Iron Crucible

The year is 1992. Over twenty years have passed since Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev was assassinated by a crazed gunman. Since that time, the Soviet Union has been put on a course toward economic success—and war. In the Balkans, Yugoslavia's collapse into ethnic violence draws NATO and the Warsaw Pact to the brink of Armageddon. Armies deploy and fleets maneuver. Political intrigue engulfs Moscow and Washington, and paranoia radiates from the Iron Curtain. In the zero-sum game of Cold War, neither side can afford to blink or back down.

The year is 1992. The unthinkable has happened. East and West are on a crash course for war, and the battlefield will be Germany. Peace is no longer an option, and all bets are off as the Free World and the Communist Bloc descend into war.

The Soviet Blitzkrieg in Germany has been beaten to a bloody halt along the Rhine River. The Reds rush masses of teenage conscripts and rusty reservists to the front, while NATO scrambles to mount a killing blow against their reeling nemesis.

The year is 1992. Europe is in flames. Scandinavia is under siege. Only Norway holds out against the Soviet war machine. And now the pride of the Soviet Navy, the Red Banner Northern Fleet, sallies out to finish the job.

The year is 1992. The Third World War rages. With Central Europe locked in a bloody stalemate, the chaos boils over into Greece and Turkey, with NATO holding on by a thread against the Soviet onslaught. But the greatest twists of fate unfold behind the scenes. The United States Presidential election may upend the balance altogether, as America's citizens choose who will lead them into the maelstrom. But in Moscow, hidden forces within the Soviet Union finally make their bid for power.

The United States and its NATO allies prepare a desperate Hail Mary: a knockout blow to end the war in a matter of months. At the same time, the Soviets ratchet up the war of attrition, a grim strategy designed to grind the West into dust. But behind the lines, a political shakeup in Moscow spells a different kind of trouble. Social unrest and the strain of total war send cracks spiderwebbing across the Eastern Bloc. The tension is high, and something is about to snap. Is this the beginning of the end . . . or will the fires of war burn out of control?

It's September 1992. The Yugoslav Crisis is over, but tensions are rising along the Iron Curtain in Germany. Forty-eight hours before a surprise Soviet invasion, hardened airborne commandos of the Warsaw Pact launch a daring raid. Their mission: the covert seizure of NATO's Rhein-Main Air Base. The only thing in their way is a small band of US Air Force personnel. Heroic last stands abound in a desperate hour-by-hour struggle for the runways, as the "Gateway to Europe" becomes the Alamo on the Rhine . . .