The Second Battle of Britain - a Soviet Sealion

Thank you.
Story-wise, a few days off. Writing-wise, still many weeks away!




At some point, before 2020 begins anyway!
More below.

114 – A sacrifice worth making


British soldiers had fought at night-time against the Argentineans in the Falklands in the hours of darkness and done the same in recent months over in the Gulf when going up against the Iraqis. Those who were stationed in West Germany as part of the British Army of the Rhine had the same training for operating out of daylight hours. There were advantages which came from engaging the enemy at both times. Initial orders had been for those in the Westphalian Gap area to wait until night fell before going over on the attack, taking advantage of the darkness. The 11st Armoured Brigade had engaged Soviet forces on the eastern side of where the River Weser meandered in a semi-circle to the south of Minden during the early afternoon before pulling back to the river-line. Those first fights had seen them halt the VDV force in armoured vehicles supported by tanks, Ogarkov’s advance guard Column #2, but there had been major casualties taken among the British units which fought there… including those which came from friendly fire inflicted by American A-10s operating above. The Soviets had been stopped from going forward. British troops with the Queen’s Regiment and the Royal Anglian Regiment (2 QUEENS & 3 R ANGLIAN) had been supported by tankers from the 5th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards. Not everyone with those battalion-sized groups nor the brigade support units had made it to the fight. Half the artillery had been missing along with engineers, signals troops and so on. There was a shortage of tanks too: only one squadron of the 5 RIDG had come up from their base down in Paderborn in time. Most of the remaining Chieftains along with the rest of the heavy guns arrived long before darkness fell. There was still a need to prepare everyone though. However, from on-high, orders came down to attack as soon as possible, in daylight. Defeating the Soviets here wasn’t just about them but everything that was happening between here and the Inner-German Border with other British troops, as well as those of NATO allies, in a bad way. Those invading forces here needed to be defeated so the road ahead could be opened to allow for overnight movement of significant NATO forces heading eastwards. Thus into the attack the 11th Brigade went starting at seven p.m.

Defensive fire met the British at once. The paratroopers, their armoured vehicles, their supporting heavy mortars and the tanks which were left all joined in. The British came ‘early’ though: the Soviets had believed it would be a night attack. They weren’t ready. Would they ever have been truly ready to stop an attack like this unlikely; the British came at them from three sides and had good air support. They struck at Hameln as well, where there were DShV airmobile troops whose defensive position was linked to that of the VDV, with help given to the embattled Royal Engineers there (bridging troops garrisoned outside the town) to force the Soviets out. It was all too much for the defenders. Try as they might, they were defeated. The day that the 119th Guards Airborne Regiment had seen started at Checkpoint Alpha. It ended here as they were finally wiped out. The British managed to get tanks along with infantry riding in support through their lines with ease then attack outwards from within. The regimental commander was captured along with most of his staff by men from the 2 QUEENS. A Soviet effort to destroy many of their surviving 2S9 mortar carriers less the British capture them intact failed as well. Perhaps too much effort was employed in trying to blow up their own mobile fire support – how much use could be made of ten war-battered mortar carriers? – but it was tried. RAF Harriers out of their nearby base finally managed to make an appearance after those at RAF Gutersloh had suffered gravely earlier in the day under a terribly effective missile strike. Elsewhere within the remains of the shattered column Soviet paratroopers threw up their arms in surrender. They only did when they were fought out and there was no longer any point in resisting though. Before that point, they gave it all they had and made sure that their opponents had to fight for every metre of ground taken first. Almost four hours after the fight began, it was over. Column #2 was destroyed. The road running west was open again. The West Germans were waiting to go forward in the direction of Hannover and that they would. Other British forces would follow them but not the 11th Brigade for now. The battle here had cost them much and an immediate advance eastward couldn’t be made. Dead and prisoner the men with the defeated VDV and DShV units might be, yet they had done their job.


