The Third World War: The Untold Story

by John Hackett

  The Marshal had, several days ago, received very clear instructions from the Americans that he was to arrange the surrender of his forces to emissaries who would arrive very soon. In the meantime he was held responsible for their good conduct and so on. The Commander of the Pacific Fleet had also received orders to recall all his ships to Vladivostok, Sovetskaya Gavan, Magadan and Korsakov. These orders had come from the Americans too. Moscow had been told about them and had simply wired back 'Comply'. That was clear enough, no problem there. But was Moscow in charge? And what of? Pavlovsky had also received news that was altogether more unsettling and heady: in Omsk, Colonel General Chervinsky, whose guts he detested but who was, he had grudgingly to admit, a man not without a certain panache, had set himself up as a sort of independent military leader and taken over his area. As far as he could gather this was tolerated by the Americans — fools they must be — perhaps so that he could keep law and order. If he knew Chervinsky he would keep lots of other things as well. All the same, it was an interesting idea.

  Pavlovsky had been musing over it for days and had made up his mind; he now had to carry others with him. He would copy Chervinsky. It might not last for long, but it could achieve what he was intent on doing, which was to ensure that the Soviet Far East came under whatever administration the US had in mind, and not under the Chinese. He was quite sure he would have no problems with his staff on that particular point. Much more difficult would be to persuade the Americans to let him keep his weapons. He was chilled at the thought of his forces being disarmed and left facing China and its millions. There was no future in that.

  The Marshal was in fact surprisingly successful. Washington had also been wrestling with the problem of how to keep China from demanding all the Soviet equipment. Of course, not all of it was still there; many men had simply left their units, with their own weapons, and gone home. Aircraft had flown off too, to airfields further away from the Chinese. All Soviet soldiers, certainly those of Russian origin, wanted to get away from the Chinese. Two warships had been scuttled and more might be yet; it was hard to put guards on everything. The Americans decided that Pavlovsky could be left with most of his forces for the time being and should operate a sort of military government in the Far Eastern coastal region — a Chervinsky under licence, so to speak. All the heavy equipment and the important naval vessels were under strong American guard, mounted by troops diverted from South Korea. Some of the latest submarines were towed off by the US Navy.

  That raised the question — a vital one — of the nuclear warheads with both the ground and air forces in the Far East. The naval ones were less of a problem — it was clear where they were — but the warheads with the ground and air forces were less easily located and accessible. Acutely worrying at the beginning, of course, was the fear of unauthorized nuclear action. Peking sent very urgent signals to Washington and was, it was plain, more than anxious to get hold of warheads itself. In fact this whole question of what was to happen to the Soviet weapons caused great friction with China. The United States was left in no doubt by any of its allies in Asia that they did not want China to get more than a very small proportion of them, and no nuclear weapons. The Chinese readiness to invade Vietnam for the second time had been disturbing. Some weapons the Americans wanted themselves, naturally.

  Peking was rebuffed by Washington; China had not been at war, but some conventional weapons would certainly be handed over. In the meantime China had nothing to fear, Soviet forces would be separated from their heavy weapons before their formations were disbanded altogether. Nuclear weapons would be guarded by special US units and later on handed over to the United Nations, to the UN Fissile Materials Recovery Organization (UNIFISMATRECO). Marshal Pavlovsky and the Pacific Fleet staff did in fact work admirably to trace warheads and see that they were handed over.

  Soviet soldiers and sailors in the Far East were thus left initially under their own command, to be demilitarized eventually. Pavlovsky, an efficient and tough man, remained in charge even when a civilian administration was slowly formed. He looked balefully at the Chinese and they at him, but his business was essentially with the Allied Demilitarization Commission, made up mostly of Americans. On these China had no more than liaison groups. But the American head of the commission had many a difficult time with the Chinese; their aims and his were not exactly coincident and the strains were evident.

