Ace Combat: Fall of an Empire

As always I hope to achieve a good story with proper material which is going to be worth the time it’s going to take to read it. This story, I’ve based in year 1984. Keeping in mind the time, which is crucial for this story, I have very carefully selected the aircraft which are authentic for the time.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

In the south/south-west region of the Verusan continent, lied a kingdom by the name Abkhazia. It was formed in the 18th century and was initially led by peacloving and just rulers. This kingdom had a total of four provinces, namely: Kaluga Oblast, Abkhaz Okrug, Romny Oblast and Sumy Oblast. Kaluga was the western province. It had a few industries. Abkhaz is where the capitol city was. The province was mostly hilly but to the east of Abkhaz Okrug, lied the Ural mountain range. They run in a N.E-S.W direction. Sumy is at the southern edge, to the northern edge are the Javordonok Highlands of Yuke. The mountains are very high, average elevation 6400 meters. The highest peak is Vorota Boha at 8610m.

File:K2 8611.jpg

A view of "Vorota Boha" from a base camp.

Sumy is a small hilly territory, very scarcely populated with average elevation of 610 meters. It's remoteness was the reason of it's unparalled beauty. Romny was mostly a farmland. It had level ground and a hand-full of towns and cities. It's long coast line had enabled it to possess several port cities. Commerce with other nations was main business. By the end ofthe 19th century, the royal family, the Shipunov family, had drowned itself in  decedancies. They no longer cared about what was going on in the kingdom. Kaluga and Abkhaz were in the depths of extreme poverty. All the land in Romny had been taken over by cruel landlords who had accumilated all the wealth of the state and the famers were going through hell. Due to carelessness and pleasure seeking attitude of the family, they had no control over the state, the landlords in their respective territories were more powerful than the king. The situation was bleak but there still was a ray of hope. In Kaluga, inspired by the socialist movement in the Kingdom of Yuke, a socialist group had formed. They repeatedly held protests and their demand was to either give the state of Kaluga autonomy or the king should step down and elections should be held for a new government that would pull the nation out of the socio-political abbyss. The group members were time and again subjected to severe attrocities and many were imprisoned and sent to correctional facilities in rural Kaluga.

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A rare photograph of prisoners of a gulag

These facilities, called GULAGS were where all prisoners eventually were sent. They were forced to do hard labour, sometimes in impossible weather conditions. Due to frequent imprisonment and faced with hardships, they were colloqually refered to as "Almazni Choloviki"(The Diamond Men) because no matter how much they went through, they did not change their political demands or affiliations.

6th March, 1907. The 11th king of Abkhazia, Viktor Shipunov fell very ill. Preparations for the crowning of the crown-prince, the king's eldest son, Viktor II were in practice. Aside from this, the youngest son, Oleksander had other plans. His father had sent him to the Kingdom of Nordennavic to study. While there he frequently heard about the shenanigins of his family back home, because of which he was repeatedly disgraced by his fellow students and teachers. It was then when he decided to change things. Since his arrival back home, he had been waiting for this very moment. Out of his personal account hired a group of Sotoan mercinaries and had his entire family killed except for his father and elder sister Anna(the king's 1st born). All of this was done very silently. He told his bed ridden father that everybody had died in a train accident on their way to a hill-station in the mountains. When questioned as to why he survived, he simply answered that he is prohibited to go in the mountains by the doctor because the thin air gives him asthma but no such case existed in reality. The dementiated father could be made to believe anything. Oleksander took care of his father for whatever little time he survived after the shock of hearing the 'family tragedy'. Once the father died, being the only male heir he was crowned the king.

Upon being crowned king, Oleksander brought about many changes. The mercinary unit he had hired, he put them on further assignments. The assignment was simple, round up all the corrupt government officers and 'liquidate' them. No case, no trial, no conviction. Once all the corrupt officers were eliminated, he put martial law into practice. Curfews were put in place. The Diamond Men did not take this lightly. To them it was another power struggle in the royal family but due to the curfews, they could not do anything. He next put his attention to the landlords. He brought down the complete wrath of the military of the kingdom down upon them. All the landlords were executed, their families exiled or put in Gulags. The state of Romny was liberated. Oleksander put his sister and only surviveing sibling as governer of Romny. He knew very well, that she would be useless as a governer, being the cocain addicted party girl she was. This entire process took nearly seven years. During this time, the king had held talks with the socialist group of Kaluga. He had requested for time.

19th Feburary, 1914. All the military activity and military force and the curfews had left the country utterly bankrupt. Oleksander had declared this in a public radio broadcast which had reached every corner of the nation. Anna Shipunova had for the time being cut back on her cocain and was a less than terrible governer. The Romnians had seen much worse than her. The Diamond Men were now losing patience, they wanted the king to step down but he stil refused to. Trying to combat the bankruptness of the country, he tapped into the offshore accounts of the members of his family and with a little string-pulling was able to get some money in. In Yuktobania, the Red Revolution had started. Oleksander remained on the throne for four years more. In the mean time he had given provincial autonomy to Kaluga to stop the socialists there breathing down his neck and had taken Abkhaz and Romny in federal constituition.

15th June, 1918. By this time, the Tsarists in Yuke had been defeated and the Union was socialist territory. In the period of 1914-1918, Abkhazia had taken several loans from many nations but was in no position to repay them. The Yukes came to the rescue but gave a condition that the kingdom would dissolve it's status as a nation and acsede to Yuktobania. If this as done all the bills of the kingdom would be met by Yuke. This caused an outrage in the country, the newspapers read "If the king wants to go, go but leave us alone". It was a tempting offer. Government officers from Yuktobania residing in Abkhaz province had calculated that the loans worth would be met by by Abkhaz province's acsession alone. This was good news. The king brought together all the adminstrative personalities of the province and declared to them that he is dividing the kingdom. All assets were to be divided. Being in autnomy, Kaluga had most things it needed but Romny wasn't. Since Abkhaz was to ascede to Yuketobania, it made no sence to keep any of the government machinery there so he figured to give it to the nations-to-be. The people responsible for the proper disturbution were all Romnians. Once they got their hands on the assets they just transferred it all to Romny. The Kalugans made a cry against the injustice that they were being subjected to but the king at this point was to depressed to care. These assets included: military equipment and personnel, government machinery, stationery, railway assets such as ownership of iron works, locomotives, bogies and garages, munition factories as well as industries of several types. Most of this was in Abkhaz, now given to Romny, none came to Kaluga. This upset the Kalugans and they were now more bitter towards the king than they ever had been. Kalugans were only left with whatever that was in their province before hand, Romny on the other hand already had a handful of ports and with this asset division, it had everything. As for Semy, nothing was decided of it, the Kalugans saw a potential for economic growth through tourism, so they requested the asset division commitee to give this virgin territory to Kaluga. They agreed but the new government in Romny had become greedy. They decided to annex it but by the time the military was mobilized Kaluga's national border had reached 66% of area of Sumy. The other 34% was annexed by Romny. This act of land grabbing would become the root of the future conflicts between the two nations.

21st August, 1918. The flag of the kingdom of Abkhazia was lowered

Romnian Flag, the plant symbolizing agriculture and the anchor portraying the vast maritime business

and the flag of the province of Romny as the national flag was hoisted at full mast above the National Assembly in Sukhumi. Romny was now a soveirgn nation with Sukhumi as it's capitol.

25th August, 1918. The flag of the kingdom of Abkhazia was lowered and the flag of the province of Kaluga

Kalugan flag. The gear represents industries, the star socialism and the colours red and white represent capitalism

as the national flag was hoisted at full mast above the Duma building in Samara. Kaluga was now a soveirgn nation with Samara as it's capitol.