It was the 7th Panzer Division which went through the Westphalian Gap overnight following the British victory there and they were joined by the 12th Armoured Brigade, another British Army unit. The West Germans were short of one of their own brigades – thus gaining that UK attachment – because the missing brigade was engaged in a fight against what NATO had called Column #3: another one of those advance guard VDV columns, this column breaking forward and racing towards the Ruhr. The 19th Panzergrenadier Brigade fought the invading Soviets not far from their garrison at Ahlen with the engagement taking place inside the town of Beckum. They wanted to fight them elsewhere, not within this town, but it wasn’t the West Germans’ choice. Circumstances made that happen where in the fog of war. Outside interference from aircraft and helicopters, plus general confusion from men in battle, especially poor Soviet navigation through West Germany (even when the road signs were still up!), brought this about. Meeting fire from up-armoured Leopard-1s, the T-64 tanks that came behind the BMD-1 armoured vehicles fell back. The column behind them halted, taking shelter within the confines of a civilian area when incoming Luftwaffe Tornados started making air attacks. The Soviet force felt forced into the town, believing too that the 19th Brigade was all around them. That only occurred afterwards when Marders, M-113s and Jaguar-2s edged around the town and met fire. They sought cover for themselves and the carried panzergrenadiers. All of a sudden, the Soviets were trapped by the West Germans all around them. More of the brigade was brought up. Attacks were made against Soviet forces in sight on the town’s edges and the remainder thus were driven closer in. Civilians sheltered in houses as gunfire was outside their windows. The West Germans had brought up their artillery, a battalion of eighteen M-109 howitzers, but they didn’t start shelling Beckum. How many civilians were in there? The brigade commander didn’t know. The exact number didn’t matter though: those were his fellow countrymen trapped too. He wouldn’t shell the town nor would he order his men to go in there and fight the Soviets in what was certain to be a deadly fight – for them, the Soviets and the civilians – for the control of Beckum.

The news went up the command chain, all the way to the top with General Rogers himself told. SACEUR was informed that there was a regiment of paratroopers with their armoured vehicles and escorting tank battalion – all of whom had already been engaged weakening them significantly – now firmly stopped. Destroyed in battle they hadn’t been, but they were halted. They hadn’t reached the Ruhr. Column #3 had been one of the two (the other #4) which he had been most worried about as it had charged towards the Ruhr. He hadn’t thought that it would go directly into there but instead try and avoid it while seeking a crossing over the Rhine in the Wesel area. It would be down into the Rhineland or across into the southern Netherlands it then was feared to proceed, through NATO airbases & supply centres. The use of nuclear weapons was what he had been preparing himself to ask for the use of to stop this from happening. If he’d received permission, Column #3 wouldn’t have got over the Rhine because he’d hit it with a tactical nuclear strike. However, the West Germans out of Ahlen had stopped the Soviets near to their home base. The 19th Brigade was a good unit, part of the 7th Panzer which was one of the strong armoured reserves available to NATO for the defence of northern West Germany. Rogers would have preferred to see the brigade go with its parent division but he’d wanted that column stopped more. Wartime plans for such things had assumed NATO mobilisation and that penetrations like that with well-armed but small enemy columns would be dealt with by mobilised West German reserves – themselves rather well-equipped – but mobilisation had only started a few hours ago across the country. The 19th Brigade had done the job in their place. When West German territorial forces were on-hand, SACEUR would see that they took over at Beckum to release the regulars but for now he wanted those Soviets stopped there held in-place.


