Decline and Fall The Long Way Round

[AllenK]

The US and CW make a couple of minor rail moves, moving units to the Atlantic coast ready for embarkation once TRANS become available. The Soviets and Chinese have nothing appropriate to move.

The US moves its MOT inland from Vigo in Spain. The Nationalists shift the army south of Chengchow eastwards hoping to get behind the Japanese and cut supply once more. The CAV division captures the factory town of Mukden in Manchuria.

[composer99]

I'm curious why the Spanish chose a blitzkrieg. An assault with the same die roll result would have slaughtered 3 Italian units.

[AllenK]

ORIGINAL: composer99

I'm curious why the Spanish chose a blitzkrieg. An assault with the same die roll result would have slaughtered 3 Italian units.

Hi Composer99,

Thanks for chipping in.

Well, yes, if I'd known in advance what the die roll was going to be I might well have chosen an assault.

The main thinking (and very possibly faulty) was I understand the blitzkrieg tends to produce fewer losses for the defender and forces the attacker to choose a more valuable unit as the first loss. Of the die roll combinations, only 7/19 would cause the attacker a loss of two or more units. With only 1 loss, the cheap INF Div would have perished. On the Blitz table there are 11/19 combinations to inflict at least 1 loss, the first of which being the MOT. In terms of defensive losses, the assault table causes the loss of at least 1 unit on 11/19 combinations, whereas the blitz causes this only 8/19.

I know this is a crude probability analysis as not all combinations are equally likely but hopefully you get the picture.

With few Spanish units to defend the country and significant CW/US support likely to take some time to get into place, I wanted the best chance to preserve the defenders. As it turned out, I got the worst of both worlds but hey, that's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.

I'd be interested to hear your rationale for going with the assault.

[AllenK]

M/J 1944 Allied Impulse 3 Land Movement

The CW move the 4th Aus Mech into Baghdad. 1st SA Inf moves back to Kuwait from Arabia.21st Ind Mech moves from Calcutta to Dacca in preparation for retaking Burma and points South East.

In Spain 3rd Can Mech advances inland from the coast and the Spanish retreat to try and form a new line along the river. Units from the south of the country move up to Madrid.

[AllenK]

In Russia, the Soviets move up on the OOS German XLV Inf and tighten the noose gathering around Rommel by pushing two units round to Tambov.

[AllenK]

With rain in the Marshalls islands, the US thinks hard about whether to proceed with the invasions but decides the odds are too risky. This frees up a land move, so the PARA is disembarked from Cape St Vincent to Cadiz, where C47's await.

After considering potential targets, the CW decide to invade Finland to knock one of the Axis minors out. The US and CW decline any further land combats. The Chinese too decide against any attacks.

The Soviets have a dilemma. The odds for either an attack on Rommel or the Panzer Army blocking the railway are not much better than 2:1 once Luftwaffe support is factored in. A poor result would finish operations in the sector, allowing the Germans to hold on to the railway until J/A 1944. However, with 3 decent ground-strike aircraft available to the Germans, the odds are only likely to get worse by delaying as more units get disorganised. The Russians order an attack on Rommel figuring that attacking one unit has a better prospect of success and taking the HQ out would put a chunk of the German army in that sector out of supply. A second attack is ordered on the XLV Inf. The orders are just about to be sent out when the Soviets realise they can get a good attack on VII SS Inf in between the Don and the Donnets. The odds are also not too bad against Manstein so the Soviets decide to go for it. The addtional attack orders are hastily added to the dispatch.

The CW and US throw all the shore bombardment they can muster behind the Finland invasion.

Rommel and Manstein add defensive HQ support to themselves. Chernyakhovsky adds his support to the attack on Manstein.

The Luftwaffe flies defensive ground support to all the attacks with a Me-109 escort to the VII SS Inf. The Soviets fly a LA-5FN to intercept.

The Soviet pilots fling themselves at the approaching German bombers. The ferocity of the attack causes the bomber pilots to jettison bombs in order to take more effective avoiding action and then sprint for home. The reckless courage costs the Soviet pilots dearly as the Me-109's fall on them and shoot them out of the sky.

[AllenK]

To the land combats. It could be a bit of a make or break for both sides, although it is the Soviets who need some good fortune the most.

[AllenK]

First of all, the invasion of Finland.

Under a storm of naval gunfire the British troops storm ashore. Resistance from the local garrison proves far tougher than expected. They cannot stop the Brits from getting ashore but the destroy the XIV Mot.

[AllenK]

Next to the attack on the XLV Inf. The Soviets have choice and choose an assault, rather than risk losing the ARM HQ in a bad attack.

The choice proves sound. The attack doesn't go well costing the Soviets the Leningrad Militia and the rest of the attackers disorganised.

[AllenK]

Next, the attack on Manstein.

The Germans have the choice of attack. With assault at +1 and blitz at +4 and both ending with a defensive loss 8/19, the Germans go for assault to maximise attacking casualties. It proves unfortunate. Manstein destroys two attacking corps, disorganising the rest but is destroyed in the process. The blitz would have retreated the HQ with no losses and half disorganised [:(]

[AllenK]

Penultimate attack is against the VII SS.

