1945 - first draft!
1945
This is the epitaph I want on my tomb: Here lies one of the most intelligent animals who ever appeared on the face of the earth!
- Mussolini.
Success is the sole earthly judge of right and wrong!
- Adolf Hitler.
As the year 1945 began it was clear that the war angainst Germany would not last much longer. As the RAF and RA routine began to bomb the cities of the Third Reich, the once proud city of Berlin got to know war rather intimately. The dark heart of the Third Reich suffered continuos attacks, which saw thousands upon thousands civilans killed and entire city blocks razed. And Berlin was not even the city that was hardest hit; Dresden and Hamburg for all purpose got obliterated by two huge air raids in early ’45.
As if the merciless Axis and Allies bombing of the Reich’s cities was not enough, the land war too went against the Germans. From the East the Soviet Red Hordes pushed ever closer and from the South and Wets the Axis and Allies fought their way stubbornly towards the Vatherland. Seen from the HQ of General Ewald von Kleist, OB Ost, this was unacceptable. In March, von Kleist, the hero of Kharkov and Przemysle, launched a military coup, Operation Parsiphall, and is said to have shot Adolf Hitler himself. Loyalist troops from the Wehrmacht arrested SS personel and disarmed army units not thought to be reliable. Von Kleist and the little terrier of a man, Oberstgruppenführer, Sepp Deitrich, knew each other from the Eastern Front and seemed to have put Parsiphall together. Along with Luftwaffe’s chief, Albert Keselring, they soon took control of Germany and established a provisional government!
In South East Asia General Slim and Admiral Cunningham launched a more or less continous offensive against the Japanse forces, who only a year before had overrun most of Asia east of India. Even with the aid of Italia and the entire Commonwealth it was obvious that it was not going to be easy liberating the old colonies. Fighting was hard and intense, but steadily the Japanese was forced back. 1945 would see Burma, Singapore and a completely ruined Hong Kong return to British rule.
The war was as good as won, but now all the heard work really began as several of Dino Grandi’s men in the Ministri degli Affari esteri (Foreign Ministry) joked. Both Grandi and Ciano laboured hard and endlessly to secure a lasting and fair, at least fair seen from Rome, peace. At the great peace conference in Paris, the Italian diplomates sidetracked the French and made sure Germany remained more or less as it had been before the war. A few changes occurred, though, Austria and Bavaria emerged as independent countries. Czechoslovakia was split up into two countries, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
The Axis wholly supported an independent Ukraine and Poland, but the less than stable environment on the eastren Front made this no easy task. As 1945 ended and 1946 begun, Ukraine, however, had been recognised as an independent nation and Axis member, while Poland still was occupied by Germany and the USSR.
The Leonardi leadership in Rome foresaw the need for a big stick, as the American president Theodore Roosevelt once had said, in matters relating to security and foreing policy. Enrico Fermi and his nuclear research team begun to get a hitherto unheard of level of funding. Laboratories was set up in northern Italia at the great hydroelectric plants near the Alps, and several others in the deep Libyan desert. The pace of research became even more frantic as the United States exploded a nuclear device in late Decmber!
Meanwhile Grandi worked to create an expanded Axis, and later Ciano’s dream of a Forum of Nations, containing not only Spain and Italia, but also Greece, Turkey, Croatia, Bavaria, Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the Ukraine, Hungary, Bulgaria, Rumania, Iraq, Persia and the not yet liberated Poland. Invitations was also extend to Syria and Egypt as well, but respectively France and Britain vetoed. For most of late ’45 diplomates and foreign ministers travelled to and forth the various capitals of Europe and the Orient. As the diplomates laboured, the Comando Supremo and the Italian armaments industry sold weapons en masse to the new Axis countris and sent an unending stream of advisors and security personal.
One of the reason why the Italians felt they needed to hurry getting these new super weapons was, not surprisingly, the Soviet Union. For the time being Stalin and his Red Hordes were of no threat as they fought both external and internal enemies. Sooner or, perferably, later the situation would stabilize and it would be pay back time.
