These posts are from the thread The Long Way Down; I decided to split the thread into two different ones for the sake of chronological clarity.
Krakenhof, Kingdom of Aemen
0200 Hours
Markus Pantelejen and his partner crept along the barbed-wire fence surrounding the mansion, which was home to a well-respected Wankan and his family. The place wasn’t guarded, despite the bubbling tensions between the darker-skinned ethnic Wankers and white ethnic Aemen majority. This made Markus’ job much easier. They reached the place where they’d cut a large hole in the barbed wire the day before, and crept through. Running rapidly amongst the shadows, they reached the door. Nobody was out at this time; the entire town was deadly silent.
It took Markus barely half a minute to pick the old lock, and both of them crept in, pistols with attached silencers in hand. The entire Weissman family lived here; had lived here for several generations, and had become a symbol of the Wankers claim that the Sellenland, as the lightly populated mountainous region was called, belonged to the Wankers. There was no time to waste. They quickly and quietly searched the ground floor. Finding nobody awake, they proceeded into the sleeping quarters. Light rays shone out from the bottom of one of the doors, it was the office. Heinrich Johannes Weissman, Wankan-rights activist, hero of the Sellenwankers and thorn of the local Aemen authorities, was up working.
Carefully, Markus turned the doorknob and opened it. A barely audible screeching alerted the victim that something unusual was going on. But there were two bullets in his head before he could register the masked intruders. It was no pleasure for Markus to kill his own countrymen, but this was necessary- for the greater good of the Wankan Volk. The Weissman family would become martyrs of the Wankan cause, their names would become known across the entire Wankan People’s Republic, and maybe, one day, even a stature of them would be constructed.
Finding nobody else in the office, Markus and his partner proceeded with their mission. They entered every room, silently killing any living being present, regardless of age or gender. Within minutes, the Weissman bloodline had been exterminated, more than a dozen Wankers lay dead on the floor, half of them children. The bodies were heaped together on the kitchen floor. Both proceeded to whack and punch the dead bodies, leaving them in a mess of bruises and cuts. On the walls of the house, they sprayed in red paint:
WANKERS, GET OUT! SELLENLAND BELONGS TO THE AEMEN PEOPLE
Finally, they each produced an Aemen-made submachine-gun.
”Bereit?”
His partner nodded. The night came alive with the sudden twin-fusillades of gunfire as sixty rounds were pumped into the dead corpses. When they were done, they swiftly left the house, exiting via the same way they came from, and disappeared into the night. The first neighbours had awoken, and had already alerted the authorities. When the deed would be discovered, both sides, the Aemen citizens and the Wankan minority, would both pay…
Kronstadt, Capital of the Volksrepublik Wanka
0900 Hours, Same Day
Abwehr-chief Franz Kanaris rubbed his eyes drowsily. He had barely received 2 hours of sleep since the Allied Nations’ oil disaster had plunged Wanka into the worst crisis since the Dellian insurgency six years ago. Meeting after meeting had been called up by the nations authoritarian (and somewhat corrupt) government, lead by Ulrike Meinhof. Wanka only produced 40% of the oil it required, the rest came from imports, much of it from the AN’s Universal Petroleum. Seemingly every nation on Meridia was now scrambling to survive. Sylva had nationalized all UP assets, and had demanded that the other nations to do the same. But Wanka had refused- it had found a solution. And the solution to the crisis seemed to him the most utterly stupid thing that any government could do in such a situation. Invade and annex part of another country. A country which was more economically developed, had a bigger population and had a far more advanced military. And his job was to give them a casus belli for the planned “return of historically Wankan land”.
Historically Wankan, my ass, Kanaris thought. The history of the Sellenland was quite recent. The geographical position meant that few people bothered to cross the difficult terrain which formed the border between Aemen and Murovanka. Back in the 1800s, Aemen families decided to settle and build villages in the few cultivatable areas near the Donau and Elbe rivers of the Sellenland. Because of the difficulties in terrain, the area remained quite peaceful- until the remains of the Wankan monarchy arrived, fleeing from the popular uprisings and subsequent revolutions which ended several hundred years under the King’s rule. The survivors of the Königliche Garde, the King’s Guard, didn’t hesitate to surprise and occupy the villages of the ethnic Aemen population. The newcomers brutally expelled hundreds of Aemeners from their homeland, forcing them to flee and killing them when they didn’t. Thus, much of Sellenland came to be Wankan-dominated.
