“UK Motorway” a Blitzkrieg-Scenario AAR

[markkur]

Chapter One - An Overview of the UK’s Blitzkrieg-Scenario start.

After looking at my nation’s footing I can see much trouble ahead, so I will report how the UK starts out in this Scenario in the various areas of running a nation.

The Government

Well one-half good news is George VI is already King but Neville Chamberlain is Head of Gov.
I pick or keep men for the following positions.

Foreign is Eden
Arms is Simon
Security is Baldwin
Intel is Lord Cecil
Staff is Gort
Army is Deverill
RN is Pound
RAF is Bowhill

Intelligence and Spies

Max home-spies - 3 ticks of Counter-intelligence and 2 ticks to raise National Unity which will probably be three once our convoys start sinking. We will Influence only the U.S.A. We are behind on too many techs to worry about the rest of the world.

At Scenario start I have spies in Germany etc. I will send no more spies anywhere but switch all existing spies to reduce NU with enemies or future enemies while in favored nations I support the ruling party. Might as well do this for whatever tiny benefit.

Economy problems

Energy – 29922 we are losing 43.7/day.

Metal – 14665 we are losing 66.08/day.

Oil – 14640 losing 49.5/day.

We have a plus 6.68$/day. That’s good but it at first strikes me as not near enough to buy all that we need. Guess I am going to find out. We will need lots of Gas for all these motorized units and we do not have hardly any tanks yet! And of course we will need lot’s o’ convoys to get the job done.

Trade & Convoys

This is a scary realm. I Start with 75 free convoys! Helloooo...fellows...we are at war! To offset this situation somewhat, I halted every supply-convoy to any island where we do not even have troops; like we need to make stockpiles for enemy troops to use.

Next I unchecked Resource-Convoys and stopped any that carry nothing or next to nothing; I’m not sending 10-15 convoys to bring back 1 metal. I have very few Convoy-Escorts and will not build any, so small convoys that do not carry oil will have no escorts. The few Escorts I gained were added to bigger Oil-convoys or important ones, like Alexandria, Singapore and the undefended Borneo port of Kuala Belait, each having 3 Escorts. I need troops in Borneo but can I hope to hold it? There’s no Brit in Kuching either.

After my ending of some Convoys I have 139 free for use, which is better than 75 and all Axis subs waiting for them.

Research

Industry - Looks good in all areas, including the 3 important supply-techs.

Far from ideal but these need researching now. With so many X3 MOT-divisions I hope to add ENG to many of them even if I reduce some divisions to Binary MOTx2 for nasty terrain. Like any other support units I may add like TDs, SpART etc. ENG and any others will add more fuel requirements.​

I do have a few Techs in Air that are needed badly but they must wait.​

The good news is that we have Radar in these British cities. Dover & Norwich are level-5. Portsmouth is level-4. London, Newcastle, Liverpool, Edinburgh & Scapa Flow are level-3. Glasgow & Belfast Ireland are level-1. The bad news is I would not have done this layout. The worse news, there is no radar anywhere else. Not Malta not Singapore, only the home-island.

OOB

Anyone that knows HoI 3 knows the set-up of Generals is generally random and minus what general commanded what force. In addition in HoI3 a higher level General grants better supply for the Army under an Army-Group {AG} and the A.I. does not follow this fact.

Starting the 1939 Blitz-Scenario as Britain, the Empires’ OOB is a mess and has no Army-Groups anywhere in the Empire. So my first step was to dismiss all Generals on the home-island except Home Command HQ to use them where really needed and rebuild a proper OOB from scratch. Supply is critical to Britain normally and now I also fear my unwanted large gas-guzzling mobile-army to boot.

My new OOB

The next move I make is putting a Logistics-Wizard {LW} heading every tiny-Theater like St. John’s Port Harcourt and East Africa Command using Old Guards +{LW}. Because if I do have a few Garrisons or other units reporting to them, they will save a little on supply as direct-reports where I have no formal OOB under that theater-command.

Home Command HQ General Ironside Skill-2. Since he is a Logistics-Wizard ={LW} and the country is full of wheels

1st Army-Group General Allenbrooke a Skill-5 with both Offense and Defense skills.
1st Army General Brooke-Papen Old-Guard = {OG}with{LW} Note: this may change later but until 1st Army leaves for overseas or has to defend our shores there is no need now.
1st Army’s 5-Corps containing all Motorized units - All have non-{OG}+{LW}leaders.

Mediterranean HQ renamed from original “Middle East Command Theater” General Dobbie is a
{OG}+{LW}and also an Engineer.
Mediterranean AG- General Alexander Skill-5 {LW} with both Defensive and Offensive Doctrines.
Mediterranean Army - General Wavell Skill-4 {LW}with Defensive Doctrine.
8th Army - General Barkworth-Wright Skill-2 {LW}

Singapore HQ renamed from “Far-East Command Theater” General Smyth Skill-1 {OG+LW}
Singapore AG – General H.M. Wilson Skill-4 {LW}
Singapore Army – General Slim Skill-5 {LW} Trickster
Singapore Corps – General Fitzpatrick Skill-4 with Defense. He will face a lot of heat.

Bombay HQ renamed from original “Army of India Theater”.
Note: All India-Corps deleted and Indian-Infantry will go to Rangoon where new Corps will be created and follow the new Burma-OOB. The only units that will directly report to Bombay HQ will be any Garrisons later posted in India-ports or on near island/ports like Diego Garcia, Trincomalee, The Maldives, Nicobar etc.

*New* Burma HQ General Adam{LW} {Created in Rangoon for the entire border of Siam, just east of Chittigong}
Burma AG - General Auchinleck Skill-5 {LW} with both Defensive and Offensive Doctrines.
Burma Army - General Anderson K.A.N. Skill-3 {LW} with Defensive Doctrines.
Burma Corps - General Maltby Skill-1 {LW}Note: All Divisions will have Commando leaders (better in low-supply) and/or other Doctrines as possible. Of all Theaters this one has an {LW} at every level since whether in Burma or India are anywhere else in the region it will face many obstacles and I don’t want supply to be an issue if possible, especially starting a war with far less convoys than is needed. Of course this is true for all Theaters but I expect enemy subs are going to be more disrupting in this game.

I should add that all Ships and Planes in a region report to the nearest Army-group to save on supplies.

The RAF

The first thing that I see brings horror. We are already at war with Germany and we have only 3 INT-groups? Not a few X3 Wings but 3 single builds. How can we defend British airspace? Overall the RAF has only 22 total groups and 9 are CAGs and of course none to spare. 5 TAC groups and 2 NAV is barely adequate but even if we had more, we already need more fighters to defend the homeland and we we could spare none to defend bombers. I just hope Germany only has 2 INTs and 1 TAC -then we have a chance.

Out of 29 techs we are current in 8. Thank God that our measely 3 INTs are up to date. “Never has so many, depended on so few”.

The Army

Hmm we are 1 brigade weaker than Poland? What have we been doing?

The backbone of an Army is Infantry and we have only 37 brigades. However, since we are a proud modern industrial nation we have over twice that number in wheeled-infantry. I look around the home-island and that is all that we have at home. Germany cannot even think of attacking because our entire force can arrive at any port on the mainland in mere minutes. :>) We have only 10 Garrison Brigades and 4 Militia. We have 4 LARM and 2 ARM. We have zero ART, AT, AC or ENG.

Our foot-soldiers in hostile terrains and environments around our Empire have no equipment of any kind. We can make Engineers but for now, they would have no weapons. The reason for not being prepared in 1939? P.M. Neville Chamberlain sold us on a paper that read...“Peace in our Time”.

Our Armor is old stuff. 1936 LARM is decent but the 1934 ARM = the non-anything “Whippet”. At least we will not have to spend much to upgrade it. Our AC = “Humber” w/ no gun or armor and it’s called an armored-car? Our legions of MOT cannot be first class if our AC is a basic metal box with wheels and at present designed for target-practice. Thankfully our AT, AA and ART are up to date...although we have not a single unit of any! Good planning boys!

Our Land-Doctrines are not fine. Of 18 techs, 8 have never been researched, 5 are behind and 5 are current.

We have no GAR guarding any port in India or any island in the Indian Ocean or the entire Pacific. Malta & Gibraltar have a single GAR brigade. We are not ready for this war.

The Royal Navy

We are a Grand-Fleet of 142 ships, though 20 are transports. We better be very wise in battle.

We have 42 CLs which is good but only 30 DDs which is very bad. We do have 31 non-CV Capitol-ships but that’s only a one-to-one ratio and what about ASW duty? This is no good way to start a war. We do have 12 old Subs, so that’s ok but one is an ancient Class-1 relic and must be used as a solo-scout.

We have researched Radar but have not started ASW or any other Radar-Techs. Our subs are not even to 1934 standards in any category; lots to invest in here if we choose. More bad news, our BBs are behind in all Techs and CVs in 3 of 4 areas. By far our best news is that CAs, DDs and CLs are all up-to-date. Finally something satisfactory, even if I would have went for more important Capitol-ship advances firsts and bypassed Heavy-Cruisers in the early years.

Production

1. We must permanently build convoys for a while. I start 5 and set them to a series of 10.
   
   
2. Fighters are priority. Three groups begin to be followed by two more series for a total of 9 – I want at least 4 X3-Wings.
   
   
3. The Prince of Wales is allowed to be built but the other BB is set-back till it completes.
   
   
4. We have to build lots of Garrisons we are guarding nothing anywhere, therefore MOT will have to be used at home for now.

“The Die is Cast”​

 

[markkur]

“Overview and the RN”
Chapter 2​

Overview

​

1. We are making a lot of extra supplies but I know I need to trade for everything I need with the U. S. So that means I need to forget everything else and sell continuous supplies to the USA before they get maxed-out, getting supplies from other nations. Britain first. To start I want to sell 2 to 3 shipments of 20. Once I get that done then I can start getting Energy, Metal and Oil from them. After I'm good, then I can cancel trades whenever I choose.

The second point about getting as much gold as I can is I need to change to my best Industrial Laws which will require well over 300 smackers.

2. Once I get 5 free-spies, I will stop spending Leadership and put that small amount it into Officers. I want 28 Techs in the queue or I will never catch-up.

3. Officer-Ratio at 102 is not good for War but since I have some time before I'm fighting around the world I will wait and “try” to get as much as I can from Leadership. i. e. My decision to only Influence the US and not create more spies than what I need at home for N-Security and N-Unity.

4. Upgrades are outrageous but I will get that Iceberg out of the way. Considering the poor state my Armed forces and the cost of Upgrades, I can only think that we've not even issued uniforms yet.

5. Notice I have no trade-routes. All sea-trade will only be to the USA. I can defend those lanes I hope. As I knew it would happen, U-Boats are sinking guess what? My supply-convoys.

6. Remember I started with 75 free convoys and dismissed several Resource-convoys and deleted some
Supply-convoys going to my island with no defenders? Well, I forgot and did not turn off A. I. Convoy Control and the number dropped 20-something in an instant. So I had to go back and do it again. I have to manage all shipping. Which takes me on to #7.

7. I wanted to do Auto-Trade this time because I usually don’t and didn’t want the hassle now. However, I have to do it myself because the A. I. will suck up my convoys and put them in routes prime to be sunk. As I said, I have to manage my trade and supply routes. I think it highly likely that I might need to have convoy-priorities to survive. Also not letting the A.I. use my diplomats for the trades - I want that amount frozen too. This is not 1936.



