Romanov Ascendant: What if the Soviet Union survived?

[Belka DNW]

Are we going to see the Buran in action? Maybe if the economy allows the soviets finally go to the moon just to make a point.

 

[Masked Grizzly]

A fact often left out is that even if Pakistan agreed to get rid of the training camps, it might delay the swarm of fighters but they would just come farther away.

People call America crazy for their role in Afgan soviet, Britain flat out had special forces fighting the soviets and sabotaging the soviet union.

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar (The man who helped start the throw acid on girls faces, spent years fighting the US later on) and Abdul Haq met Thatcher in Downing Street.

In 1983 the Special Air Service were sent in to Pakistan and worked alongside their SSG, whose commandos guided guerrilla operations in Afghanistan in the hope officers could impart their learned expertise directly to the Afghans. Britain also directly trained Afghan forces, much of which was contracted out to private security firms, a policy cleared by the British Government. The main company was Keenie Meenie Services (KMS Ltd) lead by former SAS officers. In 1985 they helped train Afghans in sabotage, reconnaissance, attack planning, arson, how to use explosive devices and heavy artillery such as mortars. One of these men was a key trainer, a former senior officer in the royal Afghan army, Brigadier General Rahmatullah Safi - he trained as many as 8,000 men. As well as sending Afghan commando units to secret British bases in Oman to train; KMS even sent them to Britain. Disguised as tourists selected junior commanders in the mujahidin were trained in three week cycles in Scotland, northern and Southern England on SAS training grounds.

The UK 's role in the conflict entailed direct military involvement not only in Afghanistan, but the Central Asian republics of the Soviet Union.MI6 organized and executed "scores" of psyop attacks in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, on Soviet troop supplies which flowed from these areas. These were the first direct Western attacks on the Soviet Union since the 1950s. MI6 also funded the spread of radical and anti-Soviet Islamic literature in the Soviet republics.

Fact is if Pakistan shut down all the training camps then the British can take over training with some US support, then fly or get them a boat over to Pakistan or China to insert them in Afghanistan.


Edit Even today people believe a lot British Jihadists are still under government control.

Was not aware of aware of the British involvement or the extent of their role on the conflict.

Otherwise do Pakistan and Iran experience any consequences by the Soviets ITTL, be it Soviet support of Communist and other separatist groups in both Pakistan and Iran, support of neighboring rivals as well as some plausibly-deniable accidents or few on their covert weapons programmes?

Surely the Soviets would not want the prospect of additional nuclear powers bordering them, especially countries that even if they got rid of the training camps would still be destinations for swarms of fighters making their way to fight the Soviets.

 

[Justinian]

Gennady Yanayev seems to be the obvious choice. However your mentioning of Zakhar Morozov's promotion to first secretary of the central Leningrad party committee (along with his personal friendship with Romanov) made me wonder wheater he might be elected to the party's highest position instead. Minister of defence Dimitry Yazov is a possible candidate aswell.

Either way, I'm pretty excited. Most likely I'm wrong altogether, and someone unexpected succeeds Romanov.

You're definitely on the right track and have caught the trials I've left off. I have it in mind but I think it's going to be pretty fun, and not unrealistic by any means.

Are we going to see the Buran in action? Maybe if the economy allows the soviets finally go to the moon just to make a point.

I'm going to make a space race post pretty soon, the Buran might even make an appearance at the victory parade. But regardless, it would be fair to assume that from 92-93 it's been operating.

On the moon, I think they have a hump to get over, but it's easily possible by the end of the 90s.

Was not aware of aware of the British involvement or the extent of their role on the conflict.

Otherwise do Pakistan and Iran experience any consequences by the Soviets ITTL, be it Soviet support of Communist and other separatist groups in both Pakistan and Iran, support of neighboring rivals as well as some plausibly-deniable accidents or few on their covert weapons programmes?

Surely the Soviets would not want the prospect of additional nuclear powers bordering them, especially countries that even if they got rid of the training camps would still be destinations for swarms of fighters making their way to fight the Soviets.

On the British stuff, I've actually read some stuff on this and there are conflicting reports. It's part of what inspired the entire idea of the west supporting Islamists, semi ironically in the Soviet Union.

