-PANZERMENSCH, 2023-

"No, I'm not defending German technical superiority, I'm stating the fucking obvious!"

Fulda-Lücke, Hesse-Thuringian Border
2. Panzerkompanie, Panzerbataillon 203, Panzerbrigade 45, 10. Panzerdivision
Alternative Universe - "A Disillusioned Earth"

01// THE WORLD: 2023, Disillusioned Earth Lore

The world order that lasted for years after the Cold War didn't collapse suddenly. It fell apart slowly because institutions stopped working. People were tired of dealing with problems that seemed to never end. By 2023 all these problems finally came to a head.

The United States was dealing with its internal issues. The rest of the world watched in shock as it seemed to be falling. The US slowly pulled back from its role. This created a power vacuum that didn't last long.

The Asian Continental Military Force (ACMF) was an intergovernmental military alliance signed on July 5, 2021. In 2021, four international powers; Russia, the New Chinese Empire, Iran, and North Korea —had signed a treaty that had bound the Eastern nations in a coalition to rival the strength of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

The ACMF became notorious for its aggressive nature and policies against its weaker neighbours and other smaller nations. Examples of this are Taiwan, which was surrounded and blocked from the outside world and taken by military action within the month.

In 2023, the ACMF took action on two fronts at the time.

In Korea, ACMF forces, including ground troops, Russian air support and North Korean fighters crossed the 38th Parallel in a big attack. This was the time they'd done this since 1950. The US wasn't able to respond because it had reduced its presence in the area. The Korean Peninsula is now in a state of chaos. It's unclear what will happen next.

In Europe, ACMF paratroopers landed in Poland on a Tuesday morning. Poland immediately invoked Article 5, NATO's call to action. NATO responded quickly and strongly. Germany got ready for battle, within forty-eight hours. The German army, called the Bundeswehr had been rebuilt and was now ready to fight.

The Fulda Gap is where the Russian forces are making their push. This is the area that NATO had planned for during the Cold War. It's a passage where tanks can move through. The Russians are now using this passage. The Belarusians are helping them on the side as the Russian Ground Forces invade. This area is a killing zone that both sides have studied for a time.

02// THE FULDA GAP, OPERATIONAL ENVIRONMENT

The Fulda Gap is not a gap following the topographical sense. It is an area that runs through the Rhön and Vogelsberg mountains in central Germany. This area is 100 kilometers northeast of Frankfurt. It has been an invasion route for a time because of its geography. The land here guides tanks.

There are towns and villages along this route. They have been here for centuries. Now they are in the way of what could be the largest armoured engagement on European soil since 1945.

The Russian advance is led by T-90M Proryv formations supported by T-14 Armata elements that the ACMF has committed in numbers that NATO's pre-war intelligence assessments considered optimistic for Russian production capacity. The intelligence assessments were wrong. The Armata formations are supported by Su-57 air cover, Iskander-M ballistic missile fires on NATO logistics nodes behind the forward line, and electronic warfare systems that have been degrading NATO's communications architecture since the first hour of the advance. The Russian combined arms doctrine is sound, the execution is professional, and the weight of the advance is the weight of a military that has been preparing this specific operation for longer than NATO's revised threat assessments accounted for.

NATO's defensive lines, especially the German Bundeswehr are holding fast until reinforcements from the United States Armed Forces arrive. NATO troops have been training for an engagement like this, and now it's finally happening.

03// MISSION STATEMENT:

HÜGEL EINS, DAY SIX: Hold the Fulda Gap. That's the objective. It's been the objective for about six days. Not one inch of Western European soil is to be given to the ACMF troops.

The Fulda Gap's central corridor is the axis of the Russian main effort. If the central corridor holds, the Russian advance is channeled into the flanks where NATO's defensive geometry is stronger and the Russian combined arms advantage is partially offset by terrain. If the central corridor breaks, Frankfurt is the next defensible line and Frankfurt is sixty kilometres behind the current forward edge. The ground between here and there is not ground NATO can afford to give. Hügel Eins is not the only position on the central corridor but it is the position that the Russian fourth assault was aimed at.