The Royal Navy

I’ve organized the navy into three theaters of operation and of course reset my Admirals. What follows is the three Army-Groups and the fleets that are in their respective theaters. Although I have some time "I hope" before Japan enters the war I will still have a Singapore fleet. By that war I want both Rangoon and Singapore strong and of course well-supplied. Until I can get more DDs, I have to run with these fleets as they are.

HMS Eagle is in route and once their will head to ASW duty. At least one more CVL will follow and do the same.

As more DDs or CLs become available a new Combined Fleet will be created.

HMS Courageous and her escorts are in route.​

My next report will be delayed till I have this nation up and running and I’ll comment about the status of the UK then.

 

[markkur]

“Before the Storm”
{Chapter 3 – 18 September 1939 to early January,1940}​

Laws

One of the first things that I saw, was that the UK could in time switch to the better war-laws with the exception of Heavy Industry. I went to Service by Requirement but with National Unity. at 79% I could not allow it to further drop or I could never enact Heavy Industry. The sinking of so many of my supply convoys would keep me from that goal and my NU was indeed falling.

In my home-intelligence network I had initially set “Counter” to 3 ticks and Raise NU to 2 ticks. Once I killed some of my spy-problem, reversing these allowed my home-spies to overcome this ASW reversal. To give you an idea concerning this brief struggle, some figures follow.

27 Sept. NU 79.956 – ASW warfare -.069 -Foreign Spies {total} lowering NU -1.09 for an overall -1.78. So my 2 ticks was only giving me +.75. After I killed some of those spies, my changing to 2 ticks for Counter and 3 ticks to Raising NU +.90 soon overcame the situation. After reaching 80 NU and changing to Heavy Industry on 4 November. At last check, on 20 Nov. things still looked okay with the max NU spies and the ASW losses generally in balance. Unfortunately, this means that I can not rise above the current 80% unless I do something about the damned U-boats. I am maxed in Spies, so must sink the subs. Thankfully, my weak Air-Force has been enough to keep Stukas from bombing England or the UK NU would be spiraling downward about now.

Events
* Germany managed to conquer Poland on 29 September, 1939.
* Siam granted me Military-access on 7 October, 1939.
* Japan conquered Guangxi 5 days later on 12 October, 1939.
* The next day on 13 Oct. Germany DOW’d Denmark.
* Germany conquered Denmark 9 days later on 22 Oct.
* On 2 December 1939 the Soviets DOW’d Finland.

At Home

* Not much to say here except that I am taking Dover to level 10 Radar and that I noticed my GARs were way behind in Small-Arms Tech because 1934 has not been researched. Since the other three techs were “up-to” but not including 1940 advances, I am bringing their S-Arms up to the same level. After-all, I will depend on these units holding ports long enough, for me to respond to invasions in many places around the world.
* France wants Lend Lease and of course we are not throwing away our IC.
* In Production I'm trying to build some of everything needed but I am focusing on Convoys and GAR. New DDs were finally added on 20 Nov 39 and CV Illustrious finished 5 Feb. 40 soon it would head out on ASW-duty.
* My STRATs I send to Dortmund where they wreck havoc during night-runs against strong x3 INT opposition before returning to base and refitting to do the same.
* By 23 Nov. all my trades were with the USA.
* In mid January our light tanks became light tanks but it is not until then we could begin researching SpART.

The RN is out in force in trying to find the subs. My NAVs offer no help. At the end of December we finally had Small Warship Radar and our CAGs also began "damaging" U-boats. Proper ASW Radar will not happen till July 1940. 9 Jan. 40 we finally sank 2 German sub-groups in two engagements. Which sounds great but the seas were covered with RN and French fleets that can see little and our Convoy losses continue. A week later, another U-Boat Squadron goes down at the hands of the French fleet. By early Feb/40 we stood at 98 convoys.

Over Seas

South-Africa
I am not concerned about this region now and will have a defensive posture. I sent the Kenyan Colonial Army to Dar es Salaam to guard that port and sent the lone brigade of the Sudan Garrison to guard Port Sudan. The last small force will remain where they are, protecting Mombasa.

The Med
Until I have GARs at Gibraltar and Malta, MOT will be there instead. I was wrong about Malta having no Radar it is level-1. Like Dover, it will stay in queue.

General Montgomery has the only “remotely” proper divisions, with 2 Larm/MOT/MOT divisions and 2 ARM/MOT/MOT; he has 2 MOT brigades directly under his command. His Corps sits in and around Khalij as Sallum with General Cunningham on his left flank in Ad Diffah, thus both face the Italian border towards Tobruch. Army Group General Alexander also gets 1 MOT for his HQ. The rest of the original Egypt-force will guard Alexandria and Bur Said.

The MOTx2 division in Iraq is sent to Tel Aviv to guard that port till GARs arrive in the MED. MOT is also sent to hold Cypress until they can be replaced.

India & Burma
As I said, Indian Infantry has went mostly to Rangoon to reform in a Burma OOB. However, I have left divisions guarding the major ports of Bombay, Calcutta, Chittigong and Columbo on Ceylon; the single Brigade that was there was sent across the island to the port of Trincomalee.

Burma’s 1st Indian Corps will be posted in Thaton and will later give Siamese and Japanese troops a major headache if they wish to move into Burma.


Singapore
A single division of 4 Indian Infantry brigades commanded by Skill-4 defensive-minded General Kirkpatrick was formed to hold Singapore, with my then creating 2 x2 GAR divisions from what was originally there and in Hong Kong, to guard the Malay ports of Telek Anson and the other.

Two more Infantry-divisions that did not go to Rangoon went to guard the oil ports of Kuala Belait and Kuching on Borneo. I chose Skill-2s with Defensive Doctrines. I don’t know if I can hold these ports but I am going to try.



A Nationalist China Crisis

The end of the war between Japan and China produced a very strange result. China is now Japan’s Puppet but yet "by the Map" holds only a few small blocks of provinces, of which none are ports. Further, I Tagged to see what was going on and found both nations nearly out of Supply. Checking the Chinese Army I found China still had ¾ of a million troops reporting to China HQ and not Japan and of course these all should have been deleted and Chinese Ports turned over to Japan.

To make a stab at finding a "partial"-remedy I deleted all Chinese troops except a few MIL and the few Corps that were Japanese Expeditionary Infantry. At last check, Japan’s Supply issues seem to be improving but needless to say, this will not be a normal Japan and of course Nat.-China is in the Axis already.

Fellow Generals, does this sound okay to run with? After all it is a Scenario that is far from accurate anyway. Or would you rather I go back to a previous Save and let what happened alone and finish the War in that direction?
Let me know your thoughts ASAP please because I am still in update mode and need to know your thoughts about whether to proceed in this fashion or replay the most recent few months. The path I chose seems to be a reasonable half-fix but I thought should explain the problem in some detail.

 

[markkur]

“On the Brink”
{Early January to 19 May, 1940}​

I needed to correct the ending date of the last update to early January and not April. In Addition, I did as Sebas suggested and now Japan has annexed Nat-China, so that is settled.

This Chapter will take the UK to Italy’s entry into WWII.

HQ-Britain
1. On the homeland I am attempting to balance GAR-needs to free MOT from Home-Defense and I have the very same issue in other Theaters.
2. My Practicals are poor in everything needed with my only success so far, with light-aircraft.
3. Only now have I began training any Infantry and because I have no ART & AT instead of building X3 INF divisions and 1 support, I am starting with 4 divisions consisting of INFx2+ART+AT to also raise my currently bad support-Practicals with those units.
4. Concerning the RN; two CVs have finished with another in production. I am building extra CAG groups because I don’t want CVs or CVLs to become empty targets now that Italy is in the war and Japan is nearing entry.
5. I probably should have deleted the BBs Prince of Wales and George V because by the completion of the 1st it will have taken nearly and year and a half. However, those two will be finished.
6. Convoys? As soon as a new round of 50 deploy, more convoy-sinkings eventually offset that gain before the next group is ready. After seeing my convoys dip to 25 free, where I had to cancel other convoys, I decided to insert a “one time addition of 100 more” while a next “series of 50” is also underway. Hopefully that will allow some cushion without my halting any more production on stuff for War...other than Trade.
7. Destroyers I have wanted since day one but with Convoys low and GAR & INT both nearly non-existent to start, it has taken a while to get them in queue. Once I did, I began 6 but soon had to cut that back to 3, so I could squeeze 2 divisions of a new INF Corps I mentioned in #3.
8. Resources and Supplies are okay but my only trading partner is the USA, so this is causing almost all of Europe to drift towards the Axis and of course I am not helping my small Allies in any way economically – I cannot create a mutually beneficial Trade when I have to supply all the convoys.
9. I have deleted Port Harcourt and St. Johns HQs and brought those small fleets home for re-assignment. Home-Command covers all of what was St. Johns and East Africa is now all Africa and controlling all the Port Harcourt covered in the southern Atlantic.

Research

The Royal Navy

Current ASW

With my recent success I expect the U-boats to move further out into the Atlantic.​

1 May the RN found their first German warships in Bressay-Bank off the eastern coast of Scotland. The German fleet’s main guns were the BCs Schleswig-Holstein & Schlesien and the CA Deutchsland w/ 3 screens. Our fleet had BB Revenge, CA York and 4 screens. I sent the powerful 1st Battleship Fleet with Nelson & Rodney and the Pride of the RN, the BC Hood but they would not make it in time. In truth, I was caught flat-footed and wished their patrols had been reversed. The sea-fight came to an end further south in Baymans Hole. HMS Revenge sank Schleswig-Holstein and one of the DD screens but we lost 3 old CLs, Coventry, Danae and Dunedin.

HMS Formidable’s 2nd CAG-wing finally deployed on 4 May. I joined the new CV with its new sister-ship the Illustrious and formed the RN’s 2nd Carrier Fleet. This new fleet quickly made an impact when the CVL Hermes HK squadron found three U-boat flotillas in the Celtic-Sea but lost contact. Soon all RN Carrier Fleets were blanketing the south-west coast of England, making engagements with these same 3 and later 3 more U-boat flotillas but not sinking any. On the 8th, the new CV fleet found these subs again and sank 3 groups, while heavily damaging the others that fled. 2 of these soon were also sunk by 2nd CV in St. Georges Channel. Now we have taken out a total of 9 Type-IX U-boat groups this year. Hopefully we are turning the corner.

On 13 May, 1st Battleship Fleet met Gneisenau, Scharnhorst, Graf Spee and Konigsberg off east Scapa-Flow. I’d stationed that fleet there suspecting German warships would be taking that route with all the CAG activity in the western-end of the Channel. I was correct. Before the fight ended, we lost a DD squadron but the Graf Spee was sunk. Somewhere about this time 1st Battleship met another German Fleet but the only thing I know about that engagement is that BC HMS Hood sank the German CA Admiral Scheer.

HQ-Mediterranean

* With France not protecting Beirut I have stationed a GARx2 in the port. If Italy or Germany could drop Paratroopers there unopposed and my having no INTs yet available for the Med, the airbase would become an Axis-bomber paradise...directed at the UK and not France.
* General Montgomery’s Corps will strike toward Tobruch next update.

BEF-Norway

For some reason I thought that Norway had already been taken by the Germans but by chance I saw a small German invasion underway. I opted to pull 2 more MOT-Division and send them to assist Norway but to my surprise the German Infantry, probably one Division, maybe two, was defeated. However, during that success I noticed there was no defense of Oslo. Seeing that fact, I decided to send the two MOT to Oslo instead and there created a Norway BEF OOB to protect the capitol.

