The War That Never Was

[Webstral]

A few weeks ago I finished The War That Never Was, which tells a story of WW3 at the end of the 1980’s. The narrative is both dense and sparse. The author tries to cover all of the major naval theaters, plus some of the ground war in areas most directly affected by combat operations at sea. There’s a lot happening. Characterization is so limited that Clancy looks rich by comparison, which is a trade-off the author makes for covering so much action in so many places in one novel of reasonable length.

In a nutshell, the author describes Allied naval victory everywhere within 50 days of the start of operations. He paints a picture of the supremacy of naval aviation and submarines over surface units. For the purpose of the coming commentary, I would like to focus on the fighting in the Norwegian Sea and around the Kola Peninsula.

The author posits a situation in which Soviet naval forces in the Far North are very badly damaged after enjoying good initial successes. His narrative regarding the fate of the Soviet offensive into Norway parallels the events in the v1 chronology. The action around the Kola Peninsula differs very significantly. Whereas in the v1 chronology NATO attacks the Kola Peninsula in June, 1997 after seven months of NATO-Pact fighting, in The War That Never Was Strike Fleet Atlantic goes after the Kola Peninsula less than six weeks in.

We have had some discussion about the bias and shortcomings of the v1 chronology regarding the treatment of naval issues. The Twilight: 2000 creators are grunts, not squids. The author of The War That Never Was is a squid at heart, if not in fact. While I can’t say for certain that his portrayal of NATO actions in the Far North is realistic, the math seems reasonable enough.

In The War That Never Was, the Soviets make their initial bid in Norway and achieve good initial success. The Soviets possess the initiative, which gives them significant advantages. In the v1 chronology, the advantages of having the initiative will be diminished by the fact that the fighting has been going on in Europe for 6 weeks by the time the Americans get involved. By the time the Soviets make their move NATO will be at a heightened level of readiness. The result will be more NATO ships closer to their wartime stations than if there had been no fighting in Germany. I doubt that NATO would be fully mobilized—especially the non-anglophone members. However, I also doubt that the USN, RN, Royal Danish Navy, or Norwegian Navy would be at peacetime manning and patrols with a hot war blazing in Germany. Where exactly the line would be drawn between full mobilization and deployment and peacetime deployment would be a very interesting subject for someone with more naval chops than I have to explore in detail.

After the initial shock wears off in The War That Never Was, NATO recovers nicely in the Far North. Once NATO gets 3 fleet carriers into action in the Far North, supported adequately by land-based aircraft and submarines, they take it to the Soviets in a major way. Strike Fleet Atlantic moves east into the Barents Sea to work over the Kola Peninsula systematically and thoroughly. The author notes through his rudimentary characters that NATO air attacks against Soviet assets on the Kola Peninsula cannot put the air or naval bases out of action permanently. What they can do is put these bases out of the fight for a few weeks and greatly diminish the combat capability of Soviet naval aviation operating out of the Kola bases for several months.

All of this said, I’m thinking of a way to correlate the events of the v1 chronology with what seems like a plausible set of developments outlined by an author with greater knowledge than I have. What if the 2 histories are not incompatible? What if Strike Fleet Atlantic moves directly against the Kola Peninsula following the denouement of the Soviet offensive in Norway in Dec 97? What if Strike Fleet Atlantic suffers losses but manages to inflict very significant damage on Soviet naval and aviation assets in the Far North, then withdraws in anticipation of an early peace due to the smashing success of Anglo-American involvement in Germany? What if the Soviets camouflage the movement of significant maritime strike aircraft and coastal defense ships to the Kola Peninsula in anticipation of a return by NATO forces? What if, anxious to score another solid victory to drive the Soviets to the bargaining table, the Americans invest heavily in a gamble characterized by hubris on the part of the senior American leadership and a cunning born of desperation on the part of the Soviets? A concerted deception plan might give NATO the idea that the Soviets no longer have the assets to launch a major strike from the Kola Peninsula. Combined with some bad decisions on the part of the Americans and luck favoring the Soviets, we could imagine a serious reversal of fortune in the Far North after the earlier success.