One thing to keep in mind is that Pakistan has been intimidated. Back in 87 and 88, Romanov not only bombed their border training camps, shot down several of their fighters and even made reference to bombing Islamabad. The ISI kept up their support but it moved more low key. It would be similar with the nuclear program, they would be operating more secretly and far more slowly, because actually going all the way is incredibly dangerous due to Pakistans security dependence on the USA. If they completely flipped to China than maybe, but that kind of switch seems unlikely to me for various economic and political reasons.

Iran is a different beast entirely, but I doubt they would pursue nuclear weapons. They're not protected by anyone, and like North Korea OTL, WMDs are more of a regime insurance policy created by American hegemony that doesn't exist in this timeline. If you meant Iran just in general, they're still reeling from the war, keeping in mind that they lost harder in 1988 than in OTL. They'll definitely get addressed when our focus shifts back to the middle east.

I wonder what Gaddafi would be up to?

 

[Chris S]

Hey!

Thanks I appreciate the compliment, I hope it's half as much fun reading it as writing it.

Now to address your points.
1) Taiwan is neutral because President Perot is making a kind of grand bargain with China, trying to keep them out of the Soviet Sphere. The current Chinese leadership look illegitimate for adopting capitalism, and then gunning down hundreds of people in 1989, so they need domestic victories and nationalism to avoid being ousted. The Americans looked the other way on them taking back the Coastal Islands still controlled by the ROC/Taiwan, and have started dropping their assurances.
2) That's half an oversight, plus 'Turkish Cyprus' is kind of in NATO. I imagine proper Cyprus may end up joining NATO at a future point.
3) That's also an oversight, but I also think it's the mistake of the mapmaker, but there were also no Oslo Accords. Israel doesn't have complete force superiority, Syria and Iraq still fund and train the PLO.
4) Yes, in fact as a result of Romanov's bean counting in the 80's, his sudden drawback of support for some of the socialist states in Africa resulted in either political chaos, juntas or fracturing. I haven't fully pieced out the Congo, but it's probably a junta with light ties to the KGB at this point.
5) Definitely going to get to this, but basically Mubarak has alienated the military, the population, the islamists and pretty much every significant figure in Egyptian politics. The socialists are allied with left wing Nasserists cooperating with an indigenous Baathist movement.

Firstly, fantastic TL.


However in regards to the People's Republic of the Congo I don't see them dropping socialism simply due to Romanov doing bean counting. They maintained good ties with France throughout their communist period and also maintained the Central African Franc (it was one of the oddities about the Francophone African socialist states that while they became communist and sometimes aligned with the USSR they maintained close economic ties with France including continuing to use the West African and Central African Francs which had a fixed exchange rate with the French Franc and with France actually holding their exchange reserves in Paris) and the PR Congo started in 1969. As many African countries were one party states throughout the Cold War anyway this obviously wasn't too much of a problem for the non-communist states to continue working with the socialist ones in the economic sphere. My bet would be that the People's Republic of the Congo would continue as it was in a TL such as this though its ties to the USSR would be weakened though remain friendly.

As for Cyprus the Northern part isn't de facto in NATO. In fact it is likely because of the Cyprus dispute why Cyprus isn't in NATO (besides local sentiment possibly not having any strong views on the issue or being in favour). Recall that Turkey is already in NATO and much like how Greece and Cyprus now will never vote in favour of Turkish accession to the EU unless Turkey ends its occupation of northern Cyprus and backs the reunification of the northern statelet with Cyprus, so would Turkey veto Cypriot membership of NATO unless Cyprus acquiesced to recognising northern Cyprus (something Cyprus would never do as NATO membership really isn't that important to Cyprus for them to agree to recognize their own forcible partition).

 

[walmart]

Just made one up, this would represent the world as of mid 1993. With that latter question, I want to leave it as kind of a surprise, i've made some hints and also some false clues throughout though, it'll start to become clear as we end the 90s.

Quick edit: Spain is in fact in NATO

View attachment 633063

What happened to Somalia, Tanzania, and Guinea to make them Soviet aligned as oppose to Chinese ?

 

[Alexniko]

There is one thing about this TL that I don't find plausible so far: The East German riots of 1989.