BEF-France

Germany had previously taken Denmark and declared on The Netherlands on 8 April, 1940. I considered using some of my Motorized in the low-countries or in Northern-France but instead opted for Southern-France against the Italians. Whatever I do, will likely not matter much but if I have the time to get my MOT dug-into those level-5 French forts along the Italian-border, I could make it hell for Italy to advance and free-up some French units to battle in the North. Of course another plus would be gaining battle-experience. Needless to say I have to be ready to yank them out. Or in this case "Brit" them out.

Note: Because time was running out for my sending more troops to South-France to be dug-in and ready for Italy’s attack, I risked the North of England by pulling out IV Motorized Corps stationed there. I have x2GARs in queue and hope to garrison all vacant northern UK ports before attack. At least, Glasgow and Scapa-Flow are both protected now.

Since I’ve decided to try and assist France, I’ve created a new OOB for the BEF in France and am now sending France 25 Lend-Lease to support this Allied effort. The new OOB follows:

BEF Army-Group France – General Gort, Skill-4, {OD}.
Army BEF – General Ritchie, Skill-4, {LW} + and Battle-Master {BM}.
II Corps – General Harding, Skill-4, {OD + DD}.

I started this plan and then ran into this development sending II Motorized Corps to Marseilles France.

German paratroopers in Ajaccio’s airfield had to be eliminated. A German-airbase smack on my supply lines in the Mediterranean? Hell no! A huge Italian SS fleet is already going to be terrible for UK shipping, without Germany adding ports for their U-boats. If I lose the Battle for the air and sea of the Mediterranean? It is game-over for the UK.​

I reacted by transporting II MOT to Gibraltar so I could invade Ajaccio. (I sent no warships because Italy had not joined the war at that time) However, upon arriving in the Bonifacio-Straits, France was already there sending INF to take the port back. I added three of my MOT in support and the Paratroopers disappeared. They may have air-lifted out. I then sent my Corps over to Marseilles as planned but kept my transports handy until I verified the French Infantry was actually standing in Ajaccio.

As of now, II MOT is on the Italian border in Nice and Barcelonnette; both have level-5 forts which I hope will make a strong front. IV MOT commanded by General Dempsey Skill-4 {LW+OD}followed and is Corps is split between the forts in Briancon & Albertville. Whether more units will follow these I cannot say at this time.

The Soviets claimed the Baltic Countries on 11 May.

Italy DOW’d France on 19 May.

Now the Med erupts.​

 

[markkur]

“19 May, 1940"​

I am inserting a short detailed report before getting to the outbreak of war in the Mediterranean. If details are tedious to you, I understand and advise you to skip this update and pass on to the next.

I decided to add this effort for readers who would like to accurately see the condition of my UK forces and my initial moves when we begin battle with Axis forces. I think this could be relevant to some that remember this AAR is about doing the best I can, after a 1939 scenario-start that has already limited my choices and will further limit how I navigate this nation in the future.

Following are the facts regarding the current equipment and doctrines of my armed-forces but first, some info about when the ground-war erupted.

I made three changes in my Government.

A. Armament Minister is now Chatfield, Battle-Fleet Proponent. My Navy-practicals are bad and “decaying” rapidly, so I removed the previous Resource-focus-minister and hope this move will at least retard Naval-decay, so with time at least new DDs or CLs will build somewhat faster then if I do nothing.

B. Robert Menzies with Land and Naval Intel instead of my previous Industrial focus.

C. Chief of Staff is now Montgomery-Massingberd – With my forces driving towards Tobruch, I ignored a defensive posture for south France for the time being because I have no reserve units there. I might add more forces in Egypt and N. Africa so this change “may” contribute.

After completely managing all aspects of Shipping, I currently have 103 free-convoys. The first sinking in the Med is of course a supply convoy to my critical port of Alexandria. Surviving the “Italian-sub-menace” to feed my Med-Army is likely going to be very difficult. I do have the RN but it will not be till my next deployment of fighters that I can begin to defend against Axis bombers; I’ve already seen NAV movements.

Two of my three initial moves, are both due to previous errors. Arrgh!
- The first is that I had 2 x2GARs still sitting in Alexandria that should have already been assigned an officer and reorganized in A. Port Sudan (because only a single MIL brigade is there) and B. the African Theater Command port of Berbera. I have sent 2nd Combined-Fleet (Admiral Fraser) and a single TP to transport what should already be in place. Worse, these two weak basic defensive units will have to reorganize upon arrival, while Italian Infantry head to assault these same provinces. This is a serious blunder.
- The other miscue is also costly to some degree because I failed to have any subs in the Med, other than Gibraltar. A group in Gibraltar is now convoy-raiding around Mallorca but another squadron is yet in route from Scapa-Flow that should also have already started there too. In addition, two more sub-groups, instead of already striking Italian-shipping from Alexandria, have to sail from Singapore-harbor first. I had them in the right place at one time but must have, at some time, sent them along with an intended fleet and never noticed the mistake.

Northern Front

Germany has swept across Holland and has nearly entered France through Belgium. German ARM and a few HARM divisions are unstoppable. Apparently Germany’s Start was a little better thought-out than my UK beginning.

Southern Front

As said earlier, two full MOT-Corps sit in the French forts bordering Italy. For the moment, it seems the Italians will not challenge me there? The only activity there are some Italian units that appear to be pulling out and heading to northern France? Needless to say, but I will anyway, I am not taking my two Corps and abandoning those important forts to attack dug-in positions of large Italian forces. Unless I miss my guess, Italy will not challenge me in the south and will make sure I can’t move while it sends some troops north. With the success of the German armor now, I think it doubtful Italy is needed in the North. I predict I will have to leave France and will have accomplished nothing. But we will see.

North Africa

France started with a well defended North-Africa but has sent most units to the mainland. Tunis has a MOT brigade and a CAV brigade with 2 INF Divisions facing Tripoli. There is not a single French fighting unit west of Tunis. I did put a x2 GAR in Beirut or there would be nothing there either.

Montgomery and his Corps are attacking and in two battles.​

Equipment and Doctrines

Next update...The Battles for the Mediterranean.

 

[markkur]

“Flying Black Snakes”
{10 May – 1940}​

Since early September last year, sailors of the RN Home-Command have seen plumes of black smoke bellowing towards the heavens and each man knew, that too often, those ominous snaky clouds, marked the area where some of the bravest men in the world gave their lives serving the life-line of the home-islands.

Till now, the enemy’s sinking of our slow & cumbersome resource and supply convoys was confined primarily to the seas west of France and Ireland but now the RN’s sailors in the Mediterranean were seeing the same oily plumes in the skies off Spain, Italy and Africa. The war was expanding the grip of death and wreckage of total-war and it was evident in the floating debris-fields of dozens of sunken unarmed merchant ships. Angry British seamen, too frequently looked helplessly on aboard their warships, as they passed those drifting grave-markers, able only to vow revenge.

We kept Berbera...barely.
​

France

To date, my B.E.F. - France has accomplished nothing. General Gort commands the BEF but has only received the order to “Stay-put”. Yes, we hold the south intact but Italy has not challenged our lines. That may be a very minor strategic victory but it is not close to the needed tactical one. However, our failure does not lie with my British Generals but with the French High-Command. Instead of moving all available units in southern France to try and halt the collapse of the low-countries (as they fell) and bolster and dig-in along France’s northern border, much time was lost in needlessly fortifying strong British positions, only to then pull-out and begin sending those same units northward, where they should have been sent weeks ago! It is too damn late now. Arrgh! Two divisions of Tiger-tanks and 6 divisions of Panzer IIIs are inside France and all Allied-troops are now rapidly falling back.

Earlier I guessed that Italy knew I did not have the strength to push into Italy and after making a formidable front facing our two Corps, sent their reserve units north to support a spearhead near Sedan. While trying to halt the invaders, French Command left a single division in each province along the Maginot line. The German spearhead is progressing in good order and should sever the line-forces from Paris-supply in a week or two. The question for me now is; When do I pull the BEF out? The answer to that is likely...soon. I am giving some time for a highly unlikely rebound before beginning an orderly withdrawal out of the northern forts southward till I can embark our units from Nice with a strong RN escort fleet.

The only impact I’ve made in France has been in the air and that is not saying much. My Strategic bombers destroyed some infrastructure in the captured Belgian provinces of Antwerpen (I was trying to block supply-lines)and Bruxelles but those runs failed to slow the German advance and even though I had Commander Portal making night-runs, his planes were quickly shot-up before we could destroy half of what was there. My Tactical-Wing was even less successful, when each attack, after only briefly cratering air-fields, they had to re-base and repair. Improving my TACs is and will be ongoing “as we are able” but the STRATs will see no changes; I have too many needs and heavy-bomber improvements cannot be pursued. As it is, the RAF is behind in most Air-Doctrines, so it looks like I will keep to INTs, CAGs and TACs. I would like to get some MRs and more NAVs but they will have to wait for a year or two, or I might not pursue them at all. Time will decide.

With the loss of Dunkirk we have lost Channel Effect. Consequently we now have to spend 2.62 IC towards keeping Dissent at zero.

Mediterranean HQ

North Africa

We were surprised to learn that Monty’s Corps battled 5 Italian Motorized divisions. However, they proved no match for our weak tanks and our satisfactory motorized units. Montgomery’s forces won in Ridotta Capuzzo and Bardia. UK men lost 166 – Italy 954. Our biggest surprise was two French infantry divisions taking Italian ground. The French may move on Tripoli but that remains to be seen.

Other Action in the Med

I decided to invite the Italian Navy to a big-gun brawl in the Mediterranean sea but so far they have not accepted my invitation. I then pushed the issue and with a little success. Since the only true Infantry I have is in India and Burma, I attempted the taking of Rodi and its important airbase...with wheels. This idea proved quite misguided, when the penalties for 6th LARM proved we could not win a battle against weak defenders. Regardless. the foolish assault did bring some reward because it created a minor sea-clash and we were able to take our first small slice out of the Italian navy; our Battle-Cruiser HMS Renown sank the Heavy-Cruiser RM San Giorgio while CA HMS Norfolk and DD Swansea both sank enemy DD-flotillas. However, we did pay a price to take out these ships; we lost 226 men while the defenders on Rodi lost 2.

Actually off Rodi Island​

After a brief fight on 22 May with an Italian CA fleet, Trento, Bolzano & Trieste, that ended with the enemy safely escaping, I have 2nd Carrier out sinking Italian shipping hoping to draw more RM capitols out from there harbors. We are sinking a few enemy convoys but it seems there may not be a lot of targets so I will likely send the 2 Singapore sub squadrons back to home-base to await Japan’s entry into the war. There’s no need for me to waste the fuel.

Another way I am trying to provoke the RM is placing Admiral Sommerville’s 1st Combined Fleet in the West-central Mediterranean Sea in the waters south of Malta. The reason? The is a prime sea-lane for Italian traffic. However, this strategy has so far only resulted in HMS BB Warspite sinking two transports and two of our DD-groups being formally named DD Grimsby & DD Flint after each sunk an Italian sub-squadron. Sooner or later we hope to see the RM’s warships.

Malta received its first two INT-wings on 2 June and Alexandria now has our only Naval bombers.

Currently Italian sub-activity is most successful in and around the Balearic Islands. I have sent 1st Cruiser Fleet to those waters. This is the same fleet that won the small fleet-action around Dodi. On 6 June our fleet found the subs and then again on the 8th. There’s no word yet about the battles.

East Africa

Weeks prior to the battle for Port Sudan​

My only plan in East & South Africa is to hold our ports and thus far we have done so. However, not without the “rescue of Port Sudan.”. I explained my blunder earlier of not having my garrisons already in place in Sudan and Berbera and that I feared one or both may be attacked before they could reorganize. As you can see above...they both could have been lost.

