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WWIII Fiction

Started by Gusington, July 18, 2012, 08:54:39 PM

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GDS_Starfury

while not really fiction Id recomment Robet Shaws Air Combat.
any tactical guide that recommends using cluster bombs against helicopters is GTG.
Toonces - Don't ask me, I just close my eyes and take it.

Gus - I use sweatpants with flannel shorts to soak up my crotch sweat.

Banzai Cat - There is no "partial credit" in grammar. Like anal sex. It's either in, or it's not.

Mirth - We learned long ago that they key isn't to outrun Star, it's to outrun Gus.

Martok - I don't know if it's possible to have an "anti-boner"...but I now have one.

Gus - Celery is vile and has no reason to exist. Like underwear on Star.


mirth

Quote from: GDS_Starfury on August 14, 2012, 12:13:43 AM
while not really fiction Id recomment Robet Shaws Air Combat.
any tactical guide that recommends using cluster bombs against helicopters is GTG.

Innovative. I like that  8)
"45 minutes of pooping Tribbles being juggled by a drunken Horta would be better than Season 1 of TNG." - SirAndrewD

"you don't look at the mantelpiece when you're poking the fire" - Bawb

"Can't 'un' until you 'pre', son." - Gus

Airborne Rifles

Gus, if you end up reading The War That Never Was I'd enjoy yor feedback.  Haven't run in to anyone else who has read it.  Red Army was very good as well, the best by Ralph Peters IMO.

Gusington

Sure thing. Perhaps I'll be able to write a review of it too.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

Toonces

#34
So I broke out my copy of Ralph Peters' Red Army again.

Page 56 (first shots of the war just fired previous page, start of new chapter):

"Junior Lieutenant Plinnikov wiped at his nose with hs fingers and ordered his driver forward.  The view through the vehicle commander's optics allowed no meaningful orientation.  Rapid flashes dazzled in the periscope's lens, leaving a deep gray veil of smoke in their wake.  The view was further disrupted by raindrops that found their way under the external cowl of the lens block.  Plinnikov felt as though he were guiding  his reconnaissance track through hell at the bottom of the sea.

The shudder of the powerful artillery bursts reached through the metal walls of the vehcile.  Suddenly, the armor seemed hopelessly thin, the tracks too weak to hold, the automatic cannon little more than a toy.  Occasionally, a tinny sprinkling of debris struck the vehicle, faintly audible through Plinnikov's headset  and over the engine whine.  He could feel the engine pulling, straining to move the tracks through the mud of the farm trail.

'Comrade Lieutenant, we're very close to the barrage,' his driver told him.

Plinnikov understood that the driver meant too close.  But the lieutenant was determined to out perform every other reconnaissance platoon leader in the battalion, if not the entire Second Guards Tank Army. 

'Keep moving,' Plinnikov commanded, 'just keep moving.  Head straight through the smoke.'
....

'Keep going,' Plinnikov said.  'Get down into the low ground.  Stay on the trail as long as the smoke holds.  Fast now, move.'

Plinnikov sensed that they were very close to the enemy.  Clots of earth and stone flew into the air, hurtling across his narrowed horizon.  Plinnikov guessed that, if he moved off the trail, there might be mines, but that the trail itself would only be coverd by direct fires-which would be ineffective in the confusion of the Soviet artillery preparation.

'Lieutenant, we're catching up with the barrage.  We're too close.'

'Keep going.  We're already in it.  Go right through.'

'Comrade Lieutenant...'  It was Junior Sergeant Belonov, his gunner and assistant.  The boy's face was milky.

'It's all right,' Plinnikov told him through the intercom.  'Just spot for targets.  If we wait and try to sneak through, they'll get us for sure.'

An unidentified object thumped against the vehicle so hard that the vehicle jolted, as though in pain.

'Go faster,' Plinnikov shouted to the driver.  'Just stay on the road and go as fast as you can.'

'I can't see the road.  I lose it.'

'Just go.'  Plinnikov brushed his fingers at his nose.  He felt fear rising in his belly and chest, unleashed by the impact of whatever had hit the vehicle.

Suddenly, the artillery blasts seemed to swamp them, shaking the vehicle like a boat on rough water.  Plinnikov realized that if they threw a track now, they were dead.

'Go, damn you.'

In the thick smoke, the lights of the blasts seemed demonic, alive with deadly intentions.

'More to the left...to the left.'

The tracks seemed to buckle on the edge of a ditch or gully, threatening to peel away from the road wheels.

'Target,' Plinnikov screamed.

But the sudden black shape off to their right side was lifeless, its metal deformed by a direct hit.  The driver swerved away, and the tracks came level, back on the trail again.

Plinnikov broke out in a sweat.  He had not seen the shattered vehicle until they almost collided with it.  He wondered, for the first time, if he had not done something irrecovably foolish.

Slop from a nearby impact smacked the external lens of Plinnikov's periscope, cracking it diagonally, just as the vehicle reached a pocket where the wind had thinned the smoke to transparent gauze.  Several dark shapes moved out of the smoke on a converging axis.

'Targets.  Gunner right.  Driver, pull left now.'

But the enemy vehicles moved quickly away, either uninterested in or unaware of Plinnikov's presence.  The huge armored vehicles disappeared back into the smoke, black metal monsters roaming over the floor of hell."
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

Staggerwing

I may have to re-read it too. And then see if I can track down IronX's Squad battles mod for a nato-wp conflict. Someone must still have it.
Vituð ér enn - eða hvat?  -Voluspa

Nothing really rocks and nothing really rolls and nothing's ever worth the cost...

