Chapter 9 - July 1940: Fall of the Eagles
I suddenly developed a window in my schedule and decided I'd invest it in winding down the war in Europe now that I am so close to doing so. First off, while I intend to carry on the war into Eastern Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, I am not entirely sure if I will opt to start a war with the Soviets in this playthrough any longer. If they decide to stay out of the Internationale, I will consider it, but if they ask to join I will let them and leave it at that. Timewise, there are other projects including more narrative-focused AARs in DH I'd like to try and carrying this on to war with the Soviets would add quite a bit to this guide's length. I've also decided against writing a simplified guide because there are fewer differences between going full mobility and this game than I expected.
Now, on to this chapter. Our first order of business is to facilitate the rapid collapse of Austria, preferably without confronting the mainstay of their army, via a rapid capture of all their VPs. While in this case, we aren't exactly in a rush to do so since the German army is at this point practically extinct, in my first game as the Commune it was only by facilitating a rapid collapse of Austria that I was able to get myself out of a grinding war of attrition along the Rhine. For newer players, I do think it is worth going over VP capture as a strategy and how to keep an otherwise potentially strong enemy at arm's length. Note that this strategy is harder to implement if the Hapsburgs centralized the empire and that it does not apply to Germany which needs to be fully occupied to trigger surrender.
When the Hapsburg Empire is only in control of its Austrian cores (even if it doesn't fully centralize, it often incorporates Bohemia and Bosnia from time to time), there aren't many VPs to worry about. Two of them are on the Bavarian border and can be taken immediately, while Graz and Vienna need to be taken by a secondary push Eastwards from Salzburg. Ljubljana likewise requires a secondary push to the south while Venice requires a westward offensive, in our case supported by our forces in Italy (it generally remains disunited in most games at this stage) Since the Austrian AI identifies the Italian border as the main threat, most of its forces are stationed there leaving all our targets but Venice pretty easy to capture. If I can, I will try to draw him in without losing SRI VPs.
Remember, if the AI grabs an allied VP, it will stay in the fight even if you take all of its native ones.
For this operation, I've gathered my entire mobile force plus 6 mountaineers and another 6 infantry divisions on their way. The rest of the infantry forces will continue their advance into the German interior since the depleted German forces no longer present any real threat or opportunity for encirclement. The plan is for faster-motorized divisions to grab the vulnerable VPs while some of them rush to establish a front near Venice and wait for the rest to reinforce them.
My entire air force is also attached to this operation, though I have forgotten to advance forward the defence detail for the Munich airbase. For now, my slowly advancing HQ will perform a brief stint at facility security since it won't get in position time for the attack anyway (before the Austrians redeploy) That said, the Austrians can often build a decent air force and I don't need tactical for the border targets. My fighter groups will focus on winning air superiority.
I wasn't able to get the pathfinding to target Vienna and the Slovenian capital the way I wanted so some forces will briefly stop at Klagenfurt.
15th of July
Salzburg falls pretty quickly whereas Innsbruck needs a bit more convincing from my bombers before it cracks. What Austrian aircraft come up (so far its puppets) are quickly swept aside whereas the German air force repositions a tactical force in Austrian territory. my fighters seem to have had a bad day, unfortunately.
Meanwhile, some remaining German units have snuck into Nuremberg once again, leaving my air force exposed. Rather than redeploy them away from the theatre wasting valuable time, air support capacity, and supply, I've decided to divert one of my armoured divisions until the infantry can come to clean them up. The lesson here is to make sure you have support divisions behind your advancing army and not have to improvise solutions at the expense of frontline troops.
16th of July
Weird stand-off between my forces and an Austrian division that seem to be both attacking and defending at the same time. No matter, it is quickly swept aside.
An infantry counterattack, supported by the armoured corps & Tacs (just in case) commences while a motorized army and armoured corps advance on Graz.
Innsbruck is reinforced by two Austrian divisions who as defenders benefit quite a bit from the mountainous terrain. Good thing I have my mountaineers here.
17th of July
Nuremberg falls for the third time, leaving my Tacs free to support the stalled Innsbruck offensive and for my tanks to continue their advance. Interestingly enough, the Austrians do not seem to be falling for those empty Italian provinces. One my Venice front is formed, I will bring those troops forward either way.
