So, here's how it essentially all went. First, my army:
- Army 1 | Infantry | Facing GER
- Artillery Corps, 2x
- 4x INF INF INF ART
- 1x INF INF INF ENG
- Anti-tank Corps, 1x
- 4x INF INF INF AT
- 1x INF INF INF ENG
- Marine Corps, 1x
- 4x MAR MAR MAR MAR
- 1x MAR MAR MAR ENG
- Motorized Corps, 1x
- 4x MOT MOT MOT AC
- 1x MOT MOT MOT ENG
- Army 2 | Infantry | Facing GER
- Artillery Corps, 2x
- 4x INF INF INF ART
- 1x INF INF INF ENG
- Anti-Tank Corps, 2x
- 4x INF INF INF AT
- 1x INF INF INF ENG
- Motorized Corps, 1x
- 4x MOT MOT MOT AC
- 1x MOT MOT MOT ENG
- Army 3 | Infantry | Facing ITA
- Artillery Corps, 4x
- 4x INF INF INF ART
- 1x INF INF INF ENG
- Alpine Corps, 1x
- 4x ALP/MTN ALP/MTN ALP/MTN ALP/MTN
- 1x ALP/MTN ALP/MTN ALP/MTN ENG
- Army 4 | Armor | Flexible
- 3x Medium Armored Corps
- 4x ARM MOT MOT SPART
- 1x ARM MOT MOT ENG
- 2x Light Armored Corps
- 4x LARM MOT MOT AC
- 1x LARM MOT MOT ENG
Airforce and navy were just the initial forces.
The opening offensive:
I opened up a broad offensive no longer just focused on the Rhineland, but into Baden as well. Things progressed well and quickly - with the higher officer ratio and rushed 1940 Op. Level Org. tech, I had attack delays of no more than ~80 hours and a good level of ORG to keep my units in good order even after many consecutive attacks. I believe that, due to my placement of more troops directly on the border, Germany doubled up units on some provinces where in previous attempts they only placed one - might be an optimization for next time to leave some units a province back to lull Germany into leaving the border less defended, but it was not a major issue. My airforce was used sparingly, mainly on missions in Baden to speed up the move to Stuttgart, but given my lack of planes, they did not get to do much before the Luftwaffe forced me to retreat from the air. As you can see, Germany has already pulled many troops away from Poland to address my attack, and the Brits have landed a couple MAR divisions at Kiel. At this point I was not hopeful for their success, but that would change as Germany's attention to my advance allowed the UK to reinforce the landing properly.
My armies advance further into the Rhineland and Baden, with Stuttgart and Koln on the verge of capture. In the East, Poland loses ground, with Warsaw now on the frontlines. Significantly, the UK has sent a large force to reinforce their initial invasion, including armor. They would never be dislodged from Kiel from this point onward, though they were still too sparing with reinforcements to breakout from the area. This is approximately when I decided I would not stick to the Neckar-Rhine-Ruhr line, as Germany was clearly incapable of responding to my offensive, and I figured the best chance at overall victory would be to link up with the Brits and cut off the Germans in the northwest.
Poland falls, but my offensive has shattered all organized lines of defense and begins to breakthrough to undefended territory, particularly in the south where Germany simply cannot respond. The British have managed to slightly expand their control into Hamburg, but they will be dislodged back to Kiel shortly. The distance to their beachhead is rapidly shrinking, and soon, cutting off the Germans in East Friesland will no longer just be a distant strategic objective.
The pocket is almost closed, with assistance now being lent by the Belgians and Dutch (the latter of which the German AI foolishly brought into the war themselves). I have almost completed the conquest of Bavaria, and I am on the verge of overrunning the German defenders in the Austrian Alps. The Weser River was not even a speedbump for my armies, and we are closing in on the Elbe. At this point, I disbanded a corps of Infantry on my alpine front with Italy to free up some manpower to reinforce. In hindsight, a more optimal build would likely keep the Italian front minimalistic, without even a whole army - A corps of ALP/MTN and INF might be all that is necessary to hold the line, and the freed IC could have been used to build some planes. But we certainly are not suffering too much from this misstep.
The Frisian Noose closes around the Nazi throat. The destruction of this pocket will make Germany's defeat inevitable (if it were not already), freeing 1-2 Corps for the final push to Berlin in the north and denying Germany about 2 Corps of their own. In the south, Munich has fallen and the symbolic town of Branau Am Inn, the birthplace of the now teetering dictator Hitler, is on the verge of capture. We have reached the Elbe at multiple locations and are on the doorstep of Leipzig and Dresden. The Saxon cities and their neighboring River are the final major obstacles before we can begin a victorious march on Berlin. Meanwhile, the British remain mostly confined to Kiel and the neighboring provinces, occasionally assisting our attacks but mostly just preserving their beachhead.
