The Final War (alt-Draka story)

[Typhonis 1]

Spotter Plane?? more like a Global hawk. Given that the US is at war woith the Draka....I expect most of the Navy has sortied and that alternate runeways have already been established using the Interstate highway system.

[Junghalli]

Damn good stuff, although I am very dubious of the Drakian
invasion fleet even making it within 200 nautical miles of
the US Coastline without having it's aircover stripped by
F-14D Super Tomcats, and then attacked by A-12 Avenger II
Stealth Bombers flying off the decks of Nimitzes; and then
the survivors are mercillesly hunted down by the SEAWOLF
SWARM.

Oh the Draka fleet is going to be horrendously mauled by the US Airforce and Navy before it makes landfall. They'll still bull through by sheer weight of numbers and fanaticism of the commanders, but they'll get a bloody foretaste of what they're in for as a consequence of spewing their shit at the mighty United States. I've got a big air/sea battle planned.
It'll be interesting to see how Ingollfson reacts to having her girlfriend die again, this time from being on a ship that gets kamikazed by a damaged American fighter and then blasted to scrap by bombers... did I say that out loud?

Once again excellent, you do a good job of putting a human face on the snakes. I have to wonder why Setzer continues to work for the Draka when he rightly despises them so much.

Thank you. I've always had a certain fascination with the Draka, as individuals, as much as I simply revile them as a culture. Their society is so alien I keep wondering "how is it that normal human beings live like this?"
As for Setzer, a lifetime of extra-strength indoctrination is a hard thing to break. The only way the Draka would work as a society, from my perspective, would have to be to make people ashamed and repelled at having normal human feelings. He's had it drummed into him his whole life that not being a heatless sadist is a sign of weakness and lack of spirit.
He's actually a rather interesting character to me. He knows, deep down, that he's fighting for the most reprehensible regime in human history. Yet he does it with it every bit as much ingenuity, inventiveness, courage, and determination as his opposite numbers who are fighting for the cause of freedom.

By this point we'd probably have the F-14E or F - supercruising, AESA Tomcats with the AAAM, AIM-9X and AMRAAM
There's also the B-52 force with 8xHarpoon apiece. Heck, this USAF might have dual-equipped with TLAM and ALCM just so they could shoot something like TASM-N

I'll try to remember some of this.

[phongn]

By this point we'd probably have the F-14E or F - supercruising, AESA Tomcats with the AAAM, AIM-9X and AMRAAM
There's also the B-52 force with 8xHarpoon apiece. Heck, this USAF might have dual-equipped with TLAM and ALCM just so they could shoot something like TASM-N

I'll try to remember some of this.

In case you want me to translate ...

Grumman had put out a proposal for various "ultimate" Tomcats; in this case, capable of supercruising, an active phased array radar and all sorts of other goodies. The "ultimate" configuration essentially would make the F-14 into an all-purpose attack/fighter/interceptor aircraft.

The AAAM was to be the successor to the Phoenix -- one proposal was ramjet-powered with a dual-mode seeker while the other one was a more conventional rocket with a tri-mode (IIR, terminal active-radar, home-on-jam) seeker.

[Junghalli]

Grumman had put out a proposal for various "ultimate" Tomcats; in this case, capable of supercruising, an active phased array radar and all sorts of other goodies. The "ultimate" configuration essentially would make the F-14 into an all-purpose attack/fighter/interceptor aircraft.

One thing though, this is a more advanced universe than OTL (albeit nowhere near as advanced as in Sterling's timeline). "Modern" designs in OTL would be maybe five or ten years obsolete here.
Hmm, the F-19 maybe...

[phongn]

One thing though, this is a more advanced universe than OTL (albeit nowhere near as advanced as in Sterling's timeline). "Modern" designs in OTL would be maybe five or ten years obsolete here.
Hmm, the F-19 maybe...

Well, as noted earlier, I'd still expect to at least see something like a completed Safeguard ABM system.

