Leone d'Cieli - A Fox and Lion Battalions mod, Hard Mode Italy AAR

[Hawke0]

I apologize in advance if i seem to be getting a bit repetitive with my choice of country for AAR's , but I've fallen in love with Tommylotto's excellent Fox and Lion Battalions mod. It improves on the base game greatly in general, but especially for Italy, representing their weaknesses and the rare strength much better than in vanilla. Among the improvements are better division construction, very plausible diplomatic modeling for war in the Balkans, the modernization of the BB's Caio Duilio, Andrea Dorea, Guilio Cesare, and the other one I can't seem to remember at the moment

The Balkan nations also have greatly strengthened, historic OoB's and AI England will deploy the Western Desert Force by event, fixing the problem of easily walking over the Balkan states or casually strolling through Egypt. I have still achieved some truly absurd things in this mod, given the weakness of the AI combined with my own skill.
Given these facts, I decided to do this second AAR on hard mode. I don't like the way difficulties were handled in Hearts of Iron 3, because I dislike fake difficulty and arbitrary bonuses - it just serves to remind you that it's an unfortunately imperfect simulation.

However, when playing as Italy it doesn't seem too unreasonable - the -20% combat malus can just be seen as the many weaknesses inherent in the Italian military that you'd be hard pressed to fix before years of war, by which point the experience of soldiers and their generals would mitigate it, somewhat. The -10% IC probably provides a more accurate representation of Italian industry, and -15% or even -20% might be more fair. And more importantly than that, the bonus to the IC of AI nations; UK, and the USA should fight much more effectively when they have even more troops and IC to spare; even in Fox and Lion Battalions, England hasn't provided as much challenge in North Africa as I'd like and the USA has never mounted an 'operation Torch.'

And as a final note, the AAR name. Leone d'Cieli translates roughly to lion of the sky. As a result of frequent argument with a history major friend who takes offense at my fondness for playing as Italy in strategy games, I've decided to opt for the small ship/aircraft strategy we both agree would've given the Italians the best chance, and this strengthening of the air force will come at the expense of the army and especially the big ships of the navy due to the IC limitations of Hard Mode.

 

[Hawke0]

A Change In Policy

The state of the armed forces of Italy on the 1st of January, 1936 was one of superficial strength covering deep, structural weaknesses.

On paper, she possessed one of the largest armies in the world - but a deeper look would show myriad weaknesses. The rank and file of the army, The Regio Esercito were reservists with mediocre training and equipment, and only the best units had weaponry more modern than the Great War. The vaunted Celere divisions and armored corps of the Italian army traveled on bicycles and horses, or were 'semi motorized' units that took turns marching and riding in a hodgepodge of commercial vehicles - to top it all off, the 'tanks' were often more akin to armored cars, with armor vulnerable to modern heavy machine guns and guns insufficient to deal with the lightest of enemy armor. The only units that could truly be called first rate were the Bersagliere regiments, the elite Alpini corps, the marine brigade and their Decima MAS commandos in Taranto, and the Granatieri de Sardegna division of regulars in Rome. The mountain divisions should have been capable, but they lacked enough specialized equipment and were diluted among reservists who were horribly equipped for mountain warfare, in the name of inflating the paper strength of the Regio Esercito. The officer corps was stretched thin with this focus on quantity over quality, with only 80% of the number of trained NCO's it should have possessed. A simple reorganization would not be enough to make the Regio Esercito competitive against France or England, but concentration of the quality units in 'relatively elite' divisions while the second rate units were relegated to inessential or simple tasks would be a first step.

The Regia Marina was shaping up to have a formidable fleet of modern battleships - two new, state of the art battleships were under construction, two Great War battleships were being extensively modernized and two more were expected to follow suit soon in the coming years. The developing battlefleet of the Regia Marina gave the appearance of outclassing many of their antiquated counterparts in the French and Royal Navies, but lagged far behind in the development of such important technologies as radar - it was estimated that even with immediate investments, Italy would be incapable of seeing results in the form of domestically built radar for at least three years. They also possessed weaknesses in fire control, the crews were undoubtedly inferior to their British counterparts, and Washington Naval Treaty tonnage limits had left much of the cruiser forces under-armored. The Trieste class, in particular, sacrificed armor for speed in the name of being able to quickly move up and down the long, vulnerable Italian coastline. A design deficiency that was telling of the strategic weakness of Italy's geographic position - despite being in a commanding, offensive position in the Central Mediterranean, defending Italy by sea against a stronger power would be virtually impossible.

These last few observations were what led to Mussolini using his control of the Italian state to dramatically shift the military in the direction of the remaining branch, the Regia Aeronautica. Perhaps the proudest branch of the Italian armed forces, Italian pilots were the first in history to use aircraft in a military application - spotting for artillery, doing reconnaissance, and even bombing Turkish forces during the brief Italo-Turkish War in 1911. While other nations still fettered their air forces to ground commanders, Italy's Regia Aeronautica was an independent branch. Throughout the 20's it had even been one of the global leaders in military and civilian aircraft, but the rise of the all-metal monoplane left Italy's once-excellent Cr. 42 biplanes in the dust, and the Regia Aeronautica quickly lagged behind - even in 1936, it had yet to institute a truly modern fighter.

