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Aaaaah, Italy... It's one of the most interesting powers to play in a WW2 wargame. Don't forget to equip the army with Ansaldo self-propelled guns, these were quite ahead of their time. And there are the Piaggio-108 heavy bombers of course! 
Germany and Italy could split the tasks between them with Italy concentrating on building a fleet and not much else and letting the Germans build army and airforce.
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Aaaaah, Italy... It's one of the most interesting powers to play in a WW2 wargame. Don't forget to equip the army with Ansaldo self-propelled guns, these were quite ahead of their time. And there are the Piaggio-108 heavy bombers of course!
Italy has its own issues. Since I decided that all of my Axis nations should be working on massive infrastructure processes to keep from overwhelming the AI too much, Italy has quite the deficit.
While that would be a good strategy, I tried not to do terribly much "on the nose" things like that. Germany wants a fleet of some sort, and Italy wants an army.
More than a little. Her generalship leaves much to be desired as well!
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The Piaggio-108! Now there is a properly Italian aircraft; an unusual idea, terribly executed. Horribly bodged engines (a badly nailed together copy of a copy), an utterly impractical concept (a four engine bomber with a 4" gun in the belly) and such terrible unreliability that it killed more Italians in crashes than it killed enemies in combat. This is the kind of useless magnificence that is being lost in the Germanification of Italy.Aaaaah, Italy... It's one of the most interesting powers to play in a WW2 wargame. Don't forget to equip the army with Ansaldo self-propelled guns, these were quite ahead of their time. And there are the Piaggio-108 heavy bombers of course!
The Ansaldo SPGs were actually quite handy, just later and not as good as the 25-pdr Bishop.
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II: 6. Burying the Versailles Treaty: German and Italian Military Expansion
As 1937 continued, much of the expansion of the Heer was based around attachments or modernization efforts which had been ordered the year before. Early in the year, six brigade sets of field artillery were activated into their respective divisions. This followed the initial Truppenamt system of divisions receiving the numbered brigade attachment that corresponded to their division number. Thus, when the 11th through the 16th Field Artillery brigades were activated, it was into the 11. through 16. Infantrie-Divisions, respectively. Throughout the course of the year, twenty-three field artillery brigades were activated. Similarly, four air defense artillery--or Flugabwehrartillerie--brigades were activated, these formations were all held at the Armee and Armeekorps level.
A Pz.Kpfw.IIIA during testing and acceptance trials, 1937. This tank would
form the backbone of the Panzerwaffe until the acceptance of the Pz.Kpfw.IIIB
In early April, the 4., 5., and 6. Panzer-Divisions received their pioneer brigades. These brigades, designed to prepare the way for the armor as well as attack hardened fortifications and provide defensive works, had already been assigned to the 1., 2. and 3. Panzer-Divisions. In exercises, this vastly improved the mobility of the panzers and permitted them to appear where the enemy was not expecting them, past formerly limiting terrain. Guderian activated Panzerbrigade 10 in a ceremony on 5 July. Speaking to the assembled crowd in front of a rank of brand new Panzer IIIs, Guderian spoke of how proud he was of the panzerwaffe and how effective they would be at keeping the Reich safe. By early August, with the activation of Pioneerbrigade 8 and 10, the Heer boasted a full ten of the new pattern Panzer-Divisions; the final two cavalry brigades having been issued their sets of Panzer IIIs and reflagged as Panzerbrigade 7 and 8.
The Duke of Windsor reviewing former SA troops assigned to the West Wall.
His continued support of Germany proved to be a diplomatic embarrassment to
Whitehall.
The process of subsuming the SA into the Heer which had begun in 1935 continued as the line members were formed into divisions in the reserve army. Over the course of the year, eleven such divisions--each of which consisted of two infantry brigades, a field artillery and air defense artillery brigade--were brought into service, and those formations manned the Westwall to relieve the regular army units which had held those positions originally. In late April the first special tasked infantry brigades to Corps headquarters was formalized and activated. The Corps headquarters units were--with an eye towards the experiences gained from the annual exercises--seen as too exposed and in need of a corps reserve to fill any gaps in the line or defend territory under their control. A full regular infantry division, 37. Infantrie-Division, was activated as well.
Goering at the commissioning ceremony for LTG 3. His depression
over political problems disappeared when he got to see the Luftwaffe
he was building for Germany.
Over the course of the first three months of 1937, the Luftwaffe reintegrated another batch of Ju-52s which had been fitted as bombers into a airlift capable asset organized as Luftrasportergeschwader 2, assigned to I. Fliegerkorps as Detachment 2. As participation in the Spanish Civil War had shown, being able to deposit troops into the fight from an unexpected direction--from the sky, in this case--was a capability that the Wehrmacht needed. A further 100 Bf109Ds were supplied to Jagdgeschwader 6 to round out XXIII. Fliegerkorps. Five days later, on 10 July, Goering attended a commissioning event for refurbished Ju-52s delivered to Luftransportergeschwader 3 and the first delivery of the Ju-87 Stuka dive-bombers to Sturzkampfgeschwader (SKG) 1. By the end of the month, the foundation of another interceptor Fliegerkorps had been formed.
