Mehring (Rus) vs Cpt Flam (Axis) - no Cpt Flam

[Mehring]

Turn 9
We’re just past half way to the end of the summer. Though I whinge from turn to turn about the precariousness of my position, I can’t help think that on every major indicator, I’m doing ok so far. No significant industrial capacity is lost yet. Manpower loses are low while tank and plane losses hardly count at this point. Everywhere I have a coherent frontline and major obstacles, natural or man made, between the enemy and their major objectives. It’s looking good at this point.

[Mehring]

Leningrad
7th Independent Army is swapping out its divisions for brigades and NKVD regiments with the Leningrad armies. The ‘no attack’ line looks pretty well covered.

Zhukov has lost his clean sheet and the Krasnogvarddeysk hills, but has still scored a good number of victories. 5th Tank and 4th Leningrad PM Rifle divisions withstand 3 attacks north of Sluditsa, two of them deliberate, before buckling under a fourth. This 30th Army still defends the direct approach to Leningrad.

29th Army holds Oranienbaum and a corridor to the main Leningrad defences. Its main body, still recovering from previous weeks’ battles, is sent to defend Leningrad itself and the Neva.

8th Army lost ground on its right, at the boundary with 30th Army but held a major attack at Novgorod. This week the army makes no voluntary withdrawals but does establish a reserve line east of the Volkhov.

23rd Army continues 8th Army’s line on the Volkhov and, taking the divisions shipped over Ladoga from 7th Independent Army, also forms a backup line behind the junction of 30th and 8th Armies.

[Mehring]

Northwest
From Lake Ilmen to Peno, Flam seems to have three infantry corps, none of which are concentrated. They push me back in places but nowhere threaten to outflank or trap units. This week 27th Army and 5th Airborne Corps straighten out their line behind the Pola. 11th Army, facing most of the known enemy in the area, continues that line in a bulge to the source of the Dvina and natural water obstacles thereabouts. Hills protect the flanks of this position.

22nd Army defends the upper Volga and the route from Andreapol to Bologoe.

[Mehring]

Centre
Reserve Front, including Moscow MD’s 24th Army at Rzhev, will not retreat this week. Apart from the upper Volga, in 31st Army sector, there are level 3 forts in the first or second line, all along the front. If the Germans want to plough through the fresh divisions ensconced in these, they are welcome. It will surely be two weeks and many losses before they can break free of the line, by which time the Lama-Moskva line will face them.

54th Army begins to form a line on the Ugra, facing southwest.

[Mehring]

Western Front is the more problematic area in the centre, particularly in 20th Army’s sector, just south of Vyazma. XXIV Pz Corps and XIII Corps have attacked around Spas Demensk with massive air support, degrading two infantry divisions and breaking the river defence, the only natural obstacle in the area. If this army fails, the enemy can cross the Ugra and outflank Vyazma.

Further south, STAVKA’s 50th Army, under our tank expert Pavel Batov, has collected under his command a group of Western Front’s badly led armoured units. They are then assigned to Reserve Front and moved north. This has the double benefit of taking command weight off Western Front and backing up 20th Army with a continuation of 54th Army’s line on the Ugra.

The rest of Western Front also shunts northwards up the line, 10th Army also continuing its dig on the Oka around Orel.

[Mehring]

Bryansk Front
Clearly something of a misnomer at the moment. The two armies between Western and Southwestern Fronts edge northeast along the Desna, also creating a second line of defence facing north, behind the Seym. The other two armies can be considered attached to Southwestern Front for the moment.

[Mehring]

Southwest

The Axis forces have now made contact along virtually the entire length of the Dnepr, but have not crossed it in this sector.

1st Airborne Corps, along with 6th and 26th Armies put together a more or less convincing front on the east side of the Dnepr near Chernigov.

12th Army, which repulsed 2 concerted attempts by German XXXXIV and XXXIV Corps to take the hill forts south of Kiev, relieves Kharkov Military District’s 2nd Airborne Corps for redeployment. They head southeast.

Next door, 5th Army shifts reserves south and quits it’s hill on the left bank.

19th and 32nd Armies have fleshed out a bit and are braced to repel a river crossing. The Germans made a half hearted effort to cross in 32nd Army sector which 103rd Rifle Division easily repulsed.

