Soviet Domination - A Red Dawn story

   James

In parts of China, hell has come. I agree with the summing up of the situation here. The direct deaths are one horror but so too is so much else which follows.
The China War is seeing the full horrors of modern war unleashed.




Thank you. Yep, what the Americans haven't yet sunk, was in port. The facilities as also a major loss for the Soviets.




With what they had before the war, the Soviets would have taken Western Europe and got to Spain if nukes weren't used. The forces available were huge. With what is left, they probably could get to Paris, again if no nukes are used. There is still a big force, just not a huge one. Western European forces on alert would really hurt them but I think they could still get very far indeed.
I looked at the Tibet issue last night on the map and did think about that. Maybe for when the war continues into December or the New Year. The terrain and distances remain daunting.



There is the potential for this but so much depends upon the major players in the war not being joined by everyone else.
You are correct, the post-war world will be very different especially with the beating the Americans have taken even if they come out fully on top. The nuclear threshold has been crossed many times too and wars in the future would see them used too.



7 Days to the Rhine, no. It would take longer and be one heck of a fight but there is still large numbers of Soviets forces east of the Iron Curtain. They could get all the way to Paris, maybe the Channel I think. But opposed all the way and beaten up. It would probably go nuclear long before Soviet tanks got anywhere near that far.
You're correct: Africa is really suffering in this war. Egypt, maybe Nigeria and South Africa could do well but then maybe not.


Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and Singapore joined the Allies at the start and have sent men to Korea: see below. The wider Pacific region is something I intend to cover in the next update. As to Indonesia, I am not so sure on what to do with that, tbh.

(258)

November 1984: Korea, north and south

Kim Il-sung was still alive after that targeted American military strike against his personal train to try and assassinate him. North Korea’s leader was badly-wounded in the attack and these injuries were quite significant. That train had crashed and there had been a fire added to by napalm dropped from the Americans. Kim had suffered spine injuries during that crash and during the fire, his lower legs had been severely burnt. He would never walk again and only with the utmost dedicated medical care he was remained alive. In pain, horrible pain, Kim had sworn revenge upon the Americans for this. That would be brought by his son and already anointed heir apparent, Kim Jong-il. The Great Leader gave the Dear Leader full authority to act in his stead as North Korea’s war would continue.

That war for North Korea had seen them suffer greatly, more than the injured dictator had done. There were two nuclear holes in the country – Kaesong and Wonsan – and North Korea’s army in the South was a ruin after further nuclear strikes. Much of it was cut off after South Korean armoured pincers had struck out from the Seoul Pocket in the west and the mountains to the east to seal the Han River. Everything below, all of that occupied territory and the best of Kim’s defeated army, was now being squeezed. Above the Han, Kaesong destruction stopped any significant attempt by North Korea to send any more men into South Korea. There had been the destruction of North Korea’s air force and navy as well as extensive bombing of selective war-supporting infrastructure nationwide. Security control over the country remained thorough and complete, the only good thing that could be said about how the war had gone for this nation with leaders who dreamed big.

The ‘big’ had been to take South Korea all on their own. The planned liberation of the southern half of the Korean Peninsula had seen an almighty army assembled and sent pouring over the DMZ. Victory after victory had been won at the start, leading to North Korean forces taking a significant portion of territory belonging to that member of the Allies. American assistance had been vital though due to the war in North America, United States forces to aid South Korea had been far smaller than they should have been in any other kind of Second Korean War. They brought something more to the table than just massed ranks of men: those nuclear weapons of theirs used in a tactical fashion in response to the North Koreans use of chemical weapons. South Korean forces, battered but unbeaten, had afterwards taken advantage. They were undertaking their own liberation and doing well. What American forces were in-country were near fought-out. The brigade of paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division had been used little before it was flown home (ending up inside Denver) but the rest of the US I Corps had taken major losses. The 2nd Infantry, 7th Infantry and 25th Infantry Divisions – the last with Hawaii national guardsmen attached – were all kept out of the battles which raged through November where the South Koreans used reservists to gobble up pockets of isolated North Korean resistance on their soil one by one. The Americans needed that break, so too other South Korean units who’d fought just as hard in bringing the invaders to an eventual stop. There were US Marines in the country as well, the 3rd Marine Division. These men had ended up in the Seoul Pocket and they were now in the process of leaving. They moved away southwards though recently-retaken territory and didn’t go out through the closer Incheon – North Korea rockets and missiles had destroyed most of the infrastructure there – but instead used smaller port and air facilities along the coast. For a long time there had been plans to see these men sent back home, to fight the war on the US West Coast and this was the beginning of that process. Replacing them in the form of available Allied forces was that mixed ANZAC formation which consisted of an Australian-led division complete with attachments from New Zealand, Malaysia and Singapore. They had yet to see battle but when they did, it would be on the edges of the Seoul Pocket as the South Koreans were eager to push outwards of the growing area they held not just east and south like they already were but northwards too, closer to the DMZ.

