ThePest179
Banned
This is obvious.
But you aren't considering whether Iran would allow it.
Ukraine and a NATO member nation are two very different things.
That isn't destabilization.
And To Think It Might Have Happened: A Ukraine War Timeline
- Thread starter Star Eater
- Start date
This is obvious.
But you aren't considering whether Iran would allow it.
Ukraine and a NATO member nation are two very different things.
That isn't destabilization.
More like the Eurasia war and quite frankly if the creator of this TL wants to call it WW3 then get Iran and China on the side of Russia (not that hard to do by the look of things IOTL).
Vjacheslav Malyshev
Banned
China is more likely to join the side of the US than Russia. Though India could join Russia.
Isn't China part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization which Russia is a part of? And how would China join the side of the US? Haven't you heard of an island called Taiwan?
China would much rather stay neutral and see the two sides blow each other apart.
Vjacheslav Malyshev
Banned
Which they pretty much given up on retaking and only say they will retake it for propaganda purposes.
Taiwan is not a black and white issue anymore. Unless Taiwan declared itself an independent state with no connection with the mainland, China will not foolishly invade the island.
That being said, yes China is part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, but SCO is not the same as NATO or the Warsaw Pact. SCO is more of an economic and counter-terrorism cooperation, with a hint of propaganda value in it as-well. China has no obligation to come to Russia's aid in times of war, and vice versa.
Now they prefer to retake Taiwan by peaceful means, but by no means have they "given up" on it. Having a credible recourse to the use of force gives them a much greater negotiating position for a desired "peaceful" reunification.
In any case China's position will be to generally prolong the war for as long as possible, without throwing Russia into disarray, and take advantage of the vacuum caused by the US distraction. The highest form of victory is to win without war.
In fact I found an article about a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan: http://nationalinterest.org/feature/war-the-taiwan-strait-would-china-invade-taiwan-11120
While I'm not expert on this, but I think China would launch attacks on various US bases with missiles and bombers while focusing most of its efforts on invading Taiwan.
I hope the OP notices this and reads this in case he wants ideas for a potential Chinese intervention.
cubefreak123
Banned
China intervening over Taiwan would not be a good idea. China would be asking themselves, "Is Taiwan really worth tanking our economy over?" The answer is no. They can certainly provide some under-the-table aid to both sides to prolong the conflict and start asserting themselves in Asia more with the west being distracted. China has so much more to gain by just using this distraction to set themselves up to expand their sphere after the dust settles because when else will they get a blank check to bully around East, South East, and Central Asia?
Agreed; the calculus just doesn't add up from the Chinese side. So much to be gained from neutrality, so much to be (potentially) lost from joining either side.
Expect an update this weekend, rest assured I'm taking everyone's comments into account.
Orville_third
Banned
I think the naval losses given are understated for both sides in terms of people.
April 6 – April 13
The Chinese vetoing of the United Nations resolution sent shockwaves through the international community, quickly interpreted by many as the People’s Republic siding with Russia. But at the White House, Secretary of State John Kerry advised President Obama that there was more to it than this; China was, above all else, sending a message to Russia. Its veto was a signal that it wasn’t going to simply sit back and chortle, as many expected it to. Rather, it was in effect a coded message that China was prepared to position itself in Russia’s corner. A visit by the Russian Ambassador to Zhongnanhai, the imperial garden near the Forbidden City in Beijing and home of the Chinese central government, cleared up a few things. The Chinese leadership bluntly informed the Ambassador that they could not hope to sustain a drawn out conflict against the West unless they resorted to nuclear conflict, and such an event was unacceptable to China. Nuclear war would devastate the world economy and even if China wasn’t targeted, she would crumble. Therefore, the Chinese approached the Russians with a deal. They would offer to send several million men and women to Russia to work the land and factories, helping build industry to keep the Russia war machine going. In addition, technology transfers would take place while China would primarily purchase its oil from Russia; plans were to be drawn up for several pipelines tunnelling through the Far East. Russia had lost much of the income that sustained a conflict once it stopped selling oil to the West, and naval blockades were sure to prevent any selling of oil to those countries still neutral. China was a thirsty customer, and had the money to buy the black gold that Russia desperately needed to sell. Both sides knew that such a deal would not stay secret for long, and so the Chinese chose to take the initiative by informing the Americans themselves. They were supplying America’s enemy, and confessing to the crime, as they sent their Ambassador to the Oval Office. This was China’s big moment to prove herself as a diplomatic player. The Ambassador argued the Beijing line that they were doing America a favour; the measures would make Russia stronger conventionally, yes, but they would perhaps eliminate the threat of nuclear war. China could hold Russia’s economy hostage, and force it to the table if the situation became too dire for either side. The Americans were unconvinced of the Chinese claims, and protested to the “secret” deals going on between Beijing and Moscow vehemently. But there was really very little they could do to stop it. Demand for Chinese goods had never been higher as Atlantic trade practically collapsed, amid the fear of Russian submarines alongside virtually everything that could float being brought under the control of one government or another. Higher prices for Chinese goods in the States and Europe came amid a time of heightened demand, and the People’s Republic began soaking up even more funds. But developments in infrastructure and other investments were slowing. Instead of new highways and railways, China was sending more and more of this wealth into her defence budget. On April 25, the government would order one fifth of all Chinese ports to cease all activities besides naval construction. New factories were appearing in deepest Xinjiang producing armaments like sausages. It seemed like China was gearing for war. Or, as some in Washington suggested, was she preparing for her post-war role as a superpower?
