WW III in 1983 - A war to save the Empire TL

(this is a rehash of a series of posts to s.h.w.i with slight modifications. I did not write it further back then, but I'm thinking about continuing it now as I have more time in my hands.)

NOTE: Some of the terminology might appear to be ideological, as I'm trying to write it from Soviet perspective.


I'll try to write a WW III in 1983 timeline. Yes, it's been done before, but not with focus on nuclear forces.. My basic POD is that Mr Andropov's liver lasts longer. The next step is to use him as a kind of deux ex machina to bring out what we want in this AH-site, a conflict scenario. How this could happen?

I'll assume that Mr Andropov in better condition will still be paranoid about possible Western surprise attack. (See Operation RYAN). Aside from this, by 1983 it is clear, although total collapse of Soviet economy is not in sight, it is clearly losing it's competitiveness. As Mr Andropov's OTL actions (campaign against corruption etc) prove, he clearly saw that this was not just a case of technical errors but also a case of somekind of odd (oh, how odd!) malaise in Soviet psyche.

Clearly the Union of Soviet Socialistic Republics is threatened on multiple fronts, on military front in which the threat of nuclear attack is acute and will increase dramatically in 1984. This is due to multiple developments, including Trident missiles which can be launched from points beyond Soviet satellite coverage, ALCM's and GLCM's which can use the gaps in Soviet Air Defense and finally due to Pershing IRBM's which can be used for "super-swift" first strike.

To make sure that first strike will succeed, Mr Reagan is proposing the Star Wars program to eliminate threat from those Soviet missiles which probably survive the first strike. As capitalist countries are inherently evil and Soviet military machine weaker than it seems, it's clear that they might attack, perhaps masquerading some kind of Mainila shots, erm, Gleiwitz radio station incidents, first to provoke anti-Soviet feelings and finally as casus belli.

The long term prospects for Soviet Empire do not look good at all. Even if oil prices stay high, the oil production will be smaller in the near future. The economy has missed the train of electronics revolution. The reliability of Eastern European vassals, erm, allies, is in doubt due to corruptive Western influences. In case of a large scale unrest in Eastern Europe it's doubtful whether Soviet Army can be used.

Thus, a way must be found to cure Soviet society of its malaise while diminishing the gap between Soviet and Western industries and making the Soviet Empire strong enough to last as a thousand years empire. Now, to use a possibly nuclear conflict to strengthen economic situation and to "cure" a nation may not sound like a good idea, but as we know, it has bee used before. For Andropov, a good example might be the Great Patriotic War, during which the Empire was spiritially united and territorially expanded, gained much respect and technological modernization. Additionally, a war would justify repression upon population on larger scale.

Now, our deux-ex-machina Andropov must gain allies, as he's not Stalin and cannot start on course to a war by himself. My solution is that he allies himself with Marshal Ustinov (Minister of Defense, yes, Soviet Union had Minister of Defense) and Marshal Sokolov (Deputy Minister of Defense). As for provoking mentality for a war, Soviet Union already was a militarized state and especially in 1983 the war propaganda was overflowing.

Part 2 - OPPLAN Morskoi Lev

EYES ONLY
From: Minister of Defense
To: Chairman of Politburo

Operational Plan Morskoi Lev - Updated as of 24 November 1983

Introduction

In general, we have overhauled our contingency plans as the older plans have been compromised by actions of enemy spies and signals intelligence, particularly by Colonel Kuklinski and American pirate submarines operating under code-name Ivy Bells.

As you know, we have a strategic warning of a impending enemy attack upon our country. It is a our legitimate right to take the appropriate action against threatening enemy forces. In any military operation there's the payoff between surprise and better correlation of forces. In case of defensive counter-attack against enemy forces, it is more important to pay attention into surprise, as succesful surprise start of the operation pays dividends in elimination of enemy weapons of mass destruction, principally nuclear weapons. As an practical example we might cite the Zionist forces in 1967 War.

While the correlation of conventional forces is favorable for us initially, although marginally, we cannot be sure of the stability of the rear within our Eastern European Allies for any length of time, which turns the correlation of conventional forces into our disadvantage.

Some of the plans tested suggested a conventional phase prior to deployment of tactical and theater nuclear weapons but this was to our disadvantage. With massive use of our chemical weapons and tactical and theater nuclear forces we can turn the correlation of conventional forces to our favour, with only using national forces, while similarly eliminating most of the enemy tactical and theater nuclear capabilities. Possible enemy retaliation against our theater nuclear operation will mostly fall upon our allies and thus be of our advantage, as it will motivate them to fight and instill anti-NATO feelings upon populace.

