AN: Credits to Vasilisa, perfect_shade, Readhead and BrettFires for feedback and revisions.
This chapter's title was inspired by the "Trouble in Terrorist Town" video game.
geo_113 created an excellent map in the Space Battle story thread (under the media section) showing the factions, their allies and their relations for a 1953 WW3: threads/the-cold-war-youjo-senki-saga-of-tanya-the-evil.948007/page-217#post-94163800
I also created a map of the railroads running through the Russy Confederation to the CSR and Afghanistan, which will be important for following along. Because FF doesn't allow direct images or image links, they are only available in my story thread on Space Battle.
1953 July 25th, at Nanjing:
"Yes, and Li was smart enough to leave a small number of his forces in the areas we were searching to keep us distracted while he was making his moves across the continent." Kang noisily set down his cup of green tea, spilling some of it. "The worst of it is that Li was actually invited in by the Rus, so we can't officially object. What also concerns me is that Loria provided us no warning of Pisarev's impending death. I would have helped Pisarev if I had known just how precarious his domestic political situation was and who was going to be replacing him. Going forward, we can't trust the NKVD. I'm worried that we know nothing about Li's new plans or what the new General Secretary Vannikov will be doing. I was confused by Vannikov's question of what my plans are for eastern Europe. I had no plans and he should inform me on his foreign policy plans, so I saw no need to respond."
"Could they be plotting to invade us?" Luo asked, raising a concerned eyebrow.
"They both know that would be the end of communism," Kang dismissed with a shake of his head. "All our enemies would exploit our joint misery. Then again, we're dealing with Li, an unpredictable extremist who hates capitalists and moderate communists equally. Li will have our heads chopped off if he amasses enough allies and forces."
Kang stood and began to pace furiously back and forth. "My agents have briefed me on Vannikov, and he comes off as a hardline Rus nationalist who is adamant about 'undoing the loss of territory and prestige'. The only way he and Li are working together is that they have come up with some stupid idea that they won't be sharing the plans with me. I would rather crush them first, then ask questions later."
"What could Loria be doing if he went along with the coup?" Luo wondered aloud, swirling his own tea around. "The old, fat snake has an angle, that much is certain."
"He is playing his own games that I don't even know about," Kang admitted, looking down at his feet and shaking his head with frustration.
"We can't just send a representative over to Moskva to demand an explanation, not when Li's army is likely already there." Luo rubbed his chin. "Our only option is to gather an army of our own and use the trans-Sibyrian railways to head straight to Moskva and demand that they either turn over Li or endure another change of government. And the Rus knows how many divisions we can send down the railways per week. They used that railway network for their army redeployment from the war against Akitsushima to OZEV, and we used it for our own invasion of them a decade ago."
"You're suggesting that we go to war against the Rus?" Kang asked, aghast. "After I just pointed out how the capitalists will rejoice if we are set against one another? We are stretched very thin as it is from all of the conflict areas and potential conflict areas that we have to handle. A war against the Rus would ruin us both!"
"If they decide to protect Li, yes," Luo conceded, "but name our other options. You know what could happen if Li isn't stopped immediately! We just have to hope that they see our bluff as a potential full invasion if they don't cooperate."
Stepping over to his desk, Kang reached for a bottle of painkillers and inadvertently knocked it over. Teetering for a moment, the vessel balanced on the edge of the desk before tumbling to the ground, shattering on impact and spilling pills mixed with glass shards skittering across the planks.
"Good thing that superstition is counter-revolutionary," Luo remarked as Kang glared, "or I would take that as a spectacularly bad sign."
1953 July 29th, just after midnight in Moskva, at the Grand Kremlin Palace:
Vannikov downed a shot of vodka and a few painkiller pills as he stared at the two papers on his desk.
The first was a report detailing an apparent invasion from the CSR. Most of the report consisted of a list of bulleted points accounting for a whole series of demands made by local Chinese commanders to various functionaries, ordering said flunkies to turn over control of railways and airfields and the trains and plains at each, along with any supplies they had. To a man, those functionaries had decided on the better part of valor and had surrendered to the invaders without bloodshed. A few isolated garrisons, mostly internal security troops and a few die-hard militia, put up brief resistance. Brief being the operative term. One group that attempted to blow up a railway bridge was subjected to public slow slicing torture, with their screams broadcasted over radio and regular intervals of broadcasted warnings to anyone that had the same idea. Everything indicated that the CSR forces were trying to travel west as fast as possible, utilizing the Sibyrian railway network.
He had expected Kang to object to his own westward invasion plans, but assumed Kang would either go along with it anyways or offer major concessions to have the attack called off. Kang's sudden invasion of the Russy Confederation on the eve of his first knockout blow against the weak capitalists was the last thing he expected.
The second paper was a courier mail delivery signed by Kang. It was apparent that Kang didn't bother with the facade of using Chairman Gao as his puppet.
I have only sent a small fraction of my readily available forces to arrest Li Lisan and his band of traitors. And I will send more if you do not cooperate with me. This wouldn't have happened if you had prevented Li from ever taking a single step into the Russy Confederation. I can assure you, I am the only friend you have. Do not test my resolve on this. You will clean up the mess you made for me, or I will do it without you.
