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It's now T4 round 4 and this is what's going on near Riga just now. I've got one division and 2 secuity forces clearing the west coast and I intend to leave a garrison just to keep Elmer from floating somebody into my empty port. There's going to be a CD gun spawn at Riga on T10 and after that I won't need a garrison there. One good thing about Riga is the plethera of airfields near each other so that one HQ unit can service several airfields simultaneously. Less HQ units needed that way. I intend on leaving AGN here at Riga to help the aircraft to heal a tiny bit faster. AGN is an R1 unit ( range one ) which means it has no arty in the unit ( yet ). So it's perfect for babysitting a plethera of aircraft.

The image depicts me fighting over the river crossings and I've captured one intact, made one with engineers, and of course there's the crossing at Riga itself. The Soviets skimped on defensive forces to defend Riga so it wasn't all that hard to just push the defenders asside and walk right in. There was a Soviet AA unit and some Soviet arty to back it up. Not much of a roadblock or a point defense. I guess that's all Elmer had that would reach that defensive position in time ( before I got there ). Now it's a foot race to Pskov.

It's now T5 and I've just opened the file and dug in OKH at Warsaw. For those of you who want to look around, check things out, maybe play it on your own starting at T5? Anyway, I've attached the T5 save game file here below. Enjoy.

It's early in T5 and this is what's going on betwen Riga and Pskov just now. The 1st Panzer Division is zooming away from Riga going NE toward Pskov. My recon unit uncovered one Soviet HQ unit still green at 74% health and it's a 2-3 with 14 MP's remaining. The idea was for the 1st Panzer Division to drive toward Pskov and no knife fights. So the recon unit went around the obstacle and kept driving NE. Just like he'supposed to. The 32nd Infantry Division is the formation nearest the Soviet HQ so they will earn the task to deal with the Soviet HQ unit as part of the follow-on forces.

Here's what's going on around the Minsk area right now. I'm in the process of trying to surround the city and destroy the Soviet units so that I own it and it's clear of enemy units. Sometime next turn maybe. The rest of the troops are going to keep heading east. The repaired rails are nearby so the supply level is good.

It's now early in T6 and this is what's happening between Riga and Pskov right now. I've gotten across the river and now heading NE I'm running into small scattered Soviet units sometimes in small groups. I'm going to try to surround them and kill them as fast as I can. The repaired rails are nearby so the supply levels are great. I've got one Panzer division headed for Pskov ( 1st Panzer Division ) and one headed east along the riverbank to clear out all the crossings between here and Orsha ( 7th Panzer Division ).

It's now T6 round 4 and I just now ran into a unit that is hording trucks. This motorized unit has 145 trucks bur they are authorized only 50. This formation spawned on T4 and this particular unit started the game with 155 trucks assigned. So here in T6 it has lost 10 trucks so far. That's almost 2 trucks per turn for just this one unit and I've got hundreds of units that are also probably losing trucks as well. According to the inventory I've lost only 156 trucks total over 6 turns. That means I'm losing about 28 trucks per turn on average. I'm making 35 trucks per turn so that means that I'm more than making up for losses, but that could change at the drop of a hat.

It's now T7 round 1 and I'm sneaking up on Orsha already. Real soon now I'm going to be fighting over the river crossings again and I'm thinking of using my pontoon guys and engineers to leap across the river and get into the Soviet backfield to help clear the crossings so supply will flow freely to the east side of the river. That will help the push keep going.

This is the south end of the Stalin Line down south and since this is still early in T7 most of these units haven't moved yet so there's a chance to make a lot of changes down here in future rounds. The repaired rails are nearby so supply is good and I've used the Slavic forces to clear out the mountainous regions to my west and they are done now so they will be pushing to the east with the rest of them. They are the white units in this image, lower left. The Italians enter the game in T9. The Hungarians were helping to clear out the mountains and they are done now so I'll rail them over here to lend a hand. There are 6 broken bridges in this image and I need to repair them all. The Soviets are sparse for the most part but have managed to build a fairly good screen in places. I will surround them and destroy them when I get to them. One by one is the name of the game.

This is the middle-ish of the Stalin Line and the repaired rails are nearby so supply is good and I'm driving an MP unit behind the Soviet lines to attempt to cut them off from their supply source to make it easier to take them down. I think it'll help. I need to find another small unit to do the same thing to the southern direction. There is the possibility that Elmer will attack my small unit(s) but a lot of times this trick works out okie dokie. And if it doesn't I don't lose much.

This is the area just NW of Kiev just below the marshes and as you can see I'm in firefights with the last Soviet defensive line before I get to Kiev. The repaired rails are up to the front lines so supply levels are good. My security forces are dealing with a Soviet remnant in my backfield and I've got some RR arty supporting them so the Soviets will be gone shortly.

This is the area just NE of Kiev and it's the area where I get to drive onto the east side of the river that passes through Kiev so that I'm able to surround the city before I destroy the Soviet defenders. I've run into a fairly stout Soviet roadblock and I'm thinking that I'll drive somebody down there to cut off the supply and prevent a retreat of the defenders and the take down will be a lot easier. It'll take a turn or two to get somebody down there but I'm not in that big of a hurry. I'd rather save the lives of my troops than just hay diddle diddle right up the middle. I've been sailing my brown-water boats on the rivers so that the Soviets can't have any supply to the units west of the river.