[Mehring]

Southern Front
XXXXVIII Pz Corps has driven us from Dnepropetrovsk. XIV Pz Corps crossed downstream, north of Zaporozhye. Following our customary, but this time expensive bombing missions, 38th Army throws them back across the Dnepr and re-establishes the line of defence.

This is not the strongest sector of the front though. 16th Army does now rejoin the Front and will provide some depth and the possibility of counterattacking any weak bridgehead in the Dnepropetrovsk area next week. I expect 9th and Coastal Armies to have to fall back in a week or two from the lower Dnepr. The entrances to the Crimea, at least, are strongly fortified and defended now.

[Mehring]

Air
Flam has made several good attacks on my airfields, but again, has not followed through. That’s fine by me! His subsequent interdiction missions on occasion suffer losses that will add up with time, and hurt. By this week’s end my air to air kills stand at 91, 29 higher than last week.

The heaviest bomber concentrations appear to be in the Leningrad and Western Fronts’ sectors. That’s where my fighter reinforcements will go.

I was for the first time tempted to deploy some IL-4s but I’ll leave it a week or two.

Not sure if will have any effect but I found AGNs FBD south of Plyussa and repeatedly bombed it. This achieved many ‘disrupted’ results but few kills. If I can lose it a few MP for next week I’ll be happy.

[Mehring]

Production
In the past I’ve tended to evacuate one city at a time. This works fine when you know which way the enemy is headed or where they will break through. When taken by surprise, however, and when the enemy breaks through in an industry rich sector, it can create a crisis of railcap, the loss of many units attempting to block advances on industry, and naturally, the loss of industry. For this reason I’m going to skim off indusrial capacity bit by bit from Kharkov, the Stalino-Gorlovka area and from Tula. Unless I’m faced by simultaneous breakthroughs everywhere, I should be able to salvage more from each sector in the end.

This week Kerch evacuates all. Tula and Kharkov also evacuate armaments centres.

At Sverdlovsk, the T50 and KV1 1941 factories are at 38 and 90 damage respectively. The former hasn’t produced a tank since moving.

[Mehring]

Turn 10

The heaviest fighting for weeks as Cpt Flam gets to grips with my defences at last. From Leningrad right down the length of Northwestern Front, then south of Rzhev down to Bryansk and Trubchevsk. Numerous crossings of the Dnepr are made from south of Chernigov to Kakhovka on the lower Dnepr bend swamps, many creating bridgeheads.

The air war also hots up for both sides.

[Mehring]

Leningrad
German units facing Leningrad are in good supply now. The land route to Oranienbaum is cut. XXXXI and LVI Pz Corps drive a wedge between 30th and 8th Armies to the south of Mga. They reach, then push back 43rd Rifle Division of 23rd Army, positioned there to counter just such a move.

Fighting is heaviest in the woods southwest of Mga. Here, in only a level 2 fort, 1st Tank Division, supported variously by 2nd Motorcycle, 150th AT Artillery, 24th Corps Art and 108th Howitzer regiments, repulses four attacks, only giving way on the fifth. These units now have between six and eleven victories, the best tally in the entire Russian army to date. Only the howitzer regiment has lost as many battles as it has won.

8th Army loses Novgorod but also scores several victories.

In response to these developments 30th Army concentrates in the Pushkin-Kolpino-Tosno fortified area, blocking the direct advance on Leningrad. The outer forts which could be outflanked by an attack through Mga are only weakly defended. With the exception of 150th AT Artillery, the Army’s depleted support regiments are sent to STAVKA. They are replaced and augmented by plundering 7th Independent Army.

Still rebuilding after its drubbing earlier, averaging about 60% ToOE, 29th Army consolidates in Leningrad and north of the Neva. Both Leningrad Armies receive 2 sapper regiments apiece though most are newly formed and may dissolve in the fighting to come. Desperate times.


The final German advances are not followed up in force, leaving the rail line through Mga clear both for evacuation of the last five heavy industrial plants from Leningrad and redeployment of various units by rail. This sort of thing makes me wonder whether Cpt Flam’s has lost strategic direction.

Having never got to serve their purpose, the Front’s two mountain divisions rail south to the Valdai Hills.

