When the Dropshots Began

This is a Tl of the Dropshot War, a conflict that ocurred in the late 50's and early 60's. WW3 between NATO and the Soviets. The war is huge, with conflict raging across the globe. The rules of war are broken repeatedly, and the world is never the same. In OTL, the US War Department made a plan in 1948 about a possible conflict in 1957 between the USA and Russia. No onre thought that plan would have to come into effect. But it did, and the results surpassed everything the drafters could have expected.It was war, complete, total, and final. Nations were shattered, and a part of the world was irretrievably lost.

Criticism is always welcome.

1953
===1956=== ===1957=== ===1958===
 * March 2: Stalin survives a stroke, thanks to the attentiveness of his personal guard. Their realization of something being wrong allowed Stalin to quickly get medical attention. Stalin will award the guards with the Order of the Red Banner.
 * September 7: Eisenhower, while on a well deserved break from campaigning, suffers a fatal brain aneurism, dying within 4 hours despite the best efforts from doctors.
 * September 12: An emergency convention meets in San Francisco to decide on a new Republican nominee for President. After 3 days of negotiations, they decide on Richard Nixon for President, with Earl Warren as Vice President.
 * October 23: A revolution occurs against the Communist govenrment in Hungary. The new government announces their intentions to leave the Warsaw Pact and hold free elections.
 * October 29: Israel invades Egypt, and seizes the Sinai Peninsula with the aid of Britain and France. their intention is to reopen the Suez Canal.
 * November 4: The Hungarian Revolution comes to an end as Soviet troops crush the uprising.
 * November 6: Adlai Stevenson defeats Richard Nixon in the Presidential Election. Almost immediately, relations between the USA and the USSR begin to cool, as anti-communist rhetoric begins to flow from the White House, and as Stalin succumbs to his visions of grandeur. The same day, israel calls a halt to military operations in Egypt, having achieved all their goals.
 * January 22, : As one of his first acts as President, Adlai Stevenson dispatches an expeditionary force to Europe to assist Eastern European nations in the event of another incident like the Hungarian Uprising in the previous year. This, combined with statements made by Stevenson during the Suez Canal Crisis, cements the belief in Stalin's mind that the USA is bound and determined to bring down the glorious Soviet Union using whatever means necessary. He decides to get in the first blow. Soviet forces begin slowly massing along the borders of West Germany, Italy, Turkey, and Greece
 * March 8: Egypt reopens the Suez Canal as Israel withdraws from the Sinai Peninsula.
 * April 27: U2 spy planes, under the jurisdiction of the CIA, spot the growing Soviet buildup. This, combined with other warning signs, points NATO to the only logical conclusion. A Soviet invasion is imminent. General Lauris Norstad issues the highest peacetime alert for NATO forces in Europe.
 * May 15: Operation Guillotine begins. The Soviet Union declares war on NATO, and a 3 million man army launches itself across the border into West Germany. In the Middle east, the Soviets launch Operation Sandstorm, with a 2 million man army slamming into the Turkish defense lines.
 * May 17: President Stevenson institutes a mandatory draft, and begins moving the nation to a wartime footing. In his speech announcing the declaration of war, he refers to this as the “Last Great Struggle for Democracy” Across the nation, troops begin marshaling in East Coast cities, for deployment to Europe and the Middle East.
 * May 19: The Soviets have broken through the NATO defense lines, and are driving them back into West Germany. In Berlin, the NATO forces have fallen back into their sectors, and are engaging in house-to-house fighting. In Turkey, the Turks are using their useless land as a buffer to weaken the Soviet invasion forces.
 * May 22: Bulgarian and Soviet forces launch attacks into European Turkey and Greece. The Turks were expecting this, and manage to hold the line, although they are forced back toward Constantinople.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">June 19: The final pockets of NATO forces surrender in Berlin. They have exacted a heavy toll on their Soviet attackers, and most of West Berlin is in ruins.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">July 3: Soviet forces reach the Rhine River. NATO forces have blown the bridges, and are perfectly content to let them ram their heads against the NATO river defenses.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">July 5: Warsaw Pact river crossings end in failure as NATO artillery destroys the temporary bridges, and machine guns mow down the men in boats. In Turkey, the Soviet forced have been brought to a halt in the eastern portion of the nation, while in the west, Constantinople is under siege.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">July 17: To no ones real surprise, North Korea invades South Korea. The South Koreans had been expecting this since world War 3 started, North Korean forces meet South Korean troops on the DMZ, and battle rages for days as the NK troops attempt to break through the DMZ defenses.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">July 25: The North Korean offensive has ended in disaster. They have been repulsed with high losses. US and South Korean forces begin building up for an offensive into North Korea.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">August 12: In a lucky strike, a B-52 bomber breaks through Soviet aerial defenses and drops a Mark 36 9 megaton strategic nuclear weapon on the Soviet port of Leningrad. The port facilities are wrecked, and much of the city is turned into an inferno in the resulting firestorm. The Soviet Baltic fleet as mostly been destroyed by this time, and some smaller ships are destroyed by the bombs detonation This is the beginning of the Totality Plan, put into effect at Curtis LeMay's urging. This is the beginning of escalation between the two powers.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">August 29: Constantinople falls. The Soviets now control the Western portion of the Bosphorous.