Muslim militants from
Soviet Azerbaijan destroy an oil production refinery in
Nizhnevartovsk, threatening to cripple the Soviet Union's economy due to oil shortages. After much deliberation, the
Soviet Politburo decides to seize the
Persian Gulf by military force in order to recoup the country's oil losses. Knowing that the United States had pledged to defend the oil-producing countries in the Persian Gulf, the Soviets decide that neutralizing
NATO is a necessary first step before its military operation can take place. If West Germany were to be neutralized and occupied, the Soviets believe that the United States would not move to rescue the Arab states since it could meet its oil needs from the Western Hemisphere alone. To divert attention from the impending operation, the Politburo embarks upon an elaborate
maskirovka to disguise both their predicament and their intentions. The Soviets publicly declare their
arms reduction proposal to scrap their obsolete nuclear missile submarines. The
KGB then carries out a
false flag operation involving a bomb being detonated in a
Kremlin building, framing a KGB
sleeper agent as a
West German intelligence spy involved in the incident. The Politburo publicly denounces the West German government and calls for retaliation. Even though a planned attack on a NATO communications facility in
Lammersdorf was compromised when a
Spetsnaz officer was arrested, the
Soviet Army pushes through with their advance operations in Germany. They suffer reverses on the first night of the war, however, when NATO
stealth and
fighter-bomber aircraft achieve
air superiority over Central Europe by eliminating Soviet
fighter and
AEW&C aircraft, and destroying key bridges that much of the Soviet Army has yet to cross. Soviet-bloc tank divisions find an early advantage, however, in their authoritarian command structure: all Warsaw Pact forces have been trained to speak Russian (as the Soviets have deliberately put themselves in command of the Warsaw Pact), while NATO tank crews find themselves confused at crucial moments as to who is in charge and how to speak to one another. NATO armies are repeatedly forced to give ground, though they resist bitterly nonetheless. Out in the Atlantic,
Soviet Navy achieves a decisive early victory by launching a bold amphibious landing on Iceland, taking control of the NATO airbase in
Keflavík. This is followed up by a substantial air attack against a combined American-French carrier battle group that was originally sent to reinforce Iceland with several landing ships full of US Marines. The ensuing battle results in serious losses to NATO's navies; the
French Navy's
Foch is sunk, and the landing ship
USS Saipan explodes, taking over 2,000 sailors and Marines with her, while the
USS Nimitz is forced to drydock in Britain to undergo lengthy repairs. While NATO's naval forces remain a significant threat, the Soviets are ultimately left in control of the strategically-important
GIUK gap. NATO and Soviet air and ground forces continue to battle ferociously in Germany, with both sides taking heavy losses. General-Colonel Pavel Alekseyev, the de-facto Soviet senior commander on the ground, scores a breakthrough in a tank battle at
Alfeld, opening the possibility of a Soviet advance beyond the
Weser River with far less opposition from NATO forces. Meanwhile, a naval attack on Soviet bomber bases with cruise missiles launched by US Navy submarines opens a window for an amphibious counter-assault on Iceland, retaking the island and effectively closing the Atlantic to Soviet forces. Among the action, a Soviet prisoner captured during the retaking of Iceland reveals the true cause of the war, and a NATO air offensive swiftly destroys much of the Soviet military's readily-available fuel supplies. With Iceland re-taken, the United States is able to resupply the rest of NATO via the reopened sea lanes. By this point Soviet tank and strategic bomber formations have taken punishing losses, forcing them to further cede the initiative as NATO prepares to mount a decisive counteroffensive. Mobilizing older tanks like the T-55 fails to do anything except add to Warsaw Pact casualties, and the Warsaw Pact is forced completely on the defensive. The Soviet leadership begins to realize that they face the possibility of outright defeat—either through a NATO military breakthrough or a war of attrition which, given their desperate shortage of oil supplies, would amount to the same result. The General Secretary considers using nuclear weapons to force a favorable end to the war. This infuriates Alekseyev, who had been mobilizing for a final counterattack on Germany but faces execution by the Soviet government for its slow timetable. The KGB chief organizes a coup along with Alekseyev and other members of the Politburo. The new Soviet government then negotiates for a ceasefire with NATO and a return to
status quo ante bellum, ending the war. ==Characters==