Shattered World - A Worse World War : Part 51

March 16th 1949 to April 20th 1949

...to the Brightest Light and into Darkness...

March 16^th 1949

British forces in Lybia, resting and reequipping since the earlier drive on Surt lost steam, number 4 armored divisions and some 400,000 men. Axis forces, with two understrength mixed armored divisions and some 250,000 men, stand ready in a series of defensive lines just east of Surt. The British are in the final stages of preparing for an offensive they hope will take them to Tripoli.

March 18th 1949

With the ground still reasonably dry in the western Ukraine, German commanders thank their

luck and launch their counter-offensive. Fully realizing that the land will soon become a

sea of Spring mud the Germans have set their objective as the river Dnieper rather than the

whole of the Ukraine. Invigorated with 1200 of the Reich's latest panzers and many fresh

mechanized infantry divisions, Army Group South has elected to strike in a single massive

thrust; moving from the extreme northwest Ukraine in the general direction of Kiev. To the

south German forces also push out of the Crimean peninsula, heading directly northeast.

March 21st 1949

German forces in the northwestern Ukraine make rapid progress as the soviets fall back

towards Kiev in good order, coldly executing their total scorched earth plans. To the

south German forces attacking out of the Crimea have made less progress, their relative

lack of armor hindering them from exploiting breakout opportunities.

March 23rd 1949

Japanese forces have begun stockpiling precious reserves of nerve gas in Korea, Okinowa and Iwo Jima. Japanese industry cannot yet manufacture nerve gas in massive quantities - so the Japanese nerve munitions are being focused in particular strategic locations where the relatively small amount of the deadly material can be used to the greatest effect.

March 27th 1949

With spring rains beginning to turn the ground to mud, the massive German thrust moving

rapidly towards Kiev suddenly wheels directly south. Rather than attempting to take Kiev

the Germans intend to link up with their southern forces north of the Crimea to pocket the

25 Soviet divisions in the central and southwestern Ukraine.

   However, the Soviets had expected and planned for this possibility and had in fact

already begun a systematic withdrawal to the east, destroying everything in their wake as per

the dictates of operation Black.

April 2nd 1949

April 3rd 1949

After a large bombing raid on Surt draws off most Axis fighter defenses in Lybia, a far smaller force of B-31's appears over Tripoli. This force, having flown an indirect southerly route over the deep desert, catches Axis air defenses largely off guard. The British drop their first atomic bomb, a first-generation implosion device, on the port of Tripoli. The 23 kiloton device destroys the harbor facilities, including many tons of stockpiled supplies, and sinks the dozen or so merchant vessels in the harbor as well as several Italian destroyers and a cruiser. Tripoli itself suffers greatly as fires spread from the harbor area to engulf entire districts in destruction. Tens of thousands of civilians die.

    On the same day, an hour after the atomic bombing of Tripoli, Britain launches its offensive against the Surt Line in central Libya.

{* Britain's choice of Tripoli as the target for its first atomic attack was hotly contested and would remain controversial in the future among historians. The British military command and political leadership had been split between those who wanted a strategic attack and those who wanted a tactical attack. In the end Tripoli was a compromise: It was a strategic target but would also indirectly assist tactical objectives on the Libyan front *}

April 4th 1949

Germany and Italy condemn the use of atomic weapons "in the civilized west" and threaten to retaliate with nerve gas on British cities if any Axis targets in Europe come under atomic attack. In addition, Radio Berlin declares that "all forms of weapons and other options" may be used in the North African theater now that "the British have have opened Pandora's Box in Africa".

Germany had already been stockpiling nerve gas in Libya for just this eventuality.

April 6th 1949

With British forces beginning to make some progress to the south of Surt, Axis mechanized forces launch a sharp counter attack supported by the first use of chemical weapons in the west. The thrust makes little forward progress into the teeth of Britain's numerical armor advantage but it does succeed in rocking the British back on their heels. After advancing several kilometers along the southern portion of the line the British offensive has now stalled.