18th-19th of July
I finally spot the German NAVS making a run for an unfortunate Italian destroyer. I will reinforce my coastal defences only with new Italian INTs for now. Motorized divisions make contact with Udine's defences which they lack the muscle to overcome for the time being, though other divisions are on their way.
Innsbruck's defences fall a second time, though I can see more Austrian divisions on their way. One of my own infantry armies is likewise coming to reinforce.
20th of July
The Austrians finally take the bait and take a nibble out of Italy. I respond by launching a counterattack to tie down their forces and advance my own.
Udine's defenders break the moment my tanks arrive to support the offensive. At the same time, the motorized divisions reach Belluno.
Another motorized army reaches the Gates of Vienna with apparently sufficient forces to take it, though an armoured corps is on its way if it needs it. Meanwhile, the Italian Expeditionary corps reaches the Slovenian capital and one of the target Austrian VPs needed for annexation. Only Vienna and Venice remain.
21st of July
An Austrian division managed to cut off my Italian corps just as it entered the Slovenian capital. I've split the corps in two with one force remaining to defend the VP while the other counterattacks with the support of the armoured corps I had slated for Vienna (since my motorized forces don't seem to need its help)
Austrians counterattack my army in front of Vienna (again, the most exposed province via multi-pronged assault) My armoured corps in the area should be enough to reinforce them. The Germans also seem to be making a run for Bavaria so I've ordered one of my cavalry divisions back until the infantry can get there.
22nd of July
My interceptors manage to catch the German naval bombers which seem to be stationed somewhere out of supply.
The brief Austrian encirclement is also broken allowing the tanks to speed on towards Vienna.
23rd of July
A bid to try and sneak into a now understrenghed Venice seems to have succeeded with the Austrian counterattack also grinding to a halt as a result.
24th of July
Vienna garrison falls leaving only Venice's final capture for this operation to end.
25th of July
Venice falls, and with it, the Austrian component of the Hapsburg Empire, leaving Hungary, Galacia, and Bosnia in the fight. Because of the distances and low infrastructure scores involved, I've decided to leave most of my mobile forces in the south to mop up the Hapsburgs while some press into Germany.
25th-30 of July
By the end of July, my infantry divisions have regained control of the Weser line and are ready to continue offensives into the Prussian heartland.
August
With the beginning of August begins my final assault on Germany on the depleted outnumbered and outmatched German army.
While the attack on Germany is ongoing, I've made a rapid advance into Hungary and Bosnia with the intention of taking their capitals. While Bosnia's tiny army poses no challenge, Hungary still has more than 20 divisions left with half of them protecting Budapest. Most of my armoured corps is trying to encircle them.
When the option presents itself to mess up Europe with another tiny state, naturally, I take it!
Bosnia surrenders on the 6th of August as my tanks complete their encirclement of the Hungarian capital and rush to seize the remaining VPs
On the 11th of August, German defences along the Weser river crumble and my cavalry divisions push on towards Berlin.
Hungary falls on the 20th of August followed by Galacia on the 24th. On the German front, my army is now closing on Berlin and the Baltic Sea.
With the war against the Hapsburgs complete, my mobile forces begin to swing north towards East Germany as some remain on the Ukrainian border.
I also get to release Austria and Hungary and opt to cut both a little bit of slack and let them retain some former imperial territories.
I limited some of the Hungarian cores via claims of my own in the interest of avoiding some irritating border gore and keeping Slovakia.
As I was enjoying how much time I'd save by moving my mobile forces through the German East, Poland decided to play dirty and grab bits of it. Can't say I was planning to attack Poland at this stage, but to put it frankly, they are in my way. If they behave themselves, I'll give them an even bigger slice of Prussia.
Poland is one of those states that's potentially very easy to knock out on account of its small and tight number of VPs
And with that, Poland is ready to join the community of free socialist anarchic
states societies
Septemeber
By the beginning of September, Germany is almost entirely occupied with the main holdout focused on Denmark. My super heavies ironically reach Dresden of all places while my motorized divisions rush into Eastern Prussia though much of the mobile forces are busy establishing a front with the eastern clients.
Meanwhile, the CNT finally wins the civil war and join the international. The CSA and the Soviets, however, are still busy with their wars.