In surprise attack of this scale it is of utmost importance that the preparations remains secure and signal traffic before operation is not compromised. Thus we need preparation time of two weeks during which we can make the necessary preparations without alarming enemy intelligence capabilities. I also suggest that we make the attack during time when Western forces have their holiday period and our forces are still in duty. Thus I suggest that we make our move on 25 December 1983, the Western christmas period, which is also a Sunday.

For nuclear weapons, our new generation weapons such as SS-20 and SS-21 present opportunity to surgically eliminate NATO targets without much collateral damage. It must be also remembered that winter time is the most suitable time for employment of nuclear weapons without much collateral damage.

After this preliminary briefing, I will present you the operational plan Morskoi Lev. One condition which is not discussed in opplan is the stability of the rear which will be under political guidance.

Due to strict timing in a operation like this without co-operation between operations to create stability and actual military operation will be crucial.


OPPLAN MORSKOI LEV

1.) The purpose of the operation is to eliminate threat against Warsaw Pact and Soviet Union by dismantling NATO and eliminating offensive capabilities of the United States and China in Asia.

2.) Purpose of the operation will be achieved by meeting following
objectives:

-Elimination of NATO offensive capabilities in Europe via political
means in France, conventional means in UK and primarily by nuclear means
in rest of the Europe.
-Elimination of US offensive capabilities worldwide outside US
territory
-Protection of own naval strategic offensive capabilities
-Preparation to eliminate Chinese and US strategic offensive
capabilities if deemed necessary
-Physical occupation of West Germany, Benelux Countries and Denmark
-Physical occupation of Northern Italy
-Forcing Norway, UK, France, Greece, Turkey and Spain into
neutrality
-Forcing Japan into neutrality
-Forcing China into neutrality

3.) Objectives will be met by following measures..
 
25 December 1983

The operation Morskoi Lev started with a subtleness of a sealion.

The first and almost only warning of Soviet strike was the stand-down of the Pact radar equipment just before H-hour. The Soviet initial strike was carried out according to plans and was mostly succesfull. Within period of some twenty minutes most of the NATO's theater firepower was evaporated. All NATO airbases known to host nuclear weapons were hit by nuclear weapons alongside with a number of US Army bases known to host tactical nuclear weapons. Air defense sites were hit by low-kiloton weapons. Within one hour most important targets were hit again by chemical weapons warheads spraying Sarin over airbase crews frantically trying to repair damage.

With total of roughly one hundred targets in Benelux-countries, Western Germany, Spain, Italy and Turkey some 500 nuclear warheads totalling almost 50 megatons were exploded. With exception of a few low-yield warheads all of them were airbursts.

In Mediterranean the task to eliminate US Navy carrier groups was easier than expected, thanks to carrier battle groups of USS John F Kennedy and USS Independence being tied to support US troops in Lebanon. USS Independence was vaporized by nuclear torpedo, while USS John F Kennedy escaped only with damage just to be finished by lucky shot of three 150kt warheads from a specially tasked SS-20.

In United Kingdom a number of nuclear targets were hit by cruise missiles and special forces.

Numerous high-yield nuclear weapons were exploded in airbursts over sea within vicinity of some of the major Japanese population centers.

Within hours a massive panic started to hit United States as well as most of the countries even not targeted by the strike. After seeing "The Day After" or "Testament" just weeks ago, with many seeing both films, the general public had no illusions about realities of a nuclear war.

One hour after the attack SACEUR General Rogers was wondering why SHAPE Headquarters at Mons, Belgium had not been hit while assessing the damage. By now reports from emergency tropospheric scatter radios were coming in and were assessed in deep dug headquarters. There were some cases of mental incapacitation, but mostly people were doing their tasks as drilled inside headquarters.

What Rogers had left, in terms of nuclear firepower, was one Poseidon equipped submarine and undoubtely some low yield tactical nuclear weapons. Additionally the special forces strike on RAF Fairford had failed and ten nuclear armed F-111's were up in the air orbiting and waiting for orders.
 
Sorry, but I find this is very ASB. The Soviets wiping out basically out all NATO forces in Europe with NATO even noticing it? And every nuke hitting?! I fail to believe that every nuke would actually detonate like planned. Sorry, but this is just a Sovietwank...

Also, you know what will happen now: with NATO forces in Europe crippled, the US will probably unleash it's ICBMs and reduce the Soviet Union into radioactive rubble...
 
