Chiang Kai-Shek goes to Germany: An Axis China Timeline

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Thank you all for your lovely feedback. I hope to reply to all the posts after this update.

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The Two Giants: The USSR and the USA.

The two remaining elephants (or giants, if you want to mix your metaphors) in the room were the USSR and the United States of America. Both had been committed to neutrality for completely different reasons, but now the former was shifting gears while the later had steadfastly remained neutral.


The Gentle Giant - USA:

America continued her role as the piggybank of the world. American banks lent to both the Axis and Entente. American firms sold raw materials and finished goods to both sides of the conflict. American agriculture fed Japanese, British and German mouths. The American government basically guaranteed the stability of the loan agreements and used the promise of repayment to fuel an ambition public works and rearmament program. The Depression years had been firmly put in the past and with that, the Democrats looked politically dominant.

It was a good time to be American. But while America bankrolled the powers, she also prepared for war herself. The American military was over 3 million strong by the end of 1941 and expanding further. American industrial production was unrivaled, even by the USSR. The American bounty of seemingly limitless natural resources, the safety of two oceans, an educated population and gigantic industry meant that America did not have to choose between beating swords into plowshares or beating plowshares into swords - she could do both.

But the prospect of American intervention on either side was remote. German atrocities across Belgium and her deportation of German Jews was countered by Japanese atrocities across North Manchuria and British carpet-bombing of German and Chinese cities. There was a genuine element of 'a plague on both your houses.' with public sympathy being on neither side. Despite the strong anti-war feelings, the American public knew that the war had effectively financed American recovery, so there was an unwillingness to take any concrete steps to address the issue. It was common sentiment at the time was that America was not the "World Police" and there was a widespread feeling that American intervention in the last Great War had produced the conditions that made the Second Great War possible. As 1942 dawned across America, the gentle giant continued her peaceful slumber.


The USSR:
The biggest reason for Soviet neutrality was that at the highest echelons of the Soviet elite, there was a widespread belief that it was necessary to let the 'capitalists and fascists' to fight among themselves. The USSR would continue to implement five year plans, building it's industrial capacity, infrastructure and re-arming at a breathless pace while the Entente and Axis powers mutually exhausted themselves.

Manchurian-Japanese air power was a decisive factor in the victory at Khalkin Gol. Pictured is the wreckage of Soviet Aircraft (most likely a Polikarpov I-16) (1)

Another factor in the USSR's decision to remain neutral was the poor performance of her armed forces. Her defeat in the Battle of Khalkim Gol in 1939 and phyrric victory during the Winter War in 1940 was blamed on 'counter-revolutionary sabotage which has sapped the morale, organization and will of the Soviet Armed Forces' and led to the rehabilitation of many purged professional officers and the purge of the NKVD. The period of 1940-41 was characterized by an increasing level of professionalization and training by the Soviet Armed forces, however, the damage inflicted by the Great Purge was still evident in many military units. A lot of officers were not in a position to be 'un-purged,' as Soviet Science had not yet advanced to the point of being able to bring the dead back to life yet.

Soviet industrial production and potential was enormous. The Soviet Union produced more tanks that all of the Axis powers combined in 1941. Pictured above are T-34s about to roll off the assembly line. (2)

Despite this, the Soviet Armed Forces was regarded as a huge potential threat. By December 1941, there were 8 million men under arms. There were also 40,000 tanks and 50,000 aircraft in the Soviet Army's inventory. Despite the relative newness of Soviet industry, the Soviet Union was able to produce outstanding, simple and rugged design, particularly in the field of tanks. The T-34 was an outstanding tank which would be produced throughout the war. The combination of mobility, sloped armor and firepower would be the bane of many Romanian and Polish troops (along with Italo-German volunteers) during the border skirmishes of 1941-42.

Soviet Industry was another huge threat. 20,000 Armoured fighting vehicles of different types were produced, just in 1941, eclipsing the combined total production of all the Axis powers. 25,000 aircraft were also produced during that year. It was clear that the Soviet Union's intervention was potentially war-winning - a fact not lost on any of the powers, particularly Germany, which was moving troops from the Western Front rapidly to the German-Polish border in order to rapidly reinforce her Polish ally. But as 1941 finished, it was clear that Stalin was willing to wait until the "forces of reaction" bled themselves out a little bit further. He would get his wish in 1942.




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Sources:

(1) http://fly.historicwings.com/2012/06/the-khalkhin-gol-incident/
(2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-34#mediaviewer/File:RIAN_archive_1274_Tanks_going_to_the_front.jpg



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-y...Soviet_Union#Second_plan.2C_1933.E2.80.931937

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge

http://ww2-weapons.com/History/Production/Russia/

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Next update: The Asian Front (1941)

 

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The Asian Front: 1941


Overall overview:
In comparison to the more fluid European Theater, the Asian Front remained a mostly static one. The war was very similar to that of the First Great War, lines of opposing trenches with the monotony of trench warfare being broken up by the occasional trench raid, artillery duel and naval bombardment. In fact, the only thing that would've looked out of place in a First Great War scene would've been the drone of low-flying aircraft on occasional air-to-ground sorties.

At the end of 1941, China had officially 12 million under arms. However, it is important to note that this figure was only inclusive of the National Revolutionary Air Force, National Revolutionary Army and remnants of the National Revolutionary Navy. This 12 million figure did not include the various militia, anti-aircraft and division level formations under the Civil Protection Office, nor did it include the security formations, secret police units and the transition camp infrastructure under the Bureau of Information and Statistics. If those figures are included, then a more accurate count of 20 million comes into place.

The Northern Army Group/Northern Expedition Army
The bulk of the National Revolutionary Army was deployed in the Northern Army Group. Before Chiang took command in May and re-organized the Northern Army Group into the Northern Expedition Army, this Army Group had 4 million troops. After Chiang took control and hollowed out other Army groups for men and material, it had swelled to 8 million in preparation for the Third Northern Expedition.

Why did Chiang 'hollow out' the other fronts? Foremost in his mind was the lack of progress being made on what was seen as a key front. Second was that the Sino-Soviet Non-Aggression pact was due to expire in August 28, 1943. BIS intelligence indicated that while the bulk of Soviet troop concentrations were across Eastern Europe, there was still a substantial concentration across the Manchurian-Soviet border. The concern was that the Soviet Union would attack Manchuria and claim the rich provinces for herself easily while China had expended countless lives and resources for nothing. Chiang intended to build up troops throughout 1941 and launch a massive general offensive in January 1942.

Entente intelligence was not blind to these developments. Increasingly shill reports to Tokyo by the North China Command were being ignored however as the Tojo regime had firmly decided on the "Southern Option" which was being developed with British forces. Although North China army command had 2 million men, the increasing concentration of National Revolutionary Army forces caused growing alarm, but the North China Army's commanding officer General Hisaichi Terauchi was not informed of the "Southern Strategy" which was intended to be kept as confidential as possible.

Du Yuming (one of the first graduates of the Whampoa Military Academy), was the Field Marshall of the Central Army Group. Although a capable comannder, he was appointed on the basis of his complete loyalty to Chiang. (1)

The Central Army Group:
The Central Army Group had two million men under arms by the start of 1941 and was reduced to one million by the end of 1 million. The Field Commander of the Central Army Group was Du Yuming, a Chiang loyalist and was appointed on the basis of his loyalty. This trait was important because the Central Army Group included the capital Nanking in it's area of command and so would have an important role in quashing any insurrection. The Central Army Group was tasked with preventing any naval invasions as well, but this was judged unlikely due to the strong defenses and the fact urban terrain of much of the province.



The Southern Army Group:
The Southern Army Group bore the brunt of troop reductions for Chiang's Northern Expedition. At the beginning of the year, the Southern Army Group had 4 million troops. But after three years of stalemate across Indochinese and Burmese border, it was clear that the anticipated Entente offensives would not occur and so 2 million men were transferred from the Southern Army Group. The death of Field Marshall Li Zongren in an allied bombing raid in April 1941 was used as a pretext to transfer Field Marshall Sun Li-Jen from his command at the Northern Army Group so that Chiang could assume direct control.

Part of the reason was political. Sun had been preparing for an offensive across the Northern Army Group and some say that Chiang felt threatened of what the young, ambitious Field Marshall could have accomplished. So, in order to nip the potential threat in the bud, Chiang had him transferred to a more quiet command and stripped of two million troops.

Field Marshall Sun Li-Jen was a resourceful and crafty commander. Popular with his troops and the wider public, he was viewed with distrust by President Chiang. (2)

Sun had a daunting task ahead of him. He two million troops with which to defend the coasts of Guanxi, Guandong and Fujian from a naval invasion and had to defend the Burmese and Indochinese border. However, Sun was not content to stay 'quiet' despite his limited resources. He ordered probing attacks conducted across the Indochinese and Burmese border to tease out the defences of the provinces.

What he found was promising. Although the rough Burmese terrain precluded serious offensive operations, French-held Indochina was quite weakly defended with just 200,000 troops holding a broad front An offensive operation against the thinly held French position could shorten the front that had to be defended. The ambitious general who could not sit still had a goal in mind. He would capture Hanoi by May 1942, which would allow him to consolidate the position and hold a stable line.

Field Marshall Ma Bufang commanded the Western Army Group. Besides being the Field Marshall of the Western Army Group, he commanded the world's largest cavalry army and had a pretty bitching beard. (3)

The Western Army Group:
Geographically the Western Army Group was probably the largest area command. Field Marshall Ma Bufang commanded a force of two million troops to defend a vast border. There was a substantial portion of his "Muslim Cavalry" which was siphoned off for the Third Northern Expedition. This left a force of 1 million to defend a wide border. However, this mostly cavalry force was well suited to conduct patrols and a fluid defense across a broad front and the poor logistics of the area was it's own protection. The Western Army Group also had about 100,000 Bureau troops stationed in border posts and across 'transition camps' which could be called on at a pinch.

The Strategic Reserve:
The remaining 4 million men consisted of a broad strategic reserve. Although officially 'uncommitted' and based around Nanking, a large portion of it would be earmarked to take advantage of any breakthrough in the Third Northern Expedition.