During the 1980s in OTL, the East German government increasingly liberalized personal travel between the GDR and the non socialist nations. Tens of thousands of people were annually allowed to emigrate permanently between 1985 and 1989. Living standarts in the GDR had significantly increased since 1961, and the party and state leadership didnt have to worry about a mass exodus anymore. In fact during the summer of 1989, when Hungary had opened it's borders to Austria, 'only' around 50.000 people left the GDR for West Germany - a very small number compared to the huge number of people who left in the years before the wall was built. And remember, many of those who left in 1989 had allready decided to leave for a long time before they eventually could do so without the bureaucratic nightmare and harassment of an official application for permanent departure. Therefore we can assume that in the following years fewer people would've left. What bothered many people was that, to them, this liberalization process in personal travel was too slow. So, in short, personal traffic was allready liberalized before 1989, not because of Gorbachev, but because the wall had simply outlived it's purpose (or at least it would have done so in the decade to come).

Furthermore, the opposition groups that initiated the first Monday demonstrations didn't seek to abolish socialism, but to renew it. The 'New Forum' and 'Democracy Now!' publicly advocated for the democratization of socialism and vehemently opposed the idea of a West German annexation of the GDR. This only changed after the fall of socialism in Poland and Hungary.

A thing that is seldomly mentioned aswell is the fact that there was legal opposition in the GDR long before 1989. Independent peace and environmental groups regularly organized protests, and though there was some harrassment towards them, it was more like how the FRG treated the '68ers movement.

For these reasons, I doubt there would've been riots in the GDR in this TLs 1989. There certainly was opposition, but it wasn't directed against socialism, there were actual legal protests and people were upset that the liberalization of personal travel didn't proceed fast enough.

 

[Justinian]

What happened to Somalia, Tanzania, and Guinea to make them Soviet aligned as oppose to Chinese ?

It was my understanding that the first two were more Soviet aligned than with the Chinese, although I cannot really speak to Guinea. It could be something that needs additional refinement.

Firstly, fantastic TL.


However in regards to the People's Republic of the Congo I don't see them dropping socialism simply due to Romanov doing bean counting. They maintained good ties with France throughout their communist period and also maintained the Central African Franc (it was one of the oddities about the Francophone African socialist states that while they became communist and sometimes aligned with the USSR they maintained close economic ties with France including continuing to use the West African and Central African Francs which had a fixed exchange rate with the French Franc and with France actually holding their exchange reserves in Paris) and the PR Congo started in 1969. As many African countries were one party states throughout the Cold War anyway this obviously wasn't too much of a problem for the non-communist states to continue working with the socialist ones in the economic sphere. My bet would be that the People's Republic of the Congo would continue as it was in a TL such as this though its ties to the USSR would be weakened though remain friendly.

As for Cyprus the Northern part isn't de facto in NATO. In fact it is likely because of the Cyprus dispute why Cyprus isn't in NATO (besides local sentiment possibly not having any strong views on the issue or being in favour). Recall that Turkey is already in NATO and much like how Greece and Cyprus now will never vote in favour of Turkish accession to the EU unless Turkey ends its occupation of northern Cyprus and backs the reunification of the northern statelet with Cyprus, so would Turkey veto Cypriot membership of NATO unless Cyprus acquiesced to recognising northern Cyprus (something Cyprus would never do as NATO membership really isn't that important to Cyprus for them to agree to recognize their own forcible partition).

It would really depend on whether or not the Congo would or could be capable of economically sustaining itself without serious amounts of Comecon aid, and whether that general Soviet drawdown wouldn't have created an opening for French "neocolonial" diplomacy, the latter being the reason I gave them (albeit only slightly) on the original map. Your argument regarding the Congo is convincing, I'll probably mark them as neutral considering that they're really juggling the benefits of both sides.

You're absolutely right about Cyprus, going to fix that when I redo the map.

There is one thing about this TL that I don't find plausible so far: The East German riots of 1989.

During the 1980s in OTL, the East German government increasingly liberalized personal travel between the GDR and the non socialist nations. Tens of thousands of people were annually allowed to emigrate permanently between 1985 and 1989. Living standarts in the GDR had significantly increased since 1961, and the party and state leadership didnt have to worry about a mass exodus anymore. In fact during the summer of 1989, when Hungary had opened it's borders to Austria, 'only' around 50.000 people left the GDR for West Germany - a very small number compared to the huge number of people who left in the years before the wall was built. And remember, many of those who left in 1989 had allready decided to leave for a long time before they eventually could do so without the bureaucratic nightmare and harassment of an official application for permanent departure. Therefore we can assume that in the following years fewer people would've left. What bothered many people was that, to them, this liberalization process in personal travel was too slow. So, in short, personal traffic was allready liberalized before 1989, not because of Gorbachev, but because the wall had simply outlived it's purpose (or at least it would have done so in the decade to come).

