The Almost, But Not Quite, 28 Year Reich

[walrus]

The Almost, But Not Quite (And Probably A Lot Less Than), 28 Year Reich​

The Annals of the Nazi Party at War 1939-19??
A Germany DAIM H/A AAR

Greetings! Welcome to what will be my first proper AAR

And I know what you're saying, "oh no, not another German AAR" but I am striving to make this one a bit different - I will be playing DAIM Hard/Agressive, and me being a not fantastic player, this means I'll probably get brutally flattened by the Russians if I'm not careful, and then turned a nice shade of green by American nukes

As well as this, instead of following Germany in this AAR, I will be following the Nazi Party. They happen to be in power in Germany and fighting a war, and so to begin with the AAR will naturally follow this, but if the Nazi party is military defeated, or coup'ed, then the focus of the AAR will switch. To where? I'm not sure yet, you'll have to stay tuned to find out!

And in this vein, I will also be following National Socialist/Facist governments around the world (albeit breifly) in this AAR, and so if anyone wishes to be in this AAR/My game as a FA/NS Head of Gov/State for anyone other than the Historical Axis powers or Britain, then you can, under 3 conditions:
1. If wanting in under your forum Nickname, you'll also need a (real or imagined) first name so as to be less immersion breaking
2. You use a picture already in the game, or supply a picture that works in-game without requiring me to edit it
3. You write your own line of code to go into the minister file. If you don't know how/can't/are as lazy as me, then ask nicely and I'll do it for you, or press gang someone else into doing it

Now, some house rules and other shizz:
-Will start playing in 1936, but will start updating from August 1939, as 1936-39 makes for a boring AAR
- Will play up till 1964 unless lag becomes stupidly unbearable, or I am so badly defeated that it would require a complete asspull storyline to continue
- May create custom events for story purposes, so no shouting at me for it
- No cheating except acceptall for story purposes
- Won't be invading mainland USA
- Will not perform Sealion in 1940, unless in-game events mean I can write a good update about it
- Once I run out of historical names for a particular unit, I will stop producing it. (Except ships, where I will allow readers to name them)
- No Allying with Japan, even if possible
- Won't build any IC in 1936-39 (For the extra challenge, and also because I've never been able to bring myself to build factories when I could be building shiny weapons of war)
- Updates will be mainly gameplay with a nice heaping of screenshots, with narrations where I feel like it, and humour where inappropriate.
- Tech team and IC takeover switched off
​

Right, I think that's about it. I won't actually start playing untill the weekend, to give time for anyone to suggest extra rules and limitations and to mod people in if they want. First update should be Sunday Night, or possible Monday all being well.

Enjoy!

 

[walrus]

Index

1. Europe's Last Moments Of Peace
2. Fall Weiss - September 1939
3.Preparations for the Invasion of the West - January 1940
4. Back From the Dead - The Situation around the World, and The Alteration of Fall Gelb - February 1940
5. The Dutch Defeated, The Norse Nerfed, The Danes Given A Stern Talking To - March/April 1940
6. Fall Gelb - The Invasion of France and Belgium - May 1940
7. The Defeat of Belgium - June 1940
8. To Me, To You - No Peace In Paris - June/July 1940
9. Saving Marshal Guderian - July 1940
10. France's Agony, Part 1 - August 1940
11. France's Agony, Part 2 - August/September 1940
12. Finishing off Norway - September 1940/January 1941
13. Plans for 1941 - March/April 1941
14. Plans for the Invasion of the Soviet Union - June 1941
​

 

[walrus]

"War. I have been at war so long, that now I am at peace, I am not sure how I should feel..." the old man gazed wistfully out of the window and sighed
"but I do know that I feel as if milennia of world history have been condensed into a mere 3 decades, and that innumerable men will debate the causes, the events and the results long into the future; so please, ask me anything - it's important that the truth is known" he smiles wryly "or at the very least, my version of the truth"

The younger man leaned forward and stubbed out his cigarette "In that case, we'll start in the most obvious place....."

Europe's Last Moments of Peace - August 25th
Most of the World was happily at peace, with only a few small flurries of violence - despite protests, Mussolini led Italy to easy military victories over Ethiopia and Albania. The was intended to raise Italys prestige, but only succeeded in raising the number of Albanians.

Over the in east, Japan took little over a year to dispose of desultory Chinese resistance, as most of the underpaid, undertrained conscripts would rather be at home working for their familes than sacrificing themselves for a corrupt and inefficiant government.

At the far end of Europe, the Spanish Civil war drags on, mainly due to the Nationalist forces holding a good defensive line, and outside aid for the republicans having to be shipped through Gibratar or through Republican Meditteranean ports, due to Portugals quiet support for Franco, and the Nationalists holding the French border.

