Novgorod AU

10. Seccond World War 1941-45

After the outbreak of the second world war in Europe in 1939, Novgorod seeked fast settlement in with the Japanese Government in 1939. Al tough imidient German attack was not apparent but the fast fall of Poland brought the Third Reich right next to the doorsteps of Novgorod. With Soviets participating in the division of Poland, Novgorod faced a situation where it could theoretically end up in war against the Soviet Union as well as with the Nazi Germany. This made Novgorod to seek possibility for alliance with France and UK but initially these talks came to no conclusion as Novgorod was unwilling to join the war right away. However Novgorod soon realized that the German-Soviet Non-aggression pact was merely a bought time for the ultimate confrontation between the Germans and the Soviet States. Neither Germany nor Soviet Union took any hostile intentions towards Novgorod in the early part of the Second World War.

Preparations for the eventual war begun in Novgorod. The strong focus on the navy had left marks for the army which was relatively small and ill-equipped for modern warfare. Tank and artillery development lacked behind of those in Germany and in Soviet Union. Trough out the 1940 mobilization of RKKA (Red Army) moved in fast pace but the eventually it proved out to be insufficient. During the mobilization effort, Trotsky died unexpectedly in August 1940 which left the country and party without prominent leadership.

The war was unavoidable despite neither of Novgorod's main belligerents Germany and Japan had any actual plans to do so in the start of the WWII. However both nations had overall expansion plans and ideological reasons to invade Novgorod. Germany wanted “lebensraum” from the east for the German master race and ultimately destroy the Bolshevik rule in Novgorod and Soviet Union. Japan in the other-hand saw Novgorod its main threat for its own intentions to expand in Asia, mainly in China and South East Asia. Japan also wanted the Far east regions of Novgorod to be included in its own reign. Siberia was to be formed as a buffer state between Japanese holdings and Novgorod.

Before 1941 Germany had effectively conquered most of Europe and only Great Britain was left to stand against Hitler. Germany knew that eventually USA and the Soviets would enter the war and thus wanted to attack Soviet Union and Novgorod and defeat them before the US intervention. Japan had subjugated much of the Chinese republic into its own puppet state and was ready to move in its plan to seize the South East Asian islands with their resources. Japan war plan called quick and decisive attack on its main adversary Novgorod and USA and then seek peace with favorable terms.

Germany attacked in 22th june 1941 against Novgorod and Soviet Union. The attack took Novgorodians by surprise despite there were indications of German build up in the borders. Novgorod relied too much on the reports from Soviet Union in which Josif Stalin personally was convinced that the Germans would not attack. Even more painful surprise was the devastating effect of the Blitzkrieg doctrines where the German tanks steamrolled over the Novgordian defenses. Minks fell in just four days after the attack and by the end of the summer the Germans had conquered large part of the western Novgorod and were closing in the capital and Leningrad.

The first battle where the Germany attack was at least temporarily halted was the first battle of Novgorod in August 1941 which saved the capital. Germany's push towards the three great cities (Leningrad, Novgorod and Moscow) however continued throughout the autumn although the coming of winter started to but strain on the overextended German lines. Of the three cities, Leningrad had the worst fate. The German attack pushed trough the defenses and in September the city was sieged as Finland had joined the German attack in order to compensate for the defeats it had during the revolution and its aftermaths and occupied the Karelian Isthmus. Thus begun the 900 days siege of the city.

The main German attack plan to take the other two cities Moscow and Novgorod was to attack with main forces against Moscow which was the southern most of the cities and from there move with huge pincer maneuver to Novgorod and join with the German northern units sieging Leningrad. By this time Novgorod and Soviet Union had come to agreement of a joint military command although in reality the co-ordination of the two armies were extremely difficult. After fierce fighting the German push was halted at the gates of Moscow and with the arrival of new fresh and battle-experienced units from Novgorod Far-east the joint command called STAVKA started the winter 1941-42 counter offensive. Initially the attacks made some progress and specially in the Soviet sector the Germans were pushed back from the Moscow outskirts. However the Novgorodian counter-offensive was cut sort as another catastrophe struck: Japan had attacked in the far-east.