Furthermore, the opposition groups that initiated the first Monday demonstrations didn't seek to abolish socialism, but to renew it. The 'New Forum' and 'Democracy Now!' publicly advocated for the democratization of socialism and vehemently opposed the idea of a West German annexation of the GDR. This only changed after the fall of socialism in Poland and Hungary.

A thing that is seldomly mentioned aswell is the fact that there was legal opposition in the GDR long before 1989. Independent peace and environmental groups regularly organized protests, and though there was some harrassment towards them, it was more like how the FRG treated the '68ers movement.

For these reasons, I doubt there would've been riots in the GDR in this TLs 1989. There certainly was opposition, but it wasn't directed against socialism, there were actual legal protests and people were upset that the liberalization of personal travel didn't proceed fast enough.

The East German Government of OTL relaxed it's travel laws and increasingly liberalized, under Soviet pressure and with the general tide or social zeitgeist of the time. It was only I think post Gorbachev that any real consistent (yet small until 1989) flow of people began between East Germany and the west. With a hardliner in Kremlin, who just had to stage a limited intervention into Poland, there was no way that Hungary was going to open it's borders to Austria.

So while yes you are correct in identifying that by 1989, the same economic pressure that resulted in the massive republikflucht that got them to put up the wall in the first place didn't exist as much. And while yes, there were many reformist organizations that didn't seek the complete destruction of socialism, there was still a significant liberal opposition movement that did attract the youth. A Honecker supported by a hardliner in the Kremlin wasn't going to let that fly. The organizations that operated through churches, and the relatively more liberal laws and rules regarding organizing in East Germany as compared to the rest of the Eastern bloc did create a significant liberal opposition. Slavenka Drakulic along with a lot of other sources make reference to this kind of underlying subculture in the eastern bloc, the idealized version of the west, born through smuggled goods, the black market, western magazines and the tails of people who had been to the west and had saw the shiny Mercedes' and upper middle class homes rather than the conditions that the vast majority of people actually lived in.

Romanov is in many ways a continuation of Andropov, which is why I mention at the beginning that he was his mentor, he is a vehicle in which I continue the policies of Andropov (somewhat), while also being our character. The KGB and Andropov's outlook was always going to be suspicion, paranoia or outright hostility to continued contacts between the populations of eastern Europe and the west, the sharing of information. Romanov's use of computer technology to improve the economy only really started to gain traction by late 1989 and early 1990. Without significant change in material or economic circumstances, the feelings of unjustified oppression, stagnation and the notion that the communist parties were robbing their respective countries of prosperity, spread by the liberal opposition often appreciated by the youth attracted by western materialism, made unrest in Eastern Germany an almost certainty. Now the extent of this is where we differ, and it's not because I actually disagree with you necessarily. But I'm pulled of course in two directions, the historical view of those more sympathic or even realistic (depending on your own persuasion) to socialism and those historical views more influenced by liberalism, especially patriotic liberalism of a nation state variety. Whereas you do correctly identify the fact that a lot of people in the GDR wanted reform through the auspices of socialism, not annexation by West Germany. Some would also believe that is no way the Soviets could continue their ruthless domination of Eastern Europe without running into some kind of opposition.

It sits on it's own within the timeline as a kind of caveat, a nod to the neoliberal assumption (one that used to be very common, if not dominant in the late 90s and 2000s, much less so now; after arab spring and etc) that liberalism is an impossible to stop historical force. My assertion is that it isn't, that there are no inevitabilities in history. As much as liberals may rightly so believe that people will rebel against oppression, realists or historians know that when the security forces and army are with you and the hammer comes down, more often than not, it's the loyalists that win. The best part about it, is that I wrote of these riots through the eyes of a western historian, someone who may have been a student who got caught up in while being in west Berlin. From his perspective it was a massive event, from the media and liberal perspective of the west, definitely so, but also if these riots were so strong, why were they crushed in a few days without any significant deaths? A riot could have happened, and I made a point of paying attention to this notion when I wrote about the events in Baku, about how politically apathetic people, especially youths, simply get sucked into the activity with tragic results.

Edit: Point being of all that is that the severity and nature of the riot is somewhat subjective, vague, and ambiguous.

 

[walmart]

It was my understanding that the first two were more Soviet aligned than with the Chinese, although I cannot really speak to Guinea. It could be something that needs additional refinement.