[Typhonis 1]

Dann...Aurora as an actual aircraft then?

[Junghalli]

Dann...Aurora as an actual aircraft then?

Ah, that would be sweet. Pity it's just a spyplane... I'm already drawing up plans for a light fighter variant which I'm tentatively dubbing the Eagle.
Of course, the Draka do have this huge fixation with speed, so I imagine they'll have their own version. Must must think of a suitably sinister name for it...
This actually puts this ATL closer to ODV (original Draka-verse) than I thought it would be. Although not really, since ODV had scramjets in, like, the 70s, and the Eagle is cutting edge in 2003 here.

[Typhonis 1]

Icarus or Pheonix. Built in response to US flyovers with the SR-71 this aircraft was designed to catch then bring it down. Then in 2000 urora began dominating the Drakan skies. Drakan airforce was in shock and they tried to play hurry and catch up....which is where the Icarus was built...using a nuclear ramjet and flying from bases in serf or Jannisary territory. It is mounted on a booster rocket to allow it to achive attack speed rapidly.

The aircraft is tempramental and still a bit buggy but can just about match the Aurora in speed.


Eagle is the same size as Aurora yet mounts one of the sirforces Boing flying lasers in its nose.


F123 Stealth fighter 2 Utilising advances and lessons learned from the F117 This aircraft has entered squadron service but is relegated curently to the intrior of the US.

[Junghalli]

Icarus or Pheonix. Built in response to US flyovers with the SR-71 this aircraft was designed to catch then bring it down. Then in 2000 Aurora began dominating the Drakan skies. Drakan airforce was in shock and they tried to play hurry and catch up....which is where the Icarus was built...using a nuclear ramjet and flying from bases in serf or Jannisary territory. It is mounted on a booster rocket to allow it to achive attack speed rapidly.
The aircraft is tempramental and still a bit buggy but can just about match the Aurora in speed.

I'd actually already thought up a name: the Harridan. But Phoenix sounds good too. I think I'll make it faster than the Eagle but not as heavily armed. Seems consistent with their philosophy of war. Hey, I realized I've got a semi-coherent airforce listing for the DAF.

Hellion=standby land-based fighter
Harridan=standby carrier-based fighter
Falcon=standby carrier-based bomber
Phoenix=hypersonic air superiority fighter

Now to assemble a similar list for the USAF. It's easier with the DAF because they're a completely fictional military so I can basically just make stuff up, the USAF designs I'm going to have extrapolate from OTL designs.
Hmm, any aircraft you'd recommend for the USAF to be using?

[LordShaithis]

I say give the Draka an fighter called the F-69 Penetrator.

[phongn]

Now to assemble a similar list for the USAF. It's easier with the DAF because they're a completely fictional military so I can basically just make stuff up, the USAF designs I'm going to have extrapolate from OTL designs.
Hmm, any aircraft you'd recommend for the USAF to be using?

Taking a page from Stuart Slade here -- what do you want your USAF to do - not the means to the end, but the end itself? I think you should backtrace your history a bit to construct something reasonable and then continue. Right now it seems like your inserting something like our USA + 10 years technology into a Drakaverse, which doesn't feel quite right.

For example, in TBOverse, the tactical air forces are almost nonexistant and the USA went for the "higher faster" route while ours had more a mix of strategic and tactical aircraft (and had our fun stealthed toys).

[Junghalli]

Taking a page from Stuart Slade here -- what do you want your USAF to do - not the means to the end, but the end itself? I think you should backtrace your history a bit to construct something reasonable and then continue. Right now it seems like your inserting something like our USA + 10 years technology into a Drakaverse, which doesn't feel quite right.
For example, in TBOverse, the tactical air forces are almost nonexistant and the USA went for the "higher faster" route while ours had more a mix of strategic and tactical aircraft (and had our fun stealthed toys).