Japan and Germany had agreed on overall principles of joint attack against Novgorod but despite Germany’s request of simultaneous attack Japan wanted to wait until its reparations were ready. It wanted Novgorod to think that japan would not attack and pull main bulk of its troops to Europe. This was due that Japan had plans to attack at the same time both Novgorod and USA and the Western allies in the overall plan to invade South East Asia. The Novgorod possessed the largest land forces in the area but Japan was able to use the millions of Chinese troops from their new puppet-ally China. In 8th of December Japanese and Chinese armies crossed the border and begun to pour into Novgorod far-east which was left under defended. Japanese quickly cut the Dalny peninsula of and moved from both China and Korea. Vladivostok fell in January 1942. At the same time Japanese aircraft carrier force attacked US Pearl Harbor and its ground based planes attacked Port Artur. Both attacks were successful, most of the USA pacific fleet battleships were destroyed. The air attacks against Port Artur had similar effects and eventually the remaining Novgorodian Pacific fleet main forces made desperate but doomed breakout to the Yellow Sea where they were annihilated. However both USN and RKKF's carrier forces were intact; Novgorodian carrier force together with the newest battleships were in Sumatra at the time of the attack and also the US carrier force was not present at Pear Harbor at the time of the attack.

The fighting in the far-east continued trough out the 1942 when Japanese eventually reached to the eastern shores of the lake Baikal. All of Manchuria and Primorye were occupied and only the Komsomolsk-Na-Amur and the railroad connecting it to the main Siberian railroad network remained in Novgorods hands. Meanwhile in the west, the battles had turned into static trench-war as the Germany's main offensives were directed south towards Stalingrad and Caucasus. As the USA now in the war, the western allies, USA and UK in the forefront begun massive Lend-Lease shipments to Novgorod and Soviet Union for material support.

The turning point for the war became the battle of Stalingrad in the winter 1942-43. The German 6th army was surrounded in to the city and was destroyed after fierce fighting. In the joint operation to assist the surrounding Novgorod and Soviet launched large scale offensives across the frontline. In the North, Novgorod made some minor success, mostly eliminating few German salients and the operation Iskra that brought small passage of land to ease the besieged Leningrad. The Soviets were more successful in the south and after the Stalingrad they managed to push pack to the Germans to Eastern Ukraine territory. As the German holdings in the north proved still to be too strong for Novgorod to break them, it was decided to launch first major counter offensive in the Far-East. In June 1943 Novgorod started massive attack in the Baikal region which pushed the Japanese and Chinese troops across the Amur river. It was the first truly successful strategical offensive of RKKA in the war.

Soviets won the battle of Kursk in summer 1943 which was the last attempt of Germany to take back the initiative after the defeat in Stalingrad. Novgorod decided to exploit the weakening of German positions and again shifted the main focus to the west and started to plan massive offensive to lift of the siege of Leningrad and drive the Germans out of the outskirts of Novgorod. The operation started in January 1944 and was successful. It drove the Germans out and released the besieged Leningrad. By the summer Finland was drove back from Karelia and forced to accept seperate peace. At this point the military strenght of Novgorod was large enough to operate simultaneously in both fronts and while the western forces pushed on towards Baltic region and Belarus, the Far East front started massive offensive against the Japanese. Amur was crossed and the Japanese and Chinese armies were crushed. At the end of the year Novgorod had reached Poland and had liberated Dalny and Vladivostok.

By this point the defeat of the axis nations were merely mater of time and the race for best position in the postwar world order had begun. In Europe the major Allied nations had agreed on general principles of the fate of Germany and Eastern Europe but in the Far East Novgorod and USA had not reached agreement over the fate of Japan. Novgorod demanded similar division of Japan as Germany but USA refused this. As Soviets were little interested on the far east matters, Novgorod was not able to push its demands. While in Europe Soviets and Novgorodians kept heading towards Berlin and capturing as much of the German realm as possible, in the Far East Novgorod started to plan one of the most impressive maneuver in the whole war.

The US led western allies had slowly occupied most of the South East Asian islands and were closing in Philippines Novgorod had managed to occupy the lost territories and was in the best geographical situation in launching an invasion to Japan. At this point it was obvious that the two allied factions could not co-operate on the matter. However Novgorod's ability to conduct amphibious assaults was far less limited than of the US. Although RKKF had successfully captured most of the Kuril islands by this point and had established workable amphibious doctrines, it lacked the sheer volume and quantitative of the western allies landing forces. Thus Novgorod wanted to buy time for its preparations of landing in the mainlands. They took risky decision to narrow the possibilities of US forces to land on Japan before them.

