The Bear and the Eagle! (Dual Soviet-American AAR)

Where are my reinforcements!



I've made it to the end of the campaigning season it seems - the Germans have given me a run for my money - pushing me back to the Dnieper in several places and driving me back to the very gates of Moscow. But thats okay as it seems the Germans are almost out of manpower - lots of their divisions are starting to appear under strength. Next year we start some serious counterattacks.

Beginning of the 1944 campaigning season - Germans are still kicking, especially in the south where a late winter offensive took a good sized chunk out of my lines. Those pesky Germans almost opened a route to Batum where whats left of my Baltic fleet is - including my one Baltic carrier.

Anyways, all they did is set themselves up for a grand encirclement. Two of my best mobile army groups have been sent south to trap and destroy the fascist pigs.



The pocket. I've bottled up around 40 German divisions in there.

Though they managed to open it back up again the next day. Then I closed it back up two days later.

After that devastating loss for the Germans their southern front collapses for a few weeks. By the 4th of July the Crimea is bottled up with another four German divisions packing up shop and heading to the Gulag.

I've also retaken Kharkov and parts of the Ukrainian industrial region that I badly need.

All thats going on up north is a minor offensive to relieve Moscow from immediate threat and almost constant German counterattacks against Pskov which I retook a month ago - and they just retook it.



Now the Germans are really cracking - I've fully retaken the Ukranian industrial area netting me something like 300 energy and 100 metal production that is badly needed. Next month my northern offensive will begin with the aim of cutting the Germans off in Estonia.

The situation by mid-September. The campaigning season is almost over and my northern offensive took longer than expected to start, but as one can see we've moved far ahead of Moscow.

In the south i've broken into Romania in a bid to take the Ploesti oilfields - that and the capture of Bucharest should trigger Romanian capitulation and defection to my side.

Meanwhile the western allies are doing dick all about opening a second front. The damned AI has never been good about actually opening that kind of front - though from what I see over in India the Brits are having a tough time holding by themselves and the American AI is probably dumping 100 divisions in Hawaii. All of Europe is therefore mine for the picking.



Bulgarian communists sieze control of Bulgaria on the 20th and switch to our side. Their army is small and weak, but it should be able to defend the country until enough Soviet units move in.

Romania continues to resist even after the fall of Bucharest.



On the 6th the Romanian government finally collapses and offers to defect in order to remain an independent nation. I gladly accept the offer and gain my third European ally after Bulgaria and Finland.

Back up north as you can see the offensive has gone well. I've retaken Smolensk, Minsk, and Riga - along with Memel and Koningsberg from the Germans. Already managed to get to East Prussia thanks to General Chuikov. Just need to get rid of that bulge in the middle of the line and move some forces south where the Germans are rebounding and launching sustained counterattacks via some impressively strong armoured forces.

Still its hard slogging as most of my divisions are somewhat antiquated. They now total the following:

189 Infantry Divisions (2/3 '41, 1/3 '43)
151 Motorized Divisions (2/3 '42, 1/3 '44)
22 Mechanized Divisions (2/3 '42, 1/3 '44)
4 Light Armoured Divisions (Pre-war design)
53 Armoured Divisions (1/3rd BT-7s, 2/3rds T-34's)
9 Headquarters Units

The front a month into the winter of 1944-45. Our offensive has plenty of steam left, but I want to rest my forces and refit my divisions. Recently i've developed Advanced Tank Destroyers, Semi-Modern Tanks, Semi-Modern Mechanized Divisions, along with some Turbo-Jet Engines.

The Axis will pay next year.



The overall European front by March 9th 1945. The Germans have gained unexpected strength in the far south taking more than half of Bulgaria since the start of the year and pushing far into Romania threatening Ploesti.

Thankfully I have some new toys coming to help with such occasions.



Over the winter I upgraded several dozen mechanized and armoured divisions - mostly the latter being my oldest tank divisions, ie. the BT series tanks.



By early April my push into Poland has gone far and we take Warsaw - triggering an uprising that we encourage. North of the city we've taken all of Eastern Prussia though everything to the south is going a bit less swimmingly - Bulgaria has been annexed by the Germans for instance.

