Klaus' War {IC|MT|CLOSED}

[Ord Caprica]

OOC: Seal is a placeholder until I can either create my own or find a suitable replacement.

To: President Johannes von Bamburg, Republic of Saatland Subject: Salutations From:State Department, URC Date: Salutations Your Excellency, I hope that this message finds you well and your people safe from the horrors of the ongoing civil conflict that grips your wider nation. My name is Oliver Kenway and I am the President of the United Republic, a democratic government not terribly dissimilar to the one you are so valiantly fighting for at this very moment. I write to you today both as an admirer and as a friend though we have never met or indeed interacted with one another before this message. I have watched and observed as you and indeed all your countrymen have attempted to forge your own little piece of liberty from the fires civil war with both dignity and honor and I must admit it has moved me greatly. Our United Republic while not necessarily formed in the uniquely horrible crucible of civil war, has had to weather storms of conflict in order to secure liberty and freedom for all who live under it's banner of protection and it is this same feeling which I am sure you feel as strongly as I do, that forms the very foundation of our duty to both our nation and to others in similar struggles. Democracy is not easy. Tyranny and autocracy are easy. It is easy because the call to impose the will of the strong upon the weak is as natural to mankind as life itself, it is one of our most primitive and basic instinct. This is what makes our system of government the noblest task known to humanity because it goes contrary to everything we as a species have learned up until the invention of civilization. I feel it is my duty to not only safeguard the liberties and freedoms of my own people but to nourish the spark of hope that exists in the hearts of all men and women who wish to be free, to live and to die free and that are willing to risk their very existence in that struggle. So I would like to offer my hand in friendship, and say that it is my hope that we can stand in solidarity against the enemies of liberty and freedom. Should you require it; small arms and supplies will be placed at your disposal and the brave Marines of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit will be placed at your disposal to be used to train and support your fight for independence. I would also like to establish a diplomatic mission in your capital to foster greater relations between our two peoples in the interest of unifying all people under the banner of liberty and equality for all. Sincerely, United Republic of Ord Caprica United Republic State Department

[New Decius]

FW 909 “Jupiter”, Personal Command Aircraft of Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel
Army Theater Command Capile, Indian Ocean
En Route to Rochefort

Being one of the best commanders in the Imperial German Army had its perks to be sure, like getting access to the latest vehicles and equipment. The FW 909 was designed as a airborne command center, able to manage to a global war while flying around high above the battlefield. It was equipped with a radar stealth system and plenty of chaff to allow it to actually operate in the combat theater, though it had a good pair of engines on it too in case a speedy escape was ever needed; this was more useful in allowing it to keep up with troops deploying to the combat theater as well as a mobile frontline. Currently Focke-Wulf had only produced around twenty of these new command aircraft, but Rommel had gotten the third one to be produced, the first and second had of course ended up destroyed as they'd been used for durability tests to see how much they could take and under what conditions they could serve. Rommel had named the aircraft 'Jupiter' after his favorite Roman deity, the aircraft had seen him through the recent Katanga Revolt in Deutsch-Mittelafrika back in 2017 and also the Georgian Intervention of the same year.

Right now however, rather than being able to properly plan his coming campaign, the good Generalfeldmarschall was being pestered and frustrated by his Staff Aide, Leutnant Linden Feltzer who was reading off a list of invitations various senior persons in European high society had sent him, hoping to get into Rommel's good graces. It happened everytime that Rommel went on campaign, the nobility and upper classes knew that when the Steel Wolf returned he would be covered in even more glory and fame than before, and it was believed that if they rubbed shoulders with him then they would have some of that fame by association. To be honest the Generalfeldmarschall hardly ever took up any of these invitations, largely cause they were too low on the rungs for him; he attended balls and galas hosted by His Imperial Majesty the Kaiser or alternatively the King's and Queen's of the European States, not Margraves and Barons who were political leeches upon his fame.

"And next on the list is His Most Catholic Royal Majesty, King Francis William of Ireland-" At that Rommel snorted and had to refrain from snickering like a small child. His Most Catholic Royal Majesty Francis William of Ireland was in fact His Royal Highness, Prince Franz Wilhelm of Prussia, a member of the once-disgraced House of Hohenzollern and a great-grandson of Kaiser Wilhelm II. When the British Revolution of 1972 threatened to plunge Ireland into a Socialist revolt as well, Germany had intervened and occupied both Britain and Ireland with the assistance of British Loyalist Forces and Northern Irish Loyalists, resulting in the restoration of the United Kingdom of Great Britain under Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II though now much linked to the German Empire. Ireland was to become a monarchist vassal of Germany, though of course a Catholic was required for their monarch and it also could not be a member of a senior German noble house because Ireland was sure to be a state of unrest for years to come, thus a member of the House of Hohenzollern was dredged up and converted to Catholicism and crowned King of Ireland.

"Lets dismiss that one without even a reply Feltzer and turn our minds to my plan of attack." Rommel said while bringing up the interactive map of Capile on the table below him, keying in a few commands to display the positions his forces were to take up on arrival in Capile. "Now when Heeresgruppe Beowulf arrives in and around Rochefort, I don't want to spend idle time chatting with the Capileans or doing parade maneuvers, I want them moving out as soon as their ready which if they expect to live up to my expectations will be within twelve hours of arrival in Capile. 12th Armee will be deployed closest to Stammburg, General von Schneider will probably be moving out before I even issue the orders, Lilian knows my style of command from previous campaigns, but she is not however to engage Stammburg directly, merely stress their flanks with artillery and probing raids. 22nd Armee and 16th Armee are to immediately make all due speed to assist 12th Armee in encircling Stammburg, with 22nd Armee to take up the center and prepare all armored units and air cavalry for a breakthrough operation."

Now came the air support to be given for the offensive and Rommel had indeed prepared far better than Leutnantgeneral Brauchwist had when gathering information on his opponent, or rather his fame and reputation had forced the Abwehr to work harder than they had for Brauchwist. He had updated satellite images being streamed right to the 'Jupiter' which in turn were being sent to the aides of each of his field commanders, along with accurate enemy figures acquired by human sources on the ground, only German agents since for an operation of this sort Capilean intelligence wasn't to be trusted due to the potential for conflicting loyalties and also any fascist deserters were just as likely to lie than tell the truth.

"This is a unique campaign, in that it will be on such a small scale that my own supplies will be more than enough to sustain my forces even if the campaign exceeds my expected time frame so I can freely destroy the enemies supply depots. Normally on the grand campaigns I command the front's are large enough to require the capture of a significant number of the enemies supplies to supplement those my forces will use up." He keyed in a few more commands to simulate the planned airstrikes. "Now with the ground based fighter squadrons I have en route to Capile now coupled with the aircraft carried by the 18th, 21st, and 32nd Carrier Battlegroups which will be deployed to support Heeresgruppe Beowulf, I expect total air superiority and anything the fascists send up will be shot down immediately if not sooner." That was no boast, Rommel was not a man to boast, there were to be almost five hundred fighters alone deployed for this offensive along with several dozen high-altitude interceptors. "I want tactical airstrikes ahead of the offensive on these depots and these armories. Several of our agents also obtained the locations of a number of 'training centers' where the fascists are drilling their recruits to be proper soldiers." Rommel snorted again at the thought. As if those ruffians and thugs knew what made a proper soldier.

"The destroyers and cruisers of the three Carrier Battlegroups will be launching cruise missile strikes on the following targets which include anti-air batteries, command posts, and other assorted targets. However I don't expect our naval forces to be very involved in this stage of the campaign, I want the naval portion of Operation Stammburg cleared up as soon as possible so the three battlegroups can be sent to support Heeresgruppe Siegfried deploying near Sudhoof."

"Now Fetlzer make a note to be distributed to all officers under my command, actually make that all ranks. We are here to help our allies liberate their land from rebelling vagabonds not to plunder it as we see fit. Any soldier in my command who does not abide by the Geneva Convention when conducting themselves will be severely punished in the highest manner. Any soldier who willfully kills civilians, loots from civilians, refuses to take surrendering enemy soldiers as prisoners of war, kills surrendered prisoners of war, or otherwise breaks the rules of civilized warfare is to be shot on site by his commanding officer or fellow soldiers. Any soldier who commits such acts is no longer fit to call himself a soldier and has become himself an enemy combatant. Any officer who defies these orders or willfully orders their men to commit acts against the rules of civilized warfare, I shall have the pleasure of shooting said officer myself."

That was a stickler with Rommel, he could not stand men or women who flagrantly ignored the rules of war and took excesses against civilians or prisoners of war. He'd had an entire company in Syria shot or hanged for looting and killing civilians in Damascus, and their commanding officer was shot by Rommel himself, each and every one of them had been denied their pensions and all commendations were revoked. Rommel only commanded soldiers, not criminals.

"Now I want you to get in contact with Feldmarschall Augustus Hornberg of the Capilean Royal Army, he is in command of the Rochefort area, and tell him that the two French Divisions and the Italian Division are to be treated with the same respect he might afford a German Division of troops. Let him know that any abuse of the French or Italian's will make its way back to me and I will meet to discuss that with him personally should that happen. If it helps the French certainly won't desert, they are commanded by His Royal Highness Peter-Christophe Napoleon, a French General and a cousin of His Royal Majesty Jean-Christophe Napoleon King of the French."

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

BISCHOFSDORF
NOVA CAPILE

---

The small town of Bischofsdorf lay within the southern tip of the Kongs River Delta, the triangular landmass formed by the intersection of the two forks of the Kongs River with the Saat River. Its one hundred or so inhabitants lined its streets to cheer as grinning soldiers marched through its streets, their khaki uniforms and brown campaign hats marking them as members of the Saatlander Army. They were in parade uniform because they had not had to fight for at least a week; no one seemed willing to contest the fertile land south of the river Saat.

By the time the first column left Bischofsdorf, the barrels of their rifles were blooming with roses and a yellow Saatlander flag was flying above the village. There were many more battalions to come, however. Saatland intended to occupy the entire Delta, and to hold a new line on the southern bank of the Saat. And they had the men to back it up.

---

Far away, in his private office in the Bamburger Haus, the President of the young republic was beaming as he read the letter of support that had reached him from Ord Caprica. He hastily scrawled a letter of reply, and then rushed to tell his ministers and generals of the joyous news: A new ally for the Republic!

To: President Oliver Kenway
From: Präsident Johannes von Bamburg

Celebrated upholders of democracy,

I am honored and grateful to receive and heartily clasp the olive branch of diplomacy which you have extended to my young nation. It fills me with pride to know that the young republic has already attracted such staunch allies as your United Republic. You already know of the sincerity and righteousness of our cause, and I am humbled that you are so readily willing to commit your nation's hard-earned resources to it.

The battalions of young men eager to join my republic's army can scarcely find enough arms to train with, and so if I am to arm my entire nation for war, supplementary materiel from yours would be most welcome. Additionally, your offer of hardened defenders of democracy is most generous. While I am not eager for more noble men to die and suffer, I am eager to see the flower of democracy bloom in Capile, and the required sacrifice will be war. Experienced combat veterans would be paramount to the success of Saatland's largely green forces.
Finally, I would be honored to host your diplomatic mission in Ludislau, with the hope that it will facilitate improved communication between us.

My spirits are buoyed by your encouraging words and deeds. I pray that this marks the emergence of a deep bond between our two republics, may they endure forever.

Sincerely,

Johannes von Bamburg
Präsident
Count of Eismar

---

ROCHEFURT
NOVA CAPILE

---

"So, the Germans are to be working with us, eh?" Field Marshal Augustus Hornberg inquired, turning Rommel's missive over in his hands once before dropping it to his desk.

"It would appear so, sir," his aide replied. The two men seated across from Hornberg, Konrad Fleischmann and Klemens von Pritzen, stared silently at their commander.

"Well," the latter said after a long moment of silence, "what else does it say?" Von Pritzen was a nobleman, a haughty and arrogant old man who was especially bitter and embarrassed that his own lands had risen against him and turned Communist. He was very much the opposite of his commander. Whereas Hornberg was a bloated, stout, and magnificently-mustached man with a healthy complexion and a snowy ring of hair, von Pritzen was tall, thin, clean-shaven, sallow, and had a sad collection of grey wisps sprouting the top of his oblong head.

The field marshal turned his baggy, morose, hound dog-like eyes to face his subordinate, and regarded him for a moment with open disdain. "It is a message telling us to prepare for the arrival of Heeresgruppe Beowulf," he informed.

"What a name," Fleischmann interjected, laughing. "It would seem the Germans have a flair for the theatrical."

"They're almost as bad as Nemetz when it comes to that," Hornberg agreed, chuckling deeply. He cleared his throat and continued: "He also explicitly mentioned that we should treat his lackeys, the French and the Italians, with the same respect we would a German."

"So none, then?" Fleischmann said, grinning.

"Exactly," Hornberg replied whilst shifting heavily in his seat. "But, no. Our cousins are proud creatures; treat them as such, and try not to smile at the names of their armies."

"My chief concern," von Pritzen broke in, "is with these French soldiers. What if they are to come into contact with forces of, say, the French secessionists, and decide they would rather serve their kin than their masters?"

"A thought that has crossed my mind more than once," the field marshal concurred. "I shall try to bring it up before the German commander without offending his sensibilities." The man's large, baleful eyes shifted to the watch straddling his thick wrist. "Speaking of which; Generalfeldmarschall Rommel should be arriving soon. We will meet him at the docks."

Fleischmann rose and started to don his officer's coat, but paused with one arm in the sleeve. "Rommel?" he asked, incredulously.

"Joachim Rommel," Hornberg said, lifting himself up with some difficulty, "the Steel Wolf. Grandson of the Desert Fox. Surely you've heard of him?"

"Yes, but..."

"Off to the docks."

---

The crowd gathered in Rochefurt's cathedral was quiet. Only a low murmur of conversation swept through them, and there was no garish military band to rouse their spirits. Nevertheless, thousands of them were packed shoulder-to-shoulder inside the massive building, and looked forward with mixed expressions of bleakness and eagerness to the raised platform before them. Presently, a figure emerged from inside the church's backrooms and walked steadily to the lectern at its center.

It took the audience several seconds to recognize their Grand Duke, even though he was wearing his signature olive uniform. His hair, dark auburn the last time he had been seen, was now completely silver, and his complexion was several shades lighter. Once he took the podium, however, his presence became unmistakable. Some of the spirit he had exuded when he first began to reform his country returned to him, and claimed his audience.

"As all of you know," he began, "these are dark times. The enemies of democracy have captured many major cities over the last few weeks, including our capital. The casualties of war are mounting, and everyone has been adversely affected in some way. However! We cannot lose heart."

Klaus' voice began to raise, echoing across the high-ceilinged cathedral. "We are the last line of defense for your brethren. If we fall, four-hundred million innocents will be left to the mercy of tyrants. I have heard that the traitor Nemetz has proclaimed his Reich. I can only imagine what horrors he intends to replicate on Capilean soil if he defeats us! And the Communists are also lashing out, despoiling our countryside and mobilizing their entire population for their war effort.
The enemy is willing to make any sacrifice for victory- and so we must be ready to do the same."

Klaus paused. The onlookers' eyes were magnetized to Klaus', so blue and clear. "Hope is far from lost for us. So recently we defeated the Communists at Haakensburg. Countless foreign nations have recognized the purity of our cause, and are devoting good men and women to our war effort. Our enemies have had their turn, but now it is ours. I ask you, Capileans, if you can make a sacrifice for your country, for each other. Surely it is not too much to ask for you to work overtime at the factory to produce more munitions for our brave soldiers? Surely it is not too much to ask for you to take up arms in defense of such a noble and priceless aim as freedom? Surely, then, it is not too much to ask for you to take in a poor refugee from Saxtonburg or Raus who has lost a home?
We must all pull our weight if we are to weather this storm! We must unify against adversity, give no quarter to our enemies, and never rest until they have been defeated!

"Capileans, it is our duty to fight. We do not have a choice in the matter. If we fail, we are dooming all future generations to lives of poverty, ignorance, and oppression, squandering their birthright- democracy! And so, I beseech you, as a fellow Capilean: Make your sacrifice, no matter how small or how great, in order to eliminate the enemies of peace!"

---

Klaus returned to Rochefurt's city hall some time later to find Wilhelm Knott and a handful of his most trusted advisors gathered in the command center.

"Thank you, Your Grace," the Chancellor greeted him. "This might have been just what Capile needed."

Behind him, an aide spoke up: "Counting radio and television audiences, your speech had over one-hundred million listeners!"

Klaus went wide-eyed for a moment, and then smiled. "That's good. See to it that it continues broadcasting. I want people to regain hope."

"Your Grace," Knott broke in in a different tone, "there is another matter that we really should attend to." He leaned in, and whispered into his liege's ear. Klaus' brows furrowed.

"Order Karl here at once. I won't stand for his foolishness any longer."

[New Decius]

Docks of Rochefort, Mooring of Troopship SMS Karlsruhe
Grand Duchy of Nova Capile
Deployment of Heeresgruppe Beowulf

At present, Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel was standing with General Lilian von Schneider and His Royal Highness General Pierre Christophé Napoleon, Grand Duc d'Occitanie (Grand Duke of Occitania) as he went over his plans for the field of battle in the siege of Stammburg. Around them troops and equipment of the 12th Armee were continuing to unload and head off to the marshaling point outside Rochefort which Rommel had previously selected while the 22nd and 16th Armee’s would be airlifted into a pair of airbases beyond the city to move out and follow the 12th for the encirclement of Stammburg. The three had already discussed the plans heavily while en route to Capile but it never hurt to have a final review before one was to be tested on their material. “I don’t expect the Fascists to be able to put up the same fight against us that they have put up against the Royalists.” Rommel stated as he folded up the map and put it neatly inside his jacket. “For one we are foreign troops so they cannot rely on deserters and turn coats for information nor are our codes similar enough to break easily. Also my troops are absolutely loyal, disciplined, experienced fighters who will die without hesitation for Kaiser and Empire-“ At that Lilian couldn’t help but snicker causing her commander and old friend to turn to her with an eyebrow raised.

“It is not so much Kaiser and Empire they will die for Generalfeldmarschall, rather it is that they will fight and die for you.” Across from her, General Napoleon nodded his agreement. “Joachim you do realize that your fame is so great that if you wished you could probably usurp the Kaiser by military coup. Thats why Regensburg is so terrified of you.”

Their French colleague now joined in with his own quip. “Indeed, your fame is well known throughout Europe and the world and even the armies of all Europe will follow you if you declare rebellion.”

“Surely you jest my friends, my fame is not that great, nor do I seek to usurp the Kaiser nor any other monarch of Europa for that would create chaos which I despise.” Rommel was famously a very modest man and refused to acknowledge the simple fact that he was more beloved than the Kaiser and if he wanted he could start a military coup with very little effort. Lucky for the Kaiser Rommel was also extremely loyal and would never betray the oath he had sworn to Kaiser and Fatherland.

Then an aide came up and informed them that Field Marshal Augustus Hornberg and his staff were on their way over to meet with Rommel, at which point His Royal Highness cringed. To say that the French commander, or any of his men, were happy about being placed at Capilean command would be a blatant lie, they were all expecting to be treated as little better than the French rebels in Capile, despite the fact that the Royal French troops were all fierce anti-communists and loyal to His Royal Majesty Napoleon VII. “Must my troops really be placed under Capilean command my friend, I expect them to barely refrain from shooting us instead of the enemy. All my men, including the Italian’s, are experienced loyal veterans of many campaigns and deserving of the title soldiers, I will not have them treated as criminals. Many of them have sacrificed their family relationships to continue serving France and Europe by going on more and more tours of duty and more than a quarter have one limb or another replaced with a prosthetic due to wounds from battle.” Contrary to popular belief the French Royal Army, thanks to the efforts of the Imperial German Army, had been made into a first rate fighting force and honed by two decades of fighting partisans in colonial territory.

Rommel nodded his head in affirmation and placed a hand on his friend’s shoulder to calm him. “I understand my friend, I have served with some of your men in Syria and I know they are all proper soldiers. You can be assured that any abuse of your men will find its way to me and there will be severe consequences, now we must greet our counterparts.” He then leaned in to whisper so that their approaching counterparts could not hear. “Besides the only way they would allow French troops on their soil was under their command. France and Italy were the only European states besides Russia with standing armies to donate troops and the Russian’s are still fighting Red Army remnant factions in Central Asia.”

At the present moment, Rommel did not hold a very high opinion of Field Marshal Augustus Hornberg due to the fact that the fascist holdout at Stammburg not only continued to exist but had expanded somewhat while he was in command of the Rochefort area. As a proper soldier Hornberg should’ve made it a priority to neutralize the fascist position at Stammburg given its close proximity to Capile’s interim-capital, as well as a potential staging ground for VF offensives against Royalist territory. Not only that but the propaganda value of a quick magnificent victory over the so-called Capilean Reich would do wonders for the Royalist cause.

As Field Marshal Augustus Hornberg and his two aides walked up to where Rommel, Schneider, and Prince Napoleon were, having been directed by a staff aide, it was almost a shock that the soldiers and officers around them did not stop what they were doing to salute the six superior officers in their presence. In fact they barely even acknowledged the presence of staff officers: that was Rommel’s style of command. Hang the pomp and circumstance just keep the gears moving. Rommel and the two General’s however did offer a salute to their Capilean counterparts, well Rommel just raised his baton to his cap since he and Hornberg were of equivalent rank theoretically; in the German Army there were Feldmarschall (Field Marshal) which was a senior command rank and then Generalfeldmarschall (Field Marshal General) which was a theater command rank of which there were only seventeen in the whole Imperial German Army. So technically Rommel would outrank Hornberg if they were both in the German Army but since they were not then the Wolf would afford his counterpart the respect of an officer of equal rank.

“Field Marshal Augustus Hornberg, a pleasure to meet you. I am Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel, Commander-in Chief of His Imperial European Majesty’s Forces in the Capilean Theater, and I look forward to working alongside you to crush the fascist scum and the socialist insects. I am the overall commander of all German forces in Capile for the duration of their deployment in the present conflict though Feldmarschall Rudolf Heitmann and Feldmarschall Franz Lütold von Sonnenschein act as strategic commander’s for Heeresgruppe Beowulf and Heeresgruppe Siegfried respectively. I also have reporting to me, six General’s acting as field commanders of their assigned Armee one of whom is here with me now.” He then gestured to Lilian standing next to him who gave the appropriate Prussian heel click salute. General Lilian von Schneider stood at five foot eleven inches tall with long blonde hair that came down just past her shoulders and piercing green eyes, she was a well built woman with a rather attractive figure but one which had been honed through much rigorous exercise. An Order of the Red Eagle, one of Prussia and Germany’s highest honors, was pinned proudly to her uniform showing that she was much more than a pretty thing but a capable commander before all else.

The Imperial German Armed Forces were rather odd when it came to the topic of female service. Women were not allowed to serve in frontline combat roles nor assisting combat roles (Artillery, Engineers, etc) but could serve in the Kaiserlicher Sanitätsdienst (Imperial Medical Service) and attend officer academies for command training. The one exception in combat service was the KSK which took recruits wherever it found merit and as the KSK was technically outside the OHL’s command structure it could ignore rules of service.

“This is General Lilian von Schneider, commander in the field of the 12th Armee attached to Heeresgruppe Beowulf which is unloading and deploying around us as we speak. General von Schneider is a seasoned veteran of many campaigns including Algeria in 1998, Syria in 2011, and Tunisia in 2014 and one of the finest officers under my command. Presently her forces in 12th Armee will begin attacking and destroying any fortified or otherwise military positions on the border between the fascist territory in Stammburg and Royalist territory while 22nd and 16th Armee continue to be airlifted in beyond Rochefort.”

Now they came to Prince-General Pierre-Christophé Napoleon, Commander of the French and Italian forces at Capilean disposal. “May I have the honor to introduce, His Grace and Royal Highness, Prince-General Pierre-Christophé Napoleon Grand Duc d'Occitanie and a cousin of His Royal Majesty Napoleon VII of France. He is to be the commanding officer of the French 7th Mechanized and 32nd Infantry Divisions and the Italian 23rd Light Armored Division which the Kingdom’s of France and Italy have generously loaned out to Capilean command for this campaign, though if I so require I will restore them to my command at any time I require. That is unless they are engaged in an active operation with Capilean forces. His Grace is a first cousin of His Majesty Napoleon VII so his loyalty is more than assured as is that of his men whom are all seasoned veterans of many campaigns.”

There was a slight cough off to the side and Rommel was once again reminded of the distinguished person whom had accompanied him from Germany to Capile yet was far beyond even his chain of command, and he turned to see that Sir Mariotte had stepped forward and given his own salute to Hornberg. So now they would get to find out why one of the Kaiser’s personal agents/bodyguards had come along for the trip. “I am Sir Julian von Mariotte of His Imperial German Majesty’s Order of the Iron Eagle, presently deployed at the express direction of His Imperial Majesty, Kaiser Josef Franz I of the German Empire. I am charged with the protection of his cousin Her Royal Highness, Princess Elizabeth of the Kingdom of Austria and Hungary, whom I understand is presently her in Rochefort under the care of His Highness, Prince Karl of Capile. If you could be so kind could you direct me to them so I may begin my duties.”

Then there was a rumble of planes overhead heading in the direction of Stammburg. “Ah that’ll be the first wave of air strikes hitting their ammo depots...”

---

SS Madras, Indian Angriya Cruise Line
En Route to Capile, The Port of Roappe
Socialist Underground Collective

Dieter Göllwitz took a long drag from his cigarette as he looked out across the waves to where the sun was setting on the horizon, and thought on the circumstances that found him on a grubby excuse for a freighter which the Angriya Company of India tried to call a cruise liner. Dieter was born in Leipzig in 1972 almost thirty years after the Imperial Restoration but his parents had been ardent socialists and fled with him to the Soviet Union in 1975 when Berlin began cracking down on the left-wing elements of society at the height of the Cold War, so he had only known Germany for a scant three years and was raised in Russia until 1985 when the Soviet-German War also known as the Romanov Restoration came and they fled again. Well Dieter had to flee from Minsk when it fell to the Kaiser’s troops fighting alongside the Red Army traitors whom fought for then Grand Duke Vladimir Kiril Romanov, though his parents hadn’t been nearly so lucky having been killed when the German Army shelled the city center believing the Soviet Command Center to be there. Afterwards he joined up with a group of partisans despite being only thirteen, and learned the hard way how to survive on his own and how to kill, oh he learned how to kill. Since then he had gone from one partisan group to another all over the world fighting for one Socialist cause or another against Germans, French, Italian’s, Japanese, English etc etc. Finally in 2006, Karl Pfaff, the General Secretary-in exile of the KPD (German Communist Party) tracked him down and commissioned him as a Colonel in the underground Secret Army of the Collective, and since then he had largely served as a drill master for the new recruits which were few and far between in Europe proper, what with the Abwehr being after them almost as viciously as they hunted fascists. Dieter would give the monarchist swine that good streak, they hunted fascists even more ferociously than communists.

So for the past thirteen years he had largely been inactive on the resistance stage, training the new recruits who seemed to get younger with every passing year, how to avoid detection by the Abwehr or any of the European counterparts to said and how to survive if they were found out. He also taught them how to fight and kill if need be but always drilled into his recruits that violence should be the last resort, only to be used if your cover was blown, though those rules only applied to Europe itself. The German, French, and Italian colonies as well as Russia beyond the Urals, were as unstable and hazardous as they’d always been so it was generally accepted that violence in those areas was a given; some of the Secret Army’s most secure bastions were deep in the jungles of the Congo inside Deutsch-Mittelafrika or within the mountains of the Russian Caucasus where proper military forces found it too risky to search. Dieter for his part was stationed in Casablanca in the French Protectorate of Morocco, another creation of Germany’s for when they restored the House of Bonaparte to the French throne they also restored France’s former colonies to the new French Kingdom. Casablanca remained, as it always had and likely always will, a hub for the seedier elements of society such as the criminal underclass and the black market, a perfect position where goods could be shifted from European ports and then sold around the world at extravagant prices, far more than they would sell for in their own country; warranted the much-well off Europeans often did not realize or care just how much more well off they were compared to the rest of the world. These lowlifes also helped keep the Secret Army and the Socialist Underground alive with their dealings and the various communist groups which made up the Underground had their agents and assets scattered about these ‘businessmen’ and their criminal enterprises to ensure their loyalty and silence.

In fact it had been through one such black marketeer in Goa, India, that had pieced together their current venture to Capile. Not long after the Capilean Civil War broke out, Terry Blücher General Secretary of the BSU put out feelers through the underworld for aid from the Socialist Underground in their struggle against the Royalists and Fascists; needless to say some hotheads wanted to use the distraction of a civil war in Germany’s strongest ally to ignite a full scale uprising across the European Federation. Luckily the leaders of the Underground knew that something like that would be quickly and brutally crushed by the Kaiser’s troops, as well as those serving the governments in Rome, Paris, Madrid, London, Vienna, and Moscow, so there was much deliberation as to how exactly to help the BSU when reports came in of how the majority of the communist forces in Capile were untrained militia with comparatively few professional soldiers. Therein came Dieter’s part of the venture.

He, alongside several thousand of his comrades from across the globe all of them hardened partisan veterans, were now en route to Capile with all their experience at hand to whip Blücher’s militia into shape as a proper army, especially given that reports were that Generalfeldmarschall Rommel himself would soon arrive with almost two million German and European troops as reinforcements for the Capileans. Blücher needed a professional trained army of either proper soldiers, or properly trained guerrilla’s who could tackle Panzer Divisions, so Dieter and his comrades would make him one. The SS Madras would carry them through to the Port of Roappe where intelligence was that the town was devoid of any Royalist military presence because of its close proximity to French territory and also the need for any and all troops to repel the BSU’s Southern Offensive, and so their black market contacts should have everything ready to go when they arrived. The Madras was also carrying a large cache of weapons and equipment, mostly German and Russian, to be used to train the BSU’s militia with and equip their professional troops with. They had prearranged a system of communication directed solely to General Secretary Blücher himself, since they could not risk any leaks at this stage of the Commune’s involvement or else the Abwehr would institute an immediate witch hunt in Europe and the colonial territories. Disposable burn phones had been provided to Dieter and the other hundred training group leaders each with a number provided to them as Blücher’s own.