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Sources:

(1)http://ww2db.com/image.php?image_id=16228

(2) http://ww2db.com/image.php?image_id=19919

(3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma_Bufang#mediaviewer/File:Ma_Bufang.jpg

 

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The end of 1941 - a map/narrative interlude

The state of play in 1941. Important to note that the colours include the 'leaner' countries that have granted military access but have no formal alliance. On the axis side, this includes Turkey, Persia and Afghanistan (formally neutral countries.) On the Entente side this includes Thailand, Saudi Arabia and Portugal.


Hans Zimmerman

Hans was happy this Christmas. The Herman Goering division had been withdrawn from the Western Front and allowed some time off Christmas. They were due east to be sent to assist Germany's most reluctant of allies - the Polish in training their army for the realities of modern warfare. The Goering Division was an ideal division to conduct the training, it was a panzer division with a heavy motorized component and was experienced in combined arms operation. Most importantly, it was staffed mostly of professional or conservative men - not the racial fanatics of the SS. They could be trusted to work well with the Poles and not damage the fragile relations between the two powers.

He took a sip from the schnapps he was sipping in the warm Hamburg tavern. It was cold outside but the warmth from the drink and the fireplace made him warm and happy. He looked around the empty tavern for officers. A lot of the men had gone home to their families, but Hans was career military. His parents had died in an English bombing raid two years ago, but he went to Hamburg to pay his respects since then.

This new war was brutal and uncivilized, he reflected. Civilians died in their homes. Although the bombing raids had abated since the Southern Front had opened up and British bombers had gone south to wreck their terror elsewhere, it was still a pity. But the war in the Far East made the happenings in the West like the quarrels of small toddlers. Chinese cities were being smashed to rubble by British airpower. Dark rumours of massacres of Chinese civilians in Japanese occupied territory and much worse - live experimentation on humans of horrific new weapons. Hans wasn't born yesterday. He knew that some of it had to be propaganda, but though Goebells was prone to distortion and exagerration, he hadn't outright made things up.

The memory made him sad. So he drank some more and he drank and he drank and he drank. In the morning he would regret it, but for now everything was going to be all right. For him and the Fatherland. And he hoped, for the human race.


Lewis K. Rockefeller

Congressman Lewis Rockefeller was nervous. 1941 was rolling around and his party hadn't made any more progress than last time. An economic boom was in full swing. American rearnament was proceeding apace and as the world wrecked itself, American peace and prosperity was magnified even more with images of a world in conflict.

All this boded poorly for his party's chances in the mid-term elections in November in a year, not to mention farther down the track. The Democrats seemed to be invincible in both domestic and foreign policy. His own seat, previously safe was even looking a little bit wobbly.

And so, amidst an opulent Christmas spent with family and friends in the upper crust of New York society, Congressman Lewis continued to worry.

Benjamin Murmelstein

Murmelstein was sick.

It was sickness born of the soul, not of the body.

That in itself was miraculous, conditions at the Kashgar Transition Camp was less than ideal.

Masses of humanity were huddled in overcrowded, ramshackle wooden buildings. Even Murmelstein, as one of the Camp's Eldest had to share his room with 12 other people.

There was enough food for everyone, that in itself was a minor miracle. It was oddly flavoured, generic gruel filled with a type of meat he couldn't identify, but it was food.

The Chinese guards treated the prisoners with pity and some small measure of compassion too. But in comparison to the fanaticism and cruelty of the SS guards, even the practised uncaringness of the Soviet guards was warm.

It wasn't deliberate. But something had to be done. So Murmelstein carefully lifted his typewriter in place and began to type. Leading his people out to exile had not been an easy job. But he would not his people down now.

 

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1942: Unlikely bedfellows in Persia

The completion of the "Iron Line" across Turkey-Persia-Afghanistan- China in mid 1941 was the culmination of the worst fear of the Entente powers, China and her German ally being able to link hands from across the world and work together closely. It is unclear at this point however, how much the Entente saw the Iron Line as a legitimate threat or how much of it was hyped up as propaganda to justify cooperation with an ideological enemy (the Soviet Union) and a hostile military invasion of an officially neutral country.

Even prior to that, with the continued frosting of German-Soviet relations, unofficial talks had already begun. It was always Stalin's intention to sweep into the Second Great War after the forces of the Entente and Axis had fought themselves to mutual exhaustion, however, with the defeats of the Entente in 1941, the war looked to be tilting towards the favour of Axis. Stalin's response was twofold. The first was to step up the number of 'border incidents' around the Polish-Soviet Border, not with the intention of provoking full scale conflict, but to force Axis Germany to keep large contingents of troops near the border. The second was to pursue a policy of "Self-interested Co-Belligerence" with the Entente. The Soviet policy would not be to seek an alliance, but find areas of common ground and cooperation with the Entente powers. Secret talks were initiated between London and Moscow about the 'inconvenience' of having China and Germany united through a rail network (these talks tactfully ignored the fact that the Soviet Union did nothing to prevent these networks from being constructed in the first place when they had the opportunity.) The talks were successful and a joint military offensive "Operation Countenance" was agreed to. Operation Countenance was a military invasion of Persia with forces between the Entente and the Soviet Union where they agreed to stage an invasion of Persia with the primary objective of cutting off the Iron Line but with the secondary objectives of plundering Persia.

Persia had been drifting towards the Axis powers, with the Shah unilaterally nationalizing the oil fields in late 1941. A contingent of German and Chinese military advisors were already present and training the Persian military. German engineers and advisors were also at hand to support the recently renationalized oil fields. A secret guarantee had also been provided to King Reza Shah Pahlavi that Chinese and German forces would provide assistance in the event that Persia's territorial sovereignty was 'violated by any power.'

Iranian warship Babr destroyed at port. A common scene in the early days of Operation Countenance. (1)

The above was purely academic to the people of Persia on the 21st of March 1942 as bombs fell on palace district and all over Tehran and as Soviet and Entente troops fell upon Persia as Persians celebrated Nowruz (the Persian New Year.) King Reza was killed, along with many innocent Persians. The small Persian navy was also destroyed at harbour and the air force was gutted by surprise bombings. The Persian army fought bravely but was overwhelmed by the superior forces that the Entente had amassed from the South and that the Soviets had amassed from the North. Initial Persian resistance was hampered by difficulties in the chain of command with the King dead and the crown prince Mohammed Reza Pahvali taking time to recover from his injuries and resume the throne.

Soviet troops crossing the border on 21 March 1942. The Soviet use of trucks and other motorized transport was key to the success of the invasion.

The invasion was widely regarded as a surprise. There was no declaration of war and no expectation that the invasion, which was predicted to happen, would come so suddenly. The Persian military was only partially mobilized, with many reservists on holiday due Norwuz being a national day of celebration. Although Germany had begun forming the nuclei of a expeditionary force with the 2nd Mountain Division being transferred to the Turkish-Persian border, preparations were only about halfway complete with the division at half strength at the time of the invasion. China's Western Army Group had also been stripped of a lot of troops and was thinly stretched across a broad front and was only able to send a division of second-rate NRA troops to try and assist. The Axis troops were also hindered by awkward rules of engagement. They were only authorized to fight Entente troops and not Soviet troops and were thus deployed to the South to fight Entente troops. The 100 or so aircraft deployed in support of the Axis efforts were also not allowed to shoot down Soviet planes that were bombing or attacking the troops there. Stalin showed no such restraint, he knew he had the upper hand and that the Axis did not want to escalate a shooting match at this point.

The outcome of the conflict should not be a surprise. Despite fanatical Persian resistance which continued well into the occupation, organized military resistance ceased by the end of May with the remnants of the Persian Royal Army and Axis expeditionary forces dissolving into the countryside and mountains to continue guerrilla resistance - led by the Crown Prince Mohammad Pahlavi who had elected to stay in the country rather than attempt to flee into exile. By the end of the organized resistance, it is estimated that about 1000 of 5,000 strong 2nd Mountain Division that Germany had sent remained in the country, along with 2,000 NRA troops. These troops were trapped and continued fighting with the Persian Resistance and were led by Chiang Wei-kuo, who had been deployed with the 2nd Division. They, along with the prince and his resistance army prayed for salvation. It would take a long time for their prayers to be answered.

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Soviet_invasion_of_Iran#/media/File:Iranian_Warship_Babr.jpg
(2) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe..._troops_are_crossing_the_border_with_Iran.jpg

 

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1942: The Entente Strikes Back - A brief synposis of the Desert War

"Amateurs talk tactics. Armchair general study strategy but the victors study logistics."
- Military proverb

After the triumph of the Axis in the Balkan theatre, the Entente needed a victory to assure a jittery public at home that the war was not lost. They needed to pick a theatre where there was an isolated Axis position and
slowly but surely squeeze it until a victory was assured. The obvious target was Italian Libya, squeezed as it was between French Algeria and English Egypt.

The Entente put together a competent, well-equipped and highly motivated modern force in the joint invasion of Egypt. (1)

Smarting from the Greek defeat, the Entente conceived the imaginatively titled Operation Vengeance as a joint operation between French and English high command to take Libya. Troops which had been evacuated from Greece and even some Greek troops were to take part in the operation. Overall, the Entente had 400,000 troops poised to invade Egypt by early late March 1942. Many of these troops were battle-hardened, refreshed from 2 months of refitting and resting and thirsty for vengeance, particularly the 40,000 "Free Greek" troops that had successfully been evacuated from Greece and later, Crete.

Italian troops remaining in Libya were a mixture of native troops, blackshirt militias and other second and third-rate troops.

Against this, Libyan Governor Italo Balbo had a meagre 100,000 troops left, after having the bulk of his soldiers and equipment stripped to fight in the Balkan theatre. These soldiers were 2nd and 3rd rate troops that did a fine enough job of crushing any local insurgencies but would struggle against any modern army. Part of the reason he had not gotten reinforcements was politics, the paranoid Mussolini wanted to deny Balbo his share of glory - but part of it was genuine logistical difficulties. The Entente had redeployed a large part of their naval assets from the Chinese front to the Mediterranean, following the disaster at Taranto a year before. Although the capture of Malta and later Crete were useful to the Axis, it did not change the fact that the combined Franco-British navy was bigger by close to 2.5:1 to the Regio Marina.

"Balbo fought valiantly. Balbo fought nobly. Balbo fought honourably. And Balbo died."
- Italian propaganda broadcast after the fall of Tripoli

Balbo gave them Entente a tough fight. But with no reinforcements forthcoming, fighting against two fronts and with ill-equipped and demoralized troops - the struggle was ultimately futile. Balbo went down with his province, fighting house to house as Tripoli fell. By the May 22, the invasion of Libya was over and the "Balkan Tragedy" had been avenged at the cost of less than 20,000 casualties for the Entente. This success, combined with the victory in Persia and continued stagnation of the Western Front swung the momentum back towards the Entente.


