World War III outside Europe?

Delta Force

Banned
World War III scenarios focus mostly on Europe and the North Atlantic, while paying little attention to events elsewhere. Even the Pacific doesn't receive much attention, despite the significant American presence in the region. What would the war be like in places such as the Middle East and the Pacific, especially during the conventional phase? Would any major non-aligned states side with the superpowers during the war, or even fight separate conflicts?
 
World War III scenarios focus mostly on Europe and the North Atlantic, while paying little attention to events elsewhere. Even the Pacific doesn't receive much attention, despite the significant American presence in the region. What would the war be like in places such as the Middle East and the Pacific, especially during the conventional phase? Would any major non-aligned states side with the superpowers during the war, or even fight separate conflicts?


As I recall, The Third World War, August 1985 dealt a lot with that. As it was written in 1978, it assumed the Shah of Iran as a strong western ally.



A lot of the answer to your question depends on when WWIII is.

If it is before the Soviet Chinese split, you could well see China with soviet far east forces attacking South Korea or Taiwan or South Vietnam to tie up the US forces there.

Soviet clients or allies in the ME could attack western allied oil producing states to reduce the flow of oil to the West. Us allied states, possibly including Israel could move to counter that.

Soviet allied Egypt might attack Israel to prevent that.

Marxist Nicaragua could make a drive for the Canal, while the US is sending everything they can to Europe.

Cuba could try to interdict US shipping along the Southern Coast, though that would seriously be taking one for the team.


Some of the more soviet friendly states in Southern Africa could attack South Africa thinking of it as a Western Ally and to attempt to cut the flow of strategic resources.


Gaddafi might try to make trouble in the Med.
 
First one would look to the various potential flash points, the USSR and PRC, India and Pakistan, North and South Korea, each armed with nuclear weapons and having past conflict and ongoing antagonism, then you have Israel and South Africa, both nuclear armed and surrounded by real and/or perceived enemies, some of whom possessed chemical or biological weaponry in response, who might use their weapons to stave off national extinction. Then one needs to consider whether the conflict and use of nuclear weapons would escalate to a global conflict.

Admittedly any of these potential regional wars even using nuclear weapons does not automatically equate to WWIII. For example if Pakistan used its limited arsenal versus India and India retaliated when a war flared up and the conventional stage was going that badly that Pakistan felt it was the option of last resort then you have a few major cities destroyed, mass casualties and loss of life, world outrage and likely little else. The USA and USSR, with the UN in the mix, would likely be working to contain this and it seems a stretch that these powers would go to blows over a regional squabble. We say this play out during Yom Kippur as both sides pressured their antagonist to back down from going nuclear or forcing that as an option. What you need is a regional war to burn out of control and necessitate super power involvement so they begin banging into each other. Think a Korea-war scenario with Soviet troops or aircraft in support, NATO on full alert as USA has its troops in combat, it only takes a misstep to get that spiraling up to full scale conflict with Lemay ticking off targets under mushroom clouds, thus the reason the USA treaded carefully and the USSR played proxy war from that time forward.

The last scenario is a rogue actor, say a nuclear Iran, and I suggest the most dangerous would be it using a bomb in a terrorist attack against the USSR. While the USA would obviously retaliate, the cold-war USSR was far less restrained, they might burn them to ash in response and if things were already heated, say at the height of the Iran-Iraq War with the western powers playing 55 Days of Peking with ships everywhere, then one might get a stumble towards the brink. Spin the scenarios from there and you might get a WWIII begun outside Europe. Good luck storming the castle!
 

James G

Gone Fishin'
World War III scenarios focus mostly on Europe and the North Atlantic, while paying little attention to events elsewhere. Even the Pacific doesn't receive much attention, despite the significant American presence in the region. What would the war be like in places such as the Middle East and the Pacific, especially during the conventional phase? Would any major non-aligned states side with the superpowers during the war, or even fight separate conflicts?

I tried this in my WW3 TL with Cuba attacking the United States and South Africa attacking Cuban-aligned Angola and other southern African states. In addition, I had plenty of focus upon the Far East.
However, Europe was always where a WW3 would be fought between the East and the West.
In my current three-part new WW3 TL I have plans for the third part to have a focus in the Middle East - Israel vs the Arab States -, in Central Asia with Pakistan moving into Afghanistan, Cuba striking in Central America and action in the Far East. Yet, once again the main part of the war will be in Europe.
That was where the focus will always be for Western writers of warfic, I guess.
 
By the 1980s, the Soviets had a huge fleet in the Pacific. So there would have been a large naval battle there. Korea is an obvious hot spot.

You have to figure there's a lot of game theory that's going to occur here, not unlike what Turkey and Italy did at the opening stages of WWI. Who do I back and how? If you get it wrong, you have big problems. "The War that Never Was" had Libya as a significant front. Does Qaddafi back the Soviets to the point of fighting? What about Syria? Iran's role changes dramatically pre and post revolution. Pre-revolution, the Soviets would probably have to invade if only to protect their flank. After the revolution, it might be more of a depends.

Cuba and Nicaragua have interesting potential but probably requires some set up as the US would have an interest in protecting the Western Hemisphere. So, to be more than anything of a sideshow or distraction, the Soviets would probably have to place some assets.

The Soviets had a big fleet in the Eastern Med in 1973 during the Yom Kippur war. But, again, they would have to preposition it because generally it was a much smaller force and if the fighting starts first, they would have to pass obvious bottlenecks (Bosphorus most obvious but possibly Denmark or North Atlantic) to build up a presence. The Suez is a likely target if only to close it off to shipping. Same with the Panama Canal although that is a bit more difficult for the Soviets to reach.

Vietnam could be interesting in the late 70s and early 80s given its ability to launch operations at Singapore, Philippine etc.

IIRC, the Soviets had a base at Socotra, which offers an opportunity to close off the Red Sea and threaten the Persian Gulf. That would have to be neutralized by the West.

The key issue is what assets could/would the Soviets deploy in advance. Because without a buildup, they either can be neutralized quickly or dealt with on a small scale.

Does India take advantage to press their interests in the Kashmir, China and Taiwan, etc?

I think opportunistic action would likely be somewhat tempered. The nuclear overhang would likely limit opportunistic action for fear of getting caught up in an exchange simply because they went to war.

China joining the West against the Soviets is a massive wildcard often underappreciated. Although, there is a good chance the Soviets might launch on entry given the difficulties they would immediately face.
 
a few years ago. giobastia did a HUGE WW3 timeline (2012-13) set in 1983, which included korea, africa, and middle eastern fronts, though China was neutral.
 
trie. China was neutral, then was decapitated late in the war in a geneocidal nuke attack. never really *involved*, just killed.
 
trie. China was neutral, then was decapitated late in the war in a geneocidal nuke attack. never really *involved*, just killed.

That was a decent TL although IIRC his nuclear targeting was a little wacky. San Francisco and San Diego had minimum damage despite Alameda NAS being hit and San Diego, well just a minor base there.
 
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