Konflikt ’47 – Introducing the Soviet Bloc

The opening of the Rifts caught the Soviets off guard, but they were not as great a surprise to Stalin and the Party as many might suppose. Across the world, many people sympathetic to the Communist regime can be found, and some of these people occupy extremely privileged positions indeed. The Soviet regime has long made effective use of these individuals as intelligence assets, staying abreast of supposedly secret developments by other nations long before they ever become public. As soon as they were made aware of the nascent Manhattan Project, the Soviet Union’s finest minds set to work on secret projects of their own.

When the Western Allies ‘gifted’ Germany with the power of the Rift, Red Army soldiers were the first to suffer the consequence of Axis resurgence. The most immediate blow, however, was US President Roosevelt’s speech declaring America’s crusade against Nazism and Communism. Incensed, Stalin declared the United States an enemy of the state on 1st May 1944, instantly severing the tenuous alliance of convenience, and leaving the Soviet Union to fight on, supported only by those conquered territories which it assimilated into the growing Soviet Bloc. Fuelled by the emerging Axis Rift-tech, the nightmare of the Ostfront descended to ever greater depths of hellish depravity, and Soviet troops had to adapt quickly in order to survive and hold back the tide. Raw manpower saved the Soviet Bloc from being overwhelmed in the opening salvos, but while quantity has a quality all of its own, it was clear that there could be no hope of victory without Rift-tech.

Stalin’s order was unequivocal. The Soviet Union must have Rift-tech, by any means necessary. Vast intelligence networks, originally designed to look inward as much as outward, ground into action, with legions of agents, spies, and sympathisers now scattered across the world, infiltrating almost every echelon of society in dozens of nations. Slowly at first, but with ever-increasing speed, knowledge and information has filtered back to Moscow, jump-starting Soviet research. Powered armour and walker technology was rapidly assessed, reverse-engineered, and deployed to the front, while the pioneering Soviet research into genetic manipulation went from merely theoretical and dubiously ethical to practical and coldly inhumane in a matter of weeks, producing monstrous new troops the equal of the worst Axis creations. The battles on the Eastern Front now burn with a new intensity, as the reinvigorated Soviet forces launch fresh offensives on a massive scale.

The goal of the Soviet Bloc is simple – the triumphant spread of Communism across the world. To accomplish this, Soviet leaders know that they must have a Rift of their own, making Dresden the ultimate prize in their war plans. Every aspect of life is geared towards this, and the regime’s repressive policies and all-pervading propaganda have ratcheted up to truly staggering levels in order to ensure that the populace is suitably motivated. Dark rumours swirl about state-sanctioned mind control on a vast scale, while machines, men, and monsters who were once men grapple against the Axis to the West, Imperial Japan in the East, and prepare for the inevitable confrontation with the Capitalist United States and Commonwealth.

Captured by a Soviet propaganda photographer during the fighting around Lvov, this widely reproduced image shows one of the feared ‘Moroz Gul’ Siberian terror troops in rare detail. Of note is the lack of winter clothing despite sub-zero temperatures, and the extreme discolouration of the skin, with ice crystals forming on the back and shoulders. Armed with a Korobov assault rifle and wickedly sharp combat blade, this trooper was observed to assault an Axis machine gun nest singlehandedly, slaughtering the crew at close quarters before being killed by Schwerefeld fire from counterattacking Vogelspinne walkers.