3rd September, 1918. With all documentations of government's records transferred to the respective nations, the flag of the kingdom of Abkhazia was lowered and the Union Jack of the Union of Yuktobania was hoisted. The royal palace was converted to provincial Kremlin. The king takes one last look at his palace, it's gardens, all the expensive accessories which now were being removed and moved to the national treasury in Cinigrad. He steps onto the horse carriage acompanied by his sister. Once seated he slowly removes his crown and detaches his sword from his belt and hands the two to the cold faced government employee standing beside the carriage. The employee gives the signal to the driver and with the flick and crackle of the whip, the carriage moves, enroute to a rather humble domicile that the government had gifted the man with. Oleksander continues his stare at the palace as the trotting of the horse-shoes becomes the dominant noise in his surroundings and soon the carriage exits the palace gates. A feeling of loss overwhelms him and he looks to his sister for comfort but she, as usual, is too stoned to notice the drastic change in their lives. Oleksander and Anna live the remainder of their lives as average citizens in a town in the Javordonok highlands of Yuktobania.

SITUATION AFTER INDEPENDENCE

Kaluga:

Being a socialist state from the begining, Kaluga after independence tread the same path as before. Being socialist, it obviously was in the good graces of Yuktobania and in the 1920s, the latter had helped the nation to get up on it's feet. Almost all of the military technology was taken from Yuke but it also managed to be at good terms with Osea as in the same timeframe, all things automotive were imported from Osea, making Kaluga a very important customer for Osea. Contracts of technology transfer were made in the late 1940s from which both the nations profited much. After that imports decreased as Kaluga had it's own car plants of Osean companies such as Chrysler Corp and Chevrolet. Kaluga tried for good neighbourly relations with all it's neighbours but with Romny it was always difficult as the matter of disputed land of Semy acted as the bone of contention. Kaluga had found an ally in Sotoa and the two nations were very close. Sotoa had obtained technology from the UYR and made it's own versions of Yuke military hardware such as planes and battle tanks. Obtaining these machines from Sotoa was much cheaper than to buy directly from Yuke so Kaluga became Sotoa's largest military hardware importer. Sotoa had a large textile industry but did not have enough adequate land to produce that much cotton crop but Kaluga had no shortage of fertile land. Kaluga exported a large sum of cotton, fertilizers and cement to Sotoa. Other than Sotoa, Kaluga diversified it's military by operating western technology.

The first Mirage IV delivered to Kaluga, photographed here making a pass at the Kremlin in the capitol.

An agreement with Dassault Aviation was made to purchase 35 Mirage IIIs, 12 Mirag F1s and 2 Mirage IVs in 1960 and the deal went underway without hassle. In the 1950s, Kaluga's economy had slowed down because of several reasons which were mainly caused by the hard socialist policy so a change in policy was made and after that Kaluga was known as a Socio-Capitalist economy as private owner ship of firms was allowed. Any firm whose annual income exceded 1 million Lorzes, the government would buy 35%-45% of the shares. To the ones who did not make 1 million or more per anum, they were left as is. On 15th December, 1967 a Boeing 707 of Kaluga International Airlines suffered from a bird strike after take off from Chernihiv Airport. The airport was located outside the city and close to Chernihiv Industrial Complex. The jet was at maximum takeoff weight and could not fly on 3 engines. The fuel-loaded jet crashed into the LavrovTM copper plant, causing a massive fire. The method of refining copper used then was such that it produced very large amount of SO2 gas which is extremely harmful, though a simple method was used to eliminate it. The inside of the chimneys of the plant were filled with a mesh coated with Lime(CaO­). The lime would react with the sulfur dioxide to make calcium sulfite(CaSO3) which would then react with atmospheric oxygen to make calcium sulfate(CaSO­4­). The calcium sulfate produced would then be transfered to cement plant in the same complex. The copper plant ultimately collapsed, releasing a mammoth amount of SO2 in the air. All towns in a 25 mile radius had to be evacuated, the largest being Chernihiv. All the military and paramilitary forces were put into action. Everything was employed to transport civilians away from the fumes. Firefighters and waterdumper aircraft were employed to spray water on the copper plant to keep it from releasing more of the toxic gas. 513 people died that day with nearly 6000 families displaced. The cost of rehabilitating the refugees was taken out of the military budget, which would in the future become a hindrance in the military modernisation of Kaluga. During the days of the in which the 'Lavrov Disaster' occured, talks were being held with the Sotoan government for the finalising of a contract through which Kaluga would buy 300 J-7 aircraft to replace the ageing fleet of J-6s in 27 months as well as importing 34 Su-20s from Sukhoi. A contract of ship building was due to be signed with Belka in which the two nations would collaborate in a venture to manufacture 10 Naval vessels with state of the art systems at the shipyard in the Anfang sea. A deal of collaboration had already been signed and was in effect with Clavis on building a dam in the mountains on the Don river. Because of this tragedy, and the money used to rehabilitate the refugees, all these contracts had to be cancelled except the one with Clavis, as it already had begun. The massive defecit in the military budget lead to military cuts. Many pilots from the air force were honourably discharged and the maintainence crews pays were cut. The J-6s were maintained and the whole fleet remained. In the Army, older tanks were broken down and the equipment sold to various businesses but mostly it just went to scrap. Whatever money that was obtained by the their sale was used in the maintanence of newer model tanks. As for the Navy and Coast Guard, the CG's administration was removed and the unit was brought under the Navy in an attempt to reduce costs. Out of the 8 helicopters that belonged to the CG, 6 were bidded off to rich buyers around the world. Money from this sale was put in use to maintane the ageing Naval vessels and the CGs hovercraft. The years of 1968-71 were very difficult. During '72, things started to normalize again. All the gas from the CIC had dispersed and the complex was running again. Chernihiv, after extensive rebuilding was rehabilitated. Pressure from the public decreased as rebuilding tax was cut from prices of all things. The deals that had been canceled were negotiated again. 180 J-7s were bought from Sotoa. The ship-building deal with Belka was revisited in '73 and it was agreed the programme would construct 7 ships, 4 of Kaluga, 3 of Belka. The plan of 34 Su-20s was changed to 10 Su-20s and 10 Su-24s, with the latter being divided into 3 of the maritime defence variant, 3 of the strike variant, 3 of recon and 1 of jammer. On the other than,

A standard Yak-9 racer in race colours.

Kaluga had come up with a rather crafty idea. The government had ordered 6 Yak-9U racer airframes along with 8 airframes of the Il-10 from a private manufacturer in Osea. All 14 airframes arrived in '74. In the mean time they had orderd from Rolls Royce 14 turboprop engines that were sterdy, had an endurance of atleast 30 hours and a minimum power production of 3000 shp. These airframes were married with the engines from RR, designated 'Crow' and yielded a brilliant combination. The aircraft produced by this programme were know as Yak-9UJP and Il-10JP,

A standard Il-10. c.1940s.