Perhaps China expected the war to end with the United States truly in its shadow, and she was already getting herself ready to fill the vacuum.
Of course, between April 6 and April 13, little of this mattered to the people of Eastern Europe in a conflict that people were now starting to try and name. It was hardly a Third World War, and name suggestions ranged from the sensible such as the Russia-NATO War, Baltic War, or Russia War, to the questionable such as the Putin War, Obama-Don’t-Care War, or Lightning War, to the downright bizarre like the Oh No War, the War of Shit Hitting the Fan, or, this author’s personal favourite purely for its nonsensicalness, the Gluten Free War. Thankfully for historians, most of these were consigned to the comments of Facebook pages, and the Baltic War generally gained favour despite its slight geographical inaccuracy.
At midnight, upon the beginning of April 6, Russian forces began another concentrated effort to plough into Riga. Latvia was turning into the main battleground of the war. Having paused northeast of Gauja National Park, the Russian 41st Army assaulted the American and French defensive line which stretched across the park once the clock struck midnight. Announcing the attack with a concentrated artillery barrage, armoured vehicles soon swept in, overwhelming the frontline defenders with the 1st Battalion, 77th Armor Regiment of the U.S. Army effectively destroyed as a fighting force with casualties of around seventy percent. The fighting reached its peak in the town of Cēsis, which lies in the middle of the national park. Having made a fighting retreat through the national park, U.S. and French troops held out at the town as they awaited air support which failed to turn up in time. Having waited too long, they found themselves surrounded on all sides as infantry from the 41st Army closed in. The French troops were a battalion sized force from the 92nd Infantry Regiment, and they led a breakout to the south in the midst of heavy Russian resistance to reach friendly lines. From the south, a marine regiment from the French Army’s 6th Light Armoured Brigade attacked to dig open a hole in the Russian lines and allow their comrades to escape. They succeeded, but with heavy casualties, and harassed by Russian helicopters the whole way. A-10s soon bombed much of the national park back to the Stone Age, lighting up the surrounding area and turning it into a cauldron of fire, but it caused little damage to the Russian advance while costing three A-10s. The retreating NATO troops were supported by the newly arrived 1st Battalion, 179th Infantry Regiment from the Texas Army National Guard, who moved up from defences in Riga to slow the pursuing Russians. By dawn, the frontline had edged much closed to the Latvian capital.
The day was not defined by the Russian movements however, but by a significant NATO counterattack which struck north through central Latvia. Several battalions of the U.S. Army’s 1st Cavalry Division, as well as M1A2s from the 35th Armor Regiment, drove north and slammed into the Russian flank. The ensuing battle drew additional Russian forces in, mostly around the town of Madona which occupied a vital road interchange. The American attack was intended to cut the Russian force in two and, after nearly thirty hours of fighting, by the afternoon of April 7 the Americans had torn a hole in the Russian lines. Additional men and materials were rushed from Estonia to plug the gap, while the Italian Army joined the fray with the 6th Cavalry Regiment, actually battalion sized despite its name, sending in wheeled Centauro tank destroyers which knocked out several T-72s and T-90s near Ērgļi. Italian infantry also performed admirably, playing a key role in retaking Dzelzava, northeast of Madona, by nightfall on April 7. By this point, serious U.S. reinforcements were arriving from across the Atlantic as the Civil Reserve Air Fleet began transporting thousands of fresh American troops to Europe. European nations were also more willing and able to send forces, after a late night agreement by the European Union for all member states to forgive all debts owed to one another. There were winners and losers, but people make quick decisions about big things when survival is on the line. With Italy’s three hundred billion euro debt to France forgiven, or France’s two hundred billion euros to Britain gone, the nations were at the very least more prepared to commit financially. On April 9, the Crimson Agreement between the United States and United Kingdom would, in secret, be revealed to the rest of the NATO leaders and dramatically change things.
By April 8, as U.S. forces newly arrived in Europe were still gearing up for operations, the NATO advance into northern Latvia began to grind to a halt. With their logistical abilities impeded by accurate Russian airstrikes, fuel was dangerously low for some frontline tank units, and it was better to choose to stop than be forced to stop. The NATO armies had at the very least pushed the Russians back, and the 41st Army had lost its momentum. But units in Estonia were preparing to move south for combat against a truly challenging foe, even as they found themselves playing a difficult game behind the lines against an unseen saboteur foe which would eventually turn out to be the First Scout Ranger Regiment, Philippine Army Special Operations Command, working alongside the Special Air Service, Green Berets, and an enthusiastic civilian population, to disrupt Russian logistics. April 8 however saw another event catch the world’s attention, when the Canadian Special Operations Regiment, operating behind enemy lines in Belarus, conducted perhaps its most famous operation to date. On the outskirts of Minsk, they ambushed the convoy carrying Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko as he headed to inspect a civil defence regiment. He never made it, his door window shattered by a single bullet from the Canadian soldiers, splattering it with blood. Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovich would briefly replace him, before Belarus would be absorbed into Russia. It was a huge boost to Western morale in the midst of only bad news and ever increasing casualty figures, and encouraged the insurgency against the Russian occupiers in Belarus to pick up the pace.
