Operation Barbarossa was a triumph. The Wehrmacht, advancing with unstoppable momentum, swept through the weak Soviet defenses, not aiming for Moscow, but striking at the very heart—the Caucasus. The oil supply, vital to the USSR, was cut off. In 1942, Moscow itself—once a proud symbol of communism—fell. The Astrakhan–Arkhangelsk line became the new frontier, behind which the remnants of the Red Army, scarred by defeat, took refuge, while the industrial city of Sverdlovsk became the capital. The peace treaty was signed on the Reich’s terms.
But the greatest triumph was yet to come. In 1943, sooner than the Allies had expected, German scientists presented Hitler with the atomic bomb. FAU-2s, loaded with a deadly payload, rained down on London and New York. The United States and Great Britain, licking their wounds, withdrew from the war. Europe lay at the Führer’s feet.
Hauptmann M. Rossman leaned back in his chair in his modest office in the Reichstag building, gazing out the window at the gray, cold Berlin. The pages of his diary fluttered beneath his fingers.
“It seemed that victory and eternal peace on the Reich’s terms—what more could one want to be happy? Back then, no one knew yet that the NSDAP leadership consisted of deranged drug addicts, intoxicated by the euphoria of unbridled freedom and completely unaware of what they were doing.
First, they spent tens of billions on the complete reconstruction of Berlin—Welthauptstadt Germania. It was foolish to change the city’s traditional name to that of the country itself. In 1979, we renamed Germany back to Berlin, and we were right to do so. Have you seen these projects? My God. The People’s Hall of Nations (Volkshalle)—a colossal, hideous monstrosity in the very heart of Berlin, which cost the lives of tens of thousands of workers who were buried right in its foundation. Practical use? None whatsoever—it’s just a gigantic dome for pompous speeches in front of hundreds of thousands of people. There weren’t even ventilation systems inside, so the collective breath of everyone inside formed artificial clouds! We had to install air conditioning in 1968 because things couldn’t go on like that. And that cost billions? Just to speak in front of a large audience? We’ve got damn television for that, for heaven’s sake! An arch, like the one in Paris, only three times bigger? What, can’t we come up with anything original? It seems like we have an inferiority complex—we steal other people’s heritage and do the same thing, only bigger. What a disgrace. And that museum tower, which Hitler himself designed as his mausoleum? I don’t know what he was thinking, but when the main landmark of your city is a giant grave, you definitely have problems.
Reichstag and Volkshalle
But anyway, architecture—that old fool Speer—is far from the Reich’s main problem. Much more important is the “Ost” Master Plan—or, more precisely, its complete failure. On paper, it all looked more than wonderful: German families moving into the ready-made estates of former owners in the Eastern Territories, completely free of charge, starting from scratch. What could possibly go wrong?
But, strange as it may seem, it turned out that when 150 million people are driven from their homes, enslaved, and massacred, they fly into a rage and begin to take ruthless revenge. Every day in dozens of cities across the Eastern Territories, there are explosions in crowded public places—terrorist attacks. They storm into the homes from which they were evicted and shoot the new owners along with their entire families. They blow up public places where high-ranking officials gather, kidnap officers, and execute them on camera—and this happens every day. No military operations, no police reinforcements, and no repressive measures are helping. These people are in utter desperation; they have nothing to lose, and they will not stop. Meanwhile, the Russians beyond the Urals are actively financing them and assisting them in every way possible.
The result? Tens of thousands of Germans are fleeing the Eastern Territories. They don’t want vacant estates or plots of land; they’ve seen armed fighters storm their neighbors’ estates and slaughter their entire families. All they want is safety. In the end, “General Plan East” effectively failed. A good half of the Germans returned; order could not be restored; and growing pressure from America and its Russian allies beyond the Urals threatens the very existence of the Eastern Territories. When Russia invaded the Reichskommissariats “Russland” and “Ural,” we already knew it was a provocation. They publicly spat in our faces, and they know we have no way to respond. If we cross the Urals, the U.S. will declare a new act of aggression by the German Reich, tightening its comprehensive sanctions and intensifying pressure in Africa and Western Europe, where it has already nearly succeeded in regaining control of France and the Netherlands. They are closing in on our borders, and we are powerless to do anything about it. The Italians are trying to stay out of the line of fire, distancing themselves from Germany in every way possible, while the Balkans have once again failed to divide up their territories and have gone mad.
And so, in this situation, our Führer decided that a parade in honor of the 45th anniversary of Victory Day is simply a waste of the budget. This is what happens when a state prioritizes appearance over intelligence—an entire apparatus of tall, handsome, blue-eyed, fair-haired Aryans who are, at the same time, as dumb as a box of rocks, completely oblivious to what they’re doing. This isn’t a beauty pageant—we need brains here, not pretty eyes, for heaven’s sake!”
Rossman snapped the diary shut. A single, simple thought kept racing through his mind: the thousand-year Reich was living out its final days. And all because of stupidity, greed, and a blind faith in their own infallibility. He stood up, threw on his overcoat, and stepped out into the hallway, filled with shadows and whispers of the changes to come.