By the end of September, all of Germany is in my control and the weaker Baltic puppets are rapidly falling. Denmark, however, is proving to be a rather irritating element in that control of the waterways prevents effective access to Copenhagen. It's the sort of situation paratroopers exist for but I don't have any. Since I want to resolve the borders (without too much gore) ahead of time, I went ahead and triggered the liberation of Poland event before I get to release Germany. The reason is that whereas the German liberation event triggers immediately, the Polish one can take a while to fire. Like in Slovakia, I claim provinces I would like to keep in Germany and leave everything I don't mind the Poles grabbing alone. If worse comes to worst, I can either reload or demand territory.
To access events, you either need to read them via script or a more specialized program such as notepad++. Events can be found in the KR db folder where you can basically alter any event chain to suit your whims in theory (it is a little bit more complicated than that) At any rate, liberation events can be found in the other folder under annexations. For Poland, the event we'll need is pretty straightforward, but in some cases, they can be a bit tougher to find.
And like magic, the Poles are once again free. To think anyone could have been so cruel enough to invade and occupy them for all this hassle!
October
When it comes to the liberation of Germany, France is faced with quite a few choices.
1) Create four puppet states (with the UoB gaining control of the North German Federation)
2) Lay claim to the Rhineland (including some provinces beyond it) and liberate the rest. I am not sure you ever get cores over it though.
3) Create a new German Union out of the entire territory.
4) Move the border to the Rhine and liberate the rest of Germany into the German Union.
5) Total occupation.
Now, it is important to note that any decision which creates Prussia includes an event chain that can cause it to revolt against you (if you decide to ban that celebration in which the Germans remember that one swell time in 1870 when the French army was beaten at Sedan) In this case, we don't have too much to worry about as I don't intend to ban the party and nor does Prussia have any potential allies, but if Russia were not Soviet, it could try to ally with them.
I'd say that the best option is a German Union since it gets a ton of industry and can help you (especially against Russia) Small puppets are simply not very efficient, and more to the point, they are much easier to knock out on the account of only having to take a few VPs to do so compared with all of Germany. If you want to see an example of how that can happen, the AAR "One and Indivisible" provides a good example of
how to exploit those German puppets. At any rate, being the Anarchists that we are, naturally, we'd like to allow the maximum amount of Germans to experience the maximum amount of freedom away from such systemically violent constructs such as the German state. We do so not out of revenge but because we love Germany so much that we'd like to have four of them!
They aren't like us
French socialist speaking peoples who have learned how to manage ourselves in a proper anarchic system in the French Commune, yes, Commune, not a state! I mean, how long can France go without a strike? Five minutes? We
French Anarchists know when to tell of the Commune. Whereas the Germans? Far too obedient and vulnerable to state-sponsored violence and oppression, we can't allow them to suffer under such a regime. We'll just have to handle most of their defensive needs ourselves. Is that not the mission of the Commune? To lead the International and the socialist speaking peoples to greatness? Naturally, they shall have to pay their bit in
reparations donation as well as some
human shields proletariat volunteers for peacekeeping missions.
Nice influx of divisions! Just in time to participate in a peacekeeping mission to facilitate a peaceful transition of power among the Czech people.
Shortly thereafter, we are happy to add two new members to the socialist family, Denmark and the Baltic State, because consistency is important. There are so many different types of Germans: Bavarians, Prussians, those guys from the Rhine, and, uh, North Germans. In the Baltics, they are basically all the same!
The best thing about forming one single happy Baltic State is that they will be much more able to help
us contain the Prussians defend their Eastern border! The same applies to wanting such a big and strong Poland! They gave up so much for the Prussians to keep, the least they can get is a bit of living space.
The real reason I liberated a single Baltic state rather than the separate nations is because Poland's Eastern claims block Lithuania from being formed.
Next time, I will arrange some free and fair elections across Europe and make moves against the Entente powers while considering what to do with the Soviets, ally or fight them. Which reminds me, what the hell are the Soviets playing at? The last time I checked (1939?), they were at war with Turkistan. Oh...
Yep, they couldn't get any other events to trigger during the war over Europe because they were too busy down south.
At least we can say one thing for sure, Europe has finally gotten rid of all of its imperial eagle standards!