[mpipes]

Come on Guys!!

A lot of opinions being voiced here are based on how real history played out. In whatever version of the TW2K you use, history goes flying out the door by 1992. You don't have a collapsed USSR nor an aggressive Soviet military expansion policy playing out in any of these TW2K scenarios using REAL world military ORBATS in 1996 after 4-years of headlong military contractions in the wake of the failed Soviet Coup.

Does anyone really believe Spain and Portugal are just going to sit passively by as the Soviets blow up Europe and China? At the very least, ALL of Europe, certainly NATO, is going to begin full mobilization as soon as Germany and Russia start a war. NO ONE is going to believe that all of NATO will NOT be involved or that the Chinese War will NOT eventually drag other Pacific countries in. If they do, ALL those delusion disappear at least by the invasion of the Persian Gulf countries.

Portugal and Spain both in the late 1980s were desperate to have a face on the world stage and badly wanted to be part of the "NATO club." Once they were in it, they were committed and they knew it. Trade was inextricably tied in, their economies were tied in, and their populations (as a whole) were scared shitless of the Communist and the Soviet Bear. They knew in that day that if they did not stand up and put their big boy pants on and REALLY contribute to the war, their reputations with the other members of the club would not recover for decades. They were going to have to fight, and they needed to be prepared to fight.

Spain, in particular, saw their membership in NATO as their best chance toward eventually getting Britain to relinquish control of Gibraltar back to Spain, so they were not going to muck it up by giving NATO the finger. They would be anxious to be perceived as ESSENTIAL NATO allies in Europe (and hopefully get to bail out the Brits in a major way) to earn the political capital to get Gibraltar back. Any other considerations would be secondary (and in my opinion after war the UK would cede Gibraltar back to Spain with a NATO base having a substantial UK presence there).

NOTE: I have always had a problem with how canon treated Spain, Portugal, and Italy. I just don't see Spain and Portugal sitting around passively or Italy remaining a PACT ally once the USSR starts indiscriminate use of nuclear weapons. After TDM, I don't believe for a second that the Italian alliance with Greece and the PACT remains intact, and I think Spain would react rather violently if France invaded Germany (or at least Andorra with which it has close ties). Spain and France will end up fighting, even if somewhat in a low intensity fashion.