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Originally Posted by swaghauler
Yes, mountain bikes were widely available in Europe in the late 90s. Hans Rey (of Germany) was one of the pioneers of mountain biking and was riding PROFESSIONALLY for GT bikes in 1987. The MBT "world cups" were already being held in the 90s. You would also have CYCLOCROSS bikes (which were big in Europe) which are road bikes beefed up for offroad riding.
As for military operations on mountain bikes, you'd need to ask the Finns. as far as I know, Finland had her ski troops riding bikes in the summer since the 90s. They were a functional part of finland's TO&E.
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Good to know. Thanks. I guess one would probably see some bike-mounted NATO units, at least, late in the Twilight War (but I'm still not convinced that mountain bikes would make good cross country vehicles for heavily-laden soldiers).
I imagine that mountain bikes were much less common in Warsaw Pact nations. IIRC, the Germans made extensive use of bicycles- especially in Volksgrenadier and Volksturm units- in the last year or so of WW2, but the Soviets did not. Perhaps there's some sort of historical aversion at play.
I can't recall if it was explicitly included in the module or whether it was a detail I came up with myself (I'll check the book when I get home), but in my
Pirates of the Vistula Campaign ("
Twilight Cruise"), part of the Wilsa Krolowa river tug's cargo was an allotment of bicycles manufactured in Krakow.
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