Twilight 1990 timeline

[95th Rifleman]

This timeline is really good but, just to be slightly picky on one point, I think that you could describe Thatcher as anti-communist prior to 1984 as she had already been called the Iron Lady by the Soviets prior to that. I know Wikipedia isn't the most reliable source on some things but according to them it was first coined for Thatcher by military journalist Captain Yuri Gavrilov in the Soviet newspaper Red Star on 24 January 1976 because of her staunch opposition to the Soviet Union and communism.

Maggie is a heroine of mine and I've sudied her history. I referred to her in the 1984 section not to indicate the start of her anti-communist stance but to indicate that stance begins to cause problems with France, setting up their eventual withdrawal from NATO. looking at it again I see how it comes across, wil edit it.

[Mahatatain]

Maggie is a heroine of mine and I've sudied her history. I referred to her in the 1984 section not to indicate the start of her anti-communist stance but to indicate that stance begins to cause problems with France, setting up their eventual withdrawal from NATO. looking at it again I see how it comes across, wil edit it.

Ah - that makes sense and it come across more clearly now.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Maggie is a heroine of mine [...].

And mine. (She & President Reagan are my heroes from the 80s when it comes to matters political)

[B.T.]

Hi 95th Rifleman,
what you came up with, sounds good. My FtF group plays only on very few occasions, so it will last for years, to play through Poland in 2000. But I'd like to try a 90ies based campaign, with a similar (or the same) background, like yours.
Just out of curiousity: Would'nt the Iran-Contra affair fit nicely in your background (maybe not as it really happened, but parts of the plans, like the selling of TOWs to Iranian separatists, would make sense.).

[Jason Weiser]

My only comment, I don't see Gorbachev making such a statement. By '86 or so, he and Reagan were having competing charm offensives. My thinking is, after Chernenko dies in 1985, he names Viktor Chebrikov to the top slot...and he begins to make things worse instead of better. In fact, say your Chinese general is a KGB asset. He's there mostly to pass intel on the PLA, but well, some bright boy at Moscow Center decides, why not embarrass the Chinese, let's have this guy arrange some small raid to let the KGB Border Guards defeat and have some bodies to display for the Western press. A sort of Gilwitz by proxy...only, something goes very wrong, and matters get WAY out of hand before our guy can stop it. By the time either army's high command is aware of what's going on, you have division sized formations going hammer and tongs with each other 10km deep in China.....

[Webstral]

Jason, it's nice to see you slumming a bit again.

[95th Rifleman]

I'm a bit blown away by the support and positive comments regarding this project. It means allot to me to have such positive peer review and critique.

I'm going to work on fleshing out other details beyond what I've done for my gaming group, TO&E's, that sort of thing.

One thing was considering (as a possible what if) is the idea that nuclear exchanges never happened and the war became a meat grinding stalemate across the middle of Poland. NATO and WP forces where fairly balanced in the mid-80's and if the fear of MAD drove respective militaries to pursue conventional solutions, they war could of dragged on for a decade.

[Mahatatain]

One thing was considering (as a possible what if) is the idea that nuclear exchanges never happened and the war became a meat grinding stalemate across the middle of Poland. NATO and WP forces where fairly balanced in the mid-80's and if the fear of MAD drove respective militaries to pursue conventional solutions, they war could of dragged on for a decade.

Personally I think that to have the right Twilight 2000 atmosphere you need to have (as well as extensive warfare) massive civilian casualties, a shattering of government organisation and a breakdown of how society works. That will result in a new fragmented society where many people are just out to look after themselves and their immediate family/friends/associates while a few are trying to rebuild something larger than their own community.

To achieve that situation limited nuclear warfare seems the only option to me - a pandemic of some kind could potentially create the same situation but that probably wouldn't involve the same level of military conflict.

That's just my opinion though. Have you ever read Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Storm_Rising. That is a potential version of WWIII without nuclear weapons.

[Legbreaker]

I'm a bit blown away by the support and positive comments regarding this project. It means allot to me to have such positive peer review and critique.

That's just the way this forum is supposed to work in my opinion. As I wrote once, "you write it, we break it!".

To achieve that situation limited nuclear warfare seems the only option to me - a pandemic of some kind could potentially create the same situation but that probably wouldn't involve the same level of military conflict.

I'm in agreement. Civilisation as we know it needs to be almost totally destroyed with rebuilding a long and laborious task of a generation or three. Without nukes, or something equally as devastating, you're not going to have much worse than WWII, which while nasty and destructive, was nothing more than a hiccup compared to what we're present in the books.

[95th Rifleman]

That's just the way this forum is supposed to work in my opinion. As I wrote once, "you write it, we break it!".


I'm in agreement. Civilisation as we know it needs to be almost totally destroyed with rebuilding a long and laborious task of a generation or three. Without nukes, or something equally as devastating, you're not going to have much worse than WWII, which while nasty and destructive, was nothing more than a hiccup compared to what we're present in the books.

Aye, that's the reason my gaming group kept the timeline canon (sort of) after '86. However as a purely academic exercise, the idea of a non-nuclear WW3 is intriguing.