(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_African_Campaign#/media/File:MatildaII.jpg

(2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Libya#/media/File:CamelSpahisinItalianLibya.jpg

 

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The Northern Offensive
"You must be as swift as a coursing river. With all the force of a great typhoon. With all the strenght of a raging fire. Most importantly, this offensive must be conducted as mysteriously as the darkside of the moon."
Chiang's exaltation to the Third Northern Expedition Army on the eve of battle.
After months of carefully stockpiling supplies and troops, the "Third Northern Expedition" commenced on January 26 1942 with 10 million men - the same day that the First Northern Expedition commenced nearly 20 years ago in 1926. It came as a complete surprise as it was in the middle of a cold winter with visibility very poor and many Manchurian and Japanese troops huddled in their bunkers. Elite NRA troops meant to spearhead the offensive were given special winter gear.

The Northern Offensive - also known as the "Winter Offensive" had massive success despite - or because of - operating in adverse weather conditions.

There was a key difference to this offensive too - rather than focusing on the capture of prestige targets such as Beiping - the objective was to seize staging grounds, 'flow around' enemy formations which were unable to move effectively during winter and then starve them out by cutting communications. Initially, there was staggering success from the offensive. Tianjin fell on Valentine's Day on February 14 1942 after a stunning 200km advance by the NRA through fierce, if disparate resistance. By the 1st of July, NRA forces had successfully advanced in a line between Tangshang and Chengdu with Beiping partially cut off from supply with a partial encirclement from the South. Although some resupply was possible through Japan's puppet Mengjiang, the infrastructure was not suited to supplying the combined nearly 2 million Japanese-Manchurian armies defending the enveloped city and it began to waste away or escape through Inner Mongolia. Although fierce fighting still took place when Chiang moved to take the city in mid-July it still fell by the 20th of July. At long last - Beiping was free again and phase one of the Northern Offensive was complete. The way to Harbin seemed to lie open with only 3 million Manchurian-Japanese combined troops in Manchuria left to fight an army of nearly 8 million battle hardened NRA troops. However, international events would overtake Chiang's carefully planning.

The Tehran Conference

The Tehran Conference marked a new era of cooperation between the forces of the Entente and the Soviet Union

Following the stunning success of the Northern Expedition and succesful Entente-Soviet cooperation on the "Persian Question," Stalin wanted an excuse to interfere in the war but wanted to secure as many concessions from the Entente as possible. His earlier plan was to sit the war out and unleash a wave of 'international solidarity' across the exhausted fighters, but the rapid collapse of the Manchurian defences convinced Stalin that he needed to interfere in the conflict earlier than expected. What followed was the "Tehran Conference" between the Soviet Union, Japan, France and Britain. The conference proceeded in very high security, with the recently occupied capital of Persia humiliatingly being forced to host a conference of major Entente leaders literally a few weeks after the surrender but the outcome was a successful one. The four powers agreed to the following:
1. A "China First" policy that would bring all four powers to bear against China before turning against Germany.
2. The repudiation of the Chinese-Soviet non-aggression pact and Soviet entry in the war against China in a few months time.
3. The end of any trade deals and military aid between the Soviet Union and China and Soviet Union and Germany.
4. An invasion of Southern China by the Entente powers by the end of the year

There were also some rumored "Secret agreements" concerning a division of spheres of influence post-war, but no concrete evidence has ever been found of these agreements even until today.

The stage was set for "Operation August Storm" which marked the first time the Soviet Union conducted military operations since it's inception. How would the Soviet Army fare against the battle-hardened NRA fighting on it's home turf?

OOC: Sorry for the long delay! It's my new year's resolution to finish this timeline before new year so time to get cracking!

 

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Operation August Storm

One of the many Soviet "Volunteers" for the Manchurian Empire being searched by a German "Advisor" to the NRA.
Pre-Operation moves
It is a testament to the Soviet Union's skill at "maskirovka" that August Storm was a complete surprise when it hit. This is attributable to the fact that in the July preceeding August Storm an increasing portion of "volunteer units" were making their way to Manchurian and fighting directly under the Manchurian Empire's flag. Initially, the Soviet Union went through the effort of looking for troops that 'looked Manchurian' but as NRA troops found themselves increasingly fighting fair-skinned and fair-haired 'Volunteers' it looked increasingly like the Soviet Union would be blatantly 'non-involved' but still transparently fighting to influence the outcome. These reports of 'volunteers' were also complemented by the reports of Premier (and foreign minister) Wang Jingwei who insisted that Stalin's first blow would strike in the West and that these 'volunteers' were just a way of trying to demarcate Soviet interest. The German, Polish, Hungarian and Romanian ambassadors in Nanking also confirmed large build-ups of troops near their borders. The Census Bureau's reports of increased flow of soviet logistics and troops concentration near the Manchurian border was explained away as 'volunteer' units about to join the Manchurian Empire. This massive intelligence error was, from a certain point of view actually true as the NRA would find itself fighting against a massively expanded "Manchurian Volunteer Army."

A Soviet map detailing the movements of the "Manchurian Volunteer Army."
The Storm Hits
Operation August Storm was launched in the dying days of August - August 30. The National Revoluntionary Army was exhausted, holding a broad front streching from the outskirts of Harbin to Shenyang. The Mongolian-Chinese border, where the largest offensives were made was only very thinly defended by reserve and depleted divisions that had been rotated out of the frontline. Even the 'front-line' troops that faced the 'actual' Manchurian-Japanese units were worn down. At the same time as the "Manchurian Volunteer Army" launched it's attack the Japanese and Manchurian troops began a broad offensive all along the line. The "Manchurian Volunteer Army" commanded by Marshall Zhukov was 2.5 million strong, mechanized and equipped with cutting edge Soviet technology - supported by 22,000 artillery pieces, 5,000 tanks and self-propelled guns and 6,000 aircraft. The "Northern Expedition Army" at this point had been reduced to an army of 7 million - supported by 30,000 artillery pieces, 6,000 tanks and self-propelled guns and 5,000 aircraft. The Manchurian-Japanese troops made up about 5 million troops with 20,000 artillery pices, 1,500 tanks and self-propelled guns and 3,000 aircraft. On paper there was a rough parity of forces but although Chinese troops were battle-heardened and fought fanatical last stands which managed to stave off enciriclement - they were an Interwar Army facing off against a modern one. The Soviet T-34 and KV-1 tanks with their thick, sloped armor badly outmatched the Tianjin type 40 tank. Even the more modern Tianjin Type 42 tank could barely make a dent. Nowhere would this be more illustrated than in the Battle of Beiping - the largest tank battle in history.

The Tianjin Type 42 Tank was based on the Carro-Armato P40. It was pretty innovative in 1940.

The Battle of Beiping: The largest tank battle in history
Although the front was collapsing all around the line, NRA troops were disciplined and were retreating in an orderly fashion. It was clear that they could not stabilize a defence line in Manchurian so Chiang ordered the troops to retreat and hold a line streching from Beiping to Tianjin. But the rapidly advancing 5th Tank Army was about to cut off and loop around Beiping and race towards the sea - this would cut off the line of retreat for the troops. Cobbling together a series of reserve tank divisions and units near Nanking - General Du Yumming was ordered by Chiang to 'blunt' the spearhead of the attack and make it possible to prepare a defence. Although General Du's armored forces outnumbered the Soviets by more than 4 to 1 (4,200 vs 980) he was barely able to 'blunt' the attack and took horrific losses in doing so. The Type 40 tank (which were modified Belgian T-13 tank destroyers) was badly outmached by the more modern T-34s and the Type 42 tank were barely any better. Neither tank could effectively frontally penetrate the KV-1 and KV-2 tanks. Although the 5th Tank army was stopped General Du's army would only have 600 operational tanks to match General Grigori Shtern after the battle.

A cutaway of the BF 109F variant which the FR VIa2 was based on. This plane would create many Chinese aces during the war - but particularly during the "Red Skies" period.
Red skies over North China
Even though the Chinese Armies were badly outmatched in the front, the same would not hold for the air-war. Even though Soviet/Japanese/Manchurian airforces outnumbered the National Revolutionary Air Force by nearly 2-1 there was mimial coordination between the two and in an ironic twist the "Manchurian Volunteer Air Force" often accidentally attacked Japanese and Manchurian Air forces and vice versa. Furthermore, the FR VIa2s (licensed and modified BF 109Fs) were more than a match for the LaGGs and Yaks that were being used by the Soviet Air Force. But fundamentally - unlike armored combat - skill counted for far more in the air where a stray bullet could end your plane. The result of this minimal coordination, badly-trained Soviet air force and a battle-hardered National Revolutionary Air Force that had been in constant combat for nearly 6 years was scores of Chinese aces and lots of Soviet dead. This period of time was called the "Red skies" period after the number of dead Soviet and Japanese aviators (the Red Air force used red and the Japanese Air and Navy Air forces all used a red roundel). The NRAF's valiant defence meant that in the Northern Front - China was able to maintain limited aerial superiority and hamper the Soviet/Manchurian/Japanese offensives.

Stabilization
Although August Storm was a strategic success - it was a limited one with the bulk of NRA forces being able to escape with 6 million still standing strong. By the end of October, Chinese forces had stabilized a defensive line running from Beiping to Tianjin and the "Manchurian Volunteer Army" was strangely reluctant to advance beyond this point. Chiang had accepted the transparent and obvious fiction of the "Manchurian Volunteer Army" largely to avoid conflict with the Soviet Union and avoid opening a number of fronts. However - a front would soon be opened by the Entente in the 'soft-underbelly' of China.

OOC: Thanks for all the comments and feedback everyone. I really appreciate it. Going to be an update soon over this weekend. I'm sorry to be going at such a fast pace - but I want to go over the material and keep a sense of momentum going.