Over most of the USSR partisan and guerrilla bands ran wild, creating utter havoc in the interior. And as armed insurgents and rebelling Nationalists was not enough several minor and one general strike paralyzed the big country. The NKVD cracked down on both the insurgents and the strikers with great severity, but the situation were far from stable at years end. Draft and food riots along with armed uprisings would plague the USSR for several years.
In 1945 the first Italian refineries began to operate in earnest in both Libya and Sicily. The Leonardi put a lot of energy into transforming the Italian infrastructure and industry from using coual to using natural gas and oil instead.
Italian and American companies formed numerous joint-ventures in 1945 and began to prospect and later mine various raw materials, among them chrome, copper, lead, zinc and even some oil.
Timeline 1945:
January 2, 1945: Canadian and British troops lands at Ostende and Rotterdam. Dutch and Belgian resistance units are already patrolling the streets. Other units are harrashing the few German troops not yet safe behind the Rhine.
January 8, 1945: The Soviet Red Army tries yet again to force its way over the Vistula River, but the Germans are holding their ground. Reinforcements are drawn in spite of Hitler’s protests from other fronts.
January 12, 1945: The Japanese launch a fullscale offensive against Nationalist positions in China. The Japansese hope to encircle large groups of troops and gain access to vital territory, while cutting off the reopened supply route from Burma.
January 24, 1945: The Regia Aeronautica launches its first airstrik on Berlin. The heavy Piaggio P.108G bombers suffer few loses from Luftwaffe fighters as they are escorted by new long range FIAT G55/M(F) Centauro, but the intense German FlaK take its toll on the Italian bombers.
February 1, 1945: In Rome, the Eternal City and capital of the New Italian Empire, Ciano, Balbo, Grandi, Bottai and several topranking Leonardi Fascisti meet. They disscus how to organize the post-war world, and the Empire.
Febuary 3, 1945: Last major German offensive on the Eastern Front. Air Marshall and Luftwaffe C-in-C, Albert Kesselring, has carefully husbanded his resources and the Luftwaffe for a while at least gain supremacy over the front. Wehrmacht troops under command of East Front-veteran General Ewald von Kleist advance rapidly in southern Poland and retake Krakow. The offensive finally stops after a weeks heavy fighting just outside Jaroslav and Przemysle.
Febuary 13, 1945: Dresden is destroyed by a firestorm after Allied bombing raids. In Italia the political leadership as well as the Comando Supremo is shocked by what they percieve as pure terrobombing, but Blabo is less squirmish: “It’s not pretty, but it’s effective! Let the Germans and their cities burn, like they burned their victims these last years!â€
March 1, 1945: The city of Hamburg is destroyed by a firestorm after Allied bombing raids. Voices amongst the Allies express doubt about the Point Blank-tactics and the bombing of civilian targets in general.
March 4, 1945: General Ewald von Kleist, the hero of Kharkov and Przemysle, meets with Hitler in the Führer’s vast underground bunker system in Berlin. Von Klesit is accompanied by his aid and right hand, General von Manteuffle. To this day nobody really know what happened in the bunker, but Hitler, von Manteuffle and several others ends up dead after a vicious firefight!
March 5, 1945: After the deaths of Hitler Operation Parsiphall kicks off in Germany. Troops from the Wehrmacht arrests SS personel all over the Reich. Here and there the SS resists, but suprisingly no Waffen-SS units take up arms against the Wehrmachts troops. General von Kleist seems to be in control of Germany.
March 7, 1945: SS-Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler commits suicide. The German High Command, OKW, set up a Provisional Government under General von Kleist.
March 8, 1045: Von Kleist, now calling himself Reichspresident, offers the Axis and Allies an armistice. Von Kleist seems to have some sort of agreement with both the Luftwaffe and the Waffen-SS as he is often seen with Airmarshall Kesselring and Oberstgruppenführer Dietric.