  The map of Asia was, as a result of all these events, 'tidied up' a little. Some problems were solved, some were probably merely moved on to the back burner. What would happen in the region in the decades ahead was hard to predict, since it depended in large measure on the policies of a China steadily growing in power and confidence and no longer checked by its Soviet adversary.

  THE END AND A BEGINNING

  Chapter 20: The Destruction of Minsk

  As it became more and more evident that the Warsaw Pact programme of operations on the Central Front had fallen critically short of achieving its main objective in time and more and more cracks were opening up in the Eastern bloc, it was abundantly clear that a completely new situation was developing.

  Debate at the highest level raged in both East and West as to what to do next. There was pressure in the US, with some German support, to allow the momentum of warlike preparation in the West, and above all in the US, to follow its logical path, to mobilize the national aspiration long dormant in the Soviet Union's subject peoples and move Allied forces in to push the Soviets back where they came from and restore freedom in Eastern Europe. Agreement among the Allies on a matter so complex and of such far-reaching importance was unlikely to be reached easily. In the first place it would be a mistake to suppose, as was very quickly pointed out, that the forces of the Warsaw Pact had been defeated. In spite of the desertion, almost en masse, of General Ryzanov's 3 Shock Army in the Netherlands, Warsaw Pact forces continued to be far more powerful than those facing them on the battlefields in Europe. Moreover, the Soviet Union's nuclear capability was still intact. But time was running out. There was something approaching open revolt in Poland and in the forward area a Polish regiment, following the example set in 3 Shock Army, had surrendered en bloc to the Americans. Defections from Warsaw Pact armies were increasing daily, in spite of the KGB. The total now ran into many thousands. It was not only in countries of the Warsaw Pact that there were signs of growing discontent. In the Baltic states of the Soviet Union itself, as well as in Belorussia and the Ukraine, there was mounting disaffection.

  None the less it was certainly not a foregone conclusion that subject nations would everywhere be easily aroused to revolt. The habits of servitude and resignation were deeply ingrained. The Communist Party had been actively engaged for so long and with such assiduity in the detection and ruthless liquidation of any source of opposition that leadership would be difficult to establish and response to it might be sluggish — unless truly dramatic events provided a powerful stimulus. Just such a stimulus, as events proved, was not far off.

  In the Soviet Union the Defence Council had been since early July in complete control, though the full Politburo was summoned from time to time to broaden the scope of discussion, to allocate responsibilities and review the performance of individuals. The Politburo was now summoned for 8 am on 19 August to meet in the VKP, the Volga Command Post built into the granite near Kuybyshev, 600 kilometres south-east of Moscow, in Stalin's time and greatly enlarged and improved since then. The most urgent requirement was to discuss the possibility of nuclear action.

  The five members of the Defence Council had met the previous night but had been quite unable to agree. The pattern of disagreement formulated in a meeting of the Politburo on 6 December 1984, when the Operational Plan for 1985 had been discussed, had persisted essentially unchanged ever since. Aristanov, Chairman of the KGB, and Marshal Nastin, Minister of Defence, both members of the Defence Council, had always supported the view that operations against the West should be nuclear from the start. The Supreme Party Ideologist Malinsky, wh
o was also a member of the Defence Council, had strongly opposed this, ably supported by two members of the Politburo, who were not, as it happened, also members of the Defence Council. These were Berzinsh, Leader of the Organization of the Party and State Control, and the Ukrainian Nalivaiko, responsible for relations with socialist countries. The milder view had prevailed in December and was later accepted as official policy. There would be no nuclear opening to an offensive against the West and nuclear weapons would not be used as long as victory could be seen to be certain without them. It was agreed, however, that if there were a setback in the operation, and the plan did not look like being completely successful in a non-nuclear mode, the matter would be urgently re-opened. The moment to re-open it had now come.