US forces were in the Philippines but still needed to get closer to the mainland Japan in order to launch landings in the scale which would be even massive than the Normandy landings in the France. The Ryukyu islands were the most optimal target for such preparations. These islands were in great strategical importance to Novgorod as well as they controlled the sea traffic from Yellow Sea into the Pacific Ocean. For Novgorod these islands were still too far as the main units of the Pacific Fleet were stationed in the remote forward base in Petropavlovsks in the Kamchatka Peninsula. Although Dalny had been recaptured, it was still rather ruins after the occupation and to move the fleet there would require too hazardous route trough the Japanese controlled narrow straights.

Thus Novgorod needed a midway starting point and the island of Iwo Jima was optimal for that. It was small and rather lightly defended and would able the RKKF to gather operational base for the invasion of the Ryukyu Islands. Starting in February 1945, Novgorod launched its first overseas long range amphibious operation in its history. It proved out to be extremely difficult affair however. Novgorod suffered severe lost of troops in the process of capturing the island. It infuriated the US and started a race over the remains of the Japanese held islands.

In the west the overwhelming combined strenght of Novgorod and Soviet Union penetrated into deep Germny and by the spring 1945 they were in the doors of Berlin. Under the Joint command of Novgorodian Marshal Zhukov the German capital was occupied and Germany defeated. Hitler shot himself and the final capitulation of Germany took place in 9th May 1945. The war in Europe was over.

In the Far East after the Iwo Jima was secured, RKKF started to move on its second phase to occupy the Ryukyu Islands. The once mighty Imperial Japanese navy had been decimated mostly by the USN and Japan had little changes to rebel the attacks. As Novgorod was so close in the opposite shores of Primorye and closing in on Korea, the Japanese had pulled most of the defending troops away from Ryukyu Islands. The Novgorodian assault started in April and by June the Islands were under Novgorods control. In a desperate attempt to counter the offensive, Japanese sent what was left of their surface force, mainly the mighty battleship Yamato in a suicide attack on the Novgorodian invasion fleet. The battleship and its escorts were however intercepted by Novgorod's carrier borne aircrafts and sunken before it reached the operational area.

As USA was now cut of its main route to occupy Japan it was left with few choices. There were even talks about declaring war on Novgorod but it was thought to be too radical and ultimately ineffective for the US interest. Main focus was on to get Japanese surrender before Novgorod could launch its offensive on the main Islands. In order to do this the facade of the integrity of the Allies had to be intact so Japanese would not try to seek separate peace with the Eastern Allies. Solution for the surrender was found on the new super weapon, the atomic bomb which was decided to use against Japan. In 6th of August single atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima and second one on the city of Nagasaki in three days later. This eventually made the Japanese to accept the peace and the Seccond World War ended in 15th of August.

11. Naval development and operations in Seccond World War 1941-45

Baltic Fleet:

At the eve of the Operation Barbarossa, RKKF's Baltic Fleet (KBF) was superior naval force in the Baltic sea. However its numerical powers were out powered with mines which were the single biggest element of the entire naval actions in the Baltics. When the Germans attacked in June 1941, they had already with the assistance of Finland mined most of the sea lanes in the Gulf of Finland. Novgorod lost its first naval unit in the second day of the campaign when destroyer Popeditel was sunk after hitting a mine. The heavy mining had the effect that in the very early days of the war, the most heavy units were pulled pack to Leningrad and Kronstadt as it was too risky to manuever in the heavy mined narrow passages. Also at the start of the war, Germany had no major surface combatants in the Baltic theatre, thus the KBF's role was reduced to supporting the ground units trying to rebel the fast moving Blitzkrieg.

Germany's advance was so fast that by end of July Riga had fell and the KBF units in the southern Baltic coast were moved to Tallinn. However the germans were closing in Tallinn in August and it was decided to evacuate the fleet and military forces from the city via sea to Leningrad. Massive convoys left the city with 160 ships and over 28 000 people on board. As the convoy had to cross the Juminda peninsula and total of 65 ships were lost. This was heavy blow to the KBF and despite the major surface combatants managed to get safe to Kronstadt, they were trapped down there for the most of the duration of the war. Germans briefly gathered powerful surface fleet called Baltenflotte which consisted the battleship Tirpitz and five cruisers and several destroyers ready to engage the KBF if it decided to try and break free and head for Sweden to be interned.

