Listening to Dönitz - a submarine-oriented Germany AAR

10. BAGHDAD NOVEMBER

Waddeneilanden, north of the Dutch mainland, was captured at the start of the month, something I did not expect. I had written off Rommel's attention to Waddeneilanden as worthless, and made special note of the fact that on manual control, I would plug up Waddeneilanden (only one province need defend against it) and bypass. But results materialized nonetheless, leading to another (albeit heavily penalized for amphibious connection) angle of attack on the western Netherlands. The same day, the U-boats recorded a three-merchant-fleet victory over the British in the Channel.

On the 3rd, submarine anti-air and engine projects completed, making acoustic torpedo research available. Checking flotilla production, I discovered that state-of-the-art subs using these new techs are classifiable as Type XXIs. Type XXIs have a mystique out of proportion to their historical impact; more than a hundred were ordered but their modular mass production was sloppy and only four seaworthy XXIs could be assembled from components by the end of the war. Production is started on eight flotillas of XXIs, for a total of forty boats. I will have ten times the XXIs the real fleet did, and they'll be at least three years early.


No Schnorkel? What kind of bullshit Type XXI is this? Maybe it's abstracted into the hull, which in HoI3 is primarily a rating of dive depth by way of Visibility. Being able to "surface" below the surface certainly reduces visibility.

On the 10th, a Ports Guard unit shatters in Ede, adding to its reputation as the war's toughest battlefield. The Ports Guard is the remnant of my aborted plan to give port garrison responsibility directly to the naval arm. I abandoned this idea and transferred the units involved to Rommel's command, but didn't change the name. Also on the 10th, the Italians capture Cairo. On the 14th, they capture Alexandria and advance on the Suez Canal, which unfortunately does not seem to grant a strategic effect.

On the 17th, the new Type IX flotillas are deemed ready for service, having spent two and a half weeks in shakedown and final testing. UG Kurt Weill (under Ciliax) and five new UGs are deployed, expanding the Brunhilde Belt right up the the entire British coast, as we no longer fear their ASW. Audaciously, Raeder's Deutschland Task Force is deployed to patrol off the Dutch coast and bombard in support of the Waddeneilanden advance.

On the 19th, Raeder is engaged by British naval commander Dunbar-Naismith with a small fleet featuring the Royal Oak and the King George V. The Deutschland and the Admiral Scheer are damaged and the Admiral Scheer is knocked out. Although the enemy heavy cruiser Durban and two enemy destroyer flotillas are significantly damaged, I order Raeder to break off and return to Rostock, concerned about the DTF's light cruisers up against the generally operational British battleships. The DTF loses a flotilla of destroyers in the disengagement. Repairs to the DTF are expected to take months and I don't see how it can be effective without even further crippling of the British, or the addition of closely coordinated naval bomber support or heavy surface ships (perhaps licensed designs from the Italians?). I doubt submarines could have helped. However, the bright side is that while the British retain surface capability, their ASW is no more effective for it. Postcombat analysis suggests that the bombardment did not help in Waddeneilanden (i.e., I waited, the battle resolved, and it was a loss, and enemy casualties were nothing special).


Rumors that ship silhouettes against city lights were easier targets for U-boats led some American coastal municipalities to enforce blackouts at night. Do you think the British will do that? Board up your windows, Portsmouth!

On the 20th, German-assisted Hungarians on the Italian front captured Nice as part of the slow general advance in the south. Knocking the French off the Mediterranean would make their convoy operations much less slippery; I suspect a great deal of their cargo sails through slipshod Italian submarine zones rather than my own seething deathtrap cauldrons of torpedo salvos. UG Hans Pfitzner was redeployed with its replacement boats as a mixed Type IIB/IX group, having missed the excitement and shame of the Raeder mess in its operational zone by a day.

On the 23rd, we got a radar advance and a fighter ground control advance. Radar research was shelved for the time being (we're way ahead of schedule) in favor of the secret acoustic torpedo project, which is even more ahead of schedule but also even more cooler. The Persians take Baghdad only to lose it later; the whole front over there is chaotic and sparse on both sides. There are only three VP provinces in Iraq and it wouldn't be hard to take all of them if they'd just get their shit together. I'm pretty damn sure a single corps from the units I have fighting Belgium could do it in a week if they started from the Persian border.


The Italians have re-secured Albania and WO III advances continue. Things must be tense in Casablanca and conflicted in (Nationalist Spanish) Tangiers. Still no sign of the British around Karachi. (When I played Persia in Victoria 2, as linked in my sig, Karachi was my first conquest. This Persia is a hundred years less on the ball.)