March 10, 1945: A US naval task force centered around two carriers are relocated from the Pearl to the Phillipines. It is based in Manila Bay. Washington and the local Philipino governemt is denying any overt threat to Japan. Needless to say the Japanese leadership in Tokyo are furious!
March 12, 1945: Mass surrenders of Germans troop to Axis and Allies forces along the fronts. In the Sudentenland, Hungary and at the Rhine some 500,000 Germans are taken as PoWs. Units along the Vistula hold their ground and keep fighting. They are even reinforced by troops from the other fronts and the interior.
March 14, 1945: Soviet troops finally crosses the Vistula and immediately begin an assult on Warsaw.
March 15, 1945: Reichspresident von Kleist outlaws the DNSAP and order all non-Communist KZ inmates to be set free at once and an immediate stop to the persecution of Jews.
March 16, 1945: The last German units facing the Axis and Allies surrenders at the Ruhr pocket as their commander, Fieldmarshall Model, commits suicide.
The Red Army fights its way into a ruined Warsaw. Much to the Soviets amazement, scattered remnants of the Polist Home Army resist more or less alongside the stubborn German defenders!
March 17, 1945: Joseph Goebles and his family surrenders to an advance unit of Italian Alpini in Sudentenland.
April 1, 1945: Representatives of the new German governemnt meet with envoys from the Axis and Allies in Prag. An armistice is signed between the Germans and the Axis and Allies. Further negotiations are to be held in Rome in a weeks time.
April 5, 1945: General Slim’s hard charging Commonwealth forces, now designated 4th Army Group, reaches the old British airfield at Tenasserim. Soon Spitfires, Typhoons and Hurricans will begin to fly from the enlarged airfields. Air superiority is now with the Allies in Asia.
In a sudden Chinese counter-offensive, the Chinese actually defeats the Japanese forces around the border to Burma, thus opening the Ledo road once more. Though the Japanese manage to inflict a good deal of casualties in return, they are thoroughly defeated and lose close to two divisions in the fighting.
April 8, 1945: Kesselring, Speer and von Schulenburg meets with Ciano, Grandi, LeCelerc and Bevin in Rome. The negotiations are tough, but the Germans have no other option than to agree to the terms offered. As it has already happened German troops are to withdraw from all occupied territory and their positions along the fronts. Furthermore they are to start negotiations with the Soviets at once, release all prisoners of war and hand over all senior members of the DNSAP. Further negotiations and the final treaty will be handled at a later meeting in Paris in late Maj!
April 10, 1945: Ciano and Atlee along with their foreign ministers, Grandi and Bevin, meet in London. French leader, Charles DeGaulle is present as well, but as the Italians insists on calling him Colonel, the meeting ends in a French boycott. Grandi and Ciano are actually quite pleased as they hope the British will tire of the pompous French.
April 17, 1945: Most of the victorious 4th Army Group prepare for an attack on Thailand, but the VII. Corps move south towards the Malayan Peninsula and the XXIV. Corps move against Rangoon. Fighter cover is total and the Allied tactical bombers wreak havoc amongst the Japanese.
April 30, 1945: Most of the PoW’s in German hand have been handed over to the Axis and Allies, but most of the Nazi-leadership has either disapered or committed suicide. A few arguments erupts between the Allies and von Kleist’s envoys as to wether SS-general Joseph Dietric should be extradited also!
Maj 1, 1945: A Regia Aeronautica Squadriglia equiped with the new long range FIAT G55/M(F) Centauro arrive at Tenasserim. These Centauro are the first Italian planes to fitted with drop tanks and have two powerfull 30mm guns in addition to their four 12,7mm machine guns.
Maj 24, 1945: Commonwealth forces are finally poised for a strike at Singapore. The new Far Eastern Fleet under Admiral Cunningham are approaching the Strait, while general Browning’s Marine and light infantry forces prepare for an amphibious assault. Meanwhile 4th Army Group draw the Japanese to the north in defence af Malaya as they advance.
