L'Empereur est mort: A French AAR

[Bored Student1414]

This alternate Great War is OTL WW1 and WW2 in one great horrifying value package. Europe and Asia is about to being consumed in one massive nightmare. Fascists, dead dukes, revanchism, ultranationalism, aircraft, tanks, and battleships! It has it all. The situation looks quite bad for France as its empire is unstable, its military is overstretched, and its chief ally is facing a two front war. Good luck and I hope the war finishes before the end of the game.

 

[Specialist290]

The lights are going out all over Europe...

 

[J_Master]

Do you want your money in marks, francs, roubles or yuan?

Guldens thank you very much

 

[GoukaRyuu]

It begins...

 

[Southernpride]

Took me three days to read this entire story going to be very sad when it ends

 

[RossN]

Newly trained Tirailleurs indochinois, July 1933.​

Part Eighty Seven - The Great War in the Far East


In April 1933 France had forty eight thousand soldiers stationed in Indochina. Though they lacked tanks (which would have had supreme difficulty with the terrain) they were otherwise relatively well equipped with light artillery and mountain guns and three squadrons (escadrons) of aeroplanes, totaling about sixty warplanes. Most of these were Breuguet XIX's or Gourdou-Leseurre GL-32's - both increasingly obsolete in Europe but likely formidable against China's under-equipped and under-trained air force. Given the immense disparity of numbers involved there could be no question of a French offensive into China. Instead the Armée d'Indochine was to remain on the defensive, relying on the naturally favourable landscape of the Tonkin region which had been further fortified in the early part of the century.

In contrast to the soldiers (and pilots) the sailors (and seaplane pilots) of the Escadron de l'océan Indien would be on the attack from the offset. The French Navy had ten modern cruisers stationed in the port of Saigon, ranging in size from five to ten thousand tons. All had been built after the Mitteleuropan War, originally as a deterrent against Japan and the force was, in 1933 the most powerful concentration of French seapower outside Metropolitan France. With the Chinese navy having been effectively eliminated by the Japanese the Escadron de l'océan Indien was ironically perhaps overpowered for its primary role of blockading the Chinese coast and sinking and capturing Qing commerce . However the Dutch, though not believed to have many warships in the region could not be completely discounted.

The Parisian press, understandably obsessed about the Germans on the Rhine and the Oder took a sanguine view of the French forces in the Far East, confident that the Qing would bleed themselves dry battering uselessly at the 'natural fortress of north Indochina'. The government, and still more the Army had a far more realistic view. The Chinese Army might have lacked the equipment and elan of the French but they were still far better armed and trained than the Egyptian rebels, or the Karnatak nationalists who were on the verge of completely defeating Bouët-Willaumez and his men [1]. Many of the Chinese officer corps were old hands who had seen service in the war against Japan and were well versed in modern warfare. With bottomless reserves of manpower to call upon and only a thin Russian presence in Siberia the Chinese could not be kept out of Indochina for long. Privately Louis Félix Thomas Maurin, the Minister for War was even more pessimistic. In his letter to Général de division Augustine Bosquet , the fifty two year old Parisian born commander of the Armée d'Indochine, General Maurin stated: 'The best that can be hoped for is five to six months resistance... no substantial help can be expected but the longer you delay the Chinese and the more men they are forced to throw your way the greater the chance of Russia surviving.'

When war broke out the French colonial administration instructed the Emperor Bảo Đại - nominally ruler of Indochina - to raise at least a dozen infantry regiments. While there were already several locally raised regiments in Indochina this order tripled at the stroke of a pen the number of Vietnamese soldiers under the tricolour. No greater sign of the desperate situation was possible, than looking to raise a large body of native troops at the very moment when a vast rebellion was underway in France's other East Asian stronghold. Whether these soldiers would materialize in time to be of use was not a question anyone cared to ask aloud.

The initial Chinese offensive began on 15 May with a major attack on Lang Son. Général de division Jean de Castlenau in command of the 7e Division d'Infanterie (reinforced by a regiment of hussars) was faced with an ever increasing Qing army that ground the French down over the following weeks. Simultaneous attacks fell on the border territories of Cao Bang and Son La.

