Colin Gee - Stalemate

SU-76: 76mm self-propelled gun used as artillery and for close support.

Sunderland: British four-engine flying boat, used mainly in maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine roles.

SVT-40: Soviet automatic rifle with a 10 round magazine.

Symposium Biarritz: Utilisation of German expertise to prepare wargame exercises for allied unit commanders to demonstrate Soviet tactics and methods to defeat them.

T.O.E.: Table of Organisation and Equipment, which represents what a unit should consist of.

T-34: Soviet medium tank armed with a 76.2mm gun and 2 mg’s.

T-34-85 [T-34m44]: Soviet medium tank armed with an 85mm gun and 2 mg’s.

T-44 [100]: Soviet medium tank, produced at the end of WW2, which went on to become the basis for the famous T-54/55. Armed mainly with the same 85mm as in the T-3485, a few were fitted with the devastating 100mm D-10 gun.

T-70: Soviet light tank with two crew and a 45mm gun.

Tallboy: British designed earthquake bomb, containing 12,000lbs of high explosive. It weighed five tons and proved effective against the most hardened of targets.

Thompson: .45 calibre US submachine-gun, normally issued with a 20 or 30 round magazine [although a drum was available.]

Tiger I: German heavy battle tank armed with the first 88mm gun, capable of ruling any battlefield when it was introduced in 1942.

Tokarev: Soviet 7.62mm automatic handgun [also known as TT30] with an 8 round magazine.

Trimbach: Quality Alsatian wine.

Trunnion: Heavy metal mounts either side of a gun barrel.

TU-2, Tupolev: Soviet twin-engine medium bomber. Extremely successful design that performed well in a variety of roles, the TU-2 is considered one of the best combat aircraft of WW2.

Type 97 Chi-Ha: Japanese main battle tank, armed with a 57mm gun.

Type XXI submarine: The most technologically advanced submarine of the era, produced in small numbers by the Germans and unable to affect the outcome of the war.

Typhoon, Hawker: RAF’s most successful single seater ground attack aircraft of World War Two, which could carry anything from bombs through to rockets.

U-Boat Type XX: 30 such U-Boats were planned, but none produced during WW2. They were intended as pure supply boats, shorter than the Type XB but with a wider beam.

U-Boat Type XXI: Advanced U-Boat design capable of extended underwater cruising at high speed.

UHU: German 251 halftrack mounting an infrared searchlight, designed for close use with infrared equipped Panther units.

Unicorn , HMS: British light aircraft carrier and aircraft repair ship, seeing service throughout WW2. Scrapped in 1959.

USAAF: United States Army Air Force.

Ushanka: Fur hat with adjustable sides.

Vampir: German term for the ST-44 equipped with an infrared sight, also used to refer to the operators of such weapons.

Venona Project: Joint US-UK operation to analyse Soviet message traffic

Vichy: Name of the collaborationist government of defeated France.

Vickers Machine-Gun: British designed machine-gun of WW1 vintage. Extremely reliable .303 calibre weapon, standard issue as a heavy machine-gun.

Vitruvian man: Da Vinci’s sketch of a man with legs and arms splayed.

Wacht am Rhein: Literally, ‘Watch on the Rhine’, a codename used to mask the real purpose of the German build-up that became the Ardennes Offensive in December 1944.

Walther P38: German 9mm semi-automatic pistol with an eight round magazine.

Wanderer W23 Cabriolet: German vehicle designed for civilian use, sometimes pressed into military service, particularly as a staff car.

Wehrmacht: The German Army.

Yakolev-9: Soviet single-seater fighter aircraft that was highly respected by the Luftwaffe.

Yakolev-9U: Soviet single-engine fighter aircraft, probably the best Soviet high-altitude fighter.

Zilant: Legendary creature in Russian folklore somewhat like a dragon

Zimmerit: Anti-magnetic paste applied to the side of German vehicles.

ZiS-3: 76.2mm anti-tank gun in Soviet use.

ZSU-37: Soviet light self-propelled anti-aircraft vehicle, mounting a 37mm gun.

Zuikaku : Japanese fleet aircraft carrier of the Shokaku class. Present at Pearl Harbor, she succumbed to air attack during the Battle of Leyte Gulf, sinking on 25th October 1944.

As Europe moved from September into October, a growing number of nations started to contribute more than good wishes to the Allied cause, prompting Zhukov to speak of the Allied forces as ‘The Army from a Hundred Lands’.

Whilst the number was an exaggeration, the following will give the reader some information on the nations who slowly united against the spread of communism.

Active forces = men & equipment supplied that forms fighting units, within the theatre indicated.

Service Units = manpower supplied, conditional non-combat use.

Home service = Also, using troops to relieve US forces in situ.

Colin Gee was born on 18th May 1957 in Haslar Naval Hospital, Gosport, UK, but spent the first two years of his life at the naval base in Malta.

His parents divorced when he was approaching three years of age, and he went to live with his grandparents in Berkshire, who brought him up.

On 9th June 1975, he joined the Fire Service and, after a colourful career, retired on 19th May 2007, having achieved the rank of Sub-Officer, Watch Commander, or to be politically correct for the ego-tripping harridans in HR, Watch Manager ‘A’.

After thirty-two years in the Fire Service, reality suddenly hit, and Colin found himself in need of a proper job!

As of today, Colin is permanently employed doing night shifts for NHS Out of Hours service.

At this moment in time Colin has a wife, two daughters, one step-daughter, two step-sons and two grandsons, called Lucas and Mason, who are avid Manchester United fans, although neither know it yet.

Four cats complete the home ensemble.

He has been a wargamer for most of his life, hence the future plans for a Red Gambit wargaming series.

In 1992, Colin joined the magistracy, having wandered in from the street to ask how someone becomes a beak. He served until 2005. The experience taught him the true difference between justice and the law, the former being what he would have preferred to administer.

In his time, Colin has dabbled with keyboard, piano, and drums, but actually managed to get a reasonable note out of a trombone.

He always promised himself that he would write something but, apart from a short story or two, it never happened.

Until now.

Red Gambit was first researched over ten years ago, but work and life changes prevented it from blossoming.

Now it has become a projected six books, instead of one. As more research was done, and more lines of writing opened themselves up, the need for a series became inevitable.

Though the books are fiction, fact is a constant companion, particularly within the biographies, where real-life events are often built into the lives of fictitious characters.

Colin writes for the pleasure it brings him and, hopefully, the reader. The books are not intended to be modern day ‘Wuthering Heights’ or ‘War and Peace’. They contain a story that Colin thinks is worth the telling, and to which task he has set his inexperienced hand. The biographies are part of the whole experience that he hopes to bring the reader.

Enjoy them all, and thank you for reading.

The Red Gambit Series