It was towards Koblenz on the Rhine where Column #4 had been racing towards when coming down the Lahn Valley. They’d fought off ineffective air attacks on the way. There had been a chance that they could get over the river there or make a turn either north or south to find another way over the Rhine. That wasn’t to be though. NATO troops would stop them. French troops from out of their garrison at Trier – the 1st Armored Division was deployed inside West Germany – had raced towards the Rhine to head them off and were deployed to stop them even when few in number as they arrived due to losses incurred when hit by ballistic missile strikes as the war began. They were on the western side of the river, denying entry into the Rhineland. The West Germans were on the eastern side. Koblenz was home to two separate brigades assigned to different divisions which were fighting close to the Inner-German Border. Each was supposed to go forward to join their parent formations but before then, the Soviet column arrived closing in on the Rhine. The 15th Panzer Brigade blocked any passage northwards through the woodland hills of the Westerwald while the 34th Panzer Brigade went head-on into the fight. The Battle of Bad Ems commenced, just outside that town after which it was called and right next to the River Lahn. Luchs scout cars, Jaguar-1 tank destroyers and also some small but well-armed BO-105M attack helicopters struck first to halt and break up the column. Lepoard-2 tanks then charged forward, taking on their Soviet counterparts. Strong return fire came from the T-64s, hitting many West German tanks but the 34th Brigade kept on coming. They used accurate artillery fire to knock out many of the BMD-1s and BTR-Ds who were trying to cover the deploying paratroopers. No civilians were present and the shells kept falling. So too did bombs from French Mirage F-1s which showed up overhead, working well with the West Germans on the ground to make sure there were very few friendly casualties inflicted. A retreat was attempted by the Soviets. The village of Dausenau was right behind them and the Soviets tried to fall back. Panzergrenadiers in their Marders had gotten in behind supported by some more Leopard-2s. They expected to hold off any attempt to withdraw through them with ease. That was a mistake. The VDV paratroopers made a serious effort and almost broke the West Germans. Only because they were on foot and more artillery could be brought down on them were they stopped. They’d taken out many tanks and armoured vehicles with man-portable weapons but had no defence against the shelling. The West Germans pushed their tanks forward soon enough, finally running through the Soviets and tearing them apart.

Soviet paratroopers were seen swimming in the Lahn afterwards. Individual men made it to the water’s edge as they ran from the manmade hell that the West Germans inflicted upon them and got into the river. Plenty of them made it to the southern bank too, with or without weapons. Maybe a hundred men got away. They were in no fighting shape nor organised either. Still, the West Germans would go after them there. North of the river, the battlefield was afterward in need of policing. There were hundreds more men to take prisoner and the wounded to be dealt with. Weapons lay about and there was the risk of unexploded ordnance too. In such a small area, a huge fight had commenced. The 34th Brigade had won the day here but it had come at a cost. They’d taken serious loses of their own and the brigade hadn’t been at full-strength when they arrived. Should the Soviet column have come here not unsupported, the Battle of Bad Ems would have gone the other way. For now, those victors would stay here. The 15th Brigade, un-blooded, would be released to head off and join the rest of the 5th Panzer Division to try and hold off the advance of the Soviet Eighth Guards Army pushing through northern Hessen… on their way to the Rhine themselves. A victory had been won here but it had seen many NATO forces once again diverted from other tasks, all at a time when they were really needed at the frontlines.


Out of six mobile columns that the Soviets had sent at dawn into West Germany, only one had survived the day intact. That was #6 which was in Nurnberg now though not currently going any further. #5 was in Bavaria too. Its men were trapped after being blocked by the effective use of air power and still being hit from above while immobile. As to #1, that had limped into Bremen at the other end of West Germany and no longer was neither mobile nor an advance guard column anymore. Two VDV divisions, first-rate Soviet formations, had been employed in forming these columns and had five of the six regiment-groups were no more. Many would say that it was a major waste of such valuable men. Marshal Ogarkov’s detractors back in Moscow before the war started had decried the supreme commander’s decision to do this and it could be argued they were correct when they’d said that such columns would be massacred eventually when out on their own so far ahead. But that wasn’t the point. They weren’t supposed to win the war on their own nor survive that long. Ogarkov had thought they would make it to the second day and he’d been wrong there. Look at what they had done though, he would now say. They had thrown NATO into a panic. Major NATO units had been dragged away from going towards the frontlines to deal with these penetrations far from near to the Inner-German Border. That had especially been the case with the trio that NATO spent tonight destroying or trapping when they’d lanced more than half the way across West Germany. Their destruction had been a sacrifice worth making. It wasn’t one sought in any way but when it eventually occurred, the damage to NATO had been done.

