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I apologize if someone has already addressed this. Do NOT uncheck the bottom box unless you intend to not only create the convoy routes but also assign ships to the convoys manually. I made this mistake once and, seeing he convoy routes in my Supply mapmode, thought I was done. However, I was getting no supplies because no ships had been assigned to the route.
Whew!
Yes, this is an excellent point!
That makes good sense.
Update is coming this weekend; it'd be sooner but Thursday and Friday are booked for me right now.
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Excellent AAR, Avindian! I really like the dialog you have written for the various characters participating in the war. For that I have nominated you to the weekly "Best Character Writer of the Week Award". Congratulations!
Hey everyone! First of all, thanks to Nick Giordano for his nomination (and take a look at his AAR, it's hilarious!) Second, update is coming Sunday.
Chapter 16: A changeup in the military and pressure mounts
The following is excerpted from Alice Harris's autobiography, How Radar Changed My Life and the World:
There are days when I wake up and miss the constant tension of operating radar. Guiding not only our own boys into battle, but detecting the enemy in time to send those boys up to stop them. Going through a hundred memos every single day, dozens of unconfirmed reports, a handful of outright lies by men and women trying to get a leg up on their friends, all of it was both exhilarating and exhausting. As I sit in my comfortable chair at Oxford, grading student essays, I think back to those days. I cannot deny that my unique experiences gave me an opportunity to piece together the war, what actually happened and why it happened, better than most. I barely needed to do a single day's archival work to complete my dissertation: my own notes, memories, and those of my husband were more than sufficient.
I remember the rain on 22 May 1944 more clearly than the pile of reports I processed that day. It was so unusual to see such heavy rainfall on Malta, but it was enough to ground most of the flights out of our airbase. My husband was planning to take Ark Royal on a patrol that afternoon, but that mission too was cancelled. We enjoyed a peaceful lunch at home when the news came in from London: Field Marshal Sir John Gort had been relieved of his duties as Chief of the Imperial General Staff. I cannot say I was surprised at the decision; after all, Sir John consistently shirked his duties in London in order to go out in the field. It would be better to have a staff officer actually present, and Sir Cyril Deverell had done most of the work as Chief of the Army, so his promotion was completely logical. Sir Cyril also knew of the Edinburgh Project, as one of those charged with the city's defense, meaning that the number of people who knew would not increase. The new Chief of the Army, however, was something of a surprise. Dozens of candidates had been considered, and a very vocal portion of the army rank-and-file wanted to see Lieutenant General Wallace Graham get the posting, despite his junior status. Sir John even recommended Graham. Instead, Lord Halifax chose a complete unknown, a cipher, Lord Archibald Wavell. Lord Wavell had done very little during the second World War, and seemed content to do so. But Lord Wavell had two important qualities: he was a close friend of Lord Halifax and he understood how to be an effective quartermaster, which was what the post demanded. In time, Lord Wavell was accepted as important to the army as Major General Graham.
Sir Cyril's reputation was as a student of the defensive, and that by and large prompted his promotion. Yet his first act as Chief of the Imperial General Staff was a cooperative offensive with the Americans to seize Brittany. The commander of the force was a subject of no little controversy. The Yanks pushed a chap named Eisenhower, but it was pointed out that this chap had hardly commanded a major operation in World War II; to give that type of operation to an untested commander was foolish and would cost countless lives. Graham's name was again raised, given serious consideration, and set aside. The army's record, according to the Prime Minister, was far more checkered than the Royal Navy's. The Americans protested the idea of setting a naval officer over a predominantly army operation, supported by Royal Marines, and threatened to pull their troops if any naval officer was given overall command. Sir John turned down the position almost before it was offered. Even Larry Quentin's name was floated; Colonel Quentin had repeatedly refused promotion to general officer, but such a plum assignment would surely convince him otherwise, according to common wisdom. Common wisdom was wrong, and Quentin again refused promotion.
Around this time, William, my husband, got a promotion to Commodore and was assigned to Sir Cyril's staff. That meant giving up his ship, which pained him, but the promotion and assignment were too good to pass up. I would like to think the new Commodore convinced Sir Cyril to offer the job to the most qualified man, but I cannot prove it. Regardless, Wallace Graham was promoted to Field Marshal and put in charge of the operation to invade France. Field Marshal Sir John Gort remained the commander in Italy. The Middle Eastern command, seen as a secondary theater, was offered to the American Eisenhower as a consolation prize; eager to prove himself, Eisenhower accepted the job.