Upon arrival in Roappe they would immediately disperse among the population, sending the first coded message from the hundred phones to the one source, Arrival, as the training groups vanished into the countryside though the overall destination was Raus. Trucks supplied by a trusted Capilean black marketeer would bring the numerous convoys of weapons and supplies from Roappe to Raus via routes even Dieter did not know. The simple message of Check would be sent in every three hours until the final message of Clear was sent which meant that the training group had arrived in Raus. Dieter and the other more senior leaders would meet with Blücher while the rest of their comrades got right to work training and equipping the militia inside Raus for combat and campaign. It would be a difficult task but if the Fascist’s and Secessionists could draw the Royalists attention long enough, they just might be able to build up the BSU into a proper fighting force.

[Ord Caprica]

Ludislau, Republic of Saatland
Port of Ludislau
0322 Hours

A Marine Expeditionary Unit is the United Republic's principle tool when it came to diplomacy. It possessed enough firepower to defend itself but was both logistically and politically light enough to not upset too many people and be capable of handling a wide variety of tasks. It is in both theory and in practice, a jack of all trades and master of enough. The 11th MEU had arrived in the theater of operations a week ago and had spent its time both making its presence known and avoiding detection as the diplomatic types back at home wrangled with their counterparts to avoid any mistakes that would cost lives.

And while the diplomats sparred with one another, the Marines did what they did best, prepared to defend the liberty and freedom of their countrymen and spread those same ideals around the globe. The MEU had been trapped in port for days, off ship liberty suspended until clearance had been given from higher up the chain of command and that clearance had been given, fourteen hours ago, a fact that had until now had been the exclusive knowledge of the MEU command team. It had been decided that off ship liberty would be extended during the middle of the night in shifts starting at 0600 in the morning in groups of roughly three hundred sailors and Marines. It wouldn't do well for their image if six thousand Capricans descended upon the capital all at once and taking such a course of action would compromise their defensive posture.

Instead, a compromise was reached to grant a company and naval compartment liberty at the same time for a period of 12 hours. They could go out and work to win the hearts and minds of the civilians and the rest of the unit would continue in their defensive posture and finally begin their mission, the training, advising and assisting of the burgeoning Republic's military forces. To assist them in that task, deep within the bowels of their amphibious vessels, nestled safely in the cargo hold were 20,000 M18 Individual Automatic Rifles, 4,000 M11 Pistols, Man-portable anti-air, and anti-tank weapons systems, kevlar and flak, night vision optics laser designators, and all manner of equipment. It would be the first of six shipments brought over in the next six weeks, with one arriving approximating every seven days. The Marines job was to teach what passed as the military of the infant country not only how to use them but how to use them as part of a combined arms unit and use them well. With almost a thousand Marines dedicated every day purely to training, preliminary estimates said they could have a force of 20,000 men ready to fight in as little as eight weeks, though they'd shoot for a six-month training rotation before the next MEU arrived to take over the job.

Underneath their official objectives, the MEU's Commanding Office Marine Colonel Byrne was tasked with assessing the viability and success rate of the Republic in its war of independence both with and without overt U.R military help. While the President had sent in the Marines on what was being called a humanitarian mission, he wanted his options laid out clearly and accurately if the request to put boots on the ground.

On the civilian side of the house, U.R Foreign Service Officer, Elizabeth McCord would be on her way to meet with President von Bamburg. She was a career diplomat, educated in some of the best universities in Caprica and had spent the last 18 months completing a joint service tour with the National Clandestine Service. She was young and hungry for success even if this was her first posting outside of a friendly country. The Diplomatic Security Service couldn't make the trip so a security detail consisting of Marines from the shipboard component of the Fleet Anti-Terrorism Team would be accompanying her to the meeting.

The Naval Component outside of whatever ships were needed to assist the Marines with their operations would be picketed forty kilometers away from the coastline and dispersed, just in case someone on the other side got trigger happy. They were there officially as noncombatants and any strike on U.R military personnel would be considered an act of war.

Marines and sailors alike were optimistic and eager to get to work.

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

NEAR OSTHILT
NOVA CAPILE

---

"How the hell did they get right on top of us!" Ernst Maier shouted.

He could barely even hear himself over the absolutely defeaning din of battle. The otherworldly scream of hurtling shells, the endless gnawing chatter of small arms, the battlecries and dying howls of men- they drowned out his thoughts, leaving only his instinct.

Minutes earlier, he had been awakened by those very noises, ordered to change into his combat uniform, and informed that their bunker position was under assault by Communist forces. His commanding officer, Captain Wirz, seemed to ignore his shout. Perhaps he hadn't heard it, or maybe he was just too preoccupied to answer his half-asleep subordinates.

Bent over a radio, Wirz pressed his ear close to the receiver and listened for several long moments. At last, he replaced it and rose. Sighting Maier as if for the first time, he frowned.

“Why aren’t you on the front line, private!” he growled. Before Ernst could reply, he waved his hand. “Doesn’t matter anyway. All units have been ordered to fall back to the defenses immediately outside Osthilt. Grab your gear and get going!”

Maier didn’t have to be told twice; the sounds of battle were sufficient warning. Reaching for a backpack and rifle, the soldier followed his officer out of the bunker and into hell.

Enemy troops swarmed like insects up at the Royalist positions. Beneath their bunker there was a skirmish line of machine gun nests and sandbag positions, all of which were now overrun, their occupants engaged in a chaotic melee with a flood of enemies.

The stench of death hung heavy over the battlefield, and as Ernst saw, illuminated by the full moon, his first corpse, he realized why his father had tried so desperately to stop him and- he forced himself to remember the name- Rudolf from enlisting.

Around him, young, wide-eyed Royalist volunteers were already beginning to rout.

“This is a fighting retreat, damnit!” he heard Wirz shout somewhere in the distance. It made no difference. A wave of frightened Capileans were straggling backwards, and soon Ernst found himself carried by the tide.
The Royalist positions were overcome by daylight, and the opening phases of Operation: Hammer were launched.

Communist troops were projected to reach Osthilt by the next day, and with the majority of Royalist troops still at Haakensburg, it seemed that the city’s fate was already sealed.

---

ROCHEFURT
NOVA CAPILE

---

August Hornberg had to remind himself that he was treating with officers, not a noble court, when he arrived at the German temporary encampment. In particular, he had to stop himself from bending to kiss the hand of Lilian von Schneider, whose title, he reminded himself, was General, not Baroness.

Women were restricted to work in the Capilean medical corps and bureaucratic positions, and it was the first time Hornberg could remember seeing a woman in uniform. If all women looked like Lilian von Schneider, maybe permitting them to serve wouldn’t be such a bad thing, he remarked in his head.

“Generalfeldmarschall,” he said airily, aware and flattered that Rommel had addressed him as an equal, “your reputation precedes you.” He exchanged polite greetings with the other Europeans, and briefly introduced his own subordinates. “Generals Fleischmann-“ he gestured to a sallow, somber-looking man- “and von Pritzen.” Von Pritzen had clearly expected a much more dignified introduction, such as he might have been afforded at the aristocratic garden parties he frequented more often than military exercises.

After the introduction of Sir Mariotte, Hornberg turned and gestured impatiently for an aide. A cheery, flaxen-haired young man whom the Field Marshal revealed to be a Major Brandt arrived.

“Brandt is the liaison between us and the high command,” the Field Marshal explained. “If Sir Mariotte would be so kind as to go with him, he will take you direct to the Prince and Princess.”

Hornberg had an air of sickly courteousness and amiability, which some took to immediately and others couldn’t stand from the first meeting. He looked at Rommel and wondered into which camp the Steel Wolf fell. He thought he already knew.

Upon hearing of the German battleplan, Fleischmann grew visibly restless, his face a mix of dark humor and earnest distress. Eventually, he interrupted his European counterparts.

“With all due respect, sirs and madam, the Fascists are not to be taken lightly. They are unlike any other enemy force in this war, in that they are as close to a military as traitorous scum can be. Although they are outside of the area of operations of our army group, whose chief concern is the containment and elimination of the Communist pocket at Pritzen, we have heard detailed reports about their cohesion and prowess in battle. There is a reason their pocket has only been expanding. I mean no disrespect, but this campaign will be different than your most recent experiences, crushing ill-equipped African rabble.”

Hornberg looked alarmed for a moment, but quickly he regained his composure, and his bloodhound’s eyes looked calculatingly at the Europeans, waiting to rebuke Fleischmann for his outburst if they reacted unfavorably.

---

Major Brandt talked to Sir Mariotte as they walked, pointing out landmarks and making small-talk as if he were leading a peacetime tour. He was older than he had at first seemed, middle-aged to fit his rank, but his body was that of a man at his physical peak, not outrageously muscled by imbued with a sense of strength.

He seemed genuinely friendly, and either stupid enough not to realize that Mariotte wouldn’t care, or carefree enough to ignore it. He spoke as if Mariotte were a new friend, asked him briefly about his service and personal life, and then they had reached the temporary capital building, which was only a block or two away from the docks.

A stream of men and women flowed in and out of the building at all times, and the two men had to fight their way in. Once inside, Brandt led him down into an underground level, past several stone-faced sentries, and through a long, dimly-lit hallway, all with the same talkative demeanor.

They stopped before a simply wooden door, and Brandt knocked thrice. After a long pause, the door opened. The impressive, bear-like form of Wilhelm Knott was there. His wild blue eyes saw Brandt, saw Mariotte, and then he nodded. Without a word, he flung open the door and admitted Mariotte, though Brandt remained outside.

The Knight was greeted by the sight of Klaus, nearly purple in the face, standing before Prince Karl, whose pallid face was a deep, embarrassed red. Most importantly, Princess Elizabeth was present, safe and secure, with a personal escort of several SD men beside her at all times.

There was a long silence, as the two Capilean royals took in Sir Mariotte.
Klaus was clearly not in the mood for introductions.

“Who are you?” he finally spoke.

---

LUDISLAU
NOVA CAPILE

---

Fending off a crowd of anxious reporters, President von Bamburg slammed the front door to the Bamburger Haus and chuckled to himself. Saatland’s amateur press was beginning to catch on, he thought.

He didn’t mean to be cruel to them, but he was in a hurry, and so he answered no questions as he strode across the pavement toward his car. A few security personnel surrounded him and herded him into the car, which took off at once toward the offices of the fledgling Republic’s foreign ministry.

Today was Johannes von Bamburg’s first meeting with an international representative- a woman representing Ord Caprica, to be exact- and he did not intend to be late.

His country’s fate might be on the line, after all.

[New Decius]

Docks of Rochefort, Mooring of Troopship SMS Karlsruhe
Grand Duchy of Nova Capile
Deployment of Heeresgruppe Beowulf

Rather than take offense at Fleischmann’s words, Rommel did almost the exact opposite by bursting into a bout of laughter. The famous officer was so boisterous that he had to grasp Prince-General Napoleon’s shoulder to keep himself from doubling over in amusement, though Hornberg and his staff did not yet know why Rommel was doing so. If they weren’t too focused on the fact that a full staff officer in his mid-fifties had just burst into a fit of joy, they might have noticed that his colleagues had drawn sly grins upon their faces while the Chief of Command of the German Forces in Capile composed himself.

After a moment Rommel collected himself and wiped a tear from his eye as he straightened himself back up. “Pardon my display gentlemen but my troops are all ten year veterans at least and some even participated in the Iberian and Finnish Interventions in the 90’s, while many of my junior staff officers got their combat and command experience during the Russian Intervention in the 80’s. Also the Imperial German Army holds no less than six large scale total war conventional arms drills every year with additional localized drills conducted for the reserve forces, as well as the three annual European Combined Warfare Drills every year.” He produced a folder from within his jacket but did not yet reveal the contents yet to those around them.

“I also have every advantage in my favor going into this battle. Total air and naval superiority allowing me to bombard and recon the enemy positions at will and conduct airborne resupply even in the event any of my troops should be encircled. I do not deny that the Fascists can put up a bitter fight and truly I look forward to the challenge, but...”Now the man flashed that famous wolfish grin which was partially the reason for his globally known nickname. “...they presume to think they lay the battlefield out for me. Rather they have merely set up the chess board and I intend to play them as I see fit. For now gentlemen I am a wolf on the hunt for his prey.”

At this moment Rommel chose to hand Hornberg the folder which was in fact General Fleischmann’s service record, the German Army kept track of officers in allied militaries for both cooperation and espionage purposes, along with a request for a temporary transfer to Rommel’s command. “Generalfeldmarschall I have reviewed General Fleischmann’s service docket and I note that he has some talent for administration and so I would request his services. As we advance on Stammburg it is clear that a great many prisoners will be taken, currently until your government dictates otherwise I am to treat captured VF troops as official Prisoners of War, and I cannot spare any staff officers to command the military police units required to guard and process them nor to handle the potential civilian unrest in the wake of our advance. I would request Fleischmann command the five regiments of Militarpolizei which have accompanied my forces along with any Capilean military police units that may be spared.”

“I anticipate that there are some fanatics among the populace who have actually been brainwashed by that lunatic Nemetz and will actively resist my forces. I cannot have my advance slowed up by partisans in my rear, I must be able to keep moving forward.” He produced another document from his jacket to give to Hornberg, one which laid out the broad idea of Rommel’s plan which centered around a pattern of action. The 16th and 22nd Armee would make rapid advances on the flanks of the enemy which would create a salient watched by the 12th Armee; air and naval bombardment would then assist in sealing that salient off as an encirclement which 12th Armee would mop up. This tactic would continue until Stammburg itself was encircled and then a short period of naval bombardment and air strikes would precede an all out offensive into the city. “If I am to properly draw the enemy into these salients where they can be encircled and destroyed, I cannot be detaching troops from my rearguard to deal with fanatics attacking us. Hence I would like Fleischmann in command of the Militarpolizei and its activities behind the lines, including the treatment of the POW’s.”

At this moment General von Schneider took her leave of the group, stating she had to join her troops moving forward to their starting positions. Meanwhile in the distance even from far away the sound of aircraft engines and distant explosions told of the battle already going on at Stammburg...

---

Though technically while Sir Mariotte was acting as the personal agent of His Imperial Majesty of the German Empire, therefore an extension of the Kaiser himself and thus due the respect of his station, he would let this abrupt rudeness on the Grand Duke’s part slide, largely because the Princess Elizabeth was safely in Klaus’ care. Also in part because Klaus was an old friend of His Former Imperial Majesty, Kaiser Wilhelm Augustus III; the two had met during several social diplomatic functions during the late Cold War and then coincidentally ended up as commanders on opposing sides during the Columbian Wars. Wilhelm had always thought Klaus would be able to heal the wounds that had begun to grow in Capile during the latter half of his father’s reign, though that faith may have been misplaced.

Sir Mariotte knelt before the Grand Duke in proper fashion before rising once more and giving the traditional Prussian heel click salute. “Greetings Your Most Royal Grace, I am Sir Julian von Mariotte, a Knight of His Imperial German Majesties Order of the Iron Eagle, acting as the personal envoy of Kaiser Josef Franz I at his direction.” He produced from his jacket his orders signed by the Kaiser and affixed with his personal seal, which he then handed to Klaus. “By the order of His Majesty I am to see to the protection of his cousin by blood, Her Royal Highness, Elizabeth Louise, Princess of Austria and Hungary, while here in Capile until such a time His Imperial Majesty recalls me.” The fact that the Kaiser could recall Elizabeth was left unspoken because they all knew if the Royalists were on the verge of defeat, the Kaiser would have her taken back to Europe no matter what even against her will. “I am also authorized if Your Grace should desire it, to provide protection to His Royal Highness, Karl, Prince of Capile while under orders of His Majesty. I have with me a company of elite troops who have never failed yet and do not intend to start now.”

---

SMS Himmelreich, 32nd Carrier Battlegroup
Just off Stammburg, Operation Faust
Grand Duchy of Nova Capile

’Even on the battlefield I find that a nice cup of tea is most relaxing, indeed it does clear the mind.’ Großadmiral Hans-Ulrach von Stürnben thought as he took a long calming sip from his cup of Earl Grey. He took no notice of the slight disturbances on the surface of the liquid as the vibrations from the action around them felt their way across the fleet. After all, if one could not enjoy a cup of tea in the middle of a battle then one was a bundle of nerves indeed.

With the 18th, 21st, and 32nd Carrier Battlegroups redeployed to the Capilean Theater from the Pacific and Indian Ocean Theater, the Kaiserliche Marine had appointed Großadmiral von Stürnben as commander of Flottenkommando (Fleet Command) Capile though he was technically still under the command of Rommel even though in terms of staff ranks they were technically equals, Ulrach even was the Wolf’s senior by two years on date of rank. Besides the three Carrier Battlegroups which already placed a considerable naval force at von Stürnben’s disposal, an additional four Surface Attack Squadrons (2 Guided Missile Cruisers and 6 Guided Missile Destroyers) were currently on their way from the South Atlantic Theater and the 7th Carrier Group would sortie from Rochefort once Admiral Kreutz had determined his personnel were once again medically fit. The 81st Attack Submarine Squadron was also at the Großadmiral’s command but he had chosen to deploy the fifteen submarines in a reconnaissance role instead, having them patrol in the North-Western waters off Capile to keep an eye on Nemetz’s small, but capable, fleet should it sail South to try and aid Stammburg.

Rommel had given the order to begin the blockade and bombardment of Stammburg long before his main forces had made landfall in Capilea though admittedly von Stürnben had been holding back in his attacks, only employing the main battery guns on the surface combatant’s while keeping his arsenal of aircraft and cruise missiles in reserve for when the offensive began in earnest. Though to be honest the presence of three Hesse-Class Nuclear Battlecruisers gave his forces more than enough firepower to level Stammburg if he so chose, not that the average Guided Missile Destroyer did not already possess enough firepower to level a city block. So far a meager force of several small fast attack craft had attempted to attack his forces and been promptly sunk, the VF had no large warships nor carriers this far South; with the majority of their territory up North, Nemetz was keeping the bulk of his fleet close to home, obviously to prevent Germany or other Royalist allies from launching a large-scale amphibious invasion of his territory. Rumors were that Nemetz was so worried about such a threat that he was actually having old museum ships such as long outdated battleships refitted to be combat vessels.

Von Stürnben was shaken from his thoughts when a thunderous roar was heard from overhead and he looked up from his position on the viewing deck beside the bridge of his vessel, to see a whole squadron of five Heinkel S-609 Command and Control aircraft (The S-609 is a military variant of the Heinkel 712 Jet Liner) flying above his fleet. They soon began to disperse in different directions to take up their positions above the battlefield, going up to an altitude too high to be targeted by enemy anti-air defenses but still low enough to communicate with troops on the ground.

“Well then I suppose its time for us to light up the dance floor eh?” Stürnben joked lightly to his second-in command, Vizeadmiral Willibald Koenig whom did not refrain from a grin himself.

“Aye Großadmiral, I’d say its a good moment to introduce those fine fellows in Stammburg to their new dance partners.” As they spoke a flight of Junker Ju-74 Ground Attack Fighters was raised up onto the flight deck, a similar scene taking place on the other carriers around Stammburg.

“Ja I understand some of them are real bombshells!” The two men could not refrain from bursting out in laughter then as the Ju-74’s tore away off the flight deck and into the sky while the three Nuclear Battlecruiser’s each fired off eight cruise missile’s in the direction of Stammburg and the surrounding towns.

Before Rommel actually besieged Stammburg itself, he would deprive the enemy of vital resources such as air defense, supply depots, and any chance of safe rest. The battlecruisers were launching missile strikes on the so far confirmed anti-aircraft batteries and emplacements which both satellite and human reconnaissance had pinpointed within the combat zone, to be followed by air strikes on the so far confirmed supply depots and troop barracks. The goal was to ensure that the enemy had no safe place to muster or rest his troops which would lead to overworked, exhausted, starving troops who could not effectively execute a battle and were more prone to either lethal mistakes or surrender, particularly if the enemy blew up their ammo depots. Constant air and missile strikes would also wear down enemy morale or at the very least the sanity of those under the target; eventually frequent airstrikes would cause people to stop sleeping in fear they could be killed without ever being awake to try and escape, which would also exhaust the enemy at his core. However one of the biggest and most important targets of these air strikes was the VF’s armor within and around the city, intelligence said that the enemy had elite veteran Panzer troops based at Stammburg which could seriously delay Rommel’s offensive costing time and lives. While the carrier based aircraft would be bombing supply depots and barracks, the ground based squadrons would effectively hunt enemy armor with guided missiles and smart bombs so that the problem could be resolved without having to meet it face to face.

The whole of Generalfeldmarschall Rommel’s staff was made up of highly intelligent and imaginative thinkers, strategists who could adapt to their battlefield as it evolved and weren’t stuck to a rule book that stunted their creativity. They all agreed that with overwhelming strength in numbers, artillery, air power, and battlefield intelligence, Heeresgruppe Beowulf would have little to minor difficulty taking the countryside around Stammburg, perhaps a small struggle for some of the larger towns but not much of a challenge overall. The real challenge was Stammburg itself.

If the VF troops barricaded themselves inside the city, an effectively used the civilian population as shields, it would force Rommel to either violate his moral code by shelling and starving out civilian’s or to risk large German casualties taking the city block by block and street by street. Though modern aircraft and artillery were precise enough for pinpoint strikes in a tactical assault on an urban area, it would be no picnic for the German troops or the Capilean civilian’s inside the city though at the very least the Capilean’s were far more likely to be better cared for behind German lines than in VF hands. Rommel was one of those officers who clung strongly to and strictly enforced the Geneva Convention especially in regards to the treatment of civilian’s and POW’s, going so far as to even bring additional shipments of food and medical supplies only to be used for the liberated civilian’s in the course of the campaign.

In three days, after all troops reached their assembly points and the air and missile strikes had been going on for almost four days, Operation Faust would begin.

OOC:

Total German Fleet Blockading Stammburg VF Territory:
-3 Nuclear Super Carrier’s (Kaiser Wilhelm Augustus I-Class)
-6 Nuclear Fleet Carrier’s (Kiel-Class)
-3 Nuclear Battlecruiser’s (Hesse-Class)
-9 Guided Missile Cruiser’s (Stuttgart-Class)
-45 Guided Missile Destroyer’s (Baden-Class)

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

STAMMBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

The city of Stammburg was a picture of the Fascist world which the VF had always sought to create. The streets were clean, the pedestrians walking forward and with purpose. No one lacked a task, whether it be the manufacture of munitions, the construction of field defenses, or simply the pinning up of propaganda posters. At the heart of the town stood the Party Offices, a tall and traditional structure which saw more foot traffic than the city hall or any other government institution.

Feldmarschall Johannes Krebs stood within the top floor of the building, in the expansive office of the Gauleiter. Krebs was a thin, olive-skinned man with dark gray hair like wool. Several had compared him to an emaciated sheep, because of both his appearance and the complacency with which he accepted his orders. The officer had, however, not been so eager to accept the latest and most bureaucratic demand from his superiors.

In accordance with the transformation of the faction from a political and military pact to a proper nation, a civilian administration had been crafted. Predictably, Nemetz had drawn upon the works of his forebearers and reinstated the Reichsgaue, the provincial units which Capile had been divided into when it was governed by the Third Reich. The Reich's southern territory had been amalgamated into one such district, and the Gauleiter, civilian governor, had been appointed just days before. Nemetz had chosen Julius Scherk, a former newspaper editor and Party hardliner, for the post.
Julius Scherk, as a matter of policy, had gone against the military administration in every way possible.

Upon their first meeting, Krebs had amiably presented the stout, portly Gauleiter with his plans for the construction of a series of bunkers on the along Stammburg's beaches, and had been shocked when the other refused him. Taken aback, the officer had tried to explain the strategic importance of such emplacements, only to be lectured for half-an-hour on the delicate equilibrium of public opinion, and the supposed upset which the construction of bunkers would cause in it.
"The average man requires a beach to sun himself, to forget the woes of conflict, to play with his progeny, to immerse his soul in nature," Scherk had frothed through his gray mustache, his voice like a whip, "not to be reminded of the negative ramifications of this total war!"

In just a few days, Krebs had grown to hate bureaucrats. "All well and good," he would say to himself in his brief moments alone, "after the war."

Today, the two were huddled before a broad screen, empty now but soon to be filled. The field marshal stood erect and unflinching, while his counterpart paced, flipped absentmindedly through an anti-Semitic publication of the gutter press, and looked down at Stammburg from the office's windows. Abruptly, the television screen was filled with the face and neck of Walter Nemetz.

The dashing young panzer commander who had risen to such prominence in Columbia seemed not to have changed. There were small lines beneath his eyes, yes, but they still shone with the bright blue invincibility of youth. And the angular, handsome face that had so long been Capile's face was still there. Only now, he was not flashing the broad grin he used when rolling over a crushed enemy tank or speaking before a crowd of middle-aged noblewomen. His mouth was drawn in a long, unmistakable frown.

Instantly, Julius Scherk presented a Roman salute and yelled, with a passion and sincerity that made the hair on Krebs' neck stand up, "Heil Nemetz!" A second too late, Johannes repeated him, the words falling limply out of his mouth. He had not really remembered when the salute became an official part of military discipline. He only recalled that one day, he had greeted a fellow officer with a military salute, had been rebuked about his "defiance of the Party", and had arrived back in his office to find an order on his desk, replacing the salute with Heil Nemetz.

"Gentlemen, I am entrusting you both with the defense of all of our southern territories. As I am sure you know, Feldmarschall, our intelligence has detected a massive troop build-up around Rochefurt, along with significant enemy fleet movements in that area. We have reason to believe that the Monarchists will descend in force on your Army Group.

"Your orders, Gauleiter," Nemetz continued, shifting his icy gaze to the left, "are to ensure the defense of Stammburg itself. The city is of immeasurable value due to the manufacturing plants located within it. In order to ensure that Heeresgruppe Süd can continue to operate, you must prevent these production lines from being destroyed or falling to the enemy. Resupply by air will not be a viable option. Therefore, I suggest you move as much of the production equipment as possible to underground facilities within the city. Furthermore, begin arming and training the populace. Should it come to it, the citizenry of Stammburg should be willing and able to resist the enemy street by street, house by house, room by room. Begin fortifying the city immediately. Should the enemy reach Stammburg, I want it to be an unassailable fortress. Finally, recruit as many able-bodied men into partisan bodies as possible. They will assist in the directives I am about to issue to Feldmarschall Krebs. That is all."

"Jawohl, Reichsleiter!" Scherk answered, his voice snapping like a whip. The newly-appointed Reichsleiter turned back to Krebs.

"We cannot allow the elite panzer forces of General Reudel to be destroyed, so they must be kept out of the sight of enemy air forces at all costs. Hence, do not allow them to enter any mass armored engagements. Instead, adopt an asymmetrical defense strategy. The backroads of the forests and countryside which surround Stammburg are ideal for it. I want our tank aces and veteran anti-tank crews to set up ambushes in every possible point of entry. They will pay for each mile of captured territory with dozens of smoking hulks. Mine the roads, as well, and disperse our elite troops across the front. Scorched earth, Krebs. Snipers picking off their officers, infiltration forces attacking their supply lines, and all the while our boys picking apart everything they could use. They’ll stretch themselves to breaking point across the land, and we’ll be behind them to pick off their precious supply convoys. When the moment is right, we’ll utilize our panzers to crush them. But until then, conserve them. That is all.”

The screen flickered off, Nemetz’s face disappeared, and the word “jawohl” fell unintentionally out of Krebs’ mouth.

Then, Scherk snapped, “There is much to be done, and we must do it.”

---

The shower of cruise missiles that began the next day alarmed the Reich’s soldiers. But they were on guard. Rather than invest in static anti-aircraft positions, the VF had opted early on to mass-produce the Kampfpanzer IB, known as the Jagdhund. With twin anti-aircraft cannons mounted on to the chassis of a medium tank and a complement of anti-aircraft missiles, the vehicle was more than capable of combating modern air threats.
Now, though it was a pre-war design, it would be put to its first intensive test.

The saturation of missiles could not all be defeated by the handful of Jagdhunde the defenders had on hand. And so the secondary targets suffered greatly from the bombardment. The missiles inbound for locations near Stammburg, however, fell prey to the quick-firing guns and vengeful missiles of the anti-aircraft tanks.

Of the twenty-four missiles launched, ten successfully reached their targets. Eight of those detonated against secondary targets near the towns surrounding Stammburg. One destroyed an anti-aircraft battery near the Party Offices. The last impacted on a radar installation, knocking it out completely. All of the rest were shot down.

Next came the air offensive. What meager air forces Krebs had at his disposal were scattered across the front, and so he had to rely entirely on his Jagdhunde. Fortunately, they proved more than up to the job, being too maneuverable to be knocked out by any of the enemy’s heavy ordnance and too armored to become easy prey for light weaponry.

Nevertheless, the enemy’s air presence was too great to be easily discounted. Havoc reigned in the sky as the Jagdhunde and their few stationary counterparts struggled to bring down as many enemy craft as possible. Luckily, the enemy air forces found very few real tank forces to hunt down, other than the Jagdhunde. The majority of Reudel's panzer army was still at the front, where it had been steamrolling through crumbling Royalist defenses, though now it had halted and was reorganizing. What few tanks were in Stammburg were rushed into underground garages when the air raid sirens went off. Unfortunately, supply depots could not be evacuated, and so they were to be defended at all costs.

Krebs might not have had any planes, but he was still going to give the Germans one hell of a fight.

---

SAXTONBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

Walther Nemetz had taken up residence within an indistinguishable building near the Party Headquarters of the Reich’s new capital, in which he spent his every waking minute. The minutia of nation-building seemed to be tiring to everyone but him.