We have achieved control of the left bank of the Elbe, and even crossed it near Rostock. Saxony is under our control, and Austria simply is abandoned. The old Czech fortifications are giving us some grief but are only a temporary hindrance. The Frisian pocket has been pushed towards the border with Denmark and will not last long. The music has almost stopped for the Third Reich, hastening towards the end as the French army closes in on Hitler, who is now rumored to be confined entirely to his bunker, either in despair or deposition.
Vienna has fallen, and the Elbe defenses are broken. Berlin can only wait for our arrival. Prague proves a tough nut to crack, but we are rapidly outflanking the Vltava River from undefended Austria and will not be denied - unless Germany capitulates fist. In the north, Germany makes a desperate move and attacks Denmark, their demands of the Danes for transit and unimpeded naval extrication to Pomerania unheeded. No Dane will see have to see combat however, as the battle to finally annihilate this pocket is underway. Hitler's Little War, as it has come to be called (alongside the more derisive "Hitler's Grand Folly"), is rapidly approaching its end. For the final push, I disband a few more divisions to top off my offensive's manpower.
The Battle of Berlin is underway. Battered into total disorganization from the virtually uninterrupted offensive from day 1 of the war, Germany can only muster a pitiful garrison to face the French onslaught. There is no one to rescue Hitler - the Frisian Pocket has surrendered, the Slovakian capital is under siege, and the bulk of the Germany army is tied down in Silesia and occupied Czechoslovakia. It is Götterdämmerung, but only for Hitler and his cadre of Nazi stooges. In French-occupied Germany, the shock of such a quick and total defeat has ripped away the Nazi aura of invincibility. Adulation and Hitler's cult of personality have given way to embarrassment and revilement towards the fools who led Germany to such humiliation, and many Germans simply hope it's all over before Christmas.
Hitler's Grand Folly reaches its conclusion. Bratislava holds out, defended by a German expeditionary garrison, but it will not last long. Nazi dreams of European domination meet a disastrous end, and oppositely, our fine soldiers have won peace for Europe in glorious fashion. Now, they return home for Christmas. Units up and down the frontline sing a mix of patriotic songs and Christmas carols at the news of the Fall of Berlin and Germany's unconditional surrender. Adolf Hitler is captured, with wounds from an apparently unsuccessful suicide attempt. France and the UK discuss what to do with him, and it is decided that he will face trial in a reconstituted, liberal-democratic German state for corruption and various other political offences committed domestically, while a joint Polish, French and British tribunal will investigate and prosecute crimes committed by the Germans on Polish soil, including the discovered (but in this timeline, quite nascent) Jewish ghettos. He will have plenty of time to write a sequel to Mein Kampf in his next, much longer prison sentence.
Some extrapolation based on this outcome:
To formalize the end of the war, the Allies and Germans sign the Treaty of Koln. Austria and Czechoslovakia are restored while France formally annexes the Saarland, The Netherlands annex East Frisia, and Denmark absorbs all of Schleswig-Holstein. Poland is given the southern half of East Prussia while its western Border with Germany is restored, and it is awarded most of Silesia. Poland campaigns hard for more, but the prevailing thought amongst the negotiators is that harsher terms would not comport with the short duration of the war and the prevailing attitude that the war was primarily Hitler's doing. France and the UK propose generous financial compensation, which Poland reluctantly accepts, having little leverage to demand more. Germany is disarmed, but the issue of governance precipitates debate. The UK floats a constitutional monarchy with a parliament for Germany, preferring the head of the House of Hanover Ernst Augustus as a figurehead Kaiser. France flatly opposes any movement towards such an arrangement and instead pushes for a Republic modeled on its own constitution. France gets most of what it wants, being the primary contributor to victory with most of the occupying forces. France oversees the first election wherein the CDU led by Konrad Adenauer as Prime Minister wins comfortably. Notably, Louis-Ferdinand of the Hohenzollern Dynasty would eventually become a political force in post-war Germany, and he would go on to nearly become President, but his refusal to renounce any claim to the German throne would cause Adenauer to publicly repudiate his candidacy and his support in the Chamber of Deputies collapsed.
The Allies now turn to consider the rest of Europe. France stands as the preeminent land power on the continent, and perhaps even the world. With the defeat of Nazi Germany nearly entirely by her hand, certainly on land, France is eager to put its fingers on the geopolitical scale and push for more democratization of Europe, with eyes towards a more unified European entity. However, her designs for a French dominated, liberal European bloc will create friction with the British, who are not eager to rock the boat in the aftermath of Hitler's defeat. In the years to come, Churchill will work to improve relations with Franco and Mussolini in a realpolitiking bid, while France will embark on a punitive and restorative mission in Hungary to return Czechoslovakia's stolen territory and reaffirm the Treaty of Trianon. With the Nazis defeated, and the French imposing harsh terms with naught but diplomatic hand wringing from the British, Hungary has no one to turn to. Horthy is forced to hold elections at a later date, and they will be extremely tense. In Yugoslavia, Prince Paul will step aside for Peter II, who will align with the Brits owing to some Anglophilia after tutorship in Surrey and general wariness of the rising French tide to the north.