With the command structure fully worked out, Field Marshal Graham planned the initial stages of the operation. The Americans had already begun an attack on Brest; the Royal Marines, led by Colonel Quentin, would lead a pair of American divisions onto the beaches of Lorient. To support the initial landings, the Americans committed an additional seven divisions, including mechanized troops, which were to land at St. Nazaire, where they could move to take Nantes. The landings were totally unopposed and Allied forces moved to quickly prevent any kind of escape by the Italian forces at Brest.
By 1 June, much of the Breton coast was secured, and multiple Italian divisions wiped out. As agreed, the American forces which accompanied Admiral Bill Halsey's task force were turned over to British command. The next stage of the operation was to secure a line from St. Malo to Nantes before pushing farther. A huge landing like the one ordered by Graham was bound to pull enemy troops off the lines in Italy and the Middle East, and Eisenhower and Gort were on the watch for any sign of weakness. Sure enough, Italian, German, and Hungarian divisions were identified by Allied radar and special agents in France. On 5 June 1944, General Eisenhower was given the okay by Sir Cyril to probe Axis defenses in the Sinai, as multiple divisions were reported boarding trains for France.
The first offensive in the Middle East saw four divisions push out of Romani to take Misfaq. If the enemy did not offer resistance, the second phase would be an attack in the south, where there were more enemy divisions. Eisenhower was on a very tight leash; at the first sign of an organized counterattack, he was to retreat to the canal and dig in. The Italians took Ajaccio, for all the good that did them. Three Marine divisions drove them off, Eisenhower won at Misfaq with minimal casualties, and four more divisions moved up to Dahab to continue pressing on German forces there. In France, I received reports that there was an uprising around the resort town of Vichy; however, it was not well supported, and even at breakneck paces, I knew there was no way we would get there in time. British and American forces had not quite established the defensive line the Field Marshal wanted, although enemy resistance was very light at St. Malo and Nantes was already held.
Throughout the rest of June, while the offensive in France started to slow down, Eisenhower kept pressing in the Middle East, driving enemy forces into Palestine. German troops barely fought; the concentrated bombing campaign deprived them of the food and supplies they needed to provide an effective resistance. In an effort to show, concretely, to the British people how committed we were, Lord Halifax proclaimed the liberation of the Netherlands after a landing by British paras in Amsterdam. While I am certain the Dutch were grateful, we lost the para divisions very quickly without any kind of follow up. It was a pure propaganda move, and an extremely foolish that even weakened our hold over trade in the East Indies.
A number of my colleagues and even some good friends have tried to say that the French campaign was reckless, that it was poorly coordinated, and that Graham was too junior to command such an operation. I refute all of those points. Graham was the man who had taken Africa and driven major successes in Italy. He got along well with American division commanders, and used sound judgment in establishing a defensive perimeter. I submit that it was the Prime Minister leaning on Sir Cyril that stalled our drive in France. Lord Halifax wanted to drive on Paris, to secure a victory like Amsterdam, but could not convince Graham to risk so much. Halifax wanted a landing at Cherbourg, all the closer to Paris, while Graham argued that the Marines should land at St. Nazaire and secure the weak right flank of the invasion force. Sir Cyril approved the latter operation, but Lord Wavell went to the Prime Minister and had the Chief of the Imperial General Staff overruled; we sent the Marines to Cherbourg instead, and we lost all of the divisions committed to that attack as they were effortlessly cut off by German armor. Our increasingly excellent radio intercepts identified the presence of heavy armor at Amsterdam; an attempt to extract the paras was also vetoed. Soon, the enemy penetrated the right flank, threatening our positions in the rear, and some spare divisions were rushed to Vannes to prevent any further deterioration, while more and more elite divisions appeared on the French front.
The only reason, and I cannot stress this enough, that our front did not completely collapse was the timely landing of eighteen more American divisions at Brest. Their man Eisenhower continued to impress, driving enemy forces up to Bethlehem and Tel Aviv. Yet by the end of July, we were no better off than the previous month. The horrific casualties of the battle of St. Malo started to turn the stomachs of some British politicians: over 13,000 dead, with two Italians for every Allied soldier. Nantes was gone, and the river protected the Italians and Germans that started to dig in. Sir Cyril ordered the offensive in France halted to give men time to recover; local attacks were permitted only if odds favored the British commanders.
