Final Days of the Reich - StB Rosencrantus (Axis) vs Tyronec (SU)

[Rosencrantus]

Stalingrad & Don:

With the hole opened in the Stalingrad pocket, it should collapse soon if the Soviets commit there units there.

Soviets pocket units again and I expose my units in order to rescue them. Fighting is extremely intense and the retreat to the Kursk - Stalino line will begin next turn.

East of all the fighting however, all is calm. Romanian units in forts are capable of holding down the rifle divisions deployed there.

[Rosencrantus]

T17 - March 11, 1943:

AGA:

Tyronec's attempt to counter naval interdict the isolated units in the far south have failed. My most experienced air group (and notably famous III./JG 52) was given an AS directive and savaged the Soviet aircraft with their altitude advantage for only 3 A2A losses. There was another air combat that I did not take a picture of where results were just as good.

My own naval interdiction succeeds and the 3 divisions are eliminated.

[Rosencrantus]

Stalingrad & Don:

The Soviets have not managed to encircle any other unit and all units are withdrawn. Before leaving though, my units inflict some heavy losses on fatigued and weakened Soviet units.

Have also withdrawn further towards Stalingrad as the outer ring of defenses have been broken through. Units there have supply but are in an absolutely dire state.

[Rosencrantus]

Kursk:

Units have been withdrawn away from the premises of Voronezh. Units are tripled stacked and are building forts rapidly along with the ones already existing from earlier.

[Rosencrantus]

Rzhev:

Action is no longer south of Rzhev. Soviets have amassed units to the salient itself and a division reserve (293. inf) has been rushed to the area to stop any attack.

[Rosencrantus]

Losses & Front:

With the withdrawal complete, the effective controlled front is almost just like how it was for Germany during summer 1942, before Case Blue began, save for Demyansk, some territory near Rzhev, Stalingrad and the units still in the Caucasus.

The 608 air combat losses are almost all from the naval interdiction combat in the far south.

[Rosencrantus]

Uploaded my turn in my game to the server and still want more WITE2 action so turning back to this AAR. Went through the previous pages and noticed that the transfer to the new forum deleted and made some of my old posts pictures kinda wack, so sorry about that.

Regardless, let's begin.

T18 - March 18, 1943:

Rzhev:

Tyronec launches an assault against the Rzhev sailent, nothing too much to worry about. A few division reinforcements have been sent and I'm going to just continue to hold down the forts and dare him to try and march into the gaps with just his rifle divisions.

Rzhev.JPG (301.73 KiB) Viewed 1440 times

AGA:

Soviets begin their assault on the new line set up in the Caucasus. Results are promising; one hex on the rough terrain was taken with more to fall back to and a hold with the black counter units (XXXX Panzer Corps).

AGA.JPG (340.48 KiB) Viewed 1440 times

Stalingrad:

The stalingrad cauldron has been cracked again and units not in the city itself are going to get destroyed soon. All I can hope for now is that the city holds on as long as it possibly can to deny the railyard as the bonus VPs have all already disappeared.

Stalingrad.JPG (83.37 KiB) Viewed 1440 times

Orel - Stalino line:

With the retreat having been done in good order and my troops digging in, the Soviets have taken advantage of a hex gap from the previous turn and are attempting to push through it. Though initially frustrated that this presented him the opportunity to roll up my flanks on this crucial defensive line, I also realised that these Soviet units have been exhausted and are understrength from all the fighting near voronezh as they have not taken an opportunity to rest much since I began the retreat. My plan was to allow the Soviets to continue to push through the gap there conducting a fighting retreat and to launch a counter-offensive once my panzers have gotten sufficient CPP and have rested.

The hold north of Orel was won due to a motorised division reserve being activated (if I remember correctly it was the 36th infantry-division (mot) that did the job).

Orel.JPG (339.05 KiB) Viewed 1440 times

[Rosencrantus]

Orel - Stalino Line Pt 2:

I also heavily reinforce kharkov to protect the level 9 railyard there as I was worried that the large concentration of soviet forces south of voronezh that were there would try and seize the city. This however leaves a gap near izyum which I wasn't too worried about since there was no railroads there for him to capture and repair to resupply.

