistic missile impacts. A bad day might see two or three dozen missiles hitting around the city. Indeed, the Rain of Steel has been so bad that a good percentage of London's population and industry has already been dispersed into the surrounding countryside or moved underground, the same is true in other large southern British cities.

Keep in mind that there are also lulls where there might be no missile attacks for a week or more, which allows some sense of normalcy to be maintained. The Germans are basically launching the missiles as fast as they can be manufactured, while saving a few on the side for occasional massed launches.


In the northern Solomons, U.S. marines land at Cape Torokina on the island of Bougainville. The Japanese have some 30,000 troops defending the island. Under cover of massive supporting naval fire and air support, the marines quickly establish several beach heads and begin pushing inland. U.S. carrier and land based aircraft have managed to establish complete air superiority with Japanese aircraft on the defensive to the north, around Rabaul.


With Japanese forces on Bougainville struggling to contain the U.S. beach head on the western part of the island, a second and larger series of landings takes place on the southeast coast of the island. The depleted Japanese forces remaining there are able to put up little resistance as they come under massive air and naval bombardment and the U.S. marines are able to push deep inland in the initial hours of these landings.


After two weeks of a fluid fighting withdrawal, the British are ready to make their stand in North Africa. British and commonwealth infantry have dug themselves deep into hasty trench and barbed wire lines immediately west of Gazala and Wavell's exhausted armored forces can provide a mobile reserve. By mid-afternoon the leading spearheads of the 1st Panzer Army crash into the British lines.

Guderian, well aware that he is now at the end of a fairly long line of supply, wants to quickly capture Gazala and then consolidate his positions. His initial hopes of pushing all the way to Tobruk in one giant leap have been dashed by stubborn British rear guards. As the hours go by Guderian feeds in his best armored reserves and the British lines waver, bend, shutter, and hold.

Losses on both sides are heavy in the first real stand up slugging match between Wavell and Guderian. In the end, it was sheer numbers that held the British lines. Indeed, during Guderian's attempt to flank the British to the south, three British tanks were lost for each German panzer destroyed, but the British still blunted the flanking attack and thus held the line.

The chance to quickly capture Gazala has been lost as British reinforcements begin moving up in the evening hours.


U.S. forces begin arriving on southeastern Borneo in preparation for a counter offensive on that island. U.S. forces have also begun arriving in Burma to aid the British in their planned offensive into Malaysia.


Italian aircraft, in perhaps their greatest success of the war to date, smash what remains of the Free French fleet in the Mediterranean - two simultaneous raids on Algiers and Oran sink or heavily damage all of Free France's remaining capital ships. The tattered remnants of the Free French fleet will now be forced to flee to the west African coast or east to Alexandria to assist the Royal Navy.


In a lucky break for Axis forces surrounding Gibraltar, a shell from one of Germany's super-heavy artillery cannons manages to penetrate dozens of feet of rock and cement to strike a large ammunition magazine. The resulting explosion and rock slide collapses a large chunk of the British-fortress-rock and kills some 3000 British soldiers. Despite this disaster, the remaining British forces on Gibraltar are not ready to call it quits. There remain other, better protected, magazines and there is still plenty of food and water. The siege continues. Of an original 30,000 British soldiers on Gibraltar, 16,000 remain. 14,000 troops have been lost to disease and Axis shelling and bombing.


One hundred U.S. B-31 bombers, operating from bases in the Philippines, bomb Tokyo. Due to the extreme range of the operation the bombers go in without fighter escort and suffer heavy losses of some 40%. The attack, which causes moderate damage to several parts of Tokyo, is more a propaganda raid than anything else. In this respect it is a huge success with U.S. and Alliance media trumpeting the "strike against Imperial Japan's heart".

The Tokyo attack gives RAF Bomber Command an idea.


Italian forces begin a new push north towards Tunis. Free French resistance is heavy and the Italians make little initial progress.    Churchill approves plans for a major British operation in the middle east - the invasion of Iraq. The operation is set to begin at the same time as the offensive into Malaysia and will involve British forces already massed in Palestine and the Arabian peninsula.

In Algiers, De Gaulle is not happy at all. Churchill's decision to launch a new campaign against Iraq almost certainly means that he won't be getting the British reinforcements he has been virtually begging for since the great evacuation in the early months of the war.


The RAF begins a major new bombing campaign against German-held ports in southern Norway and Sweden in an attempt to disrupt the flow of supplies and reinforcements into that theatre. Five hundred RAF bombers, escorted by jet Meteors and Vampires out of northern Norway, hit rail yards, supply depots, docks, and other transportation hubs in and around Oslo to begin the campaign. The raid severely damages the intended targets but also kills thousands of Norwegian civilians, a fact that will be an ongoing source of friction between the Free Norwegian government and Britain. The bombers suffer relatively light losses due to a shortage of German anti-aircraft weaponry in the theatre and the fact that the large numbers of Meteors and Vampires proved sufficient to largely drive away the smaller number of German jets.

Hitler orders Goering to begin moving more Luftwaffe squadrons into Scandinavia to counter the new British campaign - this forces Goering to reluctantly begin stripping aircraft from the vast eastern frontier with the Soviet Union.