At the first launch massive retaliation took place and poor old Andropov doesn't have to worry about liver problems ever again . Especially as the US isn't going to let it Allies go down without some payback. As Sovwank and unrealistic it's worth some giggles. But not even the USSR was dumb enough to think a Nuclear War had any winners.
 
At the first launch massive retaliation took place and poor old Andropov doesn't have to worry about liver problems ever again . Especially as the US isn't going to let it Allies go down without some payback. As Sovwank and unrealistic it's worth some giggles. But not even the USSR was dumb enough to think a Nuclear War had any winners.

Umm, no. It's hard to see a full fledged retaliatory strike starting before multiple inbound missiles towards the US would have been confirmed. Besides, considering time, Christmas, many key personnel would be away so mr. Reagan would wait before committing himself to acts which would have grave consequences for all the humanity. All out launch in payback isn't likely, rather an escalatory curve will possibly occur.

I wrote purposefully the third segment in rather fragmentary fashion. By this point only one thing is clear for NATO and US leadership: a theater wide nuclear war is a reality. All the rest is in fog, as assessing damage has not happened yet. Within one hour, perhaps, NATO political leadership can start to assess situation and start to negotiate through special communications links. Before political decisions will be made probably no emergency strike plan will be executed. Besides, most of the resources to make it are gone.
I can write it more in detail. As for dear Emperor, sure, there's failures, mishaps, etc. but none yet to manifest true divergences.

Besides, my idea is not to create a Soviet victory scenario but to see how this would ultimately play out. What I'm trying to write is how to see situation out of the Soviet context. Soviet doctrine included launching of pre-emptive strike in case there was strategic warning from enemy intentions. In OTL Soviet leadership was very concerned in Autumn 1983 and launched a special intelligence project RYAN to see if there was real strategic warning. In this ATL the strategic warning has been confirmed, and it's time to play out the cards before Western cards with superior first-strike weapons (GLCM, Pershing II and Trident together with stealth fighters with B-61's) come out to the playground.

Next post will be assesment by NATO and US political leadership.
 
There's a serious catch with this: there is very little left now on the escalatory curve, given the magnitude of the Soviet first strike. Like I said, with NATO's forces in Europe crippled, the only thing really left now for the US is to resort to the use of ICBMs, and than you have basically what Billy the Axe said, Andropov will never again suffer of liver problems...
 
Jukra I wargame scenario's at the Puzzle Palace for a living any launch Theater or Strategic gets roughly the same response in the 80's. Today is different the response would be measured, But I can't imagine any situation where a Soviet 1st strike doesn't mean massive retaliation just to get the ICBM's out of there silo's before there destroyed. It runs counter to doctrine and good sense.
 
Jukra I wargame scenario's at the Puzzle Palace for a living any launch Theater or Strategic gets roughly the same response in the 80's. Today is different the response would be measured, But I can't imagine any situation where a Soviet 1st strike doesn't mean massive retaliation just to get the ICBM's out of there silo's before there destroyed. It runs counter to doctrine and good sense.

Well, as a hobbyist I work just with public sources (some declassified) from the era. But reading from various studies of the era there were many times that launches were detected by DSP satellites but still no immediate US launch occurred. There were even times that an exercise file was set into NORAD computer but the crew still took care to measure whether the threat was real or not. In this hypothetical situation launches can be detected by DSP satellite, but not confirmed by OTH radars which would analyze the incoming intercontinental strike. The first thing to do would be to verify whether these launches - not coming from ICBM fields or sub patrol areas - would be real or not.

Fylingdales et al could classify that the tracks heading for Germany, Benelux countries and Italy. After that there's the DSP satellites detecting nuclear explosions in continental Europe.

I find it hard to believe that in light of Cuban Missile Crisis experience and Carter pressing for even more options in nuclear exchanges the US President would simply unleash all of his forces in a swift terrible strike, if no threat towards continental US had been detected yet, strategic comms links are still working, early warning systems are still working. There would be time to think before acting. I'm sure your point is very well founded, though.
 
Jukra

I think it would be very, very difficult to prevent things [FONT=&quot]escalating [/FONT]drastically, especially given the nature and size of the Soviet 1st strike. They have just murdered several million, possibly tens of millions of people and broken the nuclear taboo. This includes nuclear strikes on US targets and a lot of dead Americans.

One other issue. What does the SU do if say a dozen SLBMs hit Soviet military targets, including say the naval bases at Murmansk?