JP standing for jet powered. They were put in CAS(close air support) roles. With much higher power rating, these aircraft had a much better power-weight ratio. Increased power meant a much higher payload capability and no dependancy on AvGas as they ran on jets, could use regular jet petroleum. With their jet engines, the pilots of these planes could do things they could not imagine doing in the piston powered relatives of the same aircraft. Acceleration, top speed, service cieling, MTOW, range, all had increased considerably. These JP models proved deadly in CAS roles, especially the Il-10s. Designed as an attack aircraft, it's lethality with the new design increased 5 fold. Being bigger and heavier, it was not as fast as the Yak-9UJP, but coud carry more bombs, had increased range, could carry more ammunition for it's canons and the rear gunner could use modern guns. All of this joined in to make, as it was nick-named by the military personnel, "Destruktor".The Yak-9UPJs were nick-named "Yaskraviy", owing to their sheer agility and speed for a propeller plane. Employing these aircraft removed the neccesity of owning strike helicopters. The Mil Mi-17s, all were now used for transport only and their role as strike helicopter was removed. The rocket launchers of these copters were employed in the Il-10s and the Yak-9s

Romny:

Romny after independance was off to a rough start. It had the unfortunate geography to have a very long border with Verusa. Verusa, in the '20s was a kingdom, and the current king was not a big fan of the Kingdom of Abkhazia, especially with the Romny Oblast. This was due to the landlords and their attrocities. Farmers with their families and livestock had regularly started to come in his territory. A few families, not a problem, but with everyone trying to evade the landlords' wrath, they had nowhere else to go. A point came when border guards started to chase away farmer caravans back into Romny. Moreover, when Oleksander waged his "anti-landlord" war, it didn't take long for the conflict to spill into Verusan territory and it wasn't long before clashes between Abkhazian search parties and border patrols started to occur, as time and again they would move into Verusa tracking ecapee landlords. Long story short, the province of Romny had been a nuisance to Verusa for a long time. After independance, Verusa put claim on several territories of Romny, mostly at the north-eastern edge of the country.In 1959, Verusa became a republic after the King declared elections. Taking advantage of the time Romny amassed forces near the border on which Verusa had claims and violated it at a few points. This lead to serious border clashes between the two but Romny ended up gaining a few square miles of land but completely ruined it's prospects of friendly relations with Verusa's new governance. The small Republic of Valga, bordering Romny at the latter's south-eastern edge, a landlocked country needed a port to trade with other nations around the globe, so in 1955, the two nations signed an agreement of making four rail lines that would bring goods to the port cities of Romny. The rail line by lied mostly in Romny and very little in Valga, so Valga proposed that most of the building cost should be met by Romny, in turn, when the goods left the country, they could a add higher duty tax to be paid from nations who were buying the goods but they refused and forced that the cost should get divided 50-50. Under economic pressure, Valga reluctently agreed. Hard feelings were bound to rise. Moreover, Romny frequently blocked payments to Valga for the goods sold internationally, making a payment gap in that would cause delays in manufacturing, especially for state owned enterprises. This ultimately led to Valga making a poll station at the border, at which Romny would first pay for all the goods and then sell them as their own. This made a very large profit margin for Romny as they could sell at whatever price they wanted to, but atleast there were no payment gaps. Valga owned the locomotives that carried the goods to the ports so she demanded that Romny should pay rent as after the poll station the goods were paid for by the latter but she refused to do so and threatened Valga that they could detain their locomotives if they wanted to. Not trusting Romny with it's locomotives all the goods were transfered from Valgan trains to Romnian ones at the poll station, which decreased the trade volume by half and added the price of transfer, which drastically increased final buying price, hence this action had international effects. This was not a good sign as Romny had an increasing number of neighbours that didn't like her. Clavis was the only country in the neighbourhood with which Romny was at good terms with, beause there was a highway which went from Clavis to Romny since the time of the Kingdom, so trade just went on as before. Clavis had vast oil reserves and a pipe line was contructed in 1949 parallel to the highway, providing much needed hydrocarbon fuel to her neighbour in the north. Clavis lacked a properly developed agriculture so Romny provided it essential crops as well as it's expertise in the field while an integrated lined-canal system was laid down in the zones which were not oil rich. The canals were to be fed by a barrage on the Kalamutna river, which flows all the way from the Ural mountains, fed by the Holilid glacier.

At first Romny set out to be a socialist nation but progressively tranformed into a capitalist as the economy grew and stabalized. Being a capitalist in the Eastern block, Osea was quick to make her an ally. Transfer of technologies in all fields commenced almost instantaneously, although Romnians prefered Belkan and Nordennavic made cars. Soon, the two nations were signing pacts of commerce and defence. All military hardware of Romny, from pistols to interceptors, came from Osea. Lisenced factories manufacturing M-16 rifles and tanks as well as strategic ammunition such as anti-ship missiles, helicopter parts and guidance chips of missiles and smart bombs. Osea also sold to Romny naval vessels. The year if 1976 proved to be the biggest in terms of commerce and by the end of 1979, Romny had all the latest western technology except for nuclear.

THE NEUTRAL ZONE TREATY OF 1978 AND CONSEQUENT EVENTS

Since the time of independance, the border between Romny and Kaluga over the higher Urals was hypothesised to run along the tallest peaks, but due to the extreme altitude and weather conditions, no side could put up a base camp or even patrols to make it official, but a mineral dicovery would change everything. On 17th March 1975, Sotoan petrochemical scientist discovered a very large deposite of iron-ore lying under the mountains when they were on a discovery expedition for minerals. This news spread like wild fire. This ore deposite ran most of the length of the mountains and was unevenly distributed, in parts it lied more in Kaluga and in parts more in Romny. Since the Ural range also bordered Yuktobania, a feeling of insecurity rose in the region as no nation could stack up against the superpower to the north. The only problem was, that due to the altitude, there was no way to mine this mineral directly above it, on the mountain sides. It turned into a waiting game, all parties waiting for a technological breakthrough in mining engineering. Romny made an attempt to buy the technology used by Nordennavic to mine in it's arctic regions but failed as that tech could make mining in sub-zero conditions possible but did nothing to help with the thin air at the altitude. Further more, a change in government also added to the failure, as the new government had different economic policies. There was though, another way; to shaft mine to the ore deposite. This was to be done by digging massive, horizontal tunnels from the lower Urals, where the conditions were more tollerable, but this required ultra-heavy machinery and huge amounts of man-power. More over, it was a huge risk. The whole tunnel could could just collapse, trapping and killing whoever is in there, and then there was the environmental damage. It was estimated that a semi-cylindrical tunnel from the nearest point to the ore that provided year-round mining conditions would be 4.77Km long and a whopping 367,142.225 cubic meters of earth and rock would have to be displaced. If the cost to remove 1 cubic meter of earth was to be 400.35 Zollars, the mining alone would cost more than 146.7 million Zollars, the ventilation shafts(which would be neccesary in a tunnel this length) along with workers residence, wage, provisions, medical facilities and equipment would easily mount above 900 million. Failure in this venture meant certain economic recesstion. Since there was no practical mining method, the respective parties tried to sort out the best possible spots in the mountains via aerial: thermal and magnetic mapping. A flurry of intercepts on all sides followed the discovery soon after. The first reported one was a Romnian E-2 being intercepted by a Yuktobanian MiG-21 on 3rd June of the same year as the discovery.

A RF-104G of the Luftwaffe, similar to the one shot down.

 8th June, a Romnian RF-104G, a recon variant of the F-104G, was intercepted by a Kalugan J-6B at an altitude of 10,400m, very close to the mountain peaks. The RF-104G pilot upon noticing the J-6, tried to make a run for it despite several warning calls made by the interceptor's pilot, but this move proved fatal for the Starfighter, as the pilot of the J-6 was notorious for being ruthless in the entire air force. As soon as the Starfighter hit afterburner, the interceptor switched to K-13 heatseaker missile and within a second the missile came of the rail. Moments later there was an explosion and the turbine parts of the GE J79 were flying around, with the fire in the cumbustor exposed, being trailed by a thick line of soot. The pilot ejected and landed on a mountain peak, from where he managed to make his way down to his country. The wreck of the Starfighter was recovered, the camera was broken but the disc was intact and the photographs recovered showed that the plane wasn't scouting for possible excavation sites but was thermally imaging the mountains, looking for any military presence. It almost seemed as Romny was prepairing to claim the mountains. This event seriously escalated the tension between the already bitter neighbours. The following month was a frenzy of beaurocratic squabling and more intercepts on all three sides with aircraft shot down on all sides, but the number of loss was bigger for Romny. Many of the shoot-downs were done by the same notorious Kalugan pilot as before. The list went as follows:

Kaluga vs Romny

• Su-20, shot at with canon by a F-15A, escaped.