Despite the fall of Germany, the USSR continues to act in accordance with the map drawn by Molotov-Ribbentrop. The Winter War ends with historical territorial concessions, and there would be no Continuation War. The Baltics are given an ultimatum, and while France is certainly high on her successes in Hitler's Little War, she is far from fresh-faced and does not deem it time to risk a confrontation with Stalin. The British are similarly hesitant and opt for economic sanctions. Behind the scenes, both powers arm insurgencies in the occupied states, but their support is not cooperative. Owing to proximity, Lithuanian insurgents would be dominated by the pro French faction, while Latvia and Estonia by the pro-British. On the Black Sea, the USSR would lay down another ultimatum concerning Bessarabia, but the Romanians hold firm - hostilities commence, and push the Comintern closer to war with the strained Western Alliance as the British and French supply arms to the Romanian military. A revised Anti-Comintern pact is signed between the British, French, Polish, Spanish, and Italians, but the obligations are wishy-washy thanks to French-British disputes, and France outright refuses to enter the shared command structure laid out by the treaty. A secret clause in the pact states that should a war with the USSR erupt, any negotiated peace must return Poland's eastern territories, but again, the obligations for each party to join such a war are debatable, particularly with respect to France. Germany is admitted as an observer, being disarmed themselves.
And what of the United States? Japan was long ago victorious in the Second Sino-Japanese War and while it was squeezed by the American oil embargo, the end to formal hostilities in East Asia provided relief to the Imperial economy and set the stage for a tense but peaceful standoff between Japan and the United States. In European affairs, the US would be content to mostly stay on its side of the Atlantic with a pro-British lean, and only signed on to the new Anti-Comintern Pact as an observing member, pledging to provide economic and material support from afar. Its navy would expand rapidly in its standoff with the Japanese, whose Empire would start to feel the heat of rising rebellious sentiment in its conquered territories, neglected in the thick of the naval arms race and burning with resentment through years of harsh treatment. FDR serves 3 terms before declaring he will not run for a 4th, and his domestically oriented Vice President Henry Wallace comfortably beats the hawkish Truman in the 1944 primaries and narrowly defeats Thomas E. Dewey in the general election. Not long after inauguration, China re-opens hostilities with Japan, aiming to reclaim its coastline, presenting a major foreign policy crisis to the dovish President Wallace. The oil embargo once again becomes a central issue to the Japanese leadership, and the Pacific standoff is edging closer to outright conflict.
Europe's increasingly fragile peace is dealt a terrible blow as Horthy is finally made to hold the agreed upon elections by occupying General De Gaulle on questionable authority, and they erupt into street violence between extreme left and right wingers, infuriated by the parade of humiliations visited upon them. A center-left party gains a plurality and declares its intention to seek a compromise government amid the chaos, but the center right refuses. Rebuffed, they make overtures to the far left, which precipitates an escalation in violence from the right to organized seizure of administrative buildings, eventually leading to confrontation with the Hungarian military. Sides are taken, and the civil war is on. The Soviets see a chance to get back at the West for arming insurgencies in its territorial gains, while the UK and France struggle to coordinate a response given their distaste for either side in the fight. De Gaulle wants to support the electorally defeated center right against all comers but is ordered to leave. What follows is unclear, but either out of malicious compliance or genuine misunderstanding he takes his occupying troops with him, leaving plenty of space for the fires of the new civil war to grow unabated. Stalin reconfigures his efforts in Romania to create a corridor through to Hungary. The West escalates its support to its insurgent allies and the Romanian military, and cobbles together lukewarm support for the right wing in Hungary. As Stalin threatens to breach the Pannonian Basin, France and Britain become increasingly worried over the prospect of the Red Army running wild over Central Europe. They lobby President Wallace to become a fully-fledged member of the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the UK tries to convince France to join the unified command structure and make firm commitments, but both efforts meet resistance. Germany's rearmament is considered but France is reluctant, and Adenauer wants Germany's pre-war western borders restored before making any further commitments to the pact anyway. Furthermore, he secretly relays that any return of Poland's eastern territories should be balanced with the restoration of Germany's pre-war eastern borders.
The Comintern is bearing down on Europe, and the West is hungover from its victory in Hitler's Little War. Will they rouse to meet the challenge, or is their short-lived post war order going to crumble under the weight of their own squabbles? Will Mussolini and Franco make good on their own commitments or make a spiritual sequel to Molotov-Ribbentrop and turn on the Franco-British "alliance?" Can President Wallace mobilize the United States despite his own dovishness to face the Japanese and Comintern, or perhaps just one, or will he shrink and confront neither? Will Stalin be able to roll over Europe anyway, no matter how well Europe and the United States can come together? Time will tell.
