D21 yet again. A tribute to the community as my thanks

[larryfulkerson]

It's now T125 round 1 and this is the front lines right now. The Finns are fighting their way to Murmansk and they are having a hard time so I send them two divisions to help them. I've broken down the land forces organizationally into Task Forces. I'm pushing Task Force Louise to the NorthEast following the roads and rails just because I can kill more Soviet units slowly that way. Not so much for the objectives since they are so sparse up north. Task Force Charlotte is headed EastNorthEast following the roads and rails just to see how hard it would be to reach the east map edge. TF Ruth is headed straight east for whatever objectives there are but mostly to kill Soviet units. TF Chastity and TF Katy are following the roads and rails directly east as well. I'm counting on each TF to protect each other's flank and help each other when needed. TF Beverly is mopping up in the Stalingrad area. And TF Lucy is a mixture of Slavic, Hungarian, Romanian, Italian, and German troops. Mostly just clearing the roads and repairing the rails. Soviet units are sparse down south.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T125 round 1 and this is what it looks like near Stalingrad right now. Some of my forces were able, finally, to leap the major river and they then moved south and are now approaching the Stalingrad defenders on the east side of the river. My goal is to seal in all the defenders so I can destroy ALL of them. I've managed to do that on the west side of the river....now to stop up the east side as well. I have an engineer unit, the 355th Pioneers of the 5th Panzer Division, that's sitting on the one road leading north on the east side of the river so I need to get him some support poste haste. My bombers are going to hit the Soviet arty on the east side of the river to see if they can't make their deployment go to "mobile" from whatever they are right now ( supposing that they are "D", "T", "E", or "F" ).

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T126 round 1 and this is what it looks like near Krasnodar right now. I've managed to capture a second intact crossing over a major river. That will facilitate the passage of troops into the start of the mountainous terrain that the Soviets are sure to defend from. I notice that the bomber unit parked north of the 620th Pionier unit doesn't seem to be set to any particular mission. That means I need to go through all the aircraft and make sure they all have an appropriate mission and that the tired ones are gathered up to the airdromes near Moscow where I have parked OKH so that Hitler can entertain the aircrews while their planes are fixed. Usually the planes are ready to go out to the field early the next turn. I'm using the "just-in-time" inventory control scheme and it seems to work out just fine. Never a bottleneck or a hickup or any heartburn. I have 21.5K HRS's assigned and 729 HRS's on hand.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T126 round 3 and this is what it looks like near Kazan right now. The Soviet units are especially sparse so progress is rapid. I've surrounded the last two Soviet defenders on the east side of the river and they should be gone in a round or two. The repaired rail is close to the point of the spear so the supply level is good.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T127 round 4 and this is what it looks like near Stalingrad right now. The good news is that I managed to force my way into the city and defeated the Soviet defenders who retreated to the NE and now consist of a pontoon unit and a fixed gun emplacement ( a CD unit ) with 19% proficiency and both units are very low on supply ( probably cherry red ) and my valent units wore themselves out assaulting that small Soviet group and when they get down to about 60% of supply I usually rest them. And so most of them are resting this turn. Most of the units that were congregating around the city were railed to the south of the Rostov area to help with the push to the mountains.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T128 round 1 and this is what it looks like near Kazan right now. Yeah, we're out in the sticks, the wilderness, Russia's Great Outback. The middle of nowhere. The Soviet troops could almost be described as devoid. So I've got my units busy claiming all the roads and rails to facilitate the flow of supply. I have 21.7K HRS's assigned and 751 HRS's on hand. It's raining cats and dogs with about 8/10 cloudy, windy, rain galore with lots and lots of T-storms. I predict that we're going to have bou cou mud next turn.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T128 round 1 and this is what it looks like near Krasnodar right now. I finally managed to cut off the Soviet defenders of the Kerch Straits from their supply source and I've been railing at least a dozen divisions from Stalingrad to here and they are making a difference. Further to the east I have other units advancing this far south as well. I'm into the foothills of the mountains and looking for weak spots.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T129 round 1 and this is what it looks like near Astrakhan right now. I'm using the Italians to clear out the terrain to the west of Astrakhan and as soon as I capture the city I plan to move north and south on the rails from there. Plus some troops to drive east on the dirt road to split the Soviet Union into two halves.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T130 round 1 and this is what it looks like west of Chkalov right now. It's raining cats and dogs with about 6/10 cloudy with plenty of rain clouds and a plethera of T-storms. I have 22.3K HRS's assigned and 526 HRS's on hand. The 39th Pionier of the 3rd Panzer Division has driven way out in front of the main body and started it's journey yellow and now that it's stopped it's red. It has 92% proficiency but only 52% of health. It's needs a couple of turns of rest and refit. Next turn. I'm aiming at the east map edge.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T130 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Stalingrad right now. It's raining cats and dogs with about 3/10 cloudy. Soviet units are especially sparse so progress is rapid. The Situation Briefing panel says that my victory level is 4448 of 4400 points constituting an overwhelming victory. Cool.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T130 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Ufa and Sterlitamak right now. It's raining cats and dogs with about 8/10 cloudy. It appears that east of the major river running through Ufa there's a sparcity of roads and rails. I'm not sure that's a good thing. We'll see.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T130 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Krasnodar right now. It's raining cats and dogs with about 8/10 cloudy. I'm reducing the Kerch Straits Soviet defenders to open the bottleneck and I'm fighting over river crossings and pushing into the mountains looking for weak spots. There are several.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T133 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Krasnodar right now. It's no longer raining and it's about 3/10 cloudy and seems to be a bright and sunshiny day. I've reduced the Kerch Straits and mopped up the Soviet defenders and now I'm trying to grab the coastal road because it leads to Tuapse where the rails start along the coast and I need that particular rail.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T134 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Maykop right now. It's raining cats and dogs with about 8/10 cloudy with plenty of rain and T-storms. It's going to be muddy next turn. The repaired rails are close so supply is adequate. This is the tip of the spear in the SE corner of the war. My goal here is to cut Russia in half by getting some units to the east edge of the map.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T134 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Kirov right now. It's raining, about 7/10 cloudy with scattered rain. The repaired rails are getting closer so supply will soon be adequate. This is the tip of the spear in the NE corner of the war. I'm not sure there are any objectives this far away from Moscow so I'm not sure how much longer I should continue this direction of push. Right now I'm not running into a sufficent number of Soviet units to justify this advance. I'll do a map study to decide.

