World War III (Der Dritte Weltkrieg) is a 1998 German alternate history television pseudo-documentary, directed by Robert Stone and distributed by ZDF. An English version was also made, which aired on TLC in May 1999. It depicts what might have transpired if, following the overthrow of Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet troops, under orders from a new hard-line regime, had opened fire on demonstrators in Berlin in the fall of 1989 and precipitated World War III, leading to an alternative outcome of the later period of the Cold War. The film mixes real footage of world leaders and archive footage of (for example) combat exercises and news events, with newly shot footage of citizens, soldiers, and political staff.
In the summer of 1989, many East German citizens are dissatisfied with Communist leadership and seek reunification with West Germany. East German leader Erich Honecker hopes to crush demonstrations against the regime with military force. General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, a supporter of reforms, visits East Berlin in October during the 40th Anniversary of the GDR but is deposed by hard-line Communist leadership in a coup. In Moscow, the MVD Internal Troops and Soviet Army take control, seizing government and party buildings. Violent clashes in the streets take place, but by dawn, the city has fallen, and opposition to the new regime is driven underground.
After an emergency Central Committee plenum, Lieutenant General Vladimir Soshkin, a Red Army veteran and senior official in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, is installed as the new General Secretary and Gorbachev is never heard from again, retiring for reasons of 'ill health'. Long before his accession to the highest office in the USSR, Soshkin served on the Eastern Front with the Red Army during the Second World War, afterwards becoming a tank commander and was involved in the brutal suppression of the Worker's Uprising and the Prague Spring in 1968. Politically conservative, Soshkin adopts a more confrontational and hawkish foreign policy, with East-West relations deteriorating significantly following Gorbachev's ousting. Warsaw Pact leaders gather in Moscow on October 23, and Honecker expresses enthusiasm for a 'Chinese solution' to the unrest in Eastern Europe amid heated debate over the suppression of the Tiananmen Square protests. East German leader Erich Honecker expresses enthusiasm for a so-called 'Chinese solution'.
Soshkin and the hard-liners, resistant to glasnost and perestroika, reverse Gorbachev's reforms and the Soviet Union experiences democratic backsliding and a return to autocratic rule. During a televised press conference in the Kremlin, Soshkin blames the USSR's economic decline on 'revisionists and traitors that penetrated the highest levels of our party and state apparatus'. In late October Chinese-style military crackdowns against popular uprisings in the Eastern Bloc occur, inflaming popular opposition to communism. The immediate reaction within the West is a mix of shock and outrage; the administration of President George H.W. Bush, who had spent months building on the warming of ties between the superpowers, is stunned to learn that the Soviet Union's best hope for reform has been ousted. Within the GDR's ruling Socialist Unity Party, a number of prominent officials who support political reform are purged, including Honecker's likely successor, Egon Krenz, Dresden party boss Hans Modrow, and Secretariat propaganda head Gunther Schlabowkski. In late November, a demonstration in Leipzig is repressed by the East German Army, the VoPo and Group of Soviet Forces in Germany with great loss of life, and a demonstration at the Brandenburg Gate ends with East German border guards and soldiers killing East Berlin residents trying to scale the Berlin Wall and firing into West Berlin, with a West German cameraman recording the event among the victims.
The East German government responds to international condemnation by ordering foreign journalists out of the country and imposing a media blackout. Soshkin holds his first ever interview with western media in Moscow, and tells West German ZDF correspondent Dirk Sager that the western news media used Gorbachev's reforms to discredit the Soviet system and turn West Berlin into a 'base of aggression' against Warsaw Pact nations. The removal of Gorbachev, he argues, was a 'defensive action'. In mid-December, NATO airlifts military reinforcements to West Berlin following threats by far-left and far right groups. Secretary of State James Baker tries to meet secretly with General Dmitry Leonov, the Soviet commander in East Germany, who opposes Soshkin's crackdown, but Leonov is killed by a car bomb planted by West German neo-Nazis. When Soshkin threatens West Berlin, American Pershing II tactical nuclear missiles located in West Germany are placed on high alert. Soshkin responds by deploying the massive Soviet submarine fleet, which departs its bases in the Kola Peninsula for the Arctic Ocean, and sends Soviet Bear bombers into Alaskan airspace, which are intercepted by F-15 fighter jets. On January 25, 1990, East German and Soviet tank divisions cut off transportation and supply links between West Germany and West Berlin while the Soviet Air Force closes off East Germany's airspace. NATO deploys additional troops to West Germany. When the United States announces the first military convoy across the North Atlantic the Soviets announce their intention to blockade the U.S. Navy transports.
