ENDGAME
WRITTEN BY COLIN GEE
20th August 1946 to 19th August 1947.
Series Dedication
The Red Gambit series of books is dedicated to my grandfather, the boss-fellah, Jack ‘Chalky’ White, Chief Petty Officer [Engine Room] RN, my de facto father until his untimely death from cancer in 1983, and a man who, along with many millions of others, participated in the epic of history that we know as World War Two.
Their efforts and sacrifices made it possible for us to read of it, in freedom, today.
Thank you, for everything.
Foreword by author Colin Gee
If you have already read the first six books in this series, then what follows will serve as a small reminder of what went before.
If this is your first toe dipped in the waters of ‘Red Gambit’, then I can only advise you to read the previous books when you can.
In the interim, this is mainly for you.
After the end of the German War, the leaders of the Soviet Union found sufficient cause to distrust their former Allies, to the point of launching an assault on Western Europe. Those causes and the decision-making behind the full scale attack lie within ‘Opening Moves’, as do the battles of the first week, commencing on 6th August 1945.
After that initial week, the Soviets continued to grind away at the Western Allies, trading lives and materiel for ground, whilst reducing the combat efficiency of Allied units from the Baltic to the Alps.
In ‘Breakthrough’, the Red Army inflicts defeat after defeat upon their enemy, but at growing cost to themselves.
The attrition is awful.
Matters come to a head in ‘Stalemate’ as circumstances force Marshall Zhukov to focus attacks on specific zones. The resulting battles bring death and horror on an unprecedented scale, neither Army coming away unscathed or unscarred.
In the Pacific, the Soviet Union has courted the Empire of Japan, and has provided unusual support in its struggle against the Chinese. That support has faded and, despite small-scale Soviet intervention, the writing is on the wall.
‘Impasse’ brought a swing, perhaps imperceptible at first, with the initiative lost by the Red Army, but difficult to pick up for the Allies.
The Red Air Force is almost spent, and Allied air power starts to make its superiority felt across the spectrum of operations.
The war takes on a bestial nature, as both sides visit excesses on each other.
Allied planning deals a deadly blow to the Soviet Baltic forces, in the air, on the sea, and on the ground. However, their own ground assaults are met with stiff resistance, and peter out as General Winter spreads his frosty fingers across the continent, bringing with him the coldest weather in living memory.
‘Sacrifice’ sees the Allied nations embark on their recovery, assaults pushing back the weakening red Army, for whom supply has become the pivotal issue.
Its soldiers are undernourished, its tanks lack enough fuel, and its guns are often without shells.
Soviet air power is a matter of memory, and the Allies have mastery of the skies.
In ‘Initiative’, we see a resurgence in Allied military power, offset by a decline in the Soviet ability to wage war to its fullest extent, as supply issues and the general debilitation of their force comes into greater play.
None the less, the Red Army performs some real heroics and inflicts some heinous losses on the Allied soldiery.
The Japanese Army in China suffers defeat after defeat and ceases to function.
The US uses the atomic bomb on targets in Japan, and the Mikado announces Japan’s surrender before the Empire has made its full contribution to Project Raduga.
However, Japanese military and scientific fanatics continue to support the project, and slowly the necessary assets are put in place.
Politically, the call to use the bombs on the USSR rises with the return home of more dead sons and husbands from the battlefields of Europe.
Stalin and his closest advisors still cling to the options offered by Project Raduga and its offshoots, but are presented with the unpalatable truth that the Red Army is on the verge of defeat in Europe.
The Soviet leadership agrees to use Sweden as a go-between to broker a peace deal, insisting that the Swedes present it all as their idea.
However, Allied intelligence learns that the Soviets initiated the talks, and use their strong position to get more of what they want.
On one battlefield, a rogue element within the Soviet military employs Tabun nerve agent, which nearly brings about a cataclysmic response from the Allies.
However, a Soviet apology draws both sides back to discussions and a ceasefire is agreed.
Initiative ends with a clandestine agreement between a resurgent Germany and a disillusioned Poland, an agreement that appears to threaten the progress towards a final peace settlement between the combatants.
In the six previous books, the reader has journeyed from June 1945, all the way to August 1946. The combat and intrigue has focussed in Europe, but men have also died in the Pacific, over and under the cold waters of the Atlantic, and on the shores of small islands in Greenland or the Atlantic-washed sands of the Kalahari Desert.
In Endgame, the series heads towards its conclusion, bringing together many of the main characters into focal points where their destiny, and the destiny of the world, is decided.
The task of doing that and bringing Red Gambit to a conclusion has proved too large for one book, so there will be one more to come.
As I did the research for this alternate history series, I often wondered why it was that we, west and east, did not come to blows once more.
We must all give thanks it did not all go badly wrong in that hot summer of 1945, and that the events described in the Red Gambit series did not come to pass.
My profound thanks to all those who have contributed in whatever way to this project, as every little piece of help brought me closer to my goal.
[For additional information, progress reports, orders of battle, discussion, freebies, and interaction with the author please find time to visit and register at one of the following-
www.redgambitseries.com, www.redgambitseries.co.uk, www.redgambitseries.eu
Also, feel free to join Facebook Group ‘Red Gambit’.]
Thank you.
I have received a great deal of assistance in researching, translating, advice, and support during the years that this project has so far run.
In no particular order, I would like to record my thanks to all of the following for their contributions. Gary Wild, Jan Wild, Jason Litchfield, Peter Kellie, Jim Crail, Craig Dressman, Mario Wildenauer, Loren Weaver, Pat Walsh, Keith Lange, Philippe Vanhauwermeiren, Elena Schuster, Stilla Fendt, Luitpold Krieger, Mark Lambert, Simon Haines, Carl Jones, Greg Winton, Greg Percival, Robert Prideaux, Tyler Weaver, Giselle Janiszewski, Ella Murray, James Hanebury, Renata Loveridge, Jeffrey Durnford, Brian Proctor, Steve Bailey, Paul Dryden, Steve Riordan, Bruce Towers, Gary Banner, Victoria Coling, Alexandra Coling, Heather Coling, Isabel Pierce Ward, Hany Hamouda, Ahmed Al-Obeidi, Sharon Shmueli, Danute Bartkiene, and finally BW-UK Gaming Clan.
It is with sadness that I must record the passing of Luitpold Krieger, who succumbed to cancer after a hard fight.
One name is missing on the request of the party involved, who perversely has given me more help and guidance in this project than most, but whose desire to remain in the background on all things means I have to observe his wish not to name him.