On the frontlines in Latvia, all was relatively quiet until midday on April 9 when three Russian divisions ploughed south along the coastline of the Gulf of Riga, heading right for the capital. With the city’s defences thinned out following the advance in central Latvia, they reached as far as north of Tuja before encountering fierce resistance from the British Army’s Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, along with two battalions of the Royal Anglian Regiment, one of which was almost completely wiped out by Russian air attacks. Heavily modernised FV107 Scimitars were able to hold off an attack by BTR’s, knocking out almost a dozen amidst falling artillery shells. Panavia Tornadoes from the Royal Air Force provided crucial air support, tying down the Russian advance as additional assistance on the ground arrived in the form of the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, U.S. Army, recently arrived from Georgia, which announced its presence with Bradley fighting vehicles and infantry joining the fighting on the former campgrounds and woodlands of Tuja. But the Russian advance was too numerically superior, and the NATO forces had no choice but to bug out as forces coming from the east threatened to outflank them. The problem NATO was having was proving to be consistent; they could not yet field enough forces to truly match the might of the huge Russian advances. Anxiously, NATO commanders in Belgium called off the air campaign against Belarus and redirected the full force of NATO’s airpower against the Russian presence in northern Latvia. Throughout the latter half of April 9, NATO airpower pummelled at the Russian positions but they were countered by an equal Russian response which took advantage of the clearer skies over Belarus to deliver bombs onto Vilnius, capital of Lithuania, as well as the city of Kaunas. The Polish cities of Lublin and Bialystok were also targeted, while cruise missiles landed for the first time in Warsaw, spreading terror even as ninety percent were shot down by dedicated anti-missile defences. Plenty more landed on Riga, with air raid sirens wailing throughout the night. U.S. aircraft were not just active over the Baltic; under the night sky of April 9, American jets struck at the Russian 102nd Military Base, in Armenia, as well as an air base in Yerevan. The Russian naval facility on the Syrian coast was also obliterated by carrier aircraft from the Mediterranean, with assistance from British aircraft launching from Cyprus. The 201st Russian Military Base in Tajikistan was also wiped out, by Special Forces deployed in Afghanistan.
The air campaign in Europe continued into April 10, but it was also beginning to ramp up on the other side of the planet. American strike fighters operating out of Japan launched their first sorties against the major Russian ports at Vladivostok and Nakhodka. The raids were expected, and the Super Hornets met with Su-30s and MiG-31s, with both sides taking losses. The damage inflicted on the two cities in the Russian Far East was moderate, with the port facilities taking heavy damage in some places. Seeing the strong presence of Russian aircraft, the operation expanded to target Russian air bases in Primorsky Krai. These raids, launched using air facilities in Japan, caused genuine terror amongst many Japanese who feared that Russian retaliation would be quick to target them. They were soon to be proven right; late on April 10, the same day as the raids had begun, two Russian squadrons of Tu-22M bombers attacked Hokkaido with long range cruise missiles; Chitose Air Base, and nearby New Chitose Airport, were both mauled. The major airport at Sapporo, Hokkaido’s capital and largest city with a population of almost two million, was also targeted and reduced to a burning ruin. But, inevitably, some missiles ultimately malfunctioned and plunged right into the heart of Sapporo. One twenty storey apartment building was demolished, killing 126 people, with fires raging throughout the night across the city. In any Western country, such an event would have galvanised support for a war. For Japan, it was different; rallies erupted the following day in major Japanese cities denouncing the Americans and demanding the government expel their forces. The sentiment was even present within the National Diet, and Japanese media and Internet forums were swamped with anger towards the Americans who had brought tragedy to the Japanese Islands. Barely any word of blame was placed on Russia; some Japanese politicians were even sympathetic to them, for defending themselves from an attack that the Americans started. But, ultimately, Prime Minister Shinzō Abe promised the U.S. Ambassador that he would continue to support them, but also announced that no Japanese forces would be involved in operations against Russia, on the condition that no further attacks hit the Japanese islands.
