TRIAD TACTICS

September 1990. Relations between the USSR and the United States have deteriorated to breaking point. Armed provocations along the demarcation line in the GDR and Czechoslovakia are reported with growing frequency — from airspace violations to the first exchanges of fire between reconnaissance patrols. By the end of summer, clashes number in the dozens, and both sides have placed their forces on heightened alert. In the first days of September, the conflict enters an open phase. American command commits a composite mobile group against the border town of Chernogorsk, intending to take it on the move. The Soviet command cannot afford to lose the town. A mobile group is hastily assembled and immediately dispatched to Chernogorsk.