Chapter Forty-Eight - Ashore In Italy
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In the last chapter, Canada went ashore in Europe proper - with the intent to stay - for the very first time. Supplies were plentiful. We had no port, as yet, but this is Italy itself and the Axis are not lacking for supplies while at home. We felt confident that with the ongoing melt-down on the eastern front that the Germans were not going to be in a position to help out Italy with any serious force. The risk isn't zero, but I have to say, the chances of an Allied landing in Normandy are higher, over the next weeks, than a big German counter-attack. On the other hand, Italy was bound to send what it could to take back conquered land on the peninsula. It's not like they have something more important to defend.
I let this battle go on longer than I should have, when it started to look like a mere 60% penalty wasn't going to keep me from winning this battle before the invasion forces were ready to attack. Had I known it was just HQ units I'd be landing against I'd have held back some of my men. If I land more men now, however, that uses up the captured supplies. Waiting three days is not an eternity.
The Italians counter-attacked with a German mechanized unit which was badly depleted - 20.8% STR.
The 1700 men they sent at Giao Tauro were no match for the 21000 Canadians. In fact, the attack made it appears that the Canadians were ready to launch thei own attack, when in fact they were two days from being ready. Combat lasted only eight hours, but despite an overwhelming advantage, our casualty ratio wasn't much better than 2-1.
The listed supply situation was only one day, but it looked to me as though we had nearly a month's worth of supplies in our two provinces. Still, we need a port in Italy proper before we can begin to make big plans. I'm holding back on the portable ports. I know they "count" as a port very quickly, and I'm confident that repairing a placed port is much faster than building from scratch, but these aren't exactly Mulberries like the ones used in Normandy historically. They'd allow faster import of supplies, but they would not make for a good source of supply for a large army. On the other hand, once we link up with Sicily, I think a strait doesn't stop supplies from crossing. We'll see soon enough, I hope.
Then we saw a repeat of the Battle of the Straits of Messina, and for once we weren't looking for the Brits to appear in the east on the morning of the fifth day.
We had six destroyer flotillas against four, and three light cruisers against a battleship, if I remember the charts right. This is not the fight we wanted, but for once we weren't looking to run away ASAP. After only a few hours, Italy retreated to the port in the besieged province.
Before the Italian fleet had even reached port, Canada launched its assault on the destination. The two badly-depleted defenders should not be too much trouble for the overwhelming attacking force.
Apparently, the AI thought the same thing, and it had learned from playing Diplomacy.
That attack, on the southern of my two provinces, was going to be trouble, but not enough to save the trapped Italians for long. Apparently, the AI thought the same thing.
[Ed - oops, I thought this was the second attack, SPOILER ALERT!]
So now I faced counter-attacks on both of my attacking provinces [Ed - wait for it...]. Not enough to win, but Garrison forces have proven before to be slow-moving but otherwise respectable infantry units. Nothing to write home about, but they are far more than the glorified HQs I thought they were when I tried to brush them aside in Africa way back when.
Meanwhile in the water, they're baaack.
Note that the Italians have only one DD group this time. I guess the last battle went better than I recall.
Both Italian naval units have zero ORG, and the Battleship withdraws rapidly iirc. The DD has no ORG and not much more STR. What's worth noting here, however, is the number of Italians units incoming.
Soon, they don't have any STR at all, and become Canada's first confirmed naval kill.
The Littorio gets away, regretably. Still, Italy is massing, and we need to do something about that.
Oh, there's the British navy! We would not have minded had they Kill-Steal-ed the Littorio. We need to speed up the process of winning in Reggio de Calabria before the entire Italian army shows up.
We finally got our bombers to attack, for some reason they stalled after I moved them into place. The fighters are flying cover as well.
We've landed, and the ground attacks on the cut-off Germans continue, but I'm pretty sure we've alerted the Axis to our intentions, so time is not really on our side here. The Germans can't send an army, but they might well be able to send enough to cause us some real headaches. Plus, it's not like Italy really needs to defend the French border, and with Canadians ashore, it's not like the Russians pose a bigger threat in the short term. So Canada really needs to close the Axis pocket, and get to work kickings the italians off the southern end of the peninsula.