Back in Europe, the Russian advance to Riga restarted on April 11, one week after the war had begun. Continuing to move south on the capital, they found themselves contested at every step by a committed defence. But as NATO forces moved away from the coastline, lest they be boxed in, the Baltic Fleet was able to finally return to the action after a brief hiatus. On the coastline north of Riga, landing ships and hovercraft began depositing heavy equipment and marines onto the Latvian shores facing only minimal resistance. The heaviest fighting was against the 212th Infantry Battalion, 21st Armoured Brigade, of the German Army at Skulte, before the entire town was practically vaporised by heavy American artillery while the Germans, the first to see combat on the ground in the war, withdrew south. Riga, one of the most beautiful cities in the world, was now visible on the horizon for the Russians. Additional forces moved in from the northeast, pushing back the thin NATO forces. But the West was digging its heels in; tens of thousands of additional U.S. troops were arriving from the States, and large tank battles erupted northeast of Riga as the Americans, British, French, and Germans proved that their vehicles were superior in every technical way to those of the Russians. But the one exception was in numbers. On April 12, Russian troops reached the village of Ādaži just twenty kilometres from central Riga, after a heavy battle against three battalions of the 16th Infantry Regiment, U.S. Army. As night turned to day and the sun rose over Latvia on April 13, 2014, the Russians began consolidating their positions and prepared for the final assault on the ancient capital. Within the city, the Western troops could do little more than wait for the coming showdown.
The battle on land may have been leaving NATO with a bloody nose, but the battle at sea was a different matter. Russia had in the first few days made remarkable progress, seizing a sizeable section of the waters north of the Atlantic, having inflicted heavy losses on the British and Americans. But the success was to be short lived. In their haste to put every available ship to sea, the Russians had overlooked sometimes catastrophic technical faults which saw radars fail, and weapons refuse to fire. The initial luck for the Russian Navy was just that; luck, mixed with shock amongst the NATO navies after the loss of an American carrier. But once this shock wore off, the Russian Navy was revealed for the pile of rust it truly was. It began on April 6, when the British submarine Talent, armed with the most advanced sonar anywhere in the world,torpedoed and sunk the flagship of the Northern Fleet, the battlecruiser Pyotr Velikiy, killing 604 men. Just three hours later, she sunk not one, but two Russian submarines with 261 men killed in total. The remarkable victory was hailed by the new British national government, a coalition between the three major parties. The next day, the NATO navies launched another strike against Russian waters, headed by the carriers Dwight D. Eisenhower and Harry S. Truman, along with 22 American destroyers. The resultant battle was simply catastrophic for the Russian Navy, which saw the bulk of the Northern Fleet wiped out in a battle that cost dozens of ships and upwards of ten thousand lives. Seven American destroyers were sunk, and the Harry S. Truman took a missile which rendered her runway inoperable. But Russian submarines continued to operate in the Atlantic; the first casualty was a Dutch-flagged container ship, torpedoed with the loss of all 22 men aboard. As the first sea convoys began to assemble across the East Coast, it was clear that the process of hunting down the submarines was going to be a painful experience. Soon, NATO destroyers were trawling through the North Atlantic, looking for stealthy underwater craft that didn’t want to be discovered. Russian submarine activity in the Pacific was mostly in the Sea of Okhotsk, where the U.S. Pacific Fleet had formed a tight cordon. A handful of submarines were already in the Pacific, but under strict instructions to only reveal themselves to attack targets that were worth the risk; the errant container ship wasn’t a worthwhile target, especially amid the terror that Moscow felt at the prospect of accidentally sinking a Chinese ship. In the Black Sea, NATO aircraft launched from Turkey to target the Black Sea Fleet; in their first raid on April 7, three corvettes were sunk while the frigate Ladnyy was heavily damaged. Bombs also landed on Sevastopol. But the losses inflicted on U.S. aircraft, coupled with the desperate need for them in the Baltic as well as the general inactivity of the Black Sea Fleet anyway, led to the operation being quietly called off as forces were reassigned.
In the Middle East, the first trouble was brewing as violent uprisings went off in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, many people seeing the war in Europe as a sign that a battle to destroy the evils of America had begun. Those less ideological were swept up in a general Palestinian uprising that began on April 6, in what we now know as the Third Intifada. It is mistaken to treat the intifada as simply triggered by the war in Europe; it had been building up for years, and was probably inevitable anyway, but the Baltic War exacerbated it by encouraging the far more militant, and their actions led the violent actions of the uprising. Several bombings struck Tel Aviv and Jerusalem between April 7 and April 13, while the first rockets from Gaza began landing in Israel. What started in Palestine as rock throwing turned into gun battles on the streets; by April 11, Israeli armoured vehicles moved onto the streets of Gaza while missiles landed on compounds and rocket sites. Civilian casualties were appallingly high, while on the diplomatic front Russia took the side of the Palestinians in an effort to win support in the Middle East, especially from Iran, whom Moscow was desperately lobbying to mine the Strait of Hormuz. For the time being, at least, it was not to be. But as Israeli troops entered Gaza and the West Bank in force, and fighting intensified, Israel became openly hostile to the Russians, expelling their Ambassador and cutting off relations. Protests amongst Israel's population of ethnic Russians, which numbered around a million, soon began taking place. It seemed to many that the war in Europe was merging with that in the Middle East, and becoming a far wider conflict. In Iran, there was footage of nationalist rallies in Tehran demanding the government assist the Palestinians. And on the other side of the world, the American satellites over East Asia picked up something just as startling as the first Russian attack on April 4.