The Battle of Lang Son, 15 June 1933.
​

General Bosquet's problem was that while the Tonkin region was indeed good defensive ground he simply lacked the manpower to cover the border lines in depth. The four French divisions where spread thin indeed and had one part of the line been broken there would have been no possibility of keeping out the Chinese Army. Bosquet did the only thing he could: retreat, abandoning the north of Indochina to the Chinese. All French troops pulled south to Thanh Hoa. That at least was the plan but General de Castlenau's forces where nearly encircled by a sudden collapse in part of the French line. The orderly withdrawal from Lang Son became a rout and only the bloody victory at Cao Bang two days later saved the French forces from total disaster, shocking the Chinese into stalling their own advance. Even so the French suffered more casualties at Lang Son - killed, injured and taken prisoner than they did during the rest of the fighting in Indochina combined.

Bosquet's withdrawal was strategically sound - Thanh Hoa was far more defensible given his resources - but politically and symbolically earthshaking. He'd effectively surrendered a quarter of French Indochina (including Hanoi, the capital) to the enemy. The Emperor and his court fled south to Saigon, flown by a French Army aeroplane after a pessimistic report overstated the speed of the Chinese advance. Back in Paris the government and most of the press willingly downplayed the war in the Far East, especially as it followed on the heels of the humiliating yet inevitable defeat in India. The surrender of General Bouët-Willaumez and his all his men, immediately before the Chinese offensive had been both the greatest defeat the French Army had seen in two decades and a grim sign of just how thinly stretched France was in Asia.

Despite the fall of Hanoi the much hoped for Vietnamese soldiers finally began to arrive at the start of August. The new Tirailleurs indochinois, though hurriedly raised proved formidable troops. Roman Catholics - about a quarter to a third of the Indochinese population in the 1930s - disproportionately featured in the ranks , especially among the non-commissioned officers. The French were not above using propaganda as to what fate would befall the Christians of Indochina should the Qing win. Lurid tales of missionary priests and nuns tortured to death in Shanghai and Beijing found a willing audience. There was also a strong feeling among Vietnamese nationalists that more could be won out a French victory than a Chinese one. Egypt and India proved how overstretched the French colonial empire was. Even should the tricolour succeed and the Chinese be pushed back it did not take a utopian to foresee the weakened French granting self government as a 'reward' for loyalty.

By the beginning of August the French had reinforced their position at Thanh Hoa, along a far narrower line than on the original border, whose existing fortifications (dating back to the end of the Nineteenth Century) would at least slow down the Chinese. The River Ma itself, flowing east into the Gulf of Tonkin provided a more significant defensive barrier especially after Bosquet dynamited the Thanh Hoa Bridge on 28 July. The cautious advance of the Chinese Army to the north gave the French time to recover and reorganise after the bloody nose received at Lang Son. Had the Chinese generals immediately advanced on Thanh Hoa they might have brushed aside the weakened four divisions opposing them and pushed on into central Indochina. As it was they would face rested, dug in and reinforced soldiers.

The Battle of Thanh Hoa was not one single battle as much as a weeks long struggle of move and countermove as the Chinese tried to break through the French bottleneck. The so called 'Marin Line' proved too strong for the Chinese to break through, at least with the forces they where initially willing to use. The disastrous August-September offensive would see an entire Chinese army corps wiped out. Most of the casualties did not of course reflect combat deaths but injuries, missing soldiers and many thousands taken prisoner in an audacious French counterattack.

The war in Indochina, late August 1933.
​

The problems General Nalan Shangzhi, the overall Qing commander in Indochina faced where threefold. First he was hamstrung by a lack of truly modern equipment. The 'standard' Qing Army rifle was the "Hanyang 88", based on a turn of the century German weapon. In many respects it was a fine piece but it was beginning to show it's age in the 1930s. Furthermore the Chinese forces in Indochina had been left with slim pickings compared to their brothers in arms on the more important (to Beijing) Siberian Front. Thus the rifles genuinely were older models. The disparity in artillery quality was worse, and the Chinese Air Force essentially nonexistent in the area, leaving General Shagzhi with little ability to strike back at the French in the air - of the fifteen French aircraft lost in the Indochina War between April and November only four fell to Chinese fire, the others lost to poor weather or pilot error.