After Tallinn fell the German troops were nearing Leningrad and the city effectively came under siege in 8th September 1941. The remains of the KBF put great effort in fighting against the Germans with the battleships and cruisers using their heavy guns to bombard the German positions in the ground. However the constant air-attacks and artillery fires had toll over the KBF, the Battleship 25 Oktyabrya was sunk after German air-attacks but was later salvaged and used as a floating battery.

The naval operations after the besieging was mostly limited to submarine operations. KBF's submarines made constant efforts to try break trough the mine-barracks and submarine-nets into the Baltic Sea in order to harass the German supply convoys and merchant shipping. Small scale surface actions over the control of the islands in the Eastern Gulf of Finland took place during the 1942-43. Extensive small unit operations were also conducted in the Lake Ladoga where the Novgorodians tried to supply the besieged city over the waters during the summertime.

After the January 1944 Offensive where the siege of Leningrad was lifted, the KBF took part on the fighting in the southern bank and of the Gulf of Finland against the Germans and in the Karelian Isthmus against the Finns but the major units still remained in the ports due the heavy mining of the Baltic waters. As all of the industrial and military resources were put on defending the besieged Leningrad, no new ships were build nor completed during the war. Limited resources left for the shipyards were used to repairing the damaged units.

Northern Fleet:

Northern Fleet (SF) was the largest naval formation at least when it came to capital units in RKKF at the start of The Second Word War. Immediately after the outbreak of the hostilities, SF primary role became to support the only existing sea lane into Novgorod from the western allies. The devastating effect of German U-boat war was shown on force at the early days of the war when German U-boat sunk the aircraft carrier Kostromitinov, the largest aircraft carrier ever build to the date. Fighting of the German U-boats were the main act of hostilities in the SF campaign during the war.

In August 1941, USA and UK started sending material aid to Novgorod and Soviet Union under the Lend-Lease program. It consisted several almoust non-stop shippings of weapons, ammunition, food and other critical material via ships trough Iceland and Jan Mayen to Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. Northern Fleets main units were tasked to escort these convoys together with the UK's Royal Navy. Usually the British ships escort outbound convoys and SF ships escorted the homebound units. Germany tried to intercept these convoys with U-boats, aircrafts flying from Finland and Norway as well as with surface combatants based in Norway.

SF escort units were poorly designed to the new given role as they were mostly intended to operate inshore rather than in open oceans. Larger destroyers were optimized for speed over endurance so they were equally unsuitable for the long range escort works. The situation was same in the Western Allies and UK came up with the new warship type- frigate, slow ship build on merchantial standards and optimized for long range ASW escorts. As Novgorods shipbuilding capability was limited only for the Severodvinsk shipyard, they asked for USA and UK to build dedicated escort ships for the RKKF. Initially both nations were reluctant to give warships to the still suspicious communist regime but were forced to comply as Novgorod threaten to withdrawn from the escort duties of the convoys.

Initially 18 River class frigates was build specially for Novgorod and transferred in Late 1942 -early 43. These were accompanied by 9 Bogue-class escort carriers also build for Novgorod's use under the Lend-Lease agreement. Another 10 River class frigates were transferred in late 1943. With the arrival of new ships, the existing main surface units of the SF were decided to transfer into the Pacific Ocean to supplement the Pacific Fleet in its fight against Japan. The existing fleet carriers Grazhdanin, Svoboda and Orel together with battleships Oktyabrskaya Revolyutsiya and Chetvortyy Internatsional, cruisers Omsk and Tver and 15 destroyers were organized into 4th Pacific Squadron in honor of the 1905 sailing to help out the Pacific fleet. The squadron was send via the Northern Sea route in August 1943 to the Pacific Ocean where it rendezvoused with the Pacific fleet at Petropavlovsk.