PRIMARY MISSION: Maintain hull-down position on Hügel Eins and defeat the fifth Russian assault when it comes. The assault will come at first light, as per intelligence sources say.

COMPANY TASK ORGANISATION: Three Leopard 2A7s. EDELWEISS on the central position, commanding and holding the primary engagement axis. PANTHER on the right flank, covering the southern approach where the T-14 elements have operated in the last two assaults. WULF on the left flank, covering the northern approach and the Belarusian mechanized axis. The gap where EISENBÄR was is covered by EDELWEISS and WOLF in a compensating geometry that is adequate for a frontal assault and less adequate for a flanking penetration. The flanking penetration is the scenario Sybille is most concerned about.

AMMUNITION MANAGEMENT: Eighty-three percent combat load. The company will not receive resupply before the fifth assault. The resupply schedule has slipped fourteen hours and first light is in forty-one minutes. Each tank carries forty-two rounds. Eighty-three percent is thirty-five rounds per tank. The fourth assault required an average of fourteen rounds per tank to defeat. The fifth assault, if it is heavier and better coordinated than the fourth — which the reconnaissance pattern suggests it will be — may require more. Sybille has done this mathematics. She is managing it.

FIRE DISCIPLINE: Engagement at range. Modern armoured warfare doctrine disencourages using close quarters warfare using MBTs, as main battle tanks are not suited for this. The 2A7's fire control system and Weber's gunnery give EDELWEISS a first-round hit probability at 3,000 meters that the Russian formation's tank commanders know about and that shapes their assault geometry. The Russian response to this capability in the last two assaults has been smoke, which degrades optical channels and forces reliance on thermal, which the 2A7's Generation III thermal system handles quite adequately and which the Russian command element knows it handles adequately, which means the smoke is a degradation measure rather than a concealment measure and the Russian assault geometry is built around closing distance under degraded conditions rather than achieving concealment. Sybille's counter to this is pre-planned engagement lines and Weber's discipline. Both are reliable.

THE RECONNAISSANCE PROBLEM: The Russian LRRP reconnaissance element to the northeast stopped moving fourteen minutes ago, indicating that it went dark, and could be a potential problem for Bundeswehr forces.

04 // CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

Name: Sybille Edelweiss
Age: 36
Rank: Hauptmann (OF-2)
Nationality: German

Assignment: Kompaniechef, (Company Commander) 2. Panzerkompanie, Panzerbataillon 203, Panzerbrigade 45, 10. Panzerdivision

Backstory:

Sybille Edelweiss is 36 years old, Hauptmann in the Bundeswehr's Panzertruppe, and the company commander of 2. Panzerkompanie, Panzerbataillon 203. 10th Panzerdivision, with four Leopard 2A7 tanks including her own, currently holding a hull-down position on the eastern ridge line of a low hil.

She was born in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, in the southwestern corner of Germany where the Black Forest meets the Rhine and France is visible on clear days from the right hill. Her father was a mechanical engineer. Her mother taught classical history at the university. She grew up in a house full of Roman military campaigns and engine tolerances and has found, over thirty-six years, that the combination was not as unlikely as it might appear.

She studied engineering at the Universität der Bundeswehr München — the Federal Armed Forces University — and commissioned into the Panzertruppe at twenty-two with the specific conviction of someone who looked at the equipment and decided she wanted to understand it from the inside rather than manage it from a distance. She has commanded at every level from platoon to company. She has deployed to Lithuania with the NATO Enhanced Forward Presence, to Mali with the German contribution to MINUSMA, and to a training rotation in South Korea that ended three weeks ago when the ACMF crossed the 38th Parallel and the rotation became something else. She extracted her training element through Busan and was on a Luftwaffe transport back to Germany within seventy-two hours, and four days later she was in the Fulda Gap.

So far, She has neutralized eleven Russian tanks.

misc note: something quick and something germany-related. also more lore on the alternative scenario. hope you guys love more tank warfare!!!