On the 30th, we get a sonar and detection advance. If I'd looked more carefully at the tech list, I would have started that XXI project now instead of back on the 3rd. Oh well. Finland and Denmark are drifting Allied at the moment, but they're stranded in the middle ground and not immediate conversion risks. Hopefully I will be able to bring Sweden and Norway in to deter flips before it becomes an issue. I'm guessing at least another year before I can invite any Scandinavian countries to the Axis.


On hydrophones, a merchant engine has a mumbling sound, and a warship's engine noise is more of a chuckle or clatter, but a torpedo engine is a high droning hum. Acoustic torpedo engines have to be quieter than usual, for obvious reasons.

Meet the new U-groups! These are all deployed out of Rostock, and mostly operating in coastal Home Waters.

UG Brunk Frank, commanded by Förste
Would they really name a U-group after Bruno Frank? Presumably the laws of the Reich specifically disallowed this sort of honor from being bestowed on someone who worked, as Frank did, on the movie of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a story with no particular appeal to Nazis. Also, Frank was friends with a circle of consciously anti-Nazi authors who fled the country, including Thomas Mann.

UG Franz Marc, commanded by Lütjens
Would they really name a U-group after Franz Marc? He died in WWI, and his passions were for painting, not politics, so you'd think he'd be safe. But just when you think it's safe to go in the water, Nazis hate you. Turns out they officially disapproved of his art even though he was dead already, and featured him in the "degenerate art" exhibition of officially condemned works. The government of the time figured out too late that Marc wasn't supposed to be deployed on the front lines because he was a national treasure as an artist, but before they could recall him, he was killed by shrapnel. If not for that, he would have survived to the 1930s, and then fled to Switzerland, and then to America, and then etc.

UG Max Brod, commanded by Schuster
Would they really name a U-group after Max Brod? If Franz Kafka had posthumous veto power over U-group names, he might exercise it based on Brod's decision to publish Kafka's books after Kafka's death even though Kafka had told him to burn them. He fled Austria for British Palestine; I will ask the Persians to say hello if they ever get there.

UG Ernst Bloch, commanded by Zieger
Would they really name a U-group after Ernst Bloch? There were two Ernst Blochs and it's no for both of them. One was a Swiss-American composer and the other a Marxist philosopher who fled wartime Germany for a variety of countries ending in the USA but resettled in East Germany after the war.

UG Emil Ludwig, commanded by Mewis
Would they really name a U-group after Emil Ludwig? I suspect otherwise. Goebbels wrote in his diary that he considered Ludwig's writing particularly dangerous, and Ludwig went to Switzerland and then the United States. What were these dangerous writings? They were popular biographies of Napoleon, Bismarck, the Kaiser, etc. If Goebbels could have found a little notebook pre-printed on every page with "I hate art! I hate music! I hate literature!," his diary-writing time could have been streamlined considerably.

Sinkings for November:
Greece: five merchants. Welcome, newcomers.
Belgium: seven merchants. Welcome back, intermittent regulars.
France: 20 merchants.
Netherlands: 53 merchants. DIE ALREADY
Britain: 137 merchants. What's the matter, running low?
TOTAL: 222 merchants and no escorts. Estimated 11.1 million tons of merchant shipping.

Nuarq, you raise some excellent questions. The most foolproof way to know the British convoy situation would be to load up as Britain and check, but I feel like that would be too cheaty. The historical German Navy didn't have perfect information. In fact, they thought a red spotlight reported on a British destroyer was an infrared rangefinding beam until somebody kindly told them that you can't actually see infrared. For a long time they underestimated radar and codebreaking (with the aforementioned red spotlight distracting them from one of their many chances to deduce the capabilities of Allied ship radar), and they paid dearly for it. On the other hand it's frustrating that the stuff I care most about finding out, particularly convoy reserves and convoy routes, doesn't bother to show up in the spy information. But the other hand can go jerk it. I won't load up other countries to look at their bits, and if I did, I would load up the United States and see what exactly they are doing over there that isn't the war.

However! I can estimate British or anyone else's convoy capabilities. I may be a little off depending on how practical and techs factor in, but here goes. Merchant transports cost 2 IC for 100 days, and escorts cost 4 IC for 240 days. Right away, the production delay tells us two things. The war and the convoy losses started in May, so convoy replacements wouldn't have hit the water until early September at the soonest. Similarly, even the swiftest wartime escort production order won't christen its boats until year's end, explaining all the unescorted convoys lately.

