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Setup:

Ok, this game will be similar to my now-completed Italian AAR, in that I will focus on air power and shamelessly use oversized bomber stacks to do my dirty work. The setup, however, should be much more challenging.

Nation: Sweden
Start date: January 1936
Difficulty: normal/normal
Patch: 1.04

Special Rules:

1) No paratroops
2) No joining an alliance

Goal: To make Sweden as big as possible

Unlike my Italian AAR, I will not give extremely specific details of combat losses. This AAR will be more focused on grand strategy than air combat statistics.

As always, feedback is quite welcome and will generally be replied to. Enjoy. :)
 
The Beginning…

Sweden offers a bit to work with. In 1936 it has 18 provinces which produce 61 ICs. It is relatively resource rich, producing 122 coal and 375 steel, but no oil or rubber. Its biggest limitation is manpower, since there is only 250 MP to start and a monthly gain of 4.1. Because of manpower limitations, air power is the best way for Sweden to expand.

The starting armed forces are not too wonderful either. The army consists of 4 infantry divisions, compared to a navy of 4 cruisers, 2 destroyers and 1 transport. The air force does not yet exist. Luckily, there will be no need of an army until 1940 at the earliest.

The years 1936-1940 are all preparation. The first relevant consideration is how much industry Sweden can sustain using 1:1 resource trades. Since each IC used 2 coal, 1 steel and ½ rubber. Assuming coal can be traded for oil 1:1 and then converted to rubber at 2:1, and coal and steel could be traded back and forth at will, then the amount of industry sustainable in peacetime was (coal+steel)/4, or (122+375)/4 or 124 ICs. In order to build up a surplus, however, I only expanded the base economy to 102 ICs. Since the market would be closed after Sweden joined the fighting, enough resources had to be preserved to last until conquest provided more. This economic expansion was achieved by 1939.

Until 1938, research was the main focus. The goal was to obtain improved tactical bombers, aircraft assembly construction and enough infantry techs so the army would not be completely useless. Once these goals were achieved, the focus shifted to production. The stayed at 4 divisions, but one more transport was produced and the rest was spent on improved bombers.

The pre-war events did not all go as normal. Germany did receive Austria in 1938, but decided to pass on Munich, so Czechoslovakia remained independent. Poland was attacked via the Danzig event on August 30, and the war began on that date. Unfortunately, Sweden’s war entry was not high enough to join the conflict until July of 1940. In the intervening 10 months, Germany managed to conquer Denmark, Holland and Belgium, trigger Vichy France and go to war with the Soviet Union. At the time of Sweden’s entry, the Axis consisted of Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, Afghanistan, Italy, Yugoslavia, Vichy France, Finland and Romania.

The war was on…
 
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Sweden in 1936:

sweden01.jpg


The Axis, Allies and Commitern, July 1, 1940:

sweden02.jpg
 
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Wait, on those screenies, who's on the Allies and on th comintern? I'm assuming the Axis is all of Europe.
 
Originally posted by Morpheus506
Wait, on those screenies, who's on the Allies and on th comintern? I'm assuming the Axis is all of Europe.

The Axis are green, the Soviet Union is Commitern and the rest of the screenie are Allied. The Axis-Commitern started in June, so it still has a way to go.
 
I took your advice to heart and have begun a Brazil GC under this premise. I can only hope I'm near as successful as you managed to be. Perhaps I'll make an AAR out of it. This one here looks to be coming to a nice start, if a bit of a hard position for someone in no alliance. Good luck!
 
Originally posted by PriestOfDiscord
I took your advice to heart and have begun a Brazil GC under this premise. I can only hope I'm near as successful as you managed to be. Perhaps I'll make an AAR out of it. This one here looks to be coming to a nice start, if a bit of a hard position for someone in no alliance. Good luck!

Good luck with Brazil. It could make a great AAR. Just make sure you build enough bombers.

As for my position, yes, not joining an alliance is hardest condition I set.
 
For the record, I made a typo in the first post. The army was still four divisions at July 1940 and I had built one transport. I have corrected the post.

Also, it might not always be obvious from the narrative, but 95% of my unit kills arem ade by bombers.
 
Result of Preparations

Sweden’s economic situation in July 1940 was good. As previously mentioned, the industrial base had been expanded to 102 ICs, and careful resource trading allowed pre-war surpluses of 99,855 coal, 43,608 steel and 97,659 oil to accumulate. Assuming a 100 IC economy, I was short about 80 coal and 100 oil a day. At that rate of consumption, my economy could coast for over three years before I ran out of resources. My manpower had also built up nicely, and was up to 338 with a 4.0 per month increase.

One immediate problem, however, was the dissent resulting from the declaration of war on the Axis. Since I had decided not to join an alliance, there was no choice but to take a 40 percent dissent hit and DOW Germany. Luckily there was an election on July 2 (I did not plan this) so I lost 6 percent immediately. The other 34% dissent was bought down by abandoning research and production, and focusing all on consumer goods and supplies. This allowed a 0.17% drop per day, so in 200 days I would be back at zero dissent. Obviously this was a serious problem, since it not only eliminated my unit production, but my aircraft would suffer an initial 40% efficiency penalty in combat that would slowly decrease. This was a significant disadvantage.