With the absent of the most powerful ships in the SF inventory, Novgorodians became unease by the possibility of German surface raiders becoming more active. Specially the battleship Scharnhorst was considered a serious thread. In order to remove the thread, SF tried to lure the German battleship to come and intercept the convoy JW55 in December 1943. The plan worked and Scharnhorst was attacked by Battleship V.I Lenin and cruisers Karl Liebknecht, Irkuts, Tallinn and Sverldovsk and group of escorting destroyers. The German Battleship was first attacked by cruisers while trying to engage the convoy set to lure it out from the ports. Scharnhorst then broke of and started to head to South and was pursued by the Novgorodian cruisers. However the Battleship V.I. Lenin was heading to meat the German battleship in the south near Nordkapp. The two battleships engaged and V.I. Lenin managed to hit a salvo on the German ship which turned east. V.I. Lenin scored a long range hit on the German ship which speed fell considerably and was intercepted by group of Novgorodian destroyers which fired a torpedo salvo which further damaged Scharnhorst. With the speed of the German ship decreased, the pursuing Novgorodian cruisers and battleship opended fire on the doomed Scharnhorst. She was finally sunked after another devastating torpedo attack from the Novgorodian destroyers.

After the Battle of Nordkapp, no other major surface activity took place involving the SF ships. The convoys run trough out the war and the fight against the U-boats accompanied these as well. In 1944 second departure of ships from the Northern area was conducted when newly commissioned aircraft carriers and destroyers were sended to aid the Pacific Fleet via the Northern Sea route.

Pacific Fleet:

The pacific theater saw the most extensive and important naval operations involving the RKKF in the war. It was also the front where the fleet played most important role in the overall result of the war and its aftermaths.

Prior the Japanese attack, Novgorod had learned about the possible war against Japan in beforehand and it was decided that the main bulk of the Pacific Fleet (TOF) was not to be stationed in Port Artur in order to avoid the situation that struck the fleet in the 1904 war where the entire Pacific fleet was trapped in the besieged port. The two new just commissioned project 23 battleships were moved to Petropavlovsk and the carriers together with the heavy cruisers were already in Sumatra. Only the old Tsusima-class battleships were left from the major capital units to Port Artur. This foresighted decision ended up saving most of the fleets fighting power from the initial Japanese attack.

Japan launched its simultaneous attacks against the Western Allies and Novgorod in 8th December 1941. Chinese and Japanese troops attacked from China and Korea with overwhelming numbers as Novgorods main strength was concentrated in Europe against Germany. Japanese plans were to first attack the US Pacific Fleet in Hawaii and then turn against the TOF. However main bulk of Japanese battleships were in place in the case if the Novgorodians decided to break out from Port Artur.

In the initial phase of the Pacific campaign, the TOF was mainly inactive as fleet was dispersed across vast area and the Japanese concentrated force was too powerful. The carrier squardon in Sumatra was decided to pull out as the japanese fleet approached which caused some serious critism inside the RKKF. Admiral Yumashev, commander of the TOF however felt that the carriers were too valuable to be sacrificed in the hopeless defense of the Sumatra. The carrier squardon, known as the 3rd Eskadra was sent to east and trough the Solomon Islands and via Hawaii back to Petropavlovsk. Sumatra fell in March 1942.

In the mainland, Japanese and Chinese troops had occupied most of the Far East region by the spring of 1942. Vladivostok fell April and only the Dalny Peninsula was left for Novgorod but cut out from the rest and heavily besieged. As the Japanese closed in, the trapped 1st Eskadra, consisting mostly the 3 remaining Tsusima class battleships and several cruisers decided to make a desperate attempt to break out from the sieged city against the orders of Admiral Yumashev and the STAVKA.
Under Vice-admiral Sorokin the 1st Eskarda headed to the sea where they were countered by powerful Japanese naval formation brought to in station as the japanese were certain that the city of Dalny and Port Artur would fell in any moments. Japanese fleet consisted the 1st battleship division with Yamato, Nagato and Mutsu together with several cruisers and destroyers. The japanese battleships were superior to those of the 3 Tsusima class and were accompanied with powerful land based airforces where as the Novgorodians had barely non existent air support.

The Battle of the Yellow Sea (sometimes called second battle of the Yellow Sea, first beign the one fought in 1905) took place at 6th May 1942. Vice-Admiral Sorokin's plan was to engage the japanese units with the three battleships and draw all enemy attention and fire to them while a convoy of miscellaneous ships could pass the distracted enemy and head for Sea of Japan and try to reach Komsomolsk-Na-Amur, the closest port that Novgorod still held. The plan worked in some respect. The three old battleships lined up against the superior enemy in a desperate attack. First enemy unit that came across the line was battleship Mutsu which was taken off guard as japanese were unaware that the Novgorodians had left the port. Mutsu came into concentrated fire of three battleships at range of around 12km. She took series of hits and several fires broke out. Yamato and Nagato quickly moved in position and started firing at the Novgorodian ships. At the same time Mutsu capsized and sunk. The two japanese battleships were facing the Novgorodian ships in a favorable direction from a “crossed-T” position, ironically the same position as did the Novgorodians face the japanese in the battle of Tsusima in 1905.