North Korea was mobilising.
The Chinese vetoing of the United Nations resolution sent shockwaves through the international community, quickly interpreted by many as the People’s Republic siding with Russia. But at the White House, Secretary of State John Kerry advised President Obama that there was more to it than this; China was, above all else, sending a message to Russia. Its veto was a signal that it wasn’t going to simply sit back and chortle, as many expected it to. Rather, it was in effect a coded message that China was prepared to position itself in Russia’s corner. A visit by the Russian Ambassador to Zhongnanhai, the imperial garden near the Forbidden City in Beijing and home of the Chinese central government, cleared up a few things. The Chinese leadership bluntly informed the Ambassador that they could not hope to sustain a drawn out conflict against the West unless they resorted to nuclear conflict, and such an event was unacceptable to China. Nuclear war would devastate the world economy and even if China wasn’t targeted, she would crumble. Therefore, the Chinese approached the Russians with a deal. They would offer to send several million men and women to Russia to work the land and factories, helping build industry to keep the Russia war machine going. In addition, technology transfers would take place while China would primarily purchase its oil from Russia; plans were to be drawn up for several pipelines tunnelling through the Far East. Russia had lost much of the income that sustained a conflict once it stopped selling oil to the West, and naval blockades were sure to prevent any selling of oil to those countries still neutral. China was a thirsty customer, and had the money to buy the black gold that Russia desperately needed to sell. Both sides knew that such a deal would not stay secret for long, and so the Chinese chose to take the initiative by informing the Americans themselves. They were supplying America’s enemy, and confessing to the crime, as they sent their Ambassador to the Oval Office. This was China’s big moment to prove herself as a diplomatic player. The Ambassador argued the Beijing line that they were doing America a favour; the measures would make Russia stronger conventionally, yes, but they would perhaps eliminate the threat of nuclear war. China could hold Russia’s economy hostage, and force it to the table if the situation became too dire for either side. The Americans were unconvinced of the Chinese claims, and protested to the “secret” deals going on between Beijing and Moscow vehemently. But there was really very little they could do to stop it. Demand for Chinese goods had never been higher as Atlantic trade practically collapsed, amid the fear of Russian submarines alongside virtually everything that could float being brought under the control of one government or another. Higher prices for Chinese goods in the States and Europe came amid a time of heightened demand, and the People’s Republic began soaking up even more funds. But developments in infrastructure and other investments were slowing. Instead of new highways and railways, China was sending more and more of this wealth into her defence budget. On April 25, the government would order one fifth of all Chinese ports to cease all activities besides naval construction. New factories were appearing in deepest Xinjiang producing armaments like sausages. It seemed like China was gearing for war. Or, as some in Washington suggested, was she preparing for her post-war role as a superpower?
Perhaps China expected the war to end with the United States truly in its shadow, and she was already getting herself ready to fill the vacuum.
Of course, between April 6 and April 13, little of this mattered to the people of Eastern Europe in a conflict that people were now starting to try and name. It was hardly a Third World War, and name suggestions ranged from the sensible such as the Russia-NATO War, Baltic War, or Russia War, to the questionable such as the Putin War, Obama-Don’t-Care War, or Lightning War, to the downright bizarre like the Oh No War, the War of Shit Hitting the Fan, or, this author’s personal favourite purely for its nonsensicalness, the Gluten Free War. Thankfully for historians, most of these were consigned to the comments of Facebook pages, and the Baltic War generally gained favour despite its slight geographical inaccuracy.
At midnight, upon the beginning of April 6, Russian forces began another concentrated effort to plough into Riga. Latvia was turning into the main battleground of the war. Having paused northeast of Gauja National Park, the Russian 41st Army assaulted the American and French defensive line which stretched across the park once the clock struck midnight. Announcing the attack with a concentrated artillery barrage, armoured vehicles soon swept in, overwhelming the frontline defenders with the 1st Battalion, 77th Armor Regiment of the U.S. Army effectively destroyed as a fighting force with casualties of around seventy percent. The fighting reached its peak in the town of Cēsis, which lies in the middle of the national park. Having made a fighting retreat through the national park, U.S. and French troops held out at the town as they awaited air support which failed to turn up in time. Having waited too long, they found themselves surrounded on all sides as infantry from the 41st Army closed in. The French troops were a battalion sized force from the 92nd Infantry Regiment, and they led a breakout to the south in the midst of heavy Russian resistance to reach friendly lines. From the south, a marine regiment from the French Army’s 6th Light Armoured Brigade attacked to dig open a hole in the Russian lines and allow their comrades to escape. They succeeded, but with heavy casualties, and harassed by Russian helicopters the whole way. A-10s soon bombed much of the national park back to the Stone Age, lighting up the surrounding area and turning it into a cauldron of fire, but it caused little damage to the Russian advance while costing three A-10s. The retreating NATO troops were supported by the newly arrived 1st Battalion, 179th Infantry Regiment from the Texas Army National Guard, who moved up from defences in Riga to slow the pursuing Russians. By dawn, the frontline had edged much closed to the Latvian capital.