Vannikov looked up at the few generals in his office. The other generals and apparatchiks that normally would have been involved in crisis planning were absent at the moment due to the recent purges. The replacement process was still ongoing.
"The way I see it as it is, we resist Kang's demand and we would be officially at war with the CSR. Or we betray Li, which means taking military action because his army is too large for the NKVD to simply walk in and arrest him."
"The Sibyrian railways allow the CSR to rapidly deploy a considerable quantity of forces, and to keep reinforcing them. Even if we conducted guerilla war to utilize the vast expanses of Sibyria against the CSR, we have confirmation that a few Sibyrian Army divisions are among the Chinese vanguard forces," one general sighed.
'The Sibyrian Army? They won't need railways to march all the way to Moskva, and their resupply would be from the civilians and defeated Rus forces caught in their path.' Vannikov frowned at the prospect of reliving his nightmares.
"Anyone want to conduct a drawn out war against cannibalistic enemy forces that had no hesitation with launching offensives deep in Sibyria during the winter, while the capitalists see an opportunity to take more of our land?" Vannikov asked a rhetorical question, and found only looks of dread on the faces of his silent generals. "I was there in Sibyria a decade ago when the Chinese invaders went crazy during the winter, and it would be cruel to demand you go through that again, so it appears we have to join Kang to arrest Li."
"Our military is far larger than Li's army. He will be crushed under our numbers!" Another general proudly boasted, only to look down sheepishly when Vannikov glared at him.
"Most of our military is currently positioned to invade the Baltic states while Li's army is still about a week away from their eastward deployment to the border regions. Thus his army will reach Moskva long before ours if Li discovers our plan. How fast can we redeploy our military before Li's army is able to react?" Vannikov narrowed his eyes. "If we are too slow, our army may win in the end, but not before Moskva burns and we are forced to flee from here in shame or die."
Vannikov watched the generals look at each other nervously.
"I see. Then I'll just pretend to be ignorant and neutral about the situation until we are ready. Give the order to our forces in Sibyria to help Kang's forces move west, even if it means giving our trains, aircraft and supplies to them. In the meanwhile, we need to at least ensure Moskva is protected during our army redeployment."
1953 a few hours later, in the outskirts of Moskva:
Li Lisan stared at the map of the Russy Confederation. His informants back in the CSR tipped off that Kang was in such a hurry that the mages who were shackled to the false communist ideology were sent ahead in piecemeal groups without regards to their formal organization structures. The rest of the misguided forces were also being sent piecemeal using requisitioned transport aircraft and trains. There seemed to be confusion of who was in charge of those piecemeal forces, but it was evident that Kang just wanted warm bodies in Moskva as fast as possible. Even cargo trains were utilized to transport men. Nevertheless, it was disturbing how quickly Kang was able to throw together an invasion force only about a week after Vannikov became General Secretary.
'All the more reason to build up my forces and find allies before directly confronting that traitor to the revolution. Some of my mages were deployed to harass the invading force in Sibyria, but all that will accomplish is buying time. Kang's loyalists will eventually be in Moskva.'
And yet Vannikov remained suspiciously 'neutral' while Chinese forces were about to kill each other inside Rus territory. Even refusing to provide Li with trains or aircraft while Kang's forces had no hesitation with seizing Rus trains, aircraft and other assets in eastern Sibyria to speed up their advances.
But where could his army go?
"I've heard the monarchy in Afghanistan has been struggling to stay in power. They are unpopular with their people." Yao Fuzh, Li's assistant, muttered as he started measuring the railroad distances from Moskva to Kabul on the map.
"Yes…" Li nodded as a smile crept across his face. "We fight our way to Afghanistan. Overthrow the monarchy, install a worker's paradise, and then fortify while sending scouts to Tibet and Xinjiang. Should Kang and his lapdog Vannikov invade Afghanistan in full force or the Afghan locals cause too much trouble, we perform a fighting retreat to Tibet and Xinjiang. We'll just need to ensure that North Bharat does not intervene."
"We could escalate tensions in the Middle East between the Turkmens and Qajarians to keep North Bharat distracted," the aid suggested.
"Excellent, see to that. As for me, there is much work to be done before we can start our new long march." Li grabbed his belongings and briskly walked towards the door.
"What are you going to be doing?"
"Seizing planes, trains and automobiles from the Rus. As well as any aircraft, tanks and any other kinds of supplies and equipment we can lay hands on. We have a fully operational and highly motivated army in the very heart of Rus while Vannikov's forces have yet to fully redeploy from the border regions. Nothing to stop me from seizing his assets. There are plenty of things to acquire in Moskva, other neighboring cities and elsewhere to support our long journey. Then race down the railways to Afghanistan and fight our way through any blocking forces. What else would I do?" Li rolled his eyes.
"That would start a war on two fronts. Vannikov would have the perfect excuse to attack you in the rear!"