Within his handsomely-appointed office, covered in shining wood surfaces, was a scale model of a skyscraper. It was but one of many scale models by the Reichsleiter’s personal architect, Winfield Fenster, and co-designed by Nemetz himself. Behind it stood the prototype of the new chancellery building, pushed to the side.

The skyscraper was Nemetz’s pride and joy, as of late. Codenamed Projekt: Weltesche, it was to be a massive and costly experiment in hydroponics. Through extensive use of nuclear reactors, mirrors, and fish-based fertilizer, food was to be grown on each level of a seventy-level skyscraper, with mushrooms and fish to be raised in its underground levels. When his war was won, Nemetz would have one built in every major city; and then, he reasoned, the idea of siege would be irrelevant. His armies would never go hungry on the defense, and would be able to resist a besieger indefinitely.

The door opened. Henrik von Ravenstein entered. He was of middle height, with jet black hair plastered back to his scalp and light blue eyes blurred by glasses. The pale man had fought with Nemetz when he was a second lieutenant and Nemetz was his captain, and had been his unshakeable dog ever since.

Nemetz smiled as he would at an old friend, and turned guiltily away from the models. But there was no friendly greeting or chatter; von Ravenstein snapped into a salute that Nemetz returned, and then he said crisply, “Reichsleiter, I have come to suggest a new course of action. It has come to my attention that we have considerable naval assets, but do not yet possess substantial shipyards with which to repair or expand these assets. Therefore, I suggest we begin another lightning offensive, this in the direction of Gravines. It is the largest dockyard in the nation, and not only would we be knocking out an enemy faction, but we would also break our men out of Wolfcour.”

“Take your panzer army and Falk’s army,” he said without hesitation. “I expect great things.”

“Jawohl!” Von Ravenstein left, and Nemetz turned, satisfied, back to his models.

---

ROCHEFURT
NOVA CAPILE

---

Upon hearing Sir Mariotte’s full title and orders, Klaus’ expression softened.

“I must apologize. To treat with a man held in so high esteem by my friend, Kaiser Josef Franz, is a pleasure. I also feel the need to apologize for what your lovely Princess Elizabeth was put through. I am glad that she will be under your personal protection, and I feel that my grandson would also benefit from it.” Karl cringed involuntarily. “From now on, Sir Mariotte, ensure that the young Prince does not embark on any more foolhardy expeditions. In fact, see to it that he does not leave your sight. He will defer himself completely to you, regardless of peerage or rank. If you would be so kind, Sir.”

Before he could go any further, the doors were once more thrown open. Großmarschall Hermann Winser entered the room, his protruding gut preceding him by quite a distance, concern etched over his ancient, blockish face.

“Your Grace, we are under a dual threat. The Communists have launched a completely unexpected offensive against our forces in Osthilt, and are currently fighting in the city itself. Our commanders cannot hold it for much longer. And in the north, our forces besieging Wolfcour have come under attack from both the Fascists entrapped within the city and advance armor formations coming to relieve it. They will also be forced to fall back and abandon the siege under present conditions.”

The nominal commander-in-chief of Capile’s military had not been seen by most people for several months. Rumor had it that he had been drawing up detailed battleplans for hours within the deepest governmental bunkers, and some of the less respectable papers had printed that he had died during the Battle of Saxtonburg. But here he was, blinking awkwardly at Sir Mariotte and brandishing a handful of reports.

Deciding to ignore the foreigner, he instead pressed on to Klaus. “I am requesting the immediate transfer of 7. Army to Heeresgruppe Ost. Their rapid deployment is the only chance we stand of halting the Red advance North from Kongsburg.”

“What of the armies that just smashed the Reds at Haakensburg? And all of the rest of Heeresgruppe Ost?” Wilhelm Knott interjected.

“The former are exhausted and disorganized, and besides that they are still busy pushing the Reds back into Kongsburg. And the rest are spread out across the width and breadth of the army group’s jurisdiction managing too many fronts with not enough men.”

“Very well,” Klaus said after a lull in the dialogue, “you may have von Pritzen’s army.”

“Wonderful,” Winter replied, rocking on his heels; his body was so round and his legs so thin that it seemed as if he would fall over if he rocked back too far. His eyes twinkled, and he continued, as if it were a lesser demand and a trivial matter, “and the command of the army group?”

“Yes,” Klaus answered, as if it had already been said and Winser was forcing the word out again, “you will command Heeresgruppe Ost.”

“Wonderful.” Winser bounced out of the office, the concern he had entered it with replaced by boyish gaiety.

“Zaiser was beginning to fray my nerves, anyway,” Klaus explained apologetically. “Let us hope that our old boy still has what it takes.”
[hr]
“Fleischmann is an invaluable organizer,” Hornberg was saying when a messenger boy staggered up to them, panting.

“Important message,” he puffed, “for you, sir.” Hornberg raised an eyebrow and took the communique. He read it, and his sagging face seemed to sag further, his wide mouth curling downwards with disdain.

“Von Pritzen’s army is to be transferred to Heeresgruppe Ost and relocated to Rulund as soon as possible,” he read aloud. “Which will leave me,” the field marshal continued, looking up, “with a single, leaderless army to hold the capital with. My God, are we in such dire straits?” Then he remembered the Europeans, and he crumpled the order and cursed himself under his breath.

“General Fleischmann, see what military police you can squeeze out of high command. I believe there are at least four divisions in the area that are still mobilized. In the meantime, I will take over your command. General von Pritzen, you will carry out the order immediately.”

Von Pritzen bid a polite good day to the European officers and then turned on his heel, clearly pleased about being transferred from Hornberg’s command. Fleischmann also excused himself, which left Hornberg with an awkward job.

“I assume both of us have urgent duties to attend to,” the field marshal managed. “It was a pleasure to become acquainted with all of you. I wish you success in your coming campaign.” It was a clipped collection of phrases, and Hornberg said them without sincerity and then left, clearly glad to leave the Europeans behind for what he thought was forever.

[New United States of Columbia]

H.E.S. Hans Wilhelm VII
Nova Capile

---

A good plan violently executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week.
-General George S. Patton

---

Kristof Neuenreich’s offer was a surprisingly fair one in Hancock’s eyes. They were allies, after all, but not needing his own troops or supplies, just research and prototypes, seemed a bit foolhardy. When fighting a war that involved monarchies sticking together, he figured his Fascist ally would need as many troops and supplies as he could spare. The older man rubbed his wrinkled brow as he thought it over.

“With the way things are going, sir, I respectfully disagree. You’ll need my men. And I need them off this ship ASAP. They’ve been itching to get into a fight as they’ve done nothing but target practice and exercise on board. We can’t afford a proper simulation room or live fire exercises, you see. Besides, I’d like to think my men could help in... unorthodox ways.”

He got up and headed over to one of the few book cases in the office and pulled out a large book. He set it down on the desk for Kristof to look over. It was titled Churchil’s Men: The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Hancock observed the germanics reactions to the book and it’s ideas before he continued.

“My men could do surgical strikes behind enemy lines, sabotage important supply lines and depots, commit terror attacks on loyalist families to keep them from getting too supportive and begin questioning the effectiveness of their government, gather ‘taxes’ from the locals, that sort of thing. I’m sure you’ll need as many men on the front as you can afford and trying to get special operatives might be difficult. But, to get back on track, your offer is perfectly acceptable. We’ve some prototype drones onboard as well as other experimental tech. Nothing much, just some ‘eye sights’ for helicopters and tilt rotor aircraft capable of ferrying a tank or two.”

He then smirked darkly as he said “I’d also imagine you could use some... naval muscle. I think this carrier should do nicely."

José Azueta Naval Base
Ensenada, Baja California

---

A good Navy is not a provocation to war. It is the surest sign of peace.
-Theodore Roosevelt

---

The sight of a carrier from the Pacific Battlegroup was a sight for the many citizens of the coastal state. While Ensenada contained many installations intended for the Columbian Navy such as shipyards, naval hospitals, officer training schools, and even Marine Corps training grounds, it was rare any ship beyond the size or classification of a Destroyer appeared. When such ships did, they were mostly supply or hospital ships. So, when the H.E.S. Matthew Perry showed up and began refueling, rearmament, and resupply for a “limited intervention” in the Capilean Civil War, most folks went out of their way to see it. The Naval personel in their shore leave outfits caught a few eyes from locals, particularly the women, as they headed about seeing the sights, catching a few drinks, or simply looking for a relatively fun way to pass the time before returning to the ship, and heading off to war.

While the locals and shore-leave personel had their fun, Chief Petty Officer Claude Werhner was looking at the charts around Capile in disbelief. If the scuttlebutt was to be believed, several high class battleships of the Capilean Navy had gone missing, with some believing they mostly went to the Fascists while a few persisted the Reds got ‘em. Others claimed they were sunk by the Royalists. As if that weren’t enough, rumour had it the missing H.E.S. Hans Wilhelm VII Aircraft Carrier was sighted by sattelite to be in the Fascists territorial waters. And Claude would have to steer the carrier towards it.
“Great,” he mumbled to himself as he rubbed his eyes, getting more and more sore as he strained them against the brightly light display screens of the bridge “just what we need. A repeat of the Hunt for Bismarck.”
Getting up, the naval officer yawned and stretched, shaking his head slightly as if to wake himself up. Being crammed in a darkened room while trying to stay focused mentally did that to a man. Walking over to the station that maintained inventory, he saw they still had another few days to go before they could confirm that the carrier had all the ammo, food, parts, fuel, aircraft, and munitions it’d need to be underway for several months. So far, at least, Foley wanted to help his allies but seemed hesistant on going full steam ahead. Perhaps this was a probe, see how tough resistance would be before he’d draft up some war plans (Satellite could only give so much of the picture). Werhner figured it was more to do with the King wanting to stay out as much as possible but not seem like he was ignoring his Wilhelmian companions plight.

As he sat back down to record a potential sailing plan, he heard the bulkhead open and saw the middle aged Captain of the Perry step into the bridge. The Petty Officer leapt to his feet and snapped of a crisp salute to the tanned man.
“At ease.” He heard a somewhat higher pitched voice reply.
Wernher did as told and returned to his task. He heard boots clunk on the metallic floor as the Captain walked over and examined the projected route. The plan, so far, was for the Perry to meet up with three cruisers, the H.E.S. Yellowknife, Tucsan, and Saltillo, which would then link up with a small number of hospital and supply ships. Once gathered together, the “Relief Fleet” would set sail for Südhoof where the supply and hospital ships would dock and offload supplies and personel while the carrier and cruisers kept them protected. That was the plan, of course, and everyone knew Murphy’s Law...

[Kingdom of Damascus]

Haakensburg, Nova Capile
Captain Michail Andreas, 7th Antioch Purple Guard Brigade
July 21st, 2018, 23:24

---

The trenches would be full of corpses. The building they were held up in would be riddled with bullets. Two medics would be one by one evacuating their wounded on stretchers. Andreas' men would exit the building, with new orders of searching & destroying remaining Socialist hold outs in the city. M60A3 Patton's would continue to provide armored support as squads and even platoons of infantry cleared the now body-littered streets, bayoneting stragglers as they went. As they exited their checkpoint, they noted rifle fire and machine gun fire still could be heard sporadically throughout the city. Radio chatter entailed that the Reds' offensive tactics failed, with only a few positions being overran, of which were either detonated or didn't mean much anyway as they were forced to fall back regardless.

The tanks rolled through the streets, firing into any positions that Reds could have taken up before being cleared out by grenades, plastic explosives such as C4, and being stormed by Damascene Fire Teams. Damascene patrols would take up sporadic formations when clearing streets and alleyways, as to avoid being taken out by explosions or by ambushes. As they advanced, so did forces from former checkpoints, as they packed up their ammunition and weapons and relocated, setting up new ones as their forces advanced. Damascene forces were going to retake the city one step at a time before they grinded to a halt to rest and await reinforcements. That is, if they were coming.

---

Haakensburg, Nova Capile
Pfc. Zayd Papadopoulos, 2nd Antioch Purple Guard Brigade
July 21st, 2019, 23:34

---

There was blood and dirt all over Zayd's face. He ripped his bayonet out of the corpse of a Red that he killed; seeing the light leave his eyes. Zayd would take a deep breath, and look around him; his vision hazy, tired from the intense fighting that had just unfolded. Corpses littered the trenches, Damascenes, Capilians and Reds alike. Many Damascenes lived, many fell. Though, the Damascenes could walk away proudly from the fight knowing that their side won; they held the line long enough for reinforcements to arrive, and the chokepoint tactic worked. Many Reds would not be marching home nor victorious. Damascene soldiers already began the process of stacking bodies and burning them. Zayd smiled. It had to be over now. It was over. Relief filled his body.

Sporadic gunshots continued throughout the city, but everyone knew the day was won. Zayd linked back up with his squad. They headed back to their fallback position, where they ate their MRE's, showered and got some rest. During this however, Zayd took note of something. El-Mofty was much more quiet than usual, Metaxas and Amjad were all much quieter. During the time they were in their bunks, Zayd spoke to Metaxas, "All of you doing alright?" Metaxas paused for a moment before responding, "What actually just happened back there?"
"What do you mean?"
"They rushed us like their lives meant nothing to them."
Zayd took a moment to think before replying, "We held our ground like our lives meant nothing to us. Yet at heart we knew what we were doing. We were saving a city from Godless communists. Maybe at heart they died thinking they were doing what was right."
"I guess you're right. Find it strange how they could give their lives for something so-"
They were interrupted by Sergeant Antoniou, of whom cleared his throat to obtain their attention. "Private Papadopoulos, I need to speak with you." Reluctantly, Zayd got up. Antoniou took him outside. His face was grim. Antoniou opened his mouth. He very hesitantly said to Zayd, "Your brother is...I don't know how else to say it. He's dead."

Zayd's face remained blank. "No, no he isn't." Zayd said, "He couldn't have just-" Antoniou interrupted him, "His body was recovered 2 hours ago, and we identified him. He died of several gunshot wounds to the chest region. Because of him, his platoon evacuated successfully." Zayd shook his head. "This can't be happening." Antoniou handed Zayd a pair of his brother's dog tags. Zayd choked, holding back tears as he accepted the dog tags, clutching them. Antoniou placed a hand on his shoulder, "We can get you out of here if you'd like. I'm sorry to do this to you now but, someone had to inform you." Zayd was silent. "Listen, how about you sleep on it. In the morning, you tell me what you want to do." Zayd nodded. Antoniou patted Zayd on the shoulder, before saying, "I'll be praying for you."
"Thank you, Sergeant. That means a lot to me."
He barely got any sleep that night.

---

Haakensburg, Nova Capile
Major General Haris Ajam, 2nd, 5th and 7th Antioch Purple Guard Brigades
July 22nd, 2019, 00:08

---

Ajam would calmly speak to the Generals as soon as they were done catching up, "It is clear that the day is won. What is to come next, are we just going to dig in, await reinforcements, or advance? If we do await reinforcements I ask that we take the moment to allow me to relay information back to Damascus, informing them of our victory and requesting reinforcements. It's clear to me that if we are to continue this offensive along side you, Damascus will need to resupply immediately, and if we are to take on the Reds, will need many more men. Either that or we can take the time to dig in while you advance."

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

HAAKENSBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

The fighting in Haakensburg seemed to die away very quickly. Almost as soon as the main Communist charge had been broken on the solid allied defenses, the Red columns began to retreat from the city. Like a wave that had just thrown itself onto the beach, the Communist army flooded out of the city and back into the countryside. The Royalist troops were too exhausted and disorganized from hours of pitched battle to take up the offensive, and received orders to secure the city, resupply, and maintain their defenses in case the enemy tried another assault.
No more attacks came.

---

The generals seated within the headquarters room all looked relieved as reports streamed in confirming their victory over the Communists. Field Marshal Heinz Zaiser, who looked as if he hadn't slept throughout the course of the battle, was about to distribute further orders when a young aide entered the war room and handed him a notice. The Capilean officer read it with tired gray eyes that flashed into alertness by the time he had finished.

"Mein Gott," he cried, "this was a diversionary attack! The main Communist assault has just been launched toward Osthilt!"

General Kirstin sat up in his chair and launched into action. "This is lamentable news, as we have drawn most of the fighting strength of our Army Group into this area. Osthilt and the land beyond it will be defenseless. We must marshal a relief force immediately."

Zaiser swallowed heavily before responding. "Indeed. We will dispatch Kesselbach's 9. Army, the formation which was bloodied the least by the battle, to reinforce Osthilt immediately."

"Send them by rail, sir," General Jonathan Kirstin suggested. "It will allow for much faster deployment, and time is of the essence."

"The trail schedule will never allow for it," Zaiser dismissed him sharply, regarding his subordinate with distrust. "Rail movements must be carefully planned weeks in advance, not changed at the whim of cavalier junior officers."

"Field Marshal, this is a matter of national life and death. A mistake here could cost us our country." Kirstin reminded those in the room of a Roman senator making an appeal before his people. He had a vaguely patrician nature, not to mention that he was tall and relatively handsome. His voice rose scornfully: "You are one of the highest-ranking officers in Capile. It is well within your power to alter the train schedule. God help you, sir, is our country not worth a late shipment of shoes?"

There was a heavy silence. Zaiser stared indignantly at his unruly subordinate, but he knew that Kirstin was right. "The 9. Army will be redeployed via rail," he surrendered, voice dry. Kirstin exhaled, victorious. He had often wondered if his acts of justified insubordination would ever be punished.

"If I might suggest," Kirstin said suddenly, meeting a horrified glare from Zaiser, "in the meantime we should execute an offensive with my battlegroup and the 10. Army toward the rear of the Communist forces currently assaulting Osthilt."

"No," the Field Marshal declared, his voice final, "there will be no offensive. Our men are exhausted, and there are at least two other Communist armies that still pose threats to us."

Kirstin crossed his legs and looked down at a pen he was fiddling with in his hands. He longed to say, "This strategy is exactly what allowed the enemy's diversionary attack to work," but he knew that challenging Zaiser further would not end well.

Heinz Zaiser now turned to the men as a whole. "You all have your orders. 9. Army is to reinforce Osthilt immediately, whilst the 10. Army and 1. Battlegroup will regroup here in Haakensburg and prepare to meet whatever attacks the enemy might throw our way." He was then approached by the Damascene officer, Ajam.

"Ah, yes. I have heard that your men were invaluable to our defense. As you have just heard, just over half of our forces will remain with Haakensburg long enough to resupply, at which point we shall reassess the situation and determine whether it is appropriate to go on the offensive against the Reds or set up a defense. The 9. Army, however, is redeploying to Osthilt, where a major Communist offensive has just been launched. I leave it up to you which group you wish to follow, but I will ensure that enough supplies find their way to you either way."

---

H.E.S. HANS WILHELM IV
NOVA CAPILE

---

Kristof Neuenreich waved his hand gregariously.

"How could I turn down such a generous offer?" he said, shrugging. "I cannot stand to offer you much in return, but there is one thing," the Party Chief continued, lifting a long finger. "We have in our possession one of the rarest and most dangerous battleships still in existence, one of the legendary Prinz Karl class vessels. On its own, of course, it is quite vulnerable, and so we have been shifting it from base to base to prevent it from being destroyed, as we haven't much of a navy to speak of. However, combined with the outstanding air coverage and fire support that this aircraft carrier could provide... We could form a very dangerous strike force indeed," the man chuckled.

He suddenly stood to his full, impressive height and extended his hand toward Hancock. "Let's sign this alliance into being, shall we? Afterward, I'll give the order for the ship, Kapilia it's called, to rendezvous with your carrier, and you can begin giving orders to your men. What do you say?"

---

ROCHEFURT
NOVA CAPILE

---

Großmarschall Hermann Winser sat in his darkened office in the new War Ministry, swishing a glass of fine wine in one hand and clicking a fountain pen in the other.

The old man had a long military career, and the medals to prove it. He was a household name throughout all of the Duchy. His last name became a synonym for old but reliable cars, a national savior, and bulldogs- but that was because of his appearance. The fleshy jowls on his large face and his huge, hunched body did give him the appearance of a very big bulldog.

Firing generals did not come easy to Winser. They were his peers and his friends, after all, and he had known most of them since officer school. But one did not achieve such a high rank without a good sense, as hard as it was to believe. These men had failed their nations, and they had to be replaced. Field Marshal Zaiser, for instance, had been failing to manage the Eastern Fronts for some time now, and had sealed his own fate with the nasty operation at Haakensburg. Winser himself would be replacing him.

General Kesselbach and General Kirstin had performed well, and so they were mercifully passed over by the Winser. He could be an Angel of Death, in that he killed men's careers. Zaiser could not hope for another field command after his performance. Neither could Generals Essig, von Taler or von Grimmelshausen, all aristocrats accused of incompetence. Winser crossed out all three names with long strokes of his pen, blotting them out of the history books.

He entertained several candidates for their replacements, but settled on Rolf Wittendorfer, a career officer, Ernst Beck, a commoner of equal skill, and Harald Allenheim, a minor aristocrat who had impressed even Winser with his short combat history. After writing terse letters of appointment and dismissal, the man leaned back in his chair and switched off his lamp, basking in the total darkness.

It helped him think. So did the wine.

The latest news had been disastrous. The Communist strike at Osthilt was crushing, as was the expansion of the Communist pocket at Pritzen. The Fascist offensive toward Wolfcour could have just as bad effects, and Winser had heard that Nordlingen's surrender to the so-called Reich was inevitable. Even against the French the Royalists were losing ground, with Roappe itself coming under separatist assault.

Winser cursed aloud into the darkness and swallowed the last of his wine.

The old man had saved Capile before. There was no reason he couldn't do it again. He just needed a plan.

---

WOLFCOUR
NOVA CAPILE

---

For months, the Stoßtruppen in Wolfcour had held fast against attack, fear, and starvation. Only the last had ever threatened them, and just before it became their undoing, supply planes marked with black ravens had begun to drop food and ammunition to them. Days later, snipers had spotted their comrades advancing toward the city, and a faint radio signal had emerged promising their deliverance.
And now, a column of von Ravenstein's tanks was parading down the street.

The relieved defenders rushed forward, embracing their saviors, hugging them as old friends and tussling their hair as older brothers. The exhausted Royalists had long since retreated.

They had started out as 85,000. Only 54,000 remained to greet their brothers. But they had proved the superstition about Stoßwehr superiority. No bullet, no fear, no hunger pain could stop a true Stoßwehr soldier.

"You could only be defeated, Nemetz broadcast the next day, "when you allow yourself to be defeated."

---

OSTHILT
NOVA CAPILE

---

The battle had not lasted long. Against such great and unexpected pressure, the stretched Royalist line could not hold. The Red steamroller rolled onward, crushing divisions of Royalist troops and spitting out brigades of newly-converted Communists like an inefficient machine. Osthilt was only the first victim of its aggression.

The Royalists made a grand show, fortifying the city. But once their flanks collapsed and the BSU's artillery began raining down upon them endlessly, once they witnessed their comrades dying and deserting by the hundreds, once they saw the Red Armies sweeping through the city like wildfire, they laid down their arms or turned tail and ran.

The Battle of Osthilt was ended practically before it had begun. No number of Royalist troops could save it now, now that they were inside. The propaganda posters had been plastered, the propaganda loudspeakers affixed, the Party headquarters thrown up. The captured soldiers were being sent to either die in a labor camp or join the hungry Red Army, and the civilians faced a similar fate.
Operation Hammer was off to a smashing start.

---

Far to the North, the other half of the Communist pincer movement was beginning. Out of the industrial belly of Raus flowed a rusty-red stream, an army directed toward the city of Rulund. They might minimal resistance, and that which they did meet they easily smashed through, because of their newly developed weapon.

The Communists had not managed to capture any significant numbers of tanks or heavy armored vehicles, but more importantly, they had captured the largest tank manufacturing plants in all of Capile. From the beginning of the war they strove to resume production. It had been a titanic effort. Vast resources had to be mined, smuggled, and bought, and those resources had to be processed, refined, and finally developed into mechanisms and parts. Then, at last, it could all be welded together into the beast that was a single tank.
It had not been easy. It had taken time and toil. But it was done.

Alongside the never-ending river of infantry pouring out of Raus there now flowed a tributary; columns of tanks, painted with red stars and crewed with veteran comrades. They served the will of the people, and the will of the people was the conquest of Rulund.
So toward Rulund they marched.

[New Decius]

Coastal Banks of the Roche River
Border of Royalist Territory and VF Stammburg Enclave
Headquarters of 12th Armee attached to Heeresgruppe Beowulf

Much like his grandfather, Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel was an officer who preferred to lead from the front, always choosing to have his command center as close to the action as possible so that he could command the battle at his finger tips. Even with modern technology allowing a commander much greater control of his troops from a distance, a lot could happen in the time it took a message to reach a headquarters from the battlefield, so why not be there in the first place to cut out the middle man. Of course the propagandists whom helped built Rommel's image in the media and spread his fame across the globe always had a heart attack at the thought of one of the Kaiserreich's national heroes being up at the front where he could be killed, but by this time everyone accepted that it was pretty much impossible to stop the 'Wolf' from leading his men from the front so they just ran with it. In fact, leading from the front even helped make his career even more impressive to the civilian's at home who heard of Rommel's exploits.

Right now the Commander-in Chief of European Forces in Capile was sweeping his binoculars across the distant fascist fortifications, General von Schneider beside him doing the same, as they observed the artillery bombardment of said fortifications by the troops of 12th Armee, prior to the offensive. Though by this time all three field armies were in their positions for the offensive, Rommel wanted three days of artillery bombardment, air strikes, and additional intelligence gathering before he sent his men into the fire; that way if enemy resilience proved stronger than expected/calculated or intelligence assets uncovered additional enemy forces, there was plenty of time to change the battle plan before launching the offensive. All German soldiers during basic tactical and strategic training, were drilled to be able to adopt a new plan, on either a strategic or tactical level, within four hours notice, though tactical level operations were expected to be adopted within one hours notice. Soldiers were more than just numbers to Rommel and he would not send his men in either unprepared or in a situation where better intelligence or more air support could’ve ensured that more of them got to see their families again.

Admittedly, Rommel would have to give Feldmarschall Johannes Krebs, the fascist officer reportedly in command at Stammburg, some grudging credit with how he setup his fortifications to try and hold up the German offensive. Instead of wasting resources and time on massive defensive positions like bunkers and trench systems which the German armor or air power could easily bypass or remove with concentrated effort, his troops seemed to be focusing on a flexible mobile defense; easily repaired small defensive positions or mobile artillery and anti-air pieces that made challenging targets for the Luftwaffe to bomb. Clearly Krebs understood that Rommel had far too much in the way of resources and manpower to fight head on, shown by his dispersal of his armored troops to avoid their being destroyed from the air, and was instead going for a defense-in depth to slow down the German forces while Stammburg itself was fortified. Rommel’s reputation also told Krebs that he would not stoop to replenishing his supplies by looting from civilian’s so it was highly likely that the German supply column’s would be targeted heavily, hence why Rommel had asked for the assistance of the Capilean Military Police to bolster his own Militarpolizei forces. Still there remained one issue...

Which Lilian just had to bring up. “What will you do Herr Generalfeldmarschall, if they decide to make us bleed for Stammburg?” It was a distinct possibility, that the fascists would withdraw into the city itself to make the German Army fight for every street, battling house to house in an effort to cause as many German casualties as possible. In such a scenario the civilian population would suffer significant casualties and Rommel was not willing to stomach that.

“I am not yet sure of what I will do. Based on the Abwehr’s profile and the records which the Capilean Royal Army keep, I believe that Feldmarschall Krebs may also try and keep civilian casualties to a minimum but when his back is to the wall. There’s no question we can take the countryside and surrounding towns, after all I have three times as many troops at my command and Krebs has had to disperse his forces to enact his defense in depth, but as to taking Stammberg itself.” Not only could Rommel not personally bring himself to unnecessarily put civilian’s in harms way, with the horrors of the Second World War and certain incidents during the Soviet-German War in mind, the Imperial German Army could not afford the scandal of massive civilian casualties in a foreign country. Even that strategic airstrike at Raus was a bit touchy given the casualties even if many of them were militia members. If the German Army laid siege to Stammberg and the result was a massive amount of civilian death’s, then it would be disastrous both at home and abroad, not to mention the potential to serve as propaganda for Nemetz if he could paint the Royalists allies as murderers.

“However, if Krebs accepts my offer of surrender we may not have to slug it out and cause civilian suffering after all. Or if he does not accept my surrender offer, I hope at the very least he will take my advice to either evacuate the civilian’s from Stammberg or surrender it should the city be encircled rather than make a Stalingrad of it.” Rommel remarked as he lowered the binoculars. “Speaking of which, has that Abwehr officer managed to infiltrate Stammberg?”

Lilian nodded as she continued to watch the bombardment, taking mental notes as she did. “Yes, we had contact several hours ago that he had successfully made it inside the city. Presently he’s trying to locate Krebs headquarters and deliver your offer to him, though Hauptmann Dernen did report that he had made some interesting discovery via the black market contacts he used to enter the city.” Rommel raised an eyebrow indicating for her to go on. “It seems there are rumors of tension between the party leadership in the VF and the regular military officers under Nemetz command, not all those officers seem entirely comfortable with Nemetz remodeling of the VF along NSDAP lines.”

There was something they could potentially exploit for both their gain and the VF’s consternation. The Abwehr had long suspected that the more traditional military officers in the Vaterland Front were not rebelling out of an ideological revolution as Nemetz advocated but more because Klaus’ reforms had shaken up the old established order of Capilean society. The rumors of National Socialist influence in the Capilean Fascist movement were also long-running but evidence was emerging that Nemetz was basically taking the frame of his ‘New Order’ out of Hitler’s playbook, including the administrative division of VF territory. Though at the moment it was more likely the tension was more of the classic kind which existed between bureaucrats and military officers. The same kind which existed between the Reichstag and the Imperial German Army during peace time; the OHL was like a pack of hyena’s fighting with the Reichstag Appropriation Committee’s for scraps during peace time especially with all the new highly advanced, and extremely expensive, weapons systems under development. The new Fuchs 1A Main Battle Tanks which Rommel had been observing at the Siberian Exercises just before deployment to Capile, had cost a whopping 34 million Euromarks a vehicle to build and develop hence why only thirty or so had been ready for the combined arms exercises.