• Su-24, recon variant. Shot down by a MIM-23B. Pilot and co-pilot killed.

• J-6T, two-seat trainer variant of J-6. Violated airspace, forced to land at Anaklia Air Base.

• Mirage IV, intercepted and fired at by a F-16A with AIM-7. Damage due to shrapnel. Returned to base.

• Il-2 Destruktor. Flew 3km into Romnian airspace. Hi-res camera in place of rear turret. took pictures of mining operation. Incident proved to be an example of military lapse as no one noticed except for an AA unit in the mountains. Attempted radio contact, warning shots fired. Plane returned unharmed.

Kaluga vs Yuktobania

• J-7, border patrol accidentally crossed into Yuke airspace. Intercepted by a Su-15. Pilot allowed to return after being escorted to a base and landing. Aircraft returned three days later.

• Il-18, commercial airliner mistaken to be a recon aircraft. Intercepted by a MiG-21. MiG disengaged after confirmation.

Romny vs Kaluga

• RF-104G, intercepted by a J-6. Shot down by a sidewinder. Pilot survived and escaped, aircraft debris recovered.
• RF-104G, intercepted by a J-6. Left wing damaged by canon fire. Aircraft crashed in the mountains. The pilot was imprisoned.
• E-2, intercepted by a J-6, rotating dome and parts of tail damaged by canon fire. Was enroute to a base in Romny when hydraulics failed. Crashed 2.2km from runway. All occupants survived.
• C-141, spotted circling close to the border and dropping large crates. Warned of close proximity to border 34 times before being shot down by two S-125s upon violation.
• 2x F-4E Phantom IIs. Pair intercepted by a J-6 and Mirage F1. Dog fight ensued in which the Mirage F1 was shot down by AIM-9s from the F-4Es, of which one would be shot down by a K-13 of the J-6 and the other critically damaged by the canon fire.
• AH-1 attack helicopter. Crossed border in region of southern Semy. Kalugan soldiers claim the aircraft fired it's guns at APCs there. Heli was shot at using anti-tank rifles by foot soldiers. It suffered from moderat fuselage damage and while making it's way back to the border, crashed into forest due to fog. Both occupants died.
• C-130, violated airspace in northern Sumy, near the higher mountains. Intercepted by a Yak-9 Yaskraviy. C-130 refused to leave airspace so the Yak-9 opened fire with it's 6 .50 cal canons causing severe damage to port wing and horizontal stabilizers. Aircraft went into uncontrolable spin and crashed. No survivors. Investigation revealed 12 people in civil cloathing onboard possessing rare communication equipment. Spies.

Romny vs Yuktobania

• E-2, crossed into Yuke airspace cruising at 6000m. Intercepted by a MiG-21 patroling the area. Forced to land.
• Martin RB-57F. Detected flying inside airspace at 19,000m. Shot down by a S-125. No survivors.
• RB-47, detected at 10,000m and shot down by S-125. No survivors.
• RC-135, detected at 15,000m. Intercepted by a MiG-25P of 9th Air Division, 1st Interceptor squadron Voyna Sokol. Shot down by a R-40R missile which crippled the vertical stabilizer. Aircraft crashed in an open field. 24 out of 27 on board died.
• Low flying RF-4E in a valley. Shot down by Strela-3 man portable missils. Pilot and navigator survived. Both imprisoned and were released in '83.
• F-14, flying on a recon mission. Fifteen  57mm rounds fired by a ZSU-57-2 impacted the starboard side of plane, rupturing the combustor and causing a fire and hydraulic failure. Pilot and navigator ejected but pilot died. Navigator was searched for over 3 weeks but found dead in a forest. Was killed by a wolf.

Yuktobania vs Kaluga

• MiG-25RB, crossed border at 17,000m in the north-eastern sector, then increased altitude to 20,000m and chose a south-bound trajectory. Upon it's enclosing to the border a pair of J-7s was deployed to intercept but could not make up the 2,300m difference due to it's service ceiling of 17,500m. The MiG's position was transfered to SAM batteries and two S-125s were fired at it. The MiG managed to escape the missiles and flew into Romnian airspace where it took the airforce by surprise and then flew back to it's country.
• M-55, sent on a weather recon mission(with permission) in the northern sector to study the effects of the recent military presence on the air quality. Altitude for this mission was set at 8,600m. Faulty navigation and fog led him into a no-fly zone in the mountains. Having lost contact with his instructor in Yuke and ignoring the warnings of ground units he was tracked and shot at by radar assisstance by a GDF-001 anti-air gun unit. The pilot, Sergei Lazarov managed to crash-land his plane and escape, only to be found by gulag police officers patrolling the area. The aircraft recovered was demanded back immediately by Yuktobanian authorities due to the fear of sensitive technology being leaked out but the Kalugans kept it for over six months, reverse manufacturing the plane entirely. This led to a short time of sour relations between the two nations. The consequent effects of reverse manufacturing the M-55 would lead to intense tension in the region of southern Verusan continent.

Yuktobania vs Romny

• MiG-25RB, was detected flying inside Kalugan airspace, being followed by a pair of J-7s of Kalugan Air Force. Crossed into airspace suddenly at 20,000m, flying at Mach 2. 3rd Air Division, 18th Interceptor Squadron, Khanjali was scrambled to intercept. The party of four F-104Gs reached the altitude, but could not catch up. The Foxbat simply accelerated to Mach 2.5 and escaped.

SIGNING OF THE TREATY AND FOUNDING OF THE UMC

All the intercepts mentioned above took place between 1975-77, the last of which was the shooting down of the Romnian C-130 by the Yak-9 on 2nd December, '77, a day after the MiG-25RB incident between Kaluga and Yuktobania. The shoot down of the C-130 was a turning point because the recovery of the bodies of the spies was a very sensitive moment. Romny's international image was tarnished by the event. By this time the air force was under great pressure in the north of the country, so the army decided to bombard strategic locations inside the Kalugan side of Semy to releive some of that pressure. On 5th December, the artillery units fired several rounds just before dawn across the border into Kaluga. 11 soldiers were reported killed and another 2 injured. In response the Kalugan Army launched one 9K52 ballistic missile, armed with a high explosive, fragmentation(HE-F) warhead at a military outpost near the Sumy town of Tevali killing 6 soldiers and injuring 38 more, along with fatal damage to most of the army vehicles there. A pair of M60 tanks came close to the border and were fired at by Kalugan border patrols with RPG-7s. The tanks fired back at the soldiers, to which the soldiers called for air support and consequently the tanks were attacked by a Destruktor plane, taking them both out and the pilot ventured on further to attack a reinforcement that was headed to the border where the M60s were. All of these events took place in extreme close chronological proximity to eachother and by Christmas of '77, the neighbours were on the brink of war. To stop the situation from ascelating further and the break out of a full blooded war, Sotoa called the two nations to a neutral location for peace talks. Hoffnung city of Belka was chosen. Yuktobania and Osea were also called. On 31st December, at 1700 hours, the premiers of the five nations met in Hoffnung, in an expensive hotel hall, hosted by the interior minister of Belka. Things were a bit tense in the room. With the Cold War going on between the two superpowers as well as Osea's sentiments over the Belkan annexation of Recta, not to mention the frowned faces of the premiers from the post-Abkhaz nations. The talks proceeded and as the time progressed and the whisky started to flow, things cooled down a notch or two. The discussion over the hostilities over the Urals concluded that all three nations were to exploit the natural resource fairly, peacefully and sustainably. Damage to the environment could have disasterous results for all three parties involved in the conflict. A resolution was made such that:

1. The ore deposite would be mined privately rather than federally, hence eliminating military tensions.
2. The shares of investment and profit would be 33% to each of the neighbours, namely: Kaluga, Romny and Yuktobania with the remaining 1% going to Belka.
3. The shares of the holders would be owned by a private organization or a group of private organizations from the respective country in such a way, that to complete their respective share percentages.
4. The percentage ownership of shares would not, under any circumstances change for any share holder.
5. If a party elects to leave, a party must be there to replace the leaving party, such that the new partner would have the same percentage share as the former.
6. Shares of a party would not be, in any way or circumstance be bought by or sold to one or more of the existing partners.
7. The Ural mountains would become a politically neutral zone, with none of the governments among the three neighbours having any influence; not political, not civil nor military, over the region.
8. The above point applies to all elements, internal and external of the treaty.
9. The neutral zone would begin from an elevation of 6500m on all sides. Altitude higher than this would be neutral territory. Any civil or military instalments at or above the stated altitude of any party should be removed before the treaty is in effect. The failure to do so will give the UN the right to confiscate equipment of any nature and deport, detain or even incarcerate personnel. This applies to both: civil and military personnel.
10. In the event of an accident, any military aircraft providing aid will not be allowed to remain in the Neutral Zone for more than the time required for an air-drop. If aircraft has to land, it will not be allowed to remain on airfield for more than five hours. If it remains for more than five hours the aircraft will be confiscated by the UN from the country it belongs to. An aircraft seen flying after making an airdrop will be deserving of strict action.
11. Rules for aircraft belonging to private organizations are the same as in point number 10.
12. At normal times, the Neutral Zone will allow commercial aircraft to fly over but wil be a no-fly-zone for military aircraft of all nations unless a permit has been given by all the parties of the treaty at least 24 hours before the fly-over. Any military plane flying over without permission will be shot down by any one of the partners' air defence, from within their respective borders.
13. An elevation below the stated neutral territory boundary inside the neutral area will also be a part of the Neutral Zone, hence under no political, civil, military or cultural influence of any party, internal or external.
14. Should a situation in which an external party tries to take control of, or influence the activity inside the Neutral Zone by any means arise, all parties in the treaty will jointly counter the effects of any such practice of the foreign party.
15. Borders of the neighbouring parties, namely: Kaluga, Yuktobania and Romny will now be at the 6500m elevation, higher and beyond from which in any direction will be the Neutral Zone until a final decent to 6500m occurs, beyond which will be the other neighbouring party.

There were a few objections raised on point number four and five due to the never ending possibility of economic destability. These points in the resolution did not give any party the freedom to sell it's shares to an outside party, should a time of money shortage arise. To this it was decided that if such a position occurs, the future actions could be decided by holding another meeting in that time.

What had started out as a bone of contention had now been converted into a peaceful and prosperous business oppurtunity. The board of share holders was named as the Ural Mining Councel(UMC). The board members were people from private companies from the three neighbours and the Government of Belka owned the other 1%. A small flat piece of land, like a plateau lied within the mountains at an elevation of 4961m, which was a low enough altitude to mine from and had been the main target for reconasence until now. The trouble was that most of this flat land was covered by lake Baikalsky, which would freez over in winter and would not completely thaw until the very peak of summer. Moreover the lake would not get enough sunshine due to being surrounded by mountains on all sides, making the corresponding area very cold, even in the summer the place held an uncomfortable chill. The UMC adressed this issue after all of the had recovered from the hangover from the new year's party, for which all had commented,"Belkans know how to party". It was decided that a dam would have to be built on the source of the river to stop the lake from forming, then the frozen water would have to be melted and it would descend down easily. The dam would need to have special outlets to let the water flow out during spring and summer. Easier said than done. It was decided to get this plan in effect immediately as the winter allowed to not have the nuisance of melting snow and ice, hence no flowing water but building the dam at that altitude was no easy task. The cruel and unforgiving Ural winter along with the altitude and wind corridors would make a special little hell for the workers of the dam. The engineers would have to work during long nights as days were short, but with terrible visibility as the fog covered the place most of the time. Snow storms were common and tempratures would go as down as -35 'C and with the wind chill factor it would go down to -60'C. These things were being discussed on 1st January, 1979. The mountains were at their worst in January. Special cold resistant technology would be needed for this plan to become a success. Moreover, the housing for the engineers had to be super-insulated. Conventional power generation would be useless at those altitudes so it was decided to take turbine power into use. It would be more efficient at those heights and keep within the required environmental parameters but it was also to keep in mind that that the turbines were not all that were producing power as they too were on their own level damaging to nature and the technology was by no means cheap. As a solution to this wind turbines were agreed upon to make use of the gusting winds of the narrow wind corridors within the the mountains. Poor light conditions called for large artificial lights. The damn had to be made fast. If the contruction began in February it had to be completed by June. This was the hardest hurdle so far. It needed a special fast-setting, water proof cement. The answer came from close by. A fast setting cement had been devloped in Recta and the technology was then seized by Belka upon the prior's invasion. The name was Eagle Cement. It set three times faster than conventional cement. During all of this, one thing had been completely ignored: how to get this stuff there. This fundamental question was raised by the the Sotoan premiere just when all were rejoicing, thinking they had solved the problems. This questions quitened them down. It would be absolute suicide to send the workers and engineers there to make their housing themselves and construct the power generation. The cold would kill them. There was no possibility of a rail transport neither of by road. The only solution was to send these things ready-made to the engineers there. Sotoa was expert in ready-made and after it was decided as to what and how, the proceduers began, faster than expected. 22nd January was luckily a clear day on the Baikalsky Plain. The wind was calm and the sun was out, the frozen lake glimmered like a pearl, which would earn it's nickname "Perlyna" and the lake behind the Baikal Dam would then be named as such. The initial team was of 100 men, all civil engineers, architects and technical staff. All of them had been crammed into an An-22 heavy lifter plane of the military transport wing of Kaluga's army. Most of these men were in their thirties and had well established jobs at the firms they worked at, the same firms that had sent them here. Most came from Belka, then Yuktobania. Kaluga had around 22 men with Romny having 10. There were a few veterans with experience exceeding 25 years, but no rookies. Minimum experience for job application was 5 years. They weren't normal enginners and architects, they had been trained by Osean marines for two weeks to make them fit enough to survive the mountains. They were equipped with their tools, wearing helmets and breathing masks inside the plane, listeneing to the rear doors open. It was as if there was a technical and design war that had to be won. Upon the signal of the crewmen, the men jumped off the plane, group by group. The plane was cruising at 6,700m due to the target of the drop being at more than 4,900m. 6,700m was way more than the usual altitude of 3000m for an average paradropping. The men descended in their parachutes, as they landed they quickly removed their chutes and put them to one side and started to shovel off snow in a long line, as if to make a make shift runway. Soon the icey field started to look some what like a runway. The engineers had planted red flares along it's length to act as landing lights. Soon a fimiliar hum of the Ivchenko AI-20 turboprop engines was heard and a pair of An-12

An-12 turboprop transport aircraft.