As for the cost and opportunity cost of this stuff, it's worth noting first off that escorts and submarines have about the same production requirements. Harsh. Real merchants and escorts could be requisitioned and retrofitted and basically there were fast ways to get them together. They're also not warships in the conventional sense (or at all in the case of merchants) and they don't need big guns or specialized electronics or heavy armor plating. Hell, the main ASW weapon of the convoy escort is just a track on the deck for rolling depth charges over the side. Submarines, on the other hand, require pressure hulls and dual engine systems and banks of batteries and all kinds of nutty shit. I suspect it ought to be considerably easier to slap a towed sonar array on a Coast Guard cutter and call it a day.

My spies, and I have 10 spies in the UK so this should be reliable, tell me the British have an effective IC of 258. (They also say British resource reserves are sky-high, sadly, meaning they may not run out in a meaningful amount of time despite the blockade.) If the British built nothing but merchant flotillas right from the start of the war, they could dump out 129 in September and another 129 sometime around December. If they built nothing but escorts, they could produce almost 65 by year's end. Belgium has 46 IC, the Dutch have 48, and the French have 168. I don't know what the Greeks have because they're not important enough to spy on right now. The USA has over 500 IC, but let's assume they're not an immediate problem. (For comparison, Germany has around 300 and the Soviets have somewhere in the mid-200s.) Adding together the known ICs of the countries that have been losing merchants, we get 520 IC. From this I derive a maximum replacement rate of 260 merchants per 3 months and 10 days (we sink about that many in a single month) or 130 escorts per 8 months (100 escorts have been destroyed in 4 or 5 months with no appreciable losses other than the von Nordeck disaster).

I'd say we are exceeding the rate of replacement. Plus or minus Greece. Double those rates for a thumbnail sketch of American potential should they appear in force as convoy operators. The U-boats still win on paper, with the real outcome depending on how tough the escorts are and what kind of air/sea ASW support is provided. (It seems like the game might consider escort engagement necessary before task forces and air wings can effectively assist.) Once again, hooray for neutral Iceland and Greenland denying them the usual mid-Atlantic bases, as this cuts air cover in particular very sharply.

Ugly thought for the day: U-boats won't help me much against the Soviets when the time comes.

11. AMSTERDAM DECEMBER


Progress across the board.

Amsterdam is on the verge of falling. The Dutch front has been pushed back to an Amsterdam-Gouda-Rotterdam line, and on top of that, further adventures of the unlikely Waddeneilanden advance have (on the 27th) seen Den Helden captured in a hard-fought amphibious operation, opening another front on Amsterdam itself. The Netherlands will fall, and after the Netherlands, Belgium. If I can wrap up France, I can still have Rommel shift the army over to the Eastern Front in time to fortify against the Soviet attack. The Allies are influencing Norway as well now. I can live with keeping Scandinavia neutral until after the Allies are defeated.


Soon this front will be broad enough that I'll have to stitch these together from multiple shots.

The Persians are evenly matched in Iraq and I expect them to tie up the Iraqis who would otherwise be assisting the British in the Levant. The Italians are advancing through the Levant and I expect them to be able to assist the Persians against Iraq from the other side shortly. Italian lead elements have not yet reached Casablanca, but French presence looks light (one division spotted so far) and it should only be a matter of time. The Italians have advanced into Greece as well.

Nuarq, the Persians may be in a bad anti-Soviet spot for Persia but they're just fine for me. If the Soviets advance into Persia it will be at the cost of thinning the line where it counts.


Still no appreciable damage or disorganization in the submarine fleet.

A quiet month in submarines. With Allied merchants apparently running dry, here are the sink figures:

France: Nine merchants.
Belgium: 10 merchants and one escort.
Netherlands: 26 merchants.
Britain: 70 merchants.
TOTAL: 115 merchants and one escort, an estimated 5.7 million merchant tons.

Nuarq, realistic or not, I don't think any aspect of submarines can be upgraded, even though it was routine to swap in new conning towers, new detection systems, new AA and deck guns, and of course new torpedoes. (I think the only case of new torpedoes not being suited to old boats involved WWI-era American submarines with torpedo tubes too short for the Mark 14. They had to use Mark 10s instead, but the Mark 10 was a more proven design so there were pros and cons both ways, at least in the early part of the war.) The weirdness doesn't end there: torpedo and acoustic torpedo are separate technologies, and a number of the torpedo model names are the names of acoustic torpedos, yet the game treats them as non-acoustic. Less weird but still disappointing is the lack of pattern-running torpedoes, although by now I doubt we often encounter the kind of dense convoys that make pattern-running torpedoes useful. I am going to have to experimentally dock an obsolete fleet and see if anything upgrades.