“Well hopefully Hauptmann Dernen is still the spry crafty bastard I remember him being in Syria and Laos otherwise he’ll get caught in an instant with those security measures inside Stammburg.” None other than Hauptmann der Abwehr Wilhelm ‘Willi’ Dernen was the agent Rommel had sent into Stammburg to give Feldmarschall Krebs the opportunity to surrender before blood was spilt or honor lost. Though presently Dernen’s status on Capile was in something of a flux due to his involvement in the Reichsrat bombing; Admiral Kreutz was himself of sufficiently high rank and sufficiently close enough to members of the German High Command and the Reichstag to be spared any potential consequence besides his scolding from Reichskanzler Knott, however Dernen was not. He was merely a Captain of the Abwehr, a very able and seasoned veteran to be sure, but still just a Captain without influential rank nor friends to protect him from the backlash...well he had one friend willing to save him a potential court martial or foreign jail. Though saving him meant sending him on a dangerous assignment so that he was elsewhere when civilian authorities came looking for him. Rommel knew Dernen from his time in Syria and Indochina as well as briefly when the two were in Finland, and all times Dernen showed his value as an intelligence officer; he was highly intelligent especially about foreign cultures and had an affinity for languages, and his background as an infantry soldier meant he knew how to fight by God did he know how to fight. So Rommel had made a deal with Willi, that he go on what was perhaps one of if not the most dangerous missions of his career and in return the Wolf would square things away to keep him out of a jail cell and his reputation intact.

Lilian raised a smirk at the mention of the young Hauptmann whom was presently inside Stammburg in an enemy uniform on a deadly assignment. “Speaking of the Hauptmann, how exactly do you plan to get him out of hot water with the Capilean’s? From what I’ve heard they want to skin someone over what happened to the Reichsrat. Admiral Kreutz is too high ranked and too well connected and Major General Ulex is still making his way back to Rochefort, so apparently Dernen is in the crosshairs.”

Rommel waved his hand dismissively. “Oh I’ll just get the Kaiser to pin a Pour le Mérite on him and thus he’s a war hero and can’t be tried.”

---

“Heil Nemetz!” Willi Dernen roared as he passed by a Capilean officer in the uniform of a Colonel judging by the markings, while he was clothed as a mere Captain. Same rank no matter the army, well also this was the only identity that Theobald Mücke, the local black market liaison, could secure on such short notice. Captain Wilhelm Lücknowe attached to the staff of Feldmarschall Johannes Krebs as a junior aide; senior enough to get access but junior enough that it was unlikely Krebs would know the man on sight and thus render Dernen’s disguise a moot point. The real Captain Lücknowe was either dead or being kept prisoner in some dark place by Mücke’s ‘associates’ so that he could not foil Willi’s plan to gain access to Krebs and give him Rommel’s offer to surrender honorably.

What Rommel’s offer also included that the Capilean Royalists had not yet been informed was that the German government would guarantee the pardon of Krebs and any other senior officers as well as all regular Heer troops at his command, provided they had not broken the Geneva Convention by committing war crimes, as well as a fully funded relocation to Germany. However anyone found to have violated the Geneva Conventions, as well as all VF officials such as the Gauleiter were to be handed over to the Royalists and the German Army to be punished for their crimes. Though to be honest Willi suspected that Krebs would refuse the offer, the man likely was intelligent but also stubbornly loyal even to a maniac like Nemetz, not to mention Rommel’s strict following of the Geneva Conventions was carried with his martial fame around the world. Krebs likely figured Rommel would not violate his code by trying to take a fortified Stammburg resulting in heavy German and civilian casualties and so would hold out as long as he could for whatever gain that may bring, such as allowing the Reich to better secure its territory up North while German and Royalist forces were tied down in the South.

As he approached the Party Offices near the city center, Fate seemed to hand him a golden opportunity to accomplish his mission, for there was Krebs with several staff officers entering the building discussing what Willi assumed were the documents in their hands, likely figures for defensive operations. Taking the initiative in his hands he began a moderate jog towards the building as if to catch up with the group, a late-comer trying to make up for lost time with speed, though damning his eye-patch along the way when he nearly tripped over a fallen lamp post, all the while getting closer. As he got closer he saw them heading for the main elevator and knew his opportunity was a fleeting one and the moment had come as Krebs stopped to discuss something with one of the officers, he started sprinting and called out to them as if to get their attention. “Herr Feldmarschall! Apologize for my tardiness but I’ve arrived! Herr Feldmarschall!” And there, timed perfectly just as Krebs turned with a look of his confusion on his face did Wilhelm (Willi), seemingly out of control, crashed into him and sent them both sprawling into the elevator. Playing his part perfectly as a panicked junior officer whom had ran, literally, into a senior officer, Wilhelm bolted up and in his efforts to help his commander up ‘accidentally’ pushed the button for the rooftop level with his elbow, closing the doors on the other officers outside who were trying to get in and help their commander. As the elevator started on its way up, Wilhelm ended up ‘accidentally’ hitting the emergency stop too which brought them to a sudden and somewhat violent halt.

Now alone with the bewildered Feldmarschall whom was still sat on the floor, taking in the present situation which was rather an alarming one from the point of view of any sensible person; he had been pushed seemingly by accident into an elevator by a man whom seemed to be a junior officer of his staff and whom had accidentally gotten them stuck in said elevator away from the aid of his staff. Given that there was a war going on and Krebs was a commander, by all appearances this could be his assassination or kidnapping for all he knew at that moment. He was still wary even as the officer, whose eye-patch only added to his suspicious appearance, helped Krebs to his feet and began dusting off his own uniform while searching for a document in his pockets, the man began to speak. “I do apologize for the unruly and somewhat violent manner in which we arrived here Herr Feldmarschall Krebs but an opportunity to get you alone presented itself and I seized it. I suspect that we have limited time given that your staff are no doubt getting a mechanic to get the elevator moving again, so I will be quick and I hope you shall be also.”

The man then stiffened to attention and sketched off a proper military salute, a Prussian heel click salute of the German Imperial Army. “Hauptmann der Abwehr Wilhelm Dernen, Attached to the Command of Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel, Commander-in Chief of European Forces in Capile, reporting Herr Feldmarschall.” He then raised his hands in an attempt to calm Krebs since the revelation that he was trapped in an elevator with an enemy officer, an enemy intelligencer officer at that, was certainly no soothing information. “You may relax Sir, I am not here under orders to do you harm or kidnap you, rather I have orders of a different nature.” He produced an envelope from within his jacket and handed it to Krebs.

“Under orders of Generalfeldmarschall Rommel I hereby deliver unto you his offer for you to surrender your forces and the city of Stammburg to him. Within that envelope are the terms for said surrender, and the whole affair would involve you surrendering solely to Generalfeldmarschall Rommel rather than any Royalist officer so you may honorably say you stuck with your cause in this Civil War rather than surrender to a Royalist. His Excellency hopes to avoid needless loss of life by our respective troops and especially on the part of the civilians.” Within the envelope were the specific terms for surrender, including the pardon and relocation agreement Rommel had devised himself. “Speaking frankly Herr Feldmarschall, you must realize that all you can hope to accomplish here is a delaying action so Nemetz can consolidate in the North. Generalfeldmarschall Rommel has just shy of a million troops at his command, complete air superiority as you shall soon see given only the aircraft from the carriers offshore have so far been involved, and a vast stockpile of supplies for his troops as well as dedicated Militarpolizei troops to deal with attacks on his logistics train. We also have the advantage of real-time satellite intelligence...” Willi wisely left out that there were also a number of Abwehr agents like him on the ground reporting back. “...and complete authority over our actions, no need to ask Berlin every time a move is needed. His Excellency has also ensured there are ample stores of food and medical supplies to be distributed to civilian’s as the territory is liberated and any soldier on either side whom violates the laws of war shall be found, tried, and executed.”

Willi waited anxiously for Krebs response.

---

Estate of the Baron von Seedle, Geneva
Swiss Federal Republic, Europe
Secret Negotiations Between DRHP And VF

“...Hmm I can’t guarantee anything too flashy right away, the interested parties aren’t entirely won over yet. They’d need some show of strength beyond what they’ve already seen.” Eduard-Theobald von Seedle, formerly the Baron Seedle a member of the Bavarian nobility and of the Reichsrat, was currently engaged in negotiations with an intermediary speaking on behalf of the Fatherland Front...or rather the Capilean Reich as it was now known. The former Baron had been exiled from Germany in 2007 when he had fiercely advocated that Germany annex the Grand Duchy of Flanders-Wallonia and the Kingdom of Holland, two fellow European nations which had their origins in the fall of Communism in Europe in the late 80’s and both of which had a monarch connected by marriage to the House of Germania. Now the Baron had gradually become the center of a large number of the exiled nobles and politicians residing in Switzerland, with only two men more influential than he among these exiles, both of whom were in the room with him at that moment.

“Tell them I can get them two decommissioned aircraft carriers, SMS Goliath and SMS Solomon, on their way to be scrapped at the Odessa Naval Yards now but they have to provide the crews and aircraft for them on delivery. After all, waylaying and snatching two 65,000 ton aircraft carriers from the Soviet-German War will be risky enough, trying to get aircraft to go with them would raise too much attention back in Berlin.” One of the men remarked as he leaned back in a soft armchair sipping at a glass of wine while the third man among them was pacing back and forth, his tough military boots wearing on the carpet while he kept glaring at the reclining gentleman from time to time.

“You pompous snob, it was through great effort we even managed to make this contact, what with all the eyes the Abwehr has on our whole crowd. The very core of our ideology demands that we use this opportunity to its fullest and send those brave soldiers of the true Germanic people everything we can! My fighting boys in the Blitz-Bataillon should be sent down there immediately to fight alongside our noble comrades against the hordes of Semitic, Bolshevik, Spineless parasites trying to strangle a fellow Germanic people! We are the true force of this movement after all!” At this the relaxed aristocrat could not help but scoff.

“Yes but without me and my fellow pompous snobs in the movement, you wouldn’t have a single pfennig to your names. It is the money of us aristocrats which drives this movement and I am not going to waste millions on what may end up only being a lost cause when that money would be better served preparing for our return to Germany and my rightful ascension to the throne.” His (Disgraced) Royal Highness, Rudolph Johannes von Germania, formerly Crown Prince of Germany and Prussia, remarked as he turned to face Ferdinand Bredöw, Reichsführer der Partei of the now exiled Deutsche Reinheitspartei (German Purity Party and his nominal co-leader of the German Ultranationalist Movement in exile. Rudolph was a Prince of Prussia, formerly the Crown Prince as the first born son of Kaiser Wilhelm Augustus III whom due to a number of scandals was passed over for the throne by his younger brother then Prince, later Kaiser, Erwin Ludwig which later resulted in his exile to Switzerland the only ‘independent’ country in Europe and a virtual hotbed of nationalist exiles from Germany and other European nations, a crowd which Rudolph quickly became a prominent figure in, discreetly. Bredöw on the other hand had started out as a politician and the Chairman of the DRHP which managed to gain 43 seats in the Reichstag at its height in 2007 until they were connected with the assassination of several Social Democratic and Jewish members of the Reichstag and attempted a call for nationalist revolution in 2009 which was violently put down by the Kaiserliche Armee causing Bredöw and most of his followers to flee to Switzerland. Both men were considered persona non grata on German soil as well as that of any country in the European Federation. Both Bredöw and Prince Rudolph effectively led the German Ultranationalist Movement in exile across the world with Rudolph and his crowd of exiled nobility and industrialists providing the cash and material for the movement, while Bredöw and his crowd provided the fanatical followers and ideology to legitimize the movement.

It was an odd alliance of convenience in many ways. Rudolph represented an Paternal Autocrat movement of nobles and industrialists that wanted to create a Greater German Empire by incorporating the subject monarchies of Denmark, Poland, Holland, Flanders-Wallonia, and Bohemia as well as vesting vast power within the sovereign, the Kaiser, while stripping power from the Reichstag and the Reichsrat. Bredöw represented an aggressive National Populist movement of ex-soldiers and middle-class workers which wanted to revive the Pan-Germanism of the Third Reich with a dash of anti-Semitism and racism mixed in, setting up an absolute nationalist dictatorship by abolishing all other political parties. For now a shared hatred of the current regime in Berlin was what kept them together but eventually a clash of ideology would necessitate a split, in particular because Rudolph’s takeover would involve a fair fewer amount of purges than Bredöw’s, in specific Bredöw planned to kill all ruling families of the German States save for Rudolph whereas Rudolph did not even want to have his nephew Kaiser Josef Franz killed nor his, in his eyes, traitorous father.

“Fine tell them I’ll let loose your Blitz-Battalion, you have permission to send three regiments with full equipment to Colditz and I’ll try and get a few more Cold War-era capital ships free en route to being dismantled, the Kaiserliche Marine’s crazy about it right now so they can keep building their fancy new advanced supercarriers and destroyers. Not to mention that prototype our contact told us about.” The prototype Rudolph referred to was a joint project by KaizerTech International, Germany’s largest military and civilian corporation with a knack for technological innovation, and the Kaiserliche Werft Wilhelmshaven, and frankly one which would be quite a jewel to steal. A new type of large submarine referred to as a ‘Cruiser Submarine’ outfitted with a small internal hanger bay with space for two helicopter gunships, as well as a trio of dual-barreled nine-inch artillery mounts alongside an arsenal of cruise missiles, the Type XIX ‘Chameleon’ was a the height of modern submarine technology. Meant for the stealth forces of the KSK, capable of quick deployments to a coastal zone with the capacity for heavy support fire and helicopter transport, it was equipped with what was said to be a revolutionary new stealth system that could elude even the Kaiserliche Marine’s most effective sonar systems. “If I could get my hands on that then Nemetz could hit anywhere on the Capilean coast and get away with ease using commando raids. He could slip right into Großadmiral Stürnben’s armada and sink his flagship and escape without capture. The only issue is the security around the boat is heavier than the security around the Kaiser himself...still an opportunity may arise.”

Bredöw was on the phone to one of their many contacts ordering three regiments of Blitz-Battalion mobilized for action in Capile and to arrange their covert transport, before he turned back to Rudolph. “I will be sending Kommandeur Günther Halle as the leader of the Blitz-Battalion in Capile, though they will have to be outfitted with Stoßwehr uniforms and adopt ranks so that our involvement stays hidden.” He turned back to von Seedle and pointed at him as a way of getting his point across. “Make sure you relay that they must be given adequate cover when they arrive. The Abwehr has doubled its intelligence efforts in Capile since Germany became militarily involved, and it cannot be discovered that the Blitz-Battalion even still exists.” For all intents and purposes the Blitz-Battalion (Lightning Battalion), Bredöw’s paramilitary forces of the DRHP had been utterly demolished by the Kaiserliche Armee when their ‘national revolution’ failed, rather than dispersing to the German colonies and neutral nations to reorganize where they could prepare for what they saw as their eventual return home.

Von Seedle nodded and began relaying it to the intermediary. “Yes three regiments, all veteran fighters with full equipment will mobilize and be sent immediately by covert transport. Estimated arrival within the week, but officially they are Stoßwehr troops returning from Capilean colonies, no official or even unofficial documents can exist referring to them as anything else. The Abwehr will seize our entire crowd at once if it is found the Blitz-Battalion is in Capile. Two Fleet Carriers, 65,000 ton Tirpitz-Class that saw action in the Soviet-German War will be waiting at to be sent coordinates in the Indian Ocean, but you must supply the planes and crews on delivery. Depending on circumstances more capital ships may be sent your way. Relay all this to Nemetz and get back to us.”

And there the call ended.

---

SS Madras, Indian Angriya Cruise Line
The Port of Roappe, Grand Duchy of Nova Capile
Socialist Underground Collective

Stepping off the shabby freighter, Dieter Göllwitz was unsurprised by the fact that the town of Roappe seemed in the midst of an evacuation, having seen the chaos of war his entire adult life so it barely turned his head, by all reports Free French forces were closing in. Luckily for him and his compatriots, the chaos and confusion also concealed the arrival of what was very obviously a large group of foreigners, several thousand in fact as well as the large amount of suspicious cargo being unloaded from the shabby Indian freighter, then being loaded onto trucks supplied by the many black marketeers of the Capilean Underworld. The Socialist Underground had made sure to pay all the criminals enough money as well as discover enough about them that a betrayal would be very much to the detriment of said criminals, therefore the groups of buses and other transport were indeed waiting for them in Roappe when they arrived. Trains would’ve been preferable for transporting so many people and equipment but trains were more closely watched by the Royalist authorities whereas random buses or trucks in the countryside were more likely to be ignored, and even so a good number of the Drill Master’s would simply disperse into the countryside on foot, being well versed in living off the land, while they made their way to Raus.

Dieter looked around one last time before climbing onto his assigned truck, to take a look at the truly mixed group of volunteers deployed to Capile. A total of 2,304 veteran Socialist fighters ranging in age from 23 all the way to 67 and with a wide array of nationalities largely made up of French, German, Russian, Vietnamese, Arabian, Senegalese, Chinese, and Irish fighters each of them a master at his or her craft; many of the Drill Masters were chosen with a specific training specialty in mind such as marksmanship, vehicle maintenance, close quarters combat, combat medicine and so much more. Dieter was himself a marksman with a touch of tactical strategist mixed in, having 93 confirmed kills under his belt from a total of seven conflicts with a variety of rifles though his favorite was the old but reliable Mosin-Nagant, though admittedly friends of his like Doãn Minh Nghĩa, a Vietnamese ‘Recycler’ were far more vital for Blücher’s movement. ‘Recycler’s’ were experts in stripping down equipment and vehicles for parts and re-using said parts in completely different pieces of equipment or vehicles, basically learning to properly scavenge a battlefield for supplies; what to others seemed like a useless chunk of metal next to a dead man was to them a vital part of an artillery piece or tank engine etc. Well soon they would all see just how much of their years of experience they could impart of Blücher’s young militia military so they wouldn’t just slaughter themselves going up against professional troops.

Tossing his cigarette aside as the truck began moving, Dieter, like so many others in the group, took out his burn phone and texted the first message of the operation to the preprogrammed number to another burn phone held by none other than Terry Blücher himself; ARRIVAL.

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

STAMMBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

Johannes Krebs looked up incredulously at the captain he was now trapped in an elevator shaft with; his gruff demeanor and menacing eyepatch made him appear more like a hardened bounty hunter than the young, fanatic junior officers the Stoßwehr attracted. He quickly got to his feet, his eyes narrowing as myriad thoughts- none of them comforting- ran through his mind. His hand was already furtively reaching for the small pistol he kept when the captain began to speak,

"I do apologize for the unruly and somewhat violent manner in which we arrived here, Herr Feldmarschall Krebs but an opportunity to get you alone presented itself and I seized it. I suspect that we have limited time given that your staff are no doubt getting a mechanic to get the elevator moving again, so I will be quick and I hope you shall be also.”

Krebs' hand had nearly lunged for the gun, but his mind had reached the logical conclusion, his eyes widened in realization, and his hand fell limply away. The man was here to offer him surrender. Sure enough, Hauptmann Dernen was soon listing the terms of Rommel's offer and enumerating the reasons why Krebs should accept it. The Field Marshal took the paper stiffly and unfolded it while the Abwehr man spoke, reading it swiftly with shadowy eyes.

When he had finished reading, he looked up and waited patiently for the German to finish. When he had, he said crisply, “I am quite aware of the situation, Hauptmann, and the odds. But I did not join this movement on a whim. I joined it because of a conviction I was willing to die for. And if I must die for it, then so be it.” Krebs’ eyes gleamed for a moment, and he did not seem quite so much like the sheep of a man that he was. But then they faded, and he returned the paper politely to his counterpart.

There was a pause, and Krebs almost added that if he were to accept, it would likely cause greater loss of life among his troops than if he were to fight on. Stoßtruppen were not trained to surrender; they were trained to fight, and to die, by the hand of the enemy or by their own.
He did not say this, however.

“I will of course allow you to return to your lines, seeing as you have only sought to avoid conflict rather than cause it. Such mercies will only be extended once, however,” he warned sharply. Then there was the awkward business of waiting in the elevator with the man, now his enemy.

---

Later, after the ghastly business had passed, Krebs sat in his office, contemplative. He had received news that the enemy had begun a bombardment of fortifications along the front line, apparently unaware that those positions had been largely abandoned by the Reich’s forces. In accordance with the asymmetrical doctrine of his defense, the Field Marshal had ordered that the enemy was to meet with no foe as they probed into Reich territory.

He would allow the Germans to extend themselves deeper into the forested province before his men began launching ambushes and attacks. Once they did, there would be no holding back. All roads, paths, and conceivable points of entry had already been layered with mines, pits, traps, and heavy obstacles to delay the German advance and cause as many casualties as possible. The loyal individuals within border towns had been heavily armed, briefly trained, and interspersed by experienced Stoßwehr veterans, who would lead them in concerted attacks against the German supply line. Such tactics would be emulated throughout the width and breadth of the province.

The core of the army, meanwhile, would launch near constant ambushes against the invading forces, while simultaneously avoiding any prolonged or decisive engagements. This would minimize the enemy’s numerical advantage. Trees would be staffed by patient snipers, roadside ditches with carefully hidden infantry, caves and hollows with concealed tanks. The Germans would not be able to look at a stump, a shrub, a pile of leaves without imagining an attacker jumping out of it.

Krebs looked out through the narrow window of his office, and observed Stammburg. Julius Scherk was doing a fastidious job of fortifying it, of stockpiling food and supplies, of training up its citizenry, of preparing every building for a year-long siege. Krebs made a note to tell Scherk that his secret police had failed to apprehend a German agent. It would be satisfying to tell him that he had failed at something.

---

KONGSBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

Terry Blücher knit his fingers and grinned as he read the glowing reports from the front. Osthilt had been liberated; red banners now hung from every balcony, and the troops who had taken it now marched further, driving back the scattered and frightened remnants of the Royalist army. In the North, Communist troops had descended on Rulund, and were now fighting toward the city itself. Operation Hammer was falling into place.

This was good news, because Terry Blücher was facing more than military difficulties. Food shortages were becoming a reality. Thanks to the numerous canneries that Kongsburg was home to, a large stockpile of food had been on hand at the start of the Revolution. That stockpile was not meant to last a war, however, and now Party officials were forced to carefully ration supplies, butcher all animals they could find, and turn to unorthodox sources for food. The conquest of the Osthilt valley could provide just enough farmland to ensure the survival of the movement throughout the coming winter.

Blücher was distracted from his thoughts by a distant ring. He recognized it immediately, and, throwing open a drawer in his desk, seized the cheap phone it held.

“ARRIVAL,” screamed the message. Blücher looked upward triumphantly. This was good news indeed. The small army of trainers he’d been promised by the underground European revolutionaries had finally arrived. Soon enough, his well-meaning militias would be drilled into proper soldiers, more than capable of going toe-to-toe with the Monarchist or Fascist scum and winning.

There were days when the future of the Revolution looked bleak. Gazing out of his window over the expansive skyline of the city, Terry knew that this was not one of those days.

---

SAXTONBURG
CAPILEAN REICH

---

Walther Nemetz looked happily out into the capital of his new empire. From his desk he could see the construction site of the Große Halle, the Great Hall of the Capilean people, the epicenter of his new Reich.

Construction was well underway; the foundations were laid bare, and one could observe the rudimentary walls rising, gray-clad workers ringing the whole site like flies drawn to a particularly appetizing meal.

The door to Nemetz’s office opened, and a trio of men entered: Eugen Streich, Heinrich Heller, and Henrik von Ravenstein. They were equal in rank, but not in demeanor. Von Ravenstein regarded the Reichsleiter as an old friend, and if not for the two others would have embraced him like one. Instead, he saluted crisply. Heller looked at Nemetz with the same intensity and wonder that all common people did; Streich appeared unfazed by his leader’s presence.

“Let me first congratulate General von Ravenstein on the success of Operation Huginn,” Nemetz began after standing and returning their salutes. “The armies of Generals Falk and Worgen will be responsible for Operation Muninn, as I will be relieving General von Ravenstein from those orders.” Operation Muninn, named like its sister operation for Odin’s raven familiars, was an offensive which aimed to capture Gravines and crush the Free French faction, simultaneously obtaining a shipyard at which the Reich’s fledgling navy could base and expand.

“I am instead assigning all three of you to Operation Hel. It is this offensive which I believe will truly cripple the monarchy.” He paused before giving them further information, and then spread a map over his desk. The three generals huddled before it.

“As you know, the area between Reiburg, Quassdorf, and Pritzen accounts for nearly 60% of Capile’s wheat production, and also produces numerous other crops and much livestock. The other major food-producing areas are already in the hands of either us or the Communists, meaning that the Royalists are dependent on this area to feed their population. The grain is due for harvest this August and September.”

Slow smiles of realization crossed the faces of the three generals.

“With your panzer armies, we will capture this area. The enemy cannot hope to resist us, and I leave the intricate plans up to you. Know only that time is of the essence. The enemy must not be allowed to gather these harvests. If we can cut off their biggest producer of food, the enemy will starve, and their populace’s faith will wither. If the people of Capile will not come to me in goodwill, they will come out of hunger.”

“I will have the valley by the end of the month, Reichsleiter,” von Ravenstein boldly proclaimed. Nemetz smiled.

“Then you had better launch operations tomorrow.”

[New Decius]

Coastal Banks of the Roche River
Border of Royalist Territory and VF Stammburg Enclave
Headquarters of 12th Armee attached to Heeresgruppe Beowulf

’5...4...3...2...1...Commence.’

Right on cue a thunderous roar struck as field guns and self-propelled artillery all along the German line opened up on the fascist border positions. As the symphony of artillery erupted all around, one blast became indistinguishable from the next as Operation Faust was put into action. As Generalfeldmarschall Rommel had expected, satellite surveillance revealed that Krebs had been operating on a system of asymmetric defense which is why the initial bombardment was only a brief affair followed by longer range bombardment of ambush areas such as heavily forested zones. In keeping with the mobility of the operation, the field guns would remain at their border positions for the first twelve hours of the operation to guard the supply lines and prevent enemy flanking operations while the self-propelled artillery (Largely PzH 2000’s) would advance alongside the armored and mechanized forces. Though Rommel was withholding his air cavalry and gunship forces until enemy forward air defense was accurately assessed, while at the same time the ground-based fighter and ground attack squadrons behind the lines began taking flight putting several hundred aircraft in the air at a time belonging to ten different squadrons. Air strikes on civilian areas was prohibited save by precision munitions with active confirmation of target zone, there would be no preventable civilian casualties tolerated but that did not mean the German forces would be softies; partisans would be duly tried and, depending on the severity of their action, imprisoned or executed.

Operation Faust was a classic pincer encirclement with 12th and 16th Armee’s on the flanks moving forward and then to connect while 22nd Armee went forward to slowly but surely close up the pocket; even if Krebs did have his forces dispersed as Rommel suspected, it wouldn’t matter for much if they could be trapped and forced to fight on his terms. The whole plan hinged on Rommel being able to choose the battlefield rather than letting his troops be led around it by Krebs. In this game of their’s all depended on creating one’s own odds. While Operation Faust was a classic maneuver, Rommel was adding his own touch to it by detaching thirty percent of the Panzerkompanie’s from the Panzer Divisions of 12th and 16th Armee’s to act as small roving battlegroups to draw out Krebs larger armored forces; though on its own a Panzerkompanie was a mere twenty-four vehicles, a balanced mixture of MBT’s, SPAA’s, and Tank Destroyers, they would all have an attached Infanteriekompanie which would also not endow the groups with truly overwhelming firepower. The battleplan was that these roving battlegroups would serve as an integrated wolf pack, hunting Krebs forces, by themselves they were tempting targets but when one detached these groups from the main Armee formation they became infinitely more mobile allowing them to support one another wherever the enemy was found. Also each Infanteriekompanie had a platoon of Self-Propelled Artillery attached, four vehicles, which meant that CAS (Close Air Support) could be provided by both ground attack squadrons and the ten Luftkavallerie (Air Cavalry (Helicopter-borne Infantry and Helicopter Gunships)) Regiments waiting in the wings, because enemy anti-air defenses could quickly be shelled or otherwise disrupted.

Major der Panzertruppe Adam Thyssen could not manage to even conceal the grin on his face as his Leopard 2A7 Main Battle Tank cruised forward alongside the other three tanks in his platoon, towards a small town that according to his map was called Weidbürn. The feeling of being on the march on the battlefield again was exhilarating, truly it was unlike any other pleasure in the world for a veteran like Thyssen whom, at the age of 34, had been serving in the Imperial German Army for fourteen years now and faced death with a smirk every time. The Iron Cross First Class pinned to his chest showed that he preferred to be the first man in and the last man out, well the first tank in that is. As the commanding officer of 5. Panzerkompanie (5th Panzer Company) of the 9th Panzer Division, Thyssen had command of sixteen Main Battle Tanks (4 Platoons (4 Tanks a Platoon)), six Tank Destroyers (2 Platoons (3 Jaguar 4C’s a Platoon)) and four Self-Propelled AA Vehicles (2 Platoons (2 Flakpanzer Gepard 3’s a Platoon) with the 17. Infanteriekompanie from the 9th Panzer Division also attached so technically Thyssen shared his command with Major Johann Linde whom commanded the 150 troops of his infantry company. The two officers had the job of securing Weidbürn, a town with an estimated population of seven thousand inhabitants, fierce resistance was expected though until situational intelligence could be established only light anti-personnel munitions were authorized for use. Any man who broke that rule and recklessly endangered civilians or his fellow soldiers was for the chop in an instant.