"If they have the will to do so," sneered Li. "Kang thinks he has the boldness and decisiveness to allow him to win. He thinks he can make a quick victory by trapping us into an impossible situation. Vannikov believes that we can be easily sacrificed for his own gain. They are both wrong, and they will pay in blood."
As Li walked outside to a radio station under his control, thoughts swirled in his head.
'As for the escaped prisoner mages, I can't trust them. There's always the risk of them deciding that might makes right, and utilize their incredible power to become warlords. I just need to convert a sufficient number of them to be fully committed to my cause while they are busy tearing down Kang. When the day comes where they try to betray me to rule the CSR through their supreme magical power, they would be busy fighting an internal civil war against equally powerful mages that are under my control, and the rest of my forces as well. It's a risky plan. But it's equally risky to conduct an insurgency and try to stay ahead of Kang's far superior forces.'
About an hour later, at the Grand Kremlin Palace:
Vannikov felt someone shaking him as he groggily stirred awake from his short sleep.
"General Secretary! General Secretary! You need to wake up!" A guard shouted, who then immediately stepped back when he saw that Vannikov was up.
"What, did Li do something dumb or did Kang decide to arrest more than Li with his army?" Vannikov grumbled as he walked over to the window, saw multiple black smoke plumes in the far distance and spun around to glare at the guard. "What is going on?!"
The guard snapped to attention. "Li's army is attacking various locations throughout the region. They are targeting communication stations, train stations and yards, airports, warehouses and weapons depots. The radio stations they captured have started broadcasting propaganda criticizing you and Kang for 'betraying the communist revolution'."
'Where did things go so wrong?' Vannikov thought to himself. He continued staring through the window, observing the distant explosions and black smoke, along with the echoes of gunfire.
"His army is likely grabbing what spoils they can before Kang arrives. But where would they go?" Vannikov asked no-one in particular. "To the west and invade the capitalists? East to directly confront Kang which would result in mutual destruction? South into Caucasia or Kazakh where he has nowhere to go if Kang gives chase? North into the Arctic and die from starvation and hunger when winter hits?"
Reaching for his phone, Vannikov punched in Loria's number but got nothing but dead air. Suddenly a much closer explosion was heard and felt, prompting him to look out the window again. And this time he could see the NKVD's headquarters was bombed.
With magic spells from four figures flying in the sky and towards the direction of the Kremlin area. Which was then followed by an amplified voice broadcast from them.
"We, the rightful Chinese Communist Party, had directly supported General Secretary Vannikov's ascension to power, because we believed he would lead to a great future for the Russy Confederation and the global revolution…"
The voice broadcast was interrupted when Rus garrison mages came flying upward from one of the ruined buildings, guns blazing.
Up in the sky above the Kremlin area:
"A whole mage company! It's an ambush!" One of the Chinese mages yelled out.
'They finally reveal themselves. I was suspicious of how easy it was to fly over their capital.'
Shusheng upped his augmentation dosage. The sickening sensation caused a brief nauseating sensation, an old familiar feeling. "Fire and I will take point, you two will fall back and provide supporting fire!"
He looked over at Fire charging up his shots, and sent a voice spell to him. "Fire, don't use your augmentation too heavily. We have limited supplies and I think we're now at war with both the Rus and the CSR, so we will be running into Kang's A-tier augmented mages that can match or exceed our mana power. And hopefully the Rus doesn't have any augmentation juice for us to scavenge, because that would mean they have their own augmented mages. If this all goes to hell, we will need to plot our escape."
"Then we'll have to rely on fear to demoralize the Rus before we run out. We'll kill all but one, so that the survivor can spread horror stories," Fire cackled as he let off a burst of magic rounds at the inbound Rus mages, which those bullets were then visibly disrupted by an outer shield in front of the dense Rus mage formation and then failed to penetrate the Rus mages' personal shields.
"Interesting, I thought we were told the Rus were still using the Type 97 orbs? Did they already upgrade their Type 97 orbs with a shield enhanced one, or have significantly improved their shield spells?" Fire muttered, before dodging the Rus mages' return fire.
"They put a lot of mana into their they pooled some of their mana for some sort of a coordinated group shield. I can sense it. We can't pick them off individually as long as they are in a tight formation. We don't have the DShK machine gun or other heavy weapons to shatter them. So what are they weak in if they aren't augmented?" Shusheng continued peppering the Rus mages' shields.
"I wish they would have given me a DShK, I could have operated that myself instead of needing a mage crew."
"Well that heavy thing and its accompanying ammunition would have slowed you down when our mission requires everyone to move quickly before the enemy command can come to their senses and organize proper resistance."
"They aren't bothering to dodge our fire and instead just absorb them all…" Fire sent a volley of rifle rounds in the general direction of the Rus mages, with the magic spells configured for extremely bright flares, deafening noise and dense sparkling magic fog. Shusheng fired his own volleys to block the Rus mages' line of sight.
'It's a good thing we quickly picked up on the recent magic developments from Li's mages, instead of just being stuck with raw magic power and experimental spells we were forced to test in prison.'
