AN: Edited by Gremlin Jack, perfect_shade, and Nla Eid.

The story post on the spacebattles forum has the maps showing the movements and positions of forces.

1943, December 12th, somewhere in the Alps:

Visha and I were watching a "behind enemy lines" exercise using a map with projections on it. A dozen academy students were somewhere in the mountains or forests. Their objective was to find the hideout of the OPFOR's leadership, capture or eliminate them, and then leave the area while losing any pursuing forces. Up against them as OPFOR were other mages who were either also in stealth mode or conducting aerial patrol, and some light infantry patrolling the area on foot. The only major rule was that everyone was to have an emitting radio transmitter so that Koenig and the other instructors could monitor the situation, and that the participants were not to use the emitting radio transmitter signals to track others.

"I've heard that you were a huge fan of helicopters because it would put aerial mages out of work." Koenig said in the midst of us monitoring a minor skirmish between the two parties. I turned and looked at him with a raised eyebrow, not really having expected him to start a conversation mid-exercise, but I then figure that the skirmish that we're on top of is coming to a close anyway.

"Mhm." I hummed in agreement, "Which means all of the mages would have to go through your training and become special operators." I responded.

"Which means more work piled onto me." He pointed out.

"If you train competent successors, they'll do the work for you." I shot back.

Visha momentarily tilts her head to the side in thought. "So... is that why you trained the 203rd mage battalion so hard?" She remarked with a giggle, which also elicited a chuckle from Koenig.

I glared at her while she was smirking. This is the problem with having a too powerful and competent subordinate that is also bold enough to undercut their superior. And combined with them being in a relationship with said superior... now that's a HR manager's nightmare.

Though said nightmare isn't too bad...

I hedge a response with a shrug, "I don't know, maybe I was planning to retire and let one of you run the 203rd mage battalion."

"The Chancellor retiring early?" Koenig laughed. "That's a good joke."

I roll my eyes, of course the crazy warmongers under my command can't comprehend the concept of a peaceful life. "On a side note, I've read Elya's reports about your activity in the new republics," I say, steering the conversation back to business, "but I wanted to hear from you about the cat and mouse games."

Koenig nods and returns his eyes back to the moving projections. "It was... interesting... the experience of never being sure of if I was being hunted while I was hunting. Or if the locals I was working with had other plans in mind. And when sometimes an allied faction hates another allied faction just as much as the communists. It takes an entirely different skill set than what I had even previously taught."

I absently hummed in acknowledgement. "I've heard the CSR's Sibyrian Army had adapted rather quickly after their first winter in Sibyria." I said, to which Koenig nods in affirmation.

"Yes they have. I watched one OZEV patrol initially have the upper hand in combat against some insurgents. Then the CSR mages ended the existence of the entire patrol group with explosive spells, and after that went back to blending in with the insurgents. If I wasn't watching that insurgent group, I wouldn't have known which person was a mage. And the CSR operatives, both mage and regular infantry, are quite persistent with tracking, as if they're starving hunters after the only deer in the woods."

"Well they hunted people for food to avoid starving during the winter, didn't they?."

Koenig nods again, "And that's probably where they got their tracking skills from. Thankfully I didn't see them practice cannibalism in the new republics. Probably because they were counting on the rest of the world to ignore the anti-CSR Rus factions' complaints about war crimes after what the Russy Federation did in the Second Europan War."

"What about the NKVD mages?" I asked.

"Less subtle for certain. Very aggressive with leading attacks against OZEV forces and our allies. Generally when there's a hostile aerial mage flying in the area, it's almost always the NKVD. Sometimes what the communists would do is have the NKVD mages cause a distraction while the CSR mages quietly get into position. Oh, it looks like the students found something."

I snapped back to looking at the projection and noticed that they were splitting up to surround a cave entrance.

Two of them entered the cave. Suddenly there was a burst of magic from the cave.

"What is going on?" I asked.

"...I think they forgot to check for traps." Koenig shrugged.

The OPFOR aerial mages all started to converge on the cave location, while the other OPFOR mages in stealth mode and the regular infantry started moving on foot to get into overwatch positions.

One of the instructors called out, "They killed the OPFOR leadership."

"I wonder if they'll get out alive though?" I posed the question before humming in thought, "Hmm.. would you mind if I go out there to watch the exercise in person?"

Koenig looked at me for a short while, "...Just grab one of the instructor jackets so they know you're just watching." He eventually said, "Those students would have a heart attack if they thought you were one of the OPFOR mages."

"I think they would have a heart attack anyways from just her being there to watch their performance personally." Visha added, her tone amused.

As I arrived at the area where the cave was located, I noticed the firefight had already started between the students and the OPFOR aerial students weren't actually that bad with combat, but I quickly noticed that the OPFOR mages were merely harassing them instead of trying to win the fight. I hope those students realize that every second they waste, that just gives the other OPFOR people to close in.

The students eventually got moving, but then they started taking fire from the ground forces that had taken up ambush positions which caused some "casualties". The OPFOR aerial mages resumed attacking now that they had ground support and the students were distracted.

In the aftermath, only a few of the students escaped, with many others being "killed" or captured. I flew back to the instructors' post to meet up with Koenig and Visha again.

When Koenig had the students all gathered up for him to ask what their thoughts were and to run through everything that the instructors observed, they all froze when they saw me and Visha walk in. Koenig, sensing an opportunity, then used this moment to turn to me and ask: "What did you think of their performance, Chancellor?"

I saw some of the students blanch at Koenig's words, which had me smirking internally in amusement. But I had wanted to address something else to the students and so took mercy and dismissed Koenig's question with a wave of my hand.