OK. Firstly the chief difference in military doctrine between this ATL and OTL would be a greater emphasis on home defense and matching roughly equal foes. There are only about a dozen nation-states in this world, with three of them (the US, the Draka, and the Soviets) being continent-spanning empires. The Soviets have been messing about in South America a bit I imagine (I'm thinking there will probably be one or two communist dictatorships down there) but generally there's been less of the "proxy war" pattern we saw during the Cold War OTL. So the Soviets and US will be mostly geared up for war with one of the other two superpowers rather than the kind of steamroll-inferior-opponent-and-piss-on-the-ashes operations that have defined just about every OTL US war since the close of WWII. The exception to that will be the Draka, who have a much more hostile provincial population to control than either the US or the Soviets (in large part the fault of their whole total domination as something close to a religion thing). As a result after WWII their military shifted more to an army of occupation than an army of war. I didn't make that up, this actually happens in Sterling's timeline too, but he seems to have either failed to take into account that this would have cost them greatly against the AFD (as it will against the US Army here) or he basically used the Stone Dogs as a magic bullet. Hey, at least he reversed the usual paradigm of the good guys winning against a superior foe through a strategic magic golden BB, got to give him points for originality there.
So altogether you will see a US military with a greater emphasis on defending its spread-out territories (all of North America and various islands) and fighting another superpower that's on a roughly equal footing, and less emphasis on assymetric warfare. For instance, the current push toward a lighter, more mobile army easily deployable all over the globe and designed mostly to put down technologically inferior opponents would never happen here.
Also, since the US here controls an entire continent and then some, and has direct access to all the resources and population of North America, and exists in a world that I'd say is generally nastier than OTL, expect its military to be a whole lot bigger.

I say give the Draka an fighter called the F-69 Penetrator.

I was wondering when somebody was bound to say something like that.
Ravager cruise missiles...

[Setzer]

Thank you. I've always had a certain fascination with the Draka, as individuals, as much as I simply revile them as a culture. Their society is so alien I keep wondering "how is it that normal human beings live like this?"
As for Setzer, a lifetime of extra-strength indoctrination is a hard thing to break. The only way the Draka would work as a society, from my perspective, would have to be to make people ashamed and repelled at having normal human feelings. He's had it drummed into him his whole life that not being a heatless sadist is a sign of weakness and lack of spirit.
He's actually a rather interesting character to me. He knows, deep down, that he's fighting for the most reprehensible regime in human history. Yet he does it with it every bit as much ingenuity, inventiveness, courage, and determination as his opposite numbers who are fighting for the cause of freedom.

I always wanted a daughter... Nice that I'm so interesting to you, but I'm really rabid anti-Draka. Ah well. At least avoid killing me this time, if you please.

[Typhonis 1]

Interesting idea...a stealth aircfraft armed with one of thoes Boeing airborne lasers for killing missles in the boost phase.

As for Air force jets The F-22 is now in squadron service.

Using lessons from the airborne anti ballistic missle laser an experimental air defense laser system has been developed by the Army.


A few B-52 have been outfitted with it and...lets just say it can kill any ircraft it can detect...after all hard to fly when a beam of coherent light ruptures your fuel tank or blows a wing off.

RPVs are abundant...everything from a small hand held jb for infantry to use in scouting to harpoon armed heavy global hawks.

[Junghalli]

I always wanted a daughter... Nice that I'm so interesting to you, but I'm really rabid anti-Draka. Ah well. At least avoid killing me this time, if you please.