Argh - had to do a do-over after that event chain as I went to release Poland as what I thought would be a puppet. Instead Poland is completely independent and all of my forces there are automatically strat redeployed back to Moscow.

Had to start over in February and this time I started my offensive a month and a half earlier. I also shifting significant forces to the south to drive into Slovakia, Hungary and German occupied Romania to great results as one can see...



On the 14th of the same month I annex Hungary reducing the number of Axis nations left to a mere three.





The following month. Quick movement into and past Hungary and Romania to the south. As well i've begun my drive into Yugoslavia with the aim of cutting off Axis forces from a direct land route to Berlin. To the west i've taken Prague and am close to surrounding Berlin itself.

Maybe two months before all major resistance is destroyed.



Near the start of July. I took Berlin in mid-May and have now got as far as the Dutch border and have just taken Essen where the Germans set up a provisional capital.

Further south Vienna and Venice have fell to my motorized forces leading to several enemy corps being trapped in Yugoslavia. With my forces this far ahead I went and made Czechoslovakia and Hungary independent.



The front at mid-July. At this point the campaign is Europe is essentially over.

I could keep going - perhaps invade China and the Japanese possessions - but that would be too easy. Instead i'm going to tackle an actual challenge. I'm going to switch to the American side and attempt to first take out Japan and then attack the Soviet Union with the goal of liberating Europe.

That concludes the first part of the AAR in which I do the setup. The Soviets control all of Europe - the Allies are in deep trouble without a foothold on the continent and facing a powerful Japanese Empire.

Therefore its time to switch to the American perspective to free the world.

July 14th, 1945

This is a continuation of my small Soviet AAR in which all of Europe is put under the heel of Stalin. The western allies did all of jack shit in Europe and in the Pacific where Japan has puppeted China and has pushed into India. Things look grim for the allies indeed - so i'll attempt to do the unpossible - rid the world of the Japanese and Soviet alliances by 1953.

First things first, FDR is dead replaced by Harry S. Truman.



First, I need to make some changes here. Henry Morgenthau is relieved as the Armaments Minister to make way for Henry J. Kaiser for an additional +5% IC. Next George C. Marshall gets moved to the position as Chief of Staff giving bonuses to artillery construstion as well as research towards armor and artillery. Omar Bradley becomes Chief of the Army for this armoured combat bonuses that we'll badly need in Europe. Finally we place Chester Nimitz and Henry Arnold in the Navy and Air Force posts.

The Bad Stuff



Next I go and check my forces and we get some pretty bad news.



Almost 400 divisions - sounds powerful but its not. Most of it is pure infantry divisions and many of them out of date. Likewise we have pitiful amounts of actual motorized divisions out there and those that we do have are likewise outdated.

Still the computer has begun work on even more infantry! Add to that some destroyers and submarine flotillas and we have a whole lot of useless.




But the news gets worse...



The AI having built over 300 infantry divisions has run out of manpower. Thats simply not going to do at all. Likewise my appointments have created a decent amount of dissent that will need to be reduced. For the meantime my industrial capacity will suffer somewhat and thats not good news because I'm lagging madly behind the Soviets! They have 500 IC to my 386 IC - not good. Over the next few years i'm going to need to improve that ratio if I hope to have any chance of winning.



Next we look at the tech progress and like all other parts so far it has some serious issues. Right now i've been researching aircraft carriers, hospital systems, mechanized divisions, and rocket interceptors. The last of these shows one of the bigger problems - the Americans have yet to research a practical turbojet engine. That may not be a huge problem against the Japanese, but news from out spies in the Soviet Union (namely myself) have brought back distrubing news that the Soviets have begun mass production of a reliable turbojet fighter.

But perhaps worst is the state of the American nuclear program that languished throughout the Presidency of Franklin Roosevelt. Little has been done to advance the research in the last several years and scientists are only not beginning to talk about an Isotope Seperation Facility - work that the Soviets completed years ago. No nuclear test facility yet exists. Clearly the program needs full funding without delay.

There are some bright spots - for one the industrial foundations of the nation are quite strong.



Oil production, radar, agricultural production, assembly line technology, and electronics are all quite advanced.