"I'll let the instructors focus on the tactics. I wanted to tell you all about the big picture of why we are doing the special operations training." I replied before putting my hands behind my back and turning to face the students fully. I take a second to look them over, which got me a bit nostalgic of the moment I first laid eyes upon the newly-formed 203rd, before speaking:

"We are approaching an era where proxy wars and insurgencies will become the more common conflicts compared to the direct state versus state conflicts. Where plausible deniability is a major factor in operations. The colonies that the Allied Kingdom, Francois Republic, Unified States, Lothiern and Ispangna still hold onto will become the next battlegrounds for other countries fighting for influence. We already saw the Rus carve out a sphere of influence out of the Allied Kingdom's crown jewel followed by the CSR backing them in an attempt to take the rest of Bharat. And the CSR also has Afghanistan and Burma under their sphere of influence. The CSR and their allies will not stop trying to expand their influence into continents such as the Middle East and Africa, and we will need a way to counter this spread of influence."

I take a moment to breathe, and to let my words sink into the students before continuing:

"You will be a part of that counter; as the hammer to strike down our foes, and as the dagger to hit them where they least expect it. Out in the field, you will have to face situations that you haven't trained for, couldn't have trained for, and will have to think on your feet in order to survive and overcome. You will also be going up against CSR infantry and mages that are experienced and hardened by their brutal winter war in Sibyria against hostile Rus factions. Such an enemy must not be taken lightly."

I paused for a second, and then decided to finish my speech by addressing a matter that I think is important for the soldiers who will one day be granted much autonomy to know: "And speaking of the enemy, I am sure all of you have heard or read about the atrocities and war crimes perpetrated in the Bharati war. I want to make it clear that I do not want that." I sweep my eyes across the audience in order to emphasize my point. "You must not tarnish Germania's reputation with war crimes. If it's life or death, then go for the option that ensures your survival - You can't help others if you're dead, after all. But do not take such trust, and do not make such a decision lightly - you will be held accountable."

I then take a breath, now comes the part that's easy to say, but very much hard to do. "But don't make the mistake of confusing your own survival with the success of the mission." I said with a shake of my head, "What we will do today and in the near future, needs to be something that Germania can be proud of for decades to come. Because if not, then I ask you this: Is it truly a victory if 50 years down the road we have to endlessly downplay, deny, or lie about what we did?"

I end my speech and let Koenig and his staff take the stage for their post-exercise analysis lecture. I cracked a smirk when Koenig said they will now be conducting a resistance to interrogation exercise due to the amount of them that were captured by the OPFOR, prompting a groan from the students.

He then asked if they wanted the Chancellor and the Deputy Chancellor to conduct 'remedial' training, which seemed to inspire Visha with a mischievous idea.

"Lieutenant Colonel Koenig, have you conducted any live fire artillery training?" She asked innocently.

I couldn't help but smile when the students all froze up, though them blanching even further is a bit much in my opinion, as with Visha's and my own slightly rusty skills, we'd have to settle on lighter exercises. Concentrate on survival tactics and some practical.

Mild stuff.

In München, later that evening:

We were walking down a busy nightlife street after having dinner at a restaurant when one particular nightclub caught our attention.

"Tanya, do you see something different about the crowd there?" Visha tugged on my arm.

It was a ladies' only establishment. Strange, there was a gentlemen's only establishment that we walked past several blocks earlier.

"Let's go over there. It's probably one of those establishments where the ladies don't want to deal with men looking for dates." she winked. "Let's take a look inside."

"Visha, there are plenty of other night clubs or pubs we can vis-" I was cut off as she tugged me into the nightclub.

When we stepped inside, it quickly became apparent that it was not what we were expecting. "Visha, this looks like a bit more than just a women's association meeting."

In the back of the bar, a band was getting ready for their next song.

She shrugged her shoulders. "It's fine, not like anyone is doing anything illegal. I can dance with my 'sister' and there is nothing wrong with having a bit of fun like that."

Visha continued to tug at me, this time towards the dance floor.

"I have no idea how to dance." I softly spoke.

"You mean you can't use some of your aerial combat and lacrosse maneuvers to improvise?" Visha said as she grasped me around my waist. I hasilty tried to figure out a way to translate aerial combat maneuvers to dance moves, but I shouldn't have worried about that since Visha took the lead. How did that saying go again? Never trust a man - or in this case a very beautiful woman - with a sword if they can't dance.

And Visha was a very good dancer.

It was fun for about half an hour. There were a few people that were watching us. I wasn't sure if it was in amazement, confusion, amusement, or a combination of the three. I didn't pay much attention until I heard some loud commotion at the front door.

"Police! We're taking this place!"

I looked around and saw two people on the dance floor flash their badges before barking orders. Looks like the police had been keeping an eye on this nightclub for a little while and decided to come down on it just as Visha and I were having our night.

Just my luck.

"What should we do?" Visha whispered worriedly.

"Head to the back of the wall, drop the disguise when no one is looking, and we will greet the police." I whispered back. She quickly nods in response.

Deputy Inspector Bruch entered the nightclub. He knew that while technically there were laws that prohibited such establishments and that while he had a dislike for queers, the Chancellor's and Deputy Chancellor's relationships being made public guaranteed that such laws would be increasingly difficult to enforce and eventually abolished. Nevertheless, the mayor of the city had pushed down hard on the chief of police to crack down on the queer friendly establishments.

An undercover officer came up to him, with a pale looking face.

Wolter was confused. "What's the matter? It looks like you just saw a ghost or something."

"Sir, you should come to the back of the dance floor area." the undercover officer shakily replied.

Now he was even more confused. Until he saw what the undercover officer was spooked by.

It was Chancellor-President Degurechaff and Deputy Chancellor Serebryakov. And they did not look happy. The last time he had the same dreaded feeling was when he had stumbled straight into a meeting between some major mob leaders and dirty police officers years ago.