Mussolini had never been a strategist or tactician, and he was a lazy man who preferred to achieve an appearance of strength through bombast and elaborate military posturing rather than hard work. But throughout the 30's, he became vaguely aware of just how much he was lying when he spoke of Italy's strength, with his parades of undisciplined blackshirts and tankettes, and decided to become educated in military matters, attending debates between his generals and reading books on military theory extensively. The works of Giulio Duihet, an Italian advocate for strategic airpower particularly impressed him, but he knew Italy could never field great hordes of four-engine bombers. However, it did impress upon him the capability of airpower in general - that even if Italy couldn't rain destruction down upon enemy populations, perhaps it could build a formidable force of single and twin engine craft, to win local air superiority and aid the Regio Esercito and Regia Marina. Geography, and politics for that matter were the enemy of Italy's army and navy - the Regio Esercito could never be stronger than the French or German navies, and the Regia Marina could never be stronger than the Royal Navy.

However, Italy wouldn't be fighting the next war alone against any of these powers. Italy was also friendly with France and England, until their opposition to the invasion of Abyssinia hurt their relations and began pushing Italy into Germany's sphere of influence. Italy and Germany hadn't, for the most part, fought each other directly in the Great War, and Prussia was instrumental in gaining Italy's independence from Austria. Not to mention, Hitler was a great admirer of Mussolini; his National Socialists took a great deal of influence from Mussolini's Fascists. Britain desired Italy to stay on good terms with the West, help enforce the status quo and keep a resurgent Germany in check, while Hitler was eager to gain this seemingly-powerful fascist nation as an ally against France and England. Japan, Britain's historic ally and the third strongest navy in the world was also drifting towards Germany, after British opposition to Japanese expansionism.

While Austria or South Tyrol could spark a conflict between Italy and Germany, in this event Italy could count upon the support of Great Britain and France, resulting in a war Germany had scarcely any chance of winning. It seemed undeniable that Italy would be but another theater in a global war, and that two options would be open to it; it could take the 'safe' route and side with the Entente, play it's part swatting down Germany and see what scraps and concessions this good behavior would win from Paris and London. Or, if the democracies had shown themselves to be sufficiently weak-willed, their lot could be thrown in with Germany and upend the status quo in the name of forming a new Roman Empire.

With these assumptions made about the nature of the next war, Mussolini saw that the Regia Marina would never defeat the bottomless reserve of ships France and England possessed between each other, and that it would be useless against Germany. The Regio Esercito fighting in the Alps would be, more likely than not, doomed to repeat the bloody stalemate of the Great War, and they could hardly swim to North Africa if their transport vessels were shot out from under them.

However, due to the nature of aerial warfare, Italy could certainly dominate local airspace. Enemy air forces would be scattered on multiple fronts around the world, and those deployed in opposition to Italy would be limited based on the available space at airfields. Southern France, Austria, and British/French North Africa - the likely battlefields for Italy to fight on - lacked many large airfields, and with some amount of development this advantage could become decisive. This view of a powerful, concentrated air force providing the decisive advantage in the coming war was the key to the sharp changes that took place in the Italian military starting in January, 1936.

 

[Mkoll13]

I am quite excited for this! Italy AARs are always fun. It is exciting to hear that the Balkan states have been buffed by the mod. I remember how much more interesting Tommylotto's invasion of Yugolavia was when they had a real army

 

[Hawke0]

With his recent shift in strategy thought, Mussolini had decided it was time to put forward his new ideas in a bold way – two new battleships were currently under construction, and another two were being extensively modernized. If only he could go back in time, he wouldn’t have had them constructed at all, but unfortunately the past couldn’t be changed. Given how far down the line the old battleships were in construction, it was decided to leave their construction unchanged. The new battleships, Vittorio Veneto and Littorio, would be fairly expensive to complete – and so, it was decided they would be converted into aircraft carriers.

After being converted to carriers, Vittorio Veneto and Littorio would be an indispensable part of Italian power-projection in the Mediterranean ​

Given the rivalry between the services, the unorthodox move created dissent among Mussolini’s allies in the Regia Marina who were typically proponents of the battleship navy. The Regia Aeronautica was unsatisfied by the move as well, because it was decided to give unequivocal control of the carriers and their planes to the Regia Marina.

A few relatively minor decisions were made as well, such as expanding the merchant marine and raising fourteen divisions of Camicie Nere, indoctrinated Blackshirt militias loyal to the Fascist Party above the country.

And while investment into the Regia Aeronautica was now seen as a vitally important priority, it couldn’t begin immediately as there were more pressing matters to attend to – the Italian army, though superficially strong, would have to undergo a dramatic reorganization before it could become ready for war. Modern equipment was lacking, and the army was almost entirely composed of ill-trained reservists.

