by Gee, Colin
PLUTO
P.O.L.
Acronym for 'Pipeline-under-the-ocean’, which was a fuel supply pipe that ran from Britain to France, laid for D-Day operations and still in use at the end of the war.
Petrol, oil and lubricants.
PPD
Soviet submachine gun capable of phenomenal rate of fire. Mostly equipped with a 72 round drum magazine but 65 rounds were normally fitted to avoid jamming. It was too complicated and was replaced by the PPSH.
PPS
Simple Soviet submachine gun with a 35 round magazine.
PPSH
Soviet submachine gun capable of phenomenal rate of fire. Mostly equipped with a 72 round drum magazine but 65 rounds were normally fitted to avoid jamming.
Pravda
Leading newspaper of the Soviet Union, Pravda is translated as 'Truth'.
PS84
PTAB
RCT
Passenger Aircraft built at factory 84, the initial designation of the Li-2 transport aircraft.
Each Shturmovik could carry four pods containing 48 bomblets, or up to 280 internally. Each bomblet could penetrate up to 70mm of armour, enough for the main battle tanks at the time.
Regimental Combat Team. US formation which normally consisted of elements drawn from all combatant units within the parent division, making it a smaller but reasonably self-sufficient unit. RCT’s tended to be numbered according the Infantry regiment that supplied its fighting core.[See CC for US Armored force equivalent.]
Red Star
Standard issue Soviet military cigarettes.
Rodina
The Soviet Motherland.
Sherman
[M4 Sherman]
American tank turned out in huge numbers with many variants, also supplied under lend-lease to Russia.
Shturmovik
The Ilyushin-2 Shturmovik, Soviet mass-produced ground attack aircraft that was highly successful.
Skat
SMLE
German card game using 32 cards.
Often referred to s the ‘Smelly’, this was the proper name of the Short, Magazine, Lee-Enfield rifle.
SS-Hauptsturm
fuhrer
SS equivalent of captain.
St Florian
Patron saint of Upper Austria, Linz, chimney sweeps, and firefighters.
ST44 [MP43/44]
German assault rifle with a 30 round magazine, first of its generation and forerunner to the AK47.
Standard HDM .22 calibre pistol
Originally used by OSS, this effective .22 with a ten round magazine is still in use by Special Forces throughout the world.
Starshina
Station ‘X’
STAVKA
Soviet rank roughly equivalent to Warrant Officer first Class.
See Bletchley Park entry.
At this time this represents the ‘Stavka of the Supreme Main Command’, comprising high-ranked military and civilian members. Subordinate to the GKO, it was responsible for military oversight, and as such, held its own military reserves which it released in support of operations.
Sten
Basic British sub-machine gun with a 32 round magazine. Produced in huge numbers throughout the 40's.
Stroh rum
Austrian spiced rum.
Studebaker
2.5 ton truck built in USA and USSR [under licence] and often used as platforms for the Katyusha.
Stuka [Junkers 87]
Famous dive-bomber employed by the Luftwaffe.
SU-76
76mm self-propelled gun used as artillery and for close support.
SVT40
Soviet automatic rifle with a 10 round magazine.
Symposium Biarritz
Utilisation of German expertise to prepare wargame exercises for allied unit commanders to demonstrate Soviet tactics and methods to defeat them.
T/34
Soviet medium tank armed with a 76.2mm gun and 2 mg's.
T/34-85 [T34m44]
T-70
Soviet medium tank armed with an 85mm gun and 2 mg's.
Soviet light tank with two crew and a 45mm gun.
Thompson
.45 calibre US submachine-gun, normally issued with a 20 or 30 round magazine [although a drum was available.]
Tiger Tank
German heavy tank carrying an 88m gun and 2-3 machine-guns.
T.O.E.
Tokarev
Table of Organisation and Equipment, which represents what a unit should consist of.
Soviet 7.62mm automatic handgun [also known as TT30] with an 8 round magazine.
Trimbach
Quality Alsatian wine.
Type XXI submarine
The most technologically advanced submarine of the era, produced in small numbers by the Germans and unable to affect the outcome of the war.
Typhoon
RAF's most successful single seater ground attack aircraft of World War Two, which could carry anything from bombs through to rockets.
USAAF
Ushanka
United States Army Air Force.
Fur hat with adjustable sides.
Venona Project
Joint US-UK operation to analyse Soviet message traffic
Vichy
Name of the collaborationist government of defeated France.
Vitruvian man
Da Vinci's sketch of a man with legs and arms splayed.