He turned to the undercover officer. "Get the Inspector and Chief here. Now. This is way beyond my paygrade."

Visha and I watched the police officers and the rest of the nightclub attendants become unsure of what they should do. Some time passed before someone walked up to us and introduced themselves, with the inspector and deputy inspector somewhat behind him.

"Police Chief Wolter. May I ask what you two are doing here this evening?"

"Having fun dancing." Visha responded with a flat tone. Some of the color drained from the police chief's face.

"We're willing to let both of you just walk out of here." he responded with sweat on his face.

"And the rest?" I asked.

"We have to arrest them." he waved his hand at the rest of the people in the nightclub.

"For what?"

"Disturbing the peace. Noise complaints. Partaking in obscene behaviors. As for the nightclub, it is strictly prohibited by the city of München's law to allow queer behaviors."

The first three were just the classical rules lawyering. Completely amateur compared to some of the things I've done in the past. The last one was going to need a personal talk with the city's leaders. If Visha and I just walk out while everyone else gets arrested, it would still look incredibly bad on us. The police applying double standards and a nation's leaders taking advantage of that? Scandalous hypocrisy!

"Then you're going to have to arrest both of us." I put out my arms for him to handcuff me. "Or are you telling me that you only selectively apply the law as you see fit?"

Visha soon followed suit. The police chief was silent for a few long seconds as sweat continued to roll down his face. The inspector and deputy inspector took a few steps back.

I put down my arms. "Besides, we've been here for over half an hour before your men showed up." I spoke in a cheerful tone with a smile on my face. "Your undercover police officers could attest to that. I saw no signs of 'obscene behaviors' or 'disturbing the peace' that you speak of. Noise violation? What, do you just shut down every pub and restaurant because of someone's cranky phone call? I'm guessing you also shut down that gentleman's only club several blocks down the street as well didn't you?"

Visha nodded in agreement. The deputy inspector and inspector had an uncomfortable look on their face when I mentioned about the other nightclub that they had likely targeted.

The only way I can see out of this mess is to have a discussion with the police right here.

I motioned to one of the seats. "Police Chief Wolter, perhaps we should take a seat. I would like to hear about the orders you received. After all, I'm sure your superiors were at least aware of your big upcoming raids. And tell the rest of your men that all of the drinks are on me."

I could see the gears rapidly turn in his head. He looked back at his subordinates as if it seemed he was looking for advice from them, but they too were silent.

"I think we should get going. We have somewhere else to be. I apologize for the misunderstanding." the police chief said as he too began to take a step back.

I glared at him. He froze. "No, it would be best if we clear up the misunderstanding right here, right now."

Visha pointed at the front window. "Chancellor, I think I see one or two reporters out there."

"Well, go out there to greet them, and invite them to our table! Drinks on me!" I then turned my attention to the police chief, inspector and deputy inspector. "I insist that we have a discussion. After all, we wouldn't want more misunderstanding in the future, would we?"

1943, December 13th, in the Rajasthan province, at the Aravalli mountain range, west of Ajmer:

Georg Eschenbach knew it was just a dream. But it was too real, because it was essentially a replay of all of the atrocities that he had watched or played a role in, and he couldn't wake up to get out of it. The vision of the charred mother holding her child, accompanied by the screams, constantly occurred.

He jolted awake from the nightmare and in cold sweat. He looked around in his tent and took a deep breath before getting out of his sleeping bag to get dressed.

As he was walking to the galley tent for breakfast, he could see the defensive works that his platoon had been working on for over a week now. Digging into the rocky mountain slopes had been a slow and difficult process, especially since they also needed to build reinforcements to hold loose dirt and rocks in place so that a well placed artillery round or explosive magic bullet doesn't end up causing stone shrapnel to go flying everywhere.

A private in his platoon came up to him and asked, "Staff Sergeant, do you think we might just have to pack up and keep advancing north when the coalition breaks through Sukkur? After all, they did say we would be home by Christmas."

"Too early to say. All we can do is follow our current orders and hope that the higher ups know what they're doing. As for the 'home by Christmas' promise, that's from the other coalition partners. General Romel had already stated that we'll be here until the war is done."

After getting his breakfast and sitting down to begin eating, First Lieutenant Andrea sat next to him.

"Good morning sir."

"Good morning Staff Sergeant. Did you hear what the other coalition partners are doing?"

"Not yet I guess."

"Communists are slowly retreating from Rajasthan province."

"That's unexpected. They were putting up a stiff fight before we captured Ajmer."

"My guess is that they're probably afraid of being encircled with the other coalition forces sailing up the Indus River, and also capturing Delhi. Holding a mountainous desert area is questionable when our forces are at their capital's doorstep."

"I'm wondering why we aren't pursuing them like the rest of the coalition forces that decided to keep advancing forward. If those communist idiots are running, we shouldn't let them rest."

"Not even the battalion commander knows. All he said was we had explicit orders from the high ups to build defensive works."

Eschenbach winced. "Speaking of defensive works, I still can't shake the fucking nightmares from the bombing incident when we were dealing with the encircled communists back in South Bharat."

"Why are you still talking about that? You know the inquiry board had cleared us of all wrongdoing because we were acting on orders, had no way to determine how many civilians were in that fortress without risk getting ourselves detected, and it was the communists' fault for forcing entire families into the front line. I'm just glad they didn't outright use those civilians as bullet shields, because I've heard from some of my friends that they had to shoot through civilians to kill the communists."

Eschenbach stared at his food. Andrea put his hand on Eschenbach's shoulder. "I shouldn't have been that harsh. I'm sorry. It's a shit job. I hate this. But all we can do is make the best of this rotten situation and lead our men as best as we can."

"So what happens when the communists show up with a whole bunch of chained up civilians to march in front?" Eschenbach asked.