After last-ditch attempts at negotiation fail, on February 18, the Soviet Navy and Soviet Air Force attack as the NATO convoy crosses into the Soviet-designated exclusion zone. Nearly a quarter of the convoy is sunk in the ensuing battle before NATO forces clear the air and sea lanes to Europe, as World War III begins. An emergency session of the UN Security Council fails to reach a solution to the crisis. American National Security Advisor Martin Jacobs travels to the Kremlin in Moscow for talks with Soshkin and Foreign Minister Rubanov, and offers an extended timetable for Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe in exchange for a military de-escalation. Soshkin refuses, speaking only once in the entire meeting: "Nyet (No.)"
On March 12, amphibious landings near Kiel catch NATO off-guard, but this proves to be a feint for the real invasion: soon after, Warsaw Pact ground forces drive through the Fulda Gap toward the Rhine with heavy air support. The invasion is intended to provide Soshkin a stronger strategic position for diplomatic bargaining, but the cost is high: both sides lose over 1,000 dead in the first 24 hours. Although pressed to the limit of endurance, NATO forces fight ferociously to stall the Warsaw Pact's advance, but by March 17 the Soviets and their allies have driven 50 miles into West Germany. Public order collapses, and cars jam the roads as civilians try to flee.
24 hours before a planned series of last-resort tactical nuclear strikes meant to stop the Warsaw Pact advance, NATO launches a surprise counteroffensive to seize control of the air. One component of the mass air offensive is dedicated to striking the Soviet Army's forward headquarters in Poland with American stealth aircraft and crippling Warsaw Pact command and control posts, while the rest directly attack Warsaw Pact fighters and airbases. NATO and Warsaw Pact aviators battle to the death for control of the skies. Already hard-pressed after losing 1/5th of their combat aircraft in the initial offensives, the Warsaw Pact's air forces are ultimately defeated in the struggle, and NATO's air counteroffensive emerges a costly but complete success.
NATO gains supremacy over Eastern Europe while Polish underground forces cut off Soviet supply lines, and the Warsaw Pact rapidly loses the initiative with numerous headquarters and command posts gone. Unable to coordinate their efforts, and with their numerical superiority negated by Western technological superiority, the East German and Soviet armies melt under sustained NATO airstrikes, and counterattacking NATO forces cross into East Germany on March 23.
NATO forces break through and reach West Berlin on March 27, and the retreating Soviet Army abandons East Germany entirely as they withdraw into Poland, leading many Germans on both sides to believe reunification is at hand. In an effort to avoid escalating the conflict further, American leadership reassures Soshkin NATO will not advance beyond East Germany. Open revolt erupts throughout the Eastern Bloc, spurred by the collapse of East Germany. Soshkin's paranoia rises as the Eastern Bloc falls apart, and despite NATO's statements to the contrary, Soshkin becomes convinced NATO intends to fight all the way to Moscow.
On March 31, Soshkin makes a show of force with a nuclear strike via a TU-160 above the North Sea. The USA orders a full nuclear alert and prepares to execute the Single Integrated Operational Plan (SIOP). On April 1, ironically April Fools Day, a Soviet radar post suffers an equipment malfunction. Falsely believing the USSR is under nuclear attack, Soshkin orders a retaliatory strike against the West, with the R-36 unit at Dombarovskiy the first to launch its weapons. NATO, faced with total devastation, has no choice but to respond in kind, and thousands of nuclear devices are launched across the Northern Hemisphere. As Daniel Schorr reports outside the White House, President Bush is evacuated to a secure location via Marine One. The narrator announces "There is no further historical record of what happens next."
The film shifts back to Gorbachev's visit to East Berlin and a montage of heartwarming music reminds the audience the Cold War actually ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the eastern bloc regimes.