Ulver vs. Geoffrey or Germany goes East while France goes to the Desert

[geoffreyg]

Good from the point of view of the CP to see the revolution - now a question of trying to ensure Kerensky does not survive.
Cold and hard times in the Anatolian highlands for both sides.

[ulver]

I confess I was surprised to see Russia enter revolution while Russian morale remained comparatively good.

Russian status Nov-Dec 1915: Bad, yes – but revolution bad?

[geoffreyg]

Apologies - my email saying that I would be tied up briefly with work commitments has gone astray my end. Just sent move.

[ulver]

As Russia enters revolution the Entente armies actually manage to break though to the encircled spearhead in Anatolia. After a nail biting battle the whole thing turns out to be irrelevant as the food hex is plundered and the Russians promptly redraw.

November 1915: Everyone seems to have less the 10% supply in the Anatolian mountains

[ulver]

In the spring of 1916 the revolutionary army of the Russian Republic launches a counterattack in the south and succeed in liberating the food-producing sector. Hunger is still killing democracy in Russia but it is a start.


Mar-Apr 1916: Southern part of the Eastern Front.

[ulver]

The spring also sees a major combined Central Power buildup in the Middle East – no doubt planning to cut of lines of communications to the Anglo-French-Italian expeditionary corps in Anatolia and Iraq.

In a weird replay of the Italian front the actual country in question – in this case the Ottomans – are quickly reduced to bystanders in the battle for their own country.


Mar-Apr 1916: In this place lack of supply tends to kill a lot more troops then the enemy.

[ulver]

So how is the war going? Having forsaken a French First strategy there is little risk the Central Powers will win the war outright as both France and Italy is massively fortified and there is virtually no chance of achieving any serious results against either of them.

Having said that, there is an increasing real risk of him winning the game on points by an amazingly successful Eastern campaign that has an increasing real risk of knocking out Russia two years early. This is been combined with some astute diplomacy on the US that looks set to delay the Americans well into to 1918 – rending them all but irrelevant to the outcome by the end of 1919.

The Middle Eastern offensive of 1915 was a tactical success and mixed bag in terms of achieving its strategic objectives. I cut off and occupied every single Ottoman resource and even managed to plunder a food hex in Anatolia but – and this really astonish me – failed to make any significant impact on Ottoman moral.

The net result is that he is down 1 food resource in Anatolia while he has one functional captured food in Italy and one in Russia (The remaining captured Russian food hexes have been plundered) So in total he is up only one Food having not yet sized the treasure throve of Rumanian food while he has lost the entirety of the Ottoman resources and only gained one in Serbia.

In short he is starving and his industry is awfully short of raw materials. If Russia somehow manages to hold on for a while I really think I got him with both starvation and a pitiful resource base.

If, on the other hand, Russia collapses immediately at the end of the revolutionary period his food problems are likely to be permanently over as the occupation of the Ukraine will net him 6 food in additional to the 3 Romanian that can be sized anytime with 3 offensive points.

On the other hand the collapse of the Russian Republic will do surprisingly little to alleviate his resource problems; netting Germany only one in the Ukraine and the Ottomans two in the Caucasus. The problem is that the Italians occupy the Caucasus resources around Tbilisi and in any case I have an expeditionary force right across the old Russian-Ottoman border in British-Controlled hexes ready to intervene massively to deny him any spoils of victory in that sector. Hence even complete victory in the East will only gain him one resource.

The Entente by contrast is awash in both resources and food and will feast on the Russian carcass for even more in the event of a Bolshevik takeover. Lets just call in intervention on the side of the legitimate Russian government shall we?

Bottom line: Even with my countless screwups in this game the intrinsic strength of the Entente side will probably save me in the end.

Comments welcome

Status Marts 1916: A lot less bloody then our timeline so far

[geoffreyg]

I thought Ulver's defence of Italy was an example to us all. He makes the point that it was obviously helped by a CP East first strategy, thus freeing up French forces, but it was none the less impressive.
Interesting to see how the current tussle in the Ottoman Empire turns out. Still a lot to play for overall I feel.