This is the area just west of Odessa and I'm fighting over river crossings again. I've captured one that has a busted bridge and one that doesn't have a busted bridge but does have a fairly stout Soviet defender that I need to deal with. I've got some engineers headed this way to fix the bridge and I'm going to drive some units across that crossing to drive down to the stopped up crossing and help the 60th Motorized Division unstop that crossing. That will take a turn or two but the Motorized division needs to rest anyway since it's yellow. I can't shoot with it until it turns green according to the red green yellow rules. I would drive my brown-water boats along the river to convert the hexes but there is a Soviet unit blocking the entrance to the river at the beach hex adjacent to the bay.

It's now T7 round 2 and this is the area northwest of Moscow and I'm across the river and I'm pushing east to grab all the roads and rails I can and see if I can't surround these Soviet defenders and kill them. The repaired rails are across the river near Dagavpils so the supply levels don't suck but could be better. It's about 3/10 cloudy but no rain and no mud to deal with.

I'm moving my units after the first combat phase and I've come to the 19th Panzer Division and I'm not sure where to send them next. I don't know where they went in real life, does anybody know? I'm thinking of sending them north to help take down Leningrad but that might not be the best place to send them.

Edit: I found this in Wikipedia:
The 19th Panzer Division was an armored division of the German Wehrmacht that existed from 1 November 1940 to 8 May 1945 during World War II. The division was formed when a regular infantry division was turned into a panzer division, trading one of its infantry regiments for a tank regiment. 19th Panzer suffered heavy losses during Operation Barbarossa, with one of its three tank battalions being disbanded in August 1941. After the Battle of Moscow and the fighting in the winter of 1941-1942, the division was left with just one tank battalion, and the front was later sent south to support the Italian Army in Russia. The division suffered heavy losses at the Battle of Stalingrad, the Battle of Kursk, and the Belgorod-Kharkov Offensive Operation in 1942-1943, but it was reinforced with an additional tank battalion. In May 1944, the division was sent to be refitted in the Netherlands after nearly being destroyed, and the division was transferred to Poland to crush the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. After the Vistula-Oder Offensive by the Soviet Red Army in January 1945, the division withdrew towards the Silesian city of Breslau and then into Czechoslovakia, where it surrendered to Soviet forces west of Prague on 8 May 1945.

Down south I've surrounded quite a few Soviet units and that should clear up the second Stalin Line I've run into and now I need to know where the third one is so I've send a recon unit out to look around to see if it can't find that third Stalin Line somewhere close to where it is now. Then I got to worrying about it getting ambushed by lots of Soviet units and wondered what kind of equipment it has onboard and took a look and found all kinds of good stuff. It's got organic arty and mortars and all kinds of AT guns and some scout cars and even some motorcycles so it should be good for recon. I think it might be able to defend itself for at least one turn. I can probably get some support out to it as long as it doesn't venture much further SE.

It's now T8 round 2 and I've captured some crossings over the river near Orsha and I've established a toe hold on the east side of the river and if I can manage to get some supply to those folks then the advance can keep pushing to the east. The repaired rail is nearby so maybe that's possible. I've started resting the tired aircraft at Minsk, which is close enough to be convienient but there's the possibility of a Soviet airfield strike so I need to move some AA units to Minsk to protect the resting aircraft.

This is the southern end of the Stalin Line down south and the Soviets are scattered and have built some small groups and I'm in the process of surrounding them and killing them and progress is still fairly rapid. The terrain is favoring my Panzer troops and fast movers. I'm repairing the busted bridges as fast as I can and repairing the rail as I go so the supply situation is good.

It's now T8 round 4 and this is the Pskov area right now. I'm fighting over the river crossings again and making some small progress. I've advanced faster than the railhead in this area and so the supply situation is 28 on the rails and 9 at the front lines. It's about 2/10 cloudy with minimal scattered rain.

It's now T9 round 1 and this is the Orsha area right now. I'm fighting over the river crossings still and it seems that the Soviets have gotten enough reinforcements in to form a proper front line ( with small gaps ). But the good news is that the supply level on the east side of the river is as high as 16 which is more than enough to keep the push going. I've got to get something into the Soviet backfield to disrupt their supply to enable me to take down this area more easily. It's either that or make a gap somewhere in the Soviet lines and snake some troops through the gap to surround them one unit at a time to kill them. I've been busting Soviet bridges in their backfield, approx. 2 bridges per turn for the last three turns and it's beginning to make a difference. The Soviets are having to take detours to get their reinforcements to the front lines. I'd like to stop the inflow of reinforcements entirely somehow.

This is the area just NE of Kiev right now. I'm arrived at several river crossings and I'll soon be fighting over them. The repaired rail is up to the front lines so supply levels are good and the only thing waiting on the river crossings is the arrival of a lot more troops. They are headed this way and it'll take a turn or two before they get here. I'm using my paratroopers to clear hexes in my backfield because they are such small units they wouldn't last long on the front lines.