Hoping for a zero defender loss or retreat result, the Germans choose blitzkrieg. It doesn't work. The VII SS is destroyed for no attacking loss although all attackers are disorganised.

[AllenK]

Finally and saving the best and probably most crucial to last, the attack on Rommel.

Wanting to minimize the chance of Rommel being lost, the Germans go for blitzkrieg.

So much for praying. The Soviets indeed save their best for last and there's not much that can be done when a 19 is pulled out of the bag.

[Grotius]

Wow, Rommel meets his end near Stalingrad. Exciting stuff.

At some point, I'd be curious to see the invasion situation on the German north coast. You'd mentioned that the Germans have added INF to garrison some ports there. Do the Americans and CW have the land units to expand their bridgehead?

I'm also curious to see potential American invasion sites in the Pacific. You said that Japan was relying too much on notional garrisons.

Also, a newb question or two about invasions. I keep reading that rain is bad weather for invasions. Is that simply because of the negative modifier to combat odds, or is it the negative modifier to shore bombardment, or the weather effects on search rolls and air missions?

And I'm curious about your emphasis on Germany garrisoning ports on its north shore. Does an invading force need a port, if it controls a coastal hex with an overseas supply link to a primary supply source?

[Centuur]

An HQ can be sort of a port if it is on a coastal hex (since it than can provide supply for units inland). However, that's a waste of the HQ, since if you want to go inland such a unit has better uses. It is therefore better to try and grab a port which has a raillink. This makes it easier to transport units to the beachhead (since TRS can base in a port) and it makes it easier to trace supply, when you are moving inland.

[AllenK]

Hi Grotius,

Glad you are enjoying this.

I’m very much a newb myself. I’d never played WiF before MWiF and for MWiF I simply loaded up Global War and started playing. After about 5-6 aborted games, some of which had just been trying out different options and 2 howling starts that are best forgotten, the result is what you see here. Please therefore approach the following with a healthy degree of scepticism and if others want to correct any mistakes, please feel free to wade in.

Regarding invasions, Wif really manages to simulate why these are such tricky endeavours. It’s not just about getting ashore, which rain makes risky due to all the effects you mention, but getting enough ashore to survive initial counter-attacks and then being able to build up faster than your opponent to enable a breakout of the bridgehead (invasions of single hex islands excepted). Precisely the difficulties the Allies faced with Overlord and other landings.

The flip side is it also brings into sharp focus the Rommel vs Rundstedt debate regarding the best defensive tactics. Defend the coast and stop the invasion on the beaches or wait to see where it materialises and then throw it back into the sea, or at least bottle it up, with reserves kept inland ready to respond. The ideal would be both but unless things have gone remarkably well for the Germans; they are unlikely to be in this luxurious position. Defending every coastal hex would take a massive number of units. The compromise I’ve adopted is defend the ports and use overlapping ZoC’s to augment the notional defence in the empty coastal hexes, making them slightly more than a formality to take. This still takes a large number of units but does mean there are a number on hand to immediately counter-attack if the invasion didn’t go too well but got ashore or, if not, at least contain the bridgehead.

To my mind, and I may well be overemphasising this due to lack of experience, the importance of ports, certainly when playing with Amphibious rules, is in the build-up and breakout phases. Without a port, an HQ is needed on the coast to disembark anything other than INF/CAV. The INF/CAV can disembark onto coastal hexes if carried in AMPHs, otherwise they too need a port/HQ. With the HQ already in the hex, stacking limits mean the most that can be brought in will be one additional corps and a division. It’s also tying up a valuable resource you may want a bit more flexibility with in how you choose to use it. An empty port hex will take two corps and a division, potentially allowing a faster build up if there is some room to manoeuvre them out each time. To breakout and move inland will eventually need a port for supply otherwise it will be restricted to the supply range of the HQ stuck on the coast unless you build a chain of supply HQ’s, either of which is a bit limiting. Thank you Centuur for your excellent summary of the above.

Below is the latest situation on the North European coast. The bridgehead at Kiel won’t be going anywhere soon as it is well bottled up and would take some good carpet bombing to break the defence. The Germans have superior fighters and the CW need to rebuild two of their best bombers, so this will take time to address. That’s fine as it is tying up a greater number of German forces and the aim of that operation was the opening of the Baltic, rather than a drive into Germany. The UK ports are all double stacked with CW land units as are the US ports with US units. The bottleneck is the TRANS/AMPH availability, although several more are on their way and will be priority builds.

I’m not sure if I’ve now shot the bolt by going for Finland. The forces available were too weak for Germany. I considered the Baltic states but only Estonia had reasonable odds at taking the port. I then hit on Finland because if that goes, the Germans lose the HQ supporting the North. In many ways the invasion fleet has already accomplished a strategically useful goal by forcing the Germans to deploy its units here, rather than in Russia. Now the AMPHs are empty, they can get back to the UK, be reloaded and be out threatening again next turn. In fact, possibly sooner as I appear to have an empty AMPH and an empty TRANS, both organised, in the Baltic (don’t ask, they certainly weren’t planned to be there).