The second problem was supply. The Chinese lines were already tortuously long and civil disobedience in occupied Tonkin, itself a reaction against the Chinese seizing vast quantities of livestock and goods for the 'war effort' made things worse. The Chinese and French railway systems used different gauges and with the sea full of prowling French cruisers no freight could be sent by steamer across the waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. Cambodia was pro-France and though not openly in the war felt free to supply the French with food and other goods.

Finally the forces available for the task were simply too limited. Though possessing overall crushing numerical superiority on paper, wiser heads in Beijing felt that to be assured of victory over a well fortified enemy a minimum of a third of a million men were required. Such troops simply never materialised. The Prince Qing, for political reasons could not divert more regiments from the Siberian Front. On a strategic level he was right: defeating Russia in Siberia was more important for China than conquering French Indochina. Unfortunately for the Chinese their very success in the opening phase of the war in pushing to Hanoi and beyond made it publicly impossible to then adopt a defensive stance. Essentially the Chinese had two options in Indochina: dig-in in Hanoi, trusting to the fact the French lacked the strength to retake the north or pour in more men and material and try and conquer the whole protectorate. They chose a middle strategy... with catastrophic consequences.

Despite the hardships endured by the Chinese it would be a mistake to assume things were easy for the French. Bosquet was well aware his force could not survive the full might of the Qing Army. Even faced by Shangzhi's more 'modest' contingent the odds seemed dire. So finely poised was morale that Bosquet confiscated all private radio sets from the ranks, lest the knowledge of Bouët-Willaumez's surrender leak out and cause a crisis. Naturally this was not a total success, though perhaps the knowledge that a French army had already surrendered in recent weeks made the troops in Indochina fight all the harder to erase the stain.

The Chinese began to crack in September when serious ammunition shortages hobbled a renewed offensive by Shangzhi. By the second half of the month desertion was becoming a potent problem and Shangzai was bombarding Beijing with requests to pull back - by this point his forces were so weakened even standing still was a dicey prospect. He was ordered to make one last push, the government seemingly having convinced themselves that the French had bled themselves dry. With deep misgivings Shangzai launched his final offensive at dawn on on 19 October.

The Battle of Thanh Hoa, 1 August - 25 October 1933.
​

The French were not remotely surprised by when and where the push was made. With total control of the skies French pilots could observe the movements of the foe at their leisure, particularly the ponderous emplacements of the Chinese artillery. The attack went awry from the very beginning, the attempted crossing of the Ma by boat and raft running into deeply entrenched positions that the Chinese guns had completely failed to dent. It proved a slaughter, so awful even the hardened French Army officers were shaken. Bosquet would later write to his wife:

'The waters [of the River Ma] were full of the enemy dead, thousands who drowned during the panicked retreat. Many looked almost peaceful in death, save those taken by the crocodiles - but those deaths are too terrible to speak of.'
​

It was the end. On 23 October Bosquet launched his own counteroffensive into the collapsing Chinese positions. Over a hundred thousand enemy soldiers surrendered over the following days, in many cases dropping their weapons without even a token resistance (a subsequent investigation would find that over half lacked any remaining ammunition.) Shangzai himself surrendered on the evening of 25 October, leaving less than nine thousand soldiers to escape the pursuing French. The victory was sudden, so complete after such struggle that Bosquet seemed to have lost sight of its magnitude. He simply communicated to Paris that he intended to retake Hanoi before December.

He had in fact broken the Chinese Army in Indochina.


Footnotes:

[1] with no transports nearby and no safe terrain to retreat to Bouët-Willaumez was doomed, nor for obvious reasons could I spare soldiers to take back control. The Karnatak nationalists declared independence on 8 September 1933 - meaning if I want French India back I'll need to declare war to do it.

 

[RossN]

HIMDogson: A fair point. I admit knowledge of China of the period is not my strong point so I perhaps overlooked better candidates. Do you have any suggestions?

stnylan: Italy, Japan and the United States are also neutral, though I'd agree London is probably seeing the most frenzied lobbying.

Tankman987: Well... quite!