The light cruiser Albatross passing through the Kiel canal, 1937. A member
of the Leipzig-class light cruisers, she would be lost in 1942 at the hands of
HMS Suffolk.
The Kriegsmarine commissioned three of their light cruisers on 6 August. The Albatross, Konigsberg and Mainz were all of the latest Leipzig-class and their commissioning was led by Raeder. These were the last of the six light cruisers ordered in 1936 to escort the battlecruisers Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Von Der Tann on their commerce raiding missions, which were commissioned 13 December. As Hitler said in a speech, the Versailles treaty was well and truly dead and buried.
The last group of the Navigatori-class destroyers after being
Placed in commission in 1937.
Italy’s spending was mostly restricted to continuing the infrastructure projects initiated the year prior. With so little money left over, the Regio Esercito claimed much of it for their modernization plan. What little money remained from that went to the Regia Marina in the form of twelve destroyers being placed in commission in 1937.
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Author's Note: I just want to be done with the year 1937! Whew! Regardless, I need to go back over what appendices I need to throw together to be fully complete.
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If Germany builds much larger ships they will have to do something about that bridge.
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Panzer III.A as the backbone of the Panzer forces? With the OTL suspension? Well that is Blitzkreig dead, the tanks will all break down shortly after crossing the border!
Albatross is a be-cursed name for a German ship; the first one sank in a storm, the second got shot up by the Russians and crashed into a Swedish rock and the third was shot at by Norwegians and beached in Oslo. With that record it shouldn't be a big surprise it got sunk.
Albatross is a be-cursed name for a German ship; the first one sank in a storm, the second got shot up by the Russians and crashed into a Swedish rock and the third was shot at by Norwegians and beached in Oslo. With that record it shouldn't be a big surprise it got sunk.
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Quite true!
Panzer III.A as the backbone of the Panzer forces? With the OTL suspension? Well that is Blitzkreig dead, the tanks will all break down shortly after crossing the border!
Albatross is a be-cursed name for a German ship; the first one sank in a storm, the second got shot up by the Russians and crashed into a Swedish rock and the third was shot at by Norwegians and beached in Oslo. With that record it shouldn't be a big surprise it got sunk.
Indeed... well, the bird was lucky until someone shot the damn thing (yes, I've read a poem, try not to faint). So turning that name into something someone should use on a ship seems just begging for bad luck. And sailors are inherently superstitious.
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Albatross is a be-cursed name for a German ship; the first one sank in a storm, the second got shot up by the Russians and crashed into a Swedish rock and the third was shot at by Norwegians and beached in Oslo. With that record it shouldn't be a big surprise it got sunk.
Well, usually it doesn’t matter too much what Germany or Italy call their ships - they get sunk anyway, whether by the Ancient Mariner or more prosaic means!
Though perhaps with a real live person in charge of both this time they may do somewhat better.- 1
You made me laugh so hard
Anyway Italy should build as much ships as possible as the war for the Mediterranean is a naval war!
At least to improve practicals, than you can do some infantry divisions, btw are you keeping the binary system or will you use 3xINF? You can trust me, in one game I made Italy the greatest naval force in the world, with more than 200 ships by the fall of the USA
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Well, usually it doesn’t matter too much what Germany or Italy call their ships - they get sunk anyway, whether by the Ancient Mariner or more prosaic means!
They may... we'll see!
You made me laugh so hard
Anyway Italy should build as much ships as possible as the war for the Mediterranean is a naval war!
You can trust me, in one game I made Italy the greatest naval force in the world, with more than 200 ships by the fall of the USA
I've built up Italy somewhat, but not nearly that much! I will be using the 3xINF model, at least at some points. I didn't build many divisions as it was.
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You can do much better than the AI trust me, I am just writing a thread where I will show a coop game I had with ItalyWell, usually it doesn’t matter too much what Germany or Italy call their ships - they get sunk anyway, whether by the Ancient Mariner or more prosaic means!
the-way-to-the-thread
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Yes sometimes one just wants to progress onto the next stage of the game/AAR.
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I guess the Regia Aeronautica will be left at the bottom until it is too late... as in real life
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I think it's because the superstructure looks so small compared to the size of the hull. It gives the impression the ship hasn't finished growing up yet.
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So, let me get this straight.. The Germans will have binary Divisions (SA) on the SIegfried line, and the Italians have only triangular divisions? What is this world, it's gone all topsy turvy...
It rises up so you can see where you're going, and it's retracted when you need to get under a bridge... I'm sure the Kriegsmarine could expand on this so even their biggest, tallest ships fit under that bridge...
I would expect that the Kriegsmarine would just demand the superstructure of the ships to be partially retractable into the hull... like this
It rises up so you can see where you're going, and it's retracted when you need to get under a bridge... I'm sure the Kriegsmarine could expand on this so even their biggest, tallest ships fit under that bridge...
That actually makes a lot of sense, and it does look cute... but would the ship perform better with a larger superstructure?... who am I kidding, of course not...
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That, and the round turrets look toy-like. Will @Wraith11B 's Supermarina keep the idea of equipping them with a seaplane?
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