  At the Defence Council meeting, which went on to 3 am without agreement, Malinsky, who still opposed the use of nuclear weapons on the grounds that at this stage it would be premature and on balance do far more harm than good, had been in a minority, with two members strongly against him, Aristanov and Nastin both arguing for a full-scale nuclear offensive at once, using all weapons, while the other two members remained undecided. It was Malinsky who succeeded in causing the full Politburo to be called. This was duly summoned for 8 am. In between meetings the General Secretary, advanced in years, clearly unwell and seen by some to be visibly failing (though they could hardly say so) summoned both sides separately. One was for using all, the other for using none. He himself, it appears, was in favour of one powerful strike on a prominent Western satellite nation, a European member of the Alliance with influence in Europe. The target would not be the capital: that would be needed in the future and its destruction might in any case be counter-productive for the purpose in mind. This was to issue a dramatic warning to the world, while at the same time inviting the US to immediate discussion of a ceasefire.

  Neither Aristanov nor Malinsky, though they could hardly discuss it, thought much of this. They were both, in the last resort, men who would back all or nothing and reject half measures.

  At the meeting of the Politburo the General Secretary steered discussion towards the conclusion he had chosen. The Chief of the General Staff was invited to advise on a country and a target. After a short adjournment to consult advisers he came back to propose attack on Birmingham in England. On the strong representations of Aristanov and Malinsky, for once in agreement, the matter, before the issue of any executive order, was taken back by the General Secretary for further consideration by the Defence Council, which was ordered to meet in an hour's time. When the Supreme Party Ideologist and Chairman of the KGB turned up for the meeting they found the door closed and two of the General Secretary's personal security guard, automatic pistols in hand, barring the way. It was apparent that they were not wanted. Inside, the General Secretary had no difficulty in arriving at a joint decision to carry out a single warning strike and the President of the Soviet Union was then informed of what was expected of him.

  A very precisely detailed plan was made to allow him to warn the President of the United States over the hot line immediately the strike had been launched that one, and only one, missile was on its way and to indicate its target. He was to emphasize that this was in the nature of a warning to the Alliance, a warning which, it would be noted, though severe, was being given without doing any harm to the United States. It was not the initiation of an inter-continental exchange, in which, he was to remind the other President, the Soviet Union disposed of a very powerful second-strike capability. President Vorotnikov would hope and most earnestly urged that the US would now agree to very early discussions. Otherwise there could be further selective strikes.

  The hot line conversation, amid frantic speculation on the Allied side, was arranged for 1020 hours Greenwich Mean Time (1320 local time) the next day, 20 August. President Vorotnikov duly delivered his message.

  At 1030 hours GMT exactly, the one megaton warhead launched by the USSR detonated at 3,500 metres above Winson Green, in Birmingham, with results which we have recorded elsewhere.[27]

  At 1035 hours GMT the British Prime Minister and the President of the United States agreed on instant reprisal. The French President gave his concurrence and the Allies were all informed, even as instructions were on their way to two nuclear submarines, one each of the United States and Royal Navies. As a result of these the ancient and beautiful city of Minsk was totally destroyed, in a devastating attack even more dreadful in its power and its appalling results than that on Birmingham, and the events were set in train which were to tear the imperial structure of the Soviet Union apart and leave the world in general bewilderment, with parts of it in total chaos.

  The hideous and gigantic doom which descended upon the unsuspecting city of Minsk in the early afternoon of 20 August stunned the world. Following hard upon the disaster which had overtaken the city of Birmingham in England less than an hour before, it did much to alter the outlook of people in our time with, beyond any doubt at all, a powerful impact on history in time to come. Is it possible, people ask, and will go on asking, that human beings can allow themselves to be driven into situations in which they find no alternative to this?

  The four missiles, each of between 200 and 300 kilotons, which detonated over the centre of the city of Minsk at 1350 local time (1050 GMT) on 20 August at 3,000 metres, set up a towering fiery beacon which would be seen nearly as far off as Moscow, 600 kilometres away. The missiles did not, as distant observers noted, all. detonate at once. One exploded, then almost immediately two more, and after a second or two the fourth. Ground zeros were all within a circle, as subsequent investigation has established, of a radius of roughly 1,000 metres.