Bored Student1414: I know! I wish the war had begun in 1930 or the late 1920s to give it some proper time. As it is I have to win (or lose!) in time to finish the game.

Specialist290: Not just Europe!

J_Master: Hah!

GoukaRyuu: That it does!

Southernpride: me too, to be honest especially as it will probably be finished within the next couple of weeks. Still, I'll try and make it count!

 

[EmperorofMordor]

Truly a stunning victory for French troops and their native allies. Should France come out victorious, or even just with Indochina still in tact at the end, it would seem to be impossible not to grant the Vietnamese home rule and dominion status after such a monumental triumph. Those casualty ratios are well over 30 to 1. If only the war in Europe could go so smoothly, the war would be over by Christmas.

 

[Idhrendur]

That was quite the victory. Kind of horrifying, but effective.

 

[HIMDogson]

I mean it's a minor point, so really it's fine, but I'd say realistically it would be a biological son who OTL was never born.

Also, if the Qingophile in me is sad to see this, hopefully the Romanovophile in me can cancel it out.

 

[GoukaRyuu]

Really interesting to see. In the end quality wins out over quantity, though a long with good strategic planning. While France has lost their Indian possessions, probably for good, I think the Vietnamese are right to expect some serious autonomy. The only way they wouldn't would be if a French equivalent of Churchill takes command of the country after the war. A man so enamored with empire and French magnificence that he would refuse to give the natives any bit of self-government. But, that is for after the war. Hopefully we will see it before the game ends, I know we are rapidly coming to the end date of the game.

 

[Southernpride]

Very interesting update very clever strategy of going to defend at a fortified narrow point.

 

[stnylan]

Now if there were ever a lopsided battle ... that was it. One has to pity the poor Qing troops.

 

[Specialist290]

I'm certain Thanh Hoa is going to be seen as one of those great battles that military historians and aspiring officers will discuss for decades (if not centuries), right up there with Cannae, Leuthen, and Karlsruhe. That is the sort of battle that establishes legacies for the winner and brings down governments for the loser. It's all the more impressive given that the French pulled it off apparently without any field-grade artillery, too.

 

[Andreios II]

What a stunning victory! This kind of humiliation will destroy Qing prestige and based on how things go in Asia from here further defeats will potentially topple the current Chinese regime and knock them out of the war. How much can France realistically contribute to the Asian front from here?

I think British participation on the French side is inevitable, as it’s not in their interests to have a hegemonic Germany sprawling across the Continent. Whether it’s a big French defeat or victory as the spur to get in, I think London has to find a way to intervene.

Do you plan to do an epilogue taking us up to, say, 1940 or 1950?

 

[guillec87]

that was a massacre!

 

[J_Master]

I'm certain Thanh Hoa is going to be seen as one of those great battles that military historians and aspiring officers will discuss for decades (if not centuries), right up there with Cannae, Leuthen, and Karlsruhe. That is the sort of battle that establishes legacies for the winner and brings down governments for the loser. It's all the more impressive given that the French pulled it off apparently without any field-grade artillery, too.

Like, the Chinese are dog eating surrender monkeys?

 

[Jape]

I'm catching up on so much but by God they've done it, the mad men have done it.

Well if nothing else the Russians are high-fiving their French comrades, they've certainly pulled their weight in the East. I was going to mock China as a genuine paper tiger but I'll wait for the reports from Siberia.

 

[RossN]

A squadron of German Fokker D XIII's.​

Part Eighty Eight - The Great War in the Air and at Sea


In 1933 the German Empire was the greatest builder of aircraft in the world, comfortably outpacing the United States and France, her most serious rivals. Junkers, Arado, Heinkel, Dornier and above them all the giant that was Fokker produced thousands of airframes and engines to feed the insatiable international appetite for the aeroplane. It would have been natural to assume that this industrial dominance would have led to a military dominance but the true picture was more complicated.

French industry, as has been alluded to previously, was based around a glut of smaller and medium sized factories as against the immense conglomerates common in Germany and the United States. In terms of individual aeroplanes and engines actually produced and sold domestically France reached something like parity with Germany. It was the export market that made the German figures so impressive. No single French aviation manufacturer, Breguet for instance, could match the scale of the larger orders Fokker recieved. Immediately before the war the Chinese government had ordered two hundred Fokker D.XVII fighter planes (none actually reached China before the start of hostilities.) French overseas orders were more modest [1].