There are options for better convoy defense, should the British pursue them. Key techs include Destroyer Escort Role, Small Warship ASW (historically very important and generally involving improved detection technologies), and Commerce Defence. (Note Laurwin's post which describes using these options.) Task forces can be assigned directly to escort roles, as I did with Raeder in the final weeks of the Stettin convoy through the Baltic. I'm not sure what aircraft can do to help, but going by historical examples they presumably have a role. In addition, there are a handful of historical technologies directly relevant to reducing Convoy Attack and the dangers of submarines that don't seem to be represented in HoI3: anti-torpedo skirts and nets were experimented with but did not become universal (although the official verdict was that sometimes they worked), minelaying was used specifically to hinder submarines (particularly in the English Channel), minesweepers neutralized submarine-laid minefields, antisubmarine nets and submerged barriers protected harbors, the British developed a technique to degauss ship hulls to reduce the effectiveness of magnetic torpedo fuses, the Foxer towed acoustic decoy foiled the first generation of acoustic torpedoes, and the Hedgehog depth charge catapult was the depth charge equivalent of a grenade launcher. Only some of this is plausibly included in the game's mechanics at lower levels of detail; naval mines in particular were essential to period naval warfare and are conspicuous by their overall absence.


British unity seems robust, unfortunately. Good thing I decided to hedge my bets by investing in strategic bombers.

Laurwin, as you can see, British energy stockpiles are in the 50k range right now. I will track them for a while but I suspect it will take quite some time to deplete that. My current submarine deployments, as you can see above, range into the mid-Atlantic but cannot proceed further west without new ports or new engines. When the eight Type XXI flotillas I started last month show up around next June, I'll be able to operate more distantly than ever before even if I haven't claimed any new ports in that time, but my priority will be to seal the Mediterranean via a line from the Azores to the Canaries, if possible. (I wonder if it would be feasible to just capture the Azores with paratroopers or something. Not that I have paratroopers.)

Given that I dominate British waters with my convoy raiding, if there were American convoys linking North America and the British Isles, I'd already be sinking them. I don't know what the Americans are doing. (I also don't need to rely on deep-sea operations because there's currently no real ASW threat radius around Britain. Even if that wasn't the case, with Iceland and Greenland neutral I don't have to go as far west to be out of range of any land-based Allied aircraft.)

I am operating on the assumption that India can produce its own supplies. However, the Persians still haven't seen any British resistance in India. Maybe everything's been drawn off to fight in Europe. (In which case, Japan ought to promptly get up ins.)

I hate when peace settlement loopholes strand armies. I had a terrible time in Victoria 2 when a peace settlement with the USA that liberated the Confederacy stranded my cavalry vanguard because they would have had to cross a mix of Union and Confederate territory and both were willing to allow exit but not entry. Particularly galling from a CSA that wouldn't exist without my help! Next time I will grant their territories to the Cherokee, or possibly a puppet Texas.

Baltasar, Dutch merchant shipping is surprisingly huge even for a sea trade empire, isn't it? They can kiss it goodbye, though, because I don't see them making it to spring 1940. Mysterious that the UK has not yet lost all of its escorts, as where would it be deploying them but home convoys? The Mediterranean? In their place I would be halting all convoy activity pending the arrival of more escorts. Speaking of which, I do expect a new wave of escorts starting any day now, as the window between the start of the war and the duration of escort production closes.

Although the submarine war is successful by its own metrics, it is unimpressive strategically given the alternatives. In retrospect it seems like it would have been better to skip submarines initially, use the resulting slack in research and production to launch the historical land war a month or two early, and keep Scandinavia and the United States neutral. After finishing a historical Poland/France/Benelux blitzkreig, Africa could be secured via sideshow land operation through Spain and/or Turkey (Axised or occupied, I don't care) and Britain could be bombed with Strats (or better, rockets) while the Eastern Front built up. That seems like a better overall position than the one I'm in now, where it's not at all certain that I'll have the West resolved in time to once again swing east and fortify for a last-ditch defensive chance against the USSR.

Probably the best long-term aspect of the submarine cordon is that once France falls, I don't see the Allies ever being able to pull off a landing in Europe. They might be able to bring the units across, and even to take a beachhead, but any supply convoy will be out of the question. Air supply attempts will be likewise useless in the face of my interceptors.

12. GOUDA JANUARY


Liege fell and I forgot to mention it.

Furious fighting has seen peripheral gains in the Netherlands, particularly the south. Allied counteroffensives to reclaim those gains have been briefly successful, but at the cost of leaving Amsterdam open. Rotterdam was taken on the 5th, lost on the 21st, and is about to be retaken. Note below how other engagements are pinning units that could otherwise march to Amsterdam's aid.


Projected occupation in early February. Tactical withdrawal? I think maybe they should consider tactical unconditional surrender.

