BACKGROUND KANIUM SUNDAY 4th OF MARCH 1900 UTC "BG4 - Operation Solemn Sword" by Nike-Ajax and SnS

[Nike-Ajax]

 

Hello everybody, as promised then here is the background to Scenario 4. Next scenario in this Campaign will be held on Sunday the 4´th of March at the usual time of 2000 GMT+1, so 1900 GMT

 

Again thanks to everybody who made this work, including the people who were a part of the Session.  

 

As usually then I recommend reading the PDF

 

This is the Game list:

 

http://www.kanium.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=11630&sid=9cb0393903efbeca6e39dd3254570c7d#p11630

 

 

Intermission:

Scenario 4 Background.pdf

The Bears Gambit 4

 

 

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.”

John Stuart Mill
 

 

 

Operation Solemn Sword

 

 

 

By Nike-Ajax, All Rights reserved

 

 

DTG 081400ZNOV18

It has been just over three weeks after the battle that marked the start of actual full-scale hostilities near Vilkasviskas in Lithuania. Russia claims that they were attacked again and this time chose to pursue their attackers across the border to Lithuania stating, “That Terrorists, war criminals and gangsters will not be allowed to hide in Lithuania anymore”. Russia also claims that they only seek to create a buffer zone against aggression as well as Safe Areas for persecuted Russian minorities.  

Russia has thus gone from covertly supplying and assisting insurgents with materials, weapons and SOF operators, to openly stating that they feel forced to act to protect the safety of own troops as well as Ethnic Russians in the Baltic States.

Many NATO countries are still in internal disagreement, with both violent and fewer peaceful anti-war demonstrations still taking place across Europe, and though not increased in neither number of participants nor frequency, they have become much more violent.

The national police forces are increasingly striking down hard on the demonstrations, which has already cost the life of one policeman and wounded scores of others, and cost hundreds of millions of Euros. Yesterday 9 militant protesters were added to the death tally as Danish police opened fire in self-defence on the criminals after a unusually violent “demonstration”, led by far-left elements including ANTIFA. The chaotic street fights included burning of cars and property, the throwing of stones and Molotov cocktails on both police and fire department and the use of slingshots and what appear to be military grade artillery simulators wrapped with wire and nails thrown at police. The conflagration left scores more wounded on both sides. The Danish politicians as well as police, has backed up the actions of the police.  After this then Denmark has declared a “National Emergency”, which in reality amounts to martial law. This pattern is seen across most of Europe, where the backdrop of war has led to very little if not a total lack of understanding and patience from the vast majority of the populations against the criminals rioting in the streets under the pretence of some vague political agenda. Also internal disagreements are still prevalent in the national parliaments and in some cases in individual parties.

Norway in the meantime has nationalized the former Norwegian U-boat base Olavsvern outside Tromsø, angering the Russians State who had leased it through state-owned Gazprom. The Norwegians claimed that it had “A national need” and that this superseded financial concerns, and have reimbursed Gazprom for at least some of the value. Behind the scenes then most people could see that the former base had in fact been used by the Russian State, if not the Russian Navy Directly. Also Norway is desperately trying to reactivate anything that resembles something military. After having cut the Norwegian Army by 95 % … then it’s not much, but in a throwback to earlier time, then Civilian Norwegian men and Women are signing up for both the Home Guards as well as the adhoc training battalions that have sprung up across Norway: Some of which are not created by the Norwegian state, who needing everything they can, are forced to look the other way.  

Most NATO countries have now activated whatever units and material they can muster in the short term. Beyond that, then both the military and politicians are scrambling to reactivate whatever military resources, personnel and material can be salvaged from almost 30 years of neglect and budget cuts.

The effect of generations of politicians and civil servants using up the so called “Peace Dividend”, something that has now clearly been demonstrated by reality and facts, as a dangerous, irrational and counterfactual myth and lie, is now proving very hard to undo and repair.

In other words then you can only do so much in any given time, and certainly in the timeframe needed now. Thus no matter how the governments and especially the civil servants try to spin it, then the west have made a colossal mistake, and strategically at least then the Russians have achieved total surprise.

The effort has at least by one newspaper been described as trying to do a 100 meter Olympic sprint, where the other contestants have already started running.

This effort of rearming to the minimum required levels, includes repossessing obsolete weapon systems that have been donated to museums, and trying to get them combat worthy and ready. Surprisingly many European men and women, both former servicemen/women and raw recruits have volunteered for hastily erected ad-hoc battalions across Europe. Sadly the simple facts of the matter are that it’s much too little and much too late.