The German Air Force (Luftwaffe) had won it's spurs during the war between Northern Germany and the Tripartite Monarchy. That conflict had changed many pre-war assumptions. The zeppelins, immense rigid airships that awed the world in the early 1920s and had been the pride of Teutonic aviation revealed themselves to be too slow and vulnerable to make great weapons of war. From the mid Twenties on they would be restricted to civil aviation. Much better results had come from heavier than air machines. Raids on Vienna and Budapest did little actual damage in material terms or even lives lost but they did force the Austrians to withdraw many of their own fighter aeroplanes from the front lines. A decade later and the German air fleet reflected this hard won experience.

For France, unlike Germany, pure speed was less of a concern than stability, endurance and range. The threat of war in Europe was never completely discounted - though until 1930 Italy not Germany had been the primary rival - but the French colonial empire was the key concern for Armée de l'Air during the entirety of the 1920s. This was one reason the Bregeut XIX enjoyed such favour with France, and such longevity as its excellent long distance qualities made it invaluable in Africa and, as we have seen, Indochina. The trouble in Egypt encouraged this colony-centric view of airpower. When war finally did erupt in Europe the French were left with a large airfleet, many of quite modern design, but little built towards fighting on the Rhine.

The Luftwaffe preferred to draw a stark line between bombers and fighters. In contrast the Armée de l'Air, though it certainly employed dedicated bombers and fighter aircraft put its faith in the so-called 'Multiplace de Combat' approach where the warplane was a multiseat mix of bomber, reconnaissance and even fighter (thus alleviating the need for a dedicated fighter escort.) Again this approach was best suited colonial warfare where an individual aeroplane was needed to perform multiple roles. In Europe, up against determined modern opposition it quickly became a liability. A confident assumption that a bomber with enough guns and power could push through on its own led to brutal losses in the opening weeks of the war as the Armée de l'Air struck at Bremen, Frankfurt and the Ruhr. The problem was less with the planes - the Blériot 127, the most common French bomber was a reasonable, though not outstanding machine for its era - but the tactics.

The Dewoitine D 27's modern look swiftly captured the public imagination.
​

By the second week of May the Armée de l'Air had begun to adapt. Unescorted daylight bombing missions were abandoned altogether - even discounting the unsustainable losses the need for light bombers and reconnaissance to support the Army was far too pressing. It was here in the skies over Rheinland that the Dewoitine D 27 became the defining fighter aeroplane of the conflict, at least for the French. It's opposite number was the Dornier Do 10. Both used the parasol wing which is perhaps why they immediately stood out even with rival planes built in greater numbers. On both sides most aircraft were still biplanes, especially smaller one and two seat aeroplanes. By 1933 most aviation engineers conceded that monoplanes delivered less drag than biplanes. However they were reluctant to abandon the greater agility and stability of the biplane (larger bombers like the Blériot had neither the need nor the ability for such agility so tended to be monoplanes). The holy grail was the fast monoplane fighter but in 1933 that design still remained on the drawing board, ever so slightly out of reach. The parasol wing was a compromise, granting the benefits of the biplane while reducing the drag. At least that was the theory.

The French ace of aces flew a D 27 in combat. Lieutenant Henri Laurent of Luxembourg became the first French 'ace in a day' when he downed four Fokker C.V's and a Do 10 over Aix-la-Chapelle on 17 May. Four days later he downed two more enemy aviators. Following a minor combat injury on 8 September - by which point his total stood at eighteen confirmed kills and many more possible - Lt. Laurent was 'temporarily' withdrawn from the front to make propaganda cinema newsreels. Handsome and articulate (to the point of vanity and self promotion according to some of his brother pilots) the twenty four year old officer was a ready made hero and the Aviation Ministry was afraid of the impact on morale if so popular a figure as Laurent was killed in action.

