Red Revolution

Operation: Red Revolution is the penultimate mission of the Soviet campaign of Red Alert 2. As the penultimate mission, this is a real challenge.

Background
After the destruction of the Weather Control Device, Yuri invited the Commander, now Chief of the Red Army, to the Kremlin to "congratulate him in person". However, before the Commander set out to Moscow, a video tape was delivered to communications officer Zofia. On the tape, recorded by Romanov just before his death, the Premier denounced Yuri and revealed him as his assassin. The Commander, accompanied by Zofia, then left for Moscow, with an army, to overthrow the traitor.

Key Units/Buildings:

 * Kirov Airship
 * Nuclear Missile Silo
 * Psychic Sensor

Force Composition
The soviets loyal to the commander had completely lost control of Moscow, so they had to construct their own base. Soon, the commander was able to bring in a large force made up of Apocalypse Tanks, Kirov Airships, and Conscripts along with nearly everything else the soviet arsenal held. The commander also was able to construct a Nuclear Missile Silo. However, his forces were strongly outnumbered by Yuri's.

Yuri had months to build a defense around the Kremlin. He had set up many gun emplacements with Tesla Coils and Flak Cannons. Using two large bases south of Moscow, he was able to deploy nearly everything the Union had to offer. He used hundreds of Conscripts along with dozens of tank Divisions. He also deployed most of the Psychic Corps and took advantage of their mind control powers. Yuri even deployed an improved Iron Curtain. Despite all this, Yuri's greatest weapon was his mind, which let him see exactly what the commander was planning.

An Insertion with a Vengeance
The Soviet commander quickly built up a basic base and established up extensive resourcing. Scouting the valley the Red Army located two Tesla Reactors defended by a Tesla Coil and two Flak Cannons located on the cliff.

The Commander quickly ordered the Apocalypse and the Rhino tanks to destroy the defenses while two engineers captured the two Tesla Reactors. The commander quickly then fortified the cliff with Tesla Coils juiced up by the Tesla troopers. The commander also captured a tech outpost east of the base and fortified the position with sentry guns and more Tesla Coils.

Luckily the valley was the only entry/exit point to and from the base. Further scouting also revealed an oil derrick north of the base and several civilian buildings around the valley. The former was captured for extra credits and the latter garrisoned by divisions of conscripts. Since the defenses consumed so much power, the commander built his own nuclear reactor to prevent a severe power shortage.

Defense of the Valley
Almost immediately Yuri sent waves of his forces against the rebelling Red Army - conscripts first, then tesla troopers with dogs, and engineers. Each wave was cut up, ate up or electrocuted by the Commander's defenses.

Yuri then sent his Rhino and Apocalypse Tanks against the Red Army defenders. Although some garrisoned buildings became structurally too weak from the damage by Yuri's tanks to provide any more cover for the conscripts, even the mighty Apocalypse tanks were destroyed by the juiced up Tesla Coils.

Yuri's own Psi-Corp troopers were eaten up by the commander's attack dogs and Terror Drones, which were immune to mind-control. At periodic times Yuri also activated his Iron Curtain, giving his tanks temporary invulnerabililty to attack the Red Army.

These tanks did break through the rebel defenses at the cliff but the iron curtain's effect wore off as they reached the commander's base, which were destroyed by its defenses. Lt Zofia also managed to get her hands on Yuri's plans for the Psychic Sensor, allowing the Red Army to learn of Yuri's attackers' destination and target.

Construction of the Missile Silo
As Yuri's forces hammered on the Red Army, the Soviet Commander began construction of a Nuclear Missile Silo. Meanwhile he sent a team of Terror Drones to scout the area for more oil derricks to capture as he was running low on credits; Yuri's Tesla Coils were chewing up his War Miners from atop a second cliff, defended by Flak Cannons from air raids and siege units.

The Terror Drones located two more oil derricks and a tech airport further eastward of the commander's base. The commander quickly sent engineers to capture the buildings and placed defenses around them in case Yuri decided to restrict the commander's supplies. Finally construction of the missile silo was complete. However Yuri had noticed this and sent an air armada of Kirov Airships to wipe out the Commander's base before the missile could fire on Yuri's strongholds around Moscow. The Commander quickly deployed as many Flak cannons, flak troopers and flak tracks as he could at the northern oil derrick and at the Red Army-defended cliff to intercept Yuri's Kirovs and shoot down the airships.

Destruction of Yuri's loyalist bases
Now having the funds, reinforcements and firepower needed to confront Yuri head-on, the Soviet Commander quickly built up a strong division of Apocalypse Tanks and his own Kirov Airships spearheaded by numerous attack dogs and terror drones.

Destroying the Primary Assault base
After an extensive siege by the commander's V3 rocket launchers on the Yuri base that was primarily responsible for the relentless waves of attacks, and launched a nuclear missile onto its production facilities, the commander's army struck the base at it undefended side and destroyed the nuclear reactors first to bleed the base dry of power before taking out the remainder of the first base.

Destroying the Iron Curtain base
With Yuri's primary assault base gone, the Red Army's next target was the base that held the troublesome Iron Curtain. A previous nuclear strike on it only took out half of the superweapon's health bar. The Soviet commander scouted the area and found the main entrance heavily defended.

Soviet paratroopers patrolled the dividing cliff and located an access entry that was undefended, taking out the powerless defense emplacements along the way and captured another tech outpost which was north of the Red Army base.

The Red Army assaulted Yuri's Iron Curtain base from the back while the Kirovs provided distraction at the front. Soon the Iron Curtain was destroyed, along with a large portion of the base. This time though the Soviet commander decided to capture the surviving buildings, so the base could act as a staging ground for the Red Army's assault on the Kremlin itself.

Destruction of the Kremlin
The Soviet Commander had the Kremlin (and Yuri) at his sights. However, extensive scouting revealed two Psychic Corp bases flanking the Kremlin. Not wanting his Apocalypse tanks to turn against the Red Army at this crucial stage, the Commander ordered the Kirovs to destroy the Psychic Corps.

Although a few went down to Yuri's Flak Cannons, the Kirovs managed to render the defenses offline by destroying the Nuclear reactors and took out all of the Cloning Vats while the Attack Dogs and Terror Drones cleaned up what was left of the Yuri clones.

Now the Red Army's Apocalypse tanks could attack the Kremlin without hostile mind-control. Despite a pitiful and futile defense by Yuri's loyal bodyguards to repel the tanks from inside the Kremlin, it only acted as a fuel to anger the tank drivers and reduced the Kremlin to rubble. With Yuri inside the building at the time, he lay dead in the rubble.

Aftermath
With Yuri dead, the Soviet commander reunited the Soviet Union under one banner. To truly succeed the deceased Romanov as Premier of the USSR, the Commander needed to destroy the last potential threat to the USSR: the Allies' Chronosphere.

Valuable Assets

 * An oil derrick overlooked by 2 Tesla coils and 4 flak cannon north of your base.


 * A tech airport south of Yuri's first base, on top of a cliff.
 * A second oil derrick north of the tech airport, just south of the border-crossing with walls and sandbags, wedged in the narrow ravine leading directly to the tech airport.


 * A tech outpost east of your base. Another outpost is seen north of your base but up on the cliffside.
 * A third oil derrick east of the tech outpost, south of the one near the ravine.


 * Two Tesla Reactors due Northeast of your base is built on a cliff. Capturing them will provide extra power and room to set up defenses.


 * If you take the airfield, it is possible to take two nuclear reactors, giving the power boost, and extra oil derricks over the hill, given that a barracks can be smartly constructed on the hill conjuncted to the area.

Strategy
This level is rather infamous as one of the hardest in the entire game, probably more than the actual final level (in which your base is safely on an island and not vulnerable to direct overland attack). Yuri starts out in such a strong position, and has so many cloning vats cranking out soldiers (particularly Psi Corps Troopers which you no longer have access to) that your base can easily be overwhelmed.

A general tip is to never try to set up your defenses in the area immediately around your base. Its in a wide valley and not particularly defensible. Given the large volume of units Yuri is throwing at you, simply ringing your central base with defensive structures isn't enough, you need to concentrate your firepower. While its a good idea to avoid grinding through all of Yuri's bases and simply focus on constructing a large fleet of Kirov airships to assault the Kremlin, you might not survive long enough to construct it unless you have secured your base from attack. Also, hold off on building a Nuclear Silo unless you feel your defenses are absolutely secure, because it will cause Yuri to retaliate by sending in his own Kirovs.

The central point is to focus on the choke point between two cliffs near the northernmost oil derrick, where a border-crossing has been set up consisting of walls, sandbags, and Soviet flags. There are even a few civilian buildings nearby to aid to the defense here: you should quickly garrison these with Conscripts as soon as possible. Do not take the tech airport on the eastern cliffs initially, unless you feel you have built up enough forces to defend it, because Yuri will counterattack in force to destroy it.

Speed is crucial: very quickly, you must capture the northernmost oil derrick, located just in front of the ravine between two cliffs (just east of the border crossing) that leads to the tech airport. Use the oil derrick as a launching point to build stronger base defensies around, and extend the rang of your construction by slapping down some cheap Tesla Reactors. Quickly close off the eastern ravine using basic walls; the AI usually won't think to try a sneak attack through here, instead choosing the open path. Quickly garrison the civilian structures. The goal is to spread a chain of Tesla Reactors westward from the oil derrick, in order to then build a line of Tesla Coils (and Sentry Guns and Flak Cannons) stretching across the choke point at the border crossing. Don't build the Tesla Coils directly at the narrowest point between the cliffs, instead build them into a ring further back which incorporates the garrisoned civilian structures, so you can bring their fire to bear on incoming units. A crucial tactic is to not try to completely block off the choke point with walls or defensive structures, but to give Yuri's units a clear but narrow path leading to your base, to channel them into easy-kill zones in front of the garrisoned buildings and Tesla Coils. If you block the path entirely, Yuri's AI will try to penetrate in an unpredictable point along the walls, possibly the poorly defended ravine near the oil derrick (which you should eventually also fortify once all else is secure).

This has to be done within a few short minutes before Yuri's forces can overwhelm your position. However if you succeed in building up this choke point across the border-crossing, based off the northern oil derrick, you've essentially already won. Yuri will send numerically superior forces but they'll get effeciently destroyed in the meat grinder you've set up at the choke point, with few if any losses on your side. This will allow you to build up larger forces at your leisure from within your defensive perimeter, be it a Kirov fleet or a land-based attack. At this point Yuri will also attack using Iron curtain. Watch for tank buildup near your defensive position and destroy it using the V3 launcher. If they deployed already, construct walls on the intended target to absorb the iron curtained arsenal and buy more time before the curtain fall.

Once you feel you have enough forces, capture the tech airport on the plateau to the east; the entrance is very small and near the airport, so you should wall-off the entrance and support it with Tesla Coils and some units for defense, to repel any counter-attack (generally Yuri will ignore it if you block it off entirely, and he never sends more than a recon-in-force so even one or two Tesla Coils might be sufficient. Use the airport to add new mobility to your attack, dropping conscripts into the outskirts of Moscow to garrison inside of the city's buildings. Then engage Yuri's forces in house-to-house combat, advancing from buildings to engage targets of opportunity to lure more forces in, then retreating to garrisonable buildings to engage them. It is more effective to harass from garrisoned buildings than to attack head-on, because you can only paradrop in a limited number of Conscripts and the large number of Psi Corps Troopers will mind control them in the open.

If attacking over land, you could try to clear out all of the cliffs surrounding Yuri's first base, but you'd have to fight your way through his base anyway. Its a good idea to send the paratroopers to the cliffs on the east side of this base, because it has an oil derrick on it, and the east entrance of Moscow has two oil derricks across the bridge which you can attack (the west side has no oil derricks). Rather than slogging through the cliffs (only to engage Yuri's forward base anyway), send a large group of tanks on a "thunder-run" to dash up the cliffs only to then cross the large bridge which will take them to the eastern plateau with the oil derrick on it. This plateau is surprisingly undefended. Along with your tanks, take a few Flak Tracks based with attack dogs and a few engineers: use the engineers to possibly capture the oil derricks, so you can start building base defenses around them to support your attack on the outskirts of the city. Cover the advance of this tank column into eastern Moscow using the paratroopers who have already garrisoned civilian buildings in the outskirts. After securing the southeastern part of Moscow as a strong-point, its full-on urban combat with tanks and infantry. Garrison more buildings as you advance, and retreat your forces to their cover when Yuri's forces counter-attack. In this fashion you should be able to grind down Yuri's main base (with all the cloning vats) and ultimately assault the Kremlin.

Trivia
The fight against Yuri in the Soviet campaign is likely to be a foreshadowing of what is to come after the Allied victory in Operation: Chrono Storm.

The player may also decide to stay in the valley and defend their base to construct the Nuclear Missile Silo. Two strikes are needed to destroy the Kremlin for a quicker victory but Yuri's attacks will intensify.

It is also possible to construct Kirovs, 10-20 of them and rush them to Yuri's base from the very west side. 2 small defensive positions along the way can be destroyed as well. The west side of the psychic base has a nuclear reactor that can be bombed to take out the power. Since there is no flak tracks in the area, the Kremlin can then be bombed with the Kirov armada.