Part 5

1952(January-April)

January 2^nd--U.N. ground troops in Korea enter the heart of Pyongyang amid heavy NKPA machine gun and artillery fire.

January 4^th--A Soviet supply convoy carrying fuel and munitions to Red Army units in Norway is strafed near the Norwegian border by RAF fighters stationed just south of Narvik.

January 5^th--Imre Nagy, a former aide to the late Istvan Doby, is appointed the new Hungarian head of state.

January 6^th--NKPA tank units hit the U.N. left flank at Pyongyang in the hope of dislodging U.S. and allied ground forces from the North Korean capital. The attack is repulsed with help from U.S. Air Force fighter squadrons who bomb the North Korean lines.

January 8^th--U.S. and South Korean infantry troops surround the last remaining NKPA defensive position in Pyongyang.

January 10^th--The last pocket of Soviet resistance near Tromso surrenders to NATO troops.

January 13^th--The remnants of the sole surviving NKPA garrison at Pyongyang surrender to U.S. and allied troops. For the second time since the Korean conflict began, the North Korean capital is under the control of U.N. ground forces.

January 15^th--NATO fighter squadrons stationed near Oslo ambush a Soviet bomber force sent to raid the Norwegian capital. Nearly  sixty percent of the bombers committed to the raid are shot down before they reach the outskirts of the city; another ten percent are crippled beyond repair.

January 16^th--U.S. fighter jets bomb a Soviet military supply depot near the East German town of Neubrandenburg, destroying tons of much-needed fuel intended for Red Army tank units on the front lines of the NATO campaign in Germany.

January 18^th--CPSU first secretary Mikhail Suslov delivers a radio speech denouncing the Western powers, in particular the  United States, as "utter barbarians" and blaming them for the escalation of the Korean conflict into World War III. Foreign journalists monitoring the broadcast from Helsinki note that Suslov sounds tired; speculation begins to mount outside the Soviet Union-- and among some people inside the Soviet Union as well --that the strains of wartime leadership may be starting to make him physically ill.

January 20^th--The second-highest ranking officer on the NKPA general staff is summarily court-martialed and executed for alleged incompetence in the line of duty. In reality, though, the general is little more than a scapegoat for the failure of Kim Il Sung’s strategy in his unsuccessful efforts to thwart the U.N. forces’ second capture of Pyongyang.

January 21^st--Two Soviet torpedo boats are sunk in the Norwegian Sea near the town of Hammerfest.

January 23^rd--A detachment of Soviet Naval Infantry attempts to land near the Norwegian village of Harstad and immediately comes under heavy fire from NATO infantry and artillery units.

January 24^th--Soviet civil defense authorities hold another evacuation drill in Murmansk.

January 26^th--At a White House press conference, President Truman announces U.N. forces in Korea have captured a number of  top secret North Korean documents that he says will shed new light on the Soviet Union’s role in the original NKPA invasion of South Korea in 1950.

January 27^th--NATO air defenses in Norway shoot down two dozen Soviet combat aircraft near Tromso.

January 30^th--In a desperate attempt to stop U.N. ground forces from reaching the China-North Korea border, Chinese planes bomb U.S. and ROK advance positions north of Pyongyang.

January 31^st--The commander-in-chief of the Soviet expeditionary force in Norway is relieved of his post and recalled to Moscow in disgrace. With the Red Army far behind its original timetable for defeating NATO in the Norwegian theater, recriminations are flying thick and fast as to who’s responsible, and many more Red Army officers will lose their commands-- along with their lives in some extreme cases --before all is said and done.

February 1^st--The Communist Chinese government rushes 200,000 additional troops to the Korean Peninsula in an effort to slow down the U.N. advance through North Korea.

February 3^rd--Mikhail Suslov is hospitalized after experiencing serious chest pains.

February 5^th--The last remnants of the Soviet Naval Infantry landing force at Harstad are evacuated by sea.

February 6^th--U.N. warplanes bomb PLA strongpoints along the North Korean-Chinese border.

Feburary 8^th--Security at the Norwegian royal palace in Oslo  is greatly tightened after two NKVD "black ops" agents are caught trying to assassinate Norway’s King Haakon VII. One of the NKVD agents commits suicide while in police custody; the second agent is placed in solitary confinement at a NATO military detention center.

February 10^th--The flagship of the Soviet navy’s Baltic submarine force is sunk with all hands off the German coast.

February 11^th--British SAS commandos in Korea destroy an NKPA supply dump near the North Korean town of Nangnim.

February 13^th--U.S. and ROK fighter jets ambush an NKPA infantry convoy near the village of Rason. They also bomb troop positions and destroy a fuel storage depot near the town of Hoeryong along the North Korean-Chinese border.

February 14^th--Residents of the North Korean border village of Samjiyong are brutally executed by Communist security forces in what the American press later dubs "a modern St. Valentine’s Day Massacre". Official North Korean state media reports accuse the slain villagers of plotting to commit treason against the government; however, subsequent investigation by undercover CIA personnel in the Korean theater turns up evidence that in fact those executed were simply petitioning Kim Il Sung to initiate cease-fire negotiations with the U.N. forces.

February 16^th--A group of prominent leftists working in the entertainment industry, collectively known as "the Hollywood Twelve", is summoned to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. All but one of these twelve witnesses plead the Fifth in response to the committee’s questions about whether they have ever been members of the U.S. Communist Party; the twelfth witness gives highly shocking testimony regarding the alleged infiltration of the motion picture and television studios in Hollywood by Communists.

