(A speculative fiction based on present geopolitical realities.)
It is December 31st 2029. Tonight we celebrate the beginning of not only a new decade... but a new world. Two new worlds to be absolutely precise. We are full of trepidation, anxiety and some dread, but also some hope for a better future than our recent past.
The seemingly endless wars are over, at least for our sector, our Eurasia.
We hear little of the Americas now... less and less since the final conflagration.
Tonight there will be two separate celebrations though we know for our cousins in the southern American hemisphere they will certainly be muted. Geography finally defeated both them and us for it was clear in negotiations that the final agreement could not work as a patchwork of nations with no clear dividing line. A clear dividing line was ultimately seen to be the only viable option.
NATO pushed ever forward creating a path of fear for itself. It added to its forces within all its member states, providing them with the latest technology, all urged on by Biden, then later Harris. Russia pushed back diplomatically criticizing each new threat, but it could do nothing but protest and ready her military forces for every eventuality. That was until the Crimea attack which took place in the early hours of the morning of the 3rd of November 2023.
The multiple explosions taking out complete sections of the Kerch Bridge were said to be the work of Ukrainian special forces, but very few believed this. Everyone suspected it was in fact a U.S. task force, long in preparation, that had carried out this covert operation. Only satellite data or high-altitude surveillance could have provided the required data on the specific areas of weakness that had been hit. This could of course have been passed on to the Ukrainians but the general consensus was that this was a special op by U.S. forces from beginning to end.
Within minutes this attack was followed by multiple strikes on strategic targets in Sevastopol including a number of military craft.
An ultimatum from Kiev was transferred simultaneously by diplomatic cable to Moscow to coincide with the very first strikes. Surrender Crimea to Ukraine or this would only be the start of a much longer campaign. Moscow responded with a surgical strike on the Ukrainian Duma three minutes later. A secondary strike hit military targets near Lviv two minutes subsequently.
An ultimatum from Moscow was then fired back to Kiev. Crimea, as an integral part of Russian Federation territory being under attack meant a state of war existed between the two nations. Kiev was to desist all belligerence immediately or many more Russian strikes would follow.
At this point Washington became directly involved with a cabled threat to Moscow to desist in its aggression immediately. (At this point news was relayed of the Russian strikes across western mass media but nothing of the Ukrainian/U.S. strikes which had preceded them.
There was a pause at this point while Moscow debated possible strategies for the best way to proceed.
Meanwhile, several small flotillas of Ukrainian battle craft had eluded radar stations by extreme stealth in the Perekops'ka gulf region and were dispersing black-clad saboteurs to locations in Armiansk, Krasnoperekopsk and several small towns further south readying explosives for detonation. Other craft were attempting to breach the Russian border at several other points along the coast with varying degrees of success.
Moscow had ordered full alert as soon as the first attack upon the Kerch Bridge had taken place but at 03:45 a.m. this had taken some time to become fully operational.
Five minutes passed during which deliberations were held in Moscow, Kiev and Washington. Only two of the three had a fully mapped plan shared between them.
Now five units of Ukrainian saboteurs were in place and ordered to stand by. At 04:10 they were authorized to initiate the next stage of localized explosions.
A second ultimatum arrived in Moscow this time also from Washington. Give up Crimea or multiple strikes will be authorized on your bridge.
As this was received reports came in of explosions in and around infrastructure in the north west of the peninsula. Moscow’s attention was being stretched and pressurized from multiple points. Several further targets with Ukraine were immediately reduced to rubble.
A strategic decision was then made. Some U.S. sensitive target MUST be hit in response to these threats. Surrender of Crimea and the base of the Black Sea Fleet at Sevastopol would not and could not be contemplated.
Šiauliai Air Base, Šiauliai 77103, Lithuania was chosen along with NATO AWACS airbase at Geilenkirchen, Germany. Both were hit hard using upgraded Iskander M missiles launched from Kalingrad.