  The fireball of the first soared up in dreadful majesty alone from its point of detonation at 3 kilometres to a height of nearly 12, a beacon of light more searing than the sun. The next two, very near to each other in time and space, closely pursued the first, the fireballs of all three merging into one gigantic, blinding pillar. The fourth and last followed a few moments later and did not rise so high, reaching up some 10 kilometres into the base of an immense and growing mass of cloud. What seemed about to form huge mushrooms was now writhing in promethean patterns, turning, twisting and whirling, beginning within one minute of the first explosion to form a single colossal cloud rising to a height of some 25 kilometres across a span of 30 or 40 and now spreading in one single blanket across the sky. The blinding light from the central pillar lasted a full twenty seconds even in the clarity of an August afternoon sky.

  The unbelievably fierce effect of the downward heatwave was felt first. At a range of over 15 kilometres from the epicentre people clad in ordinary summer clothing in the open received burns which demanded immediate medical attention if they were not to prove fatal. Such attention was almost never forthcoming. The epicentre of the attack, above which the missiles had been set to detonate, was the grandiose building of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belorussia, built in the late 1930s in the style then current to emphasize the power, extent and modernity of socialism. In front of it stood a full-size statue of Lenin. Within a few seconds of the first detonation this immense structure was no more than a great pile of rubble. Somewhere in there the statue of Lenin, the principal architect of all this huge disorder, lay pounded into dust. Up to some 5 kilometres from the former Communist Party headquarters, everything combustible was immediately set on fire. Fires were also springing up further out from the centre but the heat pulse was followed in a few seconds by blast waves of terrific power which extinguished many of the fires raging in the centre itself. The huge pressures developed by blast crushed everything immediately below, so that within 5 kilometres of the centre everything above ground level, of whatever construction, was brought crashing to the earth. The effect of the blast wave declined as it travelled outwards and some buildings of stouter construction still remained standing, if badly damaged, further out, though structures more lightly built, if not immediately destroyed by blast, were often torn apart by the h
urricane winds that followed it. As far out as 12 kilometres from the city centre railway trucks were hurled from the permanent way, oil tanks were split asunder and their contents spread, while overhead wiring everywhere came down.

  The noise of these explosions, in a continuous roar, lasted for more than thirty seconds at Dzerzhinsk, for example, some 30 kilometres away to the south-west and an important centre of local administration with a key railway station, as it also did at Borisov, about the same distance away from Minsk on the direct railway line to Moscow in the north-east. Damage at this range was relatively slight, though very many windows were broken, but the terrifying burning fiery furnace, with its stupefying noise, stunned all who saw it, even those who saved their sight by turning away.

  The attack came quite without warning and though there were shelters available for at least a part of the population, very few people were in them. Of the one and a quarter million inhabitants of the city of Minsk, some 50,000 were killed almost instantly. Some, so badly burnt in the first thermal pulse as to have no hope of survival, were mercifully killed in the blast wave which almost immediately followed, while many were buried alive in the piles of masonry from buildings thrown down by the shock.

  Something that could be seen from near Moscow, some 600 kilometres' distant, was even more clearly manifest in important places nearer to Minsk itself. It was visible in Riga, capital of Latvia to the north-west, in Kiev in the south-east and in Warsaw some 450 kilometres to the south-west. The pillar of fire was seen and the rumble of the detonations clearly heard at Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, only 170 kilometres away, while in the important Lithuanian city of Kaunas, 100 kilometres further off, the disturbance in the sky was also clearly visible and the rumble of the bursts was plainly heard. The inhabitants of Bobruisk, also in Belorussia and only 150 kilometres away from Minsk, were shocked and terrified. Much was seen and heard in Smolensk, Vitebsk, Gomel and Brest, on the Belorussian/Polish border. In all these important places, each with its own political interests, there was confusion and uncertainty and everyone was gripped by a fear approaching panic as to what might happen next.