Somalia was until the Ogaden war at which point it switched over to the United States and China due to Soviet support of Ethiopia. Tanzania was firmly in the Chinese camp in the whole cold war going so far as to recognize Biafra due to Soviet Support of Nigeria and fighting the Soviet backed Idi Amin.

Julius Nyerere - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Justinian]

Somalia was until the Ogaden war at which point it switched over to the United States and China due to Soviet support of Ethiopia. Tanzania was firmly in the Chinese camp in the whole cold war going so far as to recognize Biafra due to Soviet Support of Nigeria and fighting the Soviet backed Idi Amin.

Julius Nyerere - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I'll probably defer to you on this, I did know Tanzania went socialist but I wasn't aware that they were more oriented towards China than the Soviet Union. I wasn't aware of the severity of the Ogaden War either, I think Somalia is definitely going to or has already collapsed (at this point) in the timeline.

Do you think that Ali Hassan Mwinyi would continue sticking with the Chinese, or try to reconcile and get closer with the Soviet Union? Considering the latter's stronger economic/military potential and that Mwinyi appears to be something of a pragmatist.

 

[walmart]

Do you think that Ali Hassan Mwinyi would continue sticking with the Chinese, or try to reconcile and get closer with the Soviet Union? Considering the latter's stronger economic/military potential and that Mwinyi appears to be something of a pragmatist.

No Somalia was also receiving support from United State if need be they can lean into that more

 

[Justinian]

I also intend to consider economically hobbling the Soviets as their computerization of the planning of the economy becomes brueaucratized. At the beginning I disagreed, with a few posters on whether or not computerization could solve the problems or at least the worst excesses of a planned economy.

I mean for one, planning itself is massively more efficient, data collection, digitalization and the searchability of digital records. Lets say your factory in Kiev sends an electronic ledger of what it had produced and where it was sent to be distributed. What happens if they dont match up? Typically this is a much slower paper based process, where bribery or lethargy slows any attempt to rectify this. It solves various transportation efficiency issues. Most importantly, when the information doesnt match and something was corrupted, the beeping goes off in front of some twenty something computer engineer, in Moscow under KGB supervision. He is ever closer to literally everything he wants (women, cars, nicer apartments, and etc) every time he reports these discrepencies. He cannot be intimidated and is rewarded. He is in no way connected or affiliated to corruption networks in Kiev. The human nature argument is turned against itself, as the profitive motive is used to benefit socialism instead of reward complacent drunk workers who dont do anything. You can be drunk, you can be complacent, but you cant cross the line.

I want your antithesis, your counter argument, as to why this wouldnt have solve many issues in a planned economy, or curb its ridiculous excesses.

 

[Rooki]

I want your antithesis, your counter argument, as to why this wouldnt have solve many issues in a planned economy, or curb its ridiculous excesses.

I don't really have a counter argument but what you've described kind of reminds me of what the Chinese are described doing here: https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/12/21/china-stolen-us-data-exposed-cia-operatives-spy-networks/

Seems to be working pretty well for them, don't see why the same ideas applied on internal corruption and efficiency wouldn't work for the soviets even this early on. Given they've made computer tech a national focus I can see them recognising the power of massive datasets very quickly.

Edit: Forgot to mention how amazing this timeline is, I just found it and couldn't stop reading till I was caught up.

 

[King Nazar]

I think the bigger issue in the Soviet economy was people lying about meeting production quotas. Combined with the secrecy and bribery going on across the entire economy. It made it nearly impossible for central planners to actually plan the economy with any accuracy since they didn't necessarily know what numbers they were working with. I don't know if computers would fix. However - maybe due to the fact that Romanov is more or less continuing Andropov's support for the KGB, labour discipline and anti-corruption - Romanov could basically mitigate that issue by essentially having the KGB spy on the entire economy and gather information for the central planners. I don't know how effective that policy would be but maybe that combined with the introduction of computers could revitalize the Soviet economy. Another issue would be agriculture which was always a problem for the Soviets. I think as the quality of Soviet goods improves and the country starts exporting somewhat decent consumer products in exchange for hard currency they could simply buy food from overseas. I think India would be a critical trade partner here and potentially China too depending on how Sino-Soviet relations play out in the 90s.

 

[TerenceofGod]

Maybe they can ease themselves into Socialist-Capitalism.