April 7th 1949

Army Group South links up with German forces moving north from the Crimea, putting all of

the Ukraine west of Kiev and the Dnieper river back under German control. However, the

Soviets have managed to withdraw to defensive belts in Kiev and the east bank of the

Dnieper, with less than 30,000 Soviet soldiers falling into German hands. Both sides have

suffered relatively light casualties thanks to the fluid fighting and the rapid Soviet

withdrawal. With the plains of the Ukraine now a muddy morass, the German spring offensive

comes to a halt. The Red Army's operation Black has been "successfully" executed and the

western Ukraine is a smoking, contaminated, depopulated, howling wasteland.

April 8^th 1949

After a brief lull in the fighting, the British renew their offensive in Libya and begin using their own chemical weapons; Mustard and Phosgene gas(stockpiled in anticipation of their need following their own use of atomic weapons). The weight of British numbers, and the disruption to Axis supply lines caused by the atomic bombing of Tripoli, now begins to tell as Axis forces begin to withdraw into their secondary lines of defense. Despite the Axis pull back, the British have failed so far to achieve a decisive breakout. Rommel, holding his best German units in reserve, continues in his efforts to bleed the British with his Italian infantry and anti-tank  forces.

April 10th 1949

With the last Japanese forces surrendering or dieing on Guam, the U.S. now largely controls the Marianas islands

and has isolated the Caroline islands. U.S. admirals, content to let the Caroline Islands "wither on the vine", cast their gaze hungrily in the direction of the Japanese Home Islands.

   And to the west the U.S. now effectively controls all of Formosa, though pockets of Japanese resistance remain there.

April 12^th 1949

British forces in Libya are now pushing into Surt itself and have made further progress to the south. However, Axis forces continue to withdraw in good order where necessary and Surt itself is a chaotic maze of twisting alleyways and neighborhoods rapidly turning into fortresses of rubble. Despite heavy losses of men and armor the British command is determined to press home their numerical advantage.

    Meanwhile, Axis bombers operating out of western Libya and Malta hit harbors and road/rail junctions in Benghazi and Tobruk with conventional bombs and nerve gas. Benghazi, only recently becoming useful to the British as a supply center, suffers fresh heavy damage while Tobruk suffers only moderately thanks to RAF fighter defenses which tear into the German heavy bombers, downing over a dozen of them.

With the port of Tripoli now mostly useless, Axis supplies and reinforcements are pouring into Tunis and other smaller ports in Tunisia and western Libya. In Tunis two German panzer grenadier divisions, fresh from Northern France, are in the process of disembarking. In addition, two French-Axis volunteer infantry divisions are also coming ashore. The Luftwaffe, in hopes of preventing a repeat of Tripoli, has also sent fighter reinforcements and massive ground-based anti-aircraft defenses to Tunisia - including the latest anti-aircraft missile batteries and radar-guided flak of all types.

April 16^th 1949

Germany tests its new A-5 intermediate range ballistic missile. Launched from a test complex in southern Poland, the missile hits within two kilometers of its target near an island in the Baltic. Von Braun plans to test a modified version of this same missile, which should be capable of placing a small artificial satellite into Earth orbit, by summer. An actual satellite launch may be conducted late in 1949 or early in 1950 depending on how the test program proceeds.

    The U.S.'s missile program also continues to proceed, with the 550km ranged BM-3 being manufactured in quantity and the BM-4, a totally new design with a range approaching 1000km, well into development. Britain has also begun its own program, with a design based around a modified version of the BM-3.

April 18th 1949

In China the Japanese have been pressed almost entirely out of the country as they now hold only small pockets in and around the larger coastal cities. Even Beijing has fallen to Soviet forces, though not without appalling Red Army losses; Japanese forces there held out until almost literally the last man. Eastern China, though largely liberated, is a wasteland nearly as devastated as the western Ukraine. Indeed, the Japanese-wrought destruction is so bad that the region represents a resource sink for the Soviets rather than a source of resources. And, to make it worse, Japanese garrisons are dug tenaciously into Hong Kong, Shainghai, and other coastal cities while Chinese nationalists war and squabble with Soviet-backed communist guerrillas in the ragged interior.

   To the North the Korean peninsula is an armed fortress, with defensive lines in depth crossing the peninsula from the rugged border with China to the port city of Pusan in the south. And every day Korean slave laborers add to the mounting defensive fortifications and massive tunnel complexes.