aircraft becam visible. The Antonovs had been fit with customised landing gear to land on ice. One plane after another landed and their unloading progressed immediately. One plane was carrying ready-made housing for the engineers which was made out of old shipping containers. They had been insulated redundantly to protect from the brutal cold. The other plane was carrying two power generators. The expensive turbine technology used gave it the luxury of being handled politely, unlike the housing. A turboshaft modified version of the RR Tyne turboprop engine was used as the power source. The power production had been increased from 6,100shp to 6,250shp and were made multi-fuel capable. Special 'hush-kits' were installed to supress the characteristic whining of the turbines. The exhaust ports were specially made to be able to be connected to pipes to use the hot exhaust gasses to heat up the water for bathing and other purposes, increasing the overall efficiency of the operation. Each power unit was a complete set; it had the engine, the comutator, the starter and an inbuilt fuel tank with an exterior cap for filling. These planes soon took off, keeping within the five hour limit. They had come with extra fuel to make the journey back. Another pair of An-12s arrived twenty minutes later. In the mean time the engineers had started to put the equipment together. The other planes landed. One came with the water tanks and plumbing neccessities while the other brought another housing unit, a small crane and a tractor with a pulley. Being made of shipping containers, the housing units ere quickly placed on a hill side after the place had been leveled out by the tractor. The water tanks were hi-tech. They had an inbuilt thermometer and barometer with digital displays on the outside. They already had a pipe that ran through their lengths and came out the other side with an upward right angle for the expulsion of the jet exhaust. Each pipe connecting the power units with the tanks had a shunt valve, to be able to control the amount of hot gasses going through the tank, hence controlling the temprature of water. These pipes themselves were insulated. The shunt valve had a stove structure above it, to be able to use as an outdoor stove for various purposes in the time of gas shunting during the short spells of good weather. The lake was still frozen, which was an oppurtunity to get ahead of the weather and start the construction of the Baikal Dam. Before this could be done more equipment and men were needed. This initial group, named group Alpha was assigned to establish the base of all construction. This group had com prepaired to melt the lake. Men with pick axes started to breal out the ice at the base of the lake where the water would flow out of during summer, while another batch started to put up wooden blockades at where the river came into the cavity to form the lake. Once the men had cleared the flow out region, high power halogen lamps were connected directly to a power unit and a massive 2000W light was focused at the exit. Powdered coal was put in the lit region, it absorbed the heat making the melting faster. They were also equiped with aviation grade anti-freez, which they childishly spilled on the lake. Soon the men found themselves making a small river at -17 'C. Within six hours all the ice had been melted and the lake bed was visible. In the mean time two more An-12s and An-22s each had passed from above, delivering the essentias for the contruction of a simple airdrome, more construction machinery, the Rectan cement and food. An outline of a runway was made after the lake bed had been flattened using the tractor and the rollers provided by the later airdrops. No water was to be allowed on the surface, so a few men were seen carrying propane tanks with lit flames walking around the lake bed, drying out as much water as possible. Cement was mixed and soon layed out, meter by meter on the runway outline until the whole length was covered. In the extreme cold and due to the properties of the cement it set over night. All the math and physics had been played out in the planning room, this was simply the practicle. the runway was capale of holding the weight of a fully loaded medium to heavy lift aircraft. Progress kept on going from that day onward and the rate was especially fast after the airdrome was complete. A small tower was made as watch tower. Radios installed but without a radar. behind it were the ready-made houses and the power units, of which one more had arrived, totalling to three PUs. Large light panels with effecient light bulbs were installed in the whole place to compensate for the lack of sunshine. The cement runway was smothened, painted and fit with landing lights. The men working there now amounted to 334, with architects being replaced by engineers and labourers once the designs were finalized. These men lived like brothers. Helping, co-operating, laughing, telling tales of home and living together. No one would beleive if they were told that not too long ago, the three countries these men belong to were on the brink of war. By 21st May, '78, the dam was complete, with all cementing done and the outflows which lead the water straight out to it's exit point from the lake area, by-passing the lake bed where the UMC settlement was situated.

On 14th June, '78, the UMC officially started to mine the iron ore there. It was a great day with dignitaries from all parties of the UMC's governments along with famous celebrities and singers had come to celebrate the day, unfortunately an unexpected thunderstorm put a stop on all celebration and placed an unpleasant cold spell on the place, forcing all the people to leave except the miners, who would now be running this place. They would have four month long shifts, with four months off and the cycle would go on.

THE PHEONIX MISSILE CRISIS AND MILITARY SATURATION IN THE REGION (1979-1984)

February, 1979.

A socialist government took power in Romny. The government came under unusual circumstances because the Romnian people were capitalist minded, but the previous government had many scandals. As soon as the government came socialist policies were put into place, industries were nationalized and economy went into a down turn, but due to like mindedness of the new politicians with the government in Kaluga, talks for the solving of various issues commenced immediately. The issue of Sumy was discussed and many other border disputes along with it. This was the start of a brief period of good relations between the otherwise bitter neighbours. The two nations discussed comercial relations and it was agreed upon to trade various chemicals from Kaluga and modern farming equipment from Romny. The economy slowly started to pick up in Romny. Education and health care were free and indiscriminant, the rich and the poor read the same, ate the same and wore the same. A sense of equality came over the people, the situation seemed nice for all. Agro production increased by many percent as the farmers were now given greater subsidies and seeds along with fertilizer became more available. Export of these products and derived products brought new properity to the people.

8th September, 1980.

Kaluga sucessfully conducted a missile test in the Mul sea, south of the country. The missile was named

The very first Feniks missile at launch.

Feniks. It had a three stage rocket booster, at 36m long and 3m in diameter with a maximum launch weight of 210,000Kg and a range of 16,000Km, it was a full sized ICBM. At the launch site, foreign dignitaries were present including high ranking officials from Osea, Romny, Yuktobania, Nordennavic and Belka. The facility was somewhere in the Lower Urals, in the province of Tartarstan, in Salimov Dam, named after the chief architect Arslan Salimov. The entire area is strictly restricted and is a no-fly zone, the same area where a Yuktobanian weather jet was shot down in September 1977. Kaluga then started to advertise this new missile as a potential satelite carrier to other nations and a few of them were even considering to place orders. The Romnian opposition party was the only one to recognize the weapon potential of such a thing. Protests started to happen in the nation to put pressure on the government to realize this potential and do something to counter it. Osea was quick to respond to the situation in Romny and special consideration was given to this new agenda. Up till now, nothing too serious had occured.

15th December, 1980.

Kalugan premier, Vasili Borislov filed a patent in the UN for the transfer of nuclear power generation technology from Yuktobania. When this patent was revealed in public, the opposition in Romny became very concerned about the situation as Kaluga already had an ICBM and was now filing for nuclear technology transfer. Sotoa was in favour of the situation and promoted the idea of nuclear generation in Kaluga. The opposition in Romny played up dirty politics and caused severe rioting and propaganda against the socialist government there in an attempt to secure power and be able to counter this new development in their neighbour to the west but the situation went out of hand and things got very unpleasant. Being a socialist nation, Osea could not allow Kaluga to proceed with this venture and slowly, steadily political pressure was mounted on Kaluga. Kaluga was persistant that this technology would only be used for power generation and kept pressing that they wanted to stay 'nuclear free' and a peaceful nation. Yuktobania was silent in the matter. Despite the pressure, Kaluga got the go-ahead for the technology transfer from the UN. This made things escalate very quickly.

28th December, 1980.

Yuktobania refused to transfer technology to Kaluga in fear of ruining political relations with the Western block. A pact was signed in the Kalugan coastal city of Kazan stating that the socialist nations of the world, primarily Yuktobania's immediate neighbours will co-exist in peace and social harmony and the difficulties of one nation will be dealt with by all. Similarly the objective of one nation will be considered an objective to all. This pact was basically made as an open vista for Sotoa to transfer it's technology in the field of nuclear power generaion to Kaluga.

8th January, 1981.