Yet into August, things actually got worse. Mid-August's repeat of St. Malo was not only a defeat that cost another 10,000 lives but the ratio was now reversed as German panzers pressed heavily. Production on the Edinburgh Project continued as a way to end the war quickly without further casualties. We also had two new carriers scheduled for completion in 1945. Yet more and more enemy armor arrived in France. We lost and retook and lost and retook St. Nazaire; operations at St. Malo were similar and equally bloody. That most of the lives lost were American was Lord Halifax's only saving grace. The only way to resume operations was to find a new angle, and Colonel Quentin was placed in command of a second attempt at Cherbourg; this time, the main objective was to link up to the west with British forces, not to stand alone. Eight American Marine divisions landed simultaneously at Cherbourg and Carentan in early September, and this time they held. Germany attempted to land forces in Brest and cut off our supplies, but the Royal Navy put a very quick stop to that, sinking all of the German transports.
Eisenhower sent reports that he had started to see scattered divisions return to the Levant, causing quite a stir at headquarters. My husband went to Alexandria to speak with Eisenhower on a fact-finding mission. A careful study of the units returning discovered that they were not and had never been stationed in France; they were stationed in Italy! Sir John Gort wasted no time and pressed his own offensive. 24 total divisions, including some armor, all aimed at pushing up the peninsula. A second group of landings in France saw Caen captured and some of the excess divisions in the British rear quietly roll east. Pocketing the entire enemy force was far too ambitious, but if the Germans and Italians had to redeploy to keep us from moving to Paris, or even pull units off their own left flank, Graham had the flexibility to act.
By mid October, the Italian front had some minor progress, but the possibility for more to come was very real. The formerly thick German reserve lines were gone, sent either to France or points east. Only German heavy armor kept Bethlehem from falling to Eisenhower, while Tel Aviv was once again British. Things had progressed in France as well, and Paris might fall before the end of 1944. The only significant setback was the loss of several Royal Navy transports to German bombers out of Norway and Denmark; those replacements were coming, but it did mean the delay of some armored divisions. The truth was, we badly lacked enough fighter aircraft and tanks to effect a permanent break in the German lines. The Edinburgh Project was, temporarily, put on hold, as the facilities there were considered sufficient to begin production of the finished product when our technology made that possible.
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So ends another update. Overall, I think I'm in pretty good shape, as long as I keep varying my attacks and don't focus too much on one theater. France has me the most worried; yeah, they're stretched thin, but so am I and the loss of those transports hurts (in reality, it's my fault for not pulling my transports back into port after they landed troops at Caen). The Soviets and Japanese keep fighting over Korea, and the damndest thing is that the Japanese are winning; while I'm happy my ally is doing so well, I think it's why the Soviets won't declare war on the Axis. The wild card will continue to be what the Americans choose to send me. If I could get some proper armored divisions, I could probably break through that German/Italian line in France. The trouble is that it will take me a while to build and staff my own. I'm up on all my techs -- I'll have Radar Guided Bombs soon, but I don't think I'll have nukes until 1946 at the earliest. I think I'll slowly de-emphasize some of my naval techs; to be honest, nobody can touch me right now. Every time the Soviets try to break out of the Baltic, they take serious losses. If I weren't a dolt, I'd have no losses. So, priority will be armor, followed by air. I can actually start making heavy armor now, but I don't think that would be a wise use of my resources. We'll have to see!
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Pretty rough going in France but at least the defeat of the Axis is a possibility now. Why isn't the entire Wermacht in France if they aren't fighting the Soviets?
A successful landing in France, the front in the Middle East pushed to Tel Aviv, and the British pushing up the boot; things are truly starting to go your way. As long as you can keep your momentum and the Americans back you up, it looks like you might make a breakthrough. I'm just hoping that the Soviets don't throw a wrench in that plan.
A successful landing in France, the front in the Middle East pushed to Tel Aviv, and the British pushing up the boot; things are truly starting to go your way. As long as you can keep your momentum and the Americans back you up, it looks like you might make a breakthrough. I'm just hoping that the Soviets don't throw a wrench in that plan.