 

[CCA]

The Soft-Underbelly: Operation Unthinkable
With the war grinding to a stall across all the theaters of war, an ambitious amphibious operation which had been planned for a while was given the green light. "Operation Unthinkable" was a massive coalition operation which favoured striking at the vulnerable southern coast of China where not only would the Chinese war effort be dealt a blow with the occupation of much of China's modern industry - but it would also embolden the pro-peace faction in the KMT. With much of the NRA's strength concentrated in the Manchurian front or deployed across the Soviet-Sino border, the blow was centered for the 10th of October 1942 or "Double Ten" day - a holiday which celebrated the outbreak of the Revolution. More than two million men - a large contingent of whom were Indian, Austalian and New Zealand Commonwealth troops along with French Colonial troops and Japanese troops had been carefully assembled for the effort.

Third and fourth-line NRA troops guarded the coast along with Civil Protection militias. Even though on paper numbering 5 million, they were scattered across a wide area and got the dregs of equipment and manpower.

The Darkest Hour
The attack achieved complete operational and tactical success. Southern China was barely defended with the vaunted "Southern Wall" just a mere fiction on the map. The poorly armed, poorly trained third and fourth-line troops and Civil Protection Militia defending the coast were swept away in a tide of naval bombardment, modern tanks and temporary air superiority. Progress was rapid after the landings near Fangcheng swept the initiatl resistance. Fangchenggang fell after only 3 days after the landing and Fangcheng after a week. By the end of October Qinzhou had fallen.

An Extraordinary Legislative Yuan Session
In the context of this, a fifth of the legislative Yuan sponsored a proposal to immediately ask for a ceasefire, withdraw from the alliance with Germany and seek a peace with the Entente. President Chiang immediately boarded a plan to fly from his command outpost in Xi'an to fly to Nanking to address the Yuan and lobby his closest allies.

The Xian Incident
But the plane never got there. Half an hour after takeoff the plane sent out a distress call and the wreckage was later found slammed into the mountain. An investigation would determine a navigation error in the navigation equipment of the plane.

Wang Jingwei assumes power
As Prime Minister, Wang had the legal authority to assume power. Presiding over a mourning Yuan on November 5, he declared a national day of mourning and transferred many of the powers of the Presidential Office to the office of the Prime Minister "until the crisis has passed." The earlier proposal to ask for a ceasefire and withdraw from the alliance with Germany passed. The Entente immediately accepted the ceasefire and negotiations began in earnest for a peace treaty with fighting stopping just outside of Naning. China was now out of the war.

 

[CCA]

The Consolidation and Aftermath

"The President Chiang Kai-Shek is dead! A treacherous clique of reactionary generals and bureaucrats has attempted to exploit the situation by attacking our embattled soldiers from the rear in order to seize power for themselves and continue the war which President Chiang was about to withdraw from. Therefore the new Government has declared martial law to maintain law and order!"
- Prime Minister Wang Jingwei's first address to the nation.

In the aftermath of the Xian Incident, Prime Minister Wang consolidated power and moved to open peace negotiations. The Bureau of Information and Statistics was placed under the supervision of the National Office of Civil Protection and chief Dai Li was ordered to be taken in for 'questioning.' Like any self-respecting head of a secret police, Dai Li did the sensible thing and disappeared himself before he could be made to disappear. Efforts to track him down proved elusive and it is believed that he was hiding somewhere in Tibet in one of the numerous 'black sites' that the BIS or alternatively he had fled to Germany.

But in the drama of the Xian Incident, the Republic of Manchuria declared itself as the "People's Republic of Manchuria" under Soviet tutelage. The whily Zhang had apparently decided that the Soviets would make for kinder masters than the Japanese. Officially allied with each other - or at the very least - 'co-belligerents' - Tokyo could do nothing. While the Soviet Union kept a million strong 'volunteers' in Manchuria - it rapidly began to withdraw troops and into the Polish-Soviet border where the final reckoning was near. The revolution was coming.

Secret Negotiations begin
Recently declassified archives reveal that during this time Prime Minister Wang had opened secret negotiations with the Soviet Union. In return for Soviet support for the Chinese position in the Entente peace talks, China would not interfere with the Soviet invasion of Europe. The status of the new Manchurian People's Republic was also under negotiation with a request from Wang to have Manchuria placed under the 'de jure' authority of the Republic of China but under the de facto authority of the Soviet Union with numerous concessions. These secret negotiations dragged on the official peace talks being held in Bangkok.

The Japanese lash out.
Frustrated by Soviet betrayal and the slow pace of the talks and a fear that she would be shut out by the Entente powers, Japanese troops continued their advance, launching an offensive on the 15th of December which would take Nanning by the 20th of December. While the Entente officially condemned the action, there was tacit approval for the action in order to force the hand of the new government to speed up the peace talks. Commonwealth, British and French troops followed the Japanese to Nanning where they divided the city under different occupation zones as they had in previously seized cities.

An uprising precipitated Japanese reprisals and mass-executions like this one which spread and grew out of control.

The Rape of Nanning
At first the occupation was calm, but zealous civil protection units and civilion patriots continued a guerilla resistance in the city, launching an uprising on the 23rd which pushed the Entente out of some sectors of the city. Although quickly retaken in the next two days, Japanese reinforcements entering the city would engage in a brutal 'suppression campaign' which would culminate in what is now referred to as the "Rape of Nanning." Frustrated Japanese troops engaged in brutal attrocities across the city, burning down suspected resistance spots en masse, bayonetting civilians and looting. The shocked Entente troops were powerless to stop the massacres and the world was shocked as American correspondents recorded Japanese troops spreading out to the Entente occupation zones where civilians had fled and dragging civilians out who had escaped. Although there were notable moments of resistance, particularly with the sectors held by the Indian troops and the famous "Stand of the Maori Battalion" - Entente complicity in Japanese atrocities featured strongly in Axis propaganda.

China Re-Enters the War
The Rape of Nanning forced President Wang's hand. The Yuan demanded immediate action and the ceasefire agreements broke down immediately as the blood-lusted NRA demanded and launched several local 'revenge offensives.' The Soviet coup in Manchuria had also freed up the Northern front and troops and materiel immediately began to stream down South. By January 15 1943, China was definitely back at War with the Entente, but the question was whether she would re-enter the war to support her German ally when the long-awaited Soviet Invasion arrived, they wouldn't have to wait long to find out...

 

[CCA]

A narrative interlude set in the Zagros Mountains of Persia

14 March
Chiang Wei-kuo was a man without a home. He couldn't go back to China because of a lingering fear that perhaps his father's death was not as accidental as it could've been. Coded communications from his mother had all but warned him to stay away. He couldn't go back to Germany either where his wife Geli was waiting for him with their son Adolf. The recent invasion of Eastern Europe by the Soviet Union had forced Germany to keep whatever precious resources she had at home so there was no prospect of an airship to take him away. And so he sat - or rather crawled and squatted underneath the narrow bunkers and tunnels that harbored what remained of the Persian resistance and the Sino-German elements that had come to advice them. But the situation was bleak. He looked over the tables in front of him: stores of ammunition, food and medicine were all running low and there was no prospect of resupply either.

"Boss, we've got an incoming transmission."

One of his men broke his reverie.

"I'll come on over."

He climbed up the rope ladder to the top of the caves where the radio could pick up and send transmissions.

"This is RAS Hindenburg, requesting permission to land. We have supplies and some special visitors over."

"Is this a mistake? Christmas was about three months ago over."

"Not a mistake. This is a special supply run over."

"All right all right. You can set down over.

"We're sending over coordinates for a hidden slope where you can set down comfortably. We'll meet you there in a couple of hours."

The trek to the slope took some time but Chiang was curious to know who the visitors were. He wouldn't normally come along to a supply run, but since there hadn't been one since Christmas and there were special visitors - that piqued his interest.

When he got there he nearly fainted.

"Li? Skorzeny? What do I owe the pleasure of having the two most dangerous bastards in the world pay us a personal visit."

Li flashed him a rare smile, Chiang shuddered internally.

"We have reliable intelligence that your father is alive and well and being held captive near the Mongolian border. We have two companies of the best goddamn special forces that the Reich -"

"And the Bureau - "

" - has to offer."

"You must be bored here. Are you in?"

Chiang thought very carefully and then gave his answer.

Could you really say no to a face like this?

 

[CCA]

I've just realized that I've been working on this TL for almost 10 years so I definitely need to finish it before it gets to that point.

1 May 1943

After receiving reliable intelligence that Chiang was being held in a hilly outpost near the Mongolian Border at the Altay Prefecture, the joint BIS-German task force planned an attack. They decided to do it on May 1 where the Mongolian troops near the border would be on lower alert and drunk. Their intelligence indicated that Chiang was being guarded by 50 Chinese troops with a squadron of Mongolian cavalry on special alert in Mongolia along with an unknown detachment of NKVD motorized troops.

Against them they had two companies of elite troops. Around 80 specially trained Fallschirmjäger troops and 20 SS troops made up the German presence and 100 Bureau troops made up the Chinese presence. The small outpost was constantly on high alert and had 3 light AA guns and 6 machine guns providing overarching archs of fire. With it's back to the mountain, the outpost made a formidable defensive station.

Their plan of attack was for the German troops and half of the Chinese troops to stage a diversionary attack on the front of the outpost and for a smaller contingent of 20 commandos led by Col Weikuo to execute a glider attack from the mountain right into the outpost roof where they would set off charges in the roof and then go through and rescue Kaishek who was believed to be held inside. Once the building was secure and the AA guns were neutralized an airship would arrive and extract the soldiers and Kaishek.

At 2230 hours the attack began. With the garrison distracted by Skorzeny's diversionary attack, Col Weikuo's attack went off without a hitch and they broke into the roof, right into the surprised commandant's office. The commandant - Col Yi was actually part of Col Weikuo's graduating class and after being informed of who the masked prisoner they were guarding was, he commanded the troops to stand down.

But their troubles were not over. The NKVD motorized battalion had arrived with the Mongolian cavalry squadron and the Sino-German forces only numbered 200 and had to hold off 1,200 Mongolian-Soviet troops (with 5 T-34 tanks) until the airship arrived.

A fierce battle ensued and almost all of the German-Sino soldiers were slaughtered to a man. Only 30 managed to evacuate with Skorzeny and Colonel Yi dying and Colonel Weikuo being severely wounded. After the airship rendevouzed with Dai Li's men Kaishek emerged a broken man who only had one thought in mind: revenge.

 

[CCA]

The Battle of Budapest (1943) - Germany was desperate for China to open a second front due to the magnitude of Soviet advance into Eastern Europe.