Despite severe political pressure from Osea and her allies, Kalugan premier Borislov signed a contract of transfer of technology of nuclear power with the Sotaon PM in the capitol city of Guanzhou. As a result of this the Osean President made a 3-hour-long phone call to Borislov after the latter had returned to his country. Throughout the call the President told Borislov the consequences of nuclear technology and it's adverse effects on the nation's economy as well as the threat of developing nuclear arms and falling into conflict. At the same time the Kalugan premier kept explaining to the President why the nation needed such technology. He explained a lot of statistics regarding consumption oil and gas throughout the industrial sector as well as the power sector. He explained that a very high power generation source was needed which did not requir oil nor gas because there was too much pressure on the oil and gas production sector as it alone was providing for the industrial, transport and civilian sectors. Just four 30MW powerplants across the country providing for the civilian and transport sectors would halve the pressure on the fossile fuel reserves. Moreover he also kept stressing on the climate change that the nation had experienced in the past 30 years of industrial expansion and informed of the potential effects of further change in the next 15 years or so. He kept reassuring the President of Osea that the obtaining of nuclear technology was purely for power generation and peaceful purposes. Before the conversation ended, Borislov invited an Osean premier to Kaluga as a sign of goodwill and the President set a condition that the transfer of technology be under Osean observation.

19th February, 1981.

The transfer of technology was to commence soon and all preparations were almost done. Before long there was another hitch. The Sotoan government denied the Osean premier, a Mr. Goodwin a visa. The government did not want Osean observation on any part of the operation, due to the risk of technological details being leaked out to the West. Osea pressured Kaluga to request for the granting of permission for the premier and the observation crew but the latter blatantly refused, stating that they will not risk the ruining of good diplomatic relations because the Oseans could not stop being "nosey" about a matter they kept misinterpretting as a nuclear threat. Osean pressure after this dropped to some extent. The next day, the Osean Defence Minister made a statement in a press conference, hinting to Kaluga to "tread lightly".

3rd March, 1981.

Osean PM visits Romny. The president of Romny, General Tamaz Donauri and the Osean PM discussed possible defence senarios and agreed to conduct military excercises in the Mul Sea. Romny currently was under military dictatorship due to the riots and chaos caused by the oppossition. When this news reached Kaluga, Borislov knew well what these excecises meant. He wrote a letter to the UN requesting an restraining order to keep the excercises at least 200 nautical miles away from Kalugan waters. The letter was put to hold and no reply was given.

25th March, 1981.

Several Air Force wings of Osea landed in Romnian military bases. These aircrafts included transport, air superiority, CAS and interceptor planes. Air Force of Clavis also was invited. The navies of the guest nations docked at Batumi and Khashuri. As a sign of goodwill, Borislov sent toward them a gift package containig a few hundred bottles of the finest Kalugan wine. This gift was welcomed warmly. The excercises were to start shortly in which the militaries would conduct a multitude of simulated combat operations.

1st April, 1981.

The excercises started at 4am, with a simulated interception of attack aircraft. As the days followed other

Romnian missile cruiser Batumi.

situations were mastered such as dogfights and mid-air refueling. The excercise went on for 20 days. The air fights were viewed by civillians from afar and the Naval actions were recorded from ports and at sea by fishermen. It was all the craze.

22nd April, 1981.

The excercise ended but for some reason the militaries didn't leave to their respected countries. A total of 30 Osean and 18 Clavis planes remained at their respective bases. Same went for the Naval vessels; 1 Destroyer, 1 Frigate, the John S. Hunt aircraft carrier and a few Corvettes of Osea and 4 Destroyers of Clavis. Before long, they were patrolling the Mul Sea.

1st May, 1981.

A labor day holiday went sour for the Kalugans. The Osean vessels that were in the Mul Sea had started to come very close to Kalugan waters. Their Romnian counterparts, being encouraged by this boldness started to do the same and harrasments of cruisers and fishing vessels had started. Borislov wrote to the UN that they were being pressurised militarily upon their nuclear power programme. The technology transfer was almost complete and the Uranium enrichment facility in the Tyumensky district in the lower Urals was already functional and the power stations across the countries were receiving final touches. The UN ordered all naval forces to keep a distance of at least 30Km from the Kalugan waters. Borislov gave a stern warning to General Tamaz and told him to "keep his boys on a leash". The restraining order was taken lightly and the vessels continued to break into the 30Km barrier. Borislov wrote a total 14 requests to the UN to stop this action but the complaints fell on deaf ears.

9th May, 1981.

While Borislov was writing his requests to the UN toward the continous military instigation, the opposition party, Party of Prosperous Kaluga or PPK had started to take matters very seriously. They were a fascist party and this continual disrespect by the foreign navies was not at all tolerable. They made the National Assembly a tool to pressurise the PM in taking a 'tit-for-tat' step. The ranting finally paid off when the Ministry of Defence ordered the Naval High Command to conduct 'surprise target practice' in the sea. The navy was mobilised and dummy boats were subject to artillery and anti-ship fire. Attack aircraft were flying practice missions and were hitting the dummies with their munitions. Unmanned rocket propelled drones were used for anti-air practice with guns and missiles. All this was within viewing range of the Osean and Romnian vessels. Now it seemed to be a good time to obey the 30Km rule.

11th May, 1981.

A thunderstorm had occured the previous night at near Kazan, from where the excersise was being observed and controlled. At 13:04pm that day, an Osean destroyer detected an aircraft coming toward them at supersonic speed. They were alarmed but confused as it was only one aircraft. The plane slowed down as it neared the fleet. The weapons control room was abuzz. SAMs were ready, guns were ready and the deck was blaring out radio warnings. The pilot replied and identified himself and asked for identification. When the fleet replied, he seemed confused. He didn't quite know where he was and why. As he passed over the fleet he kept to his orders and kept circling as it was the position he was designated to. What the fleet saw was terrifying. The unknown plane was a fully battle ready Su-20, armed with unguided rocket pods, free-fall bombs and a pair of R-60 AAMs. He kept circling for 75 seconds untill the control tower ordered him to move to another location. For the inexperienced sailors, those were the scariest 75 seconds. The same day a formal letter of apology was faxed to the aircraft carrier, stating that the pilot was accidently given false co-ordinates for the target practice due to malfunctioning electronic equipment which had been damaged by lightnening in the previous night. It was scare tactic that worked as the fleet decided to back down and violations of the 30Km barrier reduced drastically.

30th May, 1981.

After the scare tactic stunt, the government decided to take a diplomatic offensive against the fleet in the Mul sea. A number of fake civillian acount names were forged and the front was that these people had businesses that were directly affected by the presence of the foreign fleets and letters were written by these names to the UN making a direct apparently civil complaint list. Initially the UN seemed to be interested but then realised the scam. As a sugar coated pill, it passed an order of the removal of the international fleets in the sea but gave nothing in reference to the aggression Romny had been making. Seeing what had been done, the latter notched up the activities and on 3rd June, a P-3 Orion crossed into Kalugan airspace over her waters. The military confused this plane to a touring plane and the Orion flew in the airspace for over 2 hours before being noted as an aggressor, in responce to which a pair of J-7s intercepted it and escorted it back to a naval base in Romny. This was instantaneously reported to the UN and the latter ordered Romny to stand down or face embargoes. This continuous referral to the UN upset the opposition parties and they persuaded the PM to, "show them we mean business" but he kept reassuring that violence would only make things worse. The PM was now slowly losing popularity among the public as they felt he did not care about the national image.

8th June, 1981.

After the Orion incident, and the PM's actions, people had started to stage protests demanding that he step down. The PM assembled a public Q&A session in the hockey ground in Samara. He was asked questions by the common people, by those who were present and the ones who weren't conversated via live calling. The event was broadcasted on television and radio and went on from 8am to 5pm. In that programme he publicly promised that if any such act of undermining of the nation's soveigrnity took place, he would resign. This seemed to put the country's trust back in him a little bit. His associates praised him for his openness and bold moves. Then he ordered the military to notch up it's activities. Since his claim, he knew the nation's air defence network was slowly ageing so under proxy of 'reviewing' the military inventory, he ordered immediate modernization of all machines. As a sign of national pride and boosting public morale, he had the Air Force in all sectors paint one aircraft in the national colours and have it fly at a medium altitude above the city centres of the major cities in the respective sectors. The JT-6s were chosen for the job and 3 flights would take place per week, and for a fee, a civillian could sit in the instructor's seat in the plane and enjoy the "Pride Flight". A discussion was also made with the Air Force pilots, the Chief of Air Staff along with the Defence Minister on the credibility and functionality of the fleet. Borislov had this discussion aired live on TV, another move to gain public support. These actions resonated as waves of national pride internally and externally. The foreign probes new this was a delicate time and interventions and violations stopped for a decent length of time.

