My Fight Volume II - Yet another HPP USAAR

There were many questions since the last Chapter about the war's progress and about the state of the World in general. So this one will be a situation report.



Historical overview

The date is August 1st of 1943. The War has been raging on for about four years now. The United States joined in October, 1940, almost three years ago. We have waited a long time to start really contributing but when finally got around to it (a tiny little bit earlier than I planned, and with some major setbacks!), but American soldiers have been fighting for the freedom of eating fast food since early '43. During that time, half of metropolitan France has been liberated along with the Low Countries and much of Denmark and Allied forces have also entered Germany proper, while Italy is on the verge of collapse. But things are not all cake and candy on other fronts. The Soviet Union is fighting a two-front war against the two strongest members of the Axis, and the best they can do is holding the line against the Germans and trading provinces every now and then with the Japanese.



Economy

I have tons of resources. Don't let the red numbers on the screenshots fool you, those values are not updated until the first day passes after you load up a save.
I have 430 base, 505 effective IC. The Great Depression still gives -30%, but I have very good tech and avesome ministers, plus the New Deal helps a bit. I'm currently spending about 62 IC on Upgrades, 22.5 on Reinforcements and 177 on producing some more ships (10 Omaha-Class Light Cruisers and 10 Porter-Class Destroyer Flotillas). I still have tons to spend on Supplies, of which I have already reached the stockpile limit anyway, but I have no idea what else I should produce. I have almost 4000 Manpower, so I could spam Infantry like mad, but I don't want to. I couldn't really use them anyway. I may be doing that in the future though, but more on that later.


Research

I hate to make condensed screenshots of the Research Screen, so I'm really sorry but a simple list will have to do.
Current tech levels:

• Operational Doctrines. I went along the Superior Firepower path, almost finishing it. Mechanized Offensive gives bonuses to SP Rocket Artillery, and I have like 30 of those, so I probably should do that, too, but it's three years ahead. It's not that urgent.
• Land techs. I'm up-to-date (ie. '42 techs) with Infantry and Engineer techs, as well as Specialized Equipments except for the Mountaineer stuff. (I didn't research the Light Artillerty Miniaturization either. I don't have Mountaineers.) I also have all the unit types activated. I'm also up-to-date on Medium Armour and somewhat ahead of time on Rocket Artillery. I have rather obsolete '38 Heavy Tanks, very obsolete '36 Anti-Air guns, somewhat obsolete Armoured Cars ('38 techs, I think), completely basic Light Tanks, somewhat advanced Artillery ('38-'40 techs) and completely garbage AT guns. I don't have Infantry Support Tanks at all.
• Land Doctrines. I have Firepower Focus and Combined Arms up to '43. My Officers are highly trained ('46) and my Infantry is up-to-date ('42) but my Artillery and Special Forces are somewhat neglected ('40) as well as my Tank Crews ('41).
• Air techs. I've recently developed up-to-date techs for all the Single Engine techs except for Radar, but they didn't have time yet to be deployed in the field. Twin Engine techs are under development (the four techs are in progress to get to '43 levels). Aside from that, I have two bomber techs I've researched: Maritime Attack Ordinance and Cargo Hold (although this one is lagging behind quite a lot and I guess I won't get to a level where I can fit my monster Divisions into a single Air Wing anyway...)
• Air Doctrines. My mission-related doctrines are utter crap. Pilot and Ground Crew training is coming along, but the best I have is '40 and CAG Pilot Training is still only '38. My Bomber Pilots and Ground Crews are even less trained. But at least I have Night Mission Training.
• Naval techs. I've focused on Carriers ('38-40 techs) and Heavy Cruisers (still only at around '40 techs) plus I started with some advanced techs for Submarines. I've recently started to invest into ASW for smaller warships. Well, come to think of it, I didn't really focus on the Navy at all...
• Naval Doctrines. Obsolete junk, the only interesting item here is my level '45 Base Operations. I'm currently trying to get up-to-date on Carrier Task Force Doctrine and with Cruiser, Carrier and Submarine Crew Training.
• Industrial techs. Resource techs, Education, Decryption, Radios, Radar, Supply Production are up-to-date, the two Industrial techs are ahead of time (currently working on '48 techs) and I'm also working on more advanced Electronic Computers and '44 Civil Nuclear Research.
• Secret techs. I have Strategic Rockets (both of them ), Flying Bombs, Radar Guided Missiles, Proximity Fuses, Rocket Launchers and Light Jet Fighters. I'm currently working on Jet Bombers. The Nuclear Bomb tech is just around the corner.

France


The situation in France is pretty straightforward: we clearly have enough forces to hold the line and reinforcements are on their way, which (if we can handle the supply strain...) should be enough to finish off the German resistance. If we can coordinate well with the Italian front, that will be a major blow to the Axis powers. There are at least twenty Divisions in the area, and that's only on the ones I can see on the front! Eventhough I will have severe supply problems during this operation, I expect the Germans to have their own problems. Being cut off from their Capital means that they would need to supply their forces via convoys, which would be kind of difficult with all the Subs I operate all over the coasts of Europe. (By the way, German National Unity is down to 61.4%. With SF rules, this still will mean that I'll have to take all of their own land and then some, but at least I won't need to reach the Soviet lines to make the Germans surrender...)


Italy


Italy has 62.7% of their VPs lost, and they have 25 right now, so they had about 67 to begin with. They have 75.5% National Unity. So if my calculations are right, they would surrender once they are down to 16 VPs. So I need ten more, which means two more cities. There are two cities on the front right now: Bologna and Genoa. Out of the two, Bologna will be easy to take, I'm pretty sure about that, but Genoa might be a little more messy. If you remember, I found some ten or so Italian Divisions waiting there for Divine Intervention or something. They might not be able to stop Italy from falling but they might stall the invasion for a few days if I have to get to Venice instead. On top of that, I have my forces under AI control. Still, I'm quite confident that Italy will fall before the end of Summer.

When they fall, the democratic verison of Italy will be formed with a new government, inheriting most of the Kingdom of Italy. This will have two major consequences:

• Most, if not all of Italy's forces will switch sides. This will at least disrupt Axis operations, causing some chaos for a short while, but it might even give us some valuable troops to mop up the Axis forces in Germany. Can't be sure about that yet.
• Since Italian land will go back to Italian hands, they will be required to provide the supplies for my forces. This is good news as long as I keep my forces in Italian territory, since they will automatically recieve those supplies in the capital, but I'm not sure if they send supplies along for invasions as well. We'll see how well that will work. (Also the AI tends to have trouble coping with the supplies coming from Allies to compensate for Allied troops, not taking it into account properly when calculating the required IC for producing supplies for its own troops...)

North-West Germany


As you can see, since the British forces were invading Germany from the freshly liberated Netherlands, all the provinces they conquer are officially occupied by the Dutch. While I understand the need for this to avoid dotted maps later, it is still quite silly. It would make a lot more sense if there was a global order in which the countries would occupy land. Heck, it would be possible and logical even to give all the land to the leader of that side in the war! Well, alright, it wouldn't really work with majors. Obviously it wouldn't be right if Germany would get all the land taken by Italy for example. Still, I do believe that there would be a better way for this to work.

Two of the three Italian stacks near Luxemburg are relatively large, causing some headaches for now, but they will come quite in handy in a week or so after Italy switches sides. Also, almost surrounded Hamburg is only six provinces away from Berlin!


Soviet Front


There hasn't been much change on the Eastern Front in the last few months. The Soviets can hold their ground but they are not strong enough to push the Germans back, while the Germans have their own problems and I'd say they are probably really hard pressed not to pull back some forces to protect their Fatherland. Soon, they will have no choice.


Far East


The Far East is a little more dynamic, but still nothing like the victory march we have in Italy or the Low Countries. Provinces change hands frequently, but there's still no clear winner of the conflict.


Post-War Politics

I know, it might sound a bit early to plan for after the War, there might be a lot of things going wrong until then, but I don't think I will lose, so why not?

One thing I was wondering about is the future of China. We are not at war with japan, and I'm not sure we ever will be. They are stuck in a war against the USSR they alone can't win and if we beat Germany, they will be in a very baaaad situation. Now the question is wheter I want that or not. Currently Japan doesn't pose enough threat to me to declare war on them (42.33 Neutrality, and it would need to be under 40.99), but that won't stay this way for long. I could allow the Soviets to take care of China and once that's done, Japan will eventually negotiate for peace with them. Communist China will probably be released and pretty much the whole of Asia will be under either Communist rule or at least Communist threat. I'm not sure I want that. On the other hand, it is hard enough to supply a war against Germany from America. Germany also had trouble with fighting the Soviets. I don't even want to imagine how hard it would be to fight on Russian soil based from a different continent... Especially considering that I probably wouldn't be able to ship in supplies anyway, since there will be Post-War countries all over the place.

So, I was wondering if I should build Infantry armies specifically designed to be deployed as Expeditionary forces to the Post-War democracies. I have an aweful lot of Manpower, and I definitely won't need it at home. I would train tons of Infantry Divisions, ship them over to Europe and India and position them on the front lines. If (when...) war with the Soviets come, I could simply turn the units over to be controlled by their host country and send supplies through diplomatic channels to secure their supply sutiation. Then I could try to lead their efforts through Allied Objectives. I'm not exactly sure if that would work, but it would be interesting to try What do you think?

After the situation report in the last Chapter, it's time to get back into the action!

Last time I didn't have any intel on the actual number and composition of enemy forces in Genova. My fighters chased some Patrol Bombers (NAVs) back to that airfield now, giving me a full report on the defenders:


By the way, I wanted to mention that while I was checking the British lines up North, I noticed a few Australian and even South African Expeditionary Forces. I believe that this entire campaign is a proof that the allied AI is very much capable of doing something worthwhile, although it would have been even better if they were able to notify me beforehand (And that is taken care of in For The Motherland! Sort of.)

I've also noticed that the British have opened another front in Yugoslavia! (Or was it there before?...) They only have a single Division (some Infantry supported by ISTs) but considering that Yugosliavia is probably completely empty right now, it shouldn't be much of a problem. Especially if they could quickly capture the Beograd, although that seems very unlikely. Then again, I believe they only did it for the airfield and now bombing factories and coal mines in Ostrava, Czechoslovakia

The heavy fighting around Hamburg made the KMS Schlesien attempt to break through the blockade set by Rear Admiral Halsey, but they were surprised by the Dutch and American Submarines in the area and were quickly sent to the bottom of the sea on the 6th of August. Hamburg fell on the next day.


This success made Luxemburg realize that the war is getting out of hand and they took the "War is Escalating" decision, lowering their Neutrality significantly. I'm not sure if that will have any long-term consequence though. With 80 Neutrality and not yet involved in any way, it's still not very likely that they would join the Allies.

By 11th of August, it started to become obvious that Hitler didn't want to let go of Italy just yet. More and more German Divisions started to appear in Northern Italy, threatening with a serious delay in my victory on that front. I can't let that happen, so I started to formulate a new, daring plan. After Bologna fell, I sent some Light Bombers to scout out the area around Milano and at the same time I started to move the 17th AB 'Thunder from Heaven' Division into position in Metz. This airfield was only two provinces away from the Division (which was the one closest to any airfield at the moment) and also close enough for my Lockheed C-37 Electra planes to drop the boys right on top of Milano. (Technically the distance was calculated using a path right through Switzerland, but I believe they would be in range regardless.)

The first bombing run of Milano showed that there are no combat-worthy troops in the close vicinity to the city and only two Divisions positioned within (one Garrison Division with almost no Organisation and one Infantry Division with only slightly more), and they were completely out of supply, too. (In their own capital, no less!) The objective (taking Mussolini prisoner and thus breaking fascism in Italy) looks achievable, the potential casualties acceptable. Good. ETA for the Airborne in Metz is early in the morning on the 14th of August. Also later scouting missions revealed that the Infantry Division was in fact a German one and was only moving through the city, probably on their was to Genova.


The Republic of Italy was quickly formed by an anti-fascist government (IPP, Social Consercatives) and they joined the Allies and the war against tyranny immediately. 119 Brigades' worth Italian soldiers switched sides after the fall of Mussolini, and most of them were in a good position to join back in the fight right away. At this point I had a CTD unfortunatelly so I had to replay all of the above but I tried to do the same as much as possible and eventhough the timetable was a little different, the results were the same, except for the sinking of the KMS Schesien.

After the Italian surrender, several German Divisions got trapped in Italian lands. They were completely disorganized but so were my own forces with the sudden change of circumstances so I quickly gave new orders to my Army Corps and watched as they form new fronts against the still coming German reinforcements. Meanwhile the United Kingdom took posession of Libya except for Benghazi and Tarabulus which were given back to Italy because of the cores there.


At that point, something really interesting (or weird?) happened: Finland entered a Military Alliance with Germany.


Finland was aligning towards the Allies for ages now, so I'm not convinced that this was a good idea actually. Of course this doesn't automatically mean that they will join the war, though, either against the Allies or the USSR.

By the end of August, American forces were entering Croatia, the German resistance in Southern France was diminishing quickly and Allied troops from the Italian and French fronts were close to linking up in Austria. At the same time my freshly deployed North American FJ-1 Fury Jet-Light Fighters were in range to patrol over Berlin.

This phase of the war is usually realatively dull. As you can see on the "strength" map below, the Axis has little to no defensive forces in the Balkans and the French contingent has only weeks left at most.


According to my 9 spies in Germany, they've ran out of Oil and Fuel (which is hardly a surprise) and apparently their Supplies are close to zero, too and have already started to build up Dissent. Of course I only believe such reports if I was the one lying them, so...

But at least the Great Depression continued to wade away and in October, it decreased one level again. Also, as funny as it might sound, Italy is much better in the Allies than it was in the Axis:


And on the fifth of November, while Australian troops started to enter Berlin and the French government returned to Paris, my fourth level of Civil Nuclear Research was finished, allowing me to start building the Nuclear Bomb...

Since this game is still in Semper Fi and the surrender mechanics were only redesigned in FtM, even after losing Berlin, Germany's surrender progress is only 37% because of the massive conquests they made in Russia a few years back. With the HPP-event for losing Berlin, Germany's National Unity dropped to 56%, increasing the effective surrender progress to 43%. Still a long way to go. Liberating the Balkans (which Italy does rather efficiently) will probably help a lot though and I think we won't need to go into Soviet territory to end the war. Or at least not too deep. Anyway, the game is basically off hands for the moment, because all my European Expeditionary Forces are under AI control.

Meanwhile in Asia:


The war in Europe will be over in a few months (although not before Christmas), so I believe it's time to start planning ahead a bit. More precisely, to spend my 200 IC sitting idle on supplies with a full stockpile. (By the way, the Great Depression is still not over!) I have three projects I want to invest into:

• Six wings of Strategic Bombers. My techs in the area are crap except for the universal Aeroengine and some basic Airframes and Fuel Tanks, but my Escort Fighters are up-to-date. I plan on using these beasts in Asia in whatever role they will be needed. Their huge range will come in handy with the scarcity of airfields in the region.
• Ten new Transport Flotillas. I have 33 right now but for example the UK has 41! (Which probably explains their ability to actually make a decent landing!)
• Fourty parallels of five serials of Radar installments. I have a level 10 installment in Guam but for some reason I never built any more than that. I think I should have. I like seeing what the enemy does. Radars are awesome!

The rest of 1943 was spent with the slow but steady liberation of Hungary but more importantly, Luxemburg joined the Allies in December, gaining us another Victory Condition: I use the Historical set and the "Liberate the Low Countries" requires the city of Luxemburg to be in Allied hands. The final three conditions only require a date: 1944 for "Operation Overlord" (otherwise it would be fulfilled right from the start) and "Enter the Reich" (the date here is kinda-sorta unnecessary I guess) and 1945 for "MacArthur's Pacific War Plan" (which basically requires me to get back to the Status Qua after the supposed initial attacks). That's what you get with Historical Victory Conditions in an a-historical game The good news is that the Axis have two (probably both are Japanese...) and the Comintern has none! Excelllent!

At this point I also realized that Finland is at war with both the Allies and the Comintern (they are allied with Germany and probably the game put them into the war when I loaded up the save). I wonder if they will lose any ground to the Soviets before Germany falls...

About a week after Luxemburg, Sweden also joined the Allies. Their Neutrality is still 100, but Germany supposedly poses 177 points of threat towards them. Or maybe they only want in to see the Reich fall and maybe get their part from the spoils? Who knows. Unfortunatelly though their forces are not mobilized so they can't help retake Copenhagen. That will be the job of the 13th US Airborne 'Black Cat' Division.


With the New Year, two of the above mentioned date-related Victory Conditions were fulfilled, allowing me to end the game, which I didn't of course. There are still two (three?) enemies to fight (even though the final victory is quite certain). I also got a new Vice-President, Harry S. Truman.


In January, I checked on Finland. They did in fact lose land to Sweden (helped by Norwegian forces) but they were also entering the Soviet Union in Karelia. They also lost a province North of Leningrad. I'm not impressed.


On February 21st I encountered another CTD of unknown origin (right after assigning a Army under an AI Army Group). I was very, very close to ending the AAR at that point because any real excitement that might still come is very far away and even that will more likely be a slow, dull crawl. Asia tends to be. And when I reloaded and reassigned that Army again at the start of the month, it CTDed again. I tried one more time and it crashed again. Then I tried to assign the Army to another Army Group and it worked. It is quite unfortunate because this is not something I could fix and I very much doubt I could even make a proper bugreport on it, since this is a modded game and I don't think I could reproduce the exact bug in vanilla. Not that SF is supported anymore anyway. Moving on.

In March, 1944, Germany finally surrendered:


While theoretically this should have resulted in the reformation of Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, both territorries were already under Italian occupation and remained so for the time being. So then started the reconstruction of Europe:


With that, the only enemy left in Europe was Finland (for now at least). To neutralize that threat, I quickly organized two Corps' worth of troops and a few Transport Flotillas to assist them. I also dropped an Airborne Division on top of Helsinki just for good measure. And another one on Viipuri. The Transport Flotillas weren't really needed afterwards. Or so I thought. But unfortunatelly I was a little rush and didn't take any intel beforehand. Turned out that Viipuri had three Infantry Divisions passing by... In the end my forces triumphed, but it wasn't that trivial of a feat! We lost near four thousand lives! Almost like the Market Garden of my game, except it did have a result. Finland surrendered, to the Soviet Union! The fools! In the end I did need the transports, to bring my stranded forces back...

The other serious downside of quickly taking care of Finland was the end of War and thus the end of my efficient War Economy. The law remained in effect but resulted in 200 IC demanded by the masses. In a few weeks I could declare war on Japan, from a diplomatic point of view at least, but that will bring in Spain and Bulgaria, the two remaining European Axis members. Bulgaria is already taken care of but on the Spanish side there are only three Airborne Divisions, two provinces away from the actual border. It will take weeks or maybe even months to bring an Army Group there.

Fortunatelly I was wrong with the timetable. By mid-May, I had sufficient forces on the Spanish border to feel confident enough to continue the fight for the good cause! Unfortunatelly, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt couldn't see the end of the war. He died on 29th of May, 1944.


And since this AAR is still "From the memoires of Franklin Delano Roosevelt", with his death, our story also came to an end.