So, from the last update, you know Portugal’s war has passed through its brief respite from fervent activity, and it’s again engaged in Egypt, Somalia, Australia, New Guinea and the Caribbean. I was going to group these screenshots together by theater, but there are too many theaters, and it would seem peculiar! So here goes – this will give you an idea of how many directions my own attention is being drawn at this stage in the war.
In the 1st week of March, 1942, Portuguese troops march into Cairo. The British troops defending Alexandria appear not to be in an offensive mood, and the Italians are keeping a watchful eye on them. The Italians themselves don’t appear quite moved to cross the river delta against Alexandria by themselves, and so we set our own troops on a tour across northern Egypt for the month of March, seizing oilfields and other resource locations, as well as the entire western bank of the Suez Canal. Then we return to Alexandria.
We have, now, scouted the entire northern, eastern and western coastlines of Australia, and have determined that every seaport is guarded by strong enemy garrisons except for Perth, in far southwestern Australia. Moreover, there do not appear to be a great number of Australian army units in the region, and so we begin to think we might be able to accomplish a landing, and defend a perimeter long enough to bring reinforcements in.
Some of our generals, mind you, think this is stupid! There are enough Australian troops within a months’ march that they can begin to whittle us down, and by the time our reinforcements get there they either won’t have a base to arrive at, or they will just take the place of the spent troops they’re coming to reinforce, and we’ll never get the upper hand. This, of course, is considered, and not dismissively. We’re gambling here. But when haven’t we gambled in this war, eh?
The first landing is made immediately to the north of Perth, which itself is defended only by a garrison brigade. Mind you, we only have 2 brigades in our own garrison we land, and so it’s not like we outnumber them significantly. But this army is meant mostly just to hold the territory. We land another division further up the coast to the north, at Carnarvon. This division begins stairstepping down the coast toward Perth. You might ask why we did this, and don’t think I didn’t wonder to myself as I come upon it in the AAR a year or two after I played this! But if I had to guess it’s because I figured I wanted a larger base from which to move out. The bases on this huge island are far enough from each other that I didn’t want to move against Darwin, or someplace else, and leave behind a mere perimeter around my only conquest. And I may also have wanted a “canary” – an advance warning system – to let me know when the Australians were starting to close in on Perth. I would have been concerned about missing that threat, because my attention is so scattered to multiple theaters at the moment.
On 13 March, the attack was initiated. The enemy was outnumbered 2:1, and my general was clearly more able than the guy they had in charge. These things, combined with the landing of another division (probably the one from Carnarvon) to the south of the city, made me believe I would eventually prevail.
In Somaliland, remember, there were 2 (I later found a third) British divisions, still – isolated, but not toothless. I begin operations to reduce them. As in Alexandria, the Italians seem content to let me make the offensive moves, as they don’t apparently (and haven’t, over 3 years) feel confident enough of victory to move against these guys.
On 19 March, the Australians attempt a landing against Port Moresby. A massive fleet appeared, and an Australian division, which apparently had made the crossing bunked one to each stateroom. If this attack is allowed to continue, I feel I will lose. My divisions are still not fully recovered from the campaign which gave us most of New Guinea in the first place. And so we call in the Condor bombers to attack the enemy fleet.
The Condors do remarkably well, despite enemy air cover from fighters based in Darwin (or somewhere – I suppose Darwin – seems a long way – Darwin and Brisbane appear to be equidistant). The naval bombers are able to severely reduce the strengths and operational stati of several transport flotillas, and the attack withdraws.
Despite our multiplicitous engagements elsewhere, we still have a couple of transport-division pairs free about the Indian Ocean, and so our troops who had recently secured Yemen move into Abu Dhabi. Now, this seemed like a quiet theater with not a lot of opposition, but as soon as the transports sidled up to the wharf at Abu Dhabi, British naval bombers hit us, and darn near sunk the whole flotilla in one attack! They went from 95% to 3% in an instant.
This had the potential, of course, to end our Persian Gulf wanderings. Moreover, it wasn’t quite clear whether our ships would be safer in port, or at sea, or our troops safer on land or evacuating with our transports! I pondered this for long enough that it appeared a subsequent attack would not totally destroy us, and so I waited.
Those pesky Canadians are still trying to invade the Bahamas Islands! A destroyer flotilla and some transports made appearances again and again, and our heavy cruiser did what it could to damage them and turn them back. Again, I remained concerned that repeated attacks could sap our strength and cause us to lose these islands. So I began fishing for another plan that didn’t involve the Condors, which were busy in the South Pacific now…
At the very end of March, we were finally done securing northern Egypt, and it was time to attack Alexandria. Gen. Andrade led the attack, which by itself was woefully inadequate. We hoped that, over time, given rest for ourselves, and hopefully assistance from the Italians, we would eventually overwhelm the British 58th Infantry. We were happy to find they were actually out of supply. Probably owing to the control of the Mediterranean by the Italian Navy, or else the British lack of shipping due to our constant raids, or Germany’s U-boats, or a combination of these factors.
Also, that week, we received word that the Australian defenders of Perth had surrendered! The below screenshot emphasizes to you just how much of Australia Portugal has taken in just one month! And… ironically… how little! That’s a good base to own – basically the whole western coast – but I still have no guarantees of how well this campaign will go. The Australians sure seem to outnumber us. And those distances are VAST! I’ll have to cross, literally, half the continent, along either the north or south coasts, to reach another seaport of note.
After a few days of indecision, in the Persian Gulf, it was decided that neither our troops nor our transports need remain as targets in Abu Dhabi. The British had little hope of mustering troops to retake it, and so they would do little good as defenders. We decided to target Kuwait, at the end of the Gulf. This would gain us yet more of the British oil producing provinces, and would perhaps hasten the defeat of Britain at the hands of Germany (I am still expecting that Germany is the heavy lifter in this war, despite the fact we little bumblebees have been the most frenetic and numerously successful, of late!).
On 18 April, Kuwait falls to Portuguese troops. There is an Iraqi army division nearby. Strangely, they do not seem to be at war with us. However, the British have military access through their lands, so we must still expect they may try to retake Kuwait.
Around this time, we also achieve a technological advance in Oil Refinement, which may come quite in handy, considering how low our reserves of Fuel are, and how expensive it is to purchase these things from Germany (which is where we are currently purchasing a good amount of Fuel, at great expense!).
By mid April, Somalia has become complicated. We reduced the northernmost British division some, which was now at maybe 30-40% strength and low organization. We decided, rather than sit and wait for developments, that it would be worthwhile to isolate this division by marching to the south. There had been a British division in captured Italian Ethiopia, but they began running north, and we had a brief skirmish with them and defeated them, which forced them into this isolated pocket which we now created.
As you’ve seen elsewhere, Portugal makes a living off of isolating British divisions and pestering them until they surrender.
The Australians have been, during April, as persistent at attacking Port Moresby as the Canadians have been in the Caribbean. They return for yet another attack, which we send bombers against. Our defenders are having trouble recovering from each attack, having little time to recoup losses. And yet overall we’re winning. Moreover, further to the west, another division is harrying an Australian HQ unit, pushing them south along the coast.
Those Australians in the north, west of Lae, are isolated without supply, and so they are not moving. We will come back around for them. But now that Perth has become a priority, there will be no further reinforcements coming into New Guinea – these guys are on their own. If they can hold out against the amphibious invasions, they should be able to secure the whole island eventually.