The Good Stuff



The Navy is absolutely huge with nearly 40 carriers, over 20 battleships and almost fifty cruisers. An additional 73 destroyer flotillas add to the impressive totals but most of this force as of now is deployed in the Atlantic for some unknown regions - including the majority of my carrier forces. The first thing to do is to redeploy them back into the Pacific to take care of any Japanese naval forces that have survived the last four years of the war and then take the fight to the enemy. Furthermore, many of my flotillas are quite elderly and will need to be decommisioned post haste, and many fleets are far too large and/or diverse to be fully effective. It should take several weeks for my forces to be repositioned for maximum effect. At least the foundation is good.



The airforce is likewise as good as the navy - for my estimates also the largest in the world. Around half of my squadrons are either interceptors or fighters. Generally I'm not a fan of interceptors because they have a smaller range and don't have the same kind of ground attack statistics that fighters have. As such i'm going to disband all of my interceptor groups as they are somewhat useless for the present. The rest of my airforce will be left alone but repositioned from there somewhat crappy starting areas.

What To Do First?

The first thing that comes to my attention is this...



Most of my land forces are stuck on the small Pacific Islands - 140 on Guam, 16 on Eniwetok, 88 on Majuro. Additionally there are 43 divisions on Iceland. This simply won't work. Since most of the divisions are merely leg infantry i'm disbanding most of them - hopefully leaving just motorized formations to hold these areas until further progress can be made.



Doing this reduces my army to only 86 divisions - mostly in the Pacific where most of my best forces are concentrated on Majuro - including most of my headquarter units, all of my armour, and most of the rest of my motorized forces. As soon as humanly possible i'll start to take those off the island and back to the an area where they can make a difference.

By now i've also begun redeploying my naval forces back to bases so that they might assemble into troop convoys and powerful carrier groups. The AI has made several decent groups of the latter sort, but all of my troop transports have been left alone to carry troops unescorted - that won't do. They head back to either Norfolk or San Diego.

My Initial Plan

For the time being on i'm on the defensive. I'm in no position to intervene in Europe with only a few divisions in the area - i'd attempt a landing in Brest but I don't have any landing craft in the area and as such France is undoubtedly to be under sole control of the Soviets.

Therefore my first goal is to take back the Philippines and those parts of Indonesia that have fallen to the Japanese - along with the defeat of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Once this is completed we shall take the offensive onto mainland Asia to release the pressure on the British on the Burma border.

My initial construction goals to begin this are just some factories and four new tank divisions with attached tank destroyers. Doing this still leaves me with almost 1600 manpower from all those disbanded units.



Though it shall be several months before we can even begin this operation so in shambles is our military infrastructure.

The Naval Contraction

While I do have a huge fleet many of the vessels are quite old as stated before - and when I do manage to collect my fleets together by the start of August its time to retire those vessels that just can't handle the strain of modern combat. This includes around a dozen old destroyer flotillas, most of my battleships, and one or two elderly carriers such as the Lexington that slow the entire fleet down.

The notable retirements include...

Carriers
USS Lexington
USS Independence

Battleships
USS Nevada
USS Arizona
USS Pennslyvania
USS Oklahoma
USS Tennessee
USS California
USS New Mexico
USS Idaho
USS Mississippi
USS Arkansas
USS New York
USS Texas

Cruisers
USS Richmond
USS Milwaukee
USS Memphis
USS Chicago
USS Northampton
USS Chester
USS Louisville
USS Portland



My plan with the remaining forces is to leave one smallish carrier group of three or four carriers to cover the North Sea and Baltic along with my remaining battleships and some of the older escort carriers. The other carriers and most advanced escorts will head into the Pacific to do battle with the Japanese along with most of my troop transports that will have attached escort carriers for protection.

Most of my carriers are Essex and Midway class - though by now my research has enabled me to construct United States-class vessels and research is almost completed on the Forrestal-class. I'm going to order that two of each be laid down. The first of these will be named Lexington and Ranger - the Lexington having just been retired and the original Ranger having been sunk by Japanese aircraft. In addition to this once research is made into more advanced battleship designs they will also be laid down for I have a fondness for the battlewagon.