Berbera had a Militia capture land up the doorstep of the Africa HQ but then turned back. But against Port Sudan the Italians sent an Infantry-division against our Militia-brigade and the 2 unorganized Garrison-brigades. Just hours before the port would have been lost, I pulled the combat-ready x2 Garrison from Bur Sa’id and transported them down to save Port Sudan. In addition, I sent 2nd Combined Fleet back into the Red Sea to provide shore-bombardment. As soon as the additional 6,000 garrison troops arrived in the town, the Italians called off the attack and have now also turned around. The Italians did accomplish something in Sudan though, they cut the supply-line coming from Mombasa and that caused me to create an 8-vessel supply-convoy to Port-Sudan, which has already been hit by subs at least once. The only immediate concern I have in this theater is that Khartoum and the airbase there, has no defending garrison. I hope to get one in place very soon.

Home-Command

* I continue to give France 25 LL and Norway 10 LL.
* General Horrocks commands our small BEF-Norway and he reports; Norway has added an Infantry-division to Oslo joining our 2 MOT-divisions there. All is quiet for now.
* I should mention that I abandoned Hong Kong and brought everything to Singapore. I still have the resource-convoy running but of course that will end once Japan is in the war.
* 22 May we finished research on Single-engine Aircraft Armament 1. Our IC for Upgrades has never dropped below 20 and now that some important techs are finishing, it will not for a while yet.

Important research underway.​

* I don’t know how much it will help them but for the time being I am allowing French, South-Africa and Australia debts. Since I’ve done nothing for my weak Allies maybe this will help them somewhat?
* For those that may be interested, we are still selling 25 supplies total to the U.S.A.
* We have had only one Luftwaffe attack into British airspace and we quickly turned them back.
* The two GAR brigades pulled from Hong Kong were put directly under General Slim in Singapore.
* One troubling failure the UK has at present is that we have no defensive forces in either the Lerwick or Faroe islands as well as Iceland and Greenland.
* In Aden we gave our lone GAR-brigade to Oman who consequently sent it to the capitol.

 

[markkur]

“The Fate of France”
{11 June - 14 June, 1940}​

BEF-France

The German-spearhead at Sedan had now gained momentum south and by 11 June, German Infantry had secured the ancient town of Verdun.

As the German-forces captured one channel-port after another, the RN soon found that Axis ships could flee contact much easier and the time we needed to sink and not only damage u-boats or Raiding squadrons had been much reduced. CAG missions were frequently causing damage on German warships only to have them manage a quick escape to these new Axis bases for safety and repairs.

The Withdrawal

In the south, on 11 June the BEF reluctantly ordered its two Motorized-Corps, to withdraw, by a planned Fort-to-Fort evacuation of those forces down to the port of Nice. The Italians did not challenge this tactical retreat.

Ramsey’s 1st Cruiser Fleet was ordered to the Ligurian Sea off Nice to protect the large 1st Motorized Transport Fleet while evacuating our British forces from mainland France.

HQ Mediterranean

North Africa

After claiming two provinces in the west, French Infantry halted their advance towards Tripoli. From this time forward, all battles for the control of North-Africa would take place in the east. We now turn to those two battles and other actions in the Med theater.

After our failure to take Rodi and the port and airfield there, we have decided to attack the island again. To remove the Italian threat in the eastern-Mediterranean the 14th and 19th Indian Infantry divisions were ordered out of Indian ports on 12 June, to sail to Alexandria. This infantry is necessary for a proper island-assault.

13 June Italian naval-bombers began harassing our fleet providing shore-bombardments for our land forces driving east towards Bengasi. Our CAGS must defend our warships until we can get more fighter-wings in the region. The two interceptor wings we have on Malta cannot reach far and they are strictly limited to defending the skies above Malta.

Barce was won on the 13th. UK losses 137. Italian at 436.​

A fight for Malta

The newly named Flint DD squadron sank its 2nd ship.​

The RN

The only information regarding Italian capitol-ships were repeated rumors that two large Italian war-ships were in the harbor of Misurata. However, for the time being, we had no planes in the region to verify those reports and until more planes could arrive in the Med the RN had to await the sailing of those mystery ships and be ready to meet that force head-on in the waters off Malta.

No Warships of the Italian Navy were found in the Red Sea. After several fruitless patrols there, Rear-Admiral Fraser’s 2nd Combined Fleet was ordered to seek Italian shipping but after finding no convoys either, on16 June 2nd Combined Fleet was ordered out of the Red Sea and to sail for the waters off Malta. Remember, two unknown RM battleships are in port at Misurata and could come out to fight our damaged fleet.

We received reports from French sources that the French Fleet Admiral Darlan commands a small squadron of warships stationed in Beirut, however the composition of that fleet is not known.

We continue submarine warfare on Italian shipping but targets are few and far between. Crutchley’s 3rd SS Squadron was now sent to the Gulf of Sidra, west of Bengasi in hopes of hitting supply-vessels.

London HQ

The Battle for the Atlantic (The Convoy War)

This report started on 11 June and Britain had been reduced once again to 76 free-convoys. Though the RN has had some success in sinking U-boats, we are still suffering high-losses of convoys and worse now, German-raiders are now patrolling some of Britain’s most vital commercial sea-lanes.

Other Directives
* A small submarine patrol has been stationed in Tambelan-Passage between Singapore and Kuching and will scout these waters till Japan’s entry into the war. British High-Command will need advance warning of movements made by the IJN into the Dutch East Indies.
* With the removal of two infantry divisions from India, the remaining division that guarded Bombay was sent to guard the large port of Chittagong. Until we can deploy more Garrison divisions to this theater, the UK is defending everything east of Chittagong and hoping that India will not be attacked by Japan before the largest ports in India can be defended again.
* On the 13th of June we finished research on Large-Warship Radar 2. Now begins the expensive refit.

Will the BEF “have another go” at helping their falling allies? Stay tuned to this channel.​

 

[markkur]

“On Shaky Ground”
{June 15 – Aug 8, 1940}​

The BEF-France

By the 16th of June our two MOT-Corps were all in Nice awaiting transports. As I mentioned already, to cover the evacuation of this force, we stationed the RN 1st Battle-Cruiser Fleet southeast of the port in the Ligurian Sea. This same fleet had patrolled to the west of these waters and it was believed the sea-lanes along the southern coast of France were free of RM warships. However, at noon on the 16th, we soon found otherwise.

An Italian fleet, consisting of the BB Conte di Cavour, 5 Heavy-Cruisers and 4 screens engaged our escort-fleet, led by BCs Repulse & Renown with 6 screens. Once this engagement was underway 1st Combined fleet was routed to the area. The move was a long shot and proved so.

The sea-battle was still raging 13 hours later when at 1:a.m. the next day, a small French fleet, made-up of the CV Bearn, the Battleship Bretagne (how fitting that name) and 3 Light-Cruisers arrived in the sea-zone and began firing welcomed salvos. This engagement did not end until 3:00 p.m. on the 17th.

I mentioned our being “Lucky” earlier. HMS Repulse sank RM Bolzano, HMS Renown sank RM Pola . Had the French not engaged? We would have lost more ships and sank fewer.

We were surprised at sinking the transport and cannot help but wonder if this was actually
an Italian assault force that bumped into our escort-fleet instead of coming out to attack?​

However, we had a “2nd lucky-break” when two bombing attacks on our transport fleet, as the ships fled the port at Nice, came very close to sinking two vessels but didn’t sink either. All were loaded with Motorized. This fact makes the action of the French Navy in the sea-battle the obvious reason for a complete success with our suffering only the loss of one DD-Squadron.

By the 22 June, German forces had nearly surrounded Paris. British High Command decided to send Harding’s II Motorized to Dieppe in an effort to hold the French left flank and halt the German blitz down the coastline. As fate would have it, our transports did not make it in time. This proved disastrous because General Hilpert’s 2.Panzer-division beat us there. Instead of catching tired German infantry out in the open, as we thought possible when the mission began, we were forced to land at La Havre instead. Upon landing, we soon found the French units on our right-flank were already in full retreat. In a disparate action we attacked across the river with our entire Corps. We found the German armor fresh and ready for battle and in addition, a newly arrived 87.Infantry division was there to stop our crossing. If that was not bad enough, Stukas soon rained bombs on our shocked seasick men. Our fighters scrambled but were too late to prevent the loss of 83 men before gaining the skies. We lost 2,400 men total to the enemy’s 529. The river-crossing was much of the reason for so bad a loss but the fact is our Motorized is far inferior to all German-wheeled-units. We were stopped cold in our motorized-tracks and unable to go anywhere except back to the transports. Had we have stayed any longer, we would have been isolated by the sweeping, right German front. This was not comforting and there was much worse...Paris was burning.

July 24th ​

The Fall of France

Germany began its campaign in the West in early May. As of the 19th, German units had not crossed into France. For nearly three months an ill-equipped and ill led French Army fought the invaders.

There were two main causes for the fall of our most important ally. The first was the divided conditions of the Government and the French people. The second was that the French army was led by Generals that were mostly relics from WWI and because of that fact, the command & control capabilities of French high-command was nearly limited to the methods and strategy of the former war. There was one striking exception and he, in later years, would become President of France.

The Government surrendered on 7 August, 1940

Our two dejected MOT-Corps were eventually ordered to Bengasi.

With the fall of France, our Beirut GAR marched to Tel Aviv.

Britain soon enacted Destroy the French Fleet & TFH and Destroyers for Bases.​

The Mediterranean

The RN 1st Battle-Cruiser Fleet was very heavily damaged and sent to the shipyards of Glasgow. Our failed BB rescuers however did have their own engagement, when in route to the sea-battle, in finding a large Italian sub-squadron that had been wrecking havoc on our supply-lines. The RM soon lost two of those three subs-groups. Since 1st Cruiser was heading home, our strongest battle fleet, 1st BB, led by HMS Rodney and HMS Nelson was sent to the Med. 2nd Combined Fleet returned from the Red Sea and was sent to blockade Malta’s sea-lanes.

In the contest of sinking shipping, Italy is winning the battle. With only minor success elsewhere we sent a SS squadron to prey in the Gulf of Sidra west of Bengasi. Upon arrival, a convoy was quickly found but it had too large an escort to attack.

On 18 June 1st Combined fleet was ordered to the sea off Rodi. Our Indian-infantry had finally arrived in Alexandria and we would try again to remove the Italians from the eastern-Mediterranean sea. By 14:00 on 19 June our fleet was in place and the assault started. Unfortunately, thunder-storms moved up from Crete and we would pay a heavy price. By the time our infantry was ashore and fighting it was midnight. I was glad I had sent both Indian divisions and not only one, as I first considered in making a double-assault on Rodi & Dodecanese. I doubt we would have gained either.

Midday on 21 June, ships anchored in Rodi came out of port and RM Flume was sunk. The same day DD Flint sank two more SS squadrons adding to Italy’s growing losses of warships. Flint had 3 now but cheers fade quickly.

RN battleships HMS Queen Elizabeth & HMS Royal Sovereign along with the heavy-cruisers London & Hawkins patrolled waters east of Sicily in the East Central Mediterranean Sea. On 23 June this move, paid dividends, when a small RM fleet led by BB Giulio Cesare was found. Soon our CAGS were attacking their ships and Italian bombers from Cantania were after ours. We sent in fighters over Cantania but we stopped them too late and the CL HMS Carlisle was lost. We got some payback when our CL Cardiff torpedoed the burning wreck of the CA RM Bari and CL Dauntless sank a DD squadron. The remainder of the Italian fleet, including the Giulio Cesare made it safely to port in Messina.