Andrea chewed on his food for a few seconds to think. After swallowing, he cleared his throat. "We can't save the civilians, because if we let the communists take our defensive positions, they will keep marching with those civilians until we're back into the ocean."

"I suppose there's no way to reason with people that have turned into monsters." Eschenbach remarked. "So what should we do then?"

"Stop them from using more civilians as shields, by killing them. Even if it means shooting through the civilians or calling in artillery and air strikes on them. When this war is over, we're going to hang the bastards that came up with the monstrous plans and ordered their men to do it. I would have been in favor of just executing them on sight, but that would discourage them from surrendering, and instead engage in drawn out last stands that get more of us and the civilians killed."

As they're walking out of the galley tent, they saw General Romel looking at their defensive works and gesturing to an aide.

"Why is he so interested in our defenses? Shouldn't he be leading an offensive?" Eschenbach asked.

"I have no idea." Andrea said.

At the southern outskirts of Sukkur, on the Indus River:

Miss Caldwell was no military expert, but she knew when things had gone very poorly. Just moments ago, she was asking someone a question when there were multiple large roars, everything was covered in water, and she was nearly swept overboard by the rocking of the barge and the waves of water. She was thankful that she had invested in an expensive waterproof bag to hold her cameras, films, notebooks and other materials.

The first trouble was when all of the sacrificial empty boats suddenly came to a stop. The main riverine fleet also stopped while waiting for their divers to investigate what was happening. When the divers came back, they reported that there were timbers driven vertically into the bed of the river, which caused all of the empty boats' nets to get tangled up, and would also block anything larger than the small attack craft from passing through. Then the explosions erupted from the bottom of the river.

And now the barge is sinking. All around her was strewn with sinking or burning boats, or fragments of them, and many people that were flailing in the water or motionless.

Seconds later, she heard another set of explosions some distance behind her just as the communists revealed themselves and opened fire on the stricken fleet. Bullets and shells splashed into the water every which way as she swam from one floating fragment to another. Aircraft roared overhead to suppress the communists' positions with rockets, bombs and strafing runs despite facing a significant amount of anti-air fire.

As she neared an intact barge, someone on board extended a pole into the water for her to grab onto. The pole snapped in half from a heavy caliber bullet slicing through it, but the person grabbed another pole to try again. Just as she was pulled aboard, she was about to thank him when his body ceased to exist from a large caliber shell that went through him and left a hole in the barge's armor.

After diving to the deck while holding her ears in pain, she noticed the barge was now moving backward. She opened up her bag, and tried to start the film camera, but it didn't work. She tried another one and was able to record the fierce firefight, while occasionally bullets pinged off of the barge's surface next to her. There was a nearby splash, and then an explosion in the water. She scanned the treeline and noticed that the communists had set up giant slingshots using trees to launch improvised explosives at the boats.

A rocket artillery barrage from a few of the barges caught her by surprise. Previously they would explode a few meters above the ground to rain shrapnel on the targets below. This time when they exploded in the air, the burning petroleum jelly that she was familiar with came raining down on the communist positions. And the rain was burning very brightly. She saw burning figures jump into the river, and loud crackling and popping was heard as bright light enveloped them, followed by clouds of steam and smoke.

She heard a loud explosion and turned her head and camera towards the source of the commotion. An adjacent barge was engulfed in flames from ammunition and fuel cooking off with people jumping overboard.

As the fleet continued to reverse, she watched a group of tanks charge through a group of howitzers that had been firing at the boats. She retrieved a camera from her bag and zoomed in, which she then noticed General Patton was leading one of the tanks. Using the zoomed in camera, she also identified enemy mage formations that appeared to be hauling entire anti-tank guns to reposition them.

About half an hour later, she saw the fragments of the rear of the fleet that the center section had pushed their way through to escape from the ambush.

1944, January 9th, at a mountain outpost south of Sehwān:

Smith was standing in his dugout and stared out in the cold darkness while trying to stave off boredom. He noticed a lit kerosene lamp approaching, and saw that it was Paul.

"It's been weeks and nothing has happened." Smith said. "It's like the communists that had retreated into the mountains just gave up on the war."

"Maybe they all ran to Sukkur to defend it." Paul said with a thick Frankish accent. "Some of those stories from capturing that city are just insane. The communists forced them to take every building with bullets and blood, sometimes with fighting happening on different levels or rooms within a building."

"And the rest of the city was burned to the ground instead of taking each building by force. When even the generals are getting wounded or killed, it's a bloodbath for sure. I've heard that General Patton got back into the frontline after recovering from injuries from his previous tank being blow up, and then hours later he was finally killed when a suicide bomber dove underneath his tank."

"Well they did call those 'Dare to Die' units for a reason."

"Home by Christmas. What a beautiful lie. And we barely took Sukkur as of now. Can you light up the kerosene lamp again?"

"I can't do that." Paul said. "We're short on lamp fuel."

"They're still funneling almost everything to Sukkur?"

"I guess so. I've heard there are battles raging on the three sides of the city. The communists want that city back. Whatever the hell for, the place is just rubble by now. Apparently some of the communists retreating from the Rajasthan province have also been attacking Sukkur from the east."

"Shh, did you hear that?"

They both heard a few rocks rolling. Paul lit his lamp.

"Should we go out there and search for whatever caused that noise?"

"It's probably some wild animals. I don't hear anything else." Paul said as he turned off the lamp again.

Another 20 minutes passed when Paul suddenly picked up his rifle and fired a shot. A figure suddenly went tumbling down and remained motionless. Just as Smith also picked up his rifle, three more figures emerged right in front of their dugout.

"They're right on top of us!" Smith screamed as the five people exchanged fire. The three soldiers went down, but Paul was left lying against the dugout wall holding a gunshot wound.