From defending the Finnish frontier, 23rd Army now screens the gap between the Volkhov and Leningrad while also digging east of the river.

8th Army straightens its line, pulling back from an exposed position and prepares to defend the Volkhov, along with half of 23rd Army.

[Mehring]

Northwest
We’ve been pushed back along the entire line, but there’s no threat of a breakthrough. All armies consolidate positions between Lakes Ilmen and Seliger, and to the upper Volga. Though Northern Front’s two mountain divisions are sent here to defend the Valdai Hills, I like the current position and would be happy to stop here.

[Mehring]

Centre
Heavy attacks by XXXII, XX and LVII Pz. Corps have pushed in Reserve Front’s 33rd Army, south of Rzhev. The army still has a number of reasonably strong units, but its fortifications are only one hex deep in places. To take a little pressure of them, 24th Army attacks the German 110. Infantry Division of XXXXII Corps in their northern flank.

The usual air attacks go in first, then Rokossovsky’s army attacks! The enemy is pushed back at a price, and I have doubts about whether it really debilitates the defender so much.

In Vyazma area, XXXIX Pz, LIII and XX Corps have been on the attack. 259 Rifle Division is pushed back with ease in front of the city. Just to the south, 252nd Rifle takes four attacks to budge from its positions, two of them very heavy.

Purkaev’s 34th Army cannot take on the force in front of Vyazma but counterattacks south of Sytschewka. Interceptors fail to make contact with either preperatory bombing raid. This attack is with seven divisions and three corps artillery regiments, heavier than the previous one. So are the defenders though. 12th Panzer and 18th Motorised divisions are thrown back with heavy losses, including 49 tanks, mostly 38t and some Pz IV supports. Their losses are more than half their tank strength. It won’t bring back the forts though, and the army redeploys to back up it’s northern neighbour, handing it’s southern positions to 50th Army and Western front.

[Mehring]

3rd Army pushes back the enemy probes across the Bolva and shifts north, sucked by a vacuum. This has been created by the above attacks and subsequent withdrawal of depleted units to dig behind the Ugra and Zhizdra.

Unfortunately, XXXXVII Pz. and XXXXIII Corps have been busy south of Bryansk, near Trubchevsk. 4th Airborne Corps has been roughly treated. Though it is still able to re-establish a 20 mile defence on the Desna there’s no point in moving it north so 4th Army leapfrogs, it’s own position on the same river taken by Bryansk Front whose two armies in the region are strong and unstretched. Of the latter, 43rd Army sends three divisions to extend 10th Army’s digging on the Oka southwards and cover the gap between this river and the Tuskar.

[Mehring]

Southwest
Quite apart from the enemy seizing the heights south of Kiev, it’s time, and 12th Army abandons left bank Dnepr and the city of Kiev. No industry lost. Units gained from this rationalisation of the frontline are immediately sent north and south to cover demands made by the enemy’s crossings.

Likewise, armoured units belonging to 5th Army which would have been good reassigned to Vatutin’s 37th Army (newly appeared on the map), are sent to cover stretches of front vacated by Bryansk front units called in to counter attack the dangerous bridgehead at Kremenchug.

Without air preparation for once, an attack it scraped together from a mix of 19th and 32nd Army divisions. All are assigned to 19th Army to streamline command. The target is the weaker part of the 20 mile wide bridgehead held by 10th Motorised division. Losses are quite heavy, but ample artillery support helps send the Germans back across the river. The rest of the bridgehead, held by 10. Pz, Das Reich and Grossdeutschland, is unassailable, so while Cavalry of the 32nd Army reoccupies Kremenchug, I make do with sealing it off. They’re low on fuel and probably isolated. We’ll see.

Twenty miles southeast of Kremenchug another counterattack is scraped together by 32nd Army. Interdiction is heavy and a strong division sent by Bagramyan’s 38th Army doesn’t make it in any shape to join in. The attack goes in at less than 1:1 visible odds. Losing 2500 men to 900 Germans, the attack nevertheless succeeds, a feather in the cap for army commander Kirill Moskalenko. To his two artillery support regiments committed, the Germans committed none.

With two bridgeheads remaining on right bank Dnepr, I must most probably evacuate the entire Kiev salient next week, pulling back first to Sula-Uday.

