The Third World War: The Untold Story

Whatever difficulties faced the Soviet High Command in the field, apart from growing concern in the Kremlin over signs of internal instabilities further back, all of which indicated a pressing need to bring the operations in the Central Region to an early and successful conclusion, there was no doubt that on the other side Allied Command Europe was in deep trouble. It is well known now that SACEUR was under urgent pressure from his army group commanders to seek the release of battlefield nuclear weapons. He was still resisting this, convinced that it would rapidly lead to the all-out nuclear exchange dreaded on both sides. He knew that the President of the United States shared this view. SACEUR recognized that he had to do three things: plug the Venlo gap, where a further heavy attack from 20 Guards Army spearheaded by the crack 6 Guards Motor Rifle Division could not be long delayed; relieve pressure there by a counter-offensive from south to north into the rearward echelons following up this attack, in the general direction of Bremen; and interdict the movement through Poland of the armour now beginning to move forward from the group of tank armies in Belorussia. He had put together a theatre reserve, carefully husbanded and held under the command of Allied Forces Central Europe (AFCENT) with instructions not to deploy it without express instruction, of the equivalent of some seven divisions. He expected that if the trans-Atlantic air bridge held and the air and sea defences in the Western Approaches to the British Isles were sufficient to bring into port four big convoys now nearing the end of a hazardous journey, he could expect, even with the heavy losses there would have been at sea, the equivalent of two fresh US corps very soon. He had also managed to persuade the French to divert an armoured division intended for SOUTHAG to the north and expected it in the Maastricht area within forty-eight hours. Finally, he had great faith in the strength and capacity, as well as in the leadership, of the Allied air forces. Battered though they were they could still make a special effort and pull out something good.

The Krefeld salient near Venlo would simply have to be held by the troops already there, assisted by the French and whatever he could push up from CENTAG (a brigade or two perhaps) until his fresh troops could come in, but he would also ask for a maximum effort from his air forces in support.

The all important counter-offensive towards Bremen would be undertaken by NORTHAG, to which he ordered the allotment of four of his precious reserve divisions as from 0001 hours on 14 August, for an offensive to open at first light on the 15th.

For the interdiction of tank movement across Poland, where Polish workers were being urged by Western broadcasting media to do their utmost to sabotage the rail system, he would ask the air forces to make one supreme effort.

“SACEUR spoke over his discrete voice-net to Commander Allied Air Forces Central Europe (COMAAFCE) in his underground war room in the Eifel region.

“Can you cut the main rail links running west from Wroclaw and Poznan in Poland?” he asked.

COMAAFCE was startled. This would mean sending what remained of his irreplaceable F-111s and Tornados through the grim defences of East Germany and Poland. SACEUR’s question suggested such a complete misunderstanding of what they would be up against (and what they had already done at such high cost, for that matter) that he found it hard to be civil.

“I know things are bad,” he replied, “but have you gone out of your mind? If I sent thirty aircraft we would be lucky if ten got over the targets and five of them came back. And these are some of your dual-capable nuclear aircraft.”

“Okay, okay,” said SACEUR. “You airmen are always so touchy — I’m not telling you how to do it. I’m just saying what it is that’s got to be done. Give me a call back in half an hour.”

At COMAAFCE’s operational headquarters the planners looked at it all ways but continued to shake their heads. They just could not see how an effective force could be brought to bear at a remotely acceptable cost in air losses. The use of calculators and operating manuals speeded up as heads drew closer together over the plotting charts;

Twenty-five minutes later COMAAFCE was back on the line to SACEUR.

“Look,” he said “those Swedes are having their own war up there, but if you can get them to let us into two of their southern airfields we can do it. All we’ll want is fuel for thirty aircraft between two bases. They’ll arrive and leave at night and there will be no fuss. Depending on how it goes we might need to recover to the same bases early in the morning but we’ll try to get them back to Britain, or at least to Norway. Of course if the Swedes could give some fighter cover on the way back from the Polish coast that would be great. But from what I hear that’s against their rules.”