    One installation in particular, drawing electricity from Korea's hydro-electric dams, seems particularly well guarded - ringed in concentric circles of layered defenses and littered with machinery burrowing deep into the Earth, seeking the safety of solid rock topped with steel-reinforced concrete. The best and brightest Japanese scientists from all walks of life have gathered there;and secrecy renders the facility as mysterious and unknown as the dark side of the moon.

April 19th 1949

The U.S. and Brazil issue a jointly-issued,strongly worded, note of formal protest to Germany and Italy after a sudden spike in the number of neutral merchant ships sunk on the shipping routes southwest of Iberia. The waters separating the North and South Atlantic have suddenly becomes very dangerous as American and British admirals note a growing tide of German and Italian submarines operating in that region. The implication is clear - the Axis are attempting to leverage the fall of Gibraltar to interdict, or even seize control of, the waters separating the North and South Atlantic. It is not clear if the British can stop them.

   In Washington D.C. president Dewey meets with key advisers, leading members of Congress, the joint chiefs of staff, and high ranking Brazilian officials.

    Across the U.S. the national mood is somber and chill, yet steady - The American People are angry, they are strongly pro-British, and they are well aware that Japan is contained in the Pacific. America has built the greatest military force in the history of the world, it wields the nuclear hammer, and its greatest friend and ally now sits in mortal danger as the last island of democracy in Europe slips close to the abyss. The Giant, already awakened and stomping across the Pacific, now casts its gaze east. His eyes blaze red with barely contained fury, his fists roil with the power of the atom, there is work to be done.

April 20^th 1949

In the Mojave desert of southern California, the first squadron of 'Eagle' jet fighters has been formed. An elite group of pilots, veterans of the war with Japan, begin intense training with the new fighters. With speed and maneuverability outpacing anything in the German or British arsenal, the 'Eagle' is the best air superiority fighter in the world - on paper. With the deadly 'Eagle' fighter coming online and the terrifying, massive, B-34 bomber casting its shadow over the Pacific - the U.S. Army Airforce has become the largest and most advanced air force in the world. The Giant has an Eagle on his shoulder.

   The Luftwaffe, unaware of the Eagle in particular but wary of U.S. aerial advances in general and not ready to concede control of the skies, is hard at work on several new aircraft of its own. The Reich and America, the two most powerful nations in the history of the world, begin to assume a fighting stance toward each other. Their opposing air forces will lead the way.

    British Armor surged forward, the rumble of their powerful diesel engines combining with the roar of jet engines overhead to add to the cacophony of battle. British Imperial soldiers from four continents loped alongside and ahead, the mottled brown and khaki of their uniforms blending into the desert as they probed ahead with assault rifles banging away to flush out German and Italian rocket squads. Artillery and mortars from both sides shrieked overhead, bursting in places with sharp thumps or the hollow gurgle of chemical rounds. Ahead, over the Axis lines, a nasty haze marred the horizon - mustard, Phosgene gas and dust blanketing the landscape in the relatively calm air.

    A nasty business, this chemical warfare, Field Marshall Thomas Harding thought as he lowered his field glasses to duck back down into the sealed command car. The armored car offered protection from anything smaller than a .50 caliber round and not much else, but it was fast and sealed to keep out nerve gas. And speed was of the utmost as far as Thomas Harding was concerned. He wanted to hit the Axis forces hard and then move, skirting their flank to plunge the knife into their rear supply line.

    If he had his way the Axis position in Lybia would be rolled up and The Desert Viper sent slithering back to what remained of Tripoli - or beyond. But, first he had to hit them and the Axis weren't cooperating. Anti-tank rockets scoured his armor like lances of holy fire while tank busting jet Stukas strafed his spearheads and supply columns. And the nerve gas was a right nasty problem, the Soviets hadn't been exaggerating in their reports on that issue.

    None-the-less, he was hurting the Germans almost as much as they were hurting him and the Field Marshall remained confident that his greater numbers would win the day. And so; he issued more orders, sometimes yelling into the crackling radio links to get his words across. Messengers came and went, forces shifted. Reserves came forward. The fate of North Africa weighed on Thomas Harding's shoulders like a great boulder, threatening to crush him.

    And what orders are you issuing, Mr. Viper?

TO BE CONTINUED...