Keynes' Cruisers Volume 2
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Shouldn't Lt Kennedy be a Lt. Commander by now if not actually a Commander with all that he has been involved in?
Well sure. But for that "incident" involving the Admirals' daughter.
For a good description of the gruelling routines of trawlermen, I recommend a 1989 novel by Paul Watkins - Calm at Sunset, Calm at Dawn. Plot is serviceable, but the writing on the life is excellent.
Soon but not quite yet. He has only been at the front for ~8 months.
Story 2103
South of Rhez, Russia, June 24, 1943
The general nodded. The staff had come together. It had taken him three months and a mostly quiet sector of the front but the men who had survived combat along the Don had been able to bring the new men up to speed and the previously wounded back up to competence. Some had been shifted. His first chief of staff was back at the front, commanding an infantry regiment whose colonel had been wounded in during a strafing attack. The man could fight, he just could not organize a division. The shift had improved the division’s capabilities immensely once the chaos he fostered had been organized and regulated by his replacement.
“Very well, the digging is done, and we have orders to prepare to repel a major fascist attack any time now. Release an extra ration of vodka, of good quality, to all the men tonight. They earned a reward for their duty to the Rodina. Tomorrow, we will resume battle drills. I want our patrolling schedule to be tripled starting in two days. We will not be caught by surprise, and we let the pigs slaughter themselves against our works.”
Is it the general who was sent to Siberia in early 1941 for not being able to both train his men and tend to the harvest?
SsgtC
Banned
New division then since his last one was shattered? And is he commanding a "standard" division or a Guards Division?
Story 2104
70 miles West of Sardinia, June 25, 1943
Josh adjusted his engine as he needed endurance now rather than pure power to get off the flight deck. The rest of the Marine fighter squadron’s contribution to the pre-dawn strike was forming up. They were almost all veterans now. Over Sicily, they had lost eleven aircraft. Three pilots were dead, and another had been captured. Three more were still grounded by the flight surgeon. Replacements had come forward and their names were barely memorable yet. Once they could survive the next two or three days, they would be welcomed into the ready room poker games and the ongoing prank war against the Navy Wildcat pilots.
Rochembeau’s strike package was also forming up near Wasp’s larger strike. The French pilots were insanely brave, taking off and landing their heavy fighters on the small carrier deck like it was nothing. They were almost as fearless in the air, willing to go into head on passes of mutual destruction with German fighters whenever there was a chance to inflict equal losses.
Ahead and beneath the seventy naval aircraft was another armada. Most of the 1st Polish Corps, made up of veterans of Norway and expatriates and escapees from Northern France who managed to get ashore in England during the dark days of the summer of 1940, were in their landing craft. Two divisions would be landing in the next few hours. The mountain troops would be hitting a small beach near Oristano while the other division would be landing near S’Archittu.
Josh charged his guns and looked at the gauges and dials in the cockpit. All was good. The other eleven pilots in the fighter sweep were doing the same. They had a few minutes until any defenders could see them coming over the horizon. It was the last few minutes where his focus could be safely inside glass instead of scanning the entire world looking for a shadow, a flash or a glint.
UPDATE NOTES: PER Comments below, I changed the divisions coming ashore in Sardinia from Free French to Polish for post-war political reasons.
Josh adjusted his engine as he needed endurance now rather than pure power to get off the flight deck. The rest of the Marine fighter squadron’s contribution to the pre-dawn strike was forming up. They were almost all veterans now. Over Sicily, they had lost eleven aircraft. Three pilots were dead, and another had been captured. Three more were still grounded by the flight surgeon. Replacements had come forward and their names were barely memorable yet. Once they could survive the next two or three days, they would be welcomed into the ready room poker games and the ongoing prank war against the Navy Wildcat pilots.
Rochembeau’s strike package was also forming up near Wasp’s larger strike. The French pilots were insanely brave, taking off and landing their heavy fighters on the small carrier deck like it was nothing. They were almost as fearless in the air, willing to go into head on passes of mutual destruction with German fighters whenever there was a chance to inflict equal losses.
Ahead and beneath the seventy naval aircraft was another armada. Most of the 1st Polish Corps, made up of veterans of Norway and expatriates and escapees from Northern France who managed to get ashore in England during the dark days of the summer of 1940, were in their landing craft. Two divisions would be landing in the next few hours. The mountain troops would be hitting a small beach near Oristano while the other division would be landing near S’Archittu.
Josh charged his guns and looked at the gauges and dials in the cockpit. All was good. The other eleven pilots in the fighter sweep were doing the same. They had a few minutes until any defenders could see them coming over the horizon. It was the last few minutes where his focus could be safely inside glass instead of scanning the entire world looking for a shadow, a flash or a glint.
UPDATE NOTES: PER Comments below, I changed the divisions coming ashore in Sardinia from Free French to Polish for post-war political reasons.
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StephenColbert27
Banned
French divisions taking a much bigger role here. How many more Free French divisions are there than IOTL?
Hecatee
Donor
More importantly they are "white" divisions, and not colonials (during OTL campaign of Italy and France it was often African or Algerian troops which were on the frontline, here we have specifically mentioned "mainland Frenches" )
The Free French anticipate being able to have a combat ready field army by the end of 1943. Most of that will be divisions that were either raised from North Africa, Madagascar, and the Levant or their respective garrisons but there are 2 divisions that had been in England since June 1940, the 2nd Free French Armored Division and a variety of smaller units floating around as per OTL.
Just a remark on the French in Sardinia : OTL, the US didn't want any armed forces on the island, fearing that they'll annex it.
So it's a MAJOR switch from OTL.
The US/UK Meditarrean/Italian strategy is going to be very different in this timeline than OTL.
Another remark on Sardinia: if a fleet is heading this way then Corsica is also a target (easier to occupy (friendly population), hard do occupy one island without the other, good starting point for air missions, and the obvious political importance of starting to liberate metropolitan France), particularly if there are French troops on board. (This might also explain their presence despite the Americans not wanting French troops in Sardinia).
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