Retrieval From Majuro

With my fleets now assembled and beginning to filter into Pearl Harbour my first task is to evacuate my forces from the island of Majuro and move them south to the area around Rabaul and Port Moresby where they can begin to assemble for my first offensive. The forces already on the island include eight motorized divisions, four mechanized divisions, four armoured divisions, seven marine divisions, and six headquarters units under the command of General Vandegrift. I'll be taking away everything except for the marine divisions and one headquarters units. Two headquarters units will move south and the remaining ones will make their way back to the United States to meet up with new army corps that are to form.





Tasked with achieving this are two taskforces under the commands of Admirals Spruance and Halsey. Spraunce will cover Halsey as his troop ships take off the mobile divisions. All together there will be six fleet carriers and several other capital ships involved in the operation along with another twelve fleet carriers can be brought in from Pearl if need be.

Everything goes swimmingly during the first part of the mission - with Halsey taking aboard fourteen divisions by the twentieth and starting south to Rabaul when a comminque arrives from Europe telling us that Nazi Germany has been annexed by the Soviets.



By now the Russian bear is pushing into both Vichy France and Italy - fully on the way to annexing both of those nations as well. Meanwhile the Soviets continue to release puppet states including Norway and Denmark. The latter of which we are forced to give back Greenland and Iceland areas that are to be taken quickly once we go to war with the Soviets.

At roughly the same time we finish work on the Semi-Modern Mechanized Division tech and begin work on nuclear technology.

By the 26th of August Halsey returns to Majuro to take the rest of our forces to Rabaul where they will be met with two further carrier groups under Admirals Nimitz and Turner who possess twelve fleet carriers fresh out of Pearl. Spruance will move north to Wake Island from where he will start hunting for the Japanese navy in conjuction with Admiral Kinkaid at Guam with four fleet carriers including the USS Abraham Lincoln.

Operation Stalwart - Part I

With my forces now safely in Australia and divided into two army groups and one army corps under Field Marshal Bradley I can plot my next movements - principally the invasion of Sumatra. Already I have eighteen divisions in Australia, but before the start of the invasion a further three marine divisions are to be brought in from Majuro, under the command of General Patch.


Bradley's First Army Corps

Following the movement of three marine divisions to Australia, all forces will be moved to Java where final preperations for the offensive will be made. While Nimitz retires to pick up the men under Patch, Admiral Turner will begin a naval combat sweep around the Java Sea with the aim of bringing the Japanese to a stand-up fight.



Since most of my future operations will be heavily based on naval forces and my dissent has now been removed all that IC I was poring into consumer goods is transferred to military production - including huge increases for the navy including eight new destroyer flotillas, four light cruisers, and four heavy cruisers.



A few days after this is done research into a basic rocket powered interceptor is completed - giving us access to the Northrop P-79A Flying Ram. While one might be somewhat excited about such advances the results aren't so good. While it does have superior attack values than the P-51 Mustang, its range is severly contracted due to fuel issues and for the current locations i'm fighting in that can't be helpful at all and so i'm not going to build any of these fighters keeping instead with prop driven planes.



Meanwhile during the weeks that this transpires my naval forces make their way back to Australia and by the 29th of October we start shuttling our troops over to Java where several Dutch and Iraqi divisions are already holding. The only action we see against the Japanese during the following week is a short skirmish with an enemy troop convoy in the straights between Java and Borneo. Without proper escorts the Japanese lose two transport vessels via the USS Bennington.



When our forces are ready to begin Operation Stalwart - the invasion of Sumatra - it is already November 12th. Together I have assembled twenty-six divisions under the overall command of Field Marshal Bradley and General Vandegrift.

Our forces will land in two places over the next week - the smaller marine force of two marine divisions at Oosthaven under General Patch. Three more under Vandegrift shall land at Palembang, and one last one will remove the Japanese from Bangka Island under Major General Putt. Following the success of these landings larger army forces will land and move north to take the rest of the island.

Operation Stalwart - Part II

Operation Stalwart begins on November 14th as marines under the command of Generals Vandegrift and Patch wade ashore Sumatra. Immediately their is strong forward progress against the two defending Japanese divisions, both of which are elderly compared to mine.