On 24 June we decided to send our best CV fleet into the Med and sent 2nd CV with its older CV and CVL to patrol the Western Approaches to the Channel to hopefully find the German surface raiders. Powerful 1st BB fleet moved to the waters south of Malta, anticipating RM fleet-actions to come. Heavily damaged CAs London and Shropshire were sent to Glasgow for repairs.

On 26 June, near midnight, part of the 1st Battleship fleet, DD Ipswich got it first SS-41a. Several days later 2 July DD Wick also got its 1st kill, sinking SS-12a. While Rodi was under our attack, a repaired Guilio Cesare came out of port on 3 July only to pull back.

Three days later, on 6 July, two prizes came out to fight.

HMS Barham had the honor of sinking Littorio. The badly damaged CA Sussex was sent to Alex.​

In the first hour of 7 July, one of Italy’s top Admirals, A.D. Camponi, led a force consisting of BB Caio Duilio against the Barham & Warspite led Rodi invasion fleet but soon withdrew. The land battle for Rodi ended early morning with heavy British loss. We lost 1,219. Italian dead 545 and 6,453 captured. Our two transports were flooded, another moment longer, we would have lost the invasion. However, our troubles were not over, 1st Combined fleet was heavily damaged and to our surprise, Admiral Camponi still had his fleet in the area and before I could withdraw our crippled fleet, big-guns flashed again. 14” shells from HMS Barham sank the heavy cruiser RM Gorizia. Both sides lost 2 DD groups but I must say losing the successful Flint and Grimsby DD squadrons were very sad losses.

With the victories at Rodi, we anticipated the Italian fleet heading to Dodecanese. Warspite was a wreck, it and 18th DD squadron were rushed to Alexandria. Since BB Barham, CL Galatea and 2 remaining DD-flotillas were ship-shape, this small fleet chased the enemy towards Dode. Until the 1st Battleship & 2nd CV Fleets could arrive to these seas, they would have to contain these ships. Our fresh fleets arrived and we sent CAGs from Illustrious and Formidable and bombed the port. Nelson & Rodney waited off-port like hungry wolves.

Planes from Illustrious sank SS-43a & RM Vittorio Veneto,
Planes from Formidable sank RM Guilio Cesare​

Now that our CAGs had to leave the battle, we grabbed 2 sound transports, 14th Indian-infantry division from Rodi and assaulted Dodecanese. Nelson and Rodney still lay in wait for the battered RM ships achored at port. To the west, while the landing took place, a SS-group of ours was found by Italian NAVs in the Eastern Tyrrhenian Sea forcing us to send them to Alex for repairs.

On 20 July Dodecanese fell and the RM came out into the Central Aegean Sea. In the afternoon, we lost 1 DD-group as HMS Rodney sank RM Tireste. Our “Pride” the battle-cruiser HMS Hood sent down the newly arrived Italian battleship RM Andrea Doria and a DD-group. And DD-Wick sent three torpedoes into the battered hulk of RM Conte di Cavour making a 5th Italian battleship sank during the time spanning this report.

26 July brought 2 RM sub-group sinkings near Tobruch in the Gulf of Bomba. DDs Barrow and Lairg had their first kills.

The Mediterranean Sea now grew quiet. The RM’s surface-fleet capability had been gutted.


North-Africa

Our march west continued with Bengasi taken on 20 June. It wasn’t much of a battle with our light tanks driving into the city from the NW. We lost 6 men, the Italians 238. A counter-attack quickly failed adding 1 Brit and 45 Italians to the list of dead. Both our NAV-wings were re-based to the airfield there.

By adding supply-convoys to Tobruch and Bengasi we were now down to 60 free convoys and of course giving more targets for Axis warships. With our units in North-Africa all on wheels and also our large naval forces I was afraid if I did not increase supply, our moving front might stall.

At 13:00 on 29 June, IV Corps, evacuated from Nice and took Misurata. The Italians had only Tripoli left. 1 July our forces pushed through Djibouti; we had 3 dead Italy 74. From Misurata we immediately struck west into Zliten, soon winning the battle on 3 July. Loss of 24 vs 167 enemy.

On 11 July, II Motorized struck Tripoli and held by the 13th

All we had to do now was round up the hungry and weak. 74,033 Italian dead or captured to our losses at about 500 men. Our armor is good in North Africa - if only it was on the fields of Europe.​

On 28 July We sent our NAVs from Bengasi to port-strike Siracusa, each group sank sub-flotillas. Once we get the RM down in the Med, the German raiders now having a “happy time” in our home-waters are going to run into a lot more angry, experienced RN warships.

East-Africa

It was decided to send a less fuel consuming x2Mot Corps down to Berbera. If possible Lt. General Beck would first reclaim the french port of Obock and then move on Edd. He could not keep both so Edd was priority and if taken, Italy would lose it’s only port on the east coast of Africa. Beck won battles in Zeila 15 dead 141 killed and then took Obock; we lost 6, the enemy 42 in the French town. Edd was taken on 16 July without loss. And a small convoy started.

On 26 June we attacked from Mombasa into Lamu but were soon defeated by the river losing 260 men to 199. The attack was called off because we did not want to lose Mombasa. We must be patient.

Home-Command

* We began having dogfights over channel-ports. In Dover we wondered what the Luftwaffe was up to? but we soon learned the remnant of the Polish Navy was repairing there.
* Grim times at home. We keep finding German subs but are sinking none now.

* Late on 26 July, CA Exeter, and three CLs, Durban, Emerald & Despatch (an HK squadron)were all lost in Galway Bay when a German surface fleet led by BC Schlesien and CA Hipper was met. This was terrible news since losing this entire sub-hunting group further damages our efforts to win the convoy war. BBs Ramallies and Resolution were sent to the now dangerous sea-zone and once 1st Cruiser repairs, that fleet will patrol around Scapa-flow.

The 26th again proved a terrible day for the RN at home. The Deutchland was found sailing alone but before it could be sank it escaped to Dieppe. Then, in the Northern Celtic Shelf, Admiral Donitz commanding BC Schlesien, Pocket-BB Scharnhorst CA Hipper & CLs Koln and Konigsberg, that had earlier that day destroyed our 4 ship HK squadron to the north, found another 3 ship HK squadron of ours. We sent everything at this fleet but lost a DD squadron. In trying to get our two damaged ships home, a Norwegian fleet became mixed-up in the contest and we lost another DD while Norway lost the CA KNM Eidsvold and one of their DD Groups. The only German loss on this rampage was CL Koln. The Capetown made it to Glasgow but was more a floating water-logged tub than a CL. We sent everything to track this fleet down but without success.

* On 30 June CL Capetown was added to a new HK group but would need repairs first.
* Norway remains quiet. Three Infantry-brigades have joined our MOT in the capitol.
* We have had to wait a long time for BB Prince of Wales...maybe by Christmas?
* 8 July German bombers hit our port of Hull. Our Norway-transport fleet was there and had to re-base at Rosyth in Scotland; the docks at Hull received moderate damage. Also, air-battles over the Channel are increasing but so far the RAF is holding its own.
* On 27 July, with both now available, we began building SpART & AC brigades to improve our wheeled units. We need so damned many! But must build them in series...one at a time. Convoys, DDs and Fighters are without question, top-priority and we need to build so much else! Goodness me.
* We finally researched Schwerpunkt 2 so it and also Blitzkrieg 3 are both being pursued.
* By the end of July, Dover, Malta and Singapore all received better Radar...that effort continues.
* We still seriously lack GARs. A few are in queue and one is currently deploying at Alexandria and another making the long voyage to Calcutta.
* As of 8 August we only give 10 LL to Norway.

With all the sinkings and the newly added convoys to 6 ports we are down to 40 free. We have 100 convoys coming on 19 August, I hope they make it in time and another 50 coming 6 Oct.. We are already at “minimum convoy status” and can pare nothing except supply routes. With the complete capture of North Africa we can now gain back several but we need to create a much larger cushion.

Britain stands alone with 184 brigades.​

 

[markkur]

“The Start of The Battle of Britain”
{9 August, 1940}​

Prime Minister Winston Churchill addressed the nation.

“What General Weygand has called The Battle of France is over. The battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilisation. Upon it depends our own British life and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of a perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, This was
their finest hour.”

__________​

As France fell, during July, our intelligence network became informed that some airfields had already been hastily repaired in the low countries and were back in service. In addition, many more new fields were under construction all along northern Europe for Göering’s Luftwaffe. Our Spies in Berlin informed us recently that the Air-Marshall had boasted to OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht) that there is no need to be too concerned about the Wehrmacht or the Kriegsmarine to make Britain surrender, because German pilots and planes will bomb the British people and break their will. Their support of Churchill and his government’s prolonging the war will end.

French partisans also tell us Göering at this time lives in a castle, eating & drinking like a king in his white-royalty garb and he is going around a fallen western-Europe and taking whatever treasures of art that he likes.

Göering's counter-part leading fighter-command, Hugh Dowding
“Let him think he has the whole world in his thieving hands but he will soon discover otherwise.”​

Major Planes of the opposing air-forces

Germany

Firm knowledge of the Luftwaffe's organization is lacking but we have identified and confirmed planes in use.

Messerschmitt Bf 109 - Fighter
Messerschmitt Bf 110 Zerstörer (“destroyer”) Bomber-escort Fighter
Junkers Ju 87
Junkers Ju 88
The Dornier Do 17 Fliegender Bleistift ("flying pencil")
The Heinkel He 111

England

The defense of our island depends on Dowding’s air-defense plan.
1. - Advance-radar that reaches across the channel.
2. - A second line of lesser radar, that is only useful to a max of 5 miles off-shore.
3. - A civil-defense spotting & communications-network that will track Luftwaffe missions once inside our radar screen.
* All three levels are represented in four Fighter-sector quadrants that report to Fighter-command HQ.

In the skies over Britain, Fighter-command will depend on two fighter-types. The first is the Hawker-Hurricane, by far our most numerous interceptor and the new Ultramarine-Spitfire. Everyone at fighter-command wanted and expected more of the superior Spitfires to be available but the new plane has proved more difficult to build, therefore the backbone of our defense remains the Hurricane.

Note: Our Intelligence has also advised F.C. that Italy may send some of their own fighters to our skies. They do have the Macchi MC.200 Saetta that we know to be a good plane but whether we will see any in the air-war over Britain is not known.

As you can see above, the RAF is not a particularly strong force and the planes of our Allies are nearly non-existent. We must focus on Spitfires for some time to protect our island from what I imagine is going to be overall a large Axis bomber force, in comparison with our small numbers. However, at this time we only have information on types of enemy planes...not the numbers of them.

__________​

In July 1940, the air and sea blockade began with the Luftwaffe mainly targeting our coastal shipping and convoys. With the addition of so many good ports in France, at least part of Germany’s surface-fleet is based on the shores of western-Europe. The German U-boats, at least for the time being, are harder for our fleets to find and sink and their success against our supply-convoys has been brutal.

A meeting of “Britain’s High-Command” ended with the directive to pull some of our fleets out of the Mediterranean Sea and get them back to home waters.​

RN Fleet Orders

* 1st Cruiser (Ramsey) even though a couple of the DD squadrons were still being repaired, with the Capitols in good shape, the fleet was ordered out of Glasgow and sent to patrol the Irish Sea.

* The small HMS Courageous Squadron (Phillips) was ordered from Singapore to the Med for air-protection.

* 3rd Combined Fleet (Cunningham JHD) was also ordered out of Singapore and to re-base at Alexandria to fight whatever remains of the RM’s warships.