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">September 28: Soviet river crossings manage to establish a beachhead on the Allied side of the Rhine, through the use of chemical weapons. The neutral nations are outraged, but it is balanced by the US nuclear strike on Leningrad.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">October 1: A 25 kiloton Mark 7 Nuclear bomb mounted on a Corporal rocket detonates among the Soviet beachhead on the Rhine. The groundburst wipes out a large amount of troops, and sinks the craft that are transporting to Soviets over the river. Allied counterattacks later in the day drive the Soviets into the river. The Soviets move up nuclear weapons, and more chemical weapons, while the Allies do likewise.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">October 3: The French Communist Party walks out of the government, citing allied nuclear attacks as their reason. A general strike is ordered, and parts of French industry are hurt by french communists not showing up to work.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">October 10: South Korean and American forces launch an offensive into North Korea. Despite soviet aircraft assisting, the Americans take control of the skies, and the offensive makes large gains. The Chinese start to look warily toward their Korean border.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">October 23: The Soviet Union drops a 3 megaton nuclear weapon on Paris. The city is largely destroyed, although the important members of the French government were not present.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">November 28: China declares war on South Korea. The American and South Korean offensive had gotten to close to their border for comfort. Chinese troops flood across the Korean border to assist the North Koreans. In Japan, the involvement of China in the war strikes some concerns. A meeting of influential people is arranged.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">December 5: A constitutional amendment is passed in Japan, striking the section of their constitution that limits Japan to a self-defense force. A draft is begun, and Japan begins preparing for war.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">December 12: The US and South Korean offensive has been pushed back to their start point.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">April 3: The Soviet Union launches a major offensive into Greece, with support from Bulgarian troops. The Greeks put up a fierce resistance, but they are outnumbered and outgunned. The NATO forces there can only put up resistance by launching ambushes using the mountainous terrain.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">May 16: The US economy has finished moving to a war footing. Industries vital to the war effort have been placed under government control, strikes are illegal, and rationing has been put in place.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">May 20: Athens is put under siege by Soviet forces.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">May 21: China and North Korea begin another push into South Korea.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">May 27: In a continuation of the Suez Canal crisis from 1956, Israel launches a preemptive strike on Egypt. The Israelis claim that the Egyptian Army was preparing an attack on Israel. The Israeli Army shatters the Egyptian front, and begins driving at a fast clip towards the Suez Canal. Within hours, Syria and Jordan declare war on Israel.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">May 30: The US detonates a 10 kiloton nuclear warhead over the Chinese spearheads. The US-South Korean Army launches a counterattack, and knocks the Chinese back over the border. Israel seizes the Sinai from Egypt. They then begin moving forces to stop the Syrian offensive into Israel.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 5: Israeli and Jordanian forces meet in pitched battle to the west of Jerusalem. In a 6 hour battle, the Jordanian army is smashed.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 10: Israeli forces undertake a two pronged campaign. One army swings into Jordan, going up the West Bank, while the other launches an attack on the Golan Heights. They are generally successful, and the Arab nations begin sending out envoys to the Soviet Union for aid in the form of troops.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 15: The Chinese-NK offensive has been brought to a grinding halt.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 18: The Greek government is evacuated to Crete hours ahead of Soviet troops. Greece has fallen to the Soviets. Anti-Communist rebels will be a thorn in the Soviets side for the rest of the war.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 20: The Soviet Union agrees to send troops to the Middle East to fight Israel. Jordan, Egypt, and Syria announce their entry into the Warsaw Pact. Upon hearing the news, the Israelis approach the Americans for access into NATO.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">June 22: The Peoples Republic of Greece is declared, with Athens as its capital. The nation is basically a Soviet puppet nation.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">July 4: The US and Taiwan begin negotiations for Taiwan to join the war in order to have a base to prepare for an invasion of China.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">July 7: Israel joins NATO. Troops from Italy, France, and American move into Israel to help them fight off the incoming Soviet offensive.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">July 15: The Soviets launch a major river crossing, detonating 3 nuclear weapons over the NATO defense, while surging their aircraft into the sky. By the end of the day, the Soviets have secured part of the west bank of the Rhine. They begin a buildup to begin a drive into France.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">July 17: The Soviet drive toward France begins. The battle in the sky still rages, and NATO is hard pressed to stop the offensive. It doesn't help that the Soviets are using chemical weapons to help their advance.
 * <p style="margin-bottom: 0in">July 28: Following a massive conventional and chemical artillery bombardment, NATO launches a counterattack into the flank of the Soviet army.