Wacht am Rhein
Waffen-SS
Literally, 'Watch on the Rhine', a codename used to mask the real purpose of the German build-up that became the Ardennes Offensive in December 1944.
There will always be much debate over these troops. Ideologically driven, politically inspired, pathological killers with an unshakable faith in the superiority of the Aryan race or highly motivated troops with an incredible ‘esprit de corps’? Whatever your point of view, the military achievements of the SS Soldiers were without parallel in WW2. That others wore the same uniform as they tended the camps and satisfied the despicable agendas of the Nazi party has, in many ways, tarnished the Waffen-SS. None the less, they have their own crimes to pay for, as do all who wore a uniform in WW2, for no side came away with clean hands.
Walther P38
German 9mm semi-automatic pistol with an eight round magazine.
Wehrmacht
The German Army
Yakolev-9
Soviet single-seater fighter aircraft that was highly respected by the Luftwaffe.
Zilant
Legendary creature in Russian folklore somewhat like a dragon
ZIS3
76.2mm anti-tank gun in Soviet use.
Extras available on the website www.redgambitseries.com
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About the Author.
Colin Gee was born on 18th May 1957 in Haslar Naval Hospital, Gosport, UK, spending the first two years of his life at the naval base in Malta.
His parents divorced when he was approaching three years of age and he went to live with his grandparents in Berkshire, who brought him up.
On 9th June 1975 he joined the Fire Service and after a colourful career retired on 19th May 2007, having achieved the rank of Sub-Officer, Watch Commander, or to be politically correct for the ego-tripping harridans in HR, Watch Manager 'A'.
After thirty-two years in the Fire Service reality suddenly hit and Colin found himself in need of a proper job!
As of today, Colin is permanently employed doing night shifts for NHS Out of Hours service.
At this moment in time Colin has a wife, two daughters, one step-daughter, two step-sons and a grandson called Lucas who is an avid Manchester United fan, although at the age of one he doesnt know it yet.
A tank of fish, two turtles, four cats and a rat masquerading as a dog complete the home ensemble.
He has been a wargamer for most of his life, hence the
future plans for a Red Gambit wargaming series.
In 1992 Colin joined the magistracy, having wandered in from the street to ask how someone becomes a beak. He served until 2005. The experience taught him the true difference between justice and the law, the former being what he would have preferred to administer.
Red Gambit was researched initially over ten years ago but work and life changes prevented it from blossoming.
Now it has become five books instead of one, as more research is done and more lines of writing open themselves up.
Colin writes for the pleasure it brings him and hopefully the reader. The books are not intended to be modern day 'Wuthering Heights' or 'War and Peace'. They contain a story which Colin thinks is worth the telling and to which task he set his inexperienced hand. The biographies are part of the whole experience that he hopes to bring the reader.
Enjoy them all and thank you for reading.
‘Stalemate’ - the story continues.
Read the first chapter of ‘Stalemate’ now.
Artillery is the god of war.
Iosef Stalin
Chapter 55 – The Wave.
0255 hrs Monday, 13th August 1945, Europe.
Whilst not as big a bird as the Lancaster, or as potent a weapon in general, the Handley Page Halifax Bomber had seen its fair share of action and success up to May 1945.
NA-R was one of the newest Mark VII’s, in service with the Royal Canadian Air Force’s 426 Squadron, presently flying out of a base at Linton on Ouse, England.
Tonight the mission was to accompany two hundred and forty-one other aircraft and their crews to area bomb woods to the south-east of Gardelegen.
The Halifax crew were relatively inexperienced, having completed only two operations before the German War ended, added to four in the new one.
The night sky was dark, very dark, the only light provided by the glowing instrument panel or the navigators small lamp.
Until 0300 arrived, at which time night became day as beneath the bomber stream thousands of crews operated their weapons at the set time. Across a five hundred mile front Soviet artillery officers screamed their orders and instantly the air was filled with metal.
From their lofty perches, the Canadian flyers witnessed the delivery and arrival of tons of high explosive, all in total silence save for the drone of their own Bristol Hercules engines.
They watched, eyes drawn to the spectacle, as the Russian guns fired salvo after salvo.
Their inexperience was the death of them, as it was for the crew of K-Kilo, a Lancaster from 626 Squadron RAF.
Both crews, so intent on the Soviet display, drifted closer until the mid-upper gunner in UM-K screamed in shock and fear as a riveted fuselage dropped gently down towards him. The Halifax crew were oblivious to their peril, the Lancaster crew resigned to it as contact was made with the tail plane and rudders, the belly of the Halifax bending and splitting the control surfaces.