* 1st Battleship Fleet (Cunningham AB) is now sailing to Portsmouth were our strongest gun-fleet will be near the scene of destruction of two HK fleets.

* 2nd Combined Fleet (Fraser) is re-basing to Glasgow and will patrol the northern waters.

* 1st Combined and 2nd Carrier fleets will remain in the Mediterranean until the fleets from Singapore arrive and once naval superiority in the Mediterranean is confirmed, they will then hunt German ships in the Atlantic off the French coast.

Britain's Current Efforts​

Research

Intelligence

Government

Production

The red is our targeted level of radar. Notice we are building our "1st" support for wheels.

___________

I'm adding a link to a documentary about unsung heroes of the Battle of Britain. I'm sharing a part of history regarding what happened over Britain's skies that I do not think is very well known and believe it should be.
Bloody foreigners. Untold Battle of Britain. {English with Polish subtitles}

I ask that no comments or debates of any kind be made in this thread about the link.
Cheers! from Markkur ​

​

 

[markkur]

“The Convoy War & The Garrison Struggle”
{11 August – 26 August. 1940}​

I am separating this next update in two-parts because this part of my war must be presented with closer attention to this very important challenge, a part of playing the UK in the 39 Blitz-Scenario. Beginning this time-frame Britain had 33 free convoys. Our lack of convoys is affecting everything about Britain’s war-efforts.



Notable Impacts

1. Because we are not free to trade and I did not have the time necessary to establish a needed vast merchant-marine fleet, we are in the proverbial “rock and a hard-place”. If I choose to take care of the problem once and for all we will make little in the way of actual war machines. Obviously, I have chosen the juggling-act of keeping only resource-convoys to America going and keeping our supply-lanes running with as minimal loss as possible, while still putting as much IC to building planes, ships, and garrisons to free-up MOT-units from guard duty, while trying to get started on support units for an entire army that has none in any unit.

2. I started very short of Garrisons and because of having to focus on convoys, progress with Garrisons is very slow.

For example:

a. All Britain’s islands in the Indian & Pacific Oceans are undefended.

b. India, only just now, received a garrison for Calcutta and has an Indian Infantry division in the large port of Chittagong. I have no guards in any other port of India.

c. Hong Kong has no force of any size, since those units were pulled back to protect the small ports north of Singapore.

d. The important oil-ports of Borneo, Kuala Belait and Kuching, have Indian Infantry protecting them.

e. I have now sent a Garrison to Dodecanese but it has to have time to fully organize before I can use the infantry already there for a much better purpose.

f. Garrisons at home are now in several ports in the north of Britain and Portsmouth but many more are needed to eventually free-up two more Corps of motorized-infantry.

g. I should add that South Africa is being swallowed-up by the Axis, since I am not sending MOT down there and will not leave my important ports undefended. As long as I keep my ports there and now that I have taken Edd, if I can get Mogadishu I will be content until I can take SA back at my choosing.

To give you a clear idea of our current “close call regarding the convoy-war”.​

Transports lost

Date – Location – Number – Sinker

11 August – Eastern Biscay Plain – 1 transport – Germany

11 August – Eastern Kings Trough – 1 transport – England

11 August – Eastern Biscay Plain – 2 transports – Germany

12 August – Western Algerian Coast – 2 transports – Italy​

*** 14 August – We are down to 26 free convoys ***

14 August – Western Algerian Coast – 1 transport – Italy

16 August – Coast of Cape Matapan – 1 transport – Italy

16 August – Firth of Forth– 3 transports – Germany

17 August – Northern Celtic Shelf – 1 transport – Germany

18 August – The Long Forties – 2 transports – Germany

18 August – Eastern Somali Basin – 1 transport – Italy

18 August – Donegal Bay – 1 transport – Germany

*** 18 August – We are down to 15 free convoys ***

*** 19 August – 100 Convoys (one–shot) arrive taking us back to 110 free convoys ***

21 August – Baymans Hole – 2 transports – Germany
​

*** 21 August we sink 14. U-boat flotilla in the Celtic Sea ***

22 August – Firth of Forth– 3 transports – Germany

23 August – Central Algerian Coast – 1 transport – Italy

25 August – Dogger Bank – 1 transport – Germany



*** We will have 50 more (from series) on 6 October ***​

Current Strategy

* 5 Destroyer Flotillas arrived from America in port at Glasgow. One will flush out Layton’s reformed 1st HK group led by CA HMS Berwick, CL Columbo and CL Capetown – the only surviving ship from the original squadron. This squadron, though all repairs have not been completed, sailed for Mombasa on the 18th to seek the Italian subs off the coast.

* The other four DDs were sent to the Reserve-Fleet, made up of BB Revenge (now back in action after sinking two German ships) and 3 CAs, to which this fleet is now in action on-patrol.

* We are currently researching Spotting 2 and as soon as it finishes we will start on Spotting 3.

* DD techs, Destroyer Escort Role & Destroyer Crew Training and set to start NEXT.

* Small Search Radar for planes was waiting in a long “Need” list but it is now bumped to START

* 1st Battleship Fleet arrived in Portsmouth on 13 August and was sent to waters south of Ireland.

* 2nd Combined arrived in Glasgow also on 13 August and patrols in the Northern Bay of Biscay.

* 3rd Combined Fleet re-based to Bengasi and now patrols off Oran seeking Italian subs.

The remainder of this update will be added to the next.

Edit = "g" added to the Garrison examples​

 

[markkur]

Chapter 11 “Handcuffed”
{12 August – 12 September, 1940}​

Home Command {One year’s time}​

Britain’s Internal IC War

Upgrades

Britain has never dropped below needing 20 IC to upgrade. Most of the time it has been steady in the 30 to 40 range. Currently, after completing 3 of 4 1940 Infantry techs I have once again skyrocketed to need near 100IC. In short trying to catch-up with outdated-equipment or non-existent support-units, the combination of upgrades & terrible Practical on nearly every unit is eating up IC available for Production.

Supplies/Resources

I keep supply/IC at 30 (near 12% of IC) and have for months. Despite “needed-supply-IC” being at 27+change, I can still lose 130 in a day even when already nearly 3 IC above requirement. I am yet selling 25-supplies to the U.S. and would like to stop and I may be forced-to and then I will have to cancel all trades with the U.S. As I am in the red with cash, I keep sending supplies to America, since I am losing 78$/day. If I leave things as they are, I have about 5 months with my current stockpile before I go bankrupt. One small reason for the cash situation has been I have allowed debts from South-Africa, Norway and France. South-Africa wants more supplies now and of course we will not give “more” for free.

However the most important obstacle has been that, other than Norway, I sell nothing, nada, zilch of my only plentiful resource...Rares. This full year I have only been able to make money (other than selling plans for 1 plane) by selling supplies to the U.S. and that is with the current Gold bonus.

Production

I have had less than one week when I was at a milestone of 200 IC producing. However, for the most part I have not been above 175 and far more often...much less.

With important Infantry equipment-techs now finished to make my army “current”, when the last tech soon finishes, I will need around 115 IC for a time and that leaves me somewhere around 100 IC still making war-goods. And mind you, that is after, just now, canceling the 10 IC I was giving Norway. (more on that later) And recently canceling the 25LL I was giving France to hold out for three months.

Currently, BB Prince of Wales has been “once-again set-back” to early January 41...that one BB has been in the queue for 15 months! Btw, I once upon a merry old-England time “intended” to build the 5 George V class BBs before the end of the war. but with all of England’s backwardness I doubt that will be remotely possible.

As I have mentioned before, Light-aircraft and Garrison units have rising Practicals which are now getting into much better turn-around times but everything else is rock-bottom with my having to constantly queue more and more Convoy-production. I truly am fighting Britain’s real war, even if I am doing so with a MOT-army.

I do have a first group of DDs nearing completion (after taking many months) with another group of 3 jostling for a future position in the Queue. I also have a set of 3 CLs that I keep having to push-down, due to needing to build some infantry or forget about foot-soldiers. Meanwhile I am not yet close to being able to build tanks and of course cannot upgrade my over-abundant MOT to get my Army back in some sort of balance.

The good news is my INT fears have been dismissed. We just completed the three needed x3 wings (Park just getting his 3rd group on 31 Aug.) for the air-defense of Britain and we already have a x2 wing on Malta, though I would like a few more in the Med and we have none for the far-east. However, we have no reserve CAGs and must build at least a few spare units or risk having RN Carriers being made worthless.

Again on the RN, we are still in serious need of screens to create better fleets and therefore having any Reserve-screens seems well out of reach. I also need LC to reduce our landing-penalties but can only make 1 at a time in a series of 4. Of course our adding the LC to the queue means we are delaying other important needs. This never ends

Completed Techs

Medium Tank Engine 2 – Medium Tank Gun 2 – Infantry Support Weapons 4 – Light Artillery 4 –Spotting 2 – Militia Small Arms 2 – Fire Control System Training 1 – The last two are started again.

Battle of the Atlantic

On 4 Sept. 1st Carrier found 8. U-boat squadron and this time...sank it. Convoy-losses continue.


Status of our Army-Group Mediterranean

Misurata – (HQ 1st Larm-Corps “Montgomery MOTx3”) and “2 more Divisions” LARMx1+MOTx2
Bengasi – (HQ 8th Army “Wavell MOTx2”) “7th Armored-div” ARMx1+MOTx2, “6th Larm-div” LARMx1+MOTx2.
Tobruch – “14th Mot-div” x3 MOT reporting to Wavell.
Alexandria – (HQ Egypt Corps) Barkworth-Wright MOTx2 (HQ IV Motorized-Corps) “Dempsey” MOTx3, and “3 more divisions” of MOTx3.


South&East-Africa

Upon the arrival of our GAR into Tel Aviv from the new Vichy port of Beirut, I sent Franklyn’s MOTx2 division to Berbera and it arrived on 27 Aug. Earlier Italian MIL had claimed a second province facing our GARx2 defending HQ-Africa and we were afraid a two-directional attack that would take out that Theater HQ.

Note: Imagine my shock to see my Garrison and Militia units all had 1914 rifles. Thankfully I am now upgrading them and am taking them to the next model at least.

In the south, at Mombasa, the same situation developed there as well. To ensure the best port in the south could not be taken, 52nd MOTx2 was sent to Mombasa from Alex and landed on 27 Aug. Once a GAR unit was partially organized in Dodecanese, the 19th Indian INF-Div was also sent to Mombasa to begin a push to the province of Jimma in Ethiopia. We will need to take Ethiopia out of the war, or at least securely hold Jimma by the time the USA has joined the Allies or we will miss-out on an 10% IC increase and a 10% bonus to our combat-movement-speed. I had not realized that I would miss those needed bonuses when I chose my defensive strategy of only holding ports.


The Withdrawal of the Norway BEF

For much of this first year of war I have had 2 MOT-divisions in Oslo. Norway successfully defeated a small German invasion at Trondheim but left Oslo undefended. I made the effort in a sincere nod to the real Narvik fiasco.

A new problem began when Germany decided it was time for another invasion on 26 Aug. This time in Kristiansand. Two German Inf. and one Mtn. Divisions landed and this time the Norse/Franco troops stopped nothing. I say “Norse/Franco troops” because I had not noticed that most of Norway’s units were French! I’d not seen this before and did not expect it now. Regardless, most of the French divisions were fairly well led.

28 Aug. 8th MOT left the Capitol for the province of Tonsberg

I raised LL to 20 on 30 Aug. contemplating putting up a serious fight for our Norse ally.