New submarine air warning equipment has been researched, mass assault tactics developed (for the infantry morale bonus), and strategic air command improved. All these research projects are worth continuing. UG Robert Wagner was pulled back to port at Rostock on the 1st to see whether its torpedoes etc. would upgrade; three weeks later it was redeployed to the Amsterdam blockade with no upgrades having taken place.

January sinkings:

France: one merchant.
Belgium: three merchants.
Netherlands: 22 merchants.
Britain: 30 merchants.
TOTAL: 56 merchants, 2.8 million merchant tons.

Merchants are becoming extinct, but I think there are tentative signs of replacement production kicking in, particularly where the Belgians are concerned. Next month I will investigate withdrawing surplus submarine groups to conserve fuel. Between this and the failed torpedo upgrade experiment, I definitely plan to retire the Type II boats when Type XXIs become available, and probably a number of Type VIIs will be scrapped too.


Still the most active fronts in terms of territory changing hands.

Yugoslavia and Bulgaria have joined the war, broadening the Greek front even as the Greeks collapse before the Italian push from Albania. A single Yugoslavian province has been captured by a Greek advance, but I trust it's only temporary. Italians are on the outskirts of an undefended Tel Aviv, but still delaying their approach to Casablanca. Nepalese defenders have streamed into British India to take up positions against the Persians.


A new front established for the war I don't want. The theater dot in the center of Germany is Hamburg, administrative seat of the admiralty.

The situation in the West is finally secure enough that I can allocate infantry divisions to the East. This is a new theater under von Epp formed from units produced this month. von Epp is not sanguine about our chances and would like a hundred more divisions. That may take a while, but now that the border is occupied I can build fortifications as production becomes available. At this point I consider the Baltic states expendable and no longer vital to WO II, so I don't plan to respond to Soviet aggression there if it happens. This frees me to build fortifications along the edge of East Prussia as well.

Baltasar, Japan has made a number of interesting gains recently (including Hong Kong, Wake, Rabaul, and Port Moresby; as related previously, they already have the Philippines), but is overall not being as aggressive as I might have hoped. The X factor there is whether America entirely broken or just somewhat broken (or, very generously, just weird). If they can take Wake, though, why not strike at Hawaii and New Zealand and maybe even Australia?

My cordon doesn't make European convoying entirely impossible due to the Mediterranean. The Type XXIs will guarantee me the reach to block the Mediterranean (I think), and only then will the defensive convoy raiding system be complete. I haven't been building submarines exclusively (they take very little IC in the grand scheme of things) and land forces have always been an element of my production; so have air wings. I have six strategic bomber units coming off the assembly line in the near future. I've always known submarines alone wouldn't get me all the way. When the situation on the continent is resolved I plan to carpet-bomb London. After that, I will station the bombers in places where they can reach major Soviet cities. Sealion is out of the question considering the surface strength of the British navy, as demonstrated by Raeder's sortie to Holland (Admiral Scheer is still a long way from being repaired, by the way). Airlion is likewise impossible as I have developed neither paratroops nor transport planes.

I am passable on land. My current workhorse tank is the PzIII, which is decent for the start of 1940. I have tank and infantry upgrade research planned in the near to mid future, and Schwerpunkt should finish researching soon. I may manually reorganize the army a bit to break out the mobile elements into their own formations, particularly since Rommel has left a number of armored brigades in HQ units for some inscrutable reason.

Southern France is anything but an unopposed front. It's thickly defended by an international coalition, and every gain there is made by spilling enough blood to flood the immediate area and then paddling makeshift rafts across. A lot of the credit goes to the Hungarians, who have done at least as much as the Italians to make it happen. I don't think a single Italian boot has marched in the streets of Axis-occupied Nice, although if the citizens should see a single boot marching, I am sure they would find it memorable.

dublish, disappointing stuff to hear, but I have resigned myself to the main benefit of the blockade being a complete lockdown on overseas supply operations. This is still a decent benefit, and as I mentioned in the last post, I'd like to see the Allies try to hold Normandy with no convoys in their Mulberry harbors.

13. HAGUE FEBRUARY


The Dutch hold half the Hague and nothing else.

Amsterdam fell on the 5th. The Netherlands have been consistently reduced and cannot survive much longer. Belgium is next. The south continues to move forward.


Assistance from Bulgaria and Yugoslavia is already making a difference.

Greece is crumbling against a combined Italian/Yugoslavian/Bulgarian front. Italians have overrun the Levant. Iraq, shifting its capital, is holding out the Persians but cannot handle the coming two-front war. The Nepalese in India are not offering significant resistance so far, but the Persians are turning back to deal with a Greek-flagged British division that has invaded from Dubai across the Strait of Hormuz. The Italians continue to delay a strike for Casablanca.