Create private companies, but have the workers own 80% of it and the state own 20%. The workers can sell their shares but none should control more than the states shares. The soft purge of all the old members of the party can also combat corruption when you put a new generation of devout Communists as leaders, this can also be the handing of the Old Guard over to the newest generation of communists the power of the state.

 

[Justinian]

No Somalia was also receiving support from United State if need be they can lean into that more

You mean Tanzania?

I think the bigger issue in the Soviet economy was people lying about meeting production quotas. Combined with the secrecy and bribery going on across the entire economy. It made it nearly impossible for central planners to actually plan the economy with any accuracy since they didn't necessarily know what numbers they were working with.

I think that would generally be addressed by this, or addressed better than previously before. In the largest factories you're going to have computer monitoring, you would have to directly corrupt the computer reporting staff. Of course the latter is going to be start to happen or is happening to a lesser degree. I imagine there would be a cultural difference, they computer engineers or technicians would probably end up hated by the rest of the factory. But now that they're being increasingly held accountable, but given more authority through self management, they're able to you know "c'mon dimitri, get your shit together we actually do need to meet at least 80 percent of this quota this week or the KGB are going to come here and bust our heads"

I don't know if computers would fix. However - maybe due to the fact that Romanov is more or less continuing Andropov's support for the KGB, labour discipline and anti-corruption - Romanov could basically mitigate that issue by essentially having the KGB spy on the entire economy and gather information for the central planners. I don't know how effective that policy would be but maybe that combined with the introduction of computers could revitalize the Soviet economy.

So they work in conjunction with each other too, fear of the KGB completely fucking you over, more control on both ends and of course better organized transportation. Andropov actually had public trials for those convicted of corruption, I could see that having an effect too.

Another issue would be agriculture which was always a problem for the Soviets. I think as the quality of Soviet goods improves and the country starts exporting somewhat decent consumer products in exchange for hard currency they could simply buy food from overseas. I think India would be a critical trade partner here and potentially China too depending on how Sino-Soviet relations play out in the 90s.

My theory regarding agriculture is that overall increased industrial efficiency leads to better mechanization and utilization of farmland, helping deal with the grain import issue to at least some extent. With his unopposed power he could definitely force farmers to grow crops like corn like Khrushchev attempted to do so. Grain and food importing from India is probably going to become a major avenue though.

 

[walmart]

You mean Tanzania?

Yes

 

[Chris S]

It was my understanding that the first two were more Soviet aligned than with the Chinese, although I cannot really speak to Guinea. It could be something that needs additional refinement.


It would really depend on whether or not the Congo would or could be capable of economically sustaining itself without serious amounts of Comecon aid, and whether that general Soviet drawdown wouldn't have created an opening for French "neocolonial" diplomacy, the latter being the reason I gave them (albeit only slightly) on the original map. Your argument regarding the Congo is convincing, I'll probably mark them as neutral considering that they're really juggling the benefits of both sides.

You're absolutely right about Cyprus, going to fix that when I redo the map.

As far as I know Guinea was only aligned with the Chinese in the late 1950s and early 1960s, thereafter they switched between aligning themselves with the USSR or the USA depending on who they thought might give them more support or be less protesting about their mode of governance.

Re Congo, you already have them as neutral on the map. Wait, are you thinking of Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo as opposed to the People's Republic of the Congo/Republic of the Congo?

For reference this is what @Wolf95 and myself are talking about:

And this is what we were expecting the map of Central and Southern Africa to look like:

(With Cabinda also fixed as it is a part of Angola).


These would be fairly useful basemaps for this (and the rest of Africa and the world):

File:Cold War Map 1980.svg - Wikimedia Commons

commons.wikimedia.org

Map - Cold War 1960-1991

I also made patches for Germany (cleaned up the inter-German border using the QBAM as a base):

And Israel/Lebanon/Syria (included the Israeli controlled Golan Heights and as your POD is 1985 I included the Israeli and Syrian controlled areas in Lebanon as they were around that time (with UN controlled/local controlled areas in white).

 

[boredviewer1234]

As far as I know Guinea was only aligned with the Chinese in the late 1950s and early 1960s, thereafter they switched between aligning themselves with the USSR or the USA depending on who they thought might give them more support or be less protesting about their mode of governance.

Re Congo, you already have them as neutral on the map. Wait, are you thinking of Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo as opposed to the People's Republic of the Congo/Republic of the Congo?