1st Inf-div in Bergen on 1 Sept.

Two Inf-divisions arrive in Stavangar and is attacked on 2 Sept.

2 Sept. 9th MOT leaves an undefended Oslo

1. RAF INT-wing is sent to Bergen’s airfield.
2 Sept. we lose 165 men.
3 Sept. 158 more troops are killed by bombs


Romania joins the Axis as HMS Courageous arrives off-shore
in Boknafjordan seas and clears the skies of the enemy bombers.

We send a GARx2 to Oslo since no troops are there now.

On 4 Sept. We won the battle for Stavangar losing 288 men to the German loss of 736
and we attacked into Sirdal to send the defeated German division further back, each side losing
just over 100 men but we soon saw that the Norse army could not contain the center.
​

While our men rested in Stavanger after holding the port and also driving the enemy out of Sirdal, the transport carrying our Garrison to defend Oslo passed by Kristiansand and we could now see Germany was planning to win in Norway this time. Two more German divisions were already moving north behind the one Mtn. Division that had defeated “double their numbers” and sent our allies on the run; well-led or not they can hold no ground. Worse, a couple more divisions had apparently just arrived in port. Seeing that new force, made it clear we could not win the war for Norway. I pulled the BEF out.

Malta is struck again.

The RN was not that near because they were hunting Italian subs.
CAGs from HMS Formidable flew to the sea-zone first.

This was a large RM fleet so we called in 2nd Combined fleet repairing in Bengasi​

We soon won the fight but lost 4 more of our screens further hampering future fleet-actions.

In addition, these ships have huge damage and Italian NAVs hit HMS Formidable and really
war-out her crew, as well as the enemy bombers also made us retire that SS group for repairs.​

Malta is still ours. Don’t they know they are fighting Elite MOT? ​

 

[markkur]

“In Fits & Starts”
{11 September – 12 October, 1940}​

26 September, 1940​

After failing to halt the loss of France or Norway, this Allied-Leader is in dire-straits. Our government of course is doing all it can to bring the Yanks into the war but we make little progress. FDR understands the peril that not only Britain and her impotent allies face but knows the U.S. will soon face the same fate. However, the man is hampered by the people of the country that want no more “foreign entanglements”. The brightest gesture of hope we have had yet is the deal that gave us old mothballed destroyers for some bases we cannot easily defend, with so many global shortages of GAR.

However, until the day dawns when we are not alone, we fight! We will defend the British Empire in the sands of Africa and Egypt. We will hold our ground in Thaton and preserve a free Rangoon. We will not abandon India to an unknown fate. Italy & her puppet Ethiopia will have their troops purged from East and South Africa. The waters of the world’s oceans are menaced by Axis ambition and the RN will halt that slaughter. Britain will never surrender!


South & East Africa

Realizing now we had to knock Ethiopia out of the war we began “Operation Jimma” to be in position to gain strategic-effects. The plan called for reorganizing our Motorized-divisions in Alexandria into x2 divisions that would need less fuel in the hostile terrains. I thought about taking the new 1st Inf-Div that saw action in Norway but these 4 units all had ART & AC support; and besides, I only had them to use for any new invasions in the Med where MOT is near useless.

Under this plan, these smaller units would roll east and south and in our planned combined-offensive. The two remaining Italian ports were also in our sights. One step further, since we had already impacted enemy-supply, capturing their last two ports would further reduce supply. In addition, our remaining two STRAT-wings would be flown by a very crazy route to avoid German fighters, via Vancouver Canada to HongKong and into a captured Mogadishu, to bomb Ethiopia’s capitol and supply center, Addis Ababa.

The final step of this plan is an effective OOB for Africa HQ, in managing the best that we can, of our small strung-out forces around the southern-half of the continent.

With Berbera, the Theater-HQ, this is the new command with two new Army-groups.

“Operation Jimma” is planned​

Mombasa Front

12 Sept. we struck Nairobi with 52nd MOTx2, the 2nd MOT that arrived in this Theater. (Beck’s capture of Edd was the first unit) Nairobi was won on the 13th. Losses UK 75 enemy 265.

After 19th Indian Inf. arrived in Mombasa, the odd INF/MIL division there was split and the INF added to the 19th Inf-div and split into two x2 divisions by creating the new 7th Inf-div. The lone MIL brigade was transported to Sudan to join there with another lone MIL to make a x2 MIL-div.

24 Sept. With our victory in Nairobi 52nd MOT marched north into Nanyuku and on to Wajir and this gets us on the other side of the river to strike the Italians, on their right flank, dug-in behind the river in Lamu.

With Mogadishu ours without a fight, that INFx3 was divided. We left only 1 INF brigade to defend Mogadishu
and embarked the other two brigades to take the port of Chisimaoi.​

We won this fight on 4 Oct. 99 lost vs 479. Now we could cross the river from Mombasa.​

On 11 Oct. 52nd MOT arrived in Wajir after a loss of 52 men, taking out 203 Italians. To the north our STRATS have destroyed infrastructure and supplies and now strike ground-targets - soon a couple of hundred Ethiopian troops are permanently out of the war. The same day the Ita-MIL in Lamu is cut-off and nearly 5,000 Italians are captured.

Berbera Front

By 21 September our Theater-HQ in Berbera came under serious threat of being attacked and lost. As earlier reported, like Mombasa, Berbera had two enemy units facing our single province but now Berbera had three with the arrival of an Ethiopian inf-div in Bohotleh. Thankfully, I saw this danger unfolding and had already brought a second MOTx2 to the port. Now I sent a third and attacked out northeast and east to begin a drive to the Ethiopian capitol.

On 20 Sept. we attacked from Berbera; 22 Sept. 9th MOT attacked into Zeila and 16th MOT into Hargeysa. We gambled that our GAR could hold against the Ethiopian-inf-unit to the SE. Early morning in the 22nd we won Zeila – our dead 71, Italy 230.

24 Sept. we attacked out of Edd into Makale but Beck’s MOT found heavy resistance in hills and after a short by hot contest halted his attack. UK dead 395 – Italian 308. Once it arrived, 15th Mot attacked Makale again on the 11th and we won the next day- 111 dead to 96 on the high-ground.

2 Oct. the Ethiopian 2nd Inf-div attacked 16th MOT just as they arrived in Hargeysa. Two days later on the 4th, their attack ended with our loss of 173 and theirs at 199. However, now 16th MOT would have to wait before attacking further west but we sent 9th MOT instead into Harar; we plan to drive west and take Addis Ababa. 51st MOT arrived 5 Oct. they were routed to follow into Harar and hopefully 4 MOT brigades can take the Capitol while 16th MOT holds the critical supply-line back to port.

Port Sudan

To the north in Port Sudan, once the Tanganyikan MIL-brigade from Mombasa arrived, I formed a MILx2-div and attacked south. This attack into Erkowith on 2 Oct. failed miserably when we found three fairly well led Italian Mil brigades defending hilly country; we lost 174, the Italians 140. We had no chance, until we could get a MOTx2 unit in Sudan. Since Berbera & Mombasa-fronts were priority, it would take time. 15th MOT was sent to the port on 7 Oct. 15th MOT led by Gen. Lumsden attacked into the hills of Erkowit on 10 Oct. Erkowit is won on 12 Oct. - 65 dead to 235. A much better result.

We near the Capitol​

The RN in Action

After the previous action in the West-Central Med where we lost 2 CLs and 2DDs and the Italian-fleet lost 5 CLs, 5 DDs and 2 transports, we struck their remaining ships after they reached the port of Siracusa. On the 11th, right after the sea-battle in the late afternoon, our NAVs (not fully repaired) in Bengasi sank another CL the RM Duca d’ Aosta and a single sub-squadron. The next day they sank a transport before ending the strike.

Italian Wing-commander Balbo’s TACs are countered by RAF #11 & #12 fighter-wings, every time the enemy planes fly. Malta’s improving Radar-system is paying big dividends.

With so many lost screens, the Admiralty decided to disband two small HK-squadrons, sending the two CAs to Glasgow (our main fleet shipyard) and sent the 3 Cls and 1 DD to Begasi and Alex to bolster our two battle-fleets in the Med. In addition, 2 more CLs were taken from CV fleets as well as a DD from the HK-force on duty off the coast of South Africa. This did not give me my desired 2-1 ratio of screens escorting my Capitols but i.e. with 4 Capitols, I now had 5 or 6 screens and that was the best we could do. I took the chance of reducing the number of small HK squadrons for another reason also, they were not finding the subs! With 4 CVs & 3 CVLs in the home-waters and 3 Combat-fleets, the change made perfect sense to cover our recent losses during fleet-actions in the Med.

20 Sept. 1st Combined fleet’s HMS CL Sussex sank its second heavy-cruiser in RM Zara near Messina. This same day during our port-assault on Chisimaio our escorting-fleet 3HK<LOL> sank 2 Dds & a 1 TP fleeing the ports.; our CA HMS Berwick sank all three. Go Berwick...you bad boy.

On 29 September we sank 2. U-boat and DD Hull was glad to do so; Axis French-ports make it hard.

We found the Konigsberg alone and heavily damage her in Broken-bank...she flees to Flemish Bank.
We sent TACs and CAGS after her but she makes it safely to Middleberg. Damn!

North, 1st Crusier Fleet sees its first action since the off-Nice engagement against the RM.
This new sea-battle is brisk and costly. And the very next day on the 30th we find another prize.
We finally avenged the earlier destruction of two HK groups by some of these same ships.​

We finally avenged the earlier destruction of two HK groups by some of these same ships.​

On 7 Sept. the CVL Hermes ASW Squadron sinks a lone German DD-flotilla in Southern Celtic Shelf; we can only guess the ship was trying to find our subs sinking their transports.<S>

In Dogger Bank in 12 Oct. a German Fleet was found by our old CVs Glorious and Courageous. Very unfortunately, Gneisenau, Admiral Hipper, Deutschland and Blucher were made wrecks but escaped our slow CVs. However, we are shadowing and if we can catch them again maybe we’ll finish the job.


Home Waters

With our overlapping Wings the Germans will not win.​

We have a critical research goal, in that the RN must both reach & acquire the tech Carrier Task Force to make our CAGS, the backbone, “the watery-walls of the British Empire” as potent as possible. The Luftwaffe is no slouch air-force and just as alarming, Bletchley-Park code-breakers have “some intelligence” that the IJN-CVs may be quite advanced. Carrier Group Doctrine 2 just completed and Light Cruiser Escort 2 is less that two weeks from finishing but both are begun again to research level-3 techs or we cannot begin researching CTF to improve all of our CAG-missions.

It became obvious that appointing Chatfield as Armaments Minster did nothing to slow our terrible decay in Naval-Engineering, During the construction of HMS Prince of Wales, the completion time of the BB had continually fell-back until now it will not finish to late January! if then? Had we had the time to research all Techs before the war, a couple of rounds of Naval-Tech to reduce decay would have been beneficial but we did not and will not touch a single-decay-tech. The best Practical we have is building a Transport at 5.1! Everything else hovers around 4, except INTs & GARs. And we can do little about it!

The new Armaments Minster is Anderson and he has already reduced consumer goods by a few IC to help in real production.

Another area in our sights is Mechanized. However, we need so much else; but I also wonder, considering we are nearly an all MOT army, if it is not folly to even pursue this goal at all? Currently we are having to spend 122 IC on upgrades and Production is in the low-90s. Adding what would have to be, the largest UP-pricetag yet would continue to rob me of war-production. And...I need boots on the ground far more than anything else in the Army.

2 new CAGs were deployed on 17 Sept. but the HMS Victorious has been set-back over and over and not due to finish for months now. At least I will have a couple of reserve CAG-wings.