I can't tell you whether this is helping the fuel situation much. We captured an enormous fuel stockpile in Amsterdam, which obscures the comparatively tiny change that resting a few submarines would produce. The U-group unit cards seem to indicate that a fleet in port uses the same amount of fuel as one sailing intercept courses all over the Atlantic, so who knows.

On the 13th, UG Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and UG Erich Maria Remarque were rotated to Wilhelmshaven to stand down indefinitely, and UG Bertolt Brecht and UG Franz Marc were returned to Lübeck and Rostock respectively. On the 25th, UG Hermann Hess, UG Lion Feuchtwanger, and UG Max Schmeling were returned to Wilhelmshaven. As the Channel front stabilizes, these units (which are mostly Type IX) will be deployed forward and obsolete Type II and Type VII flotillas returned home in their place. As Type XXI boats are produced, they will replace the older models. My main long-term concern for U-boats is the possible war with America, which will produce a convoy clash at least as intense as the principal phase of the Battle of the Atlantic (May to November, 1939).

Sinkings this month: One Dutch merchant, eight French merchants, and 13 British merchants. Total: 22 merchants for 1.1 million merchant tons.


The Allies are generally weary. Left: depleted units sheltering in Den Haag under German attack. Right: depleted units sheltering in Salonica under Italian attack.

This month research completed on fighter ground crew training, fighter pilot training, and Schwerpunkt. Research began on infantry small arms and support weapons. Ground is being broken on the first stages of a fortification program on the Soviet and Baltic border. A considerable number of strategic bombers have entered service.

14. ATHENS MARCH


How much longer? Six months? Two years?

A renewed Belgian offensive meets limited success. Heavy fighting shatters German units in Luxembourg and Saarlouis, including part of Hope of Scandinavia, the abortive Spanish Civil War volunteer unit (the others are from the 6th Army and VI. Armeekorps). Liege is lost on the 7th. Luxembourg is lost on the 16th. An Australian amphibious attack on Amsterdam is begun on the 22nd but quickly repulsed. German armor retakes Luxembourg on the 30th.


Hey! Italy! Casablanca!

Salonica falls on the 13th, taking most of the trapped Greek army with it. Another small encirclement north of Athens destroys a Greek division. Athens is taken on the 25th, and Greece accepts Italian annexation the following day. German units in Greece are redeploying back to the Maginot Line.


Not a moment too soon.

Italian and Persian fronts are quiet for now. The Italians have just marched a division into Iraq; hopefully Iraq will be conquered in the next two or three months.


Sail 'em if you got 'em.

The Deutschland Task Force is judged fully repaired by the 14th, about four months after its brief battle with a British task force. Mexico joins the Allies on the 15th. Mexican merchant flotillas are encountered and destroyed on the 30th. UG Erich Maria Remarque is sent from Wilhelmshaven to thicken the Brunhilde Belt in light of the new Mexican presence. UG Hermann Hesse is rebased to Amsterdam in preparation for an attempt to blockade the Mediterranean.

Sinkings for March:

Netherlands: one merchant and one escort.
Mexico: two merchants.
Belgium: 10 merchants and two escorts.
France: 13 merchants.
Britain: 18 merchants.
TOTAL: 44 merchants and three escorts, for 2.2 million merchant tons.

Fighter ground control research completed, project shifted to infantry light artillery.

15. LEUVEN APRIL


Belgian endurance falters again.

On the 11th, Liege was retaken as part of a general wave of successful advances in Belgium. France struck back on the Maginot line, reclaiming Sarreguemines on the 16th. Combined casualties were over 10,000 in the battle of Leuven. VI. Armeekorps, 9th Corps, and VII. Armeekorps reported shatterings, two in still-hotly-contested Luxembourg and one on the Belgian front.


The latest assault on the last Dutch resistance.

After a disastrous battle last month, we overproduced consumer goods for a while to handle dissent, but now we can finally stop. The eastern defenders have been strengthened and expanded, and more infantry divisions are being produced. Assorted facilities in the east are undergoing augmentation (airfields, radar stations, naval bases).


Persia has secured its borders once more.

All the U-groups previously recalled have been redeployed to respond to a slight uptick in convoy activity. This includes UG Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, UG George Grosz, UG Max Schmeling, UG Annette Kolb, UG Lion Feuchtwanger, UG Ludwig Renn, and UG Franz Marc. Most importantly, UG Hermann Hesse has been deployed northeast of the Canaries to seal Gibraltar, with immediate results for Marseille convoys. (The front has approached Marseille on land but never quite taken it.)


France is decisively interdicted at last.

And the sinkings:

Mexico: eight merchants.
Britain: nine merchants.
France: 19 merchants.
TOTAL: 36 merchants for 1.8 million merchant tons.

ovechkinderek, luck is needed on the eastern front, but only time is needed on the western front. I think.