"Successul" landing
I believe you have mixed up the British idioms in paragraph 2. It should be getting a leg "over" their colleagues rather than leg up.
The Allied counteroffensives are really getting a move on now, these beachheads look like they'r here to stay. However the numbers of divisions committed to various positons by both sides looks a bit overdone. Especially the right flank of the Normandy-Bretagne front, anchored as it is behind the river estuary at St. Nazaire seems excessive to me. Frontal attacks against opposition of this scale would result in Great War-esque casualty ratios with equally disatrous results. Forgive the potential spoiling of your next move, but I wouldn't help myself
Logic would, in my opinion, dictate opening another invasion front, preferably one that can turn the flank on one side of the opposing Axis divisions. Southwestern France being an ideal target, forcing the enemy to relocate troops, thus destabilising their defences and enabling a strategic offensive that could lead to the liberaton of much of France. Or perhaps an Anzio-style landing behind the lines in Italy could get that front moving. Hmm now I'm tempted to try this scenario myself...
Logic would, in my opinion, dictate opening another invasion front, preferably one that can turn the flank on one side of the opposing Axis divisions. Southwestern France being an ideal target, forcing the enemy to relocate troops, thus destabilising their defences and enabling a strategic offensive that could lead to the liberaton of much of France. Or perhaps an Anzio-style landing behind the lines in Italy could get that front moving. Hmm now I'm tempted to try this scenario myself...
How about another landing in Denmark? if you work quickly you could liberate all of Denmark and if the Germans throw enough men to overwhelm you you can just retreat across the straits. Or you could just get a handful of marines and start invasions of anywhere behind the lines and just retreat whenever any axis forces turn up. hit-and-run attacks to keep them off balance
"Successul" landing
The fact he hasn't been pushed out of France yet by the German juggernaut makes it a success to me.
That's the million dollar question, isn't it? I think part of the problem is that Germany has turned over a lot of divisions to Italy, so what you see as Italian divisions might actually be German.
A successful landing in France, the front in the Middle East pushed to Tel Aviv, and the British pushing up the boot; things are truly starting to go your way. As long as you can keep your momentum and the Americans back you up, it looks like you might make a breakthrough. I'm just hoping that the Soviets don't throw a wrench in that plan.
I love your optimism, but it could be misplaced; we'll just have to see.
"Successul" landing
Looks like he already fixed it.
Nope, getting a "leg up" on someone is correct
I'm not really policing my idioms to be more or less British, but I'm glad that I turned out to be right in this case.
The Allied counteroffensives are really getting a move on now, these beachheads look like they'r here to stay. However the numbers of divisions committed to various positons by both sides looks a bit overdone. Especially the right flank of the Normandy-Bretagne front, anchored as it is behind the river estuary at St. Nazaire seems excessive to me. Frontal attacks against opposition of this scale would result in Great War-esque casualty ratios with equally disatrous results. Forgive the potential spoiling of your next move, but I wouldn't help myself
Logic would, in my opinion, dictate opening another invasion front, preferably one that can turn the flank on one side of the opposing Axis divisions. Southwestern France being an ideal target, forcing the enemy to relocate troops, thus destabilising their defences and enabling a strategic offensive that could lead to the liberaton of much of France. Or perhaps an Anzio-style landing behind the lines in Italy could get that front moving. Hmm now I'm tempted to try this scenario myself...
What you say makes some good sense. I hadn't considered it (right away) as an option, but it's on my list. My main concern is pulling too much out of St. Nazaire, especially as the Germans pile up armor. Then again, I have to keep in mind the stacking penalties as well.
Denmark is actually something I've considered. I'd love to close off the Baltic, we'll just have to see how successful I am.
All of us.
The fact he hasn't been pushed out of France yet by the German juggernaut makes it a success to me.
I doubt very much if Germany can push me out at this point without totally abandoning one of the other two fronts.
I don't know for certain when I'll update again or even play; I need to think on my next moves. I should probably also work toward playing CKII more for my other AAR. Keep the suggestions coming!
That optimism may be born from my limited knowledge of HOI3 that comes with only having played 2-3 years as Germany.
How hard would it be to get some form of air superiority over Germany, so that you can actually drop your Nuke when you get it?