4 May 1943 - The May 4th Compromise

While Chiang badly wanted revenge, cooler heads prevailed. After their daring escape from the Altay outpost they liaise with T.V Soong who agreed to broker a meeting with Wang Jingwei. Although the NRA had successfully pushed the Entente forces further South after months of bloody, attritional grinding warfare and an unending guerilla war - there was still a pocket of troops holding on and nobody wanted to start a two front war until Southern China was fully secured.

The May 4th Compromise was a gentleman's agreement that nobody really has a full, objective account of as the only three men that were there all subtly distorted the truth in subsequent years. But the broad consensus of historical opinion is that:

• The three men agreed to restore the pre-kidnapping status quo with Chiang as President, Wang as Premier and Soong as Prime Minister.
  
  
• All Civil Protection units would be placed under Dai Li’s command and oversight.
  
  
• It was agreed to temporarily accept Stalin’s explanation that Chiang’s kidnapping was arranged by a rogue NKVD elements in cooperation with Mongolia and to announce an investigation.
  
  
• The investigation would take as long as it took to crush the Entente resistance and then conclude that the Soviet authorities were actually responsible and then declare war on the Soviet Union.
  
  
• Simultaneous to this, Wang would continue leaking information to the Soviets that China was building up forces around the Sino-Soviet border and in the Sino-Manchurian border.
  
  
• China would actually build up forces around the Sino-Soviet border - but only combat-worthless militia troops and civil protection units. In combination with Wang’s ‘leaks’ to the Soviet Union - this would force the Soviets to transfer troops from the Polish front.
  
  
• Focus on crushing the remaining Entente resistance in the Leizhou Peninsula.
  

Why did they agree?
Chiang agreed because the alternative was civil war. While Chiang felt that he could win with popular support and the support of the regular army foundations, China would be weakened.

Wang agreed for a variety of complex reasons. He thought that Chiang, while his popularity had diminished could still post a formidable threat and he did not want to see China weakened.

Soong agreed because he brokered the deal and wanted to avoid a civil war. Although he was on good terms with both men, he just wanted to see an end to division.


Reactions to the May 4th Compromise:
Domestic reaction was of surprise, shock and then happiness. The news that Chiang was alive gave confidence to the army and the compromise agreement assured the population that he would not start a two front war unnecessarily.

German reaction was one of initial relief turning into a feeling of despair and betrayal. The news that Wang had been in a leading role provoked confusion and discortation. The German’s Eastern front was a string of disasters. The polish government had been reduced (ironically) to a tiny strip of the Polish corridor. East Prussia was overrun. Soviet troops were fighting in Bucharest and Budapest. Half of Slovakia was overrun. Fighting a two-front war of her own, Germany *needed* her Chinese ally to start a second front. Hitler believed that Chiang’s coup had only partially suceeded and covertly sent offers to German assistance to fully purge his cabinet. Chiang’s cryptic response back only deepened the confusion but was somewhat reassuring in that he guaranteed Chinese assistance “soon.”

Franco-British reaction was one of confusion and dread. They believed that the Soviets had abducted Chiang, but had now colluded with him after Stalin had gained maximum advantage and seized Manchuria and Persia.

For Japan it was one of concern and anger. They had lost almost all of the territory they had gained and their Manchurian concessions to the Soviets. Now they had evidence of Soviet duplicity and feared betrayal from her allies.

The new US President Henry Wallace didn’t know what to think. He liked Wang and the Chinese orders for weaponry and equipment to replace the industrial output from the wrecked Southern provinces was good for business, but outcry from the daily barrage of attrocities across the world - on all sides was getting to his and the American people’s conscience.

Soviet reaction was one of relief and paranoia. They were pleased that Wang still had a prominent role to play and that the Chinese still seemed to be accepting the Soviet line (for now) but were paranoid about Chinese deception, which was magnified by Wang’s leaks. Stalin’s decision would change the course of European and world history forever.

 

[CCA]

The Fifth Battle of the Leizhou Peninsula

The new tanks in action - American made, Chinese-bought M4 Shermans.
“
I fought against German tankers in Belgium.

Italian tankers in Libya.

Soviet tankers in Korea.

The Chinese tankers were the bravest of them all.

They drove around in these little tin cans with riveted armor - in 1943. They were slow. Their guns couldn’t penetrate ours frontally unless they got lucky and couldn’t penetrate our side armor. They were basically glorified upgrades of the same tanks that the Italians were driving in 1940 - and they were already obsolete by them. We knew it, The Italians knew it and they fought like they knew it too.


But the Chinese fought like they had the armor of KVs, attempted maneuvers like they were T-34s and shot at us like they had the guns of Tigers. Even though they were totally outmatched - still they kept coming and coming and coming in their ‘coffins.’


That’s what we called them - and that’s what the captured tank crews said they called em too so I have no idea why they kept agreeing to fight in them.

It made us sloppy. When one Churchill could take on 20 coffins, there wasn’t really any need for tactics.

In fact - scattering our tanks made sense - because the main threat was from the air.

So when they finally showed up at the Yank tanks they’d purchased, they swept us aside.

Their guns could penetrate us from all sides, they were more mobile and their armor could occasionally bounce a shell if they got lucky. There was no ‘one hit kill’ anymore like with the coffins where even a spent shell hitting it could cause the riveting to fly loose and bounce around the tank with deadly force.

So fell backwards and kept falling backwards. We’d hold for a position for a day or two but then get pushed back by either the yank tanks or their damn air force. Our air force seem to have disappeared during this time and naval support was patchy too.

Eventually we couldn’t keep retreating and we got back on the same boats we’d come in. At this point morale was so low, we’d been fighting continously for three weeks with little snatches here and there. Only the nips were actually still capable of fighting the rearguard action which they fought along with some of the curries that stayed in the back lines. Of course - that’s because the gooks and nips didn’t take prisoners of each other - but what can you expect? Brave bastards the lot of them, but savage. We should never have gotten involved in this damn war. This was no white man’s war.”

• Lt. Bryce Edwards, 2nd Armored Regiment on “Voices of War.”

The analysis above, while useful in portraying the front-line perspective of the fighting men is inadequate to assess the scope of the battle. In particular, why the Naitonal Revolutionary Army which had proved itself incapable of shifting the Entente troops from the Leizhou Peninsula over the course of four previous battles suddenly seemed to perform so well.

The main answer is of course - logistics. One of the main reforms that Wang Jingwei instituted in his premiership was purchasing arms, supplies and weapons from America. Although on paper, Chinese arms production had somehow kept pace in production despite the loss of just under half of China’s industrial capacity - this concealed a grim reality that was revealed in the Xiaoping Report.

The report revealed that in order to keep pace with the insane demands to somehow produce at the same level while losing a big chunk of China’s industrial heartland, everyone was engaging in watering down. So for example - in a Tianjin-41 tank the steel that the tank was made out of would be made from watered down steel with watered down iron and half the coal needed. The shells would be packed with explosives mixed with sawdust and other things to thicken it out. With war material and ammunition made so unreliable because of a climate of fear, patriotism and group think - the combat performance of Chinese units had dropped. Rather than suppressing the report or ignoring the problem - as Chiang was wont to do, Wang addressed the issue head on by contracting war supply production to the US and stopping all offensives.

By the time that the 5th Battle of the Leizhou Peninsula or the Leizhou offensive was launched, the supply issues had mostly been resolved (at great cost and debt - as the Chinese would find out in the post-war years.) Yes - the new tanks did help - but what helped more was artillery that would actually fire explosives that would go off. Rifles that could fire without coming unstuck or exploding.

So the result was (predictably) a victory for the Chinese army, despite fierce Entente resistance. The victory would have massive repercussions, not only in the strategic picture of the war with all of Mainland china liberated from foreign rule (except Hainan and Manchuria) but from the revalation that Japanese and Indian troops had been left to do the rearguard fighting while the British and ANZAC troops were evacuated first (post war histories show that an attempt to detail the 28th Maori battalion for rearguard duties led to a mutiny of the entire 1st NZ Division - including by the divisional general Freyberg.)

 

[CCA]

1943 - July to December - the European Front

West Europe:
The “Chinese Disaster” or “Churchill’s Folly” as the broadsheets proclaim fatally weakens Churchill. A repeated string of would-be Prime Ministers successively fail to gain the confidence of the house: Eden, Halifax, Wood, Beaverbrook and desperately - Attlee. The King is forced to dissolve parliament and call for a new election on July 30.

The election results saw a polarized electorate with a collapsing center and increase in radicalism. The two parties which had gained the most: The British Union of Fascists and the British Workers Party had consistently opposed the war from the onset. Mosley’s British Union of Fascists because Mosley was an admirer of the German, Italian and Chinese systems and the British Worker’s Party because they were taking directions from Trotsky in Mexico City and genuinely saw the war as an Imperialist one and the Soviet Union as a deformed workers state that was now just imperialist power.

During the confusion, the British-army naturally ceased offensive operations. After reclaiming much of Belgium and a portion of the Netherlands, she sat with her French allies in an uneasy cold war against the Germans who stared at them from across the West Wall.

After months of indecision and paralysis the troops received news on Christmas Day - Lord Anthony Eden had successfully formed a government and they would continue the war.

Soviet troops counter-attacking Axis troops in the Operation Summer Awakening. Marshall Tukhachevsky's counter-attacks and skillful fighting retreat saved the bulk of the Soviet Hungarian Army Front
East Europe:
The combination of temporary reprieve Germany received on her Western Front as well as the withdrawal of several Soviet Armies to the Sino-Soviet and Sino-Manchurian borders allowed Germany to salvage the strategic situation. Armies transferred from the west allowed Operation Summer Awakening to begin in earnest on July 15. This was a massive operation with two combined Axis armies of Italian, Hungarian, Romanian, Slovakian, Yugoslavian and Polish troops spearheaded by German armor. There were two army groups - Army Group Center (Rundstedt) driving east from Ostrava would be tasked with capturing Katowice, Krakow and Rzezow before turning south to Kosice. The other driving north - Army Group South (Manstein) from Timasora would be tasked with capturing Arad, Oradea and Satu Mare before swinging north to Kosice and then linking hands with the Army Group Center. The combined total of the two fronts were around 3 million men.