The day was not defined by the Russian movements however, but by a significant NATO counterattack which struck north through central Latvia. Several battalions of the U.S. Army’s 1st Cavalry Division, as well as M1A2s from the 35th Armor Regiment, drove north and slammed into the Russian flank. The ensuing battle drew additional Russian forces in, mostly around the town of Madona which occupied a vital road interchange. The American attack was intended to cut the Russian force in two and, after nearly thirty hours of fighting, by the afternoon of April 7 the Americans had torn a hole in the Russian lines. Additional men and materials were rushed from Estonia to plug the gap, while the Italian Army joined the fray with the 6th Cavalry Regiment, actually battalion sized despite its name, sending in wheeled Centauro tank destroyers which knocked out several T-72s and T-90s near Ērgļi. Italian infantry also performed admirably, playing a key role in retaking Dzelzava, northeast of Madona, by nightfall on April 7. By this point, serious U.S. reinforcements were arriving from across the Atlantic as the Civil Reserve Air Fleet began transporting thousands of fresh American troops to Europe. European nations were also more willing and able to send forces, after a late night agreement by the European Union for all member states to forgive all debts owed to one another. There were winners and losers, but people make quick decisions about big things when survival is on the line. With Italy’s three hundred billion euro debt to France forgiven, or France’s two hundred billion euros to Britain gone, the nations were at the very least more prepared to commit financially. On April 9, the Crimson Agreement between the United States and United Kingdom would, in secret, be revealed to the rest of the NATO leaders and dramatically change things.
By April 8, as U.S. forces newly arrived in Europe were still gearing up for operations, the NATO advance into northern Latvia began to grind to a halt. With their logistical abilities impeded by accurate Russian airstrikes, fuel was dangerously low for some frontline tank units, and it was better to choose to stop than be forced to stop. The NATO armies had at the very least pushed the Russians back, and the 41st Army had lost its momentum. But units in Estonia were preparing to move south for combat against a truly challenging foe, even as they found themselves playing a difficult game behind the lines against an unseen saboteur foe which would eventually turn out to be the First Scout Ranger Regiment, Philippine Army Special Operations Command, working alongside the Special Air Service, Green Berets, and an enthusiastic civilian population, to disrupt Russian logistics. April 8 however saw another event catch the world’s attention, when the Canadian Special Operations Regiment, operating behind enemy lines in Belarus, conducted perhaps its most famous operation to date. On the outskirts of Minsk, they ambushed the convoy carrying Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko as he headed to inspect a civil defence regiment. He never made it, his door window shattered by a single bullet from the Canadian soldiers, splattering it with blood. Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovich would briefly replace him, before Belarus would be absorbed into Russia. It was a huge boost to Western morale in the midst of only bad news and ever increasing casualty figures, and encouraged the insurgency against the Russian occupiers in Belarus to pick up the pace.
On the frontlines in Latvia, all was relatively quiet until midday on April 9 when three Russian divisions ploughed south along the coastline of the Gulf of Riga, heading right for the capital. With the city’s defences thinned out following the advance in central Latvia, they reached as far as north of Tuja before encountering fierce resistance from the British Army’s Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, along with two battalions of the Royal Anglian Regiment, one of which was almost completely wiped out by Russian air attacks. Heavily modernised FV107 Scimitars were able to hold off an attack by BTR’s, knocking out almost a dozen amidst falling artillery shells. Panavia Tornadoes from the Royal Air Force provided crucial air support, tying down the Russian advance as additional assistance on the ground arrived in the form of the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, U.S. Army, recently arrived from Georgia, which announced its presence with Bradley fighting vehicles and infantry joining the fighting on the former campgrounds and woodlands of Tuja. But the Russian advance was too numerically superior, and the NATO forces had no choice but to bug out as forces coming from the east threatened to outflank them. The problem NATO was having was proving to be consistent; they could not yet field enough forces to truly match the might of the huge Russian advances. Anxiously, NATO commanders in Belgium called off the air campaign against Belarus and redirected the full force of NATO’s airpower against the Russian presence in northern Latvia. Throughout the latter half of April 9, NATO airpower pummelled at the Russian positions but they were countered by an equal Russian response which took advantage of the clearer skies over Belarus to deliver bombs onto Vilnius, capital of Lithuania, as well as the city of Kaunas. The Polish cities of Lublin and Bialystok were also targeted, while cruise missiles landed for the first time in Warsaw, spreading terror even as ninety percent were shot down by dedicated anti-missile defences. Plenty more landed on Riga, with air raid sirens wailing throughout the night. U.S. aircraft were not just active over the Baltic; under the night sky of April 9, American jets struck at the Russian 102nd Military Base, in Armenia, as well as an air base in Yerevan. The Russian naval facility on the Syrian coast was also obliterated by carrier aircraft from the Mediterranean, with assistance from British aircraft launching from Cyprus. The 201st Russian Military Base in Tajikistan was also wiped out, by Special Forces deployed in Afghanistan.