There were knock-on effects from their advances too. All across West Germany, civilians were taking to the roads in panic. They were making themselves refugees as they fled the war and helping to allow for passage forward by detachments of Spetsnaz that were racing westwards. The more people on the roads, the better. Soviet forces would blast their way through them if they needed to but NATO would do no such thing. Where those columns had passed through, they spread that panic. There were plenty of West German soldiers who hadn’t reported to mobilisation posts, even deserted, who were among the panicked refugees. Much of the country had fallen into panic due to the wider war actions undertaken during the Soviet attack. This could only continue as the fighting went on and moved without halt further and further westwards.

It just occurred to me that while the US was going away from chemical weapons in the late 1980s, the GLCM and Pershing II deployment was in full swing.

GLCMs would be on QRA at Greenham Common, Molesworth, Comiso, Florrenes, and Wuscheim. Pershing II would be in QRA around Swabisch Gmund, and further US warheads for Aircraft, Lance, Artillery, and German Pershing Ia are at sites in (Western) Germany and the Low Countries.

Reading what’s available, security or evacuation of nuclear munitions to prevent capture was one of the highest priorities for the US and their host nation security forces. So, how much effort or discussion is being put into securing/removing nuclear material and what effect does this have on coalition morale? That will be a trigger that the Americans believe things are untenable.

Second, is/has SACEUR directed dispersal of the GLCM and Pershing force? Despite security, I’m sure this will not go unnoticed. I always thought it was a move that makes good military sense, but definitely feeds into Soviet “first strike paranoia”.

I can’t wait until NATO has their first compromise of Nuclear Command and Control material in the midst of all the other trauma...

115 – Liberation


Rudolf Hess had died in Spandau Prison on August 17th, six days before the war started. The last prisoner of World War Two missed the start of World War Three. His death there at the facility in West Berlin would afterwards be pointed to be conspiracy theorists though their theories about what form that conspiracy took would be rather disjointed, more than just the usual outlandish. Spandau Prison was in the British sector of the divided city. Soviet troops arrived at the site late on the evening of August 23rd. The war’s first day was seeing much of West Berlin being conquered – *cough* liberated – and this was just the latest portion to fall into their hands and that of the East German allies too. Much of the British sector was now under occupation. It lay in the middle with the French to the north and the Americans to the south. Link-up between the Soviets coming out of East Berlin and the East Germans moving in from the west had occurred earlier in the day and that connections between the two allies hadn’t been broken. Troops from all three Western powers had done all that they could to sever the connection but it was impossible. Too many troops had been brought in too fast and they had a lot of armour. The East German motorised infantry regiment involved in the midway mission across West Berlin had a battalion of tanks with them whereas the Soviet motor rifle brigade had three more battalions of them; the other East German regiments fighting elsewhere in the city had more tanks as well. All of these T-55s and T-64s were crewed by men who’d trained in urban warfare. They put that to use because they needed to. American, British & French infantry units had man-portable anti-tank weapons and the three brigade-sized forces that each operated (none matching the size nor equipment that the Soviets had) had tanks of their own assigned. Few tank-on-tank engagements actually occurred though. The opposing sides used their tanks against other armoured vehicles and buildings in which infantry sheltered; the tanks themselves were attacked by almost everything but other tanks. All around the opposing sides fighting for control of this side of the city, West Berlin was being blasted apart. Deliberate destruction was being caused by defenders and attackers alike. This saw civilians kept getting in the line of fire, cut down in exchanges of bullets or caught up in explosions. They’d spent this nightmare of a day trying to hide but as the war moved from neighbourhood to neighbourhood, seemingly everywhere being fought over in often and back-and-forth fight where counterattacks & counter-counterattacks were made, they were now on the frontlines. Safety was sought and this was fatal for so many. Plenty of others lay injured either in the streets & buildings or had been taken to West Berlin’s hospitals. Those hadn’t been directly fought over though were caught up in the war like everywhere else.