Laurent and his brother fighter pilots quickly became the public face of the air war but the struggle over the Channel and in the North Sea was just as important. The French, the Dutch and the Germans all made heavy use of seaplane scouting forces as the battlefleets of the warring powers sought each other out.

Strasbourg, a 29,000 ton 'super dreadnought' and the French flagship.
​

The French Navy had always been built with an eye towards war with Britain. The Escadre du Nord was still based in Brest. Even as the probability of war with the United Kingdom declined, and with it the naval budget there had been little change in doctrine. What had changed since the turn of the century was the relative strength of the French Navy. 'La Royale' remained the third largest fleet in the world (in vessels) or second (in terms of tonnage) but suffered from the same problems that plagued the French Army: overstretch. The cruiser squadron in the Far East has already been mentioned. Additionally fully half the fleet in Metropolitan waters was bound to the Mediterranean lest Italy enter the war. That left the Escadre du Nord essentially to fight the war on its own under the command of Admiral Guillaume Boué de Lapeyrère.

In 1933 the battleship was still considered the Queen of the Sea. Though there had been some experimentation with aeroplane 'carriers' the serious naval powers - France, Britain, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, the United States and Russia all saw little use for such vessels. The range of aeroplanes was too short, the bomb load too feeble to threaten the great castles of steel. Seaplanes and flying boats were a different matter and all major fleets utilised catapult launched aircraft on their capital ships [2].

The Escadre du Nord consisted of ten dreadnoughts and eight older predreadnoughts, classified as 'coastal defence battleships'. The latter had been due to be replaced for many years but two decades of aenemic naval budgets had kept them in service having undergone countless refits to keep them relatively modern. More promising were the twenty five heavy and light cruisers Admiral Boué de Lapeyrère had at his disposal. A further nine 'commerce raiders' - auxiliary and mine-laying cruisers - complemented the Brest fleet [3].

Boué de Lapeyrère did not have long to wait before firing his guns in anger. Raising his flag on the Strasbourg the French admiral led his fleet into the Channel on 5 May, having received reports from the Force maritime de l'aéronautique navale that a strong squadron of the Dutch fleet was at sea, among them the dreadnought De Zeven Provinciën and four older battleships. The Dutch had been returning from a recently finished tour of the East Indies when Boué de Lapeyrère found them in the straits of Dover on the afternoon of 8 May. The French admiral, intent on his prize ordered his modern dreadnoughts to close on the enemy at 22 knots, beyond the speed the older ships on either side could make. Within moment's of the ships sighting each other in the poor visibility Strasbourg's 13.5 inch guns rained down shells on the fleeing Dutch, with Alsace, Caiman and the others not far behind. Had the enemy admiral been willing to sacrifice his predreadnoughts then De Zeven Provinciën and the smaller ships might have reached Rotterdam. As it was he made the fatal decision to resist.

The result was a foregone conclusion. The Dutch squadron was sent straight to the bottom under sustained heavy gunfire. Boué de Lapeyrère began his blockade of the Dutch coast with a naval bombardment of Rotterdam. The French fear was that the Dutch would manage to link their fleet with the Imperial German Navy. Though smaller than the French fleet the German fleet was powerful and modern, the fourth strongest in the world and had the Dutch in their full strength linked with the Germans the French would have been in perilous waters indeed. The Escadre du Nord either had to sink the Dutch or keep them in harbour and Boué de Lapeyrère knew that if he was to face the Germans the Dutch ships could not remain afloat. Fortunately the Russians arrived to help.

Though numerically very large the Imperial Russian Navy had no truly powerful ships. Beset by recurring budget crisis and mostly limited in scope to the Baltic (and the Black Sea) the Russians had turned away from battleships and towards the torpedo cruiser. These vessels of around 3,000 tons were much larger than destroyers but could not truly compete with the true cruisers employed by the other Great Powers. Still they were a terrible foe against civilian shipping and the Russians dispatched part of their fleet through the Skaggerak to raid German and Duttch shipping in the North Sea. Boué de Lapeyrère used the Russians as bait to lure the Dutch out of their home port, where his own lurking battlesquadrons could fall upon them. The result was a second annihilation that swept the Dutch from the sea, save for small squadrons left in distant colonies.