First one to go was the battleship Tsusima with Vice-admiral Sorokin onboard. The ship was shread with the 460mm and 410mm rounds and was struck several times while trying to maneuver into more favorable position. Tsusima sunk with all life abroad. Arkhangelsk and Port Artur were hit next and sunked in similar manners. Arkhangelsk was the last to go, she had took more 20 hits of the japanese battleships but were able to hit at least one hit against Yamato, tough with no considerable effect. While the Japanese main force feasted on the battleships, the convoy of refugees and soldiers from Dalny managed to escape the initial japanese blockading units but were later attacked by aircrafts and submarines. Of the almoust 200 ships that left Dalny, 72 were sunked in the gauntlet run across the Tsusima straight and the Sea of Japan before reaching Komsomolsk-Na-Amur.

Actions of Vice-Admiral Sorokin were officially condemned by the officials but were felt being heroic to many others. The conduct of Sorokin and Yumashev in the early phase of the war became never ending debate among the naval circles in Novgorod and abroad ever since.

After the Battle of the Yellow Sea, the TOF remained mainly in defensive positions in Petropavlovsk and only the rather powerful submarine force was put on heavy use to trying to intervene on the Japanese sea communications across the Pacific Ocean. The submarine forces effort was often left in the shadow of the surface fleet but it played important role in weakening the Japanese war-effort trough out the war. Meanwhile the USN managed to score their first real victory over Japanese in the Battle of Midway where Japan lost 4 of its fleet carriers which issued unrepairable deficit of skilled carrier pilots. It was the turning point of the campaign.

At the start of the war, there were talks about joint command for the Pacific theater but Novgorodians were reluctant to give the command of its forces and fleet to the Americans. The two parties however agreed to inform and co-ordinate the main strategical operations but even this proved out to be almost non-existent. Where as the Americans begun their slow and consuming island-hopping from the South-East Asia, Novgorod's main strategy against Japan focused on recapturing the Far East region and get into positions to launch invasion on the Japanese mainland.

The main TOF role in the grand strategy was to be able to conduct the amphibious assaults required for the invasion of Japanese islands and the limited resources for shipbuilding and modifications, mostly those in Komsomolsk-na-Amur were harnessed to create a operational amphibious force. Existing freighters and merchant ships were converted to carry amphibious crafts and and the size of the naval infantry units were increased. In order to practice and master the landing techniques, TOF launched together with the main Baikal lake summer offensive the first amphibious landing operations against the Onekotan Island, the northern most island of the Kuril's that were under japanese occupation. The battle was short as Japanese had only small garrison there but was valuable lesson of amphibious operations and was the first operations of the Kuril Campaign where Novgorodians recaptured one after another of the Kuril islands from summer 1943 to the end of the War.

Despite the losses for the IJN had encountered, it still remained formidable force at least on the paper and RKKF decided to supplement the TOF with additional units from the Northern Fleet. The later had just received patch of 9 US-build escort carriers and British-build frigates which were more suitable for the main role of the SF which was securing the Lend-Lease convoys. The capital units, specially the 3 fleet carriers were much more needed in the Pacific theater. 3 carriers, 2 battleship, 2 cruisers and 15 destroyers were transferred to TOF via the Northern Sea route in August-September 1943. The reinforced TOF now consisted of 5 fleet carriers and 2 light carriers with 3 additional light carriers joining the fleet in December 1943 to February 1944 which were under construction in Komsomolsk-Na-Amur. These were accompanied by 4 battleships and 5 Heavy and 14 light cruisers. In the winter 1943-44 fleet were organized into 2 main formations; the 5th Eskadra with carriers Frunze, Slava, Krasnoe Znamya, Krasnaya Zvezda and Krasnyy Vympel and battleships Sovetskiy Novgorod and Sovetskiy Dalniy Vostok and screens; The 6th Eskadra with Carriers Orel, Grazhdanin, Svoboda, Znamya Sotsialisma and Krasnyy Aviator, Battleships Oktyabrskaya Revolyutsiya and Chetvortyy Internatsional and screens. These units participated on the Kuril campaigns with training and fine-tuning the carrier operation doctrines alongside.

