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Here is a shot of the North. Doing a bit better up here.

Here is the Leningrad area and the pesky Finns.

AXIS #3 SEPT/OCT 1941

Axis lost the initiative despite a re roll.

Little to report as the Allies remain on the defensive.

Germany land, Italy and Japan combined.

An Italian sub patrols Cape Verde, but doesn't search. The Japanese move troops by sea.

Italian fighters take to the skies above the Eastern Med. (This shot after Italy's land moves; a supply unit completes its long march from the Horn of Africa towards Balbo's HQ in Egypt, trailed by the parched, exhausted 11th Infantry Division.)

Residents of Chengtu receive a visit from the Japanese Nells. This unit has inflicted significant economic damage on China during the first two years of war.

The Emperor sends blossoms and awards. Why have we not built more, he demands.

Air combat as the Luftwaffe send a Stuka to ground strike Zhukov's HQ. The intercepting, and obsolete, Soviet fighters are shot down. But both this and another German ground strike, by Dorniers against the isolated Red Army column in the Nikolaev pocket, completely miss.

In compensation, Japanese artillery gets lucky against isolated Chinese Nationalists with questionable loyalty to the Kuomintang. They have been helping the communists for many months. Now, not-so-useful idiots. As Lenin might say.

Terauchi's Army Group prevail in the ensuing attack, and at last occupy the heights above Sian. Or some of them.

Antipartisan operation in Normandy is smoothly executed.

18 was maybe wasted there but the Germans roll well in a crucial, slightly risky, blitz against Zhukov's HQ (and an expensive Engineer Division) as the Battle for Kiev and the wider Ukraine develops. The Germans have deployed most of their best units, and their largest army, to this southern front in the east.

This is where the available resources are. The breadbasket of Russia.

The Baltic area has been quiet, as it rains. The Germans occupy Latvia.

But perhaps the conquest of her homeland has had the desired salutary effect on the wailing Hungarian woman at the Berghof?

The weather improves as the impulse ends. The Germans rebase a fighter and a Stuka to their spearhead in Ukraine.

Ukraine, end of Axis #3 Sept/Oct 1941.

The South Dobruja question perhaps slowed down Barbarossa (I wanted Spain and Gibraltar but didn't get the weather) but free use of the Rumanian Army is an advantage now. Units aren't great, but neither are the Bulgarian and Hungarian units we have foregone. They can all roam in the former territories of USSR, mopping up those partisans.

AXIS #6 SEPT/OCT 41

More backpedalling from the Allies.

Germany and Japan land, Italy combined.

The RN fleet in E Med is in a low box, an opportunity to reinforce North Africa. The Italians send out their fleet, and three bombers.

Neither side searches, a Mot Div and the Roma Militia are delivered safely to Bardia.

Elsewhere, a lone Italian sub found nothing in Cape Verde, and a Japanese bomber hit nothing important in a raid on Kweiyang.

German and Rumanian planes ground strike the Nikolayev pocket. The Romanians hit the Soviet Mechanised Corps.

Air combat in northern Latvia as the Reds intercept Luftwaffe ground support for a blitz into Estonia.

The bombers both get through, the fighters survive. The Finns want to dog fight but the Reds abort.

In the first of three German blitzes in the East, Guderian's armoured and mechanised units break through into Latvia and Lake Peipus.

Rommel gets a breakthrough result SE of Kiev, just, but can't get his armour across the Dneiper organised.

The Reds in the Nikolayev pocket resist bravely. The Germans lose a mot div and the Rumanians are tied down mopping up the area for some time. But the Soviet units are both destroyed as they cannot retreat.

Terauchi needed a better roll to take Sian in a hopeful assault. Had it worked, lots of isolated communists.

But the weather stays fine at the end of the impulse, roll 1.

AXIS #8 SEPT/OCT 1941

There is a sea battle in the E Med as the RN rolls 2, 8. Only one round. CL Taranto and HMS Coventry are sunk as the Allies opt for surface combat. The Italians abort an empty TRS to safety and the damaged BB Giulio Cesare.

On land, the Allies are in retreat on almost every front. Kiev, Kweilin, and Alxandria are vacated.

Three land actions.

Alexandria is hailed as a great victory in Italy. They were prepared to fight for it, but lack the advance strength just yet to press on across the Nile delta.