Just as Smith was about to consider helping his buddy, he saw many more outlines emerge from the terrain. Another coalition sentry opened up with their machine gun for a second before a magic bullet suddenly came flying out of the incoming infantry masses to silence the machine gun post with an explosive spell.

He picked up Paul and started running.

At a mountain outpost northwest of Karachi:

Edwards and his platoon mates were playing a round of poker. The area had been calm in the past few weeks with no signs of the enemy. Aerial reconnaissance further confirmed the lack of enemy sighting.

"Edwards, you're still writing to your Frankish sweetheart?"Jack called out.

Edward blushed a bit. "I got mail yesterday from her. Photos of her and her family's Christmas party."

"At least it's not her dating someone else!" Someone else laughed. "We need to see those photos!"

Edward ruffled through one of his pockets and handed the photos around. At least one person whistled upon seeing the photos.

"How did you two meet anyways?" someone asked.

"It's a very long story. Met at a university where she was studying abroad. Discovered we had a lot of shared interests. She knew a bit of Albish and I knew a bit of Frankish. I had trouble paying for tuition and with the call to arms, the military looked tempting. She said she supported my decision, especially if it's to help protect the free world from the communism menace."

John passed a photo to someone else before speaking, "I haven't heard back from my brother. The last letter I got was him complaining about his commander forcing pilots to chase the Rus planes into the mountain valleys. I hope he's doing okay."

Just as Edwards got his photos back, their staff sergeant walked in. Everyone stopped the game to look at him. "Private Jones is over 20 minutes late for watch turnover. No one knows where he is, so we're going to be searching for him."

Everyone grabbed their rifles and fanned out to begin the search. After about 15 minutes, Edwards felt a sense of unease while walking through one of the caves that they had previously dug out to incorporate into their outpost's defenses. He pointed his flashlight up at the cave ceiling and realized the source of his uneasiness that had been bothering him.

It was two people that attached themselves to the cave ceiling like spiders.

When he fired his rifle at the center mass of one of the enemy soldiers, what he expected was a crack of a rifle fire, the whizz of a bullet, spurt of blood, and a corpse falling from the ceiling to the ground. Instead, a magic shield flickered, the bullet deflected, and the sounds seemed muffled. Both of the ceiling crawling soldiers turned into a blur of erratic movement.

Four of his buddies, including Jack and the staff sergeant, just happen to walk in to investigate the commotion. He saw one of blurs descend upon them and the cave walls were quickly splattered with blood before the four men could fire a shot off.

He fired another shot as the other blur closed in on him, but still no effect.

It was the last time he felt fear.

In Berun:

I woke up early with Visha shaking me.

"Tanya, you need to get up. The coalition's Indus River offensive is on the verge of collapse, and aerial reconnaissance over the Himalayas has been stymied by Rus aircraft." She says as she places down a cup of coffee beside me. It sounds like I was going to need it.

I had been following the progress of the offensive and while they had their initial major setback and then the slow grind into the city, for it to suddenly go horribly wrong meant that the commies had sprung another surprise. And suddenly being blinded in an area means that there's also a surprise waiting for us. I immediately hopped out of bed. "Tell General Lergen and Elya to be ready in 30 minutes."

As Visha ran off, I downed the entire cup of coffee, took a quick shower and got dressed before heading to the meeting.

When I stepped into the room, Elya and General Lergen were already discussing something before they turned to me.

"What's the situation in Sukkur?" I asked.

Elya cleared her throat. "Other than aerial reconnaissance reports of a large number of possible CSR infantry being offloaded from trains that came from Quetta which would pin the coalition forces there in place, the real problem is further south of the city. Karachi has been surrounded with only the naval fire support deterring CSR forces from approaching the city. Sehwān has been completely overrun, with the last report stating that communist forces have also captured the mountains overlooking the Indus River. Hyderabad's garrison reported that their magic detectors suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree from contacts that were about 30 kilometers west of the city, and were soon attacked by a large number of CSR mages. Their forward outposts estimate that the enemy infantry would be arriving at the city in about two days based on the speed of their march now that they had revealed themselves. Also, until we get more information, we will have to assume that the CSR had captured at least some of the coalition's supply depots located along the river and maybe even docked boats or barges."

"Let me guess, they weren't detected until the last minute because the CSR Sibyrian Army was moving at night to avoid aerial reconnaissance and attacked at night? Just like the playbook they used against the hostile Rus factions?"

"That is correct, Chancellor."

"What about our aircraft to deal with their mages?"

"The Sibyrian Army's mages brought heavy equipment from the Rus, and are using them while in the air. They have also used them to great effect against the coalition's boats and barges on the Indus River." General Lergen responded.

"Oh?"

"Based on reports from our air force, the coalition air force and the Hyderabad's garrison, aerial crews of CSR mages are operating light machine guns, DShK heavy machine guns, and PTRS-41 14.5 millimeter anti-tank rifles. All of those are Russy equipment. They are also using magic ammunition with those weapons, which would explain why the uparmored barges were destroyed with ease. While those crews lack mobility, they have the firepower to establish mobile no-fly zones, threaten our mages and aircraft, and force our planes to launch their rockets from a further range. I'm still waiting on reports to see if their anti-tank rifles can outrange our rockets as they could use spells to increase the accuracy and range. They also have escorting mages with semi automatic rifles, submachine guns and shotguns."

"Since our ground forces are far away building the defensive lines, what does the coalition plan on doing?"

"General Romel stated that the forces in Sukkur were simply ordered to retreat south using the Indus River and fight their way back to Karachi."

"That's it?"

Elya spoke up. "They're more concerned about what has been happening over in Tibet. Previously they were able to get somewhat consistent aerial reconnaissance into that region. Rus aircraft that were probably built during the Second Europan War have shown up to put an end to the reconnaissance operations, and now there is also radio silence in that region. I think the CSR is using their Indus River counteroffensive as a diversion attack for a real one."