"Don't you look at me that way..." -the Abyss
 
'When searching for a meaningful embrace, sometimes my self respect took second place' -Iggy Pop, Cry for Love

... this will go down on your permanent record... -the Violent Femmes, 'Kiss Off'-

"I'm not just anyone, I'm not just anyone-
I got my time machine, got my 'electronic dream!"
-Sonic Reducer, -Dead Boys

Toonces

I finished Red Army this afternoon.  It's a pretty quick read.  Really, really good book.  I give it my highest recommendation.

It's different from RSR, but that's not a bad thing.  It's definitely grittier. 
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

GDS_Starfury

have you ever tried Team Yankee?
Toonces - Don't ask me, I just close my eyes and take it.

Gus - I use sweatpants with flannel shorts to soak up my crotch sweat.

Banzai Cat - There is no "partial credit" in grammar. Like anal sex. It's either in, or it's not.

Mirth - We learned long ago that they key isn't to outrun Star, it's to outrun Gus.

Martok - I don't know if it's possible to have an "anti-boner"...but I now have one.

Gus - Celery is vile and has no reason to exist. Like underwear on Star.


Staggerwing

Quote from: GDS_Starfury on September 27, 2012, 05:41:23 PM
have you ever tried Team Yankee?

Check out the first page of this very thread...
Vituð ér enn - eða hvat?  -Voluspa

Nothing really rocks and nothing really rolls and nothing's ever worth the cost...

"Don't you look at me that way..." -the Abyss
 
'When searching for a meaningful embrace, sometimes my self respect took second place' -Iggy Pop, Cry for Love

... this will go down on your permanent record... -the Violent Femmes, 'Kiss Off'-

"I'm not just anyone, I'm not just anyone-
I got my time machine, got my 'electronic dream!"
-Sonic Reducer, -Dead Boys

Toonces

I've never been able to get through more than half of Team Yankee.  I dunno....I just lose interest.  Maybe I'll try one more time and just gut it out so I can at least finish it.


I've started it at least 3 times.
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

besilarius

Some of David Poyer's novels are set in the 80s at sea.  If naval warfare in the Cold War is of interest, his stories could be good.
He retired as a captain in the USN and based much of his work on his own experiences.  Some of his novels are actually used at the naval academy.
"Most gods throw dice, but Fate plays chess, and you don't find out until too late that he's been playing with two queens all along".  Terry Pratchett.

During filming of Airplane, Leslie Nielsen used a whoopee cushion to keep the cast off-balance. Hays said that Nielsen "played that thing like a maestro"

Tallulah Bankhead: "I'll come and make love to you at five o'clock. If I'm late, start without me."

"When all other trusts fail, turn to Flashman." — Abraham Lincoln.

"I have enjoyed very warm relations with my two husbands."
"With your eyes closed?"
"That helped."  Lauren Bacall

Master Chiefs are sneaky, dastardly, and snarky miscreants who thrive on the tears of Ensigns and belly dancers.   Admiral Gerry Bogan.

GDS_Starfury

my problem with reading 80's WW3 ficton now is the knowledge of the real world ass beating the Warsaw Pact would have taken across the board without the use of nukes.
Toonces - Don't ask me, I just close my eyes and take it.

Gus - I use sweatpants with flannel shorts to soak up my crotch sweat.

Banzai Cat - There is no "partial credit" in grammar. Like anal sex. It's either in, or it's not.

Mirth - We learned long ago that they key isn't to outrun Star, it's to outrun Gus.

Martok - I don't know if it's possible to have an "anti-boner"...but I now have one.

Gus - Celery is vile and has no reason to exist. Like underwear on Star.


GDS_Starfury

QuoteOther WW3 reading possibilities are The Zone series of books by James Rouch

fun books when youre a kid.  silly series now.  its the ground version of the Wingman series.
Toonces - Don't ask me, I just close my eyes and take it.

Gus - I use sweatpants with flannel shorts to soak up my crotch sweat.

Banzai Cat - There is no "partial credit" in grammar. Like anal sex. It's either in, or it's not.

Mirth - We learned long ago that they key isn't to outrun Star, it's to outrun Gus.

Martok - I don't know if it's possible to have an "anti-boner"...but I now have one.

Gus - Celery is vile and has no reason to exist. Like underwear on Star.


Airborne Rifles

I just found and started reading a trilogy of books by a guy named Adam Yoshida.  The books are only available in Kindle.  They are in the vein of The Third World War by John Hackett in that it focuses a lot on the political and economic causes and consequences of a modern world war combined with the operational and tactical narrative that you find in The War That Never Was.  I've read the first book, Blast of War and am getting into the second one, A Land War in Asia.  I've already bought the third book (they are only $3) and they are all pretty quick reads.

Basically the plot is that every potential hot spot (economic and military) in the world, from the EU debt crisis to the Mexican drug war to Iran goes worst case scenario over the next five years eventually resulting in a general war between the US and its allies and China and its allies.  Yoshida definitely has some neo-con leanings so a big part of his plot in the first book is that President Obama is weakening America and destabilizing the world.  He goes kind of overboard on this point but it fits with the rest of the plot of everything being worst case.

Anyway, he seems to have a relatively astute and nuanced understanding of international politics and he's done his homework on military equipment and capabilities though its obvious he's never actually been in the military or participated in a military operation.  So far I've really enjoyed these reads; lot's of fodder for wargame scenarios (I like to try to turn these reads into SPMBT scenarios). 

Gus, this may about what you were looking for when you started this thread?

Gusington

^Does sound good and is pretty close to what I was looking for...but I don't own a Kindle :/


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd