Timeline Part Eight (No FDR)

“Operation: Gotterdamurung”

The war plan relied on two key phases. One, a massive rocket assault using the new thermonuclear or “Wasserstoff” bombs. Tokyo, Osaka, Yokohama, Nagoya and Sapporo were all targets, with Tokyo and Osaka targeted with three missiles each. Also several key military targets, including the Ujina port in the city of Hiroshima, as well as others in China, the Philippines, Indo-China, and Australia.

All of these attacks would be launched from the new Type XXXVII (Type 37) ballistic missile nuclear-powered submarines of which there were twenty-six in 1955. They would launch the A15 SLBM, introduced in 1953, each capable of a 500 kiloton thermonuclear warhead or the equivalent in high explosives or chemical weapons.

Phase Two would begin with nerve gas artillery bombardment of troop concentrations in China, eastern Siberia, and Burma, from German forces in Siberia and India. Then massive ground assaults by the Wehrmacht, primarily in the form of airborne units, the new “Kaiser” Tank, and SdKfz-322 armored personnel carriers. All supported of course by massive air coverage from the new Me-303 jets and the Dornier Do-450 tactical bomber. It would be led, in China, by General Manfred Rommel, son of the retired Field Marshall Erwin Rommel and one of the youngest generals in the Wehrmacht.

The Japanese were not expected to be caught totally unawares. Since 1947, they had developed a simple, but functional radar detection network, throughout the Home Islands and extending to the Philippines and Korea. Additionally, they had, since the introduction of nuclear weapons, divided their naval and air forces and stationed them throughout Asia to avoid a single debilitating blow.

However, due to their lack of numerous nuclear weapons and no intercontinental ballistic missiles (still a year or two from deployment), and the massive German air superiority, they had no way of posing a credible “deterrence” to the German nuclear force.

‘’’The Final War’’’ -   05:53am Berlin Time, April 20th, 1956--   A single coded message is flashed from Irkutsk to Calcutta to the newly completed German naval base on the island of Diego Garcia…”Gungnir” (the magical spear of the Norse god Odin).

The missile attack went off on schedule, with nearly all missiles fired (and none of the subs detected) within twenty minutes of each other. With no possible ballistic missile defense, Japanese Air Command detected the in-bound warheads some seven minutes before impact with nothing to do but alert all commands that the war they knew was coming, had arrived.

There was a meeting of the single-party Diet that day, with Tojo’s replacement, Prime Minister Ryukichi Tanaka, in attendance. They heard the air raid sirens go off and stunned they began to slowly make their way to the bomb shelter below. Only when Tanaka’s personal guard rushed in, to hurry the Prime Minister to an awaiting helicopter, did they realize what was happening. It was too late of course, and the city was hit in succession by three 500 kiloton thermonuclear warheads. Emperor Hirohito and the entire Imperial family were instantly killed.

The successive strikes against Japan were moderately successful. Hartmann, as promised, had taken out as much as 35% of the Japanese Navy and 20% of the Japanese Air Force in the first day. Bombers were now launched from deep inside India and Siberia, with the goal of taking out as much of the rest as possible. All German U-boats, specifically the Type XXX (Type 30) nuclear fast attack boats, already deployed, were given license to attack any Japanese vessel encountered, with special concentration in Indonesia and the Indian Ocean.

The ground assault went as planned, though delayed by a late winter snowstorm in the Chita district of Siberia. General Rommel’s tanks slowed in the heavy fall, waiting for APCs to catch up and air cover was reduced due to low visibility, though still formidable. First contact with Japanese ground forces was on April 22nd. The 21st Panzer Division, his father’s old Afrikacorps division, reached the city of Chita and urban warfare began.

For their part, the Japanese put up a valiant struggle, taking endless casualties, but slowing the German advance into China and Burma, probably by atleast two weeks. 35,000 casualties were taken at Urumchi, in the Chinese Xinjiang province, trying to stop the Germans; another 53,000 were taken at Lanzhou in the Gansu province. But by May 15, Rommel, as well as the other generals had pushed over 1000 miles into Japanese held territories, with General Kurt von Liebenstein’s 7th Panzer reaching Kunming, in Yunnan province two days later.

Meanwhile the 15th Fallschirmjägers airborne division seized the oil fields of Burma and amphibious forces took (what remained after massive bombardment) of Singapore. And amphibious troops landed outside of Perth, Australia, taking the small city from the Japanese garrison in less than 48 hours.

The Japanese tried to strike back from the air and sea. Nakajima Ki-77 bombers out of Peking and Rangoon attempted to make strikes against German forces in Russia and India. One of these, a bomber out of Peking, was loaded with the primitive Japanese fission bomb, and attempted to reach the major German staging ground at Irkutsk. It was intercepted along the Japanese/German Siberian border and shot down. The crew, with the plane’s engines on fire, set the warhead to immediate detonaton (to prevent it from falling into German hands and also in hopes of taking out some of their fighter attackers). At 5300 feet, it detonated. The blast and shockwave knocked down three of the six German jets, with another pilot suffering flash blindness and bailing out into a radioactive cloud later killing him. It was the first and last time the Japanese ever launched a nuclear attack.

To prevent future ones, key Japanese nuclear research facilities and their three nuclear reactors (all located months earlier by German reconaissance flights) were bombed with nerve gas (to keep the facilities intact for German inspection and to prevent radioactive contamination).

Meanwhile the war rages on into May and June…. Timeline for “No FDR”-Part Nine

Back to "No FDR" Timeline Part Seven