[Mehring]

Southern Front
Just at the join between 32nd and 16th Armies, the Germans have projected a Panzer division over the Dnepr. 11th Pz now sits neatly between the Orel and Vorskla rivers, its back still to the Dnepr. Nice position! Three counterattacks by 16th Army cannot dislodge it but cost more than 5000 men and several hundred tanks. I have to kick myself though. Had I sent Bagramyan’s 196th Rifle Division here instead of to the attack further north where it couldn’t take part and in any case wasn’t needed, it would most likely have made the difference. Whether or not I’ve put enough in 11. Pz’s way to keep it quiet for a week is doubtfull. It looks like the Dnepr defence is compromised.

Elsewhere, crossings are either repulsed or not followed up, except north of Kakhovka, where XXX Corps sends two Rumanian infantry divisions across the river. This is sealed off without counterattack.

[Mehring]

Air
The raids on AGN’s FBD seem to have had no effect given that rail conversion has advanced three hexes. They do seem to have alerted the Luftwaffe, though, which has bombed numerous airbases, but as is usual, only one raid per base. In some cases the raiders took a bloody nose, but the attacks on bases in the Southwestern Front area were painful for me.

This week, the Night Witches make their first raid, on an HQ near Divenskaya, just north of the Luga river. All four planes are lost.

Also in the Leningrad sector, the air force makes its first attacks on German airbases using SB-2s escorted by anything with a gun that flies. Weakly defended strips housing He-111s and Ju-52s with generally low CAPs yield 26 planes lost for 29 Germans, just over 700 casualties and 2 AA guns in ten attacks.

Not much is ready to deploy from reserve but two TB-3 regiments go to the TBAB bases in the Crimea and an IL-4 regiment to 4 BAK air command near Taganrog.

Production
Since it was left open, five HI are railed from Leningrad, leaving just the BA 10 factories which can whistle. Given the bridgeheads over the Dnepr, all 8 Armaments Factories evacuate Poltava, and six vehicle factories from Kharkov.

A number of threats are unfolding, in the Ukraine and near Moscow. I anticipate prioritising evacuation from the former next week.

It was nice to see a few more T-50s roll off the production line. They, and the KV1s, seem to repair at 3 per turn.

[Mehring]

Turn 11

Game upgraded to 1.05

This is a week of Axis attacks on a broad front. Rather than going for breakthrough and encirclement, Flam is just grinding me down. This is the ‘wrong’ way to do things but I don’t like it, it hurts.

With my front weakened southwest of Moscow and the Kiev-Dnepropetrovsk length of the Dnepr largely abandoned now, I face multiple threats to industrial centres. This is not good!

[Mehring]

Leningrad
Behind the Svir, 7th Independent Army now swaps out its NKVD regiments from the front line before they disband.

Cpt Flam has attacked all along the front here. There is no schwerpunkt and it works.

Oranienbaum is lost to a single attack and Germans probe the southern shores of Lake Ladoga. For the first time isolating Leningrad. The city’s outer defences are steamrollered, as expected, but 30th Army’s counterattacks from the second line meet with only partial success. The enticing targets turned out to have far more muscle than appeared. In all, the counterattacks wear down my forces more than the enemy’s and were a major mistake given the difficulty of replenishing the Leningrad garrison. I lose 4500 men and 250 tanks. Oops.

29th and 30th Armies dispatch units to the Finnish front to replace NKVD regiments which the new beta patch will likely disband.

29th Army divisions are still very weak, barely above 60% strength. 3rd Leningrad PM Rifle Division reoccupies Schlisselburg while the main body continues digging in Leningrad and behind the Neva.

30th Army stands in front of Leningrad, holding Pushkin, Kolpino and fortified woods north of Tosno and Mga.

The divisions of23rd Army are generally in pretty good shape. It takes under its wing stragglers of 29th and 30th Armies, retreated by the German attacks towards Ladoga. Still screening between Leningrad and the Volkhov, the main body digs in east of the river and prays.

Weak but able to offer more than token resistance, 8th Army abandons Mayasnoy Bor on the west bank of the Volkhov and digs in on the east bank.

Two airbases were hit this week by the Luftwaffe, the single raid on the VVS field being most successful.