Fire ramped up his flight, body reinforcement and reflex spells while unholstering his sawed-off double-barrelled shotgun, then charged in with an erratic zig-zag pattern while throwing a few decoys and extremely bright figures in different directions. Shusheng followed suit. The few bullets from the disoriented Rus mages that did hit them just glanced off of their shields.
'In a sustained exchange of gunfire without heavy weapons or us burning through our juice and rifle ammunition, this is a stalemate. But their movements are slow and clumsy compared to us. Fire was right about their tactical weakness. I almost pity them.'
Shusheng smiled while easily parrying an Rus mage's bayonet stab attempt with his axe, then swinging the axe at the mage's neck. The Rus mage in desperation blocked the axe swing with their arm and lost it in the process, but Shusheng made a second swing while the panicking Rus mage was still trying to comprehend what was happening, this time the axe embedding into the face and dragged vertically down the body.
He looked over and saw Fire had separated a Rus mage's torso from the rest of the body with a sword in one hand while stunning another Rus mage with a simultaneous double shotgun blast from his other hand, before lunging at the disoriented mage.
"It looks like you two don't need help with the mages," Shusheng received a voice spell from another Chinese mage. "We're going to handle the anti-air guns that are being manned."
Suddenly he felt a wet, warm sensation in his nostrils. Then wiped at his nose with his hand, revealing blood. A nose bleed.
'I'll worry about it later. It's just a little nosebleed,' he reshifted his focus on the Rus mages around him.
An anti-aircraft shell suddenly exploded in the midst of the melee, which threw Shusheng off from gutting another Rus mage.
'Now it makes sense, they were relying on having anti-aircraft batteries fire onto them and us to shoot us down, while their group and personal shields would protect them from their 'friendly' fire. A good idea, if it wasn't for the fact that we also have good shielding if we couldn't dodge the incoming fire.'
When that mage attempted to stab Shusheng with a magic blade, Shusheng blocked it with his magic reinforced hand to the surprise of the Rus mage. The mage spun up their physical strength spell to push their magic blade towards Shusheng's face, but Shusheng ramped up his physical strength spell in response to overwhelm the Rus mage's strength and pushed the magic blade towards the mage's face instead. When the mage deactivated his magic blade, Shusheng headbutted him. He swung the axe at the Rus mage's groin area, only for the retreating Rus mage to sacrifice their rifle to deflect the axe's impact.
'He's good with what he has available to drag this fight out. But that won't be enough to save him.'
Shusheng then charged to close the distance again, dodged the Rus mage's pistol fire and got right into their face, close enough for a kiss if he wanted. He crushed the Rus mage's throat with his hands, and positioned the twitching body to be between an anti-aircraft gun that just fired a shell at them. After an almost direct explosion impact, Shusheng discarded the shredded body and looked down at the anti-aircraft guns, but saw the other two Chinese mages were already at work, silencing them with extreme prejudice.
He didn't have time to take in the scenery, such as a group of large transport planes flying off in the distance. Instead he sensed something behind him, and acting on instinct, darted to one side while swinging his axe with one hand at his previous position. A Rus mage who attempted to bayonet charge him from behind suddenly flew into Shusheng's axe, and Shusheng withdrew a knife with his other hand to slice off the gurgling Rus mage's head with a single swipe.
Suddenly he heard the boom of a shotgun blast and dozens of small explosions from the pellets, and turned his head down to see a staggered Rus mage that tried sneaking up from below.
"You need to have better situational awareness." Fire mocked Shusheng as he reloaded his shotgun. Then fired it at a second mage to stagger them while advancing onto the first staggered mage to finish them off with the sword.
Shusheng noticed one particular Rus mage was flying towards him at a speed that was fast for the Rus.
'She is approaching me, and her orb is glowing…'
Shusheng fired a volley of rifle rounds with the blinding spells in the general direction of the would-be suicide bomber, then released his decoys for further confusion. He pushed his orb for the maximum acceleration to zip around the confused mage and positioned himself behind her.
He refocused his mana into physical strength and body reinforcement, then severed her spinal cord at the neck with a single axe swing, disrupting her flight spell.
"Nothing personal, darling."
Shusheng kicked her downward. The impact was powerful enough that the Rus mage crashed through the roof of the St. Basil's Cathedral before her orb exploded.
"That was a nice building with its brightly colored domes…" He muttered to himself as he briefly watched the blast of the powerful magic explosion and the building beginning to collapse, before turning his attention back at the remaining Rus mages.
As a blood-soaked Shusheng and Fire gave chase to the panicking Rus mages, they could hear the resumed magic amplified voice broadcast over the sounds of the anti-aircraft positions exploding from one of the other Chinese mages.
"But Vannikov betrayed us as soon as he got what he wanted from us. To throw us to the wolves that are the believers of the false communist ideology. The traitors would rather seek peace with the capitalist imperialists than to spread the revolution and liberate the proletariats. And the rat Vannikov intends to join them, by having all of you die for his own benefit!"
Less than half an hour later…
"I think we can agree that we have gotten the full attention of the Rus," Fire sent a voice spell to Shusheng. "Maybe we overdid our defacing of the Kremlin area, but that was Li's order."