While some Soviet troops had been transferred further East, there was still a large number of battle-hardened and effective troops led by Marshal Mikail Tukhachevsky ready to oppose with around 2.5 million men. However, Axis air superiority was enabled by the relative quiet on the western front and there was a lack of Soviet intelligence about Axis plans - forcing the soviets to disperse the troops across the front. Furthermore, a large portion of Soviet troops were also busy continuing the siege of budapest so many of his best troops were being ground up in the conflict. Furthermore, his disfavour by Stalin also meant that many of the best reinforcements and supplies were being directed north to Marshall Zhukov.

Nonetheless, Tukhachevsky fought skillfully - he successfully saw the trap that the Germans were attempting to lay before him and launched several counter-offensives to delay the Germans and began retreating his troops from Hungary. He defied Stalin’s orders to defend and conducted an exemplary fighting retreat from Hungary. Although he suffered 500,000 casualties compared to the 200,000 Axis troops - the bulk of his army front had escaped intact.

After being hauled to the capital along with Marshall Zhukov (Polish Army Front) and Marshall Budonny (Romanian Army Front) - he endured a telling off and a denunciation by Stalin. To Stalin and his surprise - Marshall Zhukov and then Marshall Budonny stuck up for him. While the three men were rivals - they had all experienced the fear and terror of the purges and did not want political considerations to override common sense. Zhukov said he would have done the same thing and asked Budonny if he would’ve done any different. Choosing his words more carefully than Zhukov had, commander Budonny said that Stalin was always right, but that he did not see if he would’ve made a different decision than Zhukov.

Fuming with rage, Stalin had ordered them all out. Finally the three men got their orders - the Hungarian Front would be dissolved and split up between Zhukov and Budonny and the Polish Front and the Romanian Front. Marshall Tukhachevsky would be demoted for insubordination and sent to command command the Soviet and Mongolian troops in the Sino-Mongolian border.

Up next: 1943 The Asian Fronts

 

[CCA]

1943 The Asian Fronts
After the crushing of the Leizhou peninsula, China conveniently finished the investigation on July 4. In the report, China blamed Chiang’s kidnapping squarely on Stalin and the Soviet Union - rejecting the Soviet assertion that it was a rogue NKVD operation with Mongolian complicity. They made a list of extremely insulting demands which were calculated to be rejected including: the handing over to China for trial of Stalin, Beria and key soviet leaders, reparations to the tune of $1 trillion USD, Soviet acceptance of Chinese suzerainty over Manchuria and the end of the independence of the so-called “People’s Republic of Manchuria,” Soviet acceptance over Chinese suzerainty over Mongolia, Soviet evacuation from the Empire of Persia and the restoration of the dynasty. The Soviet Union had 10 days to comply with the Chinese demands in full or face a declaration of War.

Chinese NRA troops crouching behind a knocked out M4 Sherman
Manchuria:
The Soviet reply came in a massive offensive against the Chinese lines which stretched from Beijing to Tianjin on July 10. Over 3 million Soviet and Manchurian troops commanded by Marshal Timoshenko hurled themselves against 4 million NRA troops commanded by Masrhal Du Yumming (promoted as commander of the Northern Expedition Army after his exemplary performance in the Battle of Beiping in 1942) in a gargantuan battle. While the Soviets were expecting a cake-walk, they found anything but that. Even though of the 4 million, only 2 were regular troops and 2 million were Civil Protection units of unsteady quality - the Chinese had dug in behind ample fortifications, had aerial superiority and were equipped with new, reliable weaponry. The Chinese assault armored cavalry divisions in the Northern sector were veterans equipped with new M4 Shermans that had proven their worth in the battles across the Leizhou Peninsula. Some Chinese infantry and Civil Protection units had the new Panzerfaust and Panzershreck anti-tank infantry weapons which were dangerous to the T-34s at all sides. By late September, Soviet forces had exhausted themselves against the Chinese lines and the front descended into a weary stalemate as the fall rains began.

Mongolia:
General Tukachevsky had his work cut out for him as the demoralized Soviet and Mongolian armies in the Sino-Mongolian border had been subjected to a round of purges for their failure in preventing the rescue of Chiang. Furthermore, the front had been stripped of much equipment, good troops and weaponry as these got absord to either Manchuria or Europe. Nonetheless, Tukachevesky began an intensive program of raids and probing attacks with the forces he had - stressing the also mostly poorly equipped Chinese forces at the border which were mostly Civil Protection Units, low quality NRA troops or NRA troops that had been recycled out of the active front-lines for garrison duty.

Indochina:
Chinese forces remained content to stare at the French and Japanese troops across the Sino-Indochinese border, mounting occasional raids and using the porous border to send supplies across the Guerilla resistance.

Burma-Indian Front:
The original plan for Burma was for the 1st Indian National Army, a force of 150,000 men consisting of exiles, rebels, formers prisoners of War and other various Indians to make an aggressive probe to gather reconissance and then withdraw. In this, they would be supported by General Sun Li Jen’s army of around 500,000 troops. The closer that Bose got to India, the more that British India seemed to erupt in revolution with strikes, civil disobedience and outright mutinies threatening British control over India. With Britain distracted with the of the election and having to put together a government - there seemed to be no coherent response. However, Bose’s army attractive massive support with many British Indian Army formations defecting en masse with the few Commonwealth troops either being quickly surrounded and overcome by a hostile population and outright withdrawing. By December Bose’s army had advanced as far as Kharagpur in West Bengal, liberating Burma, Benga and Sikkim and proclaiming the Republic of India in Calcutta on 15 December 1943. However, despite the optimism of Bose's new India, the Republic inherited a massive humanitarian disaster with a massive famine that had killed more than 4 million in Bengal. The causes of the Bengal Famine are well debated at this point - British incompetence, Chinese bombing, guerrilla sabotage of supply lines, Capitalism, war profiteering etc etc - as is the exact death toll with British historians estimating 1 million and Chinese/German historians exagerrating the death toll up to 10 million - but whatever the cause - China now had to deal with feeding a massive, starving population - when she had very little surplus food. Of course predictably - Axis propaganda made massive mileage of this discovery. Goebells sent Leni Reifenstahl and a film crew and the sight of pathetic, starving families filled the film screens of the Axis territories and neutral countries.

Images liked this was prevalently used by Axis propaganda as a symbol of Entente misrule and oppression.

Into this void stepped in Madame Chiang Kai-shek. Leveraging her friendship with former first Lady Eleanor Roosevelt who was still influential despite her husband’s passing earlier in 1943, the China lobby in the US organized massive food drives and relief. Of course, it goes without saying that the Chinese government embezzled between 1/3rd - 2/3rds of the food and supplies donated - but the combination of some aid going through and some independently supervised aid relief by the International Red Cross alleviated the worst of the famine.

With British rule disintegrating, Stalin sent armies across the Persian-Iranian border, ostensibly to assist her British ally - but covertly began drawing the more leftist members of the Indian National Congress and various politicians across the territories she was 'providing garrison duties.' The only place where British rule still held some sway was in the South where the princes of India had their own private armies and held fast to the nominal British rule.


Central Asia:
Central Asia was the unexpected thrust of the Ma Bufeng’s reformed cavalry armies. Equipped with the new M4 Shermans - these elite troops - a combination of cavalry, tanks and some crack mountain troops drove into the Kyrgstan and Tajikstan SSRs - managing to go all the way through to Dushanbe and Tashkent by the end of the year despite heavy Soviet resistance from the limited garrisons there.

 

[CCA]

1944 - January - June - the European Front


Western Europe:

The Western European front collapsed into stagnation. French troops - filled with Communist (Trotskyite) and Fascist agitation outright refused to follow orders to attack in large-scale offensives. Now that France and Belgium had been liberated - they had no intention to die in what they saw as a futile war. British troops were increasingly diverted to the continuously disintegrating Indian front, hanging onto a tenuous front in the Southern. Nonetheless, Franco-British deployments (3 million) were substantial enough and enough raids were being conducted across the border to force Germany to divert a substantial portion of her manpower (2 million) to the front.

The Polish Armia Krajowa fought a ferocious guerilla resistance against the Soviets - transcending lines of class, party, age and gender.
Polish Front:
As punishment for speaking up for Marshal Tukhachevsky, Zhukov’s Polish Army Front inherited the most beat up and obsolete formations of the former Hungarian Army Front (around 500k men.) Combined with his current Red Army troops (2.3 million) and the newly created Polish Socialist Republic’s army (200k) - he had around 3 million men. Opposing him were Marshal Guderian’s Army Group North (3 million) and Marshal Rundstedt’s Army Group Center (1.5 million) and the Polish Army (500k) that was mostly in Army Group North defending the remnants of the Polish Republic stationed in Gdinya although there were were some smaller forces (100k) of militia and regular army troops that had been raised in the newly liberated Polish territory around Krakow.


Adding to Zhukov’s headache was the massive guerilla resistance - Wehrwolves in Soviet-occupied East Prussia and the Armia Krajowa in Soviet-occupied Poland who interfered with his supply lines - blowing up railways, setting mines and generally causing havoc behind the scenes. Germany had strategic air superiority over the whole front and so continued to air drop supplies to the resistance with the Panzerfausts causing particular trouble.


Nonetheless, Zhukov had to try and advance the front and retake the polish territory to the South - crush the remaining Gdinya front and then advance to Berlin.


This was a pipe dream. Zhukov would have his hands full fighting off the two army groups. Despite Zhukov’s valiant efforts - the Axis troops had pushed the front east - advancing to Elbing in the North, Lodz in the center and Rzesow to the South. But Zhukov had extracted a high toll of blood from the Fascists with nearly 1 million casualties to only 500k of his own.


The Romanian Front:

Marshal Budyonny received the bulk of the Hungarian Army Front (1.5 million troops) which he added to his existing 4.5 million troops. His 6 million man army was given the objective of cutting off Germany’s oil supply by eliminating Romanian resistance and taking the Ploetsi oil fields. This would be no easy task - opposing him was Field Marshall Kesselring - a commander who had proven his worth in defensive battles across the low countries, Poland and now - Romania. Although Army Group South only had 3 million troops - Kesselring identified the Soviet likely area of attack. He knew that they’d try and take Ploetsi and that holding it was key to keeping Germany’s spluttering war economy limping along. Without Romanian oil - German tanks, planes and economy would come to a grinding halt. Thus - Ploetsi had to be held - at all costs.