The Lancaster bucked slightly, pushing the port fin further up into the Halifax where the ruined end caught fast, partly held by a bent stay and partially by control wires caught on debris.
The Halifax pilot, a petrified twenty-one year old Pilot Officer, eased up on his stick, dragging the Lancaster into a nose down attitude and ruining its aerodynamic efficiency. The young pilot then decided to try and move left, and at the same time the Lancaster pilot lost control of his aircraft, the nose suddenly rising and causing the port inner propeller to smash into the nose of the Handley Page aircraft.
Fragments of perspex and sharp metal deluged the pilot, blinding him. His inability to see caused more coming together and the tail plane of the Avro broke away, remaining embedded in the belly of the Halifax.
Both aircraft stalled and started to tumble from the sky. Inside the wrecked craft aircrew struggled to escape, G forces building and condemning most to ride their charges into the ground.
Halifax NA-R hit the ground first, with all but two of its crew aboard. Fire licked greedily at one of the NA-R crew’s parachutes, taking hold and leaving only one man to witness his comrade’s fate, plunging earthwards, riding a silken candle into the German soil.
The explosion resulting from NA-R’s demise illuminated the area enough for many Russian soldiers to watch fascinated as the ruined Lancaster smashed into the ground some five hundred yards north, four parachutes easily discernable in the bright orange glow which bathed the area.
The Bomber stream tore the Gardelegen Woods to pieces, destroying acres of trees and occasionally being rewarded with a secondary explosion. Seventeen more bombers were lost but they reported success and the obliteration of the target.
Unfortunately for them, or more importantly the British and Canadian units in the line at Hannover, the units of 6th Guards Tank Army which had occupied hidden positions in the target area had moved as soon as night had descended.
Apart from a handful of supply trucks and lame duck vehicles, nothing of consequence had been destroyed.
At Ceske Kubice the results were far better, with the Soviet 4th Guards Tank Corps and 7th Guards Cavalry Corps still laagering hidden and believing themselves safe.
Lancaster’s and Mosquitoes bathed the area in bombs, destroying tanks, horses and men in equal measure. It was an awful blood-letting and the survivors were in no mood to take prisoners when the New Zealand crew of a stricken Lancaster parachuted down nearby. Vengeful cavalry sabres flashed in the firelight, continuing on when life was long since extinct and the victims no longer resembled men.
On the ground the results on the Allied units were quite devastating as the Soviet Armies resorted to their normal tactic of concentrating their attacks on specific points.
Whole battalions were swept away in an avalanche of shells and rockets.
On each of the five chosen focal points breakthrough was achieved swiftly, the leading Soviet units passing through a desolate landscape tainted by the detritus of what a few minutes beforehand had been human beings and the weapons they served.
Occasionally a group of shell-shocked troops rallied and fought back, but in the main only the odd desultory shot greeted the advancing Red Army.
The reports of advances were immediately sent back and within twenty minutes Zhukov knew he had all five breakthroughs ready to exploit, and ordered the operations to go ahead as planned.
Ten minutes after Zhukov’s orders had gone out, a bleary eyed Eisenhower, woken from his much needed sleep to swiftly throw on his previous day’s shirt and trousers, learned that he no longer had an intact front line and that a disaster was in the making.
Swift conversations with his Army Commanders took place, each man in turn receiving a simple order.
“Reform your line General, reform your line.”
Each was different, for McCreery had problems contrasting those of Bradley, who had worse problems than Devers et al.
Eisenhower felt like Old Mother Hubbard. He already knew that he had probably just lost the best part of three divisions of good fighting troops and he sought replacements.
The cupboard was all but bare.
Some units were coming ashore in France, some in England. A few were already moving forward to their staging areas near the Rhine, ready for operational deployment.
Setting his staff to the problems of logistics he let them take the strain whilst he sucked greedily on a cigarette and watched the disaster unfold.
Report followed report, problem heaped on problem as the Red Army moved relentlessly and surprisingly quickly forward.
Ike stubbed out number one having lit number two from its dying butt, spotting the normally dapper but now quite dishevelled Tedder approach, half an eye on his Commander in Chief and half a horrified eye on the situation map.
So shocked was the Air Chief Marshall that he stopped, mouth open wide, watching as blue lines were removed to be replaced by red arrows.
Eisenhower moved to the RAF officer who seemed rooted to the spot.