It looks like the battle of Kursk is taking place one year early.
The Germans took the cities of Rzhev, Bryansk and Sumy this turn. After taking Rzhev the German forces there began heading south. Perhaps they are aiming at Vyazma. I doubt they will go for it, though. Our defenses there are quite strong. In fact, from Rzhev down to the head waters of the Desna we have now adopted a two up-one/two back defense giving a us a very strong front line. This is meant to deter infantry attacks.
The strong front line concept worked around Kharkov where the Germans backed off of their attacks and sent those forces north towards Sumy to reinforce their man thrust.
The Panzers that had penetrated 30 miles into our lines did not move this turn. Instead, the Germans concentrated on widening the very narrow corridor through which they were supplied. Unfortunately, we ended up with 7 divisions encircled, though I would say that such a result is fairly inevitable. There is just no way to prevent relatively small pockets at this stage. Fortunately, replacement divisions have already been moved in. As divisions are destroyed, new divisions coming in from the east are sent to man our 3rd defense line while they train up, at which point they are sent to the front to replace the divisions currently being destroyed.
The Russians launched a number of counter attacks up and down the front, including one attack the badly damaged the GrossDeutschland regiment and a motorized division. Meanwhile, the air war is very intense: The Russians lost almost 500 fighters and 80 IL-2s, while the Germans lost 68 fighters, 37 dive bombers and 176 level bombers. Although the loss ratio obviously favors the Germans, in the long run their losses are far outstripping their replacement rate. I will keep throwing more fighters into the fray despite the horrendous losses in order to wear down the Luftwaffe.
Rail capacity in version 12.x especially, but in WitE1 generally, is broken. I am down to 3% reserved rail and still don't have enough capacity to meet demand for supply/resource/fuel transport. Tying rolling stock to rail yard is a very bad idea. The Russian evacuated most of their rolling stock, leaving very little for the Germans. Yet in WitE1 you lose a city with a rail yard you lose rail capacity. You can evacuate ever other type of factory, such as tank, plane, and armament factories, but evacuating your rolling stock is impossible. At any rate, to deal with this situation I have started shutting down factories. I evaced 1 Yak-1, 1 LaGG-3, 1 IL-2, and 1 T-60 factory or order to stop some production and save on supplies. I would like to lower armament prodcution, the AP cost is too high and I am afraid to evac any of those factories considering how I lost a whole bunch of manpower and railyard factories the last time I did that.
One more rifle corps was made this turn. I plan on making two more next turn. In total I have 44 guards rifle division making it possible to create 22 guards rifle corps. That, obviously, will take a while. I am currently up to 8 rifle corps.