The NATO troops (not under de jure NATO command here as the West Berlin garrisons were a holdover from the four-power Allied agreements of the war against the Nazis) had fought out of their barracks. They’d been caught napping in the surprise attack yet were still fighting. That cold start which they had meant that the war was fought in the streets through dense urban areas. There were parklands, woods and open areas in West Berlin. Those should have been the battlefields. Yet, when the attackers came through the Wall to liberate the city, they forced the defenders to fight wherever they could. Military dependents – wives and children, even a few husbands for female personnel – were caught up in this like the German civilians were. Plenty of them had lost their lives. Many more though were in captivity. Waiting on instructions for evacuation as they were supposed to do, the East Germans especially had been those to round up many of them. They’d been taken into custody for their own protection, due to soon be removed from West Berlin to the safety of the eastern side of the city. The effective kidnapping of their loved ones wasn’t known by many of those NATO units fighting. There was a belief that they’d be safe. Word was slowly getting around that this wasn’t true though. Officers and NCOs – themselves with family members here too – tried to stamp out the rumours and said that nothing being said was true about casualties and the East Germans taking them away. It was true though and the rumours had currency when such events were a few times seen by the fighting men. Meanwhile, many of the barracks complexes from where the trio of NATO brigades had fought their way out of were now in enemy hands too. Much effort had been made to take them like the airports had also been. The Soviets and East Germans taking part in Operation Zentrum had seized such places to deny their opponents the ability to keep fighting. There was no relief coming for them by air and they lost access to supply and all forms of support from the garrisons. Zentrum planning foresaw a strong defence put up on the first day – not this strong though! – with the mission completed by the second day. So far that was looking to be the case. Britain’s Berlin Brigade was finished. Many soldiers remained fighting but they were scattered about everywhere in the American & French sectors as well some left dug-in within their own. Almost half of the French zone and at least a third of the US zone was under occupation. Darkness was falling and there remained localised counterattacks where territory was often temporarily retaken but the frequency of them was dropping off. So too was the rate of fire coming from the defenders as they ran out of everything they needed to defend the city. Fighting would go on all night but the main Soviet & East German effort was planned for first light tomorrow. They’d take the remainder of the French sector and also move on the Americans. Those defenders didn’t look at all capable of stropping that final liberation of West Berlin.


Behind the frontlines, often within shouting distance of where resistance was still ongoing, the effects of the occupation were being felt among those caught there. Soldiers in NATO uniform captured in battle were being marched off away from West Berlin. Citizens of those nations caught here were also being taken away. There were innocent travellers yet also diplomats and spooks. Those who’d taken control of parts of this city wanted the intelligence prizes which they knew it had to offer. At pre-identified facilities, GRU, Stasi & KGB personnel had found no physical treasure apart from what survived the flames of deliberate arson but they wanted the information stored inside the minds of people working for rival intelligence organisations. Removed to waiting locations far away, places which might as well have been at the end of the world for those involved, everything that they knew would be emptied from their heads. Diplomats and civilians were taken as useful pawns for purposes to either come into play at a later date or turn out not to be run with. West Berliners themselves were also targeted for certain ‘snatch’ operations. Prominent figures were sought. The lists were long and the information on where they could be found couldn’t be accurate – the fighting had seen to that – yet the process went onwards. With the majority of the population, all those who entered up behind the frontlines but who weren’t sought out, they found themselves under martial law. East German Grenztruppen and their militarised riot police had taken control of large areas. They committed some outrageous acts, gross violations of the laws of war, yet this was in many ways ‘limited’. It wasn’t as widespread as it could have been. Thousands of people weren’t being killed on purpose for no reason under orders to do that. It was mainly ‘local initiative’ and people disobeying instructions rather than something organised. To those innocents on the sharp end of this, that distinction didn’t matter one bit.