So from January-June Budyonny would hurl himself against Romania. The Axis defensive position was mostly anchored around the Carpathia-Ploetsi line which was impenetrable, but all of Romania south of this line was overrun. Bulgaria found itself in an awkward position of being a member of the Axis but not at war with the Soviet Union and having to resist pressure on both sides. Her decision would shape the future of the Balkans - and the subsequent Cold War forever.

 

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1944 - Jan-June - Asian Front:

The Central Asian Front:
Ma Bufeng continues his advance across Soviet held Central Asia at a lightning pace. Rather than pivoting north towards Kazahkstan as Marshal Kulik expected (and where he concentrated the bulk of his forces), he struck south with speed, liberating Samarkand by end of January, then Bukhara, then Turkmenabat and then Ashgabat by the end of February. Marshal Bufeng crossed the border into Soviet-occupied Persia on March 21 - being met with guerilla troops led by crown prince Pahvlavi in a highly symbolic meeting on Persian new year’s day.

German-Chinese troops storming the Royal Palace.
The Afghani-Pakistan Front:
Afghanistan although neutral, was sympathetic -even aligned to the Axis camp, particularly finding in China an inspirational model on how to develop a country independent of the imperialist powers. The ruler Mohammed Zahir Shah had developed a relatively close relationship with Chiang, which facilitated the construction of the “Blood and Iron line.” However, when Persia was invaded by the Soviets and the Entente, Afghanistan was isolated and Stalin demanded the presence of Soviet advisors and transit rights. As the war looked increasingly uncertain for the Axis powers in 1941, Zahir had - understandably put his country first and agreed.

But now the tides of war had turned again, and Soviet presence had been increasingly resented. It started out with advisors and transit rights but had expanded into legalizing the communist party and then the presence of communists in his cabinet and then later policy. Zahir found this situation intolerable and managed to secretly communicate with the BIS about taking action.

With the advance of Ma Bufeng’s troops across Central Asia, Afghanistan was now shielded from the Soviet Union and now was the time for action. However, Soviet troops and guards were posted all over Kabul and the Royal Palace as an insurance policy. The Royal family were hostages in their own palace, like the Afghani people were hostages in their own nation.

Fortunately the Axis had experts in rescue operations - men with a particular set of skills. Men like Otto Skorzeny. Having taken a year to recover from his injuries, he’d come back with a new nickname “Steelfinger” after the new prosthetics that were required to replace some of his shattered and missing pieces of his body after the Chiang rescue operation.

He put together a team which included surviving operatives from the last mission. Working together with Dai Li and royalist members of the Afghan army, he planned Operation Panzerfaust.

The execution, involving 50 operatives, successfully wrested control of the Afghan palace and the rescue of the royal family - unfortunately the Crown Prince Mohammad Akbar Khan was (allegedly) killed by NKVD operatives during the escape.

The outraged Zahir went further than the Axis had asked for and actually entered the war to fight against the Soviets. While Chiang had just wanted the expulsion of Soviet troops and restoration of military access, Afghanistan had opened a new front - invading nominally British Pakistan, but in reality under the rule of the Soviet-installed and backed People’s Republic of India. Despite the poor weaponry of the Afghani troops, they were able to advance in the thinly held frontline and had liberated the Pashtun areas of Pakistan by the end of June.

Meanwhile, the opening of a new conduit to persia immensely helped Ma Bufeng in the Persian front. By the end of June, Persian guerillas and Bufeng’s troops held a front that streched from Sari to the North, Yazd to the Center and Bandar Abbas to the South and were in control of much of the countryside.

The Indian Front:
Largely for logistical, as well as narrative reasons, the Indian front bogged down into a stalemate. With India going through a massive famine due to the disruption in the supply systems and the arrival of foreign troops, much of the attention of the powers were focussed on consolidating their territories and feeding their troops and the people. In the Northwest, Soviet troops were working with the moderate left and Islamic socialists not drawn to Bose’s banner to proclaim the People’s Republic of India. In Bengal and the Northeast, Bose consolidated his power base. In the South, Mir Osman Ali Khan had mobilized the princes of the South to oppose the “creeping bolshevization of India” and was declared as the Governor General of the newly created Federation of India by the Council of Princes.

Although each side believed that victory was only around the corner, little did they suspect that the split of the Indian subcontinent that they inadvertently presided over would remain a permanent feature of the subcontinent with it’s legacy persisting even today.

The Viet Minh's involvement in the Indochinese offensive meant that half of Vietnam was liberated before June.
The Indochinese Front:
The sleepy Indochinese front was shaken awake by the newly promoted Marshal Xue Yue’s appointment to command the Indochinese Front. Inspired by Sun Lijen’s success in Burma he worked closely with the Viet Minh to launch an offensive on March 13. Although the chair of the pan-Vietnamese organization had formerly followed the Moscow Line, Ho Chi Minh now proclaimed himself as a member of the 4th Internationale and now followed the “Mexico Line.” Although undoubtedly China was a power with ‘fascisistic tendencies’ - she was to be regarded as an ally and a revolutionary power that would bring the first stage of the world revolution by smashing colonialism in Asia.

Although the Chinese authorities welcomed the sudden cooperation of Ho’s Viet Minh - they had studiously avoided being courted during the last Chinese offensive, probably on orders of Moscow. But now that it looked like the post-war reality would have China as a regional hegemony, Ho left Moscow’s phone on the hook and finally picked up Nanking’s.

Ho’s involvement was the fuel that was needed to spark Indochina ablaze. French colonial troops found themselves beset at multiple sides and being attacked from pathways in the jungle they didn’t even know existed. By the end of June, the Viet Minh had advanced as far south as Hoi An and held a line stretching from there to Pak Se. Only the arrival of Japanese troops prevented the total collapse of the Indochinese Front.

The Manchurian Front:
The Manchurian Front continued to be grinding bloody stalemate. Even the Japanese destruction of the Huayankou damn and the subsequent massive flooding across the yellow river and the serious disruption of the supply lines did much to stop Marshall Yumming’s dogged resistance. Although Timonshenko had managed to push Chinese troops all the way to Beijing and engage in brutal street to street combat - that only further intensified the meat grinder nature of the front.

Chinese Civil Protection troops wading through the flooding created by the Huan
The Mongolian Front:
General Tukachevsky’s efforts and reorganization had finally produced results. His innovation (some say borrowed from the Entente) of the “Long Range Desert Groups” where mixed companies of cavalry and tanks would go over the porous Sino-Mongolian border and penetrate all the way South to wreak havoc before going back north. This was so successful that some Entente troops took part to pursue their own strategic objectives. One such Japanese raiding group managed to get all the way to the Huayuankou Dam and destroy it - causing massive flooding which would kill up to a million Chinese and displace ten million more.

Vowing revenge, Chiang vowed to unleash a ‘weapon of unimaginable power’ One that Sino-German scientists had been collaborating on for nearly a decade. It would change the landscape of Tokyo forever.

 

[CCA]

Japanese Battleship Yamato on a "Revenge Raid" on Chinese coastal cities.
1944 - July-December - Asian Front:
Asia was already a bloody, brutal front - but it descended even further into madness and barbarism with the Tokyo Firebombing. Using a fleet of high altitude zeppelins, the NRA unleashed the new synthetic “NAPALM” weapons that Sino-German scientists had uncovered a few months before. Using a delayed timing device, the Napalm bombs exploded just a few meters above ground - showing the rooftops with burning liquid. Combined with an unseasonal heat wave and drought - the firebombing started a conflagration that would kill nearly 100,000 Japanese and leave a million displaced. Adding insult to injury, the crown Princess Shigeko was badly burnt.

After this - all bets were off in the war between Japan and China. Previously dettered by her partners in Britain and France, Japan now resorted to unleashing biological horrors - attempting to bomb chinese cities with the black death bombs. Japan now used her vast battlefleets to pummel Chinese coastal shipping.

And the Chinese responded in turn - Chinese airships would continue to bomb Japanese cities with effective firebombs and attempt to drop incendiaries on Japanese agriculture and burn down the forests with the Napalm bombs.

In this swirling maelstorm of madness and brutality, the American conscience finally woke up. The 1944 election would be fought on a lot of issues - but one of them was President Wallace’s ‘moral foreign policy’ agenda. If re-elected, Wallace pledged to halt all trade with the warring powers and organize a peace conference. His opponent - Dewey wanted to keep business going and America right out of the quagmire.

Perhaps if it had been 4 years earlier, Dewey could’ve made the case that continued trade with all powers were essential to the American recovery. But by 1944, the Great Depression was well behind America and while the Midwest industrial states that relied on American trucks from Ford and others to be sold to Germany and the Soviet Union and American Tanks to be sold to China responded to Dewey’s message. As did the oil states of California and Texas that relied on American oil to be sold to Japan, France, China, Germany - and after the Chinese advance on the caucuses - the Soviet Union.

But it was not enough. President Henry A Wallace and his running mate Truman would defeat Dewey in a closely fought election. America was sickened - sickened by the Franco-British massacres of their colonial peoples and of the Bengal famine. Sickened by Soviet atrocities in Poland. Sickened by the German occupation of the Scandinavias and of the ‘scouring of Sofia.’ Sickened by the Japanese rape of Nanning, the biological weapons, the shelling of cities and - she was even sickened by the Chinese atrocities in Japan with the firebombings and forest burnings. Most Americans were sick of the steady diet of misery and conflict and hated what their country had become - mere merchants of death with their prosperity built on the backs of misery and destruction across the world. Merely two weeks after his election, President Wallace would issue an executive order halting all trade to the warring parties and announced that America would host peace talks in San Francisco.


The Central Asian Front:
Impressed by General Tukachevsky’s performance in Mongolia, he was promoted to Field Marshal and sent to command the Central Asian Front. The hapless Kulik was demoted and sent to command Mongolia. Although Tukachevsky was unable to prevent the Axis liberation of Iran, he beat Marshall Bufeng twice - encircling two armies. At Baku in August, capturing 200,000 Chinese and Persian troops and then again at Nukus in December, capturing 250,000 Chinese troops and other soldiers from the newly created independent republics of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikstan.

Republic of India troops advancing West towards the People's Republic of India.
The Indian Front:
The Indian theater continued to stagnate. The People’s Republic of India, although seemingly cut off from Soviet assistance by the Axis liberation of Iran, was easily supplied from the sea. Their troops and their soviet allies dug in, holding firm against the offensives by Bose’s Republic in the East and against Afghani-Chinese troops in the West.