As they rolled into the town there was a glaring lack of people in it and by all appearances the town seemed deserted rather than the home of seven thousand people, though Thyssen had no illusions that they were completely safe moving into this town. The briefing reports had required all Panzerkompanie commanders to ensure their vehicles were all outfitted with Instant Reactive Plating (IRP) which would reinforce the already formidable armor of the German vehicles in case of an ambush by partisans or professional troops armed with anti-tank weapons, though there was one weapon Rommel had had in mind when sending out that order; the Panzerfaust 4.5, Germany’s semi-latest rocket propelled anti-tank grenade with stronger penetration and more explosive force than anything developed before, and also shipped to Capile by the thousands. Originally intended as a mere stepping stone to test new principles for the under-development Panzerfaust 5, the weapon had been part of the most recent military aid package to the Grand Duchy in 2016, in which some ten thousand were sent to Capile along with a load of the usual guns, vehicles, and munitions. When the Civil War broke out, German military attaché’s at the Consular Office in Rochefort (The Embassy in Saxtonberg was destroyed by an air strike during the siege) immediately tried to gather as much information as they could regarding the more advanced weapons Germany had recently sold Capile and precisely who had them. By all reports, Nemetz had the majority of the Panzerfaust 4.5’s at his disposal and enough of them to either manufacture them for himself or make a cheaper but effective facsimile, as well as a few dozen of the latest Triton X-5 SAM’s that came in the same arms package.

’Though we’ve just as much to worry about from conventional arms as the ones we sold the Capilean’s.’ Major Thyssen thought as he recalled a report that came in mere moments ago about an ambush in the town of Emwald where three Leopard tanks of 2. Panzerkompanie from 5th Panzer Division had been taken out by a land mine trap, well by four land mines buried literally alongside each other so the explosive force would pack quite a punch. Still the odds of such a trap working more than a few times after it was first reported were unlikely; due to the efficient and organized communications network and information discipline which the Kaiserliche Armee utilized, information could travel from divisional headquarters to a platoon commander in no time at all and vice versa.

“Still...” Thyssen mused aloud, though none of the members of his tank crew turned from their task to look at him, all too well-experienced to chance it. “I wonder if they’ll go after one of our vehicles or the infantry first, perhaps both?” He leaned forward to peer through his view scope and have a look around the seemingly abandoned town, taking note of the squads of infantry fanning out cautiously to check each and every building. So far the only living soul they had encountered was a stray dog munching on a bone, one of the younger Soldat’s (Private’s) wanted to take the dog back with him as the platoons new mascot only for his Obergefreiter (Lance Corporal) to smack him upside the head. “Anyone want to make a wager on it?”

At that, Oberfeldwebel Louis Wallmann, their Loader and arguably the oldest veteran in the tank at thirty-nine but having served twenty years in the Armee, pitched in from where he was sat taking stock of the shells in his compartment. He had already taken stock twice since they had moved out but it never hurt, especially in their profession, to make sure you had done your job right. “Well Herr Major, I’d say ten marks that they hit the infantry first, probably a sniper or a machine gun on the upper floor of one of these buildings I’d guess. After all if they take out the ground-pounders they can come after us, a tank is very good and all but it needs supporting infantry.”

Before a witty retort could be made, a burst came over the radio ”Squad Anton Reporting! Enemy Presence Confirmed! Three blocks North of City Center! Machine Gunner and supporting Infantry Rooftop! Three Story Brick Building!” Well it would seem Oberfeldwebel Wallmann had won his ten marks and the fun had begun. However Thyssen knew it wasn’t anything for his troops to handle, after the general radio message that Infantry Squad would be calling in fire support from the four PzH 2000’s attached to the Infanteriekompanie, and sure enough the sharp and deafening reports of those big guns confirmed that. Within moments there was smoke rising in the distance from where those gunners had most surely hit their mark. Soon enough small firefights were taking place all over the town as the fascist partisans, no regular troops had yet been spotted, engaged the German infantry in small numbers, classic guerrilla tactics.

However, there was nothing for the Panzerkompanie to engage, they were after all restricted in their actions due to the limitations in place while fighting in a civilian area, they were only cleared to engage sufficient threat. Major Thyssen did feel for the partisans though, even if they did manage to kill a few German soldiers in their attacks and wound two or three dozen more, the German troops had superior training, battle experience, and better weapons as well as artillery support. Sure if they launched ambushes like this in every town the Kaiserliche Armee entered, they may slow down Rommel’s forces by a few hours or so, but mere partisans could not inflict anything more than piece meal losses on Heeresgruppe Beowulf, so massive was the force being brought to bear for the capture of Stammburg.

Then there came a call on the radio which peaked his interest ”This is Squad Friedrich! We are pinned down by fire from an enemy IFV! Requesting Vehicle Support!” “Finally some action! Well Hans, put her into gear and lets go help those poor ground-pounders!” The driver, Soldat Hans Küste, grinned viciously as he sent the tank moving at high speed towards where Infanterie Squad Friedrich was pinned down, the other three tanks in the platoon following suite. “And by God lets get our anthem going eh boys! Put it on the speakers!”

As the tanks were rolling down the streets, the speakers mounted on their hull crackled to life and began to blare out music, in particular a song well known to the Kaiserliche Armee...

“Wir sind das Deutsche Panzerkorps! Der Kaisers verwegene Truppe! Wir stürmen wie die Teufel hervor! Versalzen dem Tommy die Suppe!” The unofficial motto for Generalfeldmarschall Joachim Rommel, much like his grandfather before him, was the song ‘Unser Rommel’ though adapted for the modern German military and leadership. It was easily the most popular march of the common German soldier outside of the Panzerlied, and many of the Panzer Divisions of the Kaiserliche Armee were famous for having their tanks charge into battle blaring one song or the other.

“Herr Major I have the IFV in sight it appears to be a Boxer, probably one of the ones we sold them. Load APHE (Armor Piercing-High Explosive)!” With a click and a clang the shell entered the chamber, then “Fire!” Followed by the boom of the main gun as it ejected the shell at high speed towards its intended target across the plaza. The IFV didn’t stand a chance against the shell which easily penetrated its side armor and detonated inside the vehicle which also set off the ammunition inside the IFV which started cooking off. Thyssen felt bad for the poor bastards inside since the IFV didn’t blow up so that meant the crew were being killed by the internal fire and their own ammunition tearing them to shreds. If ever your vehicle was penetrated, always hope that your craft blows up instantly rather than the slow painful death of burning alive inside your new metal coffin, a reason most tankers kept one in the chamber in their side arms; it wasn’t for shooting an enemy should they have to bail out, it was for blowing their brains out instead of burning alive. It was almost an unspoken rule among veteran tank crews around the world to go for the quick and instant kill rather than a slow drawn out death for the enemy, similar to how it was an unspoken rule among fighter pilots not to shoot at bailed out pilots in parachutes.

---

Rommel watched on the holographic display table in front of him as the Abwehr’s satellites delivered to him real time updates of the situation on the ground, including all the micro skirmishes initiated by his ‘Wolf Pack’ maneuver as the Panzerkompanie’s and their attached infantry made top speed after the small urban areas inside what would soon be the encirclement zone after 12th and 16th Armee’s pincers met up. So far casualties had been relatively light on both sides, a couple dozen vehicles destroyed or damaged as well as a couple hundred troops killed or wounded on the German side, and a couple hundred partisans either killed or captured with a few dozen regular VF troops also in the mix. It was unlikely that tally would stay light for long, especially as German forces closed in on the larger urban areas in the countryside, there were several with a population of over fifty thousand, and as the Wolf Packs encountered heavier resistance.

Next to him was Feldmarschall Rudolf Heitmann, nominally commander of Heeresgruppe Beowulf though Rommel himself had taken personal command of strategic planning for Operation Faust while Heitmann handled tactical planning. Heitmann was a very lean, almost pencil thin, man in his mid-fifties with a head of thinning chestnut hair and a pair of amethyst eyes hidden behind round spectacles, though his most prominent feature was certainly either his bushy chestnut mustache or the long scar that ran from his right ear down to his chin. The result of being held hostage by Vietnamese Communist partisans for six weeks back in 2007, enduring brutal torture in an attempt by the partisans to learn the names of Abwehr operatives planted in their ranks; Heitmann’s scar was a blatant proclamation that he had not cracked. As a Feldmarschall his record was less impressive surely than either Rommel himself and fellow Feldmarschall Franz Lütold von Sonnenschein whom commanded Heeresgruppe Siegfried currently being transported to the South Eastern Coast where they would be deployed against the BSU forces which had been troubling the Royalists as of late, but he had shown his worth as a commander of infantry and Luftkavallerie during the Invasion of the Philippines in 2011 when Germany helped Spain reacquire its former colony.

Rommel pointed to a large forested area near the towns of Weidbürn and Anstedt which satellite images showed some movement within. “It seems very likely the enemy will deploy heavy skirmishers inside this forest, as well as some of his medium to short range anti-air batteries, it is the perfect position to disrupt tactical air operations within our Wolf Pack zone and on the flanks of both 12th and 16th Armee’s. I cannot risk sending any Panzerkompanie’s in there since it is far too dense for armored vehicles as well as the perfect spot for any ambush on them, your thoughts Rudolf?”

“What if we do exactly what they want by sending in the Luftkavallerie? Their anti-air batteries will likely be able to tear them to pieces but not if we blunt the birds beak first with a lightning raid.” Using a few of the commands he simulated a quick cruise missile strike on the area from the fleet at sea immediately followed by rapid deployment of Luftkavallerie dropped right through the tree tops. “If these satellite images are correct the enemy has likely moved in a mixed force of partisans and professional infantry to guard his anti-air batteries there, as you have said Krebs is no idiot and knows that this point is the perfect spot to disrupt our tactical air operations. Four cruise missiles should do the trick and then send in all of 8th Luftkavallerie Regiment to deploy and seize the area, the men can rapidly deploy either by rappelling from their helicopters or simply jumping, and the helicopter gunships will be at tree too height allowing them to deliver close-in fire support and also close enough that the guided ATM’s they carry can find those damned Jagdhund’s.”

Rommel considered the idea for a moment before pointing something out to Heitmann. “Rudolf, if your boys are sent in to do this, I will be relying on them alone to secure that area while the Panzerkompanie’s continue their mission as highly mobile hunting battlegroups, and obviously I can’t detach forces from the 12th or 16th as support. Not to mention they will be dropped right into uncertain conditions with little chance to prepare. What makes you so sure they’ll come out on top?”

Heitmann could only laugh in response. “Take it from a former Luftkavallerie man Herr Generalfeldmarschall, those are exactly the conditions we’re meant to be deployed in. No backup, unprepared, and with what could be crappy intelligence, and do you know why we always come out on top?” The Feldmarschall had started his career in the Kaiserliche Armee as an officer in the Luftkavallerie, so if anybody knew the reason it was him. “Because we’re all tough sons of bitches and we’ll be damned if we let the other bastard plug us before we plug him. The unofficial motto of the Luftkavallerie isn’t ‘Do or Die’ its ‘Die but Do’ cause even if we’re dead, you can be sure the other bastards are dead alongside us.”

Rommel was enthused by after effect of Heitmann’s own excitement and gave a sly smirk as he called over one of his aides to send the orders to Großadmiral Stürnben. “Very well then, lets see what your boys can do then eh?” Heitmann saluted and then went to send out his own orders for the 8th Luftkavallerie Regiment to mount up and move out. If they were to make their attack right after the missile strike while the enemy was still dazed, they had to get going right now, otherwise they would arrive too late and be chopped to pieces by enemy anti-air.

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

SUMPFWALD
CAPILEAN REICH

---

Jürgen Reudel had always led by example. He was never far behind his panzers. Today was no exception.

The German strategy was interesting, to say the least. If not for its ignorance of terrain, it would have been exceptional, and even with its shortcomings was sound. Their pincer movement attempted to utilize their overwhelming numbers to cut off a chunk of the Reich's army and destroy it. Presumably, Rommel intended to replicate this until he reached Stammburg, cutting Krebs' forces down to size in a piecemeal fashion. And, again, it might have worked, if not for the Sumpfwald.

Spanning from the Roche River in the North down to within a few kilometers of Stammburg in the South, and from the sea in the West to Südlingen in the East, the Sumpfwald was a gigantic tangle of brush, mud, leaves, and pines. Had the Germans invaded in the Autumn or Winter, they would have had a much easier job, as then the forest was bare and devoid of hiding places. Had they invaded in the Spring, they would be up against an impossible obstacle, as the torrents of rain and occasional cyclones turned the Sumpfwald into a waist-high swamp. But they had invaded in late Summer.

Jürgen looked about. The brush was rich and wide, a generous umbrella that could hide endless attackers. The ground was hard and dry in some places, and then gave way to unannounced patches of quicksand and mud in others. The heat was unbearable. The sun fried the men, made the metal of their guns and tanks simmer, and sucked the last drops of fluid out of their bodies. Aside from the occasional clearing, the tangle was so thick that it was unnavigable. No unit larger than a squad could navigate through the Sumpfwald without becoming hopelessly disorganized. Armored vehicles were hopeless. They could crash easily through some trees and tangles of brush, but inevitably they came against some obstacle- a massive grove of pines, a sheer cliff, a watery bog- and their crews had to limp out into the furnace that was the forest and clear a path.

This was compounded by the fact that no detailed maps of the place existed. There were a few well-known paths, all of which were heavily trapped and littered with ambushes, but otherwise, there was hardly anything to go by. Before the war, one did not travel through the Sumpfwald. One simply went around it.

Jürgen knew all of this, and he knew it would work to his advantage. As the German pincer movement pressed on, it would find itself hopelessly mired in the Sumpfwald. The first few towns- the Weidbürns, the Emwalds, the Anstedts- they would be lost, at high cost for the Germans. But the further Rommel went into the territory, the less of these villages he would find. They would be replaced by endless, inhospitable wilderness.

Rommel’s wolfpacks operated well in the setting of Weidbürn and the surrounding valley. In the Sumpfwald, they would become lost, easy prey for Reudel’s anti-tank crews. There would be engagements, but none of them would be decisive. Destroy one vehicle, he ordered his troops, and then retreat into the forest. A single volley of machine-gun fire, a single rank of Germans eviscerated, and then back into the bog. There is no need for more. He did not need to destroy his enemy’s tanks; they would be destroyed by quicksand and abandoned in the thick brush. He did not need to kill the enemy soldiers; they would be sapped of energy by the heat, bled out by the mosquitoes, and demoralized by the constant threat of mine, of trap, of ambush.
That was Reudel’s strategy.

The general gathered himself. He was a tall, intimidating figure, with chestnut hair that was silver at the temples and two white scars across his long face. He surveyed the position he was commanding with cold gray eyes. It consisted of several dozen Jagdhunde scattered around three fortified anti-air batteries, and was supposed to prevent the Germans from outright carpet-bombing their forces.

He snapped to his right when he noticed a blond aide, hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, rushing to his side.

“Herr General,” he panted after a quick salute, “the Germans have launched cruise missiles against our positions here! One was intercepted by our forces near the coast, but three are still inbound.”

Reudel smiled cruelly. “They didn’t learn their lesson after their bombing of Stammburg, eh? Order our gunners to be on alert. Shoot those missiles out of the sky.”

The three missiles came. They had gone against Jagdhunde before, and the hounds had proved their worth. This time proved no different. The first two missiles were shot down without difficult by Reudel’s precision gunners, whilst the third, by some trick of fate, managed to evade fire and detonated far to the general’s right, in the midst of dense forest. He cringed to hear a few distant screams, and glanced to see what destruction the Germans had managed to wreak.

He caught sight of a few burning hulks, destroyed vehicles; the flames were already being stifled by shirtless, sweat-drenched tankers. Reudel flew into action, dictating to his subordinates.

“Order a general withdrawal of what forces have not entered the safety of the Sumpfwald. Leave Weidbürn and the rest of the hamlets to the partisans. If they follow their orders, they will wait for the main body of the German forces to leave and then emerge to target their supply lines. Our position will hold off the German advance until all of our forces have reached the forest.

“I am willing to stake that the Germans intended to obliterate this position with missiles before sweeping the area with their so-called Air Cavalry. Tell our gunners to be on alert. If they see a helicopter, shred it.”

The soldiers of the Stoßwehr were not like other soldiers. They had a stomach for slaughter.

[Karevka]

KORODVINSK
Democratic Socialist Republic of Karevka

---

The basement briefing room in the Central Secretariat Building in downtown Kordovinsk more resembled a lounge than a bunker with its wood paneling, paintings of Lenin and Marx and wet bar in the corner among other amenities. The hints to it's underground location was the lack of windows and the bare concrete ceiling. A long oak table surrounded by twenty two chairs, of which four were filled, was in the center and illuminated with LED light fixtures. Prime Secretary of the DSRK Artyom Komissarov, Defence Minister Petr Yudin, Foreign Minister Ilya Ledovsky and Artur Dernov, head of the State Security Directorate, looked over a assembly of documents and papers detailing the ongoing war in Nova Capile. The four men were discussing the notion of intervening in the conflict. The group had been talking about the event for two hours over coffee and cigarettes.

"Think about it," the state security director said to Artyom "If we assist our fellow socialists of the BSU there will be another nation in the struggle against imperialism." Artur took a drag on his cigarette and continued "As a bonus, they will feel a sense of indebtment to Karevka for providing not only its resources but also its people." The SSD were only spoken of in whispers among the regular citizens. They were the shady intelligence service, secret police and VIP protection squad of the DSRK.

Petr added "I can organize enough men for three volunteer legions, and a sizable amount of combat vehicles and a handful of aircraft for each. I doubt we will have a shortage of volunteers." Many of the Karevkan National Army's men were highly patriotic and would love to assist fellow socialists in their battle. "The only issue would be finding landing zones for the men and land vehicles. I hope that the BSU have even a single workable airfield for our attack aircraft."

Komissarov nodded in agreement to both men and turned to Ledovsky. "And you, Ilya? Do you have anything to add from a international relations standpoint?" Ledovsky was one of Artyom's closest friends since his Petroleum Ministry days. He always asked him for advice on foreign relations.

Ledovsky finished his cup of coffee "None, comrade Prime Secretary." He placed his empty cup down and light up another cigarette with his engraved lighter. Ledovsky was a veteran in foreign affairs, and very slick in his words when needed. The Foreign Minister's response surprised Artyom, since he always had something to say.

The 54-year-old leader of Karevka sighed. "Very well gentlemen. It is decided. Dernov draft a communique to Terry Blucher. ensure it is labeled most secret." he looked over to Petr "Organize three legions of 4,570 troops plus 120 armoured fighting vehicles and a dozen helicopter gunships and ground attack aircraft."

The Defence Minister and State Security Director left the room to perform what the Prime Secretary asked of them. Artyom stubbed out his cigarette "If we lose this, we will lose thousands of good men and likely the support of my people. Not to mention the international implications."

Ilya placed a reassuring hand on Artyom's shoulder "Friend, you've made a good decision helping our fellow communists. Even if we lose we'll find some silver lining in it all." Ilya knew Komissarov often worried about various things: the climate, the happiness of the people, the counter revolutionaries. But Ilya could always get him to see the bright side of things.

---

The SSD colonel walked through the rows of cubicles, within each sat a SSD communications officer transmitting various types of messages on their cipher machines. They had begun using the "Black Diamond" cipher code on their computers and one time pads two years earlier and had proven nigh uncrackable without uncaptured documents. The colonel however was given a new cipher code, specifically made for the assignment codenamed "Bungalow". He found one of the most experienced and loyal officers in the SSD Communications Bureau, a female sergeant major of 33. The brunette looked up and asked "New orders?" the colonel nodded and said "Sergeant Major, this is a very special assignment and this message and all future materials are all classified 'Most Secret'. Only you can send these messages with my supervision only and if it is discovered that you've related this to a third party you and said third party will be discreetly executed and your remains disposed. Do you understand?"

The sergeant major, wearing her hair in a regulation bun, nodded with a curt "Yes sir."

"One time pads only, they're are most safest mode of communications." the colonel said.

It took fifteen minutes to super-encrypt the message, and was sent to the Terry Blucher in Nova Capile.

---

---

This communique is delivered to General Secretary Terry Blucher on behalf of the Prime Secretary of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Karevka and the Ministry of Foreign State Affairs.

---

We've known of your valiant struggle against the decadent Klaus I and his crumbling reign and the sinister fascists of Walther Nemetz. We've decided as fraternal socialist allies to intervene and not only supply you with arms, but with Karevkan troops as well to aid in your revolution. We can pledge three 4,570 man volunteer legions each with a complement of 120 armoured fighting vehicles and 25 to 30 gunship helicopters and ground attack jets. The Politburo has its confidence in you and your fledgling nation, we hope you have enough confidence in us to accept our aid. We await your reply.

-Artyom Komissarov

[New Decius]

Sumpfwald, Stammburg Enclave
Operation Faust, Offensive Against Capilean Reich
Grand Duchy of Nova Capile

Major Hans Tempel, 7th Kompanie of the 8th Regiment Luftkavallerie, clung tightly to the strap on the ceiling above him as they raced along the tree tops at speeds which the designers of the Fieseler Fi-89 had probably not intended to be undertaken at such low altitudes nor with evasive maneuvers thrown in. The fascists air defenses had proven more formidable than anticipated so the cruise missile strike had been less effective than expected thus requiring the 8th Luftkavallerie to get ‘creative’ in getting the boys on the ground. Oh there were some losses on the way, a few gunships and transports shot down while they were en route however as the Regiment began to get down to lower altitudes for deployment into the Sumpfwald, a glaring weakness of the Capilean Jagdhund was revealed; while they were worth their price tag against mid-altitude strike bombers and incoming missiles, they were not as efficient against small low-flying fast craft like the helicopter transports and gunships the Luftkavallerie used. They were still a threat to be sure, but not what they’d been hyped up to be.

Hans saw the pilot give him the signal that they were landing soon and he turned to the ten men in the helicopter with him, a wolfish grin on his face as he raised his G45 carbine rifle up and aimed out at the woodland around them. “Alright boys! The Kaiserliche Marine wasn’t able to blow the bastards away after all, so their sendings us in to do it! We are going in with minimal on the ground intel, minimal reinforcements, and minimal fire support!” He scoffed as they all checked their weapons. “You have to feel bad for the enemy with odds so clearly in our favor!” They all burst out laughing, even a couple whoops, while the Fi-89 began to slowly descend into a clearing accompanied by three others, a pair of Fi-74 Medium Assault Gunships hovering protectively above for the moment. The Kaiserliche Armee’s Luftkavallerie were truly as Feldmarschall Heitmann said, tough sons of bitches who will be damned if the other bastard plugs them before they do for him; used to long odds these men would fight tooth and nail to accomplish their goal, soldiers in the Luftkavallerie were well-versed in melee combat as well as ranged as they were often deployed into dense jungle or urban areas where CQC became common. Admittedly with the entire Regiment deploying in force to the Sumpfwald to engage the Fascist troops in guerrilla warfare, that did put over 5,000 German troops on the ground within a matter of hours and with the anti-armor munitions to decimate those Jagdhund batteries hidden inside the damn forest. However, the Regiment would be without en masse support for the moment as the core of 12th Armee’s pincer was slogging it out cautiously through the Sumpfwald, its sheer combined firepower nullifying any assault thrown at the hundreds of thousands of troops still steadily making their way towards their intended target, though 16th Armee on the Left Flank was having much greater success in engaging Krebs main forces. 16th Armee’s jump off point on the border had been much closer to Stammburg than those of 22nd or 12th Armee’s, allowing General Ludwig Witold to force semi-large scale engagements where he could bring his superior numbers of armor and artillery to bear, Krebs was forced to commit some of his armored forces to try and hold up Witold’s advance and keep him from being able to head for Stammburg outright.

“GO, GO, GO!” Hans shouted as he pushed his men off the chopper quickly so the pilots could get back in the air and return to base, jumping off himself once they had all disembarked. The pilots wasted no time getting their helicopters back in the sky and speeding back North to the safety of German air defense batteries, while the now scattered Luftkavallerie Regiment deployed all over the North-Western area of the Sumpfwald was left to its devices.

It seemed the enemy was not content to let them get their bearings though as a mortar round came crashing in on the clearing sending shrapnel flying killing a few poor bastards. Hans didn’t even need to shout orders to his men, all of them honed by years of combat experience and already on the ground to make as small a target of themselves as they could minimizing the effectiveness of the mortar fire. A machine gun opened up shortly after catching another couple of men but it ran both ways as the muzzle flash gave away their position and several of the German troops began to return fire with carbines. Not fast enough to seriously pin down the machine gun but just enough so that machine gunner couldn’t stop Sergeant Arno Baatz from setting up his own MG5 and opening up on his position, riddling the brush with bullets while two men used the grenade launcher attachment on their weapons to send their own mortar fire on the enemy in the bushes.

Major Tempel still grinned like a shark thats spotted a bare bottom even with fire coming in from all around them as the German soldiers returned fire with robotic ease, these were experienced veterans after all, no one was going to pieces. Hans knew that if they stayed in this clearing they were dead men and that didn’t work, even if they should die they had to take plenty of the enemy down with them; if they could get into the brush and scatter then that would nullify the enemies local firepower advantage. By scattering into the surrounding forest the enemy mortar crews and heavier artillery would only be able to fire with absolute confirmation or risk danger close scenarios where they might hit their own troops. “Into the brush boys! Show them we mean business! Scatter!”

He was still shouting even as he himself bolted up and sprinted for the woods a bullet whizzing right by him as he shot a, very surprised, fascist soldier right in the head with his carbine while a man beside him sprayed a burst from his G36C assault rifle into the bushes. Hans and his companion slid into a foxhole where a pair of enemy soldiers greeted them, Major Tempel slamming the butt of his carbine into the face of one of them as the other soldier tackled his own opponent and began to wrestle in the dirt. Despite the fact his own opponent was at least twice his size, a big hulking brute, Hans had managed to daze him with the rifle butt to the face allowing him the chance to draw his combat knife and plunge it into the boars throat, he pushed deep as blood began to spurt from the mans throat and he tried to push the German Major off of him. Hans didn’t waste time and withdrew his knife, turning quickly to shoot the other fascist in the head after the other German was overtaken shot in the chest with a handgun. While the hulking brute was bleeding out on the ground, Hans leaned down to his dying comrade and clutched his hand tightly in his while blood poured from his chest wound. “Rest easy Johann, you did good by Kaiser and Fatherland.” The dying man nodded contentedly as his eyes began to slip close and his grip weakened, his last words...

“Die but do, we are Luftkavallerie. Für Thron und Reich.”

In order to combat the fanatical opposition the Stoßwehr was likely to offer him, Generalfeldmarschall Rommel had sent in his own fanatics to be their dance partners at this ballroom of theirs. Oh the Luftkavallerie would certainly suffer terrible casualties, any operation they were involved in often resulted in said, but the ferocious resistance they could offer their enemy would ensure that they took plenty of the bastards on the other side down with them. The 8th Luftkavallerie wasn’t deployed into the Sumpfwald with a particular strategic objective in mind but rather as a way of disrupting Krebs own guerrilla forces that had been meant to hold up the advance of the 12th Armee, by acting as scattered groups of heavy skirmishers capable of dealing quite the pounding out.

If the fascists had thought fighting the Kaiserliche Armee would be easy because they had drilled with together a few times, they would be swiftly proven wrong.

---

Though Feldmarschall Krebs had, in Rommel’s opinion, done a brilliant job enacting his asymmetric defense strategy while conserving the core of his armored troops, there was a glaring disadvantage in his plan that Rommel was quick to exploit. While Krebs could hold his armor in reserve on the matter of the 12th Armee on the German Right Flank and the 22nd Armee in the Center, the 16th Armee was another matter entirely; the 16th Armee under General Witold was much closer to Stammburg itself than either of the other field armies taking part in Operation Faust. In fact, going full speed towards the city with no obstacles in their path, Witold’s forward elements could’ve reached the city in a matter of hours, and this meant that Krebs had to engage him in force. General Witold was really driving for the city, issuing orders for his troops not to halt the advance to deal with every minor band of partisans that greeted them and to conserve munitions for dealing with the enemies main forces, leaving the partisans to the Militarpolizei following closely at the Armee’s heels.

The forward elements had already encountered some of Krebs armored units resulting in heated clashes where the roughly equal experience of each sides veterans showed but the superior German numbers would often force a VF withdrawal. In this manner the 16th Armee could slowly chip away at Krebs professional troops which would further enable 22nd Armee to commit to its drive straight to the coast thus creating a pocket inside the Sumpfwald surrounded by the 12th and 22nd Armee’s and then another around Stammburg itself surrounded by 16th and 22nd Armee’s. Once the Sumpfwald pocket had been created, a portion of Großadmiral Stürnben’s main fleet would be split off and redirected to the coastal areas of the pocket where the warships could provide direct fire support including launching cruise missile’s at such close range those damned Jagdhund would have barely any time to acquire a target, reducing the effectiveness of the fascist anti-air defenses inside the Sumpfwald Pocket considerably which would also allow the hundreds of aircraft the Luftwaffe had allocated to the campaign from airbases in Royalist territory to bomb the VF troops there with impunity. While this was an extremely likely outcome in the long term, Rommel had no doubt that Krebs would be able to deal him some heavy casualties if he played his cards right and offered varying levels of resistance where needed, however the German forces would still have the opportunity to deal heavy casualties to the fascist troops. Unlike Rommel, Krebs could not easily replace his veteran troops; whereas Rommel could replenish his losses with further professional/veteran troops from Germany as well as the other European states, Krebs could only draw on a reserve of untrained partisans or fresh conscripts. True Rommel’s reinforcements would need time to arrive, but even that time wouldn’t be long enough to turn conscripts and partisans into troops ready to take on professional soldiers.