Victory is swift and when is seems as though our divisions will take the provinces quickly the Imperial Japanese Navy sees fit to intervene with a full force of battleships and cruisers in the Gaspar Straight. Halsey, in the process of unloading the two divisions under General Patch to Oosthaven is caught off guard with only one fleet carrier - the Yorktown - to defend the troopships. Immediately Admiral Turner and his five Essex-class fleet carriers are ordered south to help defend the landings.



Before they can arrive however the Japanese disengage after one of their heavy cruisers is damaged by the Yorktown's aircraft. The next day we establish contact with the Japanese again and this time Turner and his carriers are around to maul them. The heavy cruiser already damaged - the Myoko is sunk, and several other battleships are heavily damaged.

With the Japanese navy cowed into submission and retreating back to the Philippines the army forces under Bradley begin to land full sale in Oosthaven, following several days later by General Clark. Meanwhile on the other side of the island marines under Putt land at Bangka Island.



While Putt and his marines are given helpful assistance by tactical bombers to defeat the defenders, Bradley moves ahead on Sumatra with an offensive towards Padang an area defended by only two Japanese divisions.



On the 23rd Clark started his own offensive towards Dumai and it was met with quick success. With this we begin to remove our marine divisions back onto the landing ships for that they can begin Operation Flaming Arrows, the reacquisition of Singapore. By the 25th the first marines start filtering ashore near Singapore and at the same time in Sumatra, Bradley reaches Padang and strikes north towards Medan - effortlessly defeating the last Japanese division in the area.

Singapore itself falls on the 27th.



North of the province it seems there are only two defending Japanese divisions covering the way to Thailand. The remaining Japanese naval forces there quickly sortie out to find twelve of my fleet carriers blocking their way. While after several hours of battle they slip almost unharmed into the Malacca Strait we follow at flank speed while another two mechanized divisions are shuttled into Singapore by way of Halsey's transport fleet. Unfortunately the Japanese fleet manages to flee intact despite our best efforts - or so we think when they ambush us again in the Banka Straight as Halsey moves Patch's marines north to take Medan.



This is accomplished by the 4th of December at which point the island of Sumatra is declared cleared of all enemy activity and activity can now move north to either Thailand or the Phillippines.

Guangxi said:

Interesting idea. but there are a few uh-ohs on the soviet sreenshots.

Click to expand...

Oh yes, I forgot that bit on unpleasantness. But the Soviets annexed them so that issue is gone.

Leviathan07 said:

hmmm
methinks you ought to grab some land in europe, before it's all taken over by the soviets.

i'm thinking in particular of sardinia, sicily, corsica and crete... shoudl be doable with small forces.

also, depending on whether you can spare 6-8 divisions, algeria would be up for grabs as well before vichy kicks the bucket.

Click to expand...

The Russians have very little in the way of a navy - only three carriers, one battleship, and some minor escort vessels, along with no transports. At least they had that much a few months ago. I'm up to January '46 so far and all islands in the Med. are still under Vichy or Italian control.

Oh, but El Salvador took Sardinia recently. :rofl:

Recapture of the Philippines - Part I

With our forces now having the initiative in the Southwest Pacific its time to keep the pressure up. Right now we have two potential avenues for advance - up the Malay Peninsula to take Bangkok and hit the main Japanese armies from the rear - or invade the Philippines to give us a strong base for future advances. Frankly as our forces are still somewhat limited in the theatre this may prove to be the best course. Work will begin immediately to move our forces towards that region.

Meanwhile back in the Americas our diplomatic efforts to bring Latin American countries into our alliance has started to prove fruitful.



So far San Salvador, Colombia, and Uruguay have signed on to help our pursuit of liberalism and democracy. Further progress has been noted in regards to several other nations - including Mexico and Venezuela. While their entrance into the conflict is most appreciated from a moral standpoint, they bring little to the conflict that might prove useful asides from sheer numbers of infantry divisions. This should be somewhat mitigated if larger nations such as Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil are inticed into our coalition. Meanwhile, lend-lease shall be applied to give our new allies greater research options.

Several weeks later Venezuela agrees to enter the western allies - though both Mexico and Brazil are still rejecting our overtures.