Bose’s Republic of India focussed most of its’ efforts against the People’s Republic of India, believing that the troops would find themselves out of supply but they later realized that boats were an actual thing and stopped offensive operations by August, consolidating their position.

The Dominion of India held the line, declining Japanese troops as they did not want this conflict which was surprisingly civil for a civil war to escalate into a Sino-Japanese style grudgematch.

The Indochinese Front:
As the only front with Japanese and Chinese ground troops fighting, the Indochinese front was home to brutal combat between the NRA and the IJA where no quarter was taken or given. Despite all the storm and fury, the front had not actually substantially changed by December from where it was.

The Mongolian Front:
The arrival of the hapless Kulik gave the Chinese troops a much needed reprieve. Tukachevsky had taken the LRDG’s with him and their equipment and used them to great effect. In the meantime, General Kulik was content to stare at the equally disgraced General Tang Enbo (who had been in command of the Xian Army District at the time of the Xian Incident) across the long strech of barbed wire and mines.

The Manchurian Front:
The Manchurian Front went quiet. A welcome retrieve for Marshal Du’s troops that were struggling with compromised supply lines and having to aid the flood refugees. The BIS’ interrogation of captured Soviet troops revealed that the bulk of them were being transferred West, but they didn’t know why or where or what for - only that a large portion of Soviet troops were being transferred to the West in June and July. Where the hammer blow would fall in the West was unknown in Berlin and Nanking - but not in Moscow or London.

 

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1944 - July - December the European Front

Polish (Axis) troops fighting in Warsaw. By the time of the ceasefire, they had successfully captured Western Warsaw

Polish Front:
A big Axis offensive involving Army Group North - Guderian (3 million men) and Army Group Center - Rundstedt (1.5 million men) and the Polish Army - Rommel (500k) against newly appointed Marshal Rokossovsky’s 3 million strong Red Army and the 200k in the Red Polish divisions was cancelled after the hasty redeployment of Army Group Center to the Balkans.

Nonetheless, Guderian - due to political pressure from the Juliusz Rommel, (who wanted to free Poland) and Hitler, (who wanted to liberate East Prussia) had to launch offensives. Probing all along the front - he made advances where the Soviet resistance was the lightest. By the Christmas Armistice, he had advanced mostly in the South, advancing to Lublin and Lvov, grinding his way to the west bank of Warsaw in the Center, but made no real progress in the North where the Soviet army was putting up a fierce resistance using the river Vistula to great effect.


The Romanian Front:
The battered troops of Kesselring’s Army Group South held fast in their defensive positions as Buddyonny’s soldiers battered themselves against the Carpathians and the Ploetsi defences. However, despite the bloody nature of the front in many ways the attention and resources had shifted to the south where a sudden strategic stroke opened up a new front.

A bombed out building in Sophia. The "Scouring of Sophia" destroyed the City - but also the Luftwaffe.

The Balkan Front:
Italy had mostly stayed out of Soviet War. Some Italian troops were sent east to help defend Poland and were fighting in the Army Group North and Center, but the bulk of the Italian soldiery were engaging in massive staring contests with the French soldiers across the alps. A small contingent of Italian troops garrisoned Greece which had remained relatively peaceful and quiet with very small scale guerilla action.

That all changed on 4 July when Bulgaria’s government declared itself as part of the Entente and invited ‘allied and co-belligerent troops’ to help defend her country’s territorial integrity. Suddenly 3 million men commanded by Marshal Zhukov in the Balkan Front stormed south towards greece where a well-timed underground movement which had so far been content to remain passive and present a front of compliance. Suddenly the small Italian garrison army of only 150,000 found itself cut off, besieged in their barracks and attacked in patrols by what seemed to be the spontaneous uprising of an entire population.

Although the Italian Army in Albania was swiftly reinforced and ordered across, by July 24 it was too late. The Greek resistance and Red Army troops had liberated much of Greece with only a small portion around Ioannina and Arta still in Italian control in the Greek mainland. Italy managed to stay in control of the Dodecanese islands and Crete.

Hitler’s response to Bulgarian betrayal was characteristically insane. Ordering the Luftwaffe to concentrate their efforts solely in bombing Sophia as ‘punishment’ the city was levelled but at the cost of the Luftwaffe being wrecked as a fighting force and being unable to blunt the Soviet advance. Hereafter, German air superiority in the Eastern Front was no longer a guarantee.

The transfer of Army Group Center to the Balkans - where they gained the designation Army Group Center was too little too late to retrive the strategic situation. By the time that the Axis counteroffensive was launched on August 1, it was too late as Soviet/Entente forces were in control in Bulgaria and much of Greece.

That didn’t stop the fighting - far from it, the last 4 months of the war were one of the bloodiest per kilometer with fighting reminiscent of the Western Front and of the Manchuria Front. Nonetheless, it didn’t change anything.


Western Europe and the fight for peace:
The American election and Wallace’s promise to launch an embargo on all powers and force a peace caused the collapse of the French government and new elections. The new coalition - a shaky alliance of the Trotskyist left, the Petanist Right and the disgruntled splinter parties of the former center was united only in seeking peace. Peace hopes were further aided by the publication of a Papal Encyclical by Pope Pius XII “On Peace and Brotherly Love” where called on Catholics to seek peace and called for peace.

When Wallace won on November 7, the talks of peace continued apace. French and British diplomats lobbied the Soviet Union to come to the peace table, saying that their populations would no longer support the war and that the Soviets would be left to fight a two front war alone. Chiang called Hitler and said that China was close to famine and that they only had sufficient supply to feed the population enough to sustain the war effort until January 30 1945. After that, he estimated that the Chinese could continue the war for another 2-3 months before they starved to the point of ineffectiveness, but he was determined to end the war before that and was eager to participate in the peace process and urged Hitler to do the same. Mussolini, humiliated by a Fascist Grand Council vote which installed Count Ciano as his foreign minister and authorized him to begin peace negotiations urged him to do the same. As did much of his generals and Albert Speer who said that the German war machine only had two months to go on and would run out of fuel by the end of February. Japan’s government was persuaded by her allies who said that they would go and sign a separate peace with or without her and that she would face the might of the Axis alone.

With the confluence of so many factors. The stage was set. On Christmas day, 1944 - President Henry A Wallace had announced that the conflicting powers had agreed to an immediate ceasefire and had agreed to begin peace talks in New York. The war was finally over and the guns fell silent from Warsaw to Manchuria. The war was finally over, but as thankful families and soldiers wept with tears of joy at the news - the question was - would the ceasefire last?

 

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The price of peace: The New York Peace Conference and Axis Powers’ negotiating positions.

Although an uneasy peace had fallen across the world there was still no guarantee that it would last. As the various powers jockeyed and positioned for influence ahead of the New York Peace Talks there was furious discussion about bottom lines, priority positions and other demands. The following is an attempt to construct a brief analysis of the negotiating position, demands and delegations of the various Axis Powers.

Chiang Chingkuo was Kaishek's firstborn, but least favoured son. The negotiations were an opportunity for him to prove himself to his father.
China:
The Republic of China’s main priority was the return of all Chinese territory and sovereignty over the breakaway province of Manchuria. At this point Hainan was still under Entente occupation so the return of these territories were also considered a priority. The Axis also put a high priority on maintaining the “Blood and Iron Line” across Afghanistan, Persia and Turkey. China’s negotiating position was mixed. On one hand she did not have control over the People’s Republic of China but on the other, she did occupy Soviet territory.

Leading the Chinese delegation was Kaishek’s sun Chingkuo. Chingkuo although barely 35 was well qualified for the task a multi-lingual speaker who had studied politics in Moscow, learned to be a fighter pilot in Berlin and went to Harvard as a postgraduate. Chingkuo, after a brief stint in the NRA was appointed as the ambassador to America by Wang during his President-Premiership and was still serving the ambassador to America. Kaishek hoped that the multi-lingual and urbane Chingkuo could charm the American mediators into fighting for the Chinese position.

Bottom lines: Return of Chinese territory. Sovereignty over Manchuria
Secondary priorities: Axis suzerainty over Persia and Afghanistan, recognition of independence for the Republic of India
Low priorities: The return of Formosa, recognition of Chinese rule over Burma, recognition of the Republic of Indochina’s claims over Indochina, recognition of independence for the Republics of Krygstan, Tajikstan and Turkmenistan. Recognition of Afghan annexation of Pashtuni territories of the People’s Republic of India. Other Axis demands.


Italy:
Italy’s main priority was to secure her former territories in Libya and East Africa (Eritrea and Ethiopia) and if possible - to secure Greece. However, she was in a poor negotiating spot, only holding the former Greek islands and a small trip of Greek territory adjacent to Albania.

The Italian delegation was led by Count Ciano who had been appointed to the foreign ministry over Mussolini’s objections. Despite being Mussolini’s son in law, the two had frosty relations due to Ciano’s numerous affairs and his desire to pursue a more neutral foreign policy.

Bottom lines: Return of Italian colonies. Peace
Secondary priorities: Axis suzerainty over Persia and Afghanistan. Recognition of Italian suzerainty over Greece and Albania.
Low priorities: Turning the Mediterranean into an Italian Lake (tm) Other axis demands.

Germany:
Germany’s main priority was to see the return of East Prussia and her conquests legitemized. Although Belgium and Luxemberg had slipped from Germany’s grasp - she still maintained control over the Denmark, Norway and much of the Netherlands. Hitler’s main instruction to head of delegation Ribentropp was to secure the return of East Prussia - even at the expense of bartering liberated Polish territory. The secondary priority for the delegation included maintaining the Blood and Iron Line. The restoration of the borders of her Eastern allies remained a tertiary priority - as did the return of Elsass-Lothringen (but this was not treated as a serious proposition due to the fact that France remained entirely unoccupied by Germany at this point.)

Of the three Axis delegations, Ribentropp was a liability - being regarded as a buffoon.

Bottom lines: Return of East Prussia. Recognition of German hegemony over Denmark, Norway, Netherlands.
Secondary priorities: Axis suzerainty over Persia and Afghanistan.
Low priorities: The return of Polish territory occupied by the Soviets. The return of Romanian territory occupied by the Soviets. The return of Greek territory to Italy occupied by the Soviets.

Next: The Price of Peace - Entente and the Soviet Positions