For reference this is what @Wolf95 and myself are talking about:

View attachment 633698


And this is what we were expecting the map of Central and Southern Africa to look like:

View attachment 633699

(With Cabinda also fixed as it is a part of Angola).


These would be fairly useful basemaps for this (and the rest of Africa and the world):

File:Cold War Map 1980.svg - Wikimedia Commons

commons.wikimedia.org

Map - Cold War 1960-1991

I also made patches for Germany (cleaned up the inter-German border using the QBAM as a base):

View attachment 633703

And Israel/Lebanon/Syria (included the Israeli controlled Golan Heights and as your POD is 1985 I included the Israeli and Syrian controlled areas in Lebanon as they were around that time (with UN controlled/local controlled areas in white).

View attachment 633704

You don't mind me asking, how did you create those well crafted maps?

 

[Chris S]

You don't mind me asking, how did you create those well crafted maps?

Don't mind at all. I used Paint.NET along with the mapping resources found in the Maps section of the site (I used elements from the QBAM threads).

 

[Justinian]

Just Another Recce Part III:

The men loaded more rounds into their magazines, took their brief respite to drink water, piss a few feet away from themselves. Some who had them, watched the enemy approach with their optics. The soldiers brought out their RPG-7s and few 90mm recoilless guns but the trucks were at least a couple kilometers away, at least 15 of them, some armored. They had two Buffels with them too, and they also looked modified. The mortar fire had subsided after the smoke covered their initial retreat. Now they appeared to be organizing for a breakthrough. Warrant Officer Martin discussed on the radio the situation as he looked as his map with his Sergeants.

The Lieutenant reported that the free army attempted to storm the city was but fought off, and that they were shifting their weight to break through on the north side, where the first thing between the city's supply line and communications stood was his OP. Reinforcements were at least a day away. The radio connection wasn't spotty, so it could be discussed in brief detail. The flat ground and dry weather did little to disrupt communication. "I've got a couple of Gazelles to drop off some ammo and take your wounded, you should hear them any second. I'm also bringing in smoke around your position, I imagine they'll make their move when it clears. I might be able to get you a gunship run soon too. You've got fast minute to get your boys on those copters, we don't know what kind of weapons they have on those trucks so I have to get the helicopters out of there" The Warrant acknowledged "Any word on those BM-21s, Sir?" "I like the way you think Maarten, yeah the AWB got them in a couple of hours ago. We're organizing logistics on those but we should have it figured out, if you need it, use it as a last re..re..sor...tttt" The radio got choppy as Maarten heard and felt the smoke rounds impact in front of his OP, and the faint sound of the choppers in the distance.

If they have anyone from the SADF in that 'Free Army', they'll know we're up to something, smoking our own position while they're in front of us. No doubt they can hear the helicopters too. Maarten looked over at the two Gazelle Helicopters, flying fast to their position, to a prearranged landing area, he shouted orders, had his men bring four of the serious wounded on stretchers out to them, sprinting as fast as they could without throwing the wounded men off of them. As the helicopters landed he and the men started hearing the unmistakable sound of heavy machine guns and 20mm cannons being fired, albeit inaccurately, above their heads. The smoke plumes decently covered the OP and the helicopters, at least for another good minute.

The warrant felt he could count on his men, they knew the stakes as well as he, they did good last night, those four were probably going to make it. As the last of the wounded were loaded on the helicopters, heavy cases full of ammo, rations and other supplies were dropped off, as the helicopters began taking off. As they lifted and turned around, the enemy fire got more accurate, almost clipping one in the tail rotor, but they managed to get away. The same men who had dragged the wounded off had brought back the supplies, which were quickly either hidden in one of the dug out bunkers or split up amongst the various sections.

Maarten originally had a recce platoon at his disposal, usually 27 men and an officer. But because of a shortage of officers and the situation in the city they determined it fit to leave him in charge. He had recieved 14 soldiers and 4 crewmen to reinforce his now motley battlegroup. Three of his soldiers and one of the replacements were wounded, mostly just bad burns and shrapnel, two unlucky bastards got hit directly, one took a 7.62 round in the shoulder, and another got hit in the gut by what Maarten thought might be a 5.56, he was in bad shape. They didn't do too bad, after tallying the enemy dead they realized that they killed at least 27 enemy soldiers. Most of them were not wearing SADF uniforms however, a lot of them were wearing either rags, civies, patch work uniforms, the white dead wore foreign camouflage or uniforms, but there were definitely a few white and black SADF among them, wearing armbands of red and green. They could have been his old friends, acquaintances, soldiers that he trained. This entire situation disgusted him. He rubbed his eyes.