Before the US Marines could leave South Korea and ahead of the ANZAC force getting into battle, the Soviets showed up.

Detached from the Soviet Fifth Army which had gone into China, the Sixty–Eighth Army Corps had been formed in response to ongoing troubles with North Korea’s war going awry. Three combat divisions were initially supposed to complete this detachment but in the end there were only two of them who crossed through North Korea because of the intensity of the fight that the Fifth Army (still retaining significant strength) had gotten into in Manchuria. Movement through North Korea was delayed due to damage within the country across transport links coming from American bombing but also a desire to keep the Soviet movement secret. Moscow wanted to surprise those in South Korea. They nearly did, only being spotted just over a day before they came down over the DMZ and rolling towards the Seoul Pocket. The Sixty–Eighth Corps was then soon fighting South Korean forces.

Those defenders of their nation did well but couldn’t hold the Soviets back. There was a retreat made back towards Seoul from the forward positions out near Namyangju and an expectation that the Soviets would follow them closer to the battered capital city. That wasn’t to be. The Soviets carried on going south to reach Guri and then the Han River before making a crossing over it. American air power struck at them from above and South Korean light forces were attacking all over the place but on they kept on going once across the Han. Stronger South Korean forces then hit the Soviets on their flank once they were south of that river, using heavier forces which had been resting after their earlier severe fights with the North Koreans. They put in a good performance but once again, they couldn’t stop these new invaders of their country and only slow them down somewhat. Up ahead of the Sixty–Eighth Corps was the ANZAC Division. They two forces clashed near to Seongnam and there could only be one victor. It was not those assembled from the Pacific allies of South Korea and the United States.

The Australian 1st & 3rd Brigades along with the mixed brigade from the other countries had a torrid time in fighting the Soviets. It seemed as if the Soviets used all four hundred of their tanks against them; this wasn’t what actually happened but the Australians were taken apart by a mass of armour. They managed to avoid complete destruction but casualties were massive: thousands were killed, wounded or missing making it a black day indeed for Australia as well as the rest of the Pacific Allies. A withdrawal was made, Singaporean paratroopers providing the rear guard and paying a high price for that, as they all fell back to South Korean lines to the west. The Soviets drove onto the Suwon-Osan area and linked up with the large numbers of North Koreans there who had only been days away from being wiped out when under attack from three sides, their assailants due to include the ANZAC force. Seoul was now once again firmly cut off and a massive wedge of South Korean territory – lost, retaken and now lost again – was in Soviet hands with them ready to keep going south again come December. The 3rd Marine Division wouldn’t be going to California and the trio of US Army divisions were also dispatched back into the fight with haste.

Up in North Korean, Kim Jong-il was jubilant as he celebrated the ‘leading role’ that North Korean forces under his enlightened guidance had played in this major victory… that leading role being staying where they were and not dying. The Soviet Army had won this fight, not North Korea. Regardless, the war on the Korean Peninsula, fought through horrible weather and with intense brutality, was going to now go on and on.

For western europe probably less than what feared as depending on your job (if in the reserve) you are not recalled and, taking example from Italy, the entire reserve of the armed forces are around 600.000 men, at this you add more or less 400.000 men when fully mobilizated...this on a population of near 57 million of men, so while it will surely hurt it will not be crippling, expecially with an unemployment rate of 9% that will go down to almost zero as reservist will be recalled and the industrial and agricultural sector will demand a lot of men (and women) to satisfy the orders coming to east and west.

Not saying that they can keep going forever in this situation, just that for now, all considered, is doable as there is no fighting involved and in general the goverment will be selective on who's calling and not as at this stage can allow it...still it will not be cheap.

I'm also surprised for the remaining soviet capacity, the war in Asia and America will be costly in term of men and material and i bet that at least in North America the Kremlin will have sent the best material and men, plus there is China; frankly i expected that in East Europe there will be principally cat.B division with less modern equipment, same for the air force; not saying that are a paper tiger, just that arrive at the Rhine exhausted was the best possible outcome (and wrecking West Germany doing it naturally)

Soviet logistics in the Far-East are bound to be difficult, which raises the question of how much preparation did the Soviets do before the war, especially in terms of infrastructure. The Baikal-Amur Mainline should be ready and operational by 1984 though bottlenecks will exist. The existence of this line also means that the TransSib can be bypassed so the losses of Chita and Khabarovsk are not as bad as they could be. Good maps are available here though the maps themselves are in Cyrillic: www.mrl.ucsb.edu/~yopopov/rrt/railroadmaps/

A word of caution too that destroying railway lines is pretty difficult, depending on the yield and targetting of the weapons launched against both cities, critical infrastructure may be intact albeit damaged. Reconstruction will become top prioritty.
Radiation won't be an issue after a few weeks since it decays using the 7-10 rule.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if Chinese POWs end-up as "liquidators" to rebuild and expand critical infrastructure in Siberia.