Maj 26, 1945: The Royal Navy along with its Commonwealth allies blokades Singapore.
Maj 27, 1945: Eventhough the Germans are still fighting the Soviets along the Vistula, the peace conference is nonetheless held in Paris. “To be quite frankâ€, as Balbo is heard to have said, “it suites me well the Germans keep on killing the Red Bastards!†Surprisingly enough the von Kleist government is very cooperative, still there are a few bumbs along the way.
Maj 28, 1945: Back in early 1943, the German naval attaché in Tokyo prevailed on the Japanese to employ German submarine tactics, now the the Japanese submarines attacks Cunningham’s Fleet off Singapore and its supply convoys with great effect.
Maj-June, 1945: The Allies suffers heavyly under the Japanese submarine onslaught, but with their better ASW and with some escort reinforments the submarine offensive peter out.
June 1, 1945: Austria, Bavaria and the Czech Republic are formed as independent nations as part of the Peace Treaty of Paris.
June 5, 1945: Rangoon is retaken by the 4th Army Group. Soon advance parties from the VII. Corps move angainst Singapore. As General Slim is recorded for saying: “The Jungle is our friend now!â€
General Ambrosio’s I.Armoured Corps is shipped home from the Ukraine. They leave all their equipment, however, to the fledgling Ukrainian Army along with a cadre of specialists to train them. Ambrosio and his men are celebrated as heroes from their arrival at Taranto to their parade through Rome side by side with General Messe’s veterans form the II.Armoured Corps. CCNN-general Enrico Francisci’s blackshirts stay in the Ukraine for the moment. During July and August they will be replaced by other Camini Nere-troops and regular Regio Esercito units.
June 9, 1945: A very moved Ciano is greeted by jubillant masses as he return to Roma. At an improvised rally near Palazzo Venizia, Ciano held one of his most memorable speaches ever: “As our dear departed Duce once said; the New Roman Empire goes to war! Now I stand before you, dear fellow Romans, and says; today the New Roman Empire has WON the war!†The huge mass of people went completely crazy at his word and broke out in thunderous applause and called Ciano Duce!
June 12, 1945: The Chinese Nationalists launches an attack at the Japanese forces in northern Burma. They are soon forcing the Japanese back into Thailand.
June 14, 1945: After having been delayed the British finnaly attack Singapore from both air, sea and land. The battleships Valiant and Warspite bombard the Japanese defenders merciless, while the RAF hammers them from the air. General Brownimgs troops land around the city and are soon supported by units from the 4th Army group and ANZAC-forces.
June 21, 1945: After a full week of heavy and bloody fighting the last Japanese forces in Singapore are defeated. Over 1,000 wounded Japanese commits suicide as the city falls.
June 28, 1945: German forces re-enter Warsaw and is able to push the Soviets back across the river.
June-July, 1945: The strain of war is beginning to show in Japan, where many politicians and the more moderate officers cannot see the need for continuing the war. The last months massive setbacks have opened their eyes for the fact, that they are losing the war. The Nationalists in China are growing in strength, they have even shown the world that they can beat the Japanese alone, Singapore has been recapture by the Allies, the Kido Butai suffered its first major defeat in battle and tension is rising in the Dutch East Indies.
July 2, 1945: As in Japan the strain of war is beginning to show in the Soviet Union. Stalin’s hold on power is slippingly. Across most of the USSR, wokers and peasant truly unite as a general strike spread rapidly throughout the country.
July-August, 1945: As the Red Army is trapped along the Vistula, Nationalist elements among the many suppressed minorities in the USSR begin to rise up and take up arms against the Communists. Guerrilla and partisan bands raid Red Army supply depots for weapons and supplies, or is covertly supllied by either the Germans or the Axis, and start to ambush Red Army patrols and smaller units.
