"Surprise attack"
Frans B. van Blokland was woken up by sharp ring of his telephone. Who could call at this hour, he wondered. Monotonous voice in the receiver dispelled all doubts. Frans hung on the phone and cursed at himself. What could Hirohito possibly need from him at this hour. Frans ordered his housekeeper to wake up driver and prepare car. Luckily capital wasn't the city that never sleeps and he get to the Imperial palace without any hindrance. To his surprise he find that everybody was already there. Machida, Le Quan, Satoru, even Chief of Navy Mohanna was here, despite the fact he had meeting with Khalil el-Wazir at Singapore next, or more like this afternoon. He greeted everyone and sit down at last empty chair.
Gentlemen, we have a situation, started Hirohito. As some of you may already now yesterday, in 11th May France has declared war on Oceania.
As we predicted moths ago, interrupted Frans, did I win the bet ? What you may not know, continued Hirohito, is that Finland, Georgia and Prussia have declared war too. Room fell silent for a moment. In fact only Mohanna stone face and James smirk didn't change a muscle.
Can our expert in foreign matters explain this, asked Hirohito, studying him with his steady gaze...He couldn't.
But that doesn't change a thing, interrupted Satoru. We are ready, navy are ready, air force is already bombing the enemy if we can believe words of our chief of the air force. Give me week and our troops will be in California, Seattle and San Diego.
It isn't that simple Satoru, James interrupted him. We have found out that Georgians have massed 20-30 divisions in North America. Can you guarantee that we will take a piece of American industry, will EastAsian troops seize the Texan oil fields ? We can't start the war if we get the least out of it.
Where did you get this information, James, Frans couldn't refrain to ask. Various sources, James smiled, and on this one I got a little help from naval intelligence as well.
Have Axis and Allies been undertaking naval buildup lately, Keisuke asked, it may well be that combined strength of Italian and Norwegian fleets are enough to deny any supplies and reinforcements for this force.
We are almost sure that Axis fleets are nothing more than coastal guards, Mohanna took this one on himself, we have little information about French naval strength. We can only assume they haven't been completely idle if they planned to combat worlds 3rd and 4th most powerful fleets. I can give no definite answer if high seas will be controlled by Oceania,but their European possessions are unguardable, even they are willing to sacrifice whole fleet.
Does that matter, Machida nervously stirred in his chair, question remain - what do we do ?
Hirohito took a moment. We can't allow France to conquer England or allow Georgians to have monopoly of all worlds oil production, but I fear that immediate attack will result in exactly that. We will wait.
It was already dawn, when Frans woke up his tired driver and ordered to drive home. Meeting went going on for a good hour, but conclusion remained the same. Do nothing. It was only month later when French came forward with peace deal for all involved sides. Frans envied Grattan skills, not only he had secured alliance with recent enemies, he also convinced them to, as it later turned out, sacrifice 28 divisions and still get most of peace deal if Norway would choose to accept it. Now it was in Norwegian hands to spoil their triumph.
Here is industrial strength of all alliances. Oceania surprisingly still ahead, even with all their European possessions in French and Axis hands.
EastAsia
Indonesia 380/288
Japan 346/288
Nationalist China 136/97
Kashmir 5/5
=678 base IC
=581 without China
Allies
France 443/369
Quebec 157/130
Germany 118/87
=568 base IC
=499 without Germany
Oceania
Italy 363/269
Norway 149/114
=383 base IC
Axis (of light ?)
Georgia 225/153
Finland 139/107
Prussia 59/47
Madagascar 3/2
=309 base IC
Edit. AAR reward- manpower.
o