Germany's Military Positions

On our border with the French, we deployed 34 Divisions, all Infantry under control of Army Group C commanded by Field Marshal Himmler

To invade Poland, 2 army groups are deployed - Army Group A under General Runstedt with 49 Divisions

and Army Group B stationed in Koenigsberg under Austrian Field Marshal Von Tschischwitz with 24 Divisions

Now, if you excuse the shoddy drawing p) these are the my plans

The armoured forces of Runstedt will move from Oppeln to Lublin in concert with the 3 armoured corps of AG B in order to encircle the troops in the Vistula-Warasaw region. Subsidery attacks will take place towards Poznan and Danzig in the North, and Cracow in the south. The 30,000 Slovakian troops in Kosice will fall back into the interior of Slovakia in the event of a Polish offensive, to entice Polish troops to move out of their defensive positions so they can be struck in the rear once the encirclement of Warsaw in completed. These attacks will be pressed home with the support of 16 bomber wings; these will be unsupported by fighters as these will be in the West in expectation of a Franco-Bristish bomber assault and to prevent them flying planes to the aid of Poland.

​

 

[unmerged(140338)]

officially excited for a semi vanilla AAR!

 

[volksmarschall]

This should be great, I'll be following!

 

[unmerged(133310)]

Sounds awesome!
You´ve got quite a challenge there - DAIM can be pretty hard (Firestorm knows that all too well). I´ll be following!

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Oh pretty exciting .
I'm subscribed!

 

[walrus]

First update up! (Just so people have something to look at, and to stir up some interest)

Will have another update (possibly in 2 parts) tomorrow, which should cover the Invasions of Poland, Denmark and Norway and preparations for the Invasion of France.

I aim to scoot through the stuff everyone's seen 1000 times before to get to something more interesting, so updates will probably be thick and fast over the next few days.

@Lelouch - it was Firestorms AAR that inspired me to try Hard/Agressive after years of playing Normal/Normal

 

[The_Frozen_1]

Sounds Great! Will Be Following!

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Oh nice the first update.
Just a stupid question, why do you use your mountain troops in East Prussia?
They would be more useful in the South, near Slovakia and Krakow, no?

 

[walrus]

Just a stupid question, why do you use your mountain troops in East Prussia?
They would be more useful in the South, near Slovakia and Krakow, no?

Several reasons - 1) Stupidity o 2) Once the Polish North + Center collapse the south will fall anyway, and so to begin with my Southern troops are mainly just to keep the Poles from Re-enforceing where I'm trying to encircle

You're right though, they'd possibly swing the southern battles in my favour if used down there but, well, I hadn't really thought about it :rofl:

 

[unmerged(166917)]

You're right though, they'd possibly swing the southern battles in my favour if used down there but, well, I hadn't really thought about it :rofl:

Hehe
Bah it's a lesson that you'll not forget.

 

[walrus]

I hope not! I feel rather silly for not considering it, after having owned the game for almost 4 years o

 

[unmerged(166917)]

I hope not! I feel rather silly for not considering it, after having owned the game for almost 4 years o

make sure that you'll make good use of them in the Balkans and in the Caucasus.

 

[walrus]

Fall Weiss - The Invasion of Poland - September 1939

In the early hours of September 1st, after the failure to reach a diplomatic settlement, and after attacks on German border troops by Polish soldiers, Germany was once again at war

Orders had been issued to the troops and they moved out at once

(There was also an attack towards Poznan that for some reason wasn't marked on the map, but it failed with moderate casulties anyway.)

Due to Polish troops mobilizing throughout the final week of August, Polish commanders were blessed with enough troops to outnumber our divisions in certain sectors, mainly in the centre on Army Group As front, as well as in the far South by Slovakia, where Slovakian forces had to fall back to their capital under the attack of almost 90,000 Polish troops. However, Polish forces were weak in armour, and had few supporting aircrat, and so by concentrating our armour we were able to quickly encircle Warsaw and a number of Divisions.

Our troops at Torun came under heavy attack by over 200,000 Polish soldiers, and 2 Corps from Army Group B were rushed from their defencive positions at Elbing to hold the corridor. The first Mountain Corps under Mj. General Dietl herocially threw Polish forces back despite being outnumbered and suffering massive casulties and many medals were awarded to the survivors.

After the Polish attack collapsed in disarry, one of our Panzer Corps attack towards Lodz and split the Polish pocket into two. This led to a repeated flurry of counter attacks towards Lublin, but being wholly Infantry attacks with the little armour support they had being hopelessly outdated, they were ruthlessly cut down

9 Divisions under General Von Kluge then eliminated 50,000 Polish troops in the area of Bydgoscz while further South the ring around Warsaw was clamped ever tighter.