What Generalfeldmarschall Rommel figured was that as committed to his cause as Krebs was, he likely had as little desire to see Stammburg itself in ruins and its citizens dead or dying as Rommel did. Any veteran commander knew that civilian’s should not have to know the horrors of war as soldiers did, that was what soldiers were meant for after all; to make sure the fight stayed far enough from the ordinary people that the facade of normalcy could continue. Rommel also, despite all urgings by colleagues both German and Capilean (And even French and Russian for that matter) refused to put Stammburg under a lockdown siege as it would inevitably lead to large civilian casualties and frankly the ‘Wolf’ would not stand for that, he would not break his moral code under any circumstances. He would surrender his commission and slit his own throat before he ever willingly put innocent civilian’s under a gunsight. Not to mention that besieging Stammburg, thus cutting it off from outside sources of food and medical supplies, would only serve to turn the populace there against the Royalists and their German allies which generated the threat of a fifth column behind the lines. No if the Kaiserliche Armee was to take Stammburg it would have to be through victory outside the city rather than inside it.

Rommel believed that by defeating the majority of Krebs battle-ready forces in the field he could force the fascist Feldmarschall to come to terms for a reasonable surrender, at least he very much hoped that would be the case. According to Hauptmann Dernen’s assessment of him, Krebs still seemed a calculating reasonable man willing to consider all the options, and the veteran Abwehr operative doubted very much the idea that Krebs would be willing to bring the fight into Stammburg itself, regardless of his orders from higher ups, as it was basically a suicide order for his men. If the Kaiserliche Armee decided it wanted Stammburg to fall by siege then it would simply have Rommel removed from the Theater Command to be replaced by someone who was willing to compromise his or her moral values to achieve victory, and that commander could very easily render unto Stammburg a total siege assault. If one removed the restrictions for combat on German forces, artillery would be free to fire on any area of the city while aircraft would have carte blanche to carpet bomb the whole area, all the while the German Army waited outside the city, content to starve the defenders out.

For now one could but hope that both sides kept their cool in this fight...

---

Südhoof, South-Eastern Coast
Grand Duchy of Nova Capile
Deployment of Heeresgruppe Siegfried

Feldmarschall Franz Lütold von Sonnenschein took in a deep breath of fresh air when he finally got on the ground after having been cooped up in a military airlifter for fourteen hours from Germany to Capile, before looking around to take stock of the situation he found himself in.

While Generalfeldmarschall Rommel had already developed an offensive to capture Stammburg while en route to Capile, Heeresgruppe Siegfried under the command of Feldmarschall Franz Lütold von Sonnenschein was set to deploy in and around Südhoof without a definitive operation in mind. Rather they were meant simply to act as a reaction force against major BSU movements to break out to the sea, though by all appearances the situation had now reversed itself; the Reds, instead of breaking for the sea, were moving swiftly to consolidate their position in Central Capile by connecting Raus and Kongsburg with claimed territory which would make them infinitely stronger if they could establish a concerted supply line. However, none of the Capilean General’s Staff had deigned to inform the commander of Heeresgruppe Siegfried that the BSU had changed objectives while he and the three field armies under his command were on their way from Germany.

This led to the present situation of Feldmarschall von Sonnenschein standing amid a pile of rubble at the airbase just outside Südhoof where the 25th Armee was unloading as divisions continued to be airlifted in, the 30th and 71st were being airlifted in to other airbases near Südhoof though frankly none of them were really in proper condition to handle the influx of so many troops in so short a period. Standing in front of the distinguished Feldmarschall, who himself had actually become quite a legend as having risen all the way from the rank of Soldat (Private) to Feldmarschall in fifty years of military service, was a clearly terrified young Leutnant whom had been serving as a liaison officer with the command staff of Feldmarschall Heinz Zaiser, until very recently a drastic change occurred in the Capilean command structure. Franz’s imposing six foot broad shouldered frame beneath an officers field trench coat were hardly what had the young man shaking at the knees, that was credited more to his having a multitude of visible scars on his face worn proudly as a display of his years of service to Throne and Empire, as well as having only one arm, the other lost two decades prior in the Congo. The German commander was hardly in the most amicable of moods after being cooped up in a crammed airlifter for an extended period of time only to find that the situation on the ground when he arrived was confusing at best, farcical at worst.

“Your telling me that between the time I departed from Germany and the time I arrived here, the Capilean’s have sacked Zaiser and not only has he been sacked but prior to that the bloody fool didn’t even make a hint or a note as to where possibly on the line my three field armies might go or be needed! What kind of circus are they running here?!” Franz blustered and shouted as the Leutnant looked like he was ready to shoot himself to avoid being the target of the Feldmarschall’s wrath, but unfortunately he could not just run away from so high ranking a superior officer. Franz did in fact notice the lad trembling but brushed it aside. “Oh pull yourself together boy! You can stop pissing yourself I’m not going to have you shot for Christ’s sake you had nothing to do with it all so stand up straight!”

“Presently I have arrived to find the conditions for the temporary garrisoning while the three field armies are still being airlifted in, appalling would be the best word to describe it. These airbases are barely able to handle the meager rate of arrival were maintaining now, and at this rate it’ll take me two to three days to have the only Heeresgruppe on the ground and ready to march. Not only that but frankly our allies are in shambles over here by the looks of it, with a shake up of the leadership and having recently repelled a large scale enemy offensive.” Franz began walking over to the conning tower where his command staff had setup a temporary headquarters with the Leutnant following at his heels, all the while still lamenting over the state of their present situation while trying to keep his cool. Inside the conning tower the various officers on Feldmarschall von Sonnenschein’s staff had been working to get in touch with the local senior Royalist commanders to get a proper appraisal of the situation as well as communicating with Generalfeldmarschall Rommel near Stammburg, trying to get some kind of idea about what conditions were like here on the Eastern Front.

“Has anyone found out who has replaced Zaiser yet? Whose in bloody command of this damned circus act going on around here?” One of the staff officers, a Major Fritz Häuber, came up to his commander, sketched off a quick salute and at last delivered the information Franz had been waiting for with great impatience. “Sir. All reports indicate that Grand Duke Klaus has appointed Großmarschall Hermann Winser himself to command the Capilean Royal Army’s Heeresgruppe Ost. We are presently attempting to establish contact with his headquarters Herr Feldmarschall.”

’Winser himself eh? Well I suppose his appointment here in the East is for the same reason Rommel is in charge of taking Stammburg. In both cases they needed an officer who could get things done and by God nobody would dare get in their way.’ Franz had met Großmarschall Hermann Winser several times over the last decade usually at some of the Capilean-German joint military exercises held in either nation, and found the man impressive to say the least but alas never having witnessed him command up close so he could not confirm nor deny any opinions about his fame as yet. It seemed that Feldmarschall von Sonnenschein might finally get his chance to see Capile’s most famous military officer besides that bastard Nemetz in action after all.

“When you get in contact with his headquarters, make sure that they are informed that none of my field armies will be fully ready to move out until about two to three days from now depending how long it takes to get the entire army group in country. However, after that I will have enough forces available to take over at least half of the line from his troops if needed so at that time he can pull the more worn and depleted divisions out of the line.”

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

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SUMPFWALD
CAPILEAN REICH

---

Jürgen Reudel watched through his binoculars as another German helicopter careened out of the sky, plunging into a tangle of pine trees and erupting into a wide inferno of flame. A thin, cruel smile crossed his gaunt face.

He had suspected right. Expecting Reudel’s position to have been obliterated by the cruise missile strike, the Germans had ordered their air cavalry to sweep that section of the wood immediately afterward. And they had had the nerve to not rescind the order after the missile strike had failed.

The Jagdhund was designed with helicopters in mind. It was equipped with both a missile system and a flak cannon, and with the enemy craft flying so low to the ground, the Capilean gunners would have no trouble butchering them.

The chief weakness of the Jagdhund was its light armor, which was highlighted whenever one of the heavily-armed German helicopters managed to land a hit on one of them, resulting in a geyser of flame and the burnt-out husk of a hound. But for every Jagdhund that was destroyed, a far more valuable enemy helicopter was downed.

Some German assault troopers managed to escape the slaughter, deployed either far away from the fighting or just before their transport was destroyed. But their hovering protectors were driven away by the whirling anti-aircraft fire, and the stragglers left on the ground were alone.

Reudel didn’t think much of them, regardless of their elite training. They might drive through a few of his forward positions, but if they attempted to attack the clearing where he now stood, they would be slaughtered by machine gun nests. Not to mention the Jagdhunde; flak could shred infantry even better than it could aircraft.

---

Krebs’ strategy had indeed not taken into account the rapid pace the German 16th Army was capable of on his right flank. Somehow circumnavigating the natural and manmade defenses of the Sumpfwald, that formation had been able to break out and now threatened either an encirclement of the Reich’s armies or a direct assault on Stammburg.

After the first skirmishes against the 16th Army’s spearhead proved fruitless, Krebs decided not to hemorrhage his troops and equipment by throwing them against the enemy. Instead, he ordered a general withdrawal of his armored formations, which were to be regrouped to the south of Stammburg. They could also be restaffed, resupplied, and repaired during this time, since they had seen some heavy fighting against the German forces.

The infantry, however, was to stay put. Reinforced by the odd squadron of armor, the forces within the Sumpfwald would hold fast, whether they were encircled or not.

Krebs had done his research, which was confirmed by the Germans’ actions during their missiles strikes against Stammburg. Rommel had proved to be extremely averse to harming civilians, and urban combat in general. No, the 16th Army would not head for Stammburg, or at least they would not take it, because they wouldn’t be able to do so without a fight.

Krebs did not actually intend to turn Stammburg into a battleground; but the threat of doing so was an advantage he could not afford to dispose with. The 16th Army, ordered by Rommel to avoid marching on the city, would instead attempt to encircle Krebs’ infantry in the Sumpfwald- and for that, Krebs had a plan.

---

REIBURG
NOVA CAPILE

---

The Royalists had to stop falling for surprise attacks.

The problem seemed to be that they had too little resources and too much front to not fall for them. The line could not be bulwarked against every possible threat, unless perhaps the Royalists wanted to enforce mass conscription.

And so, when the panzers of Henrik von Ravenstein’s army burst out into the rolling countryside beyond Landrath, they easily overcame what thinly-stretched resistance they met. The forces of the Reich pressed onward with lightning speed, and by the time Royalist commanders had even been alerted of the sudden offensive, Reiburg had fallen and Fascist spearheads were surging over endless fields of grain.

---

RULUND
NOVA CAPILE

---

Chaos engulfed the town of Rulund.

Royalist troops, transported by rail as per General Kirstin’s request, had barely managed to arrive in the city before Red forces converged on it. Royalist troops were unable to secure the city’s outskirts and so were pressed into the town itself by the Communist assault groups, which were now led by raging tanks.

Without any armor of their own, the Royalist defenders attempted desperately to fortify every intersection and streetblock, throwing up barricades and hardpoints with whatever they could find. The Red Army attacked with abandon, running headfirst into the Monarchist defenses. Weeks before, such tactics were suicidal; but with the armor support the Reds now boasted, they were effective.

Tanks painted with crimson stars, hammers, and sickles rushed through the city, machine guns blazing and turrets firing wildly. Their crews operated not with precision or efficiency, but with a foaming desire to kill for the Revolution.

Against them were the gaunt survivors of Haakensburg, hungry, battle-scarred, weary and defeated. The fight raged on.

---

SÜDHOOF
NOVA CAPILE

---

Hermann Winser had arrived in Südhoof shortly after the Germans, in order to set up his new headquarters as commander of Heeresgruppe Ost.

The plight of the Royalists had never been cleared than during his first morning in the port, when he had been informed of their defeat on nearly all fronts of the war. It was commendable that the Germans still stood by them, even after all of their failings.

Taking his breakfast in the expensive hotel in which he was quartered, the big man penned a quick missive to the German commander:

To: Feldmarschall Franz Lütold von Sonnenschein
From: Großmarschall Hermann Winter

August Feldmarschall,

it is unfortunate that we find ourselves reunited only under such grave circumstances. Nevertheless, I am confident in the capabilities of ourselves and of our countries to reverse aforementioned setbacks and regain the initiative in this terrible war.

I would first apologize for the unprofessional and incompetent conduct of my predecessor as commander of Heeresgruppe Ost, Field Marshal Zaiser. I do not hope to excuse his behavior, only to assure you that it is unprecedented among the Capilean General Staff and was a product of the severe pressures of this total war.

Secondly, I will attempt to illustrate the situation we now find ourselves in. After the Battle of Haakensburg, revealed to have been a mere diversionary attack, the Communists launched a pincer movement, attempting to conjoin their two pockets of resistance, Kongsburg and Raus. My predecessor had only exhausted troops to stretch over these long battlelines, and was unable to prevent Osthilt from falling.

As I understand it, Rulund is now engulfed in battle, and the Communist infantry, now joined by tank battalions, are coming close to their goal of linking up the two pockets. It is our foremost objective to prevent this from happening.

Unfortunately, the Fascists have launched an offensive in the West, attacking with their armored formations into the valleys between Reiburg and Quassdorf. I expect that some of the best troops from my army group will have to be sent westward to combat this threat, though I will fight against this change with what political connections I have left.

This leaves me with understrength and weary troops to hold back the Communists, who, I will admit, are vigorous, if undertrained. To me, your army group appears to be a god-send. If deployed quickly enough, your veterans would certainly be able to halt the enemy pincer movement and prevent a disastrous link-up of Communist forces.

I am ready to meet with you at any time to further discuss strategy, should you deign it necessary.
Otherwise, I will set to work immediately on reorganizing my army group so that it will be ready for the coming months of tribulation.

Once again, I lament the tumultuous situation we find ourselves in, but believe that we will rise to the challenge.

Sincerely,

Hermann Winser
Großmarschall of Nova Capile

---

To: Prime Secretary Artyom Komissarov
From: General Secretary Terry Blücher

Hail, honored Comrade of the Worldwide Revolution!

It is a joy to hear from another country which has broken the shackles of tyranny and now seeks to help us break ours.

We will accept your aid without hesitation, in order to expedite the liberation of our brothers and sisters all across Capile.

Unfortunately, your esteemed Politburo may have to turn to unorthodox ways in order to transport this aid to us, as we currently have no ports and all air traffic is heavily monitored by the remnants of the monarchy.

Thank you for coming to the aid of the Capilean Revolution. It is our hope that more likeminded countries will follow in your example, especially now that the victories of our armies are becoming apparent.

Long live the Revolution!

Terry Blücher
General-Secretary of the Fraternal Socialist Union

[Karevka]

Korodvinsk
Democratic Socialist Republic of Karevka

---

Artyom gazed at the paper on which Blucher's response had been printed. They were back in the Central Secretariat Building basement meeting room, freshly cleaned by SSD officers. Artyom had been rereading the paper repeatedly for two minutes as Yudin, Dernov and Ledovsky looked on. The Prime Secretary understood the power of silence, and used it often. Yudin checked his watch as Dernov began tugging at his shirt collar, becoming nervous. Artyom choose to finally speak a that moment.

"Comrades, Operation Wolfstone has begun," He said. "We cannot back down now."

The silence overtook the room again, leaving only the buzzing of the lights overhead. The other men looked at Artyom, their eyes asking for instructions.

Artyom collected himself. "I will begin dictating our response, Dernov is your deception plan ready for action?"

"Yes, our 'administrative staff' are ready."

Then to Yudin, "Are your mean ready, and are the transports prepped?"

Petr gave a nod.

"Very well. This meeting is adjourned." Artyom said as he rose from his seat, and the others followed suit.

As Artyom walked into the hallway and towards the elevator he heard a little voice telling him: "Don't do this, this will only lead to the death of your political career cancel the operation.". He reasoned with it by saying: "What's done is done, there is no turning back." Similar conversations occurred in the other men's head as well. They all had the same response. A SSD crew came in the room after them, and put all the documents and plans into a steel strongbox. The strongbox eventually found its way to the SSD vault, locked in a voice verified deposit box, ready for use.

The colonel was again making his way across the sea of work desks to the sergeant major. The SSD's rank and file could be considered robots as they worked for hours without fatigue, accepted orders without protest and did their tasks with no hesitation. This was exemplified by the Communications Bureau, whose "drones", as they were called, sat for ages endlessly receiving and transmitting messages. In the room was the constant, monotonous noise of keyboards being tapped on, which would never leave the colonel's brain for days. He at last reached the right cubicle.

"Sergeant major, another Bungalow message." He handed her the dictated paper.

"Yes, colonel." She began typing, her fingers like thousands of mallets hammering nails as she typed. They maybe drones, but they were fast and efficient. "Done." she said fifteen minutes later.

The colonel read the message, and told her "You are doing a excellent job. Just keep this secret. You know the consequence of revealing state secrets." He said the last part quietly so only she could hear. As the colonel walked off, the comms officer felt a shiver down her spine.

---

---

This communique is delivered to General Secretary Terry Blucher on behalf of the Prime Secretary of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Karevka and the Ministry of Foreign State Affairs.

---

Comrade Blucher, we have a specially designed plan for the very purpose of bringing in our forces. Officially our men will be on peacekeeping duties, but will actually disappear into your territory. SSD agents playing administrative staff and our Foreign Ministry will be reassuring the Royalists of their presence and the occasional word of winning hearts and minds in a village to enforce the masquerade. As for our military equipment and vehicles, those will be hidden on the lower decks of our cargo boats along with other containers filled with food, water, clothing and other humanitarian aid to throw off the inspectors and this will be printed on the cargo manifests. We also will have a flotilla offshore with two more regiments and several squadrons of aircraft obstensily there in case the war escalates further, but will actually be our reserves.

Is this plan feasible for you, General Secretary?

-Prime Secretary Artyom Komissarov

[New Decius]

Battle for Stammburg
Capilean Reich Territory, Contested Territory
Operation Faust

Though the density of the Sumpfwald and the adverse terrain certainly provided difficulties and held up the advance of the three field armies, as the engineering units attached to the Panzer Divisions began to move up the task became slowly but surely easier to accomplish even as the forward elements of 12th and 22nd Armee’s continued to skirmish with partisans and professional troops alike. 16th Armee continued its drive on the German Left Flank pressing against the Fascist Right, taking the opposite approach to its neighbors by ignoring the small groups of partisans, leaving them for the Militarpolizei following the line closely, and solely aiming to do battle with the VF’s professional forces if they could be found.

12th Armee under General von Schneider was making steady progress in its spearhead plunging through the Northern areas of the Sumpfwald, though on the General’s orders it was moving at a deliberately slow pace to ensure enemy positions were mopped up before they could end up behind German lines. This was also to make sure as many enemy troops as possible were squeezed into the planned ‘Sumpfwald Pocket’ intended to be created by the advance of 22nd Armee to the coast thus cutting off the Fascist forces under General Reudel’s command from Feldmarschall Krebs Headquarters in Stammburg. Though meeting fierce resistance in their advance, 12th Armee were responding in kind; General von Schneider was directing her troops to fight as ferociously as possibly while still staying on the right side of the Geneva Conventions, and had also issued a directive granting full artillery fire permission for any strike outside an urban area. Alongside the armored bulldozers that the engineering units were using to clear away the trees and brush, the artillery were being used to great effect simply pounding away at the more densely forested areas which could be concealing enemy troops positions. Rather than risking aircraft being shot down carelessly by striking deep into enemy territory, General von Schneider was restricting all airstrikes to areas covered by her own troops advancing SPAAG’s which would be able to target and bring down SAM’s launched against the aircraft. It was largely due to these measures that 12th Armee was suffering perhaps the least severe amount of casualties of the three field armies in comparison to the others.

22nd Armee had actually sustained a moderate amount of casualties during the initial phases of Operation Faust due to partisan positions in the small towns and sabotage behind the lines; the worst incident was when a fanatical suicide bomber managed to smuggle himself inside a field hospital and killed seventy-two patients and fifteen medics, though logistically the worst incident was when the partisans ignited a minor brush fire which held up the advance of most of an Infanterie Division as it took several hours to put out. Though making sufficient progress for the allotted time table, 22nd Armee was facing much more heavily coordinated partisan action than either of the other field armies, likely because of the many small towns which its path of advance took it through inciting a large number of small urban skirmishes. General Heinrich Ulräch’s forces were being hard pressed to maintain their supply lines as the lions share of the Militarpolizei units had been split between the 12th and 16th Armee’s, so a number of Kompanie’s had to be detached from their Regiments to maintain a guard of the supply lines else they be attacked by yet more partisans. Because his line of advance for the operation took him across so many urban areas, General Ulräch was much more limited in his use of artillery so as to prevent civilian casualties and he was prevented from calling in airstrikes at all for fear of hitting a populated area. While the General found Rommel’s mad drive to protect the civilian’s frustrating to say the least, he did agree that at this early stage of its involvement in the war, the Kaiserliche Armee could not afford the major PR disaster an accidental and preventable massacre of civilian’s would be. So despite the incessant and coordinated harassment by the partisans of the region, 22nd Armee continued to make its way towards the coast to finish the creation of the ‘Sumpfwald Pocket’, some of its forward elements even engaging some of the few heavy enemy units located inside the Northern portion of the Sumpfwald.

If General Ulräch was restricted in his actions, then General Witold of 16th Armee was even more so as he had a very specific set of orders for his forces to carry out. Essentially he was to both frighten the professional Fascist troops back to defend Stammburg by the rapidity of his advance while also goading an engagement with said by the same, the intent being to cause such a confusion that Krebs would be unable to send any of his armored troops to try and bail out the ‘Sumpfwald Pocket’. General Witold was strictly forbidden from assaulting Stammburg itself and also unable to launch artillery or air strikes within two miles of the city outskirts due to the possibility of a civilian presence in the area, he was however permitted to engage at will any VF armored units he came across since his task was essentially to run riot outside of Stammburg and bait Krebs into a fight. 16th Armee had the advantage of having seven out of the sixteen Militarpolizei Regiments attached to it thus allowing for Witold’s main combat units to solely hunt after/bait out the VF’s professional troops while the dedicated anti-partisan troops took care of security behind the lines, this also meant that Witold didn’t necessarily have to worry about committing his troops to capturing every small town his forces came across which shaved an immense amount of time off their advance. Though brief skirmishes with Kreb’s armored forces had resulted in some minor casualties, the 16th Armee still possessed every capability to meet their enemy on the battlefield.

---

Meanwhile the remnants of the 8th Luftkavallerie Regiment were still getting mauled running around the brush of the Sumpfwald fighting General Reudel’s troops in what was often fanatical close-quarters guerrilla warfare. While most of Reudel’s strong points were fairly well defended thus negating any opportunity the German troops could have at neutralizing them, that didn’t stop the Luftkavallerie harassing these same positions where they could even in small groups; some men carried small, portable mortars on their backs while others still settled for simply hurling bundles of grenades at the outer pickets of these positions or just harassing then with machine gun fire. The remainder of the 5,000 man helicopter infantry regiment was down to about 3,200 but even vastly outnumbered with no chance of resupply that didn’t dampen their spirits nor weaken the ferocity of their attacks.

The majority of the fighting between the Luftkavallerie and the VF troops at Reudel’s command actually took place away from the SPAAG strong points and within the dense forest and brush of the Sumpfwald where it descended into sheer chaos. Though in unfamiliar terrain, the Luftkavallerie were trained for environment adaptability (Part of the training regime involved the men being blindfolded and dropped off in an undisclosed location with orders to survive for a week off their surroundings. Such locations included the Italian Alps, Rhine Valley, Greek Aegean Islands etc) and the veterans among the regiment were well versed in being dropped into some of the most brutal combat environments this awful world of ours had to offer. They were trained to throw themselves at the enemy with two main weapons; their elite training and sheer ferocity.

Major Hans Tempel quickly withdrew his combat knife from the chest of the now dead fascist beneath him, not even bothering to clean the weapon as he returned it to its sheath and took what precious moments of peace he had presently to slide down against a fallen tree trunk and catch his breath. He was distinctly aware of a sharp pain in his side which might indicate a broken rib or two as well as blood dripping down his left arm from where he believed a bullet may have grazed him but he would have to check to be sure. He had long since lost his carbine, having run out of ammunition which effectively turned it into a not quite viable club, and was relying solely on his combat knife, handgun, and CQC, admittedly he had already changed handguns three times after smashing his own original repeatedly into the face of a now very dead VF officer. Here and there he caught sight of some of his men and they would lend each other a hand but largely they kept to their training which was to act as individual demons wreaking havoc on the enemy.

’Of course its very rare the Luftkavallerie faces odds like this. The close-quarters combat and chaos is normal but its not too often we get to fight an enemy that actually knows what he’s doing. Last time I can remember that was the Sino-German War back in 98’ Hans thought as he unzipped his jacket and shrugged it off quickly, ignoring the pain in his side as he checked his left arm for a potential bullet wound. Just as he’d suspected the bullet had merely grazed the skin and it wasn’t even worthy of being called a proper wound, definitely not worth using any of his limited supply of bandages or morphine for, he could take the pain from the ribs.

’After all why should I worry about a few broken ribs, when its very likely before the day or maybe even the hour is up I’ll be conversing with the Almighty.’

Yet another facet of why the Luftkavallerie were perhaps some of the deadliest soldiers Germany had to offer was because of the conditioning they went through during training. During the grand days of the old Swedish Empire, their army was made up of troops known as Caroleans whom were trained to believe that God had already determined who would and would not survive a battle so there was no reason to worry about personal safety because it had all already been decided before the first shot was fired. The Luftkavallerie used a similar method by training its members that if they truly fought so hard as to live up to their illustrious reputation they would be guaranteed a ticket to Valhalla as a fallen warrior carried off by the Valkyrie’s; the fact that it was mostly young men recruited and telling them that beautiful women would carry them from the battlefield should they die might help with this conditioning. So in essence the goal was to assume there was a chance you would die but to fight so hard you were guaranteed entrance into Valhalla with the spirits of other warriors past.

As Hans was about to put his jacket back on he heard a twig snap behind him and wasted no time grabbing the pistol at his side as he sprang up throwing his jacket at the figure before him to blind his opponent as he ran forward to tackle the man. It only took seconds for him to recognize that this man wasn’t wearing the blue tinted feldgrau uniform of a Luftkavallerie soldier which signified he was a hostile and a few more seconds saw the man admittedly reacting quite well as he got off a quick three round burst one of which sank into Hans right thigh. However the enraged German kept going and tackled the other man to the ground as they rolled around in the dirt, Hans making sure to keep his jacket over the others face in an attempt to smother him only to be thrown off by a well placed knee to his groin.

Before his opponent could regain his composure and his weapon, Hans sprang forward again, this time seizing the jacket and quickly wrapping the sleeves tightly around his enemies throat and pulling with all his strength. Placing his boot firmly on the other man’s back to keep him down, Hans pulled and pulled as the fascist desperately thrashed and spasmed and tried to pull the jacket from around his throat to no avail. After several minutes the thrashing finally stopped but Hans was taking no chances. He took out his pistol and shot the man twice in the head for good measure before reclaiming his jacket and also taking custody of the dead mans weapon checking how much ammo it had left. Satisfied he was about to move on when a striking pain in his thigh sent a signal through his body screaming for him to not move. Looking down he saw blood practically spilling from the bullet wound he had received in the initial engagement though unfortunately it did not appear to be a through and through and he did not have the tools to remove the bullet without severing an artery.

Grunting he took one of the three morphine shots in his jacket, thankfully not crushed in the scuffle, and jammed it into his thigh feeling slight relief as the drug made its way into his system. With that the Luftkavallerie officer proceeded further into the brush, continuing his fanatical mission despite likely not long for this world...

---

Reichstag, Berlin
Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire
Federation of European Monarchies

“...and so how does this Diet vote on the matter of the Loan proposed by His Imperial and Royal Majesty’s Chancellor to be delivered unto the legitimate government of the Grand Duchy of Nova Capile.” The official squire of the Reichstag call out to the chamber which was even now still filled with shouts of debate, particularly from the center section and upper balconies, though everyone did take notice enough to submit their vote. The poor squire was often heckled when he called out such announcements, just because the men and women were all members of the Reichstag did not mean they wouldn’t shout profanities when thoroughly pissed off enough. Once during a debate about the elevation of the military advanced research budget, someone actually threw one of their boots at the squire’s head when he called for the vote.

At present though the Reichstag had no formal oversight of the OHL due to the Kaiser declaring a state of war, well outside of being able to investigate possible war crimes, they did still have the power to approve or deny loans to the Grand Duchy, a matter of hot debate. Just before Operation Faust had begun in Capile, Reichskanzler von Richthofen had proposed to the Reichstag that Germany loan three hundred billion Euromarks to the Grand Duchy at three percent interest to be paid back within twenty years. Needless to say this caused an eruption of debate from the Social Democrats in the SPD and even some of the moderates in the Zentrum though even some members of DVP on the right voiced concern over the size of the loan. The Social Democrats biggest argument was that the military intervention alone was already a drain on the German economy, almost two million troops were in the field in Capile, now the Reichskanzler wanted to write Klaus a check for three hundred billion. It wasn’t really ideological reasons that they opposed the measure, rather it was because they all wanted to get reelected to the Reichstag and sending both the citizen’s children and money to fight in Capile did not exactly make reelection a sure bet. Some members of the Zentrum and DVP simply were balking at the actual size of the proposed loan but not at the idea of sending a loan to Capile.

In order to ensure this measure passed, Reichskanzler von Richthofen and Kaiserliche Marschall von Regensburg had pulled out all the stops with their political allies and done their absolute best to find even more in the short time before the vote; Richthofen worked the left-wing and center while Regensburg rifled through the right-wing. Favors were carried out, shady deals were made, backroom exchanges took place, and morals were compromised; politics in action.