Baltasar, Raeder's cruiser-heavy fleet fought with a small two-battleship British task force back on November 19th, 1939. (There was also the highly policy-influential von Nordeck disaster.) I think you're right about Allied merchants now being new production, except of course in the case of Mexico and the hitherto mostly unmolested French Mediterranean traffic. In the distant future I hope to bring in Turkey, Spain, Portugal, and Romania if possible, and maybe also Saudi Arabia if it's not too much trouble. Also, for WO IV, ideally I will be able to invite most or all of Scandinavia to the Axis, but since Britain is influencing Scandinavian countries I suspect WO I will have to come first. The Italians took part of Spain when the Axis declared war on the Republicans and never gave it back after the Nationalists won, deeply annoying the Spaniards.

16. MARSEILLE MAY


Rushing out of Greece through Yugoslavia, reinforcing Axis units blast up through Southern France like a fart in a bathtub.

Axis and Allies continue to scrap over blood-soaked Belgian provinces like Liege and Leuven. Den Haag is indomitable, repulsing attack after attack. But the demands of the northern front have left the Allies fragile in the south, and that thing mentioned above happens. An advance by combined forces from all Axis countries except for Persia, Japan, and Ethiopia (which remains neutral) is claiming territory more rapidly than any other European push of the war. Marseille has been bypassed, cut off, and crushed. No more French ports on either shore of the Mediterranean.


That patch of empty front is what I'm calling the Avignon Gap.

Small arms research and refining research were both completed and continued. From intelligence reports it seems that British energy stockpiles are falling after all, by about 3,000 units a month. At this rate, they'll hit bottom by May 1941.


Are the Italians having supply trouble or what?

Italians have finally taken Casablanca. Iraqis are pushing back against the Persians, but the Italians have sent another division into Iraq for a total of two. The Nepalese lack the force to form a coherent defensive line in India.


Japanese kills and losses at sea.

The Americans are in the war after all. The Japanese are engaging a coalition that includes them in the Pacific. Midway is now in Japanese hands and I've got my fingers crossed for a strike on Hawaii.

And speaking of sinkings:

USA: one merchant. (A first! They were bound for Axis-friendly neutral Portugal, for some reason.)
Britain: 15 merchants.
France: 17 merchants.
TOTAL: 33 merchants for 1.6 million merchant tons.

17. CASABLANCA JUNE


They managed to close the Avignon Gap, but the Allies are still losing ground.

Romania joins the Axis via event on the 1st and joins the war on the 11th, drawing off several units to assist on the western front but maintaining a Soviet defensive line (as Hungary, I note nervously, does not). On the 23rd, Lyon is captured. On the 30th, Den Haag falls at last. Presumably the Netherlands will form a government in exile shortly.


It's easier to see the North Africa/Iraq/India front as part of the world map. Or at least it's easier to screenshot it.

French units from Beirut are getting involved in the Iraq war. The Italians continue to be sluggish but capture Tamanar in Morocco, making Casablanca safer. Still no major challenges from the Nepalese and no sign of British units operating in India.


Expect to see this expand shortly.

Big things are afoot in the world of U-boats. An Allied power, probably the British, is conducting sweeps with one or more ASW fleets. On the 5th, UG Kurt Schwitters is withdrawn to Lübeck following damage from an engagement with surface ships. On the 7th, UG Stefan Zweig is withdrawn in great haste to Casablanca for emergency repairs following heavy damage and massive disorganization from an ASW attack. On the 8th, UG Bertolt Brecht is deployed after having been mistakenly left in port last for a month and a half. On the 14th, an ASW fleet in the Thames area damages UG Hans Pfitzner and UG Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, which withdraw to Wilhemshaven for repairs. On the 18th, UG Max Brod tangles with an escorted American convoy off Portugal, suffering a minor organization loss and continuing operations. On the 23rd, UG Ludwig Renn is withdrawn from bloodless Arctic patrols to reinforce active parts of the Brunhilde Belt. On the 30th, Type XXI flotillas begin workup in Kolberg. Due to the new situation, these boats will not be phasing out obsoletes as planned, but deploying alongside them.

Sinkings:

USA: two merchants and two escorts.
Belgium: six merchants and three escorts.
Netherlands: 14 merchants and three escorts.
Britain: 15 merchants and no escorts.
France: 18 merchants and no escorts.
TOTAL: 55 merchants and eight escorts, for 2.7 million merchant tons.


Why are there so many Belgians?