"I thought we had air superiority?"

"The Rus aircraft are only operating over Tibet and the Himalayas." General Lergen said. "That makes it risky to chase after them when they could dive down into the valleys and lead our aircraft into an anti-aircraft ambush."

I stared at the map for about a minute. "For the CSR's offensive in the Indus River area, have they brought anything more than just mages and infantry?"

"Their heaviest equipment for their infantry are some mortars, heavy machine guns and anti-tank rifles." Elya said.

My eyes wander to the country that the CSR troops traversed, "What does the road network look like in Afghanistan?"

"Bad enough that it would be difficult to get tanks through there." General Lergen responded.

"And we know that the CSR has modernized divisions using Rus vehicles and heavy equipment." I mutter out, "Would those be able to use the road networks in Tibet?"

Elya nodded, "Very likely. They've been improving them ever since the aerial reconnaissance began over Tibet."

I take a moment to organize my thoughts and put all the factors into perspective before speaking up:

"I think the CSR only split up their Sibyrian Army due to logistics considerations, so they will be fighting differently." I trace my finger along a line on the map, "Our defensive lines that are facing towards Tibet should be modified to take in consideration of an attack from a conventional army, while our other defensive lines facing the Indus River should be expecting mass infantry and mage assaults. The defensive lines around Delhi should be expecting a combination of both." I then look up to Lergen, "We will also need to tell the coalition that we have intel suggesting that the CSR will be fighting conventional warfare from Tibet with modernized divisions, and no more than that. If they reject our advice again, then that's their problem."

General Lergen nods before carefully putting out: "...Should we consider using nuclear weapons to preemptively destroy their logistics hubs and their divisions in Tibet before they commence their assault?" He asked. "It would ensure minimal civilian casualties while also crippling their military operations, instead of having to use the nuclear weapons in a more populated area."

...I wasn't sure if he was bloodlusted, or is unaware of the geopolitical nightmare from countries liberally using nuclear weapons in conventional warfare when they get theirs. I can't blame him for the second part as there hasn't been a Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing to set a nuclear weapons precedent. There was no way of knowing how the CSR might respond. Maybe they'll immediately surrender, but given the limited scale of the war, they would be relatively intact and free to eventually develop a nuclear weapons program to use for first strike capability the next time they get into a war. Or they may declare to the world "We have reserves" and continue fighting, especially if we try to enforce harsh peace terms on them, which would also set a horrible precedent.

"No," I shake my head and firmly give my decision, "We will only use nuclear weapons if Germania itself is threatened or someone uses the nuclear weapon on us first. Even if South Bharat entirely falls, it wouldn't be a direct threat to Germania."

I look at the two people in the room and see that they're both nodding in agreement, though it would seem like Lergen has his brows furrowed in frustration.

Time to steer this conversation towards something else. "What is the status of our jet fighters?"

"Fully operational and ready for combat." General Lergen replied, quickly shaking off his previous look, "We already started building the prototypes for the next generation jet planes."

I nod in approval, "It's time we send our jets over to Bharat to crush the communists' attempts at trying to contest our air superiority. I would have liked to have carrier based jets, but the ones we have should do the job."

I heard some rapid footsteps as I walked away from the meeting room and back to my office, and I turned around to see that Visha caught up with me.

"Are you going back to South Bharat?" she asked.

"There's no point." I said. "General Romel has specific orders to dig in and wait for the CSR to come to him, and there's no need for me to micromanage him. If I did need to, I would have found a more competent general to do the job. I would like to watch the commies uselessly throw their men into the meat grinder while all we do is expend our ammunition, but I can settle for the after action reports."

Visha nodded, though I caught a small sigh of relief there. "Would you like me to make you some mochi today?"

"...Are you trying to bribe the Chancellor?"

"Maybe." Visha teased.

"You know that's illegal right?"

She grins and leans forwards so that she can whisper directly beside my ear, "Then punish me~"

My brain stopped working and had to reboot for a second. I tried to ask 'what?' but all that came out of my mouth was an unintelligent "Guh…"

Visha giggled at me being flustered and then pinched my cheek, "I'll see you tonight!" she says before skipping off.

In Hyderabad along the Indus River:

Colonel Clark Puller was staring at a map while hearing the din of artillery fire trying to deter the communists from pouring into the city. He had been skirmishing against the communist forces that were retreating east from Rajasthan when the garrison in Hyderabad requested help. By the time his forces had arrived, the CSR mages had been driven off, but the garrison was a small fraction of itself. The main CSR army was right at the outskirts of the city and had already captured the University of Sindh that was under construction before the war broke out. With no other higher ranking commanders in the area after the CSR mages had wiped out the garrison's headquarters, he took command of all of the coalition forces in Hyderabad.

The original order was to hold the city while waiting for the main coalition forces to retreat from Sukkur along the Indus River.

With the news that the coalition divisions and battalions rallying towards Sehwān to retake it had been beaten back after realizing that there were more enemy infantry pouring into the area than they could literally kill, and are now retreating westward to reach the Germanian defensive lines in Rajasthan or north to link up with the main force at Sukkur, the garrison at Gharo had gone silent, Jungshahi has been encircled and the coalition forces are skirmishing against the CSR northwest of Thatta, he decided the original order was no longer feasible.

The question is, where could he retreat?