The air campaign in Europe continued into April 10, but it was also beginning to ramp up on the other side of the planet. American strike fighters operating out of Japan launched their first sorties against the major Russian ports at Vladivostok and Nakhodka. The raids were expected, and the Super Hornets met with Su-30s and MiG-31s, with both sides taking losses. The damage inflicted on the two cities in the Russian Far East was moderate, with the port facilities taking heavy damage in some places. Seeing the strong presence of Russian aircraft, the operation expanded to target Russian air bases in Primorsky Krai. These raids, launched using air facilities in Japan, caused genuine terror amongst many Japanese who feared that Russian retaliation would be quick to target them. They were soon to be proven right; late on April 10, the same day as the raids had begun, two Russian squadrons of Tu-22M bombers attacked Hokkaido with long range cruise missiles; Chitose Air Base, and nearby New Chitose Airport, were both mauled. The major airport at Sapporo, Hokkaido’s capital and largest city with a population of almost two million, was also targeted and reduced to a burning ruin. But, inevitably, some missiles ultimately malfunctioned and plunged right into the heart of Sapporo. One twenty storey apartment building was demolished, killing 126 people, with fires raging throughout the night across the city. In any Western country, such an event would have galvanised support for a war. For Japan, it was different; rallies erupted the following day in major Japanese cities denouncing the Americans and demanding the government expel their forces. The sentiment was even present within the National Diet, and Japanese media and Internet forums were swamped with anger towards the Americans who had brought tragedy to the Japanese Islands. Barely any word of blame was placed on Russia; some Japanese politicians were even sympathetic to them, for defending themselves from an attack that the Americans started. But, ultimately, Prime Minister Shinzō Abe promised the U.S. Ambassador that he would continue to support them, but also announced that no Japanese forces would be involved in operations against Russia, on the condition that no further attacks hit the Japanese islands.
Back in Europe, the Russian advance to Riga restarted on April 11, one week after the war had begun. Continuing to move south on the capital, they found themselves contested at every step by a committed defence. But as NATO forces moved away from the coastline, lest they be boxed in, the Baltic Fleet was able to finally return to the action after a brief hiatus. On the coastline north of Riga, landing ships and hovercraft began depositing heavy equipment and marines onto the Latvian shores facing only minimal resistance. The heaviest fighting was against the 212th Infantry Battalion, 21st Armoured Brigade, of the German Army at Skulte, before the entire town was practically vaporised by heavy American artillery while the Germans, the first to see combat on the ground in the war, withdrew south. Riga, one of the most beautiful cities in the world, was now visible on the horizon for the Russians. Additional forces moved in from the northeast, pushing back the thin NATO forces. But the West was digging its heels in; tens of thousands of additional U.S. troops were arriving from the States, and large tank battles erupted northeast of Riga as the Americans, British, French, and Germans proved that their vehicles were superior in every technical way to those of the Russians. But the one exception was in numbers. On April 12, Russian troops reached the village of Ādaži just twenty kilometres from central Riga, after a heavy battle against three battalions of the 16th Infantry Regiment, U.S. Army. As night turned to day and the sun rose over Latvia on April 13, 2014, the Russians began consolidating their positions and prepared for the final assault on the ancient capital. Within the city, the Western troops could do little more than wait for the coming showdown.
The battle on land may have been leaving NATO with a bloody nose, but the battle at sea was a different matter. Russia had in the first few days made remarkable progress, seizing a sizeable section of the waters north of the Atlantic, having inflicted heavy losses on the British and Americans. But the success was to be short lived. In their haste to put every available ship to sea, the Russians had overlooked sometimes catastrophic technical faults which saw radars fail, and weapons refuse to fire. The initial luck for the Russian Navy was just that; luck, mixed with shock amongst the NATO navies after the loss of an American carrier. But once this shock wore off, the Russian Navy was revealed for the pile of rust it truly was. It began on April 6, when the British submarine Talent, armed with the most advanced sonar anywhere in the world,torpedoed and sunk the flagship of the Northern Fleet, the battlecruiser Pyotr Velikiy, killing 604 men. Just three hours later, she sunk not one, but two Russian submarines with 261 men killed in total. The remarkable victory was hailed by the new British national government, a coalition between the three major parties. The next day, the NATO navies launched another strike against Russian waters, headed by the carriers Dwight D. Eisenhower and Harry S. Truman, along with 22 American destroyers. The resultant battle was simply catastrophic for the Russian Navy, which saw the bulk of the Northern Fleet wiped out in a battle that cost dozens of ships and upwards of ten thousand lives. Seven American destroyers were sunk, and the Harry S. Truman took a missile which rendered her runway inoperable. But Russian submarines continued to operate in the Atlantic; the first casualty was a Dutch-flagged container ship, torpedoed with the loss of all 22 men aboard. As the first sea convoys began to assemble across the East Coast, it was clear that the process of hunting down the submarines was going to be a painful experience. Soon, NATO destroyers were trawling through the North Atlantic, looking for stealthy underwater craft that didn’t want to be discovered. Russian submarine activity in the Pacific was mostly in the Sea of Okhotsk, where the U.S. Pacific Fleet had formed a tight cordon. A handful of submarines were already in the Pacific, but under strict instructions to only reveal themselves to attack targets that were worth the risk; the errant container ship wasn’t a worthwhile target, especially amid the terror that Moscow felt at the prospect of accidentally sinking a Chinese ship. In the Black Sea, NATO aircraft launched from Turkey to target the Black Sea Fleet; in their first raid on April 7, three corvettes were sunk while the frigate Ladnyy was heavily damaged. Bombs also landed on Sevastopol. But the losses inflicted on U.S. aircraft, coupled with the desperate need for them in the Baltic as well as the general inactivity of the Black Sea Fleet anyway, led to the operation being quietly called off as forces were reassigned.