[ulver]

In the summer of 1916 the air war heats up with first blood going to the massed Entente air force fighting the first huge air battle of the war over the Syrian desert of all places.

May-June 1916: Victory in the Air!!!! (Unless this is a really clever stratagem to lure my air force away from the critical sector)

[ulver]

Summer brings unexpected good news for the Entente: Democracy has triumphed in Russia.

July 1916: Long live the constitutional Russian Republic

Reilly, ace of spies, succeeded against the odds in eliminating Lenin just in the nick of time.

This is an Illustrious moment in history. The Russian people have made their choice; the great democracies stand more united then ever against the common foe

[arichbourg]

How sweet that would have been, historically. Great AAR as always.

[ulver]

ORIGINAL: arichbourg

How sweet that would have been, historically. Great AAR as always.

Thanks, glad to know it is being read.

Yes, sweet indeed, it would have been a very different post war world although I think, realistically, it would have taken something of a miracle for a liberal democracy to emerge from the chaos of Great War Russia. I suppose some sort of mild autocracy might well have been possible.

Alexander Kerensky was just in every way possibly the wrong man for the job of stopping the communists but someone like Lavr Kornilov might well have succeeded. I’d like to think that is what happened here.

In our game I think my opponent may have made mistake in launching such a massive attack to retake large swaths of the Middle East as the lessening of pressure on the Russian enabled them to slightly alleviate their horrible food situation.


Jul-Aug 1916: The Armies of the Russian Republic succeed in gaining some more precious food. Is that what saved her?

[ulver]

On the Northern Sector on the other hand things are looking very grim indeed with the Germans pushing deep into the heart of Russia. Desperate plans are being made to rail massive Western reinforcements in to save Somlensk. Will they arrive in time?

Jul-Aug 1916:Russia needs direct support. Now!!!!

[ulver]

In the air the Entente air force continue to sweep the Germans from the sky. Weight of Industrial production is really beginning to tell.

Jul-Aug 1916: Victory in the skies

[ulver]

In the Middle East a series of bad misjudgments leads to the Central Powers gaining considerable ground.

I was absolutely paranoid about the risk of having my lines of supply cut while there was a risk of Russia succumbing to Lenin – that could potentially have resulted the entire expeditionary force being stranded out of supply. I had some issues with rail moves – I suppose that is what you must expect when Italians, British, French and Russians are trying to use the same rail net – and thus had trouble taking Baghdad to open a second line of supply.

I will need to beef up defenses to ensure he doesn’t liberate Ottoman resources.

Jul-Aug 1916: German offensive in Anatolia

[Naskra]

Bizarre.  A dozen armies in the black hole theater.

[Mike Dubost]

ORIGINAL: ulver

ORIGINAL: arichbourg

How sweet that would have been, historically. Great AAR as always.

Thanks, glad to know it is being read.

Yes, sweet indeed, it would have been a very different post war world although I think, realistically, it would have taken something of a miracle for a liberal democracy to emerge from the chaos of Great War Russia. I suppose some sort of mild autocracy might well have been possible.

Alexander Kerensky was just in every way possibly the wrong man for the job of stopping the communists but someone like Lavr Kornilov might well have succeeded. I’d like to think that is what happened here.

In our game I think my opponent may have made mistake in launching such a massive attack to retake large swaths of the Middle East as the lessening of pressure on the Russian enabled them to slightly alleviate their horrible food situation.

This is off topic, but I just cannot resist telling a great story.

Back in the 1980s, one of my high school teachers told us about a party he had been at years earlier (I think it was in Berkeley). A stuck-up UC Berkeley professor (BP from here on out) was talking to an elderly White Russian (WR from here on out). BP was saying that he knew how Kerensky could have won the Russian Civil War. If Kerensky did A, everything would have been fine, or he could have done B and it would have been great. WR kept bringing up other points. If Kerensky did A, the Reds would have responded with W, or B wouldn't have worked because of Z. Finally, BP gets up on his high horse and says "I'm a UC Berkeley professor of history, what do YOU know about the subject?". To which WR says, "Clearly we haven't been introduced. I'm Kerensky!".