As the Imperial Chancellor and Head of His Imperial Majesty’s Government, Richthofen could not actually speak on the floor of the Reichstag, though Chancellor’s whom were former members of the Diet did retain their floor privilege since Richthofen was not formerly a member of the Reichstag this was not allowed to him, nor could Regensburg as he wasn’t a political official of any kind. All the same the Reichskanzler was watching the proceedings from the office of the Reichspräsident situated above the chamber via a one way window, presently Her Excellency, Theresa Celia Röche (SPD) was on her way up from the chamber below, she didn’t have to actually be present for the vote itself, merely be informed of it. Given that the Reichspräsident was elected by the members of the Reichstag rather than by the people themselves, it was a small miracle that Röche had won the Presidency twice now and looked like she would secure a third term in the next election. Since 2006 the Reichstag had largely been dominated by a coalition of the Zentrum (Social Conservatives) and the DVP (Authoritarian Democrats) with the SPD and other small left-wing groups holding a large number of the remaining seats and then a very small number going to the fringe ultranationalists or bolsheviks on either the left or right. That Röche had been elected Germany’s second female Reichspräsident in 2014 when her party only held 32% of the seats in the Reichstag opposed by the Zentrum/DVP’s 56% showed how much of a bridge builder she was; That was also quite literal, in her two terms she had so far introduced three successful bills for both building new bridges across the Rhine and Danube as well as renovating existing ones. Her third election victory seemed in the bag as the Zentrum and DVP began to drift further apart ideologically so a Zentrum/SPD coalition seemed to be in the cards or even an outright SPD majority.

’Then again the war could change everything.

Before coming to see the result of the vote, Richthofen had been reading a report sent to his office by several of his own private agents, he didn’t trust Regensburg to tell him the absolute truth about the war, regarding Generalfeldmarschall Rommel’s offensive against Stammburg. By all accounts it appeared to be going within expected parameters and casualties were so far not too heavy, however the report on the stability and sturdiness of the Royalist government and military was far less optimistic. There was a strong indication that while Reichskanzler Knott seemed to still have some faith in Grand Duke Klaus ability as a leader, Großmarschall Winser and other members of the High Command appeared to be losing faith after the Fall of Saxtonburg, Richthofen was still sorting through angry missives from the Foreign Office over the Reichsrat incident, and the recent BSU offensive. Things were bad enough with Nemetz practically free from harm save his enclave at Stammburg because the Royalists seemed more concerned with the Reds than the so-called ‘Capilean Reich’ which would allow Nemetz time to build up his position and consolidate his forces. If the Royalists started tearing themselves to pieces then their cause was hopeless and even worse, from Richthofen’s perspective, German interests in the reason would be forfeit. Hence the three hundred billion loan with a very low rate of interest and two decades to repay. That should not only be enough to keep the Capilean civilian economy afloat but also stabilize their military industrial complex.

The Reichskanzler was brought out of his thoughts when the door behind him opened and in walked Her Excellency the President of the Imperial German Diet. If Richthofen and Theresa weren’t both married and in their fifties he might have made a comment about her beauty, even with those restraints he still thought she was rather beautiful. Theresa definitely looked good for fifty-seven, with a fit well-exercised figure, not a wrinkle in sight and her perfectly maintained strawberry blonde hair neatly pinned up in a bun. However the Baron had always found his Reichstag counterparts mind her most beautiful quality, they had matched wits many times since she was elected Reichspräsident in 2014 (Richthofen was appointed Reichskanzler by Wilhelm Augustus III in 2012) and she had even managed to outmaneuver him a few times on the political chess board. That took not only brains but courage, after all as the grandson of the world-famous Red Baron, Richthofen’s fame alone could help him end careers.

As she strode over towards her desk he poured two glasses of a fine cognac sitting on the table and gave one to her as she passed by. Theresa downed it in one gulp, a trick veteran politician’s picked up quickly from being cooped up in an office for eighteen to twenty hours at a time, hell some members of the Reichstag barely ever went home and practically lived in their offices. “So I take it the vote will go in our favor?”

Theresa raised an eyebrow as she sat down and began to access her computer. “You know Julius when you says things like that I always wonder in whose favor you mean? Do you mean in the favor of the German people? Who will not have access to three hundred billion additional Euromarks for education, infrastructure, security, health, and all the facets of normal life? Or do you mean you and I personally for the sake of our political careers?”

“Let us assume that for official reasons I inquire on behalf of His Imperial Majesty’s government, after all I am appointed by the Kaiser, you are elected by people whom have been elected by The people.” Richthofen slowly sipped at his own glass, as the second most powerful man in the Empire after the Kaiser himself, he could afford to take his time.

“Well in that case yes the vote goes in our favor. It looks like it’ll be 411 in favor versus 274 opposed so we have the 60% margin needed to pass and with how some members are I expect at least another ten members of the Greens who are voting against to switch so they can stay in the Zentrum’s favor. Honestly the core of the opposition actually came from the DVP which is surprising.” Indeed it was. The DVP (Deutsche Vaterlandspartei) was not quite as far-right as its ‘First Empire’ (1871-1918) precursor had been but it still leaned to the right and had voted vehemently in favor of any military intervention in the past or support to a foreign ally.

“Thats because recently their membership has begun to include old soldiers, by which I mean men who served during the Restoration Period in the 50’s and 60’s as well as the veterans from the Soviet War in the 80’s who don’t want their sons to have to go through what they did, fighting a war on foreign soil. They’ve definitely shifted towards being more Authoritarian Democrat than Paternal Autocrat on the political spectrum, so much so that they’ve even started disavowing and condemning the more extreme protests by the AV (Alldeutscher Verband).” The AV was the National Populist splinter of the now exiled DRHP, as the DRHP had been an outright National Socialist organization is was made illegal by Imperial Constitution Article 7 which banned all such movements, and had recently been involved in a spat of anti-immigrant and anti-semitic riots that had gotten Richthofen to authorize the Abwehr to begin conducting domestic surveillance on the party. “How could they not when their own members opposed that AV riot in Bonn two weeks ago?” Recently the AV had thrown one of its usual rallies protesting what they viewed as the ‘Jewish Infiltration’ of German society only for a large counter-protest by DVP members to occur as veterans of the Kaiserliche Armee, Jewish, Christian, and Secular, came out in droves to oppose them. The AV talked a big game but their members tended to be common civilian’s while the actual veterans or serving soldiers flocked to the DVP, Zentrum, and SPD, so they didn’t have the muscle or political shielding to attack a group of veteran soldiers.

“By the way Theresa, as much as I have been working with him recently, I don’t trust whatever Regensburg is up to. He is seizing every opportunity this war and freedom from the Reichstag have presented him with, grasping them firmly with both hands. Already ten new divisions are being mustered in Westfalen and sixteen new destroyers have been contracted out at Kiel and Rostock, something which would take him six months during peace time if he even got the Reichstag to authorize the funding for such a crash venture.” Though Richthofen and Regensburg were semi-allies politically, they were also arguably on opposite sides because while the Reichskanzler believed Germany needed a strong military to retain its authority and guard the empire, the Kaiserliche Marschall wanted to expand the military’s authority into the political and domestic sphere as well. Regensburg longed for the days of Ludendorff and Hindenburg where the military told the Reichskanzler what to do and could tell the Reichstag to piss off rather than submitting to the oversight of the civilian government. “I would advise you to watch your back. Regensburg might be loyal to the Fatherland but I wouldn’t put it past him to stage a false flag attack in order to expand the scope of this war ever further. An apparent ‘terrorist’ attack conducted by the fascist underground supplied by Nemetz, not that we don’t have enough trouble with the aristocratic and national populist exiles stirring up trouble right now.”

Theresa shook her head with a sigh. “Nothing we can do about that, you and I both have tried to convince His Imperial Majesty that His Royal Highness the Prince Rudolf should be extradited back to Germany but he has forbade action against a member of his family.”

“Even when that same family member tried to launch a coup to remove our previous Kaiser, May He Rest In Peace, from the throne. Honestly that swine disgusts me, we should have hung him or tossed him in some dark cell when we had the chance.” Richthofen squeezed his glass so hard a slight crack formed just before he regained his composure. “Alas we cannot afford the international incident of breaking over two hundred years of Swiss neutrality to arrest some frustrating exiles.”

Theresa only poured herself another drink before turning to see the chamber below beginning to empty, the vote obviously having concluded. “Well you have your loan Julius, now lets see if the Royalists still have a coherent enough government to use it right. Three hundred billion Euromarks should be enough to almost totally reinvigorate the civilian industry in the Grand Duchy’s territory, or alternatively they could use the loan we gave them to buy more weapons from us.” With a wry smirk from both, they shared the opinion that the latter option was probably what Regensburg was hoping for.

For now, Germany had just made a move to replenish the coffers of the Royalist state. It was yet to be seen if the money would be put to good use...

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SMS Alfred von Tirpitz, 3rd Battle Squadron, Hochseeflotte
Central Mediterranean Sea
Operation Cerberus

Though many believed the days of the battleship to be long dead, the Kaiserliche Marine did not wholly endorse such a philosophy. During the German-Soviet War this reluctance to abandon heavy tonnage surface combatants was proven when the Nuclear Battlecruisers operated by the German fleet were able to deal significant damage to the Soviet Black Sea Fleet which led to the Hochseeflotte continuing the usage of such warships. In 2002 as part of the Naval Expansion Program Stage 6 initiated in 2000, the hulls for an entire new class of nuclear powered modern battleships were laid down at Wilhelmshaven and Kiel’s military shipyards, as Reichsmarineminister (Imperial Navy Minister) Hans-Volker von Breiten (Term 2000-2008) envisioned the recreation of the First Empire’s High Sea’s Fleet. In total by 2010, after Breiten had left his post in His Imperial Majesty’s government, a total of fifteen nuclear battleships (Bismarck-II, Jutland, and Memel Classes) and eight nuclear battlecruisers (Hesse and Ansbach Classes) had been commissioned into the Kaiserliche Marine with additional hulls under construction as well as expansions of the carrier fleet and cruiser forces also planned. While conventional destroyers and submarines would continue to make up the bulk of the fleet, it was planned to commission a total of sixty surface combatant capital ships into service by 2030 and twenty additional carriers by the same as well as a hundred cruisers.

The SMS Alfred von Tirpitz named for the very man responsible for the original Kaiserliche Marine’s now famous arms race with the Royal Navy prior to the First World War, was presently the flagship of the Hochseeflotte as the commanding vessel of III. Schlachtgeschwader as well as the Pride of the Fleet. The vessel was the third laid down of the Jutland-Class Nuclear Battleships weighing in at 48,000 tons, armed with nine automated 16 inch guns (three triple barreled turrets with two guns fore and one aft) as well as a wide variety of lighter automated 7 inch guns, cruise missile VLS pods, and CIWS weaponry. These modern battleships were the shining pride of the Kaiserliche Marine and presently Großadmiral Hermann Horst intended to use them and his carriers to cripple the naval power of the Capilean Reich.

While Generalfeldmarschall Rommel commanded two field army groups on the ground in Capile, much debate had occurred at the OHL regarding how the Kaiserliche Marine could similarly assist the campaign against the fascists. As it happened the Abwehr had detected large movement by the naval forces of the Capilean Reich in the form of several battlegroups departing port to assist ground operations, as well as new intelligence regarding the refit of formerly retired warships from the Cold War and the presence of the believed sole Prinz-Karl Class Super Battleship which the Reich might possess. In response to this increase in fascist naval activity, Großadmiral Hermann Horst had drawn up a plan to mobilize the core battlegroups of the Hochseeflotte from the North Atlantic where it was based, to be sent into Capilean waters. As Horst saw the issue, Nemetz would have no choice but to militarily engage the Hochseeflotte, a gambit which by all accounts was out of the capabilities of the fleet of the Capilean Reich supposedly, or else allow the Kaiserliche Marine to enforce a total naval blockade of his territory while the aircraft from the carriers similarly blocked the territory off by air. If intelligence reports were to be believed, Nemetz had nowhere close to the strength needed to challenge the force Horst was bringing into the theater so he would either lose his fleet in a breakout attempt or lose all access to maritime commerce.

’Of course this gambit of mine relies on the Abwehr being right about how much of the Capilean fleet Nemetz managed to secure.’ Großadmiral Horst thought sardonically as he took tea in his quarters alongside his ADC Konteradmiral Manfred Rüthe and Oberst Julian Pfeeke of the Seebataillon (Imperial German Marines). Recently the Abwehr had been tragically embarrassed by some truly massive intelligence failures, most critical among these being their lack of forewarning that Capile would actually split into civil war in the first place; all the analysts at the Abwehr had believed the crisis would pass peacefully and Grand Duke Klaus would be able to hold his country together. This was followed by the seizure and execution of a majority of the agents the Abwehr had in fascist or communist territory shortly after the civil war broke out, then there was the failure to properly assess the Royalists capability to hold out at Saxtonburg. All in all the Abwehr had fallen flat on its face only to get up and be knocked on its ass...into a mud puddle.

Placing his cup back down on the saucer, Horst looked back at the monitor mounted on the wall behind his desk, a satellite relayed map tracking the fleet as it transitioned across the Mediterranean, each warship represented by a blinking red icon, with different shapes for different classes of warship. Triangles for the carriers, ovals for the battleships, squares for the cruisers, and circles for the destroyers. They were presently just passing Malta en route to the Suez Canal, the Kaiserliche Marine base on Malta attaching a few resupply vessels to each squadron as planned, while a second group of support vessels mostly minesweepers and intelligence frigates would attach to the flotilla from the base at Dschibuti at the mouth of the Red Sea.

“Well gentlemen I do believe I am presently in command of the most powerful naval force Germany has had under sail since the First World War.” Horst was hardly joking, he did have a total of ninety-six ships under his command split between four battle squadrons including a total of twenty-four battleships and eight carriers.

Rüthe chuckled at hearing the First World War mentioned. “If we’d had ships like these back in 1916, I imagine Jutland would have turned out very differently, by which I mean we would’ve been invading England within the week.” They all enjoyed a good laugh about that before falling silent as they all thought on such a notion. Since the Imperial Restoration in 1953, there had been much debate as to what precisely led to the First Empire’s defeat in the First World War, and it was largely acknowledged that rather than on the ground it had been at sea that Germany had lost the war. Had the Hochseeflotte been able to break the British blockade even partially thus reinstating even limited food shipments then analysts determined it was likely the Kaiserliche Armee may have been able to win in France in 1917, despite idiotic material and manpower losses from the brainless adventure that was the Verdun Offensive.

Nevermind the past though.

“Are all squadron commanders clear on their general orders for arrival in the theater of operations?” Horst questioned Rüthe who nodded and brought out his tablet on which he had the complete fleet roster.

“Ja Herr Großadmiral. All vessels in the fleet including the support vessels which joined us from Malta report green station and total readiness. We are also presently on a green alert status since it is highly unlikely, perhaps impossible, that the VF has any assets in either the Red Sea or Mediterranean, the Abwehr believes that the naval forces at Nemetz command have only local deployment capability right now so even the Red Sea should be out of their capability despite its proximity to Capile.” Once more Horst took that with a grain of salt given that he didn’t trust the Abwehr’s assurances until he could see proof they were back at the top of their game. “However I have made sure to transmit your requirement to Vizeadmiral’s Stahl, Metzger, and Wahlün that all ships are to be on a one hour alert notice for potential surface combat while all carriers are on a half hour launch notice for potential air combat.” Horst nodded in appreciation, but then again he would expect nothing less of the man whom had been serving as his ADC for going on fourteen years now and whom had graduated top of his class from Marineakademie Wilhelmshaven.

“What about the Italian’s? Has the Regia Marina agreed to supply the support I requested of them?”

“Ja Herr Großadmiral, the Italian’s will have submarine patrol aircraft flying out of their airbases in Ethiopia and Somaliland to make sure that the fascists don’t have any surprises waiting for us in the Red Sea or just beyond it.”

“Good, given that we will have to move through the Red Sea squadron by squadron in a line formation I cannot fully utilize the advantage of my destroyers until we are once again in open water. If the VF managed to slip an attack submarine into the Red Sea while our ships are in those confined waters it will greatly limit our response capabilities.” What the seasoned naval commander was really worried about was the possibility that one of the Capilean cruise missile submarines rumored to be in fascist hands may slip into the Red Sea to launch an attack on his forces. He knew that it was all too likely the VF had its own spies among the, sadly all too many, ultranationalist’s or Pan-Germanics back in Germany as well as the exiles so it was a very real possibility they knew the Kaiserliche Marine was deploying this large force. Shaking his head he got back to the matter at hand. “Now what about Vizeadmiral Mecklendorff’s newly formed V. Unterseegruppe? Have they entered the combat theater yet?”

“Unfortunately Herr Großadmiral since in its wisdom OHL chose to form the new Unterseegruppe out of four squadrons from different commands, with two from the Pacific, one from the Indian, and one from the South Atlantic, there has been some delay in their deployment. Vizeadmiral Mecklendorff though it best to marshal his squadrons to Dar-es-Salaam before beginning to deploy his subs for active operations. Presently only IX. Unterseegeschwader out of the South Atlantic and II. Unterseegeschwader out of the Indian have arrived at port while XLV. Unterseegeschwader and XXVI. Unterseegeschwader out of the Pacific are still transitioning.” Rüthe did not seem happy at all to deliver that news and Horst was not happy at all to receive it.

“Why are the two squadrons out of the Pacific still transitioning? OHL decreed they were to be detached from the Pazifikflotte so who on Earth is holding it up?” Even as he asked that he had a decent idea as to who.

“Apparently Großadmiral Klein, in command of Pazifikflotte raised hell when OHL told him he was losing two of his attack sub squadrons and has been trying to stall their departure as long as he can without being sacked from the Kaiserliche Marine.”

Horst snorted. “I might’ve guessed. Friedrich thinks if we detach so much as a frigate from the Pazifikflotte that the Chinese will see that as a sign to look at our treaty ports and Indochina as free real estate. Man’s more high strung than a Duchess trying to set her daughter up with a young noble of higher rank. No matter let OHL know that I want those squadrons released immediately or I will go to the Reichskanzler personally, that should get Regensburg to do something about it.” Inwardly Horst recoiled at the mention of his sole superior outside of the Kaiser and Reichskanzler. Dietrich von Regensburg was without a doubt a capable strategist and commander, he had to be to attain his rank (The modern OHL is much more a meritocracy than in days past), but he also kept that by constantly pitting the Generalfeldmarschall’s, Großadmiral’s, and Luftmarschall’s against each other as rivals. Keep them too busy squabbling with each other to question what he told them.

However how would such a tactic of command fare during war time...

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

SUMPFWALD
CAPILEAN REICH

---

Captain Dietrich Stolte took another step forward into the brush, a thick sediment of leaves and mud crunching under his heavy boot. A submachine gun was ready in his hands, in perfect coordination with the precise, measured movements of his gray eyes. His squadron followed behind him, mimicking his movements.

The Captain had his brigade been called in to eliminate the threat posed by the rogue, dwindling remnants of the German Luftkavallerie. The higher-ups considered them to be of little threat, but considering that they had the resources to dispose of them, they saw no reason not to. Technically, every unit of the Stoßwehr was considered elite, and so, apart from a few special forces battalions, the new military of the Reich had no elite units; its entire army was elite.

However, Stolte’s brigade, the 27., had a long and distinguished combat history, being one of the first Stoßwehr units that was ever formed. Dietrich himself had seen combat in four continents and dozens of countries. He had seen it all; his morals and inhibitions had been shaved away over the years by the grindstone of war, and all that was left was his undying service to his cause.

Their mission was simple. Their enemies were operating as rogue cells, rarely cooperating and instead choosing to overwhelm isolated patrols and outposts whenever they could. Such a strategy might have preserved the enemy’s limited manpower, but it very much inhibited their individual survivability. Thus, Dietrich and others like him had been dispatched with their squads to sweep through the infested sectors of the forest, drawing out any insurgents and gunning them down with sheer, overwhelming firepower.

The man trudged onward, carefully, when his steely eyes locked with a flurry of motion from behind a nearby pine. Bursting forth from beneath an umbrella of thickly-needled branches, a gray-uniformed rogue landed squarely on his feet behind the enemy patrol. He might have been able to take out many men if he had a weapon such as Dietrich’s, but his supplies and those of his comrades were wearing thin, and he had to think economically about every bullet.

As Dietrich was spinning around, the German put a bullet into the back of two men’s heads; they never knew what had killed them. Before their bodies hit the ground, the soldier had surged forward and sliced the throat of a third shock trooper, who had just begun to whirl around to face the new threat. Turning toward his fourth victim, the German was raising his knife to strike when his luck ran out.

A hail of bullets let loose from Dietrich’s gun, joined by rounds from the barrels of his unharmed subordinates. They caught all over the German’s body- in his neck, his limbs, his stomach, his head. His grip on the knife slackened, his legs buckled, and he fell backward, a smile crossing his lips as he hit the ground. In his last moments, he appeared to have overcome the searing pain with the knowledge that he had been granted a warrior’s death, and a place in Valhalla.

“That,” Dietrich spat, “is why you’re supposed to watch our fucking six.” He glared at his surviving compatriots. “These are real fucking soldiers, not Somalian bandits. You slack off again, and we’re all dead.

“Now, again. They can’t all be tough sons of bitches.”

---

The slow and methodical advance of the 12th Armee was both a blessing and a curse for the Reich. While it did mean that the partisan elements which had been planned to disperse behind enemy lines were purged from those sectors, that did not concern the Reich’s General Staff, who understood that such gaps could easily be filled once their sleeper cells within the various cities now under German occupation were activated.

The bonus was that it afforded them more time to transfer troops from the pocket which the Germans clearly intended to close.

Various formations were pulled out. Most all motorized, mechanized, and armored units were ordered to report back to Stammburg, as they were unfit for intense combat within the treacherous terrain of the Sumpfwald, and would eventually cause further supply problems because of their need for fuel. In addition, a number of veteran, heavy assault, and engineer-based formations were withdrawn. All of these troops were shifted piecemeal behind friendly lines, so as to not alert the enemy to a massive troop reconfiguration.

Krebs began to marshal his forces in the vicinity of Stammburg. Reudel, fresh from the Sumpfwald, began to refit and refresh his tank army, while various infantry elements also took pause to recover from the fighting. Meanwhile, the forces still within the forest were ordered to use the terrain to the best of their advantage, and began to receive extra supplies which they were to stockpile in anticipation of the oncoming encirclement.

The troops holding up the 12 Armee, meanwhile, were mostly freshly-recruited infantry and partisans, which gave ground quickly to their seasoned enemies and were ordered to avoid decisive engagements at all costs, instead inflicting maximum casualties on the enemy from afar and with small skirmishes, and conducting an organized retreat whenever the enemy brought their force to bear.

Krebs intended to let Rommel rush toward the coast with his armies; if, however, he dared to come near Stammburg and the surrounding territory, he would be met with hardened defense and veteran soldiers, rather than the flimsy defense he had encountered so far.

---

To: Prime Secretary Artyom Komissarov
From: General Secretary Terry Blücher

Hail, newfound friend of the Revolution!

The plan you and your fellow Comrades have devised is a most ingenious ploy which may very well succeed in circumventing the treacherous dogs of the enemy intelligence service.

It is entirely sound, but I urge you to take great caution when undertaking certain parts of it. For instance, the monarchist pretenders might balk at the thought of allowing a socialistic nation such as yours access to its territory. To preclude that, I advise you to stress the purely anti-Fascist purpose of your mission, and to stage humanitarian acts near Fascist rather than near BSU-controlled territory (while, in actuality, your forces will be on revolutionary land).

I believe steps such as these will minimize royalist suspicion and grant your inspired plan success.
With that in mind, I give it my blessing, and hope to stand alongside Karevkan brothers-in-arms soon!

Long live the Revolution!

Terry Blücher
General-Secretary of the Fraternal Socialist Union

[Karevka]

Korodvinsk
Democratic Socialist Republic of Karevka

---

Ilyich Ledovsky stood in the backroom of the press hall, out of sight from the news correspondents arrayed outside, while he quietly rehearsed his lines. In his telegram Blucher said to emphasize the anti-fascist part of this ostensible peace keeping operation. Yudin had already assembled the troops including his reserve flotilla all Ledovsky had to do was get the Royalists to agree to the proposal. He turned to his Deputy Minister, who nodded encouragingly and gestured for him to take his place outside.

Walking out onto the stage, the bright flashes of cameras made his eyes wince a little but didn't raise his hand to cover them. He got to the lectern, which had a Karevkan banner on its front panel, and adjusted the microphones to his liking. The journalists began taking out their notepads and phones ready to write down every word they deemed newsworthy. The TV crews got their cameras rolling as well. Foreign affairs work would be much easier if you didn't have so many eyes on you. Ledovksy thought.

"Comrades, foreign correspondents and Karevkan journalists. I welcome you today to this press conference for a important announcement regarding the horrible civil conflict in Capile. The war there has caused untold suffering and destruction, displacing and killing thousands. This saddens me and the rest of the Politburo greatly and we have decided to act to help in stopping this wanton madness." Ledovsky began. The crowd took more photos and notes.

"Three volunteer legions of peacekeepers, each with 4,570 men and 120 combat vehicles, will be deployed to curtail unneeded violence and to help bring stability to the lives of the Capilean people. Our primary concern is the Capilean Reich, who threaten the capital of Saxonburg and thus the stability of Capile. The regiments and humanitarian supplies will be deployed by sea, while a flotilla of one aircraft carrier, three troop transports and three destroyers will hold two more regiments in reserve when needed. We hope the Capilean government will accept our offer." Ledovksy finished the announcement and started to walk towards the back room as the press began their usual barrage of questions.

"The announcement has been made, and now we shall wait." Artyom and Ledovsky sat at a corner table in one of the eateries reserved for high ranking military and political figures, a plate of cheese, crackers and kolbasa between them along with two mugs of hot chocolate. The Prime Secretary ate a piece of cheddar cheese before continuing, "Yudin has informed me that the entire force is mobilized but the supplies are still being loaded onto the ships. Operation Wolfstone is moving quick. For now at least."

Ilyich finished his mug. "As General Secretary Blucher said, the Capileans will be wary of a socialist nation deploying ground troops, even if it is for peacekeeping duties. I can state the troops won't engage unless fired upon, but even then the Royalists will be suspicious of our motives." Operation Wolfstone called for the regiments to operate around the BSU borders in order to make disappearing easier. The SSD plants would just outside the capital, away from the encroaching fascists and it was likely there would be regular visits from Klaus' lackeys.

Artyom leaned back in the oak wood chair and said "Of course they will be suspicious. But do not worry about such things now, we'll receive a response in due time."

[The Grand Duchy Of Nova Capile]

---

ROCHEFURT
NOVA CAPILE

---

There was a reason Klaus is not invited to these meetings, Wilhelm reflected, looking around at the three men seated before him. These were the men who were now in control of the Duchy, for better or for worse. And all of them seemed to have qualms with their leader, Reichskanzler Knott lamented as he took in the red, angry faces, the grinding mouths, the hoarse yells.

“Laws are like sausages,” Bismarck had said. Klaus would certainly not want to see them being made.

“Order, gentlemen,” Wilhelm boomed, rising to his feet. His body was not as powerful as it had been in the early days of the war. His stomach protruded; his back hunched; his gray eyes were tired and dim; even the trademark walrus mustache seemed to droop. But standing now, the man mustered what strength the war effort had not yet taken, and the other voices fell silent out of instinctive respect.

The war hero scanned the small group seated at the table within the inner recesses of the capitol. His eyes fell first upon a large man spilling out from the chair he was confined to. Gerhard Hahn was the latest in a long line of cattle barons, and had neither the refined elegance of an aristocrat nor the humble charm of a commoner. But he was shrewd, and, critically, was the owner of an unprecedented amount of ranching and farming land, land which was now under threat from the Reich. His keen baby blue eyes, peering out from beneath a ten-gallon hat, were treacherous.

Seated on the right was a man similar to Hahn in profession, but completely his opposite in terms of character. Thin and sallow, with black, oiled hair and sharp, tawny eyes, Joachim Strauss had, prior to the war, been the most prominent tycoon in all of Capile. His companies dominated the heavy industries of Kongsburg and Raus, and his influence extended throughout the Capilean allies and colonies. It was those foreign ventures, the Middle Eastern oil fields, the African mines, the Columbian motor plants, and the German pharmaceuticals, which had saved him from ruination after the BSU seized his assets in Raus and Kongsburg. Judging from the tightness of his waxen face, he had a bone to pick with Knott, too.

Sitting between these two behemoths of capitalism was a third man, bald and fair, donning a trim mustache, a gilded monocle, and an army uniform. Theodor Sachse’s quick blue eyes shone with a righteous fury, and his hands twitched over a massive binder on the table before him. The Capilean Army’s Inspector General was filling in for Hermann Winser’s absence, and matched the ferocity of the Großmarschall.

“Shall we address your concerns one at a time?” Wilhelm began calmly. There was a low murmur of consent from the men, and the Reichskanzler exhaled. “Good. You first, Herr Hahn.”

The corpulent cattleman shifted in his seat before beginning. “As you know, Herr Reichskanzler,” he drawled, “the land owned by me and my partners is critical to the food supply of the entire nation.” Wilhelm nodded curtly, in defeated admission. “Therefore, it is in your best interest to defend it from foreign attack, yes?” Knott was forced to jerk his head up and down. “I am shocked, then, to have these reports,” Hahn continued, throwing a small stack of papers upon the table, “which reveal that you have been unable to defend our shared territory! The Fascists have already overtaken the majority of the cropland in the Rhei Valley.”

“I know that the situation is dire,” Knott intoned, but was interrupted by an unprecedented waggle of Hahn’s thick finger.

“I will take this opportunity to notify the honored Reichskanzler that his Duchy is not the only market I could sell my produce to,” Hahn revealed, a slimy grin splitting his fat face.

“Bastard!” Knott yelled, unable to stop himself from naming the backstabbing traitor. Hahn recoiled in faux indignity.

“In fact, the Reich has offered my corporation generous terms, should I resume operations within their territory.”

“Herr Hahn,” the chancellor ground out, glaring at his smirking counterpart, “your occupied land will be reconquered. Already I am transferring troops to bulwark the northern front, after which a counteroffensive can be undertaken.” Sachse bristled at the mention of a troop transfer, but graciously remained silent. “If you wish to go so low as to betray your own country and starve your countrymen, then I would not do business with you anyway. You will not do business with Nemetz, or you will find that when the valley is liberated, you will no longer own it.”