In the Middle East, the first trouble was brewing as violent uprisings went off in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, many people seeing the war in Europe as a sign that a battle to destroy the evils of America had begun. Those less ideological were swept up in a general Palestinian uprising that began on April 6, in what we now know as the Third Intifada. It is mistaken to treat the intifada as simply triggered by the war in Europe; it had been building up for years, and was probably inevitable anyway, but the Baltic War exacerbated it by encouraging the far more militant, and their actions led the violent actions of the uprising. Several bombings struck Tel Aviv and Jerusalem between April 7 and April 13, while the first rockets from Gaza began landing in Israel. What started in Palestine as rock throwing turned into gun battles on the streets; by April 11, Israeli armoured vehicles moved onto the streets of Gaza while missiles landed on compounds and rocket sites. Civilian casualties were appallingly high, while on the diplomatic front Russia took the side of the Palestinians in an effort to win support in the Middle East, especially from Iran, whom Moscow was desperately lobbying to mine the Strait of Hormuz. For the time being, at least, it was not to be. But as Israeli troops entered Gaza and the West Bank in force, and fighting intensified, Israel became openly hostile to the Russians, expelling their Ambassador and cutting off relations. Protests amongst Israel's population of ethnic Russians, which numbered around a million, soon began taking place. It seemed to many that the war in Europe was merging with that in the Middle East, and becoming a far wider conflict. In Iran, there was footage of nationalist rallies in Tehran demanding the government assist the Palestinians. And on the other side of the world, the American satellites over East Asia picked up something just as startling as the first Russian attack on April 4.
North Korea was mobilising.
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I'd love to get an estimate from people of what the likely casualties are, so I can be sure I'm reasonably accurate when I mention it in the next update.
Orville_third
Banned
Looks like NATO is getting the upper hand in these cases, though Russia is giving back a lot of damage.
One MAJOR problem. You have Civil Air Patrol flying US troops to Europe. CAP flies single-engined planes that normally can't carry more than four people, including the pilot. (If we flew people to Europe, the US would be at the end of their rope...) You're likely thinking of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, which involves effectively drafting many US airliners and pilots.
Was the Army unit being transported from Georgia the nation or Georgia the state?
The US/UK's intervention in Syria will likely upset the Syrians, and may wind up aiding IS....
I know the Philippines are allies of the USA. Why would they be operating in Europe?
Would PM Harper get criticized for using Canadian soldiers on effectively an assassination mission? And why a satchel charge, instead of Canada's well-trained snipers?
One MAJOR problem. You have Civil Air Patrol flying US troops to Europe. CAP flies single-engined planes that normally can't carry more than four people, including the pilot. (If we flew people to Europe, the US would be at the end of their rope...) You're likely thinking of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, which involves effectively drafting many US airliners and pilots.
Was the Army unit being transported from Georgia the nation or Georgia the state?
The US/UK's intervention in Syria will likely upset the Syrians, and may wind up aiding IS....
I know the Philippines are allies of the USA. Why would they be operating in Europe?
Would PM Harper get criticized for using Canadian soldiers on effectively an assassination mission? And why a satchel charge, instead of Canada's well-trained snipers?
ThePest179
Banned
Not to be insulting, but this seems unrealistic for China. They'd try to keep out of it at all costs.
Shouldn't that be the Third?
The intervention is targeting Russian military installations, not Syrian ones.
Because that is a very valuable place for them to be operating in?
China would maintain armed neutrality while maneuvering for advantage. But I'm not sure Putin will agree to let in millions of Chinese into Russia. He doesn't want pro-Chinese "referendums" in Haishenwai and Boli a few years down the road.
Would Israel really reflexively back the west? Given its huuuuge Russian population, and given the still large Jewish population in the New Soviet Union, I think it will maintain Chinese-style armed neutrality. It doesn't need outside help to maintain its control over the Palestinians, and may not be prepared for a formidable enemy like Russia.
Would Israel really reflexively back the west? Given its huuuuge Russian population, and given the still large Jewish population in the New Soviet Union, I think it will maintain Chinese-style armed neutrality. It doesn't need outside help to maintain its control over the Palestinians, and may not be prepared for a formidable enemy like Russia.
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