The destruction of the Red Dutch fleet, May 1933.​

However successful the fight against the Dutch the true enemy had yet to be faced. That changed the following month when on 18 June the Germans led an audacious raid into the North Sea. The bulk of the French fleet was still off the coast of Holland and Vice Admiral Konrad von Wettin's battlecruisers caught a squadron of French commerce raiders at Dogger Bank, sending eight to the bottom. Worse news was to follow when French seaplanes made reconnaissance flights over Kiel three nights later. The Germans, in a surprising but strategically brilliant move had decided to throw their entire strength at sea against the French and ignore the Russians.

Boué de Lapeyrère was faced with a stark choice. Every tradition of 'La Royale' disdained a defensive attitude at sea, but with half the French Navy stuck at Toulon to intimidate the Italians the Germans shifting everything to Kiel the odds had tilted in their favour. Nor could anyone doubt the skill of the Teutonic sailors after Dogger Bank. The French admiral bluntly informed the Naval Ministry that if he came to battle with the Germans French valour would not be lacking. Until then he would keep up the blockade.

When the true clash came it was ferocious - and muddled. Once again bad weather intruded, limiting the use of aerial scouts and when French destroyers and German destroyers blundered into each other along the Dutch coast neither side quite realised how many ships were involved. In the confused fog beset battle of 15-16 October the Germans sank two of Boué de Lapeyrère's dreadnought's - Alsace, whose magazine exploded under shell fire from Derflinger and the battlecruiser Caiman, badly damaged in a duel with Friedrich der Große, which was hit by two torpedo's on the voyage back and had to be scuttled by her crew. The French also lost two cruisers. On the German side the casualties were the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen and two minelayers. Both sides suffered heavy damaged to their surviving ships.

Though the clash was tactically and strategically inconclusive it was deeply disappointing the French who now decided they had no alternative but to shift four dreadnoughts and half a dozen cruisers from Toulon to Brest. The French sailors, though mourning their losses remained in good morale. As Boué de Lapeyrère reported: 'the false bravado after sinking the Dutch is gone, replaced by determination - and anger. We shall have our revenge.'

Perhaps so, but it would have to wait for another war. On 28 October, before the Mediterranean based dreadnoughts had passed Gibraltar the warring parties agreed to an armistice. The fighting at sea and in the sky was over.

The inconclusive yet bloody grand clash between the French and German fleets.​

Footnotes:

[1] In real life Fokker was the greatest aeroplane manufacturer in the world in the 1920s. Here, with the continuing patronage of the German government their dominance continues.

[2] In our time line aircraft carriers gained a massive boost from the restrictions of the Washington Naval Conference. There was no such equivalent in this timeline so such vessels as HMS Courageous or USS Lexington retained their original design (the other reason of course is that the game doesn't model aircraft carriers.) In game terms 'dreadnought' means any post-HMS Dreadnought battleship or battlecruiser. Strasbourg and her sisters are modelled after the planned but never built Lyon-class.

[3] As I've noted before I've tended to use in-game 'commerce raiders' to represent smaller, lightly armed warships like torpedo cruisers, auxiliary cruisers and mine layers and sweepers. They don't represent destroyers or submarines, both of which exist in-universe but are not significant independent units.

 

[RossN]

EmperorofMordor: In fairness the terrain and fortifications helped me there. I do agree that France will find it difficult to turn down Vietnamese aspirations after the war.

Idhrendur: I know, I feel the same way. Realistically most of those casualties are probably prisoners taken.

HIMDogson: Good point. In general I've tried to steer away from that, even it might be plausible.

GoukaRyuu: Yes. I have to admit I probably ended the war much more quickly than otherwise precisely because the end of the game was so close. I'd have preferred a longer struggle if I had to have one!

Southernpride: Thank you!

stnylan: Pity the enemy? What treasonous talk is this?

Specialist290: Actually I'm not sure where my artillery went. I'll have to recheck if I have an appropriate save. Also good callback to the decisive battle of this timeline!

Andreios II: At this point I'm mostly thinking about the next AAR but I'll see what I can do.

guillec87: Very true!

J_Master: hah!

Jape: Welcome back! Also I like the paper tiger line!