Beyond that, there were numerous structural deficiencies as well, with effective mountain troops being diluted among poorer quality troops, and specialized support units for mountain fighting were near-nonexistent outside the four Alpini divisions. Speaking of which, the absurdity of the organizational structure – the Alpini Corps only commanded a single division, with two of the other Alpini being held back as operational reserves by the 1a and 4a Armata’s. (The other was attached to the Armata del Africa Occidentale Italiana in the East African colonies)

In the North African colonies, the 5a Armata facing the French in Tripolitania had a few poor quality garrison units and a single effective combat division, and the 10a Armata in Tobruk, Cyrenaica was a glorified port garrison. The forces on the mainland were quite poorly organized, as well.

Gruppo di Armate Est, facing the Yugoslav frontier commanded three ‘armies’ – one of which, the 2a Armata, commanded three proper infantry divisions and three coast defense detachments, meaning a supposed army was weaker than many German or French corps. The 8a Armata commanded the strong VI Corpo d’Armata, with four infantry divisions, but had no worthwhile combat elements besides those units, making it a redundant HQ that cluttered the Italian chain of command.

The 6a Armata ‘Armata del Po’ was perhaps the single most effective structure in the Regio Esercito, with four infantry divisions in XIV Corpo d’Armata, and three mobile divisions with a mixture of mechanized cavalry, Bersagliere units, and a respectable complement of support battalions and regiments in the Corpo d’Armata Celere. There was also a fourth unit, a strong brigade that would be brought up to full division size once the restructuring began.

Gruppo di Armate Ovest was in worse shape, with the 1a Armata being downright laughable, as several corps lacked any combat elements capable of anything more than a defensive delaying action. The 4a Armata could be consolidated into an effective force, but poor quality garrison troops would have to be stripped away and replaced. At that point it could serve as an elite mountaineer army, to either defend or attack through the Alps.

Gruppo di Armate Sud was, by and large, a garrison force for southern Italy, commanding many coastal artillery detachments, a few reserve infantry divisions, two Bersagliere regiments, the sole regular infantry division in the Italian army, 21a Div. ‘Granatieri di Sardegna’, and the elite Forze Speciali Navali, with a marine regiment augmented by highly trained commandos. The noteworthy units would be stripped away from the Army Group’s command, to strengthen units that would be more likely to see combat or to form the future basis of a Marine Corps that would be an invaluable asset in the Mediterranean.

First off, the semi-motorized division under Gruppo di Armate Ovest was ordered to semi-drive to Venezia and join Corpo d’Armata Celere. 21a Div. ‘Granatieri De Sardegna’, the regular infantry division was attached to XIV Corpo d’Armata, and retraining and reequipping of the four reserve divisions it already commanded began – half of which were slated to become mountain troops, the other half regular infantry that would be equipped with infantry tank battalions, which would make the 6a Armata a formidable, versatile force of nine divisions.

While all this restructuring was going on, the Ethiopian Army attacked Italian forces in Eritrea, marking the true beginning of the Italo-Abyssinian War.

 

[tommylotto]

Very cool. I will be following! I would stay away from medium airframe and just concentrate my practicals and research on single engine airframe -- CAG, INT, CAS and Multi-Role will be enough.

 

[Pipoka]

I will keep an eye on this AAR. Good Work!

 

[Guaro90]

looking for an update

 

[Hawke0]

Sorry, Air Force things have been keeping me busy, but I hope to get at least two updates done before I leave for bootcamp on the 8th.
... Assuming this cold I got doesn't delay my ship date, that is.

 

[sebas379]

Another Italy AAR? Well why not, count me in, I loved your first one.

 

[Hawke0]

I've fallen in love with the Fox and Lion Battalions Mod, so it seemed almost mandatory for me to play it next.
Although, my next idea is non-Italy. Germany, Great War style, with infantry and (mechanized) cavalry, no dedicated armor/mechanized divisions and a powerful navy. It seems delightfully absurd, lol. I might even play Hard Mode to make things interesting.

 

[Cardus]

Leone d'Cieli translates roughly to lion of the sky..

Maybe I am mistaken but it should be
leone del cielo = lion of the sky
or
leone dei cieli = lion of the skies

 

[Hawke0]

As a culturally ignorant monolingual American, I consider that close enough!

 

[Cardus]

As a culturally ignorant monolingual American, I consider that close enough!

Well, then for a cultural ignorant monolingual Italian it should be "laion ov d skai". That is indubitably close inoff!

 

[Pipoka]

No news?

 

[Flessar]

Updates for this AAR?

 

[Cardus]

Updates for this AAR?

Right. I was surprised as well because Hawke0 wrote a very clever guide to the mod.

 

[Hawke0]

I think I posted in my previous AAR that I had ran off to join the Air Force, and I am currently in tech school without access to my old laptop and the savefile/screenshots. I think I might just scrap the bit of progress that'd been made and start anew when I've got the time, maybe as a MP AAR.