May 15, 1997
Nothing official for the day.
The defense rests in the treason trial of Autumn Lotus; the defense counsel attempted to question the legitimacy of evidence collected by the military and its admissibility in court.
map of front lines in Poland
No. 58 Squadron, RAF Regiment seizes the Soviet airfield at Powidz, Poland. The British troops, they are startled to discover, are actually several miles ahead of friendly units in an area that, thankfully has few Pact defenders present to resist the unit's heavily armed (but unarmored) Land Rovers.
Third German Army pauses to reorganize and replenish supplies in preparation for PanzerGruppe Oberdorf's drive.
NATO deep strike aircraft roam along the Warta, Oder and Wisla River valleys seeking out masses of Soviet and Polish vehicles bunched up waiting for river crossings. They are assisted in this hunt by USAF TR-1 and E-8 surveillance aircraft, now orbiting over liberated Polish territory.
The German government begins releasing some territorial security troops from active service, allowing the German economy to partially recover from the withdrawal of most of its adult male workforce. The economy is still, however, struggling from the burdens of repairing battle damage in both East and West, the cutoff of energy supplies from the USSR and worldwide economic turmoil caused by the war.
A SH-60 helicopter from the USS Deyo, part of the escort of Convoy 140, sinks an unidentified Soviet submarine. (Surviving Soviet records list a number of boats that lost contact in mid-May in the North Atlantic.)
The American heavy cruiser Salem and her battle group arrive in Ascension Island in the South Atlantic for a brief stopover to collect mail, discharge a handful of wounded sailors and receive intelligence updates and a consignment of high-priority parts.
In Iran, Rifleman Goreng Nassang further distinguishes himself. Back with his unit (the 1/7th Duke of Edinburgh's Own Gurkha Rifles) outside of Bandar Abbas, he successfully hits a Soviet captain and his radio operator with his trusty GPMG at a range of over 1600 yards.
The two Soviet raiders in the Indian Ocean, the Echo II-class sub K-35 and the destroyer Buliny launch a cruise missile strike on the American base at Diego Garcia. Using targeting data from one of the USSR's last remaining RORSAT (ocean radar recon) satellites, the destroyer dashes towards the American base and launches its five remaining SS-N-22 cruise missiles at the ships in the lagoon. The submarine fires its four SS-N-12 cruise missiles at the airfield, hoping to strike the tank farm, runway and any aircraft parked on the apron. The strike is a success; the American destroyer tender Acadia is struck and sunk, while the tanker Mount Washington is set ablaze, sinking at dusk. The air base is also damaged, with two fuel tanks burst (the fire put out after herculean efforts of the base firefighting team), two P-3s of VP-4, two C-141s of the 172nd Military Airlift Wing (Mississippi Air National Guard) and a KC-135 of the 380th Air Refueling Squadron lost.
The SAS team in Leningrad uses the fake passes and a substantial bribe to obtain access to the nuclear battlecruiser Rossiya, under construction at the Baltic Shipyard. They manage to start a fire belowdecks and escape before the fire brigade can arrive.