INVADE? Need advice....

[Baelfiin]

To invade or not to invade, that is the question.

Getting late in the year, progress through the toe is slow, what to do what to do.

[Baelfiin]

Weather Situation looks good for the moment.... but maybe will change in a couple of weeks. I don't think I can afford to invade in the mud

[Baelfiin]

Air Situation, I have supremacy for the moment, interdiction causing lots of problems for germans according to radio intercepts.

[whoofe]

that's an ambitious landing spot, IMO

[Baelfiin]

very ambitious, but I have air cover.

[MisterBoats]

Bring a lot of beach chairs and blankets -- you may be seaside for a while. Why not go for the east coast?

[Baelfiin]

Situation in the Toe, 8th army pretty well bottled up

[Baelfiin]

ORIGINAL: MisterBoats

Bring a lot of beach chairs and blankets -- you may be seaside for a while. Why not go for the east coast?

Im out of time before the weather gets bad. Plus farther for my fighters to fly

[Tazak]

you invasion units seem a little lite on support units?

can you redirect 'spoon' landings to the north of 'knife' which you will likely cut off Civitavecchia with ZOC, although personally I prefer the 2 landing spots north and south of Naples but it looks like that will land you in the middle of his next defensive line

[Baelfiin]

ORIGINAL: Tazak

you invasion units seem a little lite on support units?

can you redirect 'spoon' landings to the north of 'knife' which you will likely cut off Civitavecchia with ZOC, although personally I prefer the 2 landing spots north and south of Naples but it looks like that will land you in the middle of his next defensive line

Yes they do. I found out hard way earlier in this game that attaching support units while prepping messes up your prep time.

If I redirect I think the weather will get bad on me before I can land but that would be a better spot you mention.

[Baelfiin]

Rail Situation around landing area

[Baelfiin]

I think my airpower will give me a chance to hold on if there are a lot of tanks that come in

[KWG]

If you land at Rome use knife and fork, spoon to the reserves. Keep invasion together.

Looks like good size German force near Rome. Germans in toe may react in force at Rome. Race them from toe to Rome.

Secondary invasion site can still be contained along with your original Italy forces.

[marion61]

Are you playing the AI? If you are, and depending on the setting you can probably do that and stay on the beaches. You'll have mud in two turns, and the axis get a crap load of reinforcements in Nov. and Dec. It's not so much his rail system you need worry about, it's his existing air forces. Against a human opponent, you'd be in trouble imho. The invasion around Crotone is already outflanked by all those bases around Taranto. Most importantly is Corsica. None of your air bases are expanded, and I'm betting the ports are still damaged (Sardinia looks good tho). So your air forces to cover two separate invasions down here is no where near sufficient to do this with out having to pull from Tac Air and 15th AF (or England). If you haven't destroyed axis planes on the ground, then your not ready. My two cents.

One more note: 3 invasion beaches is not enough for a successful landing, close to bad weather time, and into his air cover, even with naval control. You can be easily stuck on those beaches, being boxed in by by axis units until the weather breaks again in spring. He only has to maintain 10hexes to hem you in there, and one unit can be attacked from 4 hexes. It won't last long.

[Baelfiin]

This is PBEM vs AWG, Italy just surrendered so that's why the Corsican area is beat down.

That Crotone area looks way to dangerous to me, its only a brigade sized landing force with 4 brigades of para's. Not going to try there at all.
Also I have every single bomber other than the 4 engine in med doing work.

Sounds like consensus so far is to not invade 8)
Luftwaffe seems pretty well suppressed at the moment, but the may be just resting.

[marion61]

Your best option that I see at the moment is to retarget your amphibs, and land in the bay around Taranto, but build up your airfields before you go. By '44, your going to want those bases in southern Italy for 15th AF.

[cmunson]

You've done a great job preparing for the invasion, especially with you interdiction levels at sea. I don't know, pretty risky to invade that far from your main line especially since he has you hermetically sealed on such a small front in the toe thus leaving a lot of Germans free to thwart you by Rome. If I were the German I would hem you in around Rome and pound you with bombers while still keeping you bottled up in the toe. You might retask spoon farther south (by Taranto?) and when he reacts to that hit fork and knife the next turn.

Let us know what you do.

[whoofe]

^^

yeah that sounds good

BAM! fork in the eye!

[Baelfiin]

I'll let you guys know tomorrow how it turned out 8)

[marion61]

GOOD LUCK![:)]