Part XV: Change of Strategy
After four days of heavy battle, it becomes too much -- the Republicans defeat us in Toledo, but fortunately don't start a direct counter attack on our totally disorganized forces in Tarancon. Even now our relief forces are still some days away. As there is no point in delaying the enemy forces in Madrid longer with the lost battle of Toledo, I also stop the attack on the Spanish capital preliminary, which leaves my forces in Guadalajara at least with a small amount of organisation. I would have nearly forgotten about the events in the south -- Malaga was captured, hence our port in Cadiz is cut off. On the other hand, Franco seizes Murcia and now moves to Alicante, where he will destroy one Republican milita division.
This was a very harsh caesura indeed. The Republicans can now evacuate their divisions from the pocket, and I'm condemned to do nothing in the meantime due to my embarassing low organisation. It would be foolish to immediatly get back to business as usual after such a failure. We have to take a closer look at the current state of affairs and need to readjust our overall strategy in order to achieve a satisfying success. Although I don't have to fear any kind of defeat in the Spanish Civil War, I'm definitely not longing for a sloppy conclusion of this conflict. Such habits could prove to be devastating when we will later wage war against the Allies and the Soviets on a much larger scale.
Strategical Situation
The Republicans have suffered major defeats, especially during the first two stages of the Spanish Civil War (SCW). As of 0900 October 13, 1936 the Republicans control twelve provinces with eleven victory points, all in continental Spain, which is really poor, considering that they started with twenty-eight provinces. We expect, however, due to the recent events some obvious border changes: We will seize Segovia and Alicante shortly, while the Republicans will probably be able to reconquer Cadiz, Granada and Jaen. This will increase the amount of Republican provinces to thirteen and the Republican victory points to twelve. The Republicans still control the Spanish capital of Madrid. The Republicans have roughly five Base IC and are utilising four points of it, although this value may differ as IC is constantly destroyed and reconstructed due to the repetitive border changes. German intelligence estimates the size of the Republican army to be around twenty-three infantry divisions and two armor divisions, which is, according to our encounters during battles with the Republicans, an accurate evaluation. The reports on Republican navy are not reliable; the numbers are way too low and would only make sense if some form of self-scuttling occured, as our navy failed to destroy the Republican fleet. The numbers regarding the air force are somewhat accurate, the overall air force volume is given with eight squadrons, which is probably correct, although the distribution is, according to our direct knowledge, not two interceptors and six bombers but four interceptors and four bombers.
The Nationalists have scored decisive victories and are about to win the SCW. Starting with just twelve provinces in continental Spain, we managed to more than double this number to twenty-six. Nationalist Spain controls nine base and eight effective IC. We have thirty-eight land divisions at our disposal, the vast majority is infantry, although we also have a small number of militia, and a single HQ, light armor and motorized infantry unit, respectively. Our navy consists of nine small ships and five transports, and our air force encompasses two interceptors, two tactical bombers and one CAS.
As earlier battles have shown, we can not claim to be technologically superior any longer; it appears that we have only the advantage of numbers on our side. The Republicans have showed a medium or even relatively high organization in the past, while nearly all of our land forces are highly disorganized and suffered recently the first major defeat during an attempt to encircle a massive amount of enemy units. The Republicans possess total Air Superiority, as their air force outnumbers ours and we still need reinforcements for our interceptors and more organization for our bombers, that will be again lowered should we make the necessary step and rebase our airforce to the Spanish mainland in order to contest the Republican air force.
Tactical Situation
In principle, we can now speak of a Nationalist Northern Spain and a Republican Southern Spain. Our forces are currently guarding the majority of our threatened border provinces, and due to the confinement of the Republicans to twelve or thirteen provinces they will soon be able to form a stabilized front line, too. We expect, however, that the Republicans will slowly retreat a good chunk of their forces from Madrid, as the city is under a constant threat of encirclement. Should there be only a tiny guard in Madrid left, it would be probably better to simply seize the city and abandon any plans for encirclement.
We are unable to undertake any major offensives for the rest of October, as we would risk destruction and defeat at the hands of the Republicans due to our non-existant organisation. The organisation has literally fallen to zero in some corps, thus making even movement between friendly provinces impossible due to terribly slow speed. We will, however, destroy at least one enemy division in Alicante, as the Southern Action Forces under the command of General Franco are still operational and our only guarantee in case of a large-scale Republican counter-attack. Our fleet in Cadiz is under persistent threat from enemy forces, as the province is cut-off and could be easily seized by the Republicans at any time, thus making constant supervision and vigilance mandatory. Our air force remains inoperable until further notice.
The Republicans are probably exhausted from their recent victories, and too occupied in finally regrouping their units into a coherent front line, so we probably won't see any offensives, especially as they will hesitate to attack us if we are numerically superior, which is almost everywhere the case, except for Toledo, but these units are, as already mentioned, in no shape to attack us as they recently fought against our units.
Until now we pursued an aggressive strategy of maneuver warfare which aimed at taking as much provinces as possible without allowing the enemy to inflict any bigger casualties. We succeeded til this point, but as the enemy has finally recovered from the initial trauma, we either have to prevent him from taking up a viable defensive position or accept larger and longer battles, with higher casualties, to slowly push the Republicans back to the seas.
We will try a combination of both strategies: The Republicans should be distracted, as in the begining of our campaign, by an amphibous landing of one army corps in the southern hinterland so that they will be forced to weaken their defenses at the main front. At the same time, we will try to resume our encirclement of Madrid, should a sufficient number of units still occupy the city to make it worth enough, but this time with clearly superior forces, and we will participate in some other major battles if this should become necessary in order to penetrate the front line. We will, however, only attack if we can win and abandon the idea of Blitzkrieg warfare. Our main problem, organization, will be solved by giving our forces more time to reorganize. As we also have a higher industrial base now, we have the luxury to postpone some offensives in order to enhance our odds significantly. New major offensives will therefore start in November at the earliest.
Revised Objectives
Due to the results of our assessments above we are forced to revise our initial objectives for the third stage of Operation Gisela. Stage III and Stage IV were approximate formulations anyway, as we couldn't provide such exact predictions to name more precise objectives.
Stage III
- Capture of Madrid. If more than three Republican divisions will stay behind in Madrid, capture through encirclement.
- Amphibious invasion of the Republican's hinterland by at least one army corps. Beginning of renewed harassment, resulting in the return of the expeditionary forces to the Nationalist mainland by unifying the two pockets at best.
- Destruction of the Alicante pocket.
- Rebasing of the Nationalist air force to the Spanish mainland.
- Full organization replenishment of all Nationalist forces.
- Cutting up of the Republican's mainland into two seperate pockets, e.g. through Jaen-Cordoba-Huelva or through the amphibous assault. Destruction of one pocket.
Stage IV
- Destruction of the remaining pocket and annexation of Republican Spain.