August 1, 1945: The Soviet Union and Germany finally sign an armistice. The real peace negotiations will continue into the 50’s. Germany, USSR and the Allies will quarell over the re-establisment of Poland until 1948.
August 3, 1945: A Regia Marina task force centered around the new battleships Italia and Impero of the Littorio class, the light carrier Aquila and the fleet carrier Bruno Mussolini arrives at Singapore. A force of fast transports loaded with two reinforced regiments of the nearly legendary San Marco Marines accompany the Italian task force.
August-September, 1945: The 4th Army Group clears out the last remnants of Japanese resistance in Malaya and Burma, while Commonwealth and Italian units invades the Dutch East Indies..
September 22, 1945: The first unit, the 6. Stormo, of Caproni Reggiane 2007 jet-fighters become operational around La Spezia. A second unit is due to become operational in late ‘45.
September-October, 1945: British and Commonwealth forces invades Thailand. The Thai government soon collapses and the new government ask the Allies for terms, while it turn on its former Japanese ally. Japanese and Thai forces clash around the countryside. General Slim and the 4th Army Group soon drive the stranded Japanese back into Indochina.
October 3, 1945: Nationalist Chinese troops retake Beijing. Beijing is once angain the capital of China. Chiang Kai-shek enters in trumph.
October 5, 1945: Primeminister Atlee and Chief of Staff Alanbrooke visits the HQ of the 4th Army Group. Slim is promoted to Fieldmarshall.
October 15, 1945: The first two really modern Italian-designed tank enters production. The Carro Armato Celere Sahariano, a medium tank equiped with a long 76mm gun, is base on the British cruiser tanks. It, however, already seems somewhat outdated. The second design show more promise. The Carro Armato Pesante (heavy) 50/45 was a heavy 50-tonnes tank build around a reliable V12 engine and equipped with a heavy British-made 17pdr. maingun.
October 20, 1945: The majority of the Dutch East Indies are cleared of Japanese forces. Fighting will continued to the final surrender of the Japanese in late 1946.
November 1, 1945: The Allies begin to move against both Indochina, as French forces have now arrived in Burma and Thailand, and Hong Kong.
November 28, 1945: Ciano, Stalin and Atlee meet in Athens. Once again Harry Hopkins is present as an unofficila representative for the Americans. As Mussolini did Ciano insist that Ukraine is to be given its independence. Backed up by the powerfull armed forces of Axis, Ciano threatens Stalin with war if he does not comply! Stalin actually caves in as he know his Red Army is incapable of fighting a major war right now!
November-December, 1945: Fierce fighting in Indochina as France tries to re-establish control over their former colony. By the end of the year, France control most of the build-up areas, while the countryside is either controlled by the Viet-Minh or the Japanese.
December 22, 1945: At Alamogordo in New Mexico the US demonstrates a new powerfull weapon! At Enrico Fermi’s labs the workpace picks up.
December 23, 1945: A prototype of an inter-continental bomber is testflown by Regia Aeronautica pilots in Sicily. Though, it is only a proto-type it causes a great commotion in the medias, both the Italian and foreign ones. The big ungainly plane is, however, already nearly ouydated as the Macchi Mc.500 Jet bomber is test flown in early 1946.
December 30, 1945: After terrible losses and one the most fiercely contested battles of the war, Allied forces under the direct command of Fieldmarshall Slim himself is finally able to raise the Union Jack over the ruined city of Hong Kong. In London both Alanbrook and Atlee are shocked by the number of casualties. It is decided to concentrate on suppling and training Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists Chinese forces, blockading the Japanese Home Islands and bombing the populated areas into ruins for most of 1946, while the Commonwealth builds up its forces once again.
Of the 'bad four', Musso was the least-evil of the bunch (altho against Hitler, Stalin and Tojo, that ain't sayin' much.). However, in order for him to "grow a brain", I'm afraid an ASB is necessary... 