Red in the face, Hahn straightened his hat, stood, looked awkwardly at his boots for a moment, and then muttered, “We shall see about that, Reichskanzler,” before leaving.

When the heavy metal door slammed shut, Knott swung to face the industrialist. “Herr Strauss?”

“Yes,” Strauss began smoothly, “as you know, I have lost a large number of factories- which were under contract to produce military equipment and other vital supplies for your government- to the Red Menace. Fortunately, due to my other ventures, I retain the capital to reinvest in Capile, and unlike Gerhard Hahn, I have no interest in betraying my homeland. However,” Strauss leaned forward, eyes narrowing as he revealed his demands, “there are only a few, ah, benefits, which I believe my companies should be afforded.

“First of all, all of my employees must be exempt from the draft and any other service you might try to impress upon them.” Strauss knew how scarce and expensive labor could become in a devastated country. “Also, I have a number of candidates in mind to be appointed to various regulatory boards and commissions. Next, my corporations must be granted special status under law. There are several issues, namely corporate tax rate, working hours, and minimum wage, which need to be revised for the Strauss companies. Finally, I have ideas as to where some of the money from the most recent German loan should be appropriated. And in exchange,” Strauss said cheerfully, “I will see to it that my factories are producing guns and shells for the war effort by November.”

Knott took a deep breath. “You leave me with little choice, Herr Strauss.”

“I’m glad we could see eye to eye,” the other said warmly, gathering his briefcase. “If you will excuse me, I have urgent business.”

Wilhelm watched the tycoon leave resentfully, and then rounded on the man who had yet to speak. “Inspector General?” he questioned wearily.

“With all due respect, Herr Reichskanzler,” Sachse began, his brown mustache trembling, “this war has been an absolute disaster. We have not won a single battle since Haakensburg, and even that was pyrrhic victory, negated by the mass-firing of the generals involved. In the past week alone Reiburg, Nordlingen, and half of the Rhei Valley have been conquered by the Fascists, not to mention the embarrassing affair of the French victory at Roappe. And just today, Rulund fell. These are not just coincidences, Reichskanzler. They are the consequences of a disease which I have been warning the government about for years now.” Sachse was talking rapidly as his thin fingers splayed the binder open, revealing papers covered in neat type.

“This is my comprehensive report on the state of our military, which was compiled just a few months before the war began. Let me begin with the issue of our officer corps. Your father saw it fit to appoint any aristocrat’s son as a commander, and somehow these incompetents have climbed the ranks without anyone removing them. The result, as we have found out, has been the decay of our officer corps, which, at present, is dominated not by men of merit, but men of money. My report found that approximately seventy percent of senior officers have aristocratic connections. Some of them might indeed be skillful, but there are undoubtedly many who were appointed because of their last name.

“Großmarschall Winser attempted to address this problem when he sacked a number of his subordinates, but unfortunately he did not pull the weed up by the root. This is a systemic problem, and it will need to be addressed thoroughly and impartially.

“Next, I am sorry to say that our manpower and equipment are in a sorry state. Significant percentages of our reserves and active-duty military have defected to enemy causes, and due to the government’s reluctance to introduce a draft, those that remain have not been enough to fill the gaps caused by casualties and the need for new units. Another problem is that of our equipment production. As Strauss said, half of our military-industrial complex went with Raus and Kongsburg. At present, we are relying on our military surplus to resupply our divisions, and that while that surplus is, due to the Grand Duke’s military downsizing programs, significant, our men will soon have to resort to using out-of-date or foreign equipment.

“These three problems are, I believe, the source of our misfortune in the conflict. In order to reverse the tide, it is my opinion that a general draft should immediately be enforced. Men with any sort of military experience or training should be given basic training and then immediately sent out to reinforce existing units, while those with none should be trained extensively and used to form at least six new armies. Meanwhile, we should utilize the new German loan to subsidize the construction and operation of a host of new factories in our core provinces. Finally, we should launch a general investigation into our officer corps, the goal being to replace any who were unfairly promoted or who display signs of corruption with men of skill and merit.”

Sachse took a deep breath, removed his monocle, polished it with a handkerchief, and replaced it. “That, is my plan for the restoration of our military.” He did not tell his commander-in-chief that he also had a plan for replacing him.

---

Hours later, Wilhelm Knott sat in his office within the makeshift Chancellery, his sore hand flying across paper with a pen. Orders, legislation, correspondence, and invitations to tea landed on his desk, and all were met with the same careful scrutiny, then either discarded or signed.

Pressing was the German loan. It was a massive amount of money, more than enough to give kickbacks to Strauss and subsidize the development of military industry, leaving a rump sum that every one of Capile’s Ministries would scramble to get ahold of. Wilhelm could practically see the advisors lining up outside his door the next morning.

Knott paused when he reached an unusual missive. It was a short note penned in the elegant hand of Kalvin Englebert, Capile’s Minister of Foreign Affairs. Wilhelm raised an eyebrow as he read that the socialistic state of Karevka had offered to deploy a peace-keeping force to Royalist territory, ostensibly to prevent the Fascists from committing war-crimes against the local populace.

Wilhelm had previously authorized the deployment of troops sympathetic to the BSU to his soil, and this was no different, on a smaller scale, in fact. It was also important to consider the publicity factor. The Duchy was the force of reason and sense in this conflict, and only such a force would be the patron of peace-keepers. Convinced, the Reichskanzler wrote one word in huge, black letters upon the note: Approved.

[Luxembourg-Bavaria]

---

GRAVINES
NOVA CAPILE

---

The Bavarian ships were greeted with the sight of a miniature Paris. Minus the Eiffel Tower and the Notre Dame, Gravines resembled a metropolitan French city greatly, with tree-lined boulevards, busy markets, and tightly-packed rows of neoclassical buildings. The shelling which had plagued the city for the past few months had temporarily abated. Already, the streets were flooded with frantic civilians, rushing to obtain vital supplies before the bombing resumed. Coated policemen directed the clotting traffic and were already hard at work repairing shellholes. Despite the siege, the city seemed to be neat, clean, and orderly.

Gravines' dockyards were extensive. Before the war, they had been home to the Capilean Navy's most formidable squadron, with top-of-the-line shipbuilding, repair, and maintenance facilities. As such, the primary ships of the Bavarian fleet easily fit into the harbor. Before any formal introduction was made, swarms of burly teamsters hustled onto the allied ships and offered to help unload their cargo. As loads of military equipment and tired men spewed forth from the bloated warships, a collection of tall, mustached men in olive uniforms approached the Bavarian flagship.

All but one bore a serious expression and a red kepi. The exception rose a few inches above the others, and wore a modish, European-cut suit. His mustache and curly hair were chestnut brown, his eyes bright hazel and intelligent, and his face ruggedly handsome. As he came to a halt beneath the gangplank of the fleet's flagship, his expressive mouth broke into a wide smile.

Jean-Paul Charleroi, Premier of the Free French State, awaited the Bavarian commander.

Gravines
Nova Capile

---

---

The port bustled with activity as the Bavarian troops unloaded into the city. At the bridge of his flagship, Admiral Dieter Wagner watched the entire affair. Ah, he thought to himself, there is nothing better in the world then a job well done.

Below him, General Lukas Werner was less relaxed. He was frantically organizing the men as they came out of the lead ships.

"Look alive men! You there! Get off your ass and get out there!"

He made his way out to where the Premier and his advisers were approaching. As he came up to them he snapped off a quick salute before rattling off a few sentences in barely intelligible French.

"I am Lieutenant General Lukas Werner, commanding Army Group Werner. I place myself and my troops under your command. What are our orders?

---

[New Decius]

National Party Headquarters, Raus
Fraternal Socialist Republic of Capile
Caspian Initiative

“...for the tenth time you idiots we have a prior appointment with the General Secretary on behalf of various interests so let us through.” Dieter Göllwitz had a cigarette hanging from his mouth, a rather French tactic for a German to take up, but even with a scowling face managed to maintain the perfect muscle control to keep it from falling as he glared at the three men in front of him. He had been standing outside the National Party Headquarters of the BSU here in Raus waiting to speak with General Secretary Terry Blücher for almost an hour now and he was getting very mad to the point of hostile at this point. Judging by the youthful faces of the two guards and the officer in front of him, chances were Dieter wouldn’t even need to use more than a couple tricks to kill all three; really Blücher should be sending the you conscripts to the front and keeping the old soldiers around him until he had a more secure base of power.

To be honest he couldn’t entirely blame the guards for holding them up, after all Dieter and his group were quite the sight. Next to the German Socialist was his comrade from the Communist Party of Vietnam (Đảng cộng sản việt nam/Since 1994 and up till present the largest insurgent faction in the German Indochina Colony) Chu Quang Hùng, followed by his comrade of the Congolese Communist Party (Chama cha Kikomunisti cha Kongo/Since 2005 the most prominent insurgent faction in Deutsch-Mittelafrika) Hamidi Zawadi, then the comrade from the French Communist Party (Parti Communiste Français/Illegal since 2003 but not a present insurgency in France Proper) Gabriel Gachet, and finally from the Communist Party of Russia (Kommunisticheskaya partiya Rossii/Illegal since 1987 after Soviet-German War and a major insurgency since) Lavrova Elisavetta Victorovna, the only woman of the group. All of them garbed as if seasoned mercenaries, which in effect they were, and armed with an assortment of weapons of varying nationalities, and all of them looking thoroughly pissed off because of the holdup. The reason they were mad was because the upstart Lieutenant in front of them had only just sent someone to inform Blücher several minutes ago when he should’ve sent someone on arrival, but he instead chose to scrutinize them particularly the non-whites which frankly pissed off Dieter the most.

While the Western and Eastern socialist groups may not always get along they largely put aside racial and ethnic tensions in favor of fighting a common enemy; Capile’s socialist movement had been isolated from the larger world and so would probably receive a shell shock still when its leaders told them they were to let foreigners, non-Germanic foreigners at that, teach them how to conduct a war. At least that was what Dieter hoped would be the case, after all if the Vietnamese could decide to allow European Socialists to help them try and kick out the Germans then why couldn’t the opposite apply here in Capile. Put racial differences aside to kick the Royalists and Fascists where it hurt, especially given how outmatched the BSU’s militia armies were in comparison to their opponents; Blücher needed the experienced veterans as well as the smuggled arms they brought with them to turn his militia into a proper army.

“Come on our boys and girls have all been waiting in makeshift camps outside Raus for hours now because they can’t officially take up quarters or start doing their job until we speak to Blücher, so someone tell him were damn here!” Dieter was raising his voice now because he was beginning to lose his temper, something Gabriel noticed and placed a hand on his shoulder to try and calm him down. The two men had previously served together training Algerian rebels when the German’s reclaimed the territory for the reborn Kingdom of France in 2004 and Tunisia in the same year. “I did not travel halfway around the world evading who knows how many agents of the Abwehr to come train a bunch of farmers and factory workers how to be soldiers only to be held up by a upstart boy who thinks just cause he’s got some braid on his shoulders that he’s better than the snot nosed brat he is!” By now the cigarette had indeed fallen to the ground but that didn’t concern Dieter since another one seemed to appear out of thin air and replace itself in his mouth, however Dieter did not give a care towards the switch as he continued to glower at the young brat in front of him. He normally only smoked when he felt stressed.

Since he had arrived in Raus he had already gone through almost half a pack.

“Look kid, I have seen more fights in my life than your likely to ever see in yours even if you lived to be two hundred, thats if a halfwit like you even survives on the battlefield! If our orders weren’t to render complete cooperation to our fraternal marxist brethren here in Capile I’d knock your block off, but I can’t because that might not be considered cooperation.” Now an evil glimmer came to his eyes. “You better hope to any God of any ridiculous faith that you don’t get put in one of my training units boy. I’ll make a soldier of ya but it’ll be long and hard and aching before its over.” Then the evil glimmer was gone replaced once more by the hard steel that had once inhabited Dieters’s gaze. “Then again you’ll probably come back and thank me for that afterwards, if you live, cause I’ll train you so you have a chance of surviving your battles.”

---

Reichstag, Berlin
Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire
Federation of European Monarchies

Richthofen was going through some reports concerning the ongoing Russian infrastructure improvement efforts in the Caucasus, the least frustrating documents on his desk at the moment given all the missives from the Foreign Office and the OHL regarding Capile, and praying that his day would continue to at least have some semblance of calm. It had so far been an unusually pleasant day for the Reichskanzler; he had slept at his home the night before rather than passing out on the couch in his office, enjoyed a delicious breakfast with his wife and their two youngest daughters, managed to fit in a amiable conversation with his son Heinrich whom was presently stationed in Martinique, and had arrived at the office to a reasonably calm atmosphere rather than a buzzing hornets nest of activity. Such days were very much a rarity before the present political and global climate, but were now becoming even more scarce.

Since the authorization of the Economic Revitalization Loan to the Grand Duchy, the Reichskanzler had begun to receive information that the War in Capile was rapidly becoming a topic of heated debate in regards to the Reichstag’s upcoming election’s in 2020 (The Reichstag holds elections every 6 years (2020,2014,2008 etc) while the Reichsrat is filled by representatives of the ruling German nobility) especially among the DVP. With the Authoritarian Democrats membership swelling with elderly veterans who didn’t want their children and grandchildren sent to die in a foreign land, they were rapidly transforming from the ‘war hawks’ party they had been for decades into an ‘anti-war’ party. Meanwhile the SPD was completely the opposite as the Social Democrats were some of the most vehement opponents to fascists in the German political sphere and so were all for continuing the fight to the very end until the thugs were beaten down to the ground. Then there was the AV which true to its Paternal Autocrat/National Populist message was swearing left and right that the BSU was the true enemy while of course hinting at a global ‘Jewish Bolshevik’ conspiracy that thankfully remained on the fringe of German society. Frankly this war had turned German politics completely upside down as the traditional doves became war hawks and the traditional war hawks became doves and it was all giving the Reichskanzler a massive headache.

Now while Richthofen didn’t really have to care which party controlled the Reichstag for his own sake, his position wasn’t political and only the Kaiser could remove or appoint the Reichskanzler, he did have to care about who filled the seats for the success of the cabinet he put together since the Reichstag dictated the budget for each cabinet ministry. For the past five years, he had, with the help of his more able cabinet colleagues and the Reichspräsident, managed to maintain a fairly balanced national budget only going over a few times and with good reasons such as natural disasters or military operations, however that had all changed. Now with a full-scale war on the Ministry of Defence had seen a massive budget increase corresponding to the overall significant rise of the military budget as the OHL happily dug into the national purse to finally test out all its brand new advanced weapon systems. This had the result of shattering the Reichskanzler’s perfectly balanced budget and causing several of the Ministry’s to lose significant funds which had the further result of earning the ire of his cabinet colleagues as well as those citizens affected by the cuts to various programs.

Presently he was seeing where he could make cuts to German commitments to larger European Federation projects to perhaps rebalance the budget at least somewhat. He could afford to trade the temporary anger of the European states for a stable German economy, though already the Foreign Office had been sending him missives from the Russian’s whom had of course caught wind of the cuts before they were made.

At least there was no trouble out of the Imperial Household to pile on.

A knock came at the door.

“Come in.”

A tall man in a pristine suit entered the room with poise and dignity, his short black hair neatly combed back and piercing blue eyes calm behind gleaming spectacles. The man did a short polite bow as he approached the desk causing Richthofen to don a cheeky grin that defied his fifty seven years. “Your Excellency I hope you are having a good morning.”

“Come now Horst you have been my Principle Private Secretary for the past seven years, our wives are good friends and our children attend the same school. So how many times must I give you permission to address me by my first name before it gets through that thick head of yours?”

Horst Linden rose back up as he adjusted his spectacles keeping a perfectly composed expression at all times. “Perhaps just once more Your Excellency.” Horst had been snatched right out of the Foreign Office seven years ago when Julius was appointed Reichskanzler and chosen as his Principle Private Secretary, the man who ran the Reichskanzler’s private office. Horst also acted, unofficially, as Richthofen’s eyes and ears in the cabinet, the OHL, and at the Court, relaying back to him full unbiased accounts of all the goings on of government just in case people dared try to conceal things from the Reichskanzler.

“You say that everyday.” Richthofen mumbled under his breath with a light chuckle before turning to business. This morning he had sent Horst to the Stadtschloss to mingle among members of the Kaiser’s Court and see what might be in the cards. “What’s going on at Court? Is the King of Bavaria still in hot water with the Duke of Brunswick after they found out their children were secretly seeing on another? I always find the affairs of those nobles provides a good laugh now and again.”

“It does appear that His Majesty and His Grace have for now buried the hatchet though at the very least His Majesty is doing his best to avoid the subject in the Court.” There was a few moments of silence as Julius had a good chuckle over the spat between the two high nobles before Horst delivered a blow. “Oh and it appears His Imperial Majesty intends to rewrite the Constitution.”

Richthofen froze like a statue as he was leaning back in his chair, absolutely astounded by what he had just heard. It took him a few moments to process exactly what that could mean followed by exactly what parts of the Constitution the Kaiser had ever even taken an interest in or taken exception to. “The Kaiser intends to rewrite the Constitution?” When Horst nodded he could only fearfully ask. “Which Article?”

“Article IV which designates the Imperial House of Germany and the Royal House of Prussia as one and the same and declaring the Prussian King or Queen to also be German Emperor or Empress.”

Now the Reichskanzler was on his feet, his chair flying backwards and striking the wall with some force as he slammed his hands on his desk. The shock on Richthofen’s face would’ve been suitable for the most fantastic twist ending of a mystery film, but it was mixed with horror and confusion all the same as yet more implications ran through his mind. “His Imperial Majesty intends to separate his rule over Prussia and Germany!? He intends to upend the very fabric of our government that has been in place since the Restoration as well as the tenure of the First Empire!” Then the terrifying thought came to mind of what noble family the Kaiser might intend to cede his rule over Prussia to; all the major or prominent nobility in Germany already possessed a ruling title and yet another Article of the Constitution forbade any ruling noble reigning over more than one Constituent State of the Empire. “What exactly does he intend to do?”

Horst calmly cleaned his spectacles with his handkerchief before going on. “If what I heard is to be believed, His Imperial Majesty, seeing that His Imperial Highness Crown Prince Karl Friedrich is only two years old feels that he does not want the full attention and weight of both an Imperial and Royal title upon his son and heir. He also feels that for too long have Prussia and Germany been attached at the hip by a joint sovereign and so has decided to appoint another heir apparent to the Prussian throne in Karl Friedrich’s stead until the Crown Prince sires his first and second children at which point a referendum will be held as to whether or not the House of Germania will regain the Prussian throne or stay with the Kaiser’s chosen recipient.”

“I’m almost afraid...strike that I’m terrified to ask who the Kaiser is considering as his heir apparent to the Prussian throne.”

“It would seem the most likely candidate is Her Royal Highness, Elizabeth Louise Princess of Austria and Hungary. As she is the second child of His Royal Majesty King Maximillian I of Austria and Hungary, and His Royal Highness Crown Prince Albrecht of Austria and Hungary has already fathered two children, it makes her unlikely to assume the Austrian and Hungarian throne and therefore eligible as the monarch of a Constituent State of Germany. As she is also tied by blood to His Imperial Majesty that technically means he can claim to not be separating the House of Germania from the throne of Prussia-“

“Until that ludicrous referendum comes around.” Richthofen cut him off sharply as he finished the explanation until his eyes widened in realization. “Or until she is married and takes her husbands name thus transferring Households by the Laws Governing the Peerage.”

“As you already know, at present Her Royal Highness is engaged to His Royal Highness Prince Karl Marius Friedrich of Capile of the House of Saxtonburg-Hohenzollern.” The implications had finally all been revealed.

The Reichskanzler wasted no time as he marched for the coat rack next to his desk and donned his hat and coat. Seizing his phone from his pocket he called ahead for his driver to bring the car around so he could go to the Stadtschloss. “Horst I may be in prison by the end of tonight because I am in the mood to murder whoever has caused this outrageous circumstance.” The two men swiftly left the office and made their way through the halls for the elevator. “Someone has gotten it in the Kaiser’s head that his workload and responsibilities as a in theory dual monarch are too heavy to pass on to the next generation and so a temporary release should be granted. While at the same time helping a noble and vaunted ally rise in prominence and influence...BY HANDING OVER THE LARGEST STATE IN GERMANY GIFT WRAPPED!”

It had been a perfectly nice day.

“My main suspect is Regensburg because he has been all for establishing contingencies should the Royalists lose this war, but this goes too far. Offering to shelter exiles here in Germany alongside monetary support is one thing, hell even propping them up in one of our colonies as a state-in exile is doable, but this?! Setting them up as the potential monarchs of Prussia, this goes too far! If Elizabeth is made Queen of Prussia that will make Karl her King-Consort allowing him to basically recreate the Capilean aristocracy among the Prussian nobility, transfer Capilean business interests and major corporate tycoons into the German market, secure Royalists officers high ranks within the OHL! Not to mention that as the largest and most influential state in Germany, Prussia has significant influence over not only the Reichsrat but also my Cabinet allowing foreigners to dictate our laws!”

By now they were outside and getting into Richthofen’s car which was flanked and proceeded by a police escort. “By Gott Horst I will march into the Kaiser’s study and argue with him for the next week if thats what it takes to squash this nonsense! In the meanwhile you get ahold of His Former Majesty so I can come at our current monarch on two fronts, hell get ahold of the Austrian’s too while your at it, I can’t imagine Maximillian will be too pleased with the Kaiser deciding his daughters fate.”

It had been a perfectly nice day.

---

Battle for Stammburg
Operation Faust, Heeresgruppe Beowulf
Sumpfwald Pocket

“OBERST SCHLÖM YOU WILL CONTINUE YOUR ADVANCE! I DON’T CARE IF YOU FIND THE CONDITIONS UNSUITABLE FOR PROPER COMMAND! OUR BOYS SEEM TO BE GOING ALONG JUST FINE AND YOU WILL GOD DAMN GET UP THERE AND LEAD THEM YOU BASTARD! THAT IS AN ORDER!” General Lilian von Schneider screamed into the telephone as she slammed it down on the table in front of her and ended the call before the offending officer could get another word in. The boom of artillery was hardly a distant sound, in fact her makeshift command center was practically shaking from how close to the front it was, though the fact that said position was erected on a plot of land which had been teeming with trees only hours ago but was now cratered and barren may have suggested the same.

’Gott I wish I had one of those new CNC (Command and Control) vehicles their issuing to all officers ranked Feldmarschall and higher. Manual operators are perfectly efficient but an automated satellite connected command system sounds superb for a campaign such as this.’ Recently Kaizertech International had designed a new CNC vehicle based on a large military transport, and the OHL had immediately put in an order as soon as the first five were produced in December 2018, the Reichspräsident had almost had a seizure when the OHL’s attaché to her office informed her each vehicle cost twelve million Euromarks but had decided to consent after being given a demonstration of its capabilities. The Vulcan S5 required a crew of only seven operators and they were only for its automated defense systems as well as mobility and potential maintenance; its chief features were a satellite guided holographic display with links to all strategic and tactical networks of the German militaries allowing a commander to link in directly to their men in the field. A high performance supercomputer also provided extremely effective tactical and strategic advice capable of calculating the enemies future moves with almost instant reaction time, hence why Lilian so desired such a vehicle. ’Though by what I hear, alongside the latest weapons shipment to Capile to replenish their arms supplies, three of the Vulcan’s are also going for Capilean use.’

The 12th Armee was making excellent progress given their operational objectives at present and that they were limited in their rules of engagement, however in truth the forces Krebs was throwing at them were the real reason they were advancing so quickly. Even despite fanaticism and suicide tactics, fresh conscripts and partisans were hardly anywhere close to a match for seasoned German troops armed with the latest modern weaponry had to offer, as well as devastatingly effective artillery and air support where it was needed. They were advancing so much that they had even begun encountering some of the scattered squads of Luftkavallerie remaining in the Sumpfwald, though Lilian was pressed to throw them immediately back into the fight despite the desire to give those brave idiots the rest they had truly earned. She needed all the troops she could get to keep pressing the enemy and make sure he had no time to regroup or slip troops behind her lines, she wasn’t about to make the same mistake General Ulräch’s forces in 22nd Armee had made by underestimating the abilities of partisans and allowing even small groups to slip behind their lines. Though in truth she doubted whether she could’ve gotten the Luftkavallerie boys to agree to go behind the lines for medical attention even with a direct order to do so; the fanatical desire to fight like the Germanic warriors of old that their training and conditioning instilled in them was in all truth some times counterproductive to military discipline. Lilian, like many students of Rommel and thus a great believer in proper treatment of ones subordinates, had been very opposed to the Luftkavallerie system when it first came up for debate at the OHL in 2006, well not the idea of creating helicopter borne infantry regiments but rather their purpose and conditioning. Dropping men behind enemy lines with limited supplies and limited chances of survival with orders to fight like bastards until they died or there was no enemy left to fight. The whole program was designed along the lines the Japanese Kamikaze training courses of WW2, basically conditioning men to be willing to commit suicide.

Thanks to the anti-air umbrella erected by the SPAAG units at the front moving up with the Panzerkompanie’s, Lilian had been able to effectively commit her helicopter gunship squadrons for CAS duties as well as call in tactical airstrikes without having to risk any craft being shot down. Soon enough once Großadmiral Stürnben had positioned his destroyers off the coast, the anti-air umbrella would be large enough that Lilian could begin utilizing the aircraft available to her with impunity, and when that happened, any VF troops inside the Sumpfwald Pocket would be finished without German forces having to actually engage them. Then the whole Heeresgruppe could turn its attention towards Stammburg itself and finish the job.

At the moment the feisty General was dealing with an irate Oberst in the Artillerie whom was upset with the conditions of such ungentlemanly warfare; the man had gotten his rank and command because his cousin sat on the Reichstag Armed Services Committee, which also prevented Lilian from just outright sacking him and replacing him with someone more seasoned. Even in Germany there remained an issue in the armed forces of the powerful using their connections to secure glorious commands or grand positions for those close to them, in defiance of the meritocracy which the OHL was meant to truly be. Lilian dealt with such officers by being as brutal as possible to either terrify them into resigning their commission or actually becoming a half-decent officer which usually yielded results of the latter category since war was enough to make even the most pompous ass of a commander see at least some daylight filter through.

---

At present 12th Armee was rapidly closing the Sumpfwald Pocket as 22nd Armee’s forward armored units closed in on the coast, finally having overcome the major partisan strongholds in its path after a few Jäger Regiments were transferred over from 12th Armee to assist. Satellite imagery had spotted some of the heavier VF units attempting to quietly but swiftly withdraw from the closing encirclement in the Sumpfwald but a few cruise missile strikes on the more viable roads in the area as well as some well placed air strikes later saw moderate damage dealt to said units and also their best routes for swift retreat. It was only a matter of time now and then the offshore warships as well as the troops of 12th and 22nd Armee would crush the remaining VF forces in the Pocket.

By now the skies were very clearly in German hands, largely due to the significant number of SPAAG’s moving forward with the troops creating a large anti-air umbrella allowing broader air strikes to resume once more, since now the German troops could usually shoot down the SAM’s targeting the Luftwaffe’s aircraft. With this additional air support as well as the fact that the partisans did not have the munitions or training to keep up sustained resistance for very long, 22nd Armee had been able to reverse the ill fortune from which it had suffered in the early moves of Operation Faust. Particularly since the increased anti-air security allowed General Ulräch to commit his helicopter gunship and airborne infantry that had been held in reserve due to the threat from the VF’s SAM vehicles and static sites; this meant that rather than having his main line divisions bogged down in every town and village they passed through, such positions could now be tackled by the helicopter troops which meant Ulräch’s Panzers could head right for the coast. The only problem which continued to make itself ever more apparent was the insufficient numbers of Militarpolizei attached to each of the field armies, meaning here and there front line troops had to be detached to guard and administrate POW’s.

As per Rommel’s order all prisoners were being treated according to the Geneva Conventions, including the partisans whom by most definitions would not warrant status as POW’s but spies and saboteurs out of uniform. Several processing centers and makeshift POW camps had been setup behind the lines far enough from the front line that escapee’s couldn’t slip away, not that conditions were bad enough to make many want to run. Prior to the start of the campaign, Rommel had ensured there were adequate supplies of food, medical supplies, and assorted other necessities not just for his own troops but also for a potential of two hundred thousand POW’s, and they weren’t anywhere close to such a number so the camps certainly weren’t under supplied or running low on food. Quite frankly the majority of the occupants of these camps were partisans and conscripts as opposed to the veteran professional troops which either showed how good the Stoßwehr was in a fight or how much Krebs was conserving his real heavy hitters.

Meanwhile in the South, 16th Armee under General Witold continued its efforts to try and goad Krebs into an open engagement outside of Stammburg to little success. A small engagement here and there but nothing too significant, Krebs was refusing to take the bait and commit his main armored forces to a battle he most surely couldn’t win, precisely as Rommel expected he would. Still Witold was experiencing the least resistance to his advance because his front was effectively a ceasefire given that he was forbidden from attacking Stammburg itself due to the risk of civilian casualties, and Krebs refused to sally forth and properly engage the German forces waiting for him. All the same in the end you couldn’t keep over a hundred thousands troops cooped up inside a city indefinitely especially when that city was cut off from land, sea, and air with no chance of resupply or relief; eventually strife would ensue between the soldiers and the civilians as food and medical supplies began to dwindle. If the soldiers kept everything for themselves while children started going hungry then the civilian’s inside Stammburg might think they’d get a better deal with the people outside rather than inside even if they didn’t particularly agree. On the other hand if the civilian’s got the lions share of the supplies while the VF’s troop sheltered inside the city, just how long could Krebs enforce effective military discipline among tired, hungry, bored soldiers being prodded and teased by a tasty target on their doorstep.

In the end a German victory was inevitable.