But once again, chaos threw the existing Wankan order apart. The Republic of Murovanka was torn into a state of anarchy which lasted for several decades with numerous factions fighting for domination. In face of the chaos, the Aemen King did not let the opportunity to retake what had been lost over a hundred years ago, pass. 1982, Aemen troops invaded the Sellenland and occupied it with little resistance. However, unlike the Wankans earlier, they did not attempt to force their enemies out; instead, more Aemeners were encouraged to settle in the Sellenland. The Aemen population swelled, and conflicts ensued due to racist policies of the Aemen authority. As a result, these policies were relaxed and overt discrimination ceased to exit; however, it was still widely present. The Aemen citizens were treated far more favorably and had a generally far better quality of life. Wankers were far more susceptible to being arrested and executed. This apartheid-like system generated much discontent and anger which continued to rise over the years, and was something the Wankan government was now happy to exploit…
And so, the Abwehr was to play a big role. As the nations foreign intelligence service, it was responsible for primarily these situations. Kanaris’ agents were now actively stirring and provoking conflicts between Wankans and Aemens; the number of wounded, dead and executed (mostly Wankan for the latter) was skyrocketing. Special-Forces squads of the 75. Sturmbattalion and Sturmgeschwaders 12 and 13 were being infiltrated past the porous Wankan-Aemen border with missions to find suitable pathways of advance, gather intelligence on Aemen Army strengths and to prepare for sabotage missions.
Volksrepublik Wanka
1600 Hours, Same Day
Hauptmann Zweistein of B Kompanie, 1. Battalion, 66. Fallschirmjägerregiment (Paratrooper) kissed his tearful wife and two children goodbye. His little ones wouldn’t let go, especially his 7-year old daughter, who understood fully well that her father might not come back.
”NEEEEIIINN… Papa, geh’ nicht!” she squeeled, desperately clinging to his camouflage jacket, causing several heads to turn.
”Papa wird bestimmt zurückkommen. Das versprech’ ich dir. Sei ein gutes Kind und kümmere dich um Mama und dein Bruder, ja? Papa kommt bestimmt zurück.”
He firmly but kindly pulled his daughter away from him, waved at his family for the last time, and headed toward the waiting Transler-400’s military transport aircraft where men on loudspeakers were loudly chanting the respective unit names: ”ROT-BLAU, ROT-BLAU, ROT-BLAU, HIERHER..”
One of his platoon commanders caught up with Zweistein, patting him on his back. Both had red eyes. Nobody spoke until they walked up the ramp into the aircraft, which was already halfway loaded with his company.
“What do you know about our mission?”
“I know as much as you do, nothing more, nothing less. What do you think is going on? As usual, the wording is so damn vague…”
“I’d guess its some bloody Dellen faction acting up again. We’ll probably have to flush them out of the mountains once more- or something like that.”
Zweistein grimaced at that. Both of them had been there, as privates, in the cold mountains near the Wankan-Aemen border. Dellian rebels were waging an expertly-led guerrilla warfare campaign which shook the entire north of Wanka. Together with several Gebirgsjäger (mountain troops) battalions, they were tasked with clearing the network of caves that the Delles were using to stage their attacks. The mission was met with varying success, with massive casualties on both sides. A ceasefire was agreed upon, something which holds to this day. The Dellian rebels still continue to live in the mountains, mostly on the Aemen side of the border, where the local authorities didn’t bother them.
“Still, watch your words. I think Meinhof’s loosening up her policy on the Delles, apparently trying to get them to ‘integrate’. Rumor has it that there are numerous half-Delles in the Armed Forces, and even some full-Delles.”
“Madness, gell? First sign of a rebellion, and they’ll switch sides. These cold bastards should be kicked out immediately.”
Zweistein shrugged at that.
“The regiment commander says they’re the best mountain troops around. Well, we will see. We’re in no position to decide.”
“Hmph.” Zweistein clearly saw that his subordinate wasn’t satisfied by the answer. The issue with the Delles was a twisted and complicated one- what issue wasn’t twisted and complicated? What bothered him about this mission was the vagueness about it. He’d only been told that they might be deployed to ‘protect’ Wankan lives up north, and that his company would undergo preparations and training in the cold mountains. He turned his head, just in time to see the last crates of locally manufactured air-launched anti-radiation missiles and air-to-air missiles get loaded onto the aircraft. The grey Transler-400 rolled out behind the massive Transler-5 strategic transport which was no doubt carrying several of the regiments Wiesel Waffenträger Armored Weapons Carrier on board.
We’re in a massive oil crisis, but the government still has enough to airlift entire divisions across the country. he thought. ”How strange…”
Map of the Sellenland