Finally, on the 24th of Sept. we have 2 new DD-squadrons.

Free convoys at 77 on 12 September.
Free convoys at 54 on 20 September.
Free convoys at 42 on 05 October.
Back to 90 free on 7 October.​

The Broader War

Bulgaria joined the Axis and mobilized on 19 Sept.

Greek & Yugoslavian subs began hunting the eastern-Med.​

Hungary and Romania watch on the sidelines for now but Bulgaria attacked Greece.​

We will not let the Axis have that airfield for their Paratroopers​

 

[markkur]

“Jimma Jamma”
{12 October – 7 December, 1940}​

3 November Yugoslavia still fights.

But has to surrender 18 days later.​

RN Action – Home Waters

We left off last report with our chasing an escaping German fleet of 8 ships. 2nd Combined Fleet was rerouted to intercept but as happens so often, we are unable to make contact...most our ships are WWI era and are too slow compared to our enemy’s vessels. The enemy-fleet was very fast and ran towards the Coast of Holland, with 2 of our old CVs hot on their tail. We caught the Germans in Bridlington Bay. 2nd Combined Fleet again could not engage and destroy these damaged warships. Our CV fleet tried to get ahead of these ships by running to The Wash and we rerouted 2nd C-F to Broken Bank hoping to get one more engagement between our CVs and the fleeing-fleet to give 2nd C-F time to arrive. Tactical-bombers were called in but did no damage...the prey was moving too fast for anything we sent after it but finally in The Wash we did get in one strike but sank nothing.

All during the German escape-effort, our CAGs hit these ships but could send none down. This same sequence repeated in the Mouth of the Thames and a few of these ships were burning now but we could not sink them! The enemy fled to Flemish Bank and we followed one last time. This time 2nd CF was there! Guns from HMS Queen Elizabeth & HMS Royal Sovereign would surely take some out?! Only one, HMS Royal Sovereign sank the CA Blucher (Hipper-class) just before Donitz’s fleet reached the port of Middleberg. I am beginning to hate this port, since this is the second time lately we have been deprived of sinking a fleet because of this new Axis port. Our TACs were rerouted and soon struck the port sinking Germany's 6. DD-flotilla but the 2 Squadrons could do no more.

19 Nov. We found a German-surprise in Devil’s Hole...Graf Zeppelin had left port, with a repaired Deutschland, a healthy Gneisenau and two.DD-screens. The Germans did not like Allied subs on the east side of Britain and sent this squadron after. We countered with Glorious & Courageous and sent them packing after many dogfights, with even 109s from Bergen getting into the fights! Neither side lost anything for days and the German fleet fell back to the Dutch coast and once again...made it safely to Middleberg. And once again we were outrun!

The last day of this report Germany’s 1. DD-flotilla was found and sank in the Moray Firth Apparently on its way to the Channel Approaches were are own subs are wrecking havoc.



The Convoy War


Date – Sinker – Owner & Number – Location
15 Oct – UK – Italy, 1 TR & 1 ES – Eastern Ionian Sea
16 Oct – UK – Germany, 2 TR – Eastern Porcupine Plain
17 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Northern Hebridean Shelf
18 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Cape Finisterre
19 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – East Central Atlantic
19 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Southern Somali Basin
22 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Donegal Bay
22 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Northern Hebridean Shelf
23 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Galway Bay
24 Oct – UK – Germany, 2 TR – Galway Bay
24 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – East Central Atlantic
25 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Coast of Galicia
26 Oct – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Northern Celtic Shelf
29 Oct – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Devil’s Hole
29 Oct – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Celtic Sea
30 Oct – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Devil’s Hole
31 Oct – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Celtic Sea
01 Nov – UK – Germany, 2 TR – Eastern Porcupine Plain
02 Nov – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Northeast Almirante Basin
05 Nov – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Cape Oregal
06 Nov – UK – Italy, 1 TR – Gulf of Tunis
09 Nov – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – Northern Seychelles Bank
09 Nov – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Coast of Galicia
09 Nov – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – Straits of Messina
12 Nov – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – Straits of Messina
13 Nov – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – Western Tyrrhenian Sea
14 Nov – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Devil’s Hole
20 Nov – GER – Britain, 1 TR – The Wash
22 Nov – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Silverpit
22 Nov – GER – Britain, 2 TR – The Wash
23 Nov – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Cape Oregal
26 Nov – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – Northern Seychelles Bank
29 Nov – GER – Britain, 2 TR – Bridlington Bay
01 Dec – GER – Britain, 1 TR – Mouth of the Tyne
05 Dec – ITA – Britain, 1 TR – West-Central Med Sea
05 Dec – UK – Germany, 1 TR – Cape Penas
05 Dec – UK – Italy, 1 ES – Gulf of Tunis


Lost – Convoys – Escorts
Britain – 17 – 0
Germany – 22 – 0
Italy – 2 – 2

* So, some good news there...at least of sank more of theirs than they did mine. 26 to 17 ships


RN Action – The Med

14 Oct. HMS CL Calcutta got its 2nd kill in sinking 4a Flotilla; also an Italian transport went down; both were sunk in Cape Matapan, without loss of our own.

Operation-Nightmare

6 Nov. we took a gamble and decided to try and take Sardinia from Italy by striking Cagliari. I will call this Operation-Nightmare...because it was nothing less. With 1st Combined Fleet offshore to provide typically strong shore-bombardment and our best CV-fleet, 3rd Carrier, nearby to ward of ITA-NAVs, we sent 1st Infantry Corps against the port. Because we had only been able to build 1 LC to date and 3 others are still held-up, again, (what the hell isn’t?) we made this assault from transports. An excellent full corps of infantry with support-units against a single Italian Inf-x2 division?; should be doable with high losses...right? Wrong...we were slaughtered! Italy brought every bomber it had till 3 or the 4 transports were in very bad shape. Finally, our CVs cleared the skies but they could fight no longer – thankfully no new bombers came to the battle.

Our TACs did remove 483 defenders but that is not much of a trade.​

The only good that came from this engagement, was out sinking 2 SS-flotillas, 14a & 17a, that tried to make it to their home-port and instead arrived in the deep of the Med.


Home Command

Tech vs Officer-ratio

As the months pass we continue to have our Officer-ratio decline. Currently we are only at 112%. I don’t have to tell you...this is not good when you are also behind in Equipment & Doctrines. Very, very reluctantly I decided to drop research down from a brief fling at 30 to 28. This only gives us 15-officers/day and since we must make some INF, GAR and support-units for everything we have, we will likely meet a great difficulty in trying to catch-up on so many techs (it’s crazy how far behind we are in some areas) and also keep a decent Officer-ratio. 140% is out of the question, unless I really want us behind the 8-ball on about everything except officers.

Research

Another serious issue for us is Plane-doctrines. We are having a hell of a time trying to get some “out of the stone-age” and with most others we are not yet to 1940; the only planes in good-shape are our Fighters. We have the same issues with Ship & Land – doctrines. I am being forced to ignore many Techs and that will not be good later in the war. Britain really is on the ropes.

* Medium Tank Armor & Reliability both finished. Next, a screen to show we are trying to keep-up.

We will have to sit here though we will be behind soon. Tuff luck it is.​

* Our first ARM-division goes in cue. Each unit costing 24-27 IC! This Blitz-Scenario is very nasty about about everything UK.
* After successful action in the Ethiopian-campaign, our STRATs were flown into the Med. With the Balkans slowly falling, they will be needed there, providing they are not instantly shot down.
* The critical Naval-Strike Tactics completed and went-in again; this Tech MUST be current for our CAGs & NAVs.
* For our Garrisons; We finished Peoples Army and are still behind and Militia Arms advanced however we still need another level! Arrgh!

Other Efforts

Because of German bombers beginning to strike in St. George’s Channel
we extended our reach and shut-them down.​

* 20 Nov. Grand Battle Plan finished...finally something good!
* Newcastle GAR deployed.

* Finally we began to need less IC (122) for upgrades and by 18 Nov. we had dropped to 89. (still a hell of a lot) However, as we neared the end of this report we finally got below 20IC for the first time since I can’t remeber when and broke the <100IC for Production by reaching 122IC.

C'mon Prince you can make it.​

Eastern & Southern Africa

Berbera-Front

The attack on the Ethiopian capitol of Addis Ababa began on 14 Oct. when 9th & 51st MOT-divs were reorganized. Our two squadrons of STRATs attacked Addis Ababa for a couple of weeks and only managed to kill 243 men. These old planes are out-dated and we will do no improvements. However, with the planes overhead and our strong wheeled-infantry, the Capitol fell after a week of fighting, late in the evening of 21 Oct. We lost 202 men while 414 Ethiopian Militia fell, before 9,500 fled.

Our units were now pushing everywhere and though we were not in favorable terrain we were now being stopped nowhere and steadily advanced. We had another skirmish in Herbagat losing 20 vs 93 Italians. Several more hit & runs did nothing to stop us, the enemy was nearly out of supply.

Mombasa-Front

The Italians tried to stop 52nd MOT once again in Nanyuki but were blown past; we took near 8,500 prisoners. The captured men were short on supplies down here too.

During the remainder of this report we began to mop up the remaining Italians.

By the time we recaptured Khartoum we had captured over 60,000 enemy troops total in this fight.


The Battle for Crete​

Greece remains but will be driven from the mainland. We need to hold Crete and it’s bases.​

 

[markkur]

From London High Command HQ​

Date: 9 December, 1940
Attn: All Commands

Gentlemen,

Revised Research Strategy

After reviewing Staff-member Racebear’s Research-plan, I found I had previously overlooked and agreed with some Techs and their necessity. These were immediately implemented within the framework of England’s way forward.


A few examples:

* I had Capital AA-techs in the queue but not Escorts – since we’re short of Destroyers, though we’re building some now, we do need them to be as strongly defended and operationally-advanced as possible...thus all Destroyer-techs were rushed.

* I had neglected Engineer-techs “for the most part” and now agree better Weapons and Bridges need priority; we need these elite units to supplement a huge MOT-army and improve our assaults, whether in cities or crossing rivers. Also, though Britain has only began making support units for ARM & MOT, we will soon be able to build much larger numbers. After we receive some LL from the USA, plus our building ENGs – both will work in coordination with future INF-units to reduce turn-around times.

* Another important area that was further developed by our collaboration regards, as stated by another staff-member recently...Marines. I verified we can now build them, however to make them Elite we need to prioritize Amphibious Warfare Equipment (a Marine Army is in queue) which I had overlooked. We both agreed on our backward Integrated-Support and I already had started Special Forces, as I always have my MAR supported by ENG. Our new combined strategy of MAR/ENG/LC focus will ensure we have the most potent invasion-forces in the coming years.

* No staff-member can make incorrect suggestions, since England needs so much, but sitting in my chair, we must regrettably, by necessity, leave a few areas alone. i.e. We cannot pursue SS-Techs of any type and likely will not build any more subs at all – our lack of any Support-Units is a future death-wish versus Germany’s advanced armored-units. Now that we have caught-up in Interceptors and doing so with Destroyers, Radar for all units is strong and our CVs & CAGs a top priority...Support is in my judgment absolutely paramount.

Overall I am glad we had the meeting because our strategy is hampered behind hard, limited decisions and I feel our strategy has been fine-tuned. For his service, Racebear has been activated as Field-Marshall of the British Empire & Commonwealth. Enjoy your weekend-pass. Much work lies ahead.



To our “V” Gentlemen,
Colonel Markkur

London High Command​

 

[markