Operations and Foreign Intelligence July 1940-January 1941
Our Carrier group at Casablanca finally catches up to its British counterparts after nearly three months of searching
Two Carriers and a battlecruiser are sent to the bottom. A solid victory, but the British task force has been able to sink nearly 400 convoy transports in the last six months. The victory should stem the bleeding, but it is still nearly impossible to import raw materials from the colonies and it's even becoming hard to supply our troops in North Africa. Production is immediately altered to prioritize an increase in our merchant marine.
Closer to home, the French attack into Aachen is stopped with a combination of tanks and air power. Unfortunately our counter-attack into Eupen fails to dislodge the French despite heavy casualties on both sides.
At the same time, we are pushed out of Saarbrucken, but manage to inflict heavy casualties on the invaders.
Our counter-attack makes steady progress, even though late in the month the first French independent tank divisions are encountered, as well as French heavy tanks.
This attack too proves a failure, but intelligence believes we can eventually bleed the French manpower with selective attacks and an overall defensive strategy. Ukraine appears to be crumbling and when it falls another 30 divisions can be transferred West, a number OKH believes will be decisive.
Speaking of the East, the first phase of Russia's wars to restore her former glory is complete, the Don-Kuban Union crumbles beneat the weight of Russian conscripts. German observers report that while crudely equipped, and tactically inept, the Russians are experimenting with new strategic thinking. Marshalls Deniken and Wrangel refer to it as "deep battle". We will see how effective their new doctrine is once their troops and junior officers are capable enough to use it in the field.
Mid September brings a renewed French assault; this time into our lines at Mainz. Seventy French divisions plow into only fourteen of our own. The advance guards are overrun but miraculous delaying actions by Generals Paulus and von Manstien are able to hold off the French until our reinforcements arrive. In all, over fifty divisions, including our most elite panzer and cavalry units hold off the French onslaught, as always with help from the air. Von Richtoffen's 6th bomber wing exhausts its men and munitions pummeling French columns but the pilots and bombardiers are celebrated as heroes by the beleaguered schutzen on the ground. As the French regroup, yet another German push is launched into Saarbrucken...
...which again ends in failure
Two events quickly expand the war dramatically. First, likely due to our struggles to defend our Western border, the Socialist Republic of Italy decides it is time to reunite the peninsula. At dawn on October 1st, 1940, 19 divisions of the Esercito del Popolo begin an artillery barrage. Several units of socialist irregulars, infiltrated into the Kingdom of Italy simultaneously rise up in Rome. For a few tense hours it seems as if the Kingdom's government will collapse amid the chaos in Rome. The news isn't all bad however. Intercepted diplomatic cables indicates the French government was unaware of Sicilian intentions, or at least didn't take them seriously. Within a day, forward observers spot large French formations withdrawing from the front. The possibility of a massive ruse is taken seriously, but it seems to most parties that the French are redeploying to the South.
In related news: after months of diplomatic prodding, the crisis in Italy finally persuades the Austrian government to join the war on our side. Panicked Italian promises of territorial compensation may or may not have had an effect Austria's decision to abandon it's neutrality. One potential complication of this good news is the refusal of both the Italians and Austrians to coordinate military planning with OKH.
Perhaps the least obvious effect of these events is the dramatic expansion of the Eastern front. Initially our appeals to Bulgaria were met with promises of material and and volunteers. However, Turkey, seeing an opporunity to reclaim lost territory, and perhaps ingratiate themselves with their Syndicalist allies, promptly invade. The front now Stretches from Alexandropolis on the Aegean sea to the Russo-Ukrainian border near Konotop
Seven divisions of German troops and redeployed into Bulgaria to help our new ally, where they are met by Hungarians, Serbians, and Austrians. Over the next month they are able to slow, but not stop, the pushes West from Istanbul and South, along the Black Sea coast, from Constanta. The thinned out troops in central Ukraine prove easy targets for a counter-attack. German and Polish divisions at the so-called "hinge" of the line at Hotin on the Ukraine/Romanian border are forced to retreat by sustained Syndicalist attacks.
In the West, another massive French attack is launched as the weather turns cold. This time, it's a huge two-pronged attack at Mainz in the south with 71 divisions and Koblenz in the North with another 55, including three armoed and fifteen modern motorized divisions. Scrambling by high command and several more weeks of heroic efforts by the German army and airforce blunt the Commune's attacks at Koblenz and turn Mainz into a huge couldron battle. The city is utterly destroyed but the French are routed, sustaining over 170,000 casualties
The city on November 5th, 1940
Six days later, the even more catastrophic battle of Koblenz concludes. Though the casualties are higher, this time the French withdraw in good order as the German army is too exhausted to pursue.
In Italy, the Pope's armed forces are suffering badly. In the south, the Republican army, with the help of many irregulars, has taken Rome, Ancona, and Perugia, and is approaching Bologna on the Adriatic. In the North, French units have poured over the border, and despite early setbacks, have occupied Nice, Genoa, and Turin. Perhaps too late, the Italians agree to subordinate their divisions to the overall direction of the more experienced commanders in the German general staff. Austrian and German units are sent to Bescia, but worry is that Italy will totally collapse before they arrive.
In order to take pressure off our Italian allies, OKH authorizes an ambitious operation in late December: an all-out offensive along the French border. Although French forces have been thinned out, they have had over a month to dig-in and many of them are relishing an opportunity to engage Germans from prepared positions.
At 6am on New Years Day, 1941 the guns of 120 German divisions sound off from Eupen to Strasbourg and the assaults begin. Although the French offer fierce resistance, German numbers and air power show and within a fortnight the operation is all but concluded.
French defenses lay shattered but German divisions are too exhausted to follow-up the successes with decisive actions into Lorraine. Even worse, the French, far from being beaten, have called our bluff and continued decisive offensive actions in Italy. On the 5th, Parma falls, effectively splitting the Italian army and threatening to completely cut off twenty divisions still fighting in Florence and Livorno, including the Austrian expeditionary force. If Italy falls Austria only has a few home guard divisions and lies open to invasion.
With our reinforcements still not in Italy the future of the Peninsula, and perhaps the entire war, is still very much in the balance.
Well, I am eager to see The World aligning against The Eagle! And not only the croissant munchers, the republican bastards on the isles, and the börkbörk syndies. 