'If even Fire is concerned about the situation, we are quite in a mess. The next time we fight a battalion of them, we need the DShK or even the bigger 14.5mm KPV heavy machine guns and their magic capable bullets to tear through their shields. Or even look into magically enhanced recoilless rifle rounds if they love to stay in a tight formation so much.' Shusheng thought to himself as he ducked into another building.
The other building he was just in a second ago was leveled by three dive bombers dropping their payloads. He coughed and wiped away blood from his mouth before upping his augmentation dosage. A steady stream of armor piercing magic bullets suddenly ripped through the ceilings and walls, forcing Shusheng to keep moving.
"What's our plan now? We both have an entire battalion of enemy mages on us. There's no way we can penetrate their group shields as long as they stay within their dense formations. And no support to distract their aircraft swarms that keep us from approaching the two battalions." Shusheng sent a voice spell back to Fire while sprinting from one building to another, as the second building was obliterated by a volley of artillery spells.
"I think our only option is to keep moving around. You saw the aircraft that were arriving to help them."
"Over 30 aircraft in the first wave when I ran my area scan. More in the second wave after the first wave expended their munitions. They have one or two jet planes out there, their airspeed is just enough to outrun our maximum speed, and I don't want to confirm what weapons they have." Shusheng replied, while ducking into yet another building to avoid the third building that was now being strafed by rockets fired by ground attack and fighter aircraft.
He then sent a voice spell to the other Chinese mages again asking for assistance. Then shook his head in annoyance when he got the message back to keep the Rus distracted as long as possible to buy time for the rest of Li's forces to grab what they needed for the long journey to Afghanistan. Supposedly they were busy mopping up the Rus airborne infantry that were flown from the airfields bordering the Baltic states and paradropped onto the outskirts of Moskva in an attempt to slow down Li's army, and it was us tying up the Rus mages and aircraft support that is resulting in the paratroopers and some of their transport planes taking heavy losses.
'Maybe they actually needed the heat to be taken off of them so they could finish seizing the trains, aircraft, equipment and supplies. Or Li was willing to sacrifice me and Fire, potentially seeing the two of us as dangerous assets that need to be disposed of when their usefulness ends.'
There was a distant but loud rumbling and the ground shook.
"Fire? Fire?! FIRE! Where are you?!"
'And now I have to rescue him. At least his magic signature is still emitting.' Shusheng frowned.
"I'm fine. Uh, just don't try to use the sewer system for cover. At least in the industrial area."
"Why?" Shusheng could barely register a confused look while dashing to another cover, as the fourth building was set ablaze by the Rus mages concentrating fire at it.
"Buildup of flammable gas and it was ignited when they indiscriminately fired into the streets to try to flush me out. Entire streets are lined with burning craters from the underground explosions, and I think I see a factory also catch on fire. Probably the one that was leaking flammables into the sewer."
1953 July 31st, Berun, BND headquarters
BND headquarters was a beacon of calm efficiency. Johanna looked out at her army of secretaries and nodded to herself in satisfaction at all the worker bees buzzing away busily throughout the hive. The calm was abruptly broken when the door crashed open and Cyclone Elya swept into the office. "What's the latest on the Rus situation?!" she bellowed to all and sundry.
"Director Müller?!" Johanna blurted, springing to her feet in astonishment. "What on earth are you doing here?"
"My job, of course!" Elya snapped. Not bothering with further conversation, the Director strode over a pile of high priority papers and began leafing through them with great impatience.
"You should be on vacation right now! The President was most insistent that you rest and recuperate for at least a month; nobody wants you to fall apart from a nervous breakdown!"
"Pshaw, she's just being overprotective. I can rest when I'm dead!" Elya sniffed dismissively. "I have more important matters to deal with – an important asset of mine has failed to check-in at the designated time for two days in a row! I want to know why, and I want to know now!"
"Don't worry, I'm on it!" Anna announced, rolling in through the open door in her shiny new wheelchair.
"You should be on vacation too, Anna!" Johanna protested. "In fact, both of you should be convalescing at the Director's house right now as we speak, with her supervising your rehabilitation!"
"I don't need relaxation either, I'm strong as an ox!" Anna declared, patting her chest proudly.
"And as stubborn as one too," Johanna muttered under her breath.
"What was that?"
"Nothing," Johanna sighed in defeat. She waved her hand to the left. "Latest Rus intercepts are over on Desk L."
Anna favored her with her sweetest smile, before wheeling her chair over to the designated area to take charge of the secretaries responsible for Rus. But her smile quickly faded as she reviewed the documents.
"I'm afraid our information on Rus activities is very limited at the moment, Director," Johanna explained apologetically. "Most of our personnel are still operating in the Francois Republic. The instability there doesn't show any signs of resolving itself in the short term ..."
Elya gave a terse nod, without looking up from her papers.
"I'm afraid it's bad, Director," Anna announced. "We've just received the news. There are several reports that suggest your Rus boyfriend was probably killed in Moskva." Elya froze, staring blankly at her. "His other contacts informed our agents that the NKVD headquarters has been bombed by the "Butchers of Moskva" and Loria has posthumously awarded your boyfriend the Order of Ulyanov third class for shielding him from falling rubble."