6^th September, 1981.

It had been quite some time from the last violation of airspae or territorial waters. Borislov was now a very popular man but on 6th September, tragedy would strike. In the early hours of morning, a Romnian F-14 crossed into Kalugan airspace in the southern region of Sumy. A pair of J-7s was sent to intercept but the Tomcat escaped. This was a shock and the same day Borislov gave his public resignation. In his speech he said,

“Once again we have become victims of military aggression. Our neighbour does not respect our soveirgnity and this morning we were given a clear cut example of that. Moreover, my people, beloved Kalugans, I promised that if any such incident would occur, I would quite. I was raised with virtues of honesty and dignity, and I shall stay true to my promise. I hereby reisgn from my post as your PM. It was a good experience in office, I shall cherish my time serving you now an.............fo.....uh!!”

Those were his last words. Giving the speech he suffered from a fatal heart attack. This transformed him into a national hero. This sudden change in events called for the controlling of the situation, for which the president disssolved the assemblies and took matter into his own hands. Elections for new parliament were called on 28th November, which happened to be Borislov’s birthday. This change of events gave rise to a wave of confidence internationally. The nuclear technology transfer was complete from Sotoa and the power stations were up and running. Within days and without any prior notice, sanctions were placed on Kaluga by the UN, demanding a thorough observation be allowed of the nuclear programme and the power stations. It also authorised aerial reconassence over Kaluga. The president, Artёm Kievsky gave a strong speech in front of the UN security council over then new developments and the UN a “corrupt machine there to cater to the political opression of the powerful nations”. He called the demand for observation a “childish rant and utterly pointless persuasion” and stated the sanctions as “illegal and cruel” and stated that people of Kaluga do not recognize them and will go about their activities as before. He also informed that the people of Kaluga are deeply grieved by the passing of their beloved PM and any aggression expressed would be met with a tit-for-tat policy.

15^th October, 1981.

Tensions had been very high between Kaluga and the West. There was an air of insecurity in the region due to the complete gridlock of diplomatic relations after the strict refusal from Kievsky for the observation. For the world, the hot topic of debate was what would become of the UMC and the NZ, which up till current moments was unaffected by the political bitterness, but tensions were bound to trickle down there as well. Kaluga was not yet sanctioned over her share in the UMC. By this time, an air base had been established at a small airfield in Clavis, close to the border of Romny. A SR-71 Blackbird was posted there and by November, the OADF was conducting thrice weekly flights over Kalugas strategic locations, including Salimov Dam, the Central Nuclear Control(CNC) and border rail junctions along the border with Yuktobania, from where the nuclear tech had been brought in from Sotoa.

9th March, 1982.

The Blackbird sorties continued. The sanctions were starting to take hold of the economy. The currency worth was dropping slowly and Kievsky had started to make budget cuts in the government spending. The industries were slowly facing a downturn. In this time of despair Sotoa had not forsaken her ally and increased business between the nations to help the economy of Kaluga. Other Kazan Pact countries did their part. Kievsky kept condemning the recon missions from the Osean military. In a UN confrence Kievsky pointed out a few facts and economics of the SR-71 operations and told the Osean premiere did the nation of Osea really need that much spending on a non-existant nuclear threat. The statistics surpised quite a few people in the confrence. It had been a little over three months after the elections were held, the PPK had won the mandate in the central legislature and in four out of the six provinces. The policies were being discussed and quite a few changes were being made. Industries were further being denationalized, although with strict restrictions. Imports from nations was being reduced while expanding the export sector became the main economic priority. Defence regulations were revisited and more sophisticated anti-air systems were slowly being contracted byfriendly nations. The foreign minister was replaced, though the defence minister, due to his experience and great merit, was not replaced.

22nd April, 1982.

As the spring arrived, the occurances of thunderstorms began and following them the fog. On one such foggy day the Naval Air Arm of Kaluga, under orders of the new PM sent a Be-12 maritime patrol aircraft out to sea. With the losening of the restrictions since the imposing of the sanctions, the international navy was present in the Mul sea. The Be-12 passed over several times a Romnian corvette. The plane was on a rescue mission, as it told the crew of the corvette. This again caused an outrage as a military plane flew over the navy vessels. This was declared a hostile act but Kaluga remained firm on the claim of the rescue mission of a fishing vessel that had an accident on board and could not navigate in the fog. They even presented the supposed crew of the vessel. This led to the fleet population in the Mul to increase, with more Osean ships coming in. The world remained on the demand to observe the nuclear facility and the Kalugans kept refusing. Tensions were escalating quickly.

4th July, 1982.

As this time approched, the sheer stubborness of the new government had gotten the west to tire and hence it was decided that an agreement be reached. A seven page draft was made and the PM of Kaluga was invited to Oured to settle the matter. Upon the start of the meeting and reading of the clause, the Kalugans were fine but demanded that an additional point be added, which was that the west must not consider any such actions in the future that would undermine the soveirgnty of the Kalugan people. This was basically a call to remove the excess military from the Mul Sea. The Oseans agreed to it rather casually, which caused a wave of suspicion in the mind of the PM and his associates. Nonetheless, the treaty was signed and the leaders cheered in front of the media outside the President House but all was not as straight forward as it seemed as time would reveal in the future.

3rd January, 1983.

In the months after the treaty, there was a calm over the state of Kaluga. The PPK had the administration and without the threat of aggression looming, they had taken steps to better the infrastructure of the country. Rail transport was being modernised with new locomotive designs taken under lisence from Sotoa, older aircraft from the national airline were slowly being replaced with newer models, a good diplomatic balance was planned by buying Western and Yuktobanian aircraft. A modern aviation industry also called for newer radars and a deal had been struck with Yuke. This new step toward better logistics held also a military aspect, though Kaluga had not ordered nor produced any new technlogy other than upgrading it’s anti air defence capability. The share in the UMC had brought great profits for the state. The iron and steele production of the country was in surplus and had been exporting it to her neighbour to the west, across the Gulf of Kazan to Karelia. As the new year approached all things seemed to be in place but an unexpected turn of events would change the region’s history.

Karelia.

Karelia is a small nation to the west of Kaluga across the the gulf of Kazan. Although a communist nation, it differs in it’s principles of communism as the system there is more allowing and free than other states. This change in the ideology caused her to be at political odds with her powerful neighbour to the north, Sotoa. The nation used a large military as a deterent, with a major amount of hardware being of Yuke origin. Most of the budget was commited to the military. It had the highest ratio of machines to soldiers in the world in the ‘70s due to a new found bone of contention between her and Sotoa. In the mid-‘70s, a large gas field was discovered in the border region between the two neighbours. The problem was that the terrain on the Sotoan side was not suited for mining, while on Karelian land, mining could commence easily. The threat of annexation was very real. Multiple stay orders and cross border firing had brought the countries to a breaking point. Things changed in 1983. A devastating flood hit the country. Due to excess military spending, the infrastructure was ignored. When the flood hit, the country was paralyzed. The people came out on the streets, demanding reform. There was also a military elitism in the country, as a large number of high earning industries were owned by the military, causing a major portion of the working class to become military employees. Recovery from the floods was not easy. The government became bankrupt. A impopular party, which had been against high military spending got the mandate in the next elections. A treaty was made with Sotoa over the gas field and military spending was reduced greatly. Personell were releaved of duty and hardware was put to sale.