At least to save the Lithuanian Capital Vilnius, that fell 5 days ago after very hard fighting. In fact then much of the city now lay in ruins, as Russian forces in a repeat of their approach in the first Chechen war tried to take the city in a fast surprise attack and with armoured units, suffering very heavy casualties from hand held anti-tank weapons, ATGMs and Lithuanian defenders who for some of them had more courage than training. A brave move that could not stop the Russian forces as the Russian in the end used massive firepower to subdue the defenders.

The Lithuanian government has vowed never ever to give up the fighting. Across the invaded areas, bands of Forest Brothers (miško broliai), as Stay-behind units have sprung up and are inflicting casualties especially on lightly armoured Russian supply columns. As well as making reprisal attacks against Russian insurgents and sympathizers. The Russians consider them Terrorists, and kill them on sight. In this the cycle of hate and violence accelerates by itself.

All across southern Lithuania Units from The Baltic States, NATO, JEF and all affiliated groups have fought hard, and inflicted surprisingly heavy losses on Insurgents and Russian Ground Forces as well as Byelorussian Forces. The attritional pattern of this follows more or less what was seen in the initial engagement east of Vilkaviskis, where the Russians are paying very dearly for the ground they take.

This however has come at a clear cost, and cannot change the fact that Russia have made significant progress and now stand at a general line from Klaipeda in the west to Zarasai in the East, at which the Russian Forces are now regrouping, rearming and standing by for further operations. The Russians have stated that they will go as far as necessary north, as needed to create “Viable Safe Areas” and “Stop future Aggression”.

Parallel to this then fighting have picked up in Ukraine, as well as an increased activity in the southern Russian republics by Islamic insurgents and terrorists. Here full scale clashes between Ukarinian and Russian armed forces have so far yielded little change in ground, as the fighting have ground down and both sides basically defend what ground they have.

Also in other places sensing weakness, Islamic movements, both Sunni and Shia, have struck across the Middle East including Israel, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Iran and Iraq. This pattern has also repeated itself in India where several civilian and military targets have been attacked by terrorists.

India claims to have solid evidence that these have been funded, trained and supplied by Pakistani intelligence. Consequently they have issued a full military mobilisation and are massing troops in the NW. Which in turn have made the Pakistani mobilize in turn.

North Korea has declared unlimited war on USA again, claiming that USA has tried to kill their Leader with directed energy weapons of unknown origin and type. China is making overt threats against Taiwan, or what they call “An island of rebels and insurgents”. At the same time China has reaffirmed their unilateral claim on the entire South China Sea as well as islands therein. This has brought them into a direct conflict that has not – for now – turned violent, with Japan, The Philippines, Vietnam, South Korea, Cambodia, Malaysia and Thailand to name most but not all. In the meantime Turkey is massing troops primarily in the E and SE, thus directly threatening the Kurdish areas. Greece in turn has gone to full military alert and mobilisation as well, fearing Turkish parallel stated and renewed claims on Cyprus and other areas of contention.

In South America then a desperate regime with millions of people protesting in the streets and on the brink of total economic collapse, have tried to divert the attention of its population by making threats against Colombia, Holland and Brazil.

Colombia and Brazil have agreed to a defensive alliance supported by a number of other South American nations, and have mobilized some of their considerable forces.

Russia claims that the west is directly supporting terrorists and insurgents as well as fanning the flames of war in general, and in Ukraine and the Baltic States in particular. But no actual proof has been supplied yet of these claims. Moreover they state that the latest developments are direct consequences of flagrant western provocations, and a failure to heed Russian warnings and pleas both present and in the past.

Some western governments – principally France – are still trying to pursue diplomatic solutions at all costs, but most of the NATO countries find that diplomatic solutions – at least in the short term - have been exhausted. France have also tried to leverage EU into the peace talks, but as most EU northern and eastern countries does not support this line in any way, shape or form, then EU is increasingly split and thus marginalized.

Also EU´s military arm have been made increasingly obsolete and useless by the events in the Baltics and other places, as well as deep divisions within EU. NATO and JEF as well as other intra-governmental alliances are arming for wars, while trying not to make it obvious that they do.

Meanwhile and across Europe, then many IT hubs and infrastructure targets have been attacked by hackers and virus. This seems to be a combination of foreign, principally Russian and/or Chinese, efforts as well as domestic anarchistic and terrorist groups. This is not only information being targeted but also infra structural targets such as powerplants, electrical distribution nodes as well as traffic lights and water plants.

However surprisingly then some Hacker groups like Anonymous have now publicly declared war on Russia, and are actively feeding authorities information on how to track down some of the perpetrators, of whom many have been jailed. Much to the surprise of many of the arrested they are mostly being charged with terrorism plus whatever else applies, and are thus facing very lengthy jail sentences if convicted.