To the north, Sehwān is firmly in the communists' hands. To the east, the enemy forces in Rajasthan are likely digging in now that the trap has been sprung. With the rough terrain and poor road networks in that area, he would only have enough fuel to make it to the Germanian line if he only used light vehicles and thus abandon his tanks and other heavy assets. To the south, the enemy forces retreating from the Gujarat province were now marching towards the Indus River and most critically, all of the available boats were being used to move the wounded so the ships waiting at the mouth of the river could pick them up. Which meant his forces would have to march alongside the river. Unfortunately the roads south of Gharo and Thatta were not in a good condition either. And to the west, it would be a race against time to save Thatta, and then he would have to fight through Gharo to reach Karachi. At least the roads are actually paved for his tanks and other vehicles to use, and there was also a supply depot located between the Keenjhar Lake and Indus River, and another one at Jhirk that he might be able to get to assuming Thatta doesn't fall.

An aide ran up to him with a telegram. He read it and smiled.

The coalition navy had decided the simplest solution was to erase Gharo off the map with naval bombardments, allowing them to recapture the ruins of the town. They are now sending a rescue column to Thatta while using naval fire to suppress any attacks against Gharo.

He told the aide, "Instruct all of the forces in Hyderabad that we're heading for Thatta. And tell our boys in Thatta that we're coming to save them."

"Sir, we are surrounded."

He nods in agreement, "We've been looking for the enemy for some time now. We've finally found him. That simplifies things."

Back in Berun:

On my office desk was a newspaper from the Unified States and Anna's reports. It was the Unified States' streetcar conspiracy that initially came to my attention about a year ago.

How should I respond to this? Its public transit dismantling activities will become public. It's only a matter of time before someone starts digging to find how deep the rabbit hole goes, and the Volksauto will be dragged through that inevitable scandal. The interesting thing is that their competitors who survived the Great Depression and the onslaught of the cheap People's Cars were just as complicit, and also the various companies that would benefit from increased automotive sales such as tire manufacturers and oil companies.

Then there's this person named "Robert Mose" in New Amsterdam that has been a trailblazer for urban highway constructions. A newspaper article mentioned about the construction of a new park where the roads leading to the park and within the park all had overhead structures that made it impossible for streetcars and busses to get through, making the park accessible by car only. A proposal to build a train station at the park was strongly contested by him. He's also trying to scuttle a metro expansion project in favor of building more highways.

I'll need to tell Volksauto to cease their monopolistic practices, and to prepare to come out publicly to admit to wrongdoing while ensuring that the other auto companies are made to seem more guilty than them. I wonder if I should have Elya help out with that? And maybe also have Elya covertly support Robert Mose to boost automotive sales by encouraging more car-centric infrastructure?

But at the end of the day, as long as the Volksauto isn't outright banned, the company will recover. General Motors and other companies in my previous world continued to prosper until the OPEC oil crisis and the Japanese showing up with their cars. The Unified States is getting their suburban housing and highway construction boom going, and some of their cities have started planning for "urban renewal" projects that simply bulldoze portions of their downtown areas to build highways through them, so there's going to be a strong demand for cars for a few decades.

And that means I need to remain focused on securing a stable oil supply or alternative energy sources for OZEV, and encourage energy conservation before the Middle East starts having major instability. I expect the CSR to resume meddling with our new republics, especially Caucasia and Kazakh.

I heard the noise of the pneumatic tube system and the cylinder coming to a stop. It was recently installed overnight at the request of Visha, the only person I couldn't yell at for making unauthorized changes to my office. I'm not sure if her intention was to reduce the amount of interruptions from aides knocking on my office door to deliver a package, or if the pneumatic tube system was a backdoor way of shoving more paperwork onto me.

I opened up the package from the pneumatic cylinder and then looked at its contents. Interesting, I never expected to see a variation of the Plan 315 come back again. According to the BND's reports in the package, it seems the CSR is building railroads in Afghanistan and Burma to link North Bharat, Russy Confederation and themselves in a massive circular train track system, which would greatly support their logistics of waging war all across Asia. What a familiar experience from an unfamiliar perspective.

I looked at the map of Europe. The new republics were still using the Rus railroad track gauge so our trains couldn't directly travel to their country. There had been debates in the OZEV over if all of the railroad tracks in the new republics should be changed over to be compatible with OZEV, or leave them as is. Caucasia and Kazakh is completely inaccessible by railroad as any connecting rails run through the Russy Confederation territory.

I scratched my chin. I remembered the high speed rails in my previous life. For city to city travel, it was certainly more convenient than the Americans' method of either traveling by car or plane. It would sidestep the issue of incompatible track gauges as the high speed trains would need a new rail network because they would derail on many portions of the existing rail networks upon hitting a slightly too sharp curve. I would also be interested in having Legadonia Entente, Lothiern, Francois Republic, Waldstatten and Ispagna be partners with the high speed rail network. I just need to find someone that is working on high speed trains, and if not, put out a public bid for someone to try. Foreign or domestic, steam, diesel or electric, it doesn't matter.

I would also need to push for better public transportation infrastructure within cities, which would be essential to reducing OZEV's oil usage. The last thing I want is the American's fanatical love of cars and their willingness to destroy their own public transport infrastructure and cities to spread to Europe. I get that cars would be ideal for rural areas and faraway suburbs, but I've been to car-centric cities and seen their nightmares.

Hmm. I should probably create the Ministry of Energy to help manage all non-nuclear energy affairs. Once all of the major problems with the first generation of nuclear power plants are addressed, I could consider handing those over to the ministry for them to manage.

And speaking of alternative energy, I don't remember if there was any major development around the 1940's in my previous world, but it wouldn't hurt to have people check for those within OZEV and in other countries. I know for certain that wind power was still in significant use by farms that weren't connected to the electrical grid.

In the CSR:

"How many of these 'jet planes' are coming our way? Nearly 300?" Peng Dehuai asked out loud as he read the report that Kang Sheng was sharing with him.