Infantry support weapons, strategic air command, and light artillery have advanced this month, and research continues. The spearhead doctrine was finally researched as well, and its leadership was redirected to radar development. Infantry upgrades are a large chunk of current IC (55+). With Greece and Romania accounted for, WO II in the east is complete unless you count the Baltics.

18. BRUGGE JULY


Look closely, and you'll see the French fronts have linked up north of Switzerland.

Middelburg falls on the 8th, leaving the Netherlands entirely occupied. No diplomatic acknowledgement of this from the Dutch yet. On the 11th, Brugge is briefly captured before being recaptured; it is the last Low Countries port left.


Assault on Den Haag as of the 30th. Yes, that is a zero-progress battle.

On the 16th, Americans begin an amphibious attack on Den Haag. The attack is persistent and shatters four carelessly located headquarters units, but it is also doomed and futile. UG Engelbert Humperdinck is diverted to scout the American fleet and discovers that it contains two battleships and a carrier. I dare not engage it with anything at my disposal, even though there is the outside chance that it is too weakly screened (a cruiser or two) to protect its capital ships. I make the unwelcome discovery that capital ship designs can't be licensed (I think). The Den Haag assault is still going on come the end of the month, but all the Americans are doing is chewing up their own organization. Den Haag is a level 2 coastal fort.


Battle lines are forming in Iraq. Will the French be able to keep Persia and Italy out for another month?

Japan has landed in Indonesia. Haven't seen any Mexican convoys for a while. British energy reserves have fallen below 29,000.


On the left is a new Type XXI and on the right is what appears to be a recently overhauled Type IIB. Check it out: the Type XXI actually lags behind the IIB in a couple of areas because advances were made between the time the XXIs were ordered and now.

I spoke too soon when I said subs weren't upgrading. Frustratingly, the refurbished U-boats are uniformly classified as Type IXs even though their ranges differ. It seems everything in gold can be upgraded, but I'm not sure how to force it. Perhaps in the future I should try a combination of prioritizing upgrades and withdrawing fleets to port.

I almost forgot the sinkings!

Belgium: four merchants.
USA: eight merchants and nine escorts.
France: 10 merchants.
Britain: 34 merchants.
TOTAL: 56 merchants and nine escorts, for 2.8 million merchant tons.

Baltasar, what can I say, when conditions are right for me to update, I update. These monthly state-of-the-wars are pretty fast.

As lacking as the Persians are, India is even sparser. From what I've seen so far, Persia can take India as soon as Iraq is settled. Rather than Italian technology, I'm pulling for French supply problems to make their contribution worthless. (Unfortunately, they are probably piggybacking on Iraq's local supply net.)

The best way to get Hungarian soldiers back on the Soviet border, I think, is to end the war in France.

von Epp is stacking those triple INFs together for added firepower. If there's an interwar lull, though, I will use it to add artillery to them. Apart from that, they'll have good air cover (although minimal CAS) and armored units from the west can ride to their assistance. Remember, my overall plan for the Soviets is, if war is unavoidable, to merely hold the line while strat-bombing their cities. Another interwar lull project will be upgrading all the remaining light armor units to medium armor. I'm trying to follow a light MBT path, tankwise.

I'd rather bring both Turkey and Spain in peacefully. If it comes to war, those wars may have to wait until after the USSR, and I guarantee they won't happen before France is dead and buried. Ideally the UK will be finished as well. More or less the same goes for Scandinavia, apart from the scenarios discussed previously in which one or more Scandinavian countries are flipped diplomatically in order to intimidate the others and particularly to preserve the neutrality of Denmark's holdings in the Atlantic. I have no plans to directly reinforce the Persians at this time, but may be forced to develop them if Italy is inadequate in Iraq.

19. DARWIN AUGUST


That Den Haag attack collapsed on the first of the month with 1,000 German and 4,000 Americans dead.

Still burning through southern France, still slogging over blood-sodden Belgium. Portugal is at "maybe" for joining the Axis but declined the first offer. Spain is currently ineligible due to Allied influence. On the 5th a unit shatters at Wissembourg.


Same size, different shape.

Italians have pulled forces from Casablanca and appear to be concentrating in the Middle East. I'm glad I no longer have any subs repairing in Casablanca, I'd be nervous. Turkey's Axis-join is at "impossible," probably because of the whole Iraq/French neighbor thing.


Persia is enormous now.

A British division is sighted near Indore by advancing Persians, but it disappears, probably fleeing south. Not sure what the British plan for India is. British energy reserves have fallen below 26,000.


Just another Belgian battlefield.

Sinkings this month:

Britain: 16 merchants and no escorts.
USA: 26 merchants and 18 escorts.
TOTAL: 42 merchants and 18 escorts for 2.1 million merchant tons.

The Japanese have landed on Australia at Darwin.