How the fuck did we even get here, am I getting old, I swear it wasn't that long ago that things were normal. This was unimaginable... but he stopped himself, he did imagine this. As did a lot of men in the SADF, they talked about it, bragging about how the kaffir wouldn't stand a bloody chance. I didn't hate the Africans, but I come from a long line of Dutch settlers who had lived centuries and braved the frontier in this country. They got more oppressed by the fucking British than we ever treated the Kaffir. I had as much fucking right to it as the bloody stupid Americans and their country, so ignorant or so evil that they ignore their own hypocrisy or are dumb enough to not know their own history. It astounded him that they even had the audacity to criticize his country for defending itself, to support the traitors and to make him kill people who used to be his friends. The traumatic difficulties, sleep deprivation and psychological affects of killing tend to bend one's thoughts like this. Deep down, Maarten's heart was hardening, at this point it wouldn't matter what happened, he'd fight with his platoon, his regiment and his army until the bitter end.

By 6:01AM, the South African Free Army charged their position, unleashing a fury of land based rocket artillery, mortar shells, machine gun fire and at least 5 105mm rounds, one that impacted nearly directly killing 5 men. However as their technicals closed the distance, the soldiers kept firing back. When the one of the soldiers let a burst go with his FN MAG, it hit the drivers compartment of an incoming toyota, killing the driver, causing the high speed vehicle to turn and then flip, sending it's contents of a heavy machine gun and crew into the air as it twisted and rolled, hitting another incoming vehicle, one of the modified heavy buffels, that just plowed through it, and kept going, the men inside still shooting at the OP.

The Free Army started pouring fire as they managed to dismount several squads only 400 meters away from the OP. Maarten's men were getting pinned down or wounded, one by one. As the SAFA assembled, to charge them directly, covered by their own smoke grenades and the mortar rounds. Maarten, now in the front with his radio, radioed for whatever support he could get. As at least two hundred and fifty men spread out, covered by machine gun fire from heavily armoured vehicles started crawling towards their point, the situation appeared increasingly desperate.

Hubrecht's eyes were dead and focused, he had already dragged back the master corporal who was laughing at him for a medic at the command bunker. He locked his rifle on whatever moving target he could acquire. The dust from the plains, the smoke from the weapons and the smell of open wounds became increasingly disconnected from him, and his task. His task was to aim his rifle, and to use his brain to tell his finger to pull the trigger. There was literally nothing else, until a familiar click reconnected the conscript back to reality. He looked to the left, one of his only friends in the unit was dead, a round had struck him in the head, blowing his face open. He looked to the right and saw the warrant officer, who looked at him, with an empathy and pain in his eyes. Just as another mortar round came down in front of the trench, Hubrecht started puking bile on his boots. The warrant grabbed him by the shoulder, told him to focus, he put a magazine in his rifle for him and pushed him back into position. Just like that the stimulation died down, he was back to his task.

It was 6:31 AM and the reinforced platoon was only at half effective strength. They were at the breaking point, but Maarten recognized the familiar sound of a grad rockets, and for once it was a good thing. "Everyone hide, get the fuck in your holes now!" The warrant officer, Hubrecht and everyone else hit the dirt and hid, fire kept coming at them until the sounds of rockets gracefully gliding above their heads passed them. The slavo started hitting the ground at 6:38AM. The enemy's vehicles were ripped apart, just as many of their men were, into burnt, often reddened carcasses. One round hit the modified buffel directly, completely obliterating it. The enemy was confused, they stopped shooting. Hubrecht's ears were ringing, a lot of those rockets hit way too close for comfort. But he was relieved. They were running, throwing smokes, the vehicles reversing and shooting and even turning around. Maarten signaled for his Ratel to give chase, Hubrecht had forgot that it even existed. It's 20mm gun shredded what was left of the enemy's vehicles, and many of the soldiers running back. Some, behind a tree, waved a white rag on a stick. Maarten, grabbed Hubrecht by the kit, and motioned a few other of the less wounded soldiers with them. They crouched from cover to cover, waiting until they made it to the surrendering band, only 50 meters away.

Maarten intended on killing them, the only thing that surprised him was that it was Hubrecht that started shooting first.