"Butchers of Moskva?" queried Johanna, when it became clear Elya remained speechless while Anna picked up another report.
"Supposedly two very powerful Chinese mages slaughtered an entire Rus mage company in the span of a few minutes through melee combat while two regular Chinese mages suppressed their anti-air defenses. The four then routed the surviving remainder of the Kremlin's garrison forces, and after that, went on to conduct strikes throughout the city before the Rus mounted a major counterattack to force them from the city. The Rus informants are currently smuggling recordings of the incident to us. They said the recordings will show the magic detectors' readings maxing out in the presence of the two mages, Chinese mage attacks and their new tactics, the Kremlin being rained on with blood, body parts and mangled corpses of the former mage company. Statues of Ulyanov and other Rus heroes toppled. St. Basil's Cathedral was completely leveled. The Russy Confederation flag atop the Kremlin was defaced with the phrase 'Traitor to the communist revolution, enemy of the proletariats!', and a limbless and headless mage corpse was impaled on the flagpole."
Johanna blinked her eyes. "I'm glad we never launched that sort of humiliating attack on the Russy Federation in our last war; just spitting in their faces like that without inflicting enough material devastation to knock them out of the fighting entirely would have done nothing but stir up a nationalist frenzy, dragging the war out still longer. Does the report mention anything about us also getting the magic detector readings? We need to better understand the augmented mages that the CSR are fielding. And maybe the recordings will also show if the Rus have new tactics and military developments."
"It mentioned the magic detector readings of the two mages were… erratic. Different from the other augmented Chinese mages they have seen in the past." Anna put down the report and picked up another one. "I'll take on the responsibility for getting the actual magic readings from our contacts so we have a better idea of what mage forces the CSR might be developing."
Elya took a deep, unsteady breath, then muttered, "Loria survived instead of him…"
Anna shrugged her shoulders uncomfortably. "Well, the silver lining is that the NKVD is less likely to suspect anything of your boyfriend's own network of moles that were passing information along to us, since Loria is personally thankful of him. So we can still continue our operations against the Rus. He wouldn't expect a traitor to sacrifice themselves for him."
"We'll have to cautiously adjust our operations and leave no trace of our involvement," Elya tersely said while her knuckles turned white from clenching her hands. "He was careful to manage his moles so they never knew the information they were providing was going to Germania. The whole time they were under the mistaken belief that he was using their information to advance some ideologically appropriate project he had dreamed up. That was how he was able to provide us with a roster of the Rus nuclear scientists and those scientists' contacts."
Elya then grabbed her bag and prepared to leave the office. "Carry on, Anna, Johanna. I need to go have a long lunch with Visha."
Anna and Johanna shared a long look after Elya left.
"You'd better make yourself a comfortable space somewhere," Johanna grumbled. "Looks like the two of us are going to be burning the midnight oil to try and salvage this situation as much as possible."
She looked around and realized that the duo had become the center of attention of the entire secretarial staff in the office.
"Well, what are you all gawking at?" she snapped. "Last time I checked I wasn't an Alpine landscape, so quit admiring and get back to work! The Director doesn't look like she's in a forgiving mood at the moment!"
1953 August 3rd, Londonderry, Pennsylvania, Unified States:
The darkness of night shrouded the secret SH-1 facility. Layers of armed guards patrolled the perimeter while inside a horde of technicians busily ran their scheduled tests. Senior Technician Curt Reynolds took a drink of coffee as a short break, his thoughts running in his head.
'If all goes well, this could be our first domestically designed and built nuclear reactor, without any Germanian assistance whatsoever.'
Suddenly the quiet of the evening was broken by a shrill alarm. Curt frowned. "That's an alert for one of the secondary systems!" He hurried to the control room. "Johnson, Report!"
"Team Twelve was attempting to fix a blockage in one of the condensate polishers that filter the secondary loop water," the technician stated grimly.
"What happened?" Curt demanded.
"They tried to force out the blockage with compressed air, like usual," Johnson explained. "It didn't work, so they decided to blow the compressed air directly into the water and let the force of the water clear the pipes."
"That should've been enough."
"Should've but wasn't." Johnson grimaced. "I don't know what went wrong but the feedwater pumps are no longer operative. The reactors aren't getting fresh water anymore and the temperature is rising rapidly!" He pointed to a row of lights that were blinking an ominous red.
"Alright, tell Kushner to –"
Reynolds' sentence cut off as the entire facility shuddered. Several technicians lost their footing and fell to the floor. A new series of alarms blared out.
"Johnson!" Curt bellowed over the sound of the sirens.
"It's an alert for reactor 4!" Johnson yelled. "Schumer's team is the closest to there!"
Reynolds flipped on his radio and ordered Schumer to investigate the situation on the ground. A few tense minutes later the radio chirped and gave the man's response.
"We've just been to reactor 4, Boss!"
"And what's the status of the reactor?"
"Well, that's a bit hard to say …"
"What do you mean? Out with it, man!" Curt snapped impatiently.