In the suburb of Kreuzberg, where the Stasi’s Felix Dzerzhinsky Guard Regiment had gone through in force, much of that area was left burning. Resistance from those who lived here, already decided to be certain troublemakers, had been met with extreme violence. American soldiers with the US Berlin Brigade had inadvertently caused much of this. Tempelhof Airport was nearby in this part of the American sector of the city. Soviet airmobile troops with the lone rifle company sent there by transport helicopters had been driven out in an immediate American counterattack before they then threw everything they had to retake it once armed helicopters came to support them. Armoured vehicles carrying men from that East German paramilitary unit had come up behind the Americans forced out of Tempelhof. Gunfire was exchanged and the East Germans used every weapon to hand. Those who lived in Kreuzberg were in the middle. Some of them – immigrants from abroad but also Germans who lived here – joined in the fighting when their homes came under attack. They had petrol bombs, stones and sometimes used knives as well. The East Germans used machine guns, shells and high explosives. Up in flames went parts of Kreuzberg and there were no firefighters to put it out. Fleeing alight from buildings, those involved in the fighting as well as those not in any way wishing to offer resistance were gunned down without the Stasi troops taking a moment to make the distinction between the two.

Elsewhere in West Berlin, the fighting soldiers from the three regular East German regiments and that Soviet brigade did very little to molest the civilian population. Armed resistance was met with force but it was rare. There were only a few incidents of looting, robbery, rape or murder from these soldiers towards the locals. Political officers made their presence felt while the military officers also kept their men in-line. The motives from superiors were different but the end result was the same. Atop of this, those soldiers were too busy to misbehave. They were fighting professional NATO troops instead of civilians. Certain select detachments of men from the East German and Soviet forces weren’t involved in the main fighting though. They did go out and mix with civilians. Again, there were orders for them to stay out of trouble or there would be hell to pay. They had a mission that demanded that they move away from the main bodies of troops. Pre-war intelligence of a long-standing nature spoke of the Americans and the British, less so the French, having readied special forces parties to take part in unconventional warfare missions in the event of West Berlin being overrun. They were due to conduct operations within the city but also far outside as well. These soldiers sent against them were to hunt them down. That hunt would take them wherever it needed to go. It wouldn’t be an easy task yet it was going to be done. It was also the type of mission from which prisoners were going to be taken either.

James- the post on the peace camp made me laugh. I’m imagining a skit with a banged up blue Robin Reliant full of protestors driven by a GRU Officer (who assumed the identity of the deceased as a youth Bean) in a frantic effort to chase a GLCM flight up the A14 while evading the Cambridgeshire Constabulary. Hilarity ensues as they try to keep tabs on the convoy despite Bean not having a map, Bean loses his patience with the protestors and their constant noise, and tries to find the missing Spetsnaz R-team after he threw away the instructions for linkup.  Bonus points if the R-team appears in a Robin Regal (maybe Uncle Albert is more than he appears to be).

All kidding aside, it’s kind of curious how CND, Cruisewatch, and the Peace Camps kind of died all of sudden at the end of the Cold War.

Good update. One certainly hopes that those civilian dependents snatchednfrom West Berlin will be treated reasonably. Using them as hostages is illegal but my primary concern here would be for their treatment while they are in custody rather than anything else. Regrettably, with nuclear war on the horizon, I can't see them ever making it home.

As for the special forces concept: I doubt it would happen in a bolt from the blue attack. Had NATO seen this coming, SAD & Green Beret types would have used West Berlin as a staging arda to infiltrate East Germany and link up with potential partisan elements, but not in this case. The Green Beret element in West Berlin (Det A, of about 90 men) might make it out and keep up the fight, but I doubt it given that they were taken by surprise.