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[larryfulkerson]

This is a zoomed out view of what area in NE Russia looks like and my analysis shows us that there are a few Soviet units and a couple of objectives but nothing of real value to the war effort up there. No reason to continue this direction of push. I'm going to fall back to better defensive positions and use the unemployed troops to push east instead.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T134 round 1 and this is what it looks like around Chkalov right now. It's raining, about 4/10 cloudy with scattered rain and 9 T-storms. The repaired rails are close so supply is more than adequate. In the lower part of this image I feel like I need to pull back to the south of the river to have a stronger defensive configuration because there aren't a lot of avilable troops to firm up the footprint and stabilize the situation. I consider that I might be able to find a division or two to rail into this position to lend a hand.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's still T134 round 1 and this is what it looks like north of Chkalov right now. It's raining, about 3/10 cloudy with scattered rain and 11 T-storms. The repaired rail is close so supply is adequate in the south part of the image but not so great in the north. I have 22.7K HRS's assigned and 507 HRS's on hand.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T135 round 2 and this is what it looks like around Mozdok right now. It's raining cats and dogs, about 9/10 cloudy with scattered rain and multiple T-storms. The repaired rail is close so supply is adequate and it appears that the Hungarians are making some progress in moving to the SE with the goal of moving to the east map edge. I've attached the 60th Motorized Division to this effort as well and they are coming in really handy for this push.

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[larryfulkerson]

It's now T135 round 4 and I finally captured Ufa just now. I've never before seen so much rain, about 9/10 cloudy with lots of scattered rain and many T-storms. The repaired rail is close so supply is adequate. I've captured a crossing over the major river which I believe is the Volga ( ? ). I don't know how much further east I should move but I see the objective Magnitogorsk SE of where this crossing is so I suppose it wouldn't hurt to capture that city.

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