Kharkov.JPG (298 KiB) Viewed 1435 times

Near Stalino, forward units at Voroshilovgrad have made contact with Soviet units, the line from there to Rostov is just to buy time for the units behind to dig up more forts.

Stalino.JPG (349.66 KiB) Viewed 1435 times

Velikie Luki:

Soviets have launched a counter offensive to retake the hexes that were lost during the incursion offensive that I launch previously. Battles were won but no units were there to occupy the hex. Soviets suffered heavy losses even when victorious.

VL.JPG (301.6 KiB) Viewed 1435 times

VLloss.JPG (73.82 KiB) Viewed 1435 times

[Rosencrantus]

Frontline Overview:

At this point in time, I was very satisfied with my performance over the 42-43 Winter Campaign. I didn't suffer anymore destroyed units from encirclement and I even managed to evacuate by air experienced infantry units from Stalingrad. With strong reserves from the first reconstituted panzer divisions sent to the reserve turns ago finally arriving, I strongly believed that Tyronec's offensive was largely over. Save for the one near Orel which as I stated above formed plans for.

Reserves.JPG (509.62 KiB) Viewed 1431 times

Order of Battle:

Here is a picture of the order of battle at this time. Was very happy to see that the Soviet tank numbers have fallen so low (less than 2:1 ratio). Sent a lot of the Luftwaffe to the reserve at this moment, bad decision considering the fact that I wanted to launch a counter offensive soon but at least they'll get more training as many of my air groups fell below 70 exp.

OOB.JPG (108.87 KiB) Viewed 1431 times

P.S Really happy that the new forum allows for more than one attachment to be used, makes making these types of AARs a lot easier!

[Rosencrantus]

T19 - March 25, 1943:

Orel:

Let's start this turn with some ACTION.

Soviets continue to try and push through the gap I mentioned a turn earlier. They won the hex and battle, but also suffered horrendous casualties in this massive battle.

Kursk.JPG (332.16 KiB) Viewed 1426 times

Kurskbattle.JPG (353.29 KiB) Viewed 1426 times

Kharkov:

The other area near Izyum which I also left some gaps to cover Kharkov have also been exploited by a broken down tank corps. The 3 brigades have been routed but the corps that have crossed in force over the donets I have failed to repel. The Grossdeutschland Division I have left at a part of the line to ZOC crucial hexes very important to the defensive line in the area. I'm hoping that this will stall whatever attack the Soviets have planned for in this area as the unit is extremely hard for the Soviets to dislodge in the lvl 2 fort it is in. I also have massive amounts of armoured units and more reserves being sent to the area if he attempts to isolate and destroy it.

Kharkov.JPG (287.08 KiB) Viewed 1426 times

kharkovbat.JPG (191.23 KiB) Viewed 1426 times

[Rosencrantus]

AGA:

Fighting continues in this area. One thing to note is that the Soviets are attempting to outflank from the north but I will use the sturm brigades (for now broken down Romanian cav divisions will work) that were given to me near the beginning of the scenario to screen and attack any Soviet unit Tyronec has in that area trying to flip hexes. They are ideal for this job as they are a motorised, small high exp unit making them easy to supply and get 40+ MPs every turn. Them only being around 2293 men strong is no big deal due to the very low unit concentration in the wide open steppes of this region.

AGA.JPG (436.98 KiB) Viewed 1421 times

VL - Rzhev:

Fighting continues in the salient and around Velikie Luki. The Soviets did in fact try to force rifle divisions through one of the gaps and come within a hex of cutting off the rail line to Rzhev. The reserves sent there earlier conduct a counter attack and try to secure its surrender next turn.

VLRzhev.JPG (487.43 KiB) Viewed 1421 times

rzhevEncircle.JPG (399.49 KiB) Viewed 1421 times

Losses:

This turn losses are quite good for me, 39,672 total losses for the Axis against 117,531 total Soviet. A very nice 2.96:1 ratio.

glossw.JPG (38.89 KiB) Viewed 1419 times