"That's what the NKVD informats at the Aegyptus airport reported." Kang Sheng replied from where he's standing, "Those planes stopped for a refueling before continuing on. Unfortunately all we have are their words as of now because the pictures and recordings will take some time to arrive."

Peng Dehuai finds himself massaging his temples for what seems like the hundredth time this week. "What was the speed of those planes again?"

"Over 700 kilometers per hour, though it's probably higher as there's a big difference between cruising speed and maximum speed." He replies and then takes a seat with a sigh, "I spoke with the Rus air commander and he said that the number of jets is unlikely, and that at over 700 kilometers per hour is where the plane's maneuverability drops off significantly. Wang Ming reported that the Frankish naval advisors with carrier plane experience were skeptical of how well those jet planes would maneuver at such high speed. He also said Frankish agents operating in the Allied Kingdom have been monitoring their jet plane development, and the Allied Kingdom had many setbacks. If the Albish is struggling to build a single plane, I'm not sure how Germania could field that many operational jets. After all, the Albish should have good intelligence on Germania."

"Can we be certain that the informants at the airport aren't feeding us false information?" Peng Dehuai puts out, "They could be exaggerating how many jets are heading our way."

The other man shakes his head, "There's never a guarantee when it comes to intelligence operations, especially since we have no direct contact with the informants at the airport. I'm still investigating to determine how the coalition's counter-intelligence has been uprooting our efforts in Bharat."

"No point in spooking my subordinates in Bharat over some exaggerations then." Peng Dehuai pushed aside the report, favoring a change of topic that's less speculative."Anyways, how have the coalition forces been responding to our activity in Tibet?"

"They think our main attack is coming through Tibet as they have been building up forces along the Tibet front instead of sending them toward the Indus River region."

He nods, "Good. I'm having the Tibet front assault commence within a few days while our forces around the Indus River hold their positions or continue to put as much infantry as possible between the trapped coalition forces and the likely escape routes. Hopefully the Rus will finish converting their bombers into transport planes for us to use captured airfields to support our logistics effort, and I also hope that Li Kenong is ready for the drastically increased fuel usage from the tanks and planes."

"Hmm." Kang Sheng hums, "I should let you know that it would appear that the coalition has committed most of their reserves to the Tibet front so we can clean up the mess in the Indus River area."

Peng Dehuai acknowledges the information with a nod. "Speaking of reserves, do you have any idea what the Germanians are up to? None of our commanders in the Indus River area reported seeing them."

"All I know is that they seem to be most active in the rear areas." Kang marked the approximate locations of the known forces. "I'm not exactly sure what they are doing. Maybe they're acting as reserves and building up infrastructure for the coalition to deploy more vehicles, artillery, land aircraft and other assets that are a heavy strain on logistics. After the destruction of their riverine fleet in their initial offensive towards Sukkur, I wouldn't be surprised if they're pursuing a change of strategy. It's been hard to get intelligence in the past few months."

"Well if that's the case, we will need to knock out the coalition before they deploy a moving wall of steel to run down our light infantry and our far inferior modern units. Also, what's the situation with the possible religious strife in North Bharat?"

"The Chairman already told North Bharat's government that communism doesn't have to be strictly atheist and he would not tolerate a religious conflict on his doorstep, especially when we have a war to win. Then again, he doesn't mind using anything that hurts the European powers if it means keeping our country safe."

Peng Duhai hums, "Well, hopefully that doesn't come back and harm us."

AN:

The nightclub scene was based on Babylon Berlin's nightclub scene and the Stonewall riots.

CSR's movement tactics were based on real life PRC's Korean War movements: wiki/Korean_War#China_intervenes_(October_1950)

UN aerial reconnaissance had difficulty sighting PVA units in daytime, because their march and bivouac discipline minimized aerial detection.[227] The PVA marched "dark-to-dark" (19:00–03:00), and aerial camouflage (concealing soldiers, pack animals, and equipment) was deployed by 05:30. Meanwhile, daylight advance parties scouted for the next bivouac site. During daylight activity or marching, soldiers were to remain motionless if an aircraft appeared, until it flew away;[227] PVA officers were under order to shoot security violators. Such battlefield discipline allowed a three-division army to march the 460 km (286 mi) from An-tung, Manchuria, to the combat zone in some 19 days. Another division night-marched a circuitous mountain route, averaging 29 km (18 mi) daily for 18 days.[82]

To cover 2500 km, assuming an average of 24 km per day, it would take about 104 days to cover the distance. Assuming the corps and divisions closest to Afghanistan had their march started in early September and the farther away ones were assigned to build the roads and the railroad, that would give them about 100 days to be in position by early January.

Regarding the "Dare to Die" units: wiki/National_Revolutionary_Army#Dare_to_Die_Corps

A "dare to die corps" was effectively used against Japanese units at the Battle of Taierzhuang.[19][20][21][22][23][24] They used swords.[25][26]

Suicide bombing was also used against the Japanese.[27][28] A Chinese soldier detonated a grenade vest and killed 20 Japanese soldiers at Sihang Warehouse. Chinese troops strapped explosives like grenade packs or dynamite to their bodies and threw themselves under Japanese tanks to blow them up.[29] This tactic was used during the Battle of Shanghai, where a Chinese suicide bomber stopped a Japanese tank column by exploding himself beneath the lead tank,[30] and at the Battle of Taierzhuang where dynamite and grenades were strapped on by Chinese troops who rushed at Japanese tanks and blew themselves up.[31][32][33][34] In one incident at Taierzhuang, Chinese suicide bombers obliterated four Japanese tanks with grenade bundles.[35][36]

I'm assuming Germania's jet planes operating in South Bharat are using kerosene: wiki/De_Havilland_Goblin#Specifications_(D.H_Goblin_II_ _27)

Or on diesel or high octane aviation gasoline with oil mixed in: wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_262#Test_flights