Just assume this guy's the descendant of the MU counterpart to the guy in Drakafic, who in this timeline survived WWII because the Draka didn't loose it. Gotta love the multiverse with all its possibilities and permutations.
Sorry if my typecasting irritated you. It's not that I see anything Draka-like in your personality (the only people I'll deliberately typecast as Draka are trolls, especially the racist neo-Nazis like Arminius). I picked your name at random the first time and used it again here because I'm a lazy lout who couldn't be bothered to think up a new one.
And yes, you will have a long and prestigious military career fighting a valiant but ultimately futile fight against the mighty US war machine, although I can't promise you won't die gloriously at the very end pulling an Alamo on the combined Soviet/American/British forces marching on Archona city itself.
Hmm, I'm thinking at the very end of the war there'll be a land grab between the Americans and Russians over the spoils of war taken from the Dominate and the Draka heartland gets turned into the Soviet Socialist Republic of Drakia. Give the Snakes a chance to find out what it's like to live under an opressive dictatorial regime themselves.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I still can't see the map. The link you put up gives a 404 error. Have you tried photobucket?

[Junghalli]

I still can't see the map. The link you put up gives a 404 error. Have you tried photobucket?

I just signed up.
AARRGGHH! WTF I can't fucking get a direct image link! Son of a fucking bitch! Here's a link until I can fix it.
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a24/Ju ... ld1600.jpg

[CaptainChewbacca]

This should do it. If I can make a few suggestions...

1. Iceland would've been picked up by someone by now. Its too important to the North Sea.

2. British Guyana would probably have gone American, given they're english-speaking and surrounded by commies.

3. I don't know where you diverge from the Draka timeline, but Stirling only has 2 or 3 countries in South America.

Overall a good map.

[Black Admiral]

A question: did the XB-70 Valkyrie and XF-108 Rapier reach production this universe?

[Junghalli]

This should do it. If I can make a few suggestions

Thanks! Sure, go ahead.

1. Iceland would've been picked up by someone by now. Its too important to the North Sea.

Good point. I was originally going to make Iceland a British territory but I was reluctant to do so because it wasn't a colony in OTL AFAIK. I guess it could have federated with Britain sometime after WWII, lest it be gobbled up by the Soviet and Draka menaces to the south. After all, now that I think about it, Ireland became independent before WWII IIRC, it would probably have to have rejoined the Empire at some point to be a British territory in the 2000s (probably pretty damn uncomfortable with only a few hundred miles of water between it and the Dominate).
Come to think of it, this might be the beginning of some kind of European Federation to be established after the war, once Europe is liberated from the Draka.

2. British Guyana would probably have gone American, given they're english-speaking and surrounded by commies.

Grand Columbia isn't communist in this timeline. It has a very strongly US-backed government. I imagine the US would have taken pretty strong precautions against the possibility of a communist country sharing their border, and right next to their most strategically important state (Panama).
That said, you have a good point, it would probably have become a state at some point. The boundaries of the US expand again! Long live America! Napalm and nukes for the Draka scum!

3. I don't know where you diverge from the Draka timeline, but Stirling only has 2 or 3 countries in South America.

He had Peru as part of Grand Columbia and Bolivia as part of Brazil. I've gone with the (IMO) more sensible South American situation of the Drakafic-verse.
Most of the serious timeline divergences don't start until WWII though.

[Junghalli]

A question: did the XB-70 Valkyrie and XF-108 Rapier reach production this universe?

Yes. I think I'll make the Valkyrie the USAFs main-line bomber in this timeline, like the B-52 was in OTL.

[Black Admiral]

A question: did the XB-70 Valkyrie and XF-108 Rapier reach production this universe?

Yes. I think I'll make the Valkyrie the USAFs main-line bomber in this timeline, like the B-52 was in OTL.

Goodie. That'd mean the Rapier's there then, as an escort for the Valk (oh the snakes are gonna hate those planes).

BTW, with the Valkyrie going uncancelled, that mean the GAM-87 Skybolt was brought into service as well (wiki article)?

[phongn]

Skybolt might or might not be cancelled, but it was supposed to be carried on Vulcan or the BUFF. The B-70 certainly doesn't need it.

[Typhonis 1]

What about the B-1?

[phongn]

What about the B-1?

Why would SAC have the B-1 when they have the B-70?