My army was extremely weak. Since all unit production had gone towards aircraft, it stood at its pre-war strength of 4 infantry divisions. Some time was spent improving its tech, however, and by July 1940 each division had fairly respectable stats:

Hard Attack: 3
Soft Attack: 8
Air Attack: 2
Defense: 15
Air Defense: 3
Organization: 58

Of course, if things went as planned, there would be little land fighting. The only addition to the navy was the building of an extra transport.

The air force had expanded from nothing in 1936 to 16 improved tactical bombers by the beginning of hostilities. Each bomber had a tactical attack of 9, range of 825 miles an organization of 30. The only tech upgrades were dive-drop bomb shells, deep penetration bombs and basic radio navigation. Of my two air generals, I chose Lt. General Nordenskold to command the bombers. He had a skill of two, but I went ahead and promoted him to an Air Marshall, so his skill was zero to start. He was a winter specialist.
 
The Guns of July

My plan was to take out the Axis one at a time, starting with the weakest. Finland, luckily enough, was not only weak it was also close. To make it even better, it was embroiled in battle with the Soviet Union and only had 1/3 of its army on the Swedish border. Finland had an army of 25 divisions, 7 of which were on the Swedish border while the other 18 faced the Soviets along Karelia. The Soviets only had 7 divisions facing the Finns, but Finland seemed reluctant to advance past the pre-war borders. Regardless, it would allow me to destroy the Finnish army piecemeal.

The main Swedish-Finnish border was in the north, with the Swedish provinces of Kiruna and Lulea bordering Finnish Rovaniemi. This border did not interest me, however, since there were no VP provinces in the north. However, I did place 2 divisions there to discourage the Finns from trying to invade. I would attack in the South. Finland had 4 VP provinces: Helsinki, Turku, Vaasa and Mariehamn. Of those provinces, Vaasa was furthest north, and it was only two provinces up from Helsinki. An attack in the south would allow me to grab all the VP provinces easily.

It might not be obvious if you have never played or attacked Sweden, but the provinces of Stockholm, Mariehamn, and Turku can be crossed by land troops, much like going from Thrace to Anatolia. This allowed my infantry to go from Stockholm to Helsinki by only crossing four relatively high infrastructure provinces. For the invasion, I used the infantry division stationed in Stockholm.

The Swedish air force pounded the four Finnish divisions in Mariehamn starting on July 2. By July 7 the enemy was destroyed and the island was occupied. Before advancing further, time was taken to remove the Finns in the north, and Rovaniemi was attacked by air from July 9 through the 18th. Once the enemy was removed, Swedish forces occupied the city. Meanwhile, in the south Swedish forces took unoccupied Turku on July 15. From there, Helsinki was attacked, after a proper air bombardment, and although the initial attack was repulsed, the Finnish capital fell on July 28.

From Helsinki, Swedish troops advanced north towards Vaasa, capturing the coastal city of Pori on August 1. By this time, about half the Finnish army was destroyed and the other half bogged down with the Russians. Vaasa was occupied on August 8, and Finland was annexed. The Nordic Empire was established.
 
Breaking through the Sund

Finland was an excellent conquest. Not only did it remove the threat posed by an Axis neighbor, it also boosted my resource production, adding 86 coal and 57 steel daily. It also gave me more breathing room if I eventually went to war with the communists. Once it was conquered I turned my gaze south.

The next ripe Axis target was Vichy North Africa. It was sure to be lightly defended and the Mediterranean provided the best route of conquest. The only other alternative was to directly attack Germany, but I knew my air force, at only 16 planes, was not up to taking on the Nazis at this point. Unfortunately, one small detail had been overlooked. Germany controlled Denmark and with that the Sund. Since my fleet was in Stockholm, it had no way of breaking out of the Baltic. It seems I was trapped.

Not willing to wait and build new transports, I decided to instead raid Denmark, capture the Sund temporarily and break the fleet out, retreating my troops as soon as it reached the North Atlantic. This would be a difficult operation. First step was to capture the German controlled island of Bornholm, between Rostock and Malmo. It was defended with one German division and, with air support, the island was cleared on August 18. From this base, reconnaissance by fleet showed the north German coast was undefended, so the raid commenced on August 22.

As a distraction move, Rostock was captured on August 22. I then discovered Germany had 13 divisions in Berlin. I also came under heavy attack from the German air force, so I new seizing Berlin was impossible at this point. Instead, I landed a second division in Rostock and proceeded to march through undefended northern Germany. Lubeck was captured on August 24 and Kiel fell on August 26. Denmark was seized in early September, the army retreated and the fleet was rebased to formerly Finnish Petsamo. Although all of north Germany was back in Axis hands by September 12 my fleet was clear of the Baltic and there were few losses. I could now focus on Vichy France.
 
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