Public reaction was building fast in areas hit within the Crimean peninsula and from vehicles trapped on the Kerch Bridge and from the motorway access roads.
New targets were listed for targeting depending on eventualities.
President Putin had immediately attempted to call President Harris as soon as hostilities began.
barely twenty minutes had passed in a flurry of activity on both sides before the hotline functioned.
The heated discussion is not known in verbatim form however, it came down to a stalemate where neither side could agree a path forward after Harris demanded Russia release Crimea back to Ukrainian control. Putin point blank refused.
Finally a halt was called to all hostilities for two hours for the tenuous, fraught dialogue to resume after more strategic personnel were called in on the Russian side. The demand from the U.S. side remained as an ultimatum that would not be withdrawn.
Lavrov arrived just in time from Turkey where he had been in talks with the new government on its purchase of several upgraded defense systems. Hurriedly he was briefed and forward tactics intently discussed before the deadline for the renewed call.
Ukraine was to be given greater access to the peninsula under a new agreement which proposed certain undertakings which would allow Donetsk and Lugansk regions with Ukraine’s Donbass to have full autonomy. Under these circumstances, also including guarantees of security for the mutual security of those on Crimea through a co-governance agreement with Kiev. All of this to be thrashed out at a specially convened conference in Minsk.
The second hotline conversation became a conference call which eventuated in a begrudging acceptance of the proposed conference with major caveats regarding the use of further force at any time if deemed necessary by either U.S. or Ukrainian forces. Russia reserved the right to respond with equal or greater force if deemed necessary.
This then is how it all began.
(Though of course preceding events led up to these, but those are well known.)
The conference failed to reach agreement and talks dragged on interminably for many months thereafter. The three sides, plus input from France, Germany and Italy simply could not find common ground enough to link all expectations, demands, safeguards and treaties required to make peace either stable or long-lasting.
The perpetration by both sides of such violence, death and destruction that had occurred shocked all sides and all nations to the core. No nation felt safe. The genie had been let out of the bottle. How could anyone be assured now that anything approaching peace could ever be found and maintained? The situation was intolerable.
The next steps led us here and our long anticipated end-of-decade moment at midnight which had gripped us all for months. We had this one last chance in a world now terminally broken between sides where no stable agreement had been possible and was seen clearly to be never possible at any future time.
China had stepped in early on in the ‘Final Settlement’. In a mirror image of the Berlin settlement at the end of The Great Patriotic War the world would be permanently divided into the Americas and western Europe and our Eurasia. The negotiations naturally were extremely prolonged, myriad details had to be discussed, national interests argued for and often given up and replaced by other concessions from the other side. The process took seven long years.
Seven years to divide a planet in two. To preserve the future peace and stability of one half as the U.S. zone of control (with European nations and Latin America in subservient roles) and the other, our Eurasia with China and Russia holding positions that in theory demarcated a partnership but with Chinese economic dominance a primary factor.
At the end of a bitter and violent struggle from the earliest days of humankind it appeared a final fix where geopolitical ambitions could be nullified and violent instincts inclined toward conquer, could be quarantined, had finally been arrived at.
It is 23:59 on the 31st of December 2029. I am standing in Red Square Moscow with my family around me and twenty five thousand or so others also. Our hearts are pounding. We dare to hope through myriad emotions from fear to joy to grief and back again, our bodies shake involuntarily, the moment is too much for us with all its significance. Tears begin to well in our eyes then and roll down our cheeks as the first toll from the mighty Spasskaya Tower bell booms out from far above us.
The last chime tolls and it is finally midnight. Everyone is shouting and kissing one another, drinks in hand. It’s a new time, a new world and we have new hope in our hearts.
Above, the fireworks begin, rockets burst above us raining down showers of multicolored light. It looks and feels a little like a battlefield as we shake with emotion again, hot tears of joy and pain fall uncontrollably as we exchange smiles, hugs and kisses with all around us... knowing with some good will and good fortune will there will be no more battlefields, ever again.
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