[chico20854]

November 8, 1997

To impede the arrival of additional reinforcements from the US by way of Japan, the east coast ROK port cities of Busan and Ulsan are targeted for destruction. The Echo II-class sub K-34 surfaces in the early morning hours in the Sea of Japan and launches two nuclear-tipped P-1000 Vulkan cruise missiles, one each at Busan and Ulsan. Several minutes later, the 350 kt warhead aboard the first P-1000 detonates over Busan, wrecking the port and badly damaging the eastern half of the city. The missile targeting Ulsan suffers a critical engine failure soon after launch and crashes into the sea well short of the Korean coast (the warhead did not explode). A JDF P-3 Orion, on routine ASW patrol over the Sea of Japan, spots the smoky missile launch signatures on the western horizon and closes at speed to investigate. K-34 has difficulty retracting one of its missile launch tubes, delaying its escape. It attempts to submerge just as the JDF P-3 arrives overhead. The P-3 drops two Mk. 46 homing torpedoes, both of which track and hit the crash-diving K-34, sinking it along with all hands.

Unofficially,

Alarmed at the growing losses at the front, collapsing Soviet economy, massive damage already endured from NATO nuclear strikes and the utter impossibility of retaking East Germany, the Politburo confronts General Secretary Sauronski, demanding he reach out to seek a negotiated and immediate end to the war. The "peace faction" - composed of the Minister of Defense and nearly all the civilian members of the Politburo - argue that the USSR is in a better position than it was prewar, for while East Germany has been lost, the USSR now controls China, Romania, Jugoslavia, Austria and Turkey, and that the potential for a disastrous continuation or escalation of the nuclear war has the potential to destroy the USSR and the Communist Party. The opposition - Secretary General Sauronski, KGB Chairman Yangel and the aged ideologue Nikolai Kozlov - decry the defeatism of the peace faction and boldly claim that Western resistance is collapsing and that victory is nearly at hand.

Another Forrest Sherman-class destroyer, the USS Bigelow, is recommissioned in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

To provide more trained and combat capable small units to battered units at the front, the Army staff in Washington directs the "Bravo Company transfer" - all combat battalions in the strategic reserve (the 46th ID, 49th AD, 194th Armored Brigade, 197th Infantry Brigade and 13th Armored Cavalry Regiment) plus the 193rd Infantry Brigade in Panama - are to transfer their complete B Companies to the front and to stand up a new B Company with new replacements being sent from the training base. The battalions are to identify their highest performing soldiers in the remaining companies and promote them to leadership positions to staff out the new companies.

The nuclear attack forces the delay of the trial of the former commander of the battleship Missouri, charged with dereliction of duty for the unauthorized release of a nuclear missile in October.

Tensions grow higher in Bratislava as the 155th Motor-Rifle (my 235th Rear Area Protection) Division's commander demands resupply from the city authorities in Bratislava. The Soviet general is forcefully ejected from the town hall after a confrontation with the city's Communist Party chief.

The American XI Corps and German V Korps evacuate Legnica, Poland after thoroughly demolishing the former Soviet Northern Group of Forces and Western TVD headquarters complex and the nearby command bunker. To the north II British Corps defends Gorzów Wielkopolski, a town which it captured in May, holding on only by the determined efforts of its artillery gunners and intrepid Harrier jump-jet pilots who bombard the attacking Soviets with cluster bombs, rockets and iron bombs.

A team of engineers, contracting experts and civilian experts (American expats employed by the Saudi state oil company) arrive in Aden, Yemen to assess the condition of the city's refinery, which, thankfully, was only lightly damaged in the fighting for the city.