Situation for Japanese had deteriorated as the war dragged on. Novgorod was ready to launch massive offensive in the Far East Region and the Americans were closing in the “outer defensive ring” of the central pacific islands. Japanese doctrines called for 'decisive battle' where they would engage the main enemy naval units in a single massive battle. IJN knew that the combined strength of USN and TOF was too powerful so they decided to first focus on the later which they considered beign inferior and therefore easier to deal with. Unaware of the recent reinforcements, Japanese made a plan to attack the TOF units in the Petropavlovsk in may 1944 before the next major offensive of the USN units. The plan was called 'Operation A-Go' and it consisted most of the remaining strength of IJN with 9 carriers, 5 battleships, 13 heavy cruisers and screens. This force headed out to the Northern Pacific in 10th of May from Kure where the task force had been mustered.

However the Japanese fleet was spotted by submarine Yu-24 some 500km west of Japan which informed the TOF headquarter of the approaching Japanese formation. The TOF main units were just being sended out to participate on a landing operation against the Kuril Island Urup but that operation was canceled and both 5th and 6th Eskadra headed on South to engage the Japanese fleet. 5th Eskadra moved alongside the Kuril Islands towards South-West and 6th Eskadra moved directly southward from Petropavlovsk.

At the morning of May 12th the Japanese reconnaissance aircraft spotted the 6th Eskadra and Japanese launched their first air-attack. However the quality and skills of the japanese carrier pilots were poor, the experienced and well-trained aircrews had been whiped out in the previous battles of Midway and Solomon Islands. 6th Eskadra's carriers started launching fighters to meet the Japanese and of the 68 aircrafts, 41 were shot down and the japanese managed to inflict only minor damange to the Battleship Chetvortyy Internatsional. Japanese launched another wave of aircrafts but these were met fully prepared CAP units and were almost all shot down before reaching the Novgorodian ships.

In meanwhile the 5th Eskadra moved from the west into attack positions and launched its aircraft in a massive 240 aircraft attack against the Japanese units. The first one to hit was carrier Taiho which took hit of a single torpedo. The damage was first seen as rather minor but the poor damage control of the ship spread the fires across the ship which caused series of explosions and eventually the ship sank. Next one to go was the Carrier Shokaku which took 3 direct hit from torpedoes and blew up after series of explosions on its fuel and weapon magazines. Third carrier that was struck was converted oceanliner Hiyo which was hit several bombs and torpedoes and sank as well. Alongside with the 3 carriers, 2 oilers were also sank and the battleship Haruna took some damage from aerial bombs. After the devastating blows, the IJN units were ordered to withdraw and despite the both Novgorodian fleets took pursuit, the remaining Japanese units managed to escape.

The battle of Northern Pacific as it was later called was the largest carrier battle in the world sofar and was the last nail to the IJN coffin as it effectively made the Japanese impossible to counter either USN or TOF in equal basis anymore. This later led to Japanese to adopt the desperate Kamikaze suicide-attacks as a last means of defense of their islands. With the lack of opposing Japanese naval units, the Americans managed to take over the Marina Islands in relatively ease in the following month.

For the TOF, the battle was an important victory after the defeats in the Yellow Sea in 1941 and 1905 and it was specially important as the 5th Eskadra, made of the original TOF units was the one that gave the main blown to the Japanese. In grand strategical sense it gave Novgorodians a confidence to expand their naval operations and plan the eventual invasion of the Japanese mainland.

The main land offensive in the summer of 1944 drove the Japanese out from most part of the Far East region and Dalny was recaptured in August. Vladivostok and the Primorsk area was liberated by the end of the year. As Novgorod was now in the opposite shores of the narrow Sea of Japan, the Japanese begun ship back their units from the pacific and China to their main Islands. At this point the defeat of Japan was merely matter of time and a race of who would get the best spoils. Discussions with the western allies over the post-war fate of Japan was moving nowhere so Novgorod decided to make sure that their forces would be in the best situation to move over to Japan. Novgordian amphibious capabilities tough beign tested and trialed in the Kuril Campaign, was still inadequate to launch major scale invasion of the Japanese main Islands. However the USN had developed and constructed massive landing force and had put it in effective use across the Pacific. In the late 1944 the Americans were fighting in the Philippines and it would be obvious that the next target would be the Ryukyu Islands which would be the base for future invasion of Japan.

