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Turn 145, Blizzard in the North Soviet Weather Zone and Snow in the Central and South Soviet Weather Zones.

At the start of the turn, attacking along the coast just Southwest of Odessa German mechanized forces were successful in allowing the two encircled SS Panzer Divisions to escape encirclement.

But alerted Soviet Tank Corps in the area counter-attacked along the coast encircling one of the escaping SS Panzer Divisions along with two other Panzer Divisions.

A determined German counterattack gave the two Hungarian Divisions surrounded in Kiev a chance to escape encirclement.

But Soviet forces in the area were alerted and able to instead isolate and encircle another four divisions of the attacking German relief force. A bad situation got worse for the Axis forces as 6 Axis divisions are now encircled.

Soviet unstoppable march! the fall of romania seems near

ORIGINAL: moonspirit

Soviet unstoppable march! the fall of romania seems near

Agreed, Stavka expects to capture the capital by July 1944.

Turn 146, Snow in all 3 Soviet Weather Zones. Mud season starts next turn.

West of Odessa, disaster strikes the German Army Group South as 3 German Panzer Divisions surrender including the elite 2nd SS Panzer Division.

And near Smolensk another German Infantry Division also surrenders.

The German Army once again attempts to save the Axis units surrounded near Kiev.

But this is 1944, and by attacking the base of the Axis bulge the Soviet Army succeeds in enlarging the pocket encircling a total of 12 Axis Divisions.

End of turn near Smolensk, another 3 German Infantry Divisions are surrounded.

And west of Odessa, 6 German Infantry Divisions are surrounded.

This turn the German Army lost 214 Panther Tanks and 59 Tiger Tanks.

Turn 147, Mud in all 3 Soviet Weather Zones.

Three German Infantry Divisions surrender northwest of Smolensk.

West of Kiev a Panzergrenadier and Panzer Division also surrender.

Followed by the elite 3rd SS Panzer Division which also surrendered west of Kiev.

And the remaining 3 German Infantry Divisions also surrendered.

End of turn in the Kiev sector, the 3 Hungarian Divisions surrounded in Kiev successfully held off two Soviet attacks.

Start of turn west of Odessa, the 6 German Infantry Divisions attempt to escape encirclement.

My diagnosis of the German problem here is that they seem to have everything on the front line, trying to create the largest CV possible on the front while leaving nothing in reserve. They also have almost no entrenchments leading to higher casualties for themselves and fewer casualties for the Russians.

The intent seems to be to stop every single attack, or cause the Russians to devote as many troops as possible to each attack. An acknowledgement, however, that the Russians will be able to defeat any German stack they choose to attack would lead to a different deployment. Instead of stacking everyone up front, have just enough up front to force the Russians to devote considerable resources to their attacks, but leave plenty of troops behind the line where they can set up fortifications while acting as a reserve for the front line. Being in reserve mode will slow entrenchment efforts, but would mean the entrenching has at least begun when the front line troops are forced to retreat. They will then be in a position to further increase the entrenchment level while the reserve troops fall back and start the next line behind them.