"I mean that reactor 4 … well, the reactor, it's not there anymore!"
AN: If someone wants to do an omake or spinoff of how WW3 would have played out if Kang didn't stop Vannikov and Li from igniting a full blown global conflict, and instead was dragged into WW3, I would be more than happy to support their writing. I primarily use the Space Battles website and Discord to talk to my reviewers and other fanfic writers.
References:
Reference to the violent conflicts between communist factions in China during the Cultural Revolution: wiki/Violent_struggle
Weapons used in armed conflicts included some 18.77 million guns (some say 1.877 million[12]), 2.72 million grenades, 14,828 cannons, millions of other ammunitions and even armored cars and tanks.[6] Researchers have pointed out that the death toll in violent struggles ranged from 300 thousand to 500 thousand, while certain documents from the Chinese Communist Party have revealed that 237,000 people were killed and another 7,030,000 were injured or permanently disabled.[6][13][14][15]
Reference to the lack of communications between the CSR and Russy Confederation: wiki/Sino-Soviet_split
Further damage was caused by the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis toward the end of August. China did not notify or consult the Soviet Union before initiating the conflict, contradicting China's previous desire to share information for foreign affairs and violating - at least the spirit - the Sino-Soviet friendship treaty. This may have been partially in response to what the Chinese viewed as the timid Soviet response to the West in the 1958 Lebanon crisis and 1958 Iraqi coup d'état. The Soviets opted to publicly support China at the end of August, but became concerned when the US replied with veiled threats of nuclear war in early September and mixed-messaging from the Chinese.
Reference to the conflict between the USSR and China, which almost escalated to nuclear war: article/714064/nixon-intervention-saved-china-soviet-nuclear-attack
It is October 1969: China is preparing for a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. Lin, second to Mao, orders 940,000 soldiers, 4,000 planes and 600 vessels to scatter from their bases and the transfer of major archives from Beijing to the southwest.
Then US president Richard Nixon intervenes. Secretary of state Henry Kissinger tells the Soviet ambassador in Washington that as soon as the Soviets set off their first missile against China, the US will launch nuclear missiles at 130 Soviet cities.
This is the dramatic account in an official magazine of the closest China has come to a nuclear war. The latest issue of Historical Reference, published by the People's Daily, mouthpiece of the Communist Party, describes in detail the five occasions in the post-1949 period when China was threatened by nuclear attack.
Reference to the railroad wars between Li's forces that are retreating to Afghanistan while being pursued by the Rus forces and running into Kang's forces that were heading west to intercept Li's forces:
wiki/Revolt_of_the_Czechoslovak_Legion
watch?v=r10Yt_8Umrw
Vannikov's and his generals' fear of the CSR (without realizing that Kang was bluffing) was inspired by this Victoria 2 multiplayer video that showed how things got chaotic for the Poland-Lithuania and Ottoman Empire players when a player on a partially westernized China decided to support the Russia player in a war with their entire massive army (roughly 15-20 times more manpower than Poland-Lithuania). The China player's first move was to move about 100 brigades (3000 men each) into a battle: watch?v=r3ZTGzeWdD8&list=PLhJpK3gw2nb8ceUr-8R7AxGVfM6LLHpIF&index=11
In the next video, it was mentioned that China was "only" 18% mobilized after prolonged fighting and had millions of men to keep feeding into the meatgrinder.
And historically, the USSR in the 1950's to 1960's wielded significant power over their satellite states, using military force against any of their allies that stepped too far out of line. The Rus in this story is in a significantly weaker state and thus the CSR takes the place of the USSR.
wiki/East_German_uprising_of_1953
By 9:00 AM, 25,000 people had gathered in front of the House of Ministries, and tens of thousands more were en route to Leipziger Strasse or in Potsdamer Platz. Between 10:00 and 11:00 AM, 80 to 100 demonstrators apparently stormed the government seat, visibly demonstrating that the 500 Volkspolizei and Stasi members had been overpowered.[20] Then, suddenly, Soviet military vehicles appeared, followed by tanks, to repel what appeared to be an immiment takeover. Within an hour, Soviet troops had cleared and isolated the area around the government headquarters. At noon, Soviet authorities terminated all tram and metro traffic into the Eastern sector and all but closed the sector borders to West Berlin to prevent more demonstrators from reaching the city centre. An hour later, they declared martial law in East Berlin.[20] Outside East Berlin police headquarters, Soviet tanks opened fire on "the insurgents". Fighting between the Soviet Army (and later GDR police) and the demonstrators persisted into the afternoon and night – with, in some cases, tanks and troops firing directly into the crowds. Executions, most prominently of West Berlin worker Willi Gottling, and mass arrests followed.