Novgorod decided to take the Ryukyu Islands before the Americans but although Dalny had been captures, the main fleet together with the Amphibious units were located in the Kurils and Petropavlovsk in the Kamchatka Peninsula. It was too long distance to attack the Ryukyus so the STAVKA decided to occupy a mid-way base for the operations. The so called Volcano Islands were selected as they were somewhat in the middle between a searoute from Kurils to Ryukyu Islands and were also important operational base for the possible American landings. TOF begun to send its carrier units to strike on various Japanese held positions across the Pacific, including the main Islands. The strikes started to consentrate on the Iwo Jima, largest of the Volcano Islands around december 1944 and January 1945 which alerted the Americans as well. When requested of the Novgorod intentions, Americans were given awnser that Novgorod just wanted to do their share on bombarding the Japanese holdings.

The Battle of Iwo Jima started in 17th January just prior the planned USN operation to take the same Island. It was preluded by 10 days of heavy naval bombardment from the surface ships and constant air-raids from the carriers. The initial landings were successful, but the Japanese in-depth layered defense network proved out to be a capable opponent. The scale of the Japanese resistance was far beyond what had been witnessed in the Kuril Campaign. After heavy fighting the island was captured on 22nd of February 1945. Although with heavy prize of almost 10 000 troops dead the battle was succesfull and did not only accomplish its purpose but also put the Americans and British in total confusion. The Western Allies were not anticipating Novgorod to make such a risky and bold maneuver and were uncertain of the purpose of the attack. They generally regarded it as a preparations for the attack on the main islands and a sort shown-off force to both Japanese and the Western Allies.

For the Novgorodians, the Iwo Jima was just a midway stop and the planning on the ultimate attack on the Ryukyu Islands were on the way. With enough strength gathered, the invasion fleet was on move and the Battle of the Ryukyu Islands started at 1st of April. Despite Japanese had pulled out most the troops from its ofshore bases, there were still around 50 000 troops defending the Ryukyu Islands. Japanese put up a fierce resistance and the heavy use of Kamikaze attacks were pouring into the Novgorodian ships and troops. The most desperate move from Japanese were the operation 'Ten-Go', a suicide attack of the remaining Japanese battleship, the mighty Yamato together with its screen of cruisers and destroyers. It was ment to be one-way trip, the Japanese ships were to fight they way to the Ryukyus and beach on the shore and use their guns as a coastal artillery.

The Japanese ships left from Kure but were soon discovered by Novgorodian submarines which begun to the follow the Japanese fleet and informed its positions to the main Novgorodian forces. Knowing that Yamato was coming without aircover the 4 battleships and the Heavy cruiser Krohnstadt stopped their shore bombarding mission are were ready to move in to encounter Yamato. However Admiral Yumashev ordered the battleships remain in their position and instead gave the order for the carrier force to launch air-attacks against the Japanese ships. Over 400 Novgorodian planes attacked Yamato and its escorts in several waves and after multiple hits from bombs and torpedoes, the largest battleship ever constructed was sank before it reached the operational area around the Ryukyu Islands. Many in the Novgorodian naval circles criticized the decision not to allow the Battleships to engage Yamato as it would have been a honourable and worthy fight. Admiral Yumashev promptly dismissed such emotionally driven romantical ideas in the face of modern warfare. His reasoning was that the shore bombardment was more critical mission at the time and the risk of losing some of the battleships despite overwhelming odds to the Japanese were too big. The Operation 'Ten-Go' was the last major naval engagement of the World War II.

The battle over the Ryukyu islands went on and the islands were fully secured in 22nd of June. This time the true purpose of Novgorodian actions were fully reveled to the Western Allies and relations of West and the Soviets begun to detoriate. It was obvious that Novgorod would refuse the use of Ryukyu Islands as a base for US led invasion of Japan unless the Western Allies would agree on Novgorodian demands on dividing Japan in the manner of Germany between the Americans and Novgorodians. This forced the Americans to use their new superweapon, the atomic bomb against the Japanese and force them to surrender before Novgorod could invade. The bombs were dropped in 6th and 9th of August and Japan surrendered in 15th of August.

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