February 18^th--The People’s Liberation Army starts its famous "Midnight Snow" offensive, so named because it’s launched at  midnight local time in the midst of a heavy snowstorm, as part of the next phase of their campaign to prevent U.N. forces in Korea from reaching the Chinese border. Because aircraft on both sides of the front are prevented by the inclement weather from taking off, Chinese and U.N. commanders alike must rely entirely on ground troops to accomplish their objectives in the first twelve hours of the offensive; it will be at least three days before any significant tactical air operations can even be attempted by either side.

February 21^st--Despite the deteriorating strategic situation in Norway and growing evidence that the Red Army’s Norway campaign will end in failure, if not outright disaster, Mikhail Suslov orders the commander-in-chief for Soviet combat forces in the Norwegian theater to proceed with plans for establishing a so- called "Norwegian People’s Republic" inside the shrinking Red Army occupation zone in Norway.

February 22^nd--Seeking to make good on Kim Il-Sung’s long-standing vow to "burn Inchon to ashes", a Soviet long range bomber is sent to drop 15-kiloton nuclear warheads on the provisional South Korean capital; a similarly equipped bomber is dispatched to strike at Pusan. Although the Inchon strike has to be aborted when the plane assigned to carry out that mission loses engine power just before it’s scheduled to cross the DMZ, the aircraft designated to mount the A-bomb attack on Pusan succeeds in delivering its warheads, vaporizing most of the U.N. equipment and personnel in the South Korean port city along much of the city itself.

February 23^rd--On orders from General MacArthur, U.S. troops begin deploying to assist South Korean authorities in caring for the survivors of the Pusan nuclear strike. That same day the Soviet airbase from which the Pusan attack was launched is itself destroyed by U.S. nuclear weapons; the U.S. bomber force assigned to carry out that mission sustains heavy casualties en route to its target.

February 25^th--Soviet premier Mikhail Suslov is hospitalized for the second time in just over three weeks. The news fuels rumors in the NATO intelligence community that Suslov may be dying.

February 27^th--A six-man delegation of Norwegian Communists gathers in the town of Skjervøy to proclaim the establishment of the Norwegian People’s Republic. In their first official act, the members of this rump puppet government declare Norway’s monarchy officially abolished; this edict is largely ignored by non-Communist Norwegians.

March 2^nd--General Matthew Ridgeway gives U.S. and NATO ground forces in Germany the go-ahead to begin a renewed offensive on Dresden within 72 hours.

March 4^th--One of the six men handpicked by the Soviets to run their "Norwegian People’s Republic" puppet state out of Skjervøy is found dead in his office of apparent strychnine poisoning. Although the official Soviet line on his death is that he was assassinated by anti-Soviet terrorists, most Western journalists suspect-- and postwar CIA investigation will confirm --that he actually committed suicide.

March 5^th--NATO launches Operation Poleaxe, its second major effort to capture Dresden.

March 7^th--In a serious blow to NATO maritime strategic defense capabilities in the North Sea, the British aircraft carrier HMS Triumph is torpedoed by Soviet submarines.

March 10^th--Mikhail Suslov lapses into an irreversible coma.

March 11^th--U.S. and British warplanes bomb Communist military targets near Rostock, East Germany.

March 13^th--NATO and Communist infantry forces clash southwest of the East German town of Pirna.

March 14^th--Mikhail Suslov is pronounced dead of an aneurysm just after 1:30 PM.

March 16^th--NATO ground units advance to within fifteen miles of Pirna.

March 17^th--Mikhail Suslov is laid to rest in one of the most elaborate funerals seen in the USSR since the 1924 memorial  service for Vladimir Lenin. Even as Suslov’s ashes are being interred, the CPSU elite is confronted with a new political crisis in its efforts to find a successor.

March 21^st--NATO troops enter Pirna; that same day U.S. and British fighter jets bomb Communist defensive positions on the outskirts of Dresden.

March 24^th--The last pockets of Communist resistance in Pirna surrender to U.S. troops.

March 26^th--Disregarding pleas for calm from the East German government, hundreds of civilians flee Dresden in a desperate attempt to escape advancing NATO ground forces.

March 28^th--East German chancellor Erich Honecker convenes a special emergency session of his cabinet ministers to get their assessment of the tactical situation in the Dresden area. The ministers’ verdict is unanimous and grim; barring a miracle, NATO advance units will likely reach the outskirts of Dresden proper within five days or less.

March 29^th--World War III expands to the Middle East after Soviet troop concentrations along the USSR’s border with Turkey are bombed in a pre-emptive air strike by U.S. carrier jets attached to the 6^th Fleet in the Mediterranean. The decision to launch the pre-emptive strike was made after the White House received word from the CIA that Soviet ground forces were in the midst of preparations to invade Turkish territory.

March 31^st--After receiving credible intelligence which suggests Soviet bombers are preparing to mount a nuclear strike against NATO ground forces advancing on Dresden, General Ridgeway orders U.S. and British air force tactical squadrons in the European theater to attack the airbases from the nuclear raid is set to be launched.

April 1^st--In the so-called "April Fools’ Day raid", USAF and RAF fighter squadrons venture into Soviet airspace and engage Soviet air defenses in an effort to neutralize the base from which the Soviets hope to launch their planned nuclear strike on U.S. and allied ground troops marching on Dresden. The fighter raid ends in a stalemate: although half the attack force is shot down by Soviet anti-aircraft fire, the bomber field suffers damage heavy enough to force at least a postponement of the nuclear strike.

April 2^nd--Within the five-day time frame predicted by Erich Honecker’s military advisors, NATO ground troops arrive at the outskirts of Dresden. At 7:30 AM local time that morning, NATO and Communist artillery units begin exchanging broadsides and a massive air battle between NATO and Soviet fighters erupts in the skies over the city. The most intense land battle so far of the war in Europe has commenced.