wiki/Polish_October
Eventually, when Khrushchev was reassured that Gomułka would not alter the basic foundations of Polish communism, he withdrew the invasion threat and agreed to compromise, and Gomułka was confirmed in his new position.[1][4] According to the account Khrushchev gives in his memoirs, he ordered the Soviet troops to halt in place after he was personally confronted by Gomułka who, according to Khrushchev, was in a state of agitation and "demanded" that the troops return to their bases, or "something terrible and irreversible will happen." Khrushchev claims that he was never against appointing Gomułka at the helm of PZPR and had expected him to be elevated to the top post ever since he was released from prison.[21]
…
Gomułka, however, could not and did not want to reject communism or Soviet domination; he could only steer Poland towards increased independence and "Polish national communism".[2][7] Because of these restricted ambitions, which were recognized by the Soviets, the limited Polish revolution succeeded where the radical Hungarian one did not.[2] Norman Davies sums up the effect as a transformation of Poland from puppet state to client state;[2] Raymond Pearson similarly states that Poland changed from a Soviet colony to a dominion.[7]
wiki/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1956
Although initially willing to negotiate the withdrawal of the Soviet Army from Hungary, the USSR repressed the Hungarian Revolution on 4 November 1956, and fought the Hungarian revolutionaries until 10 November; repression of the Hungarian Uprising killed 2,500 Hungarians and 700 Soviet Army soldiers, and compelled 200,000 Hungarians to seek political refuge abroad.[7]
wiki/Prague_Spring
The reforms, especially the decentralization of administrative authority, were not received well by the Soviets, who, after failed negotiations, sent half a million Warsaw Pact troops and tanks to occupy the country. The New York Times cited reports of 650,000 men equipped with the most modern and sophisticated weapons in the Soviet military catalogue.[2] A massive wave of emigration swept the nation. Resistance was mounted throughout the country, involving attempted fraternization, sabotage of street signs, defiance of curfews, etc.
As for why Li's four mages were able to waltz through the Kremlin and the rest of Moskva, the AYWPR used the assumption that the Russy Federation never attacked the Empire, and this story builds off of the AYWPR's world. Therefore, there were no prior foreign enemy attacks on Moskva for the Rus to provide incentive to significantly upgrade the city's defenses. The collapse of the Russy Federation and then the following civil war in the ending of AYWPR certainly didn't help. Only having a few hours to prepare the previously unprepared city for an attack from Li's locally superior army is a tall order.
As for why the KPV heavy machine gun would be a step up from the 12.7mm DShK (which I'm assuming the DShK is roughly comparable to the .50 cal Browning): wiki/KPV_heavy_machine_gun
The muzzle energy of the KPV reaches 31 kJ (for comparison, the 12.7 mm Browning M2HB machine gun has 17 kJ, the 20 mm ShVAK aircraft mounted gun has about 28 kJ). It is one of the most powerful machine guns ever used by the Soviet and later Russian armed forces.
Regarding the Rus jet plane, I would expect the Russy Confederation to eventually get a first generation subsonic jet plane by this point, as the Allied Kingdom had sold their first generation jet engine designs to the CSR. In comparison to real life where the USSR was a full generation ahead of the Russy Confederation by this point: wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-19
second generation, single-seat, twinjet fighter aircraft and was the world's first mass-produced supersonic aircraft.
First flight: 24 May 1952
Maximum speed: 1,452 km/h (902 mph, 784 kn) at 10,000 m (33,000 ft), Mach 1.35
I would expect the Russy Confederation to have a limited numbers of something along the lines of this: wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-9
First flight: 24 April 1946
Maximum speed: 910 km/h (570 mph; 490 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft), Mach 0.74
Reference to the shashlik: wiki/Shashlik
Reference to the Saint Basil's Cathedral and how it was almost demolished: wiki/Saint_Basil_Cathedral#1918
Bolshevik planners entertained ideas of demolishing the church after Lenin's funeral (January 1924).[86] In the first half of the 1930s, the church became an obstacle for Joseph Stalin's urbanist plans, carried out by Moscow party boss Lazar Kaganovich, "the moving spirit behind the reconstruction of the capital".[87] The conflict between preservationists, notably Pyotr Baranovsky, and the administration continued at least until 1936 and spawned urban legends. In particular, a frequently-told story is that Kaganovich picked up a model of the church in the process of envisioning Red Square without it, and Stalin sharply responded "Lazar, put it back!" Similarly, Stalin's master planner, architect Vladimir Semyonov, reputedly dared to "grab Stalin's elbow when the leader picked up a model of the church to see how Red Square would look without it" and was replaced by pure functionary Sergey Chernyshov.[88]
In the autumn of 1933, the church was struck from the heritage register. Baranovsky was summoned to perform a last-minute survey of the church slated for demolition, and was then arrested for his objections.[89] While he served his term in the Gulag, attitudes changed and by 1937 even hard-line Bolshevik planners admitted that the church should be spared.[90][91] In the spring of 1939, the church was locked, probably because demolition was again on the agenda;[92] however, the 1941 publication of Dmitry Sukhov's detailed book[93] on the survey of the church in 1939–1940 speaks against this assumption.
Context for sewer explosions:
wiki/Louisville_sewer_explosions
wiki/1992_Guadalajara_explosions
wiki/1929_Ottawa_sewer_explosion
Reference to the US reactor accident:
wiki/Three_Mile_Island_accident
wiki/SL-1