...just a thought I had a work last week: what would Allied Forces Southern Europe's mission and actions be in your basic Red Storm Rising-Third World War 1985 type scenario?
Let's assume Yugoslavia goes in on the Soviet bloc.
On top of this, Italy will be a big player here, as a staging ground for incoming troops as well as counter-attacks into Yugoslavia.I doubt that the Warsaw Pact can launch an attack across the Adriatic Sea, but NATO may be able to, if they can spare the manpower. It could be worth it to keep Yugoslavia on their toes.
Edit: In RSR, didn't Greece stay out of the war?
In RSR , both Greece and Turkey remain neutral . I think that Turkey participating in WWIII opens up countless options . After all ,the U.S. can still use Suda bay regardless of what the greeks think about american military ventures, and they customarily do . Btw , does the A7 Corsair have the range to strike Sevastopol from the turkish Black Sea coast?
Nope, those birds have short legs. They could do it with a lot of tanker support but not without
I think that's one reason that the US was so happy the Turkish Air Force went with F-4s. Those things have enough mileage to get pretty far out into the Black Sea and keep any Soviet fleet/aircraft at a fair distance.
Unless, of course, they start using MiG-25s for point-and-click raids. Then something faster has to be brought in, or the Patriots and Hawks have to try and get them.
Either way, it'd be a neat scenario to have Incirlik actually being used for what it was built for.
Yeah thats sort of the problem with Syria. They HATE Turkey, but as long as they have a hostile Israel to the south its to dangerous to commit forces to Turkey.How big of an influence did the Soviets have over the Syrians in the 1980s? Is it possible to have the Syrians invading Turkey from the south alongside a Soviet invasion from the Caucasus? How successful would such an invasion be? I don't think it would be very successful if Syria was attacking alone, but if Turkey is under attack from the Caucasus and the Balkans, it could succeed.
One big question is how Israel would react. I think they would attack Syria and probably defeat them. I can't imagine the US standing by while their Middle East oil supplies are being threatened by a Soviet proxy. Depending on who sides with who in the Middle East, NATO might choose to put much of the forces it originally had earmarked for use in support of Turkey into the Middle East to protect the oil supplies, figuring that oil is more important than the Black Sea Fleet.
Yugoslavia's military doctrine was pretty much total partisan war, not so good on offense, but a pain in the ass when they are being invaded.I think it is very very unlikely Yugoslavia would side with WarPac in almost any plausible scenario in any decade of the cold war. Country would be screwed in any WWIII scenario, but still best hopes are to just scream "we are neutral" as loud as possible.
Now problems would come if one side violated that neutrality. Try to resist it and you get hammered. Try to resist them and ask assistance of opposite block, you get hammered a bit more slowly, and than nuked. Say "screw it, its not our war" and opposite Block is howling at you to do something
How big of an influence did the Soviets have over the Syrians in the 1980s? Is it possible to have the Syrians invading Turkey from the south alongside a Soviet invasion from the Caucasus? How successful would such an invasion be? I don't think it would be very successful if Syria was attacking alone, but if Turkey is under attack from the Caucasus and the Balkans, it could succeed.
In Hackett's book, Yugoslavia is invaded by the USSR resulting in a clash between US Marines and the leading Soviet troops. This in turn is the more direct cause of the invasion of Germany later. And RSR I don't think they get a mention at all. I have to agree with others that the Yugos stay out of it. There's little for them to gain from joining a NATO v Warsaw Pact war and a lot lose.
Question: Black Sea--how much do Soviets have in it? Enough for an amphibious assault on Turkey?
It looks to me like the whole front could just be an exchange of pawns if you will. It seems almost very unlikely that the Warsaw Pact could actually the straits, but I'm sure they'd still assault them because you know what they say about the best defense.