The worrying thing is that, from what I read of Soviet military policy in the 80's, they did often think the way Jukra is suggesting. So if the balloon does go up, even with a period of conventional conflict, things would get very, very hairy. Furthermore someone mentioned the idea of the Soviet politicians restraining the Red Army. I remember reading that at one of the Arms Control meetings the Soviet politicians involved privately thanked the western delegates for supply them with information their own army kept secret from them!

Steve
 
Jukra its all good, And as you suggest the USSR did contemplate several similar scenario's, But the guys who really run the place( Field Grade Officers) obfuscated the facts to deter adventurism by the Party. I've seen some pretty scary Intelligence Findings from the 80's when I briefed in we came real close a couple of times but cooler heads prevailed. In your scenario unfortunately, The British Counter-Strike force isn't taken into account, A SSBN is constanly on patrol, And any attack even non-Nuclear on UK Nuclear Forces coupled with the Nuclear attack on the BAOR spells 144 multi-kiloton mushrooms on Pact targets regadless of US response.
 
I think it would be very, very difficult to prevent things [FONT=&quot]escalating [/FONT]drastically, especially given the nature and size of the Soviet 1st strike. They have just murdered several million, possibly tens of millions of people and broken the nuclear taboo. This includes nuclear strikes on US targets and a lot of dead Americans.

Actually we're not in million killing business yet. Storage of tactical and theater nuclear weapons was very concentrated, mainly in air bases. Of gravity bombs, they were stockpiled in 1983 around 28 sites, of which 6 were located in United Kingdom. Five Pershing battalions were located in five separate locations and additionally QRA missiles were located at separate (known in peacetime) QRA spots. 100 sites to be struck is a very rough estimate, but fairly realistic I would guess. Many targets would be bonus targets in sense that many conventional forces would be eliminated during the process.

Primary weapon used in operation are SS-20 missiles, solid fuel missiles which can be readied without anyone noticing in time with three 150kt warheads.

Let's take a case study of now popular Ryanair hub, Hahn Air base, in 1983 home of USAF 50th Tactical Fighter Wing. Like most of the airbases, even in crowded Western Germany, it's in comparatively remote location. A 150kt nuke, according to

http://www.fourmilab.ch/bombcalc/

creates 3 psi damage (enough to collapse residential buildings) within 5km radius. In case of Hahn Air Base this means under 10 000 civilians within this area. Moreover, most of the people within this radius will not die, or even suffer incurable injuries.

If one takes a look at other targeted airbases, such as Florennes, Belgium, Ramstein, Germany and Aviano, Italy, you can see the pattern.

Moreover, as it's winter, there's much less collateral damage than during summertime for several reasons. First, immediate heat effects are much lower as snow reflects and furthermore absorbs an enormous amount of heat. No firestorms either due to snow and moisture.

Second is that fallout is much less of a concern, as livestock is inside and fallout will be falling mostly on snow and thus decays naturally before springtime comes and it will be absorbed to the ground.

Outside perhaps ordering Emergency Strike Plan, most of whose assets are gone, there will have to be somekind of assesment to be done before next step as there always has to be reserve.
 
There are going to be millions of casualties... not from the nuclear bombs(that would only account for a couple hundred thousand casualties given the kinds of weapons your using), but from the chemical weapons. Nerve gas(particularly the main kind used by the Soviets, Gabon) is highly persistant, highly lethal to unprotected personnel, and can be carried very far away. Furthermore, Soviet literature calls for dosage amounts FAR in excess of the lethal dose limit.

Short run? 1,000,000-2,000,000 casualties in the course of a day as the nerve gas spreads into the cities.

The long run? We are talking about 10,000,000+ casualties in Germany(yes, BOTH Germanies) alone over the course of a few months. Regardless of being in or out doors.
 
Jukra

I suggest you think about what you just said. 3x150kt warheads, is a hell of a lot of firepower. Even if they were all accurately delivered, in a region as heavily populated as western Europe that is going to cause no end of devastation and destruction. Don't forget the two Japan bombs were only 15-20kt so a single SS-20 will cause immeasurably greater destruction, even if targeted at a low density population area. Your talking about a hundred such attacks. Even presuming no missiles off target that's going to cause a hell of a lot of casualties, both directly and through the destruction of facilities. Then as ON says you have massed chemical attacks and presumably a firepower heavy Red Army charging westwards.

Just had another nasty thought. A series of nuclear attacks on US military targets off Lebanon. Wondering what's going through the minds of people in Tel Aviv and also various neighbouring states.

Steve
 
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