After pausing to allow the infantry to march east, the attack on Warsaw commenced on the morning of the 20th, with 39 German Divisons attacking 10 demoralised Polish ones, and it took a little under two days before the remaining troops surrendered to German forces

Seeing the collapse of the Poles, Soviet armoured forces quickly overran the parts of Eastern Poland given to them in the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, which put the final nail in the Polish coffin.

After this there was relative quiet, as German forces in the South crushed the final Polish resistance in Przemysl and Northern Slovakia. The rough terrain allowed the Poles to make a gallant last stand, but pressured from 3 directions, it took just under a week for the final Poles to either surrender, or escape into Hungary and from there into Romania.

Polish independance was once again eliminated, and the attention of our leaders, and our 73 experienced and now unemployed Divisions could be turned elsewhere.......

*Should be another update covering Demark/Norway/French Invasion plans in a few hours, stay tuned!*
​

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Good job in Poland!

 

[walrus]

"of course, the Soviet seizures of Lithuania, Estonia and their War with Finland were all within the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, but I, like many others did not exactly relish the Soviet border growing closer and longer"

"But surely their, frankly terrible performance in the Winter War was encouraging?"

"Well, on one hand, certainly; but anyone who'd dealt with the Russians in the 20s and 30s knew that they would learn from their mistakes. Only we did not realise just how well" he chuckled.

The younger man scribbled a few lines into his notebook "Now, we'll come back to the Russians in due time, but I'd like to know what was going on behind the scenes, so to speak, during the winter of 1939-1940"

"Certainly. The plans didn't really take a concrete form untill the planning meeting held on the evening of the Nazi's 7th Aniversary, on the back of a wildly successful Polish campaign, so everyone was in a most cheerful state of mind......"

Preparations for the Invasion of the West - January 1940

It is the will of the Fuhrer that we attack in the West as soon as possible. Before we can be sure of victory, we must secure our Northern flank; despite their assurances of neutrality, we can not ignore the threats to us posed by an independant Denmark and Norway. Copenhagen remaining in the hands of another country could allow the Allies to slip Warships into the Baltic and interrupt the flow of Iron Ore from Sweden, and our communications with Finland.
Now, to Norway - bombers based at Norways southern airfields theoretically have the range to reach Berlin, and to enable our fighter force to be engaged at the front line, we must eliminate this potential. We also gain the added benefit of Sweden becoming dependant on our goodwill to allow shipping in and our of their ports.

We propse the following plan to remove these two troublesome states from the equation in a few swift blows

65,000 men of Army Group Norway under General Von Kapisch (this should hopefully be raised to 95,000 with the addition of an extra corps of infantry if the attack can be postponed long enough) will perform the attack. Initially, 30,000 will move into Denmark, and march on the Capital; once the surrender of the Danish is received, our entire force will be landed in Kristiansand, whereupon they will move with full haste towards Hamar and then Alesund. This will encircle Bergen and Oslo, and with the seat of their economy captured, Northern Norway will swiftly fall.

Now, to France

Our forces line up like this:

Army Group A with 58 divisions, including all our Armoured forces

Army Group B with 34 Divisions

Army Group C with 22 Divisions

(All under the same commanders as before)

And now the actual plan:

The plan is split into 4 distinct stages.

1. The Red Arrows - Our armoured forces will cut through Belgium to the Channel in order to isolate Holland and removed their army from the playing field. This, combined with a lack of offensive action elsewhere, should make the French forces move into Belgium to the aid of the Dutch

2. Purple Arrows - Once the dutch have been isolated, the infantry of AG A will move in backed up by our bombers to take their capital and accept the surrender of their army. They will then move south and take over the defence of the areas captured by our armoured thrust.

3. Green Arrows - Once the infantry has moved into place, all the armour will be switched to AG Bs control, and moved to Cologne. They will then launch an assault through Bastogne - Arlon - Reims. If all resistance is overcome, they will then turn north and drive to Le Havre and cut off French forces in the North.

4. Blue Arrows - Once a pocket has been created, the infantry will move forward to eliminate it.

As all plans tend to get a bit cocked up once the action heats up, this will likely have to be modified on the fly, and further plans will be made once the initial objectives have been achieved.

You have your orders gentlemen, the Fuhrer is watching and waiting for you to succeed, do not let him down.
​

*Next Update will hopefully be tomorrow and cover both invasions*

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Sound strategy, but beware sometimes the Ardennes thrust can fail, when the French AI brings back a lot of divisions from the Maginot Line to Reims.
It can turn into a real bloodbath.

 

[walrus]

Sound strategy, but beware sometimes the Ardennes thrust can fail, when the French AI brings back a lot of divisions from the Maginot Line to Reims.
It can turn into a real bloodbath.

I've had that happen to me countless times before, but I'm hoping to be able to throw most/all of my airforce into that battle, and hopefully my armor can break through quickly

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Ok, so we'll see if the Luftwaffe is going to make the difference.