[AllenK]

In the Pacific to conduct naval combat or invasions from high sea-boxes you need ports and especially major ones close to the area you want to operate from. Below is the situation in the Pacific. The only Japanese garrisons are Truk, Guadalcanal and Saipan, although the postponement of the US invasion will likely mean further garrisons to the Marshalls. The rest are notional defence only. For the Americans, having saved Rabaul from invasion at the start of the war, this major port is probably the best jumping off point for an approach to Japan via the Philippines. For that, Rabaul needs to be reliably in supply (not yet achieved), which the Jap subs and NAVs in the Solomons and Marshalls are blocking and hence current US ops.

[Centuur]

What I would have done as the Allies is to take Portugal first, build up a large army their and than crush the Spanish army due to overwhelming numbers (and especially air).

Also, it looks like there isn't an Allied concentration of forces in one area. There are some in Finland, Denmark, Spain etc., but there doesn't seem to be a very large army anywhere on the map (exception is the USSR). This strategy does extract units from the USSR, but it doesn't give the Wallies the opportunity to try to liberate France. The Allies only have a year left to take out the Axis. For that, you need a very large US/CW/French army in France. Italy is also still alive...

Now, if German defenses collapse, it usually goes quite fast, but it doesn't look like it at all...

[AllenK]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

What I would have done as the Allies is to take Portugal first, build up a large army their and than crush the Spanish army due to overwhelming numbers (and especially air).

Also, it looks like there isn't an Allied concentration of forces in one area. There are some in Finland, Denmark, Spain etc., but there doesn't seem to be a very large army anywhere on the map (exception is the USSR). This strategy does extract units from the USSR, but it doesn't give the Wallies the opportunity to try to liberate France. The Allies only have a year left to take out the Axis. For that, you need a very large US/CW/French army in France. Italy is also still alive...

Now, if German defenses collapse, it usually goes quite fast, but it doesn't look like it at all...

Spain is on the Allied side following the Italians declaring war and invading it, so I don't need to crush the Spanish. The Italian goal being the Spanish resources and a move on Gibraltar. Taking Portugal may yet need to be considered though, if only to stop the Italians getting it.

I think 'strategy' is probably a far too kind and generous word to describe what amounts to the Allies trying to make the best of a series of botch ups and at least keep the Russians alive and fighting.

There are 3 areas with terrific concentrations of Allied forces; the US Pacific coast, the US Atlantic coast and the UK [&:]. Botch up number one, not prioritising the build of sea-lift capacity plus combat losses mean lots of shiny units with nowhere to go.

Italy, now there's botch up number two. Placing the corps protecting the flank at El Alamein in an exposed hex too far west. It took some additional favourable Italian die rolls but essentially was the cause of the CW eviction from the Middle East. At that point the Allies could have mounted a Med campaign but what had started as a raid to knock out as much as possible of an unguarded Kriegsmarine in Brest, opened out into an opportunity to recapture France and on to Germany. The German efforts to block this nearly led to the Russians waltzing through a much reduced eastern front garrison. That did result in initially a large concentration of the WAllies in France. The thought was finish Germany and the Italians will be easy but then ...

Botch-up number three. Leaving the gap between the US forward units in France and the reinforcements following up from the coast. When a bad combat role left those on the front disorganised, the Italians were able to get into the gap and put them out of supply. The German counter-attack, resulted in the collapse of the American front and the Germans retaking France. Lack of transports to bring in sufficient reinforcements to replace earlier losses and then block the German counter-attack played a big contribution here, which cycles back to botch-up one.

Left to their own devices, the Italians have been able to quietly build up their strength and chuck the odd spanner in the Allied works. The invasion of Spain, with diversion and dilution of Allied effort being the most recent example.

Ultimately you are right. The Allies only have a year left and it sure doesn't look like it at all. For quite a while I've been aware of how behind the curve the Allies are and have thought of ending the game as an Axis victory. On the other hand, having got this far and with extended game length available, I'm kind of curious just how long I can eke the Axis out.

[AllenK]

M/J 1944 Axis Impulse 4: Naval Air

Anyhow, back to the action.

The Japanese go to fly their two recently rebased NAVs into the Marshalls 4-box, to add to the two already there, only to find some buffoon of an air commander forgot to check the supply status of the islands before take-off and put the planes down on one out of supply.

That ends the Naval Air phase as the Japanese have nothing else they want to commit at this stage and neither do the other Axis powers.

Naval Movement:

The Japanese ship the Tokyo Militia to Eniwetok and the SNLF to Majuro (currently OOS). The others have Land actions, so that concludes business here.

The Japanese are offered two sea areas for naval combat. They decline the Marianas but initiate combat in the Marshalls. This could well be foolishly optimistic but here goes ...

The gamble pays off. The Japanese find the US fleet but the USN fails to spot the Japanese. The IJN choose to concentrate on the 2-box containing the TRANS and 3 CV's.

[AllenK]

The Japanese choose Naval Air Combat and choose not to use any surprise points at this stage. The bomber/fighter distribution going into the battle is shown below.

Air combats are always in the lap of the gods but this looks like it could be a bit bloody for the US.