So. My miserable plight.
1. These 2 very valuable arty reinforcements (the 18th and the 183rd) are destined to never get out of here, despite my efforts to save them. My error. I should have defended Briscol. I do stage a fierce battle now to try to get back in there, but mainly I've only arty to throw at the fight. And so has he, it seems. This little corner fight turns very bloody and within a few hours most of the units you see here at 1 will be destroyed. Yep.
2. Reinforcements. All I get before day 7. A Bn - the 517. They're my reserve. yeah, right. I intend to move them to plug one of the gaps highlighted by the yellow arrows.
3. The BIG YELLOW ARROW. A huge gap. It's dense forest, but he could sneak infantry through it during the night. If he does then I think the game is his for the taking. There's not much I can do. I can strip off units to block him, of course, for a time. But like that the slow attrition will continue, because those blocking units always get killed. And if there's hardly anything left by the time my reinforcements arrive on days 7, 8 and 9 then I won't be able to stage a comeback. Because I know that as I get reinforcements, so does he. I've lost over 20 units so far. It's hard for me not to think that this game - in which I've achieved minor victories as allies against the AI - is not balanced properly for the allies, if playing a decent human opponent (one of the key things I would stress from this battle is how VERY different it can be playing a human - like a different game altogether). He has played extremely well, of course, but he's had a lot of materiel to do it with. He could have played as badly as the AI has against me, in the past, and then it would have been diff - so I'm not detracting at all from his skill - it's been a learning experience - but it's also been an experience of not having enough to stop a competent commander, no matter what I might have tried. I'd love to be proved wrong on that by someone more competent than myself. Form a line....
4. TF McGeorge - the only concentration of armour I have left, really (and it's only 28 Shermans) is doing nothing, but I dare not move it somewhere else because the main road north will then be clear for him and the last I could see he had armour there waiting. Interestingly, his armour there hasn't attacked TF McGeorge and that makes me wonder if he has either withdrawn or if he didn't have much armour there in the first place. Just not sure. Certainly, if he knew that TF McGeorge comprises nearly all my armour and that's a measly 28 Shermans then he would realise that he could probably muster a force easily capable enough to erase TF McG as he did 40n Tank earlier.
5. 5 just shows my blocking line. Across the length of it there is basically 4 incomplete Bns. That's all I have. I hope he thinks there's more than this!
6, 7, 8 and 9 - with the red arrows - show where I expect he will attack during the next day. I will be able to hold out for about a day, I think, if he does attack these obvious places. Maybe longer. Maybe long enough to get more men on day 7.
10, 11 and 12 (along with 3) and the yellow arrows, show my key fears given the way he has played so far. If he exploits these gaps properly I will be in trouble. My tactic is to have units there to block, use arty when he probes and if necessary strip units away from my line to deal with it. This will work for yellow arrows 10, 11 and 12, maybe. But if he finds the big gap marked 3 and puts substantial forces through it then I may end up too depressed to continue. I may surrender.
13. Just to make things clear. Within the circle marked 13 there are 896 men.
14. Within the circle marked 14 there are 522 men
15. Within 15 - TF MCG - there are 444 men. another 367 in the 517 BN, just behind them.
There are 9 Shermans at Grand Hoursinne. 28 in TF MCG. That's my armour.
So. About 37 tanks and about 2,200 men. To last until day 7.
But that isn't what is making me so gloomy. It's the realisation that when my reinforcements arrive they're going to be caught up in a desperate fight to get away from their jumping off points. Mainly because I messed up at Briscol. That might be a key error. It makes me wonder whether I should pull TFMCG away from the nth, take the risk and try to use it to get Briscol back.