Turkey claims that the west is reaping what they have sown, and refuse to help in any way whatsoever, and have closed Turkey to NATO troops and are debating whether or not to leave NATO entirely.

USA has accelerated reinforcing units across Europe, but has yet to do a full REFORGER style air- and sealift.  They have however discreetly deployed significant air assets to Europe, and are recalling reserves and pulling materials and equipment from storage.

In Asia, then the American administration has discreetly sent surplus weapon systems to Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. These include hundreds of older Harpoon missiles and ground launch units and FIM-92 Stingers, AA systems like the AN/TWQ-1 Avenger, AT systems like TOW missiles launchers as well as hundreds of ATGM Missiles. But this also includes more modern ones Like Patriot batteries and HARM missiles for the respective Airforces.

China has covertly and overtly expressed outrage and anger. This however did not stop the shipments, the contents of which are rapidly being integrated and deployed in the three nations. But all over Asia the nation are mobilizing their armed forces, unified with the common - but officially undeclared - enemy of China.

Other nations including Finland are for now holding on to their stated Neutrality. This has not prevented Finland going to full military readiness and reactivating all reserves, as well as discreetly receiving shipments from USA along the lines of the Asian nations.

In fact many if not most of the other nations across the world, are increasing their military readiness in varying degrees.

As a consequence of the events in the last months, then the Baltic States and principally Lithuania, have formally invoked Article 5 of the NATO charter. All NATO countries have debated this at length and most, except France and Turkey, have in principle accepted this yesterday even though the Southern European states have yet to fully commit politically and militarily.

In line with this, then NATO have given Russia 24 hours to cease hostilities and start pulling back to their own borders. Otherwise NATO will formally invoke Article 5 against Russia, and act in accordance with it. Russia replied that they did not seek war, but would accept it – and finish it - if NATO started it. Byelorussia pledged full support to their “Brother Nation”, and in accordance with this have issued a full military mobilization, in tandem with Russia.

China, Syria, Venezuela and Iran have openly declared solidarity with Russia, without specifying what that really entails.

The 24 hours are now almost over and across Lithuania as well as at sea and in the air, NATO as well as Sweden via the Nordic Battlegroup are getting ready to strike back. But it’s to be done with a limited scope for now.

The initial wave of attacks are planned to be a limited offensive so as to give Russia one last chance to back down, as well as not escalating the war further than needed. Russia has stated that attacks on their nuclear missile assets in Kaliningrad will be considered a strategic attack, to which they would respond strategically.

The western allies for this reason amongst others, will refrain from striking certain areas, but will however strike at Russian Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence across Lithuania, in an effort to keep the conflict localized.

This does not mean it will be easy: many JEF and Baltic units have been hit hard throughout the last days. But TF-32 is one of the remaining strong forces that will roll into action soon.

For TF-32 one piece of good news is that Colonel Sexton has been replaced, and is now busily in charge of counting Tampons and Toiletrolls.

The new Commander, Col. J. Eckert is providing whatever assets she can spare, scrounge or steal for the Taskforce.

She expects every man and woman will do their duty.

She has stated that she will provide every help she can, and kick every ass that isn’t helping fight the battle. Some of the officers say that she has much bigger … spirit … than the former CO. But not while she is listening as she truly is a scary person and a force of nature.

 

SITUATION

OWN forces are poised for an attack vicinity EAST of KLAIPEDA, with the intent of breaking the front ENY units and forcing through their lines in order for OWN follow-on forces to exploit the breach as well as to secure a supply route  via the port of Klaipeda.

This is a limited offensive, in that the intention is not to overreach and push further than what can be defended. The goal is to push ENY forces S and E opening up for resupply from the port of KLAIPEDA as well as strategically threaten ENY forces S of KLAIPEDA as well as making a show of force in the direction of Kaliningrad.

We are at full strength and in the case of the Swedish platoons at +1 vehicle for both TANKS and MECHINF.

 

Rules of Engagement

NOTHING IN THESE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT LIMITS YOUR RIGHT TO TAKE APPROPIATE ACTION TO DEFEND YOURSELF AND YOUR UNIT.

A. You have the right to use force to proactively engage any and all ENY targets of opportunity.

B. You are cleared to fire first on all hostile targets or targets with deemed hostile intent, including armed civilians.

C. The force should be used under the circumstances and proportional to the threat.

D. We are De Facto at war but still in an allied nation, uncalled for destruction of civilian property is to be avoided to the extent that it does not interfere with the military goals of the mission.

 

Edited February 26, 2018 by Nike-Ajax