Acually given the 1970s in the Soviet Union...them having a lacking time due to the slowly festering curroption that is slowly taking hold effecting their actual abilities in the field sounds about right.
As for the rest? Most of it was probably luck and skill on that end.
Fantastic Breakdown of the War Lucasfilm started!
The funny thing about history is that it isn't realistic at times. Sometimes, history reads like a trashy novel with all the petty feuds, ridiculously inhuman feats, improbable scenarios, and such.
It's believable enough to me at the very least.
Also, I think you forgot something here.
My only reply to that.
Everything that happened in Europe from 1791, to 1815. That reads like a trashy victorian era novel, with an overpowered main charecter who can do no wrong, and taken out by his own hubris.
All true, and I suppose there's a decent chance of a lot of the stuff happening in a hypothetical war save for how the Revolution was started and the lopsided casualty ratios. But considering current events, having the Soviet Union suffer such a horrendous defeat is quite cathartic. It does help that most of the issues plaguing the Russian military and its political culture stem from stuff that originated in the 60's so the Soviets are literally dealing with the same crap plaguing Russia but instead it's against a large and well-equipped peer with the power of Magoose Dice on their side.
...So, is this gonna end up being the first recorded time where the Olympics was actually very much not worth the cost?
Cause while the cost has yet to start ballooning as much as currently, this Russian Olympics seem to be looking at having most of the world boycott it.
Technically Montreal is the first as the city would be plagued with horrendous debts for the next 30 years and the shit design of the Olympic Stadium doomed the Expos to failure. But yeah, the Moscow Games are going to be a horrendous financial loss for the Soviet Union as most of the world isn't even going to play. If not for the boycott, then most athletes probably wouldn't want to go anyways considering the plague shenanigans Magoose has hinted at going on behind the Iron Curtain.
...I'm now very upset that The Miracle on Ice isnt set to happen in this timeline.
Also, why no mention of the IRA?
Considering that America helped to deliver the greatest defeat the Soviet Union has experienced in its history that makes the Soviet-Polish War look like a papercut, not to mention the enlarged Summer Boycott, I don't think that the Soviets would be in the mood to play in America. That's not even mentioning the very hostile atmosphere present against the Communist nations as I think the Soviets would have a legitimate fear of their players being assassinated like the Israelis at Munich.
I didn't mention the IRA because I forgot, but to be honest I don't really see it being realistic for them being present in any major capacity. Firstly, I don't see why the CIA would let the IRA take a leadership role in supplying the Romanians considering this is the most important operation in the agency's history and the CIA already has cooperation with Yugoslavia, the country through which the guns are ran. So there is no gun smuggling and the IRA wouldn't have any natural motivation to actively aid Romania, or how they would make such an impact versus the American Military-Industrial complex? I would imagine the IRA's role, if any to being used as grunt labor for weapons smuggling after the Biowar and some Irish mercenaries being badasses.
Sorry brain fart.
Next turn we should be putting a lot of money into Romania via investing, maybe talk to the CIA about how to give money to support rebels in other parts of the Warsaw Pact
So think anyone can make a map how this Romania looks like?
I would hold off on investment in Romania until its confirmed the plagues are cleaned from the country and they have an official treaty with the Soviets. Also the only way Bruce is gonna fund CIA operations is through his taxes. There's absolutely no need to support rebels when the Soviets just ended the kill order. All it does is put a target on Bruce's back and there's no need to do something that the CIA can handle on their own.
My idea for Romania after the war was current Romania plus Moldova sans modern day Transinistria and the Western Odesa Oblast which comprises of the historical Romanian counties of Ismail and Cetatea Alba. The border with the Soviet Union/Ukraine would be at the Dnister river and Transinistria would probably exist here as a military district to block off Romania in a potential future war. I'll probably make a map later and a separate post describing whatever peace treaty comes.
So the Soviets are gonna have to repace those 700k soldiers and with 350k in citizens dead to infection is gonna be hard, and with a famine in the soviets and a lack of trade, they are in for a very hard time, and many more citizens are gonna died
Not to mention the PTSD and social ostracization of the veterans which OTL resulted in the high crime waves taking place in Russia in the 90s and whatever epidemic is going on in the Soviet Union as hinted by Magoose. Their demographics are certainly going to be more fucked than OTL.
I will say that when I wrote famine, I meant it to be a situation in certain regions of the Soviet Union rather than a total famine across the entire nation. Most of Ukraine's breadbasket survived the war and plague deaths mean less mouths to feed. I think you'll probably see famines in places like Siberia, Central Asia or the Caucuses but the Western Union will still have food.