Over the in the Pacific most of my combat divisions are making their way from Sumatra and Singapore to Guam where they will begin preperations for the assault on the Philippines which shall begin early in January. Landings are to be made at the same time at Legaspi and Cagayan.



General Vandegrift will land in the north at Legaspi, followed quickly by Field Marshal Bradley for the drive on Manila. At the same time, General Patch with three divisions will land at Cagayan with the support of General Clark and his army regulars. Following the occupation of Minadao, Patch and his marines will move to take the smaller islands such as Leyte.

Our movement of supplies and ships to Guam goes fell throughout much of December with our only contact with the Japanese Navy coming on the 30th. Only a small force consisting of a light carrier and a light cruiser they don't stand a chance. While the cruiser makes it away, the carrier doesn't.



A further Japanese destroyer flotilla is destroyed by the second week of January when the first marine divisions board the troopships and begin making their way to the Philippines.

Recapture of the Philippines - Part II

Troopships making their way to the Philippines are brought under air attack on the 14th of January.



While the troops are not hit in any drastic way the USS Baltimore, one of the escorting heavy cruisers is badly damaged. Three further vessels - the escort carrier Bellau Wood, heavy cruiser Columbus, and light cruiser Vicksburg are also damaged in the attack. Having already mauled Halsey the bombers make a further attack against the fleet under Nimitz. Among others the Midway-class carrier Theodore Roosevelt is hit several times, but again the troopships are not hit.

Despite the problems our forces reach the Philippines by the 15th, and the following day both Vandegrift and Patch begin landing on the beaches. Immediate success is seen in Cagayan to the south where Patch finds the defending marine division harshly beat up by our bombings running from Palau to the west. Progress in the north is almost as quick.

Patch has his forces fully on the island by the 18th and finds the Japanese quickly counterattacking from the west.

The Japanese, already running low on supplies, fail in their bid to throw the marines off the island and with both landing zones secure for the moment by naval forces make a dash back to Guam to pick up Bradley and Clark. With them they'll bring some of our newest toys - the 5th Armoured Division has been reequipped with new Pershing tanks.

Boarding the ships on the 21st these new forces reach the Philippines on the 24th. The following day Bradley begins moving towards Manila with full steam ahead. Vandegrift is to be removed and sent to invade the smaller islands such as Leyte. Bradley makes quick movement towards the capital, moving towards Lamon Bay. The only forces opposing me are a few Japanese infantry divisions with precious little anti-tank guns to stop my advancing Pershings and Shermans. The enemy could only hold back the American advance for a day.

By the time Bradley broke through the defenses at Lamon Bay, Vandegrift had already boarded his troops back on their vessels and began landing on Samar. Further south General Clark had begun moving to the west to crush the five Japanese divisions holed up at Zamboanga.

While both attacks are successful, General Vandegrift and his three marine divisions take heavy losses at Samar where Japanese strength was widely underestimated - eventually shown to be two full strength divisions. Nevertheless seven Japanese divisions are destroyed in fierce fighting. Two days later Bradley smashed towards Manila with full speed - in his way a mere seven divisions composed of Japanese, Chinese, and Thai forces. Nothing can stop Bradley as he sweeps asides the defenders. He entered the city on the 30th, the same day Patch swept aside the last resistance on Leyte.

Back on the other side of the planet our diplomatic efforts finally pay dividends in regards to Mexico - also joining the allies on the 30th of January. At the same time news from the Mediterranean tells me that El Salvador has managed to take Sardinia from the almost totally dejected Italians. To keep up steam i'm sending one of my new mobile corps to Tripoli for operations in the Mediterranean - hopefully to take Sicily before the Soviets do.

Back in the Philippines Bradley has kept up steam - moving forward from Manila to attack two Japanese divisions at Clark Field. A few days later on the 3rd of February Clark down in Mindanao attacked and destroyed the last two Japanese divisions on the island at Davao. By this point my forces are somewhat exhausted from weeks of harsh fighting - especially my six marine divisions and for now it seems as though they need a break before the campaign can continue - even Bradley seems to need a break with Japanese forces stalling him at Clark Field.