Elements of the U.S. marines from the two separate landings on Bougainville link up near the center of the island, cutting the Japanese garrison in half. Japanese resistance has been suicidal, resulting in devastating casualties for both sides. Several Japanese naval re-supply and reinforcement attempts have been easily repulsed by U.S. air and naval forces with heavy Japanese losses in destroyers and transports.


U.S., British, and Australian forces unleash a large counter-offensive on Borneo, driving north and west from out of the southeast corner of the island. With total air superiority and a huge advantage in firepower and mobility, the allied forces make rapid progress in the first hours of the offensive.

After a brutal campaign, the last Japanese resistance on Bougainville has been crushed. The U.S. has suffered 9,456 deaths and three times this number wounded in the campaign, making it the most costly single battle for U.S. forces to date.


Escorted by several hundred long-range fighters, 300 U.S. B-31 bombers strike Rabaul, causing heavy damage to the harbor facilities and several airfields. In addition, 127 Japanese fighters are downed by U.S. fighter escorts - Japanese air forces at Rabaul, already weakened by the ongoing U.S. air campaign, have been dealt a crippling blow.


The RAF stages its first significant raid against Berlin. Several smaller raids attack lesser cities in northern Germany while a force of some 250 RAF B-31 and Lancaster bombers head for Berlin. The operation is, to put it simply, a catastrophe for the RAF. The Germans have been upgrading their air defenses since before the 1000 bomber raid on Hamburg and Berlin in particular has had its air defenses bulked up and upgraded. Caught in a storm of radar-directed flak and night fighters, the RAF loses 175 of the 250 bombers sent into the "Hell's Den" as British bomber crews will call Berlin for the rest of the war.

The operation also sees the first use of German anti-aircraft missiles in combat. The first generation radar-directed SAM (Surface to Air missile) shoots down a dozen of the 175 total bombers downed.

The RAF's plan has backfired badly and the Germans have been handed a crushing propaganda victory of their own. Following this disaster, the RAF cancels all plans for future massed bomber attacks on German cities.


The Alliance/U.S. offensive in Borneo has effectively crushed Japanese forces on that large island. The Allies have used multiple naval landings and air drops to help encircle and isolate Japanese troop concentrations. This, combined with massive tactical and strategic bombing, has led to a complete Japanese collapse on the island.


In the latest and most massive attack on oil refineries in the East Indies, nearly 1000 U.S. and British bombers hammer the largest oil field in that region. The oil field is effectively destroyed, with massive damage to every aspect of the field's infrastructure. Over two hundred Japanese fighters, including many Shinden Jet aircraft, are downed in several large fighter engagements prior to the arrival of the bombers. Japanese air power in the South Pacific and Dutch East Indies has largely been broken by the massive U.S./British air pushes in those regions.


After two weeks of mop-up operations, the island of Borneo is solidly in Allied hands. Small groups of Japanese soldiers will fight a low-intensity guerilla war for many months to come.

By the time of the counter-offensive in Borneo, Japanese forces there had been completely isolated for some time. The Allies dominated the air and sea and could attack where and when they chose, hence the relatively rapid campaign.


The latest bloody and slow Italian offensive towards Tunis bogs down about 40km south of the city. Italian forces begin to dig in while reinforcements are drawn together for another, hopefully final, push towards Tunis.

The Free French have been fortifying Tunis for a long time and De Gaulle plans to make it one large funeral pyre should the Italians reach it - If Tunis falls then Tunisia is lost and it will become very difficult for the Free French to hold onto eastern Algeria.


A specially modified U.S. B-31 bomber, the 'Darling Valentine', drops an atomic bomb on Japanese-held Rabaul. The 15 kiloton device detonates over the southwestern edge of Simpson Harbor, heavily damaging the Japanese squadron at anchor there and largely destroying the major Vunakanau airbase and nearly all the aircraft based there. The atomic bomb also devastates the city itself, killing tens of thousands of garrisoned Japanese soldiers, local civilians, as well as a few British prisoners of war.

In all, a dozen Japanese destroyers and cruisers are put to the bottom of the harbor and two battleships are very heavily damaged. Other Japanese ships also take varying levels of damage,  depending on how close they were to 'ground zero'. The crews of the ships at harbor who survived the initial blast will almost all be dead within days due to lethal levels of radiation poisoning - something the U.S. won't realize for some time.

The U.S. trumpets news of the atomic bombing and calls on the Japanese to begin negotiations for a ceasefire in order to "prevent further catastrophic atomic attacks" on their military and civilian infrastructure.

The atomic device used here is the relatively simple 'uranium gun' design which was known to be highly reliable, hence - in order to gain the advantage of surprise it was decided to use the 'uranium gun' device against the Japanese before testing the more complex 'implosion' design.

Earlier air operations against Rabaul had been designed to cripple Japanese fighter coverage, which is what allowed the lone B-31 bomber and several dozen fighter escorts to enter the airspace over Rabaul relatively unmolested. The Japanese did scramble some interceptors but they were driven off by the escorting P-51 Mustangs and other late model prop fighter escorts.


A quote from the pilot of the 'Darling Valentine' taken shortly after his return from the atomic bombing of Rabaul...

"There was the pillar of smoke towering into the sky, and we watched it blossom with a great mass of dark clouds forming a cap at its top. And down below it, the harbor itself was obscured by roiling clouds and a haze of vapor. It was boiling underneath with a sort of haze on top. We created hell down there, a shattered world."

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