[Lascar]

ORIGINAL: Mike Dubost

ORIGINAL: ulver

ORIGINAL: arichbourg

How sweet that would have been, historically. Great AAR as always.

Thanks, glad to know it is being read.

Yes, sweet indeed, it would have been a very different post war world although I think, realistically, it would have taken something of a miracle for a liberal democracy to emerge from the chaos of Great War Russia. I suppose some sort of mild autocracy might well have been possible.

Alexander Kerensky was just in every way possibly the wrong man for the job of stopping the communists but someone like Lavr Kornilov might well have succeeded. I’d like to think that is what happened here.

In our game I think my opponent may have made mistake in launching such a massive attack to retake large swaths of the Middle East as the lessening of pressure on the Russian enabled them to slightly alleviate their horrible food situation.

This is off topic, but I just cannot resist telling a great story.

Back in the 1980s, one of my high school teachers told us about a party he had been at years earlier (I think it was in Berkeley). A stuck-up UC Berkeley professor (BP from here on out) was talking to an elderly White Russian (WR from here on out). BP was saying that he knew how Kerensky could have won the Russian Civil War. If Kerensky did A, everything would have been fine, or he could have done B and it would have been great. WR kept bringing up other points. If Kerensky did A, the Reds would have responded with W, or B wouldn't have worked because of Z. Finally, BP gets up on his high horse and says "I'm a UC Berkeley professor of history, what do YOU know about the subject?". To which WR says, "Clearly we haven't been introduced. I'm Kerensky!".

Kerensky

Great story. That professor missed a golden opportunity to keep his mouth shut and learn from one of the most significant historical figures of the 20th century instead of trying to debate him.

[ulver]

As the long hot summer of 1916 draws to a close the German armies continue their relentless drive Eastwards. With both Odessa in the South and Smolensk in the North falling to the Germanic armies the Russian Republic is teetering on the edge. Yet another hammer blow to the nascent Russian democracy is the news that a large Russian army is cut off in the center and starving to death.

One question is asked again and again in Russia: What are our allies doing?

The allies are doing their best but find they are facing impregnably unbroken lines of fortifications on the Western front and impossible supply conditions in the Anatolian mountains. Starvation in bleak mountain passes or endless lines of barbed wire and machine guns; attempting to force their way though either seems destined to result in bloody failure.

Yet doing nothing will doom Russia and likely the Entente cause, and with it the cause of Democracy. Something must be done and there is one theater of operation that offers everything the allied generals dream of, plenty of space to maneuver, flanks to turn, a front impossible to cover in its entirety for the Central Powers. That front is Russia and a decision is made in the Allied supreme war council meeting in Paris:

Send the elite of the combined Western armies in to Russia. Support her directly in a way that has never been done before: With boots on the ground. Send every aircraft, every soldier, every gun and every shell to the Eastern front the rail net can carry.

And endless stream of trains begin making their way northward from the Middle East carrying British, French and Italian armies though Iraq and the Caucuses into the Ukraine to launch the first counteroffensive in the East.

Over the Eastern front the Russian soldiers have bitterly come to expect to see the skies darkened by German air force but in September 1916 they witness something vey different as the Royal Flying Corps, the Corpo Aeronautico Militare and the Service Aéronautique combined forces in the largest air offensive ever seen decimating and driving the stunned Imperial German Army Air Service from the skies.


Sep-Oct 1916: Breaking the back of the German air force?

[ulver]

In the Artic North re-energized Russian armies supplied by French HQ’s try again and again to encircle the German forces occupying Smolensk and are repeatedly repulsed with heavy losses by well-prepared defenders. Even with plentiful French supplies the Russian army is simply no match for the might of the Imperial German army. High hopes for a counteroffensive in the North are cruelly dashed.

Unless something can be done soon the heroic commitment of the Russian people to democracy against all the odds may prove to have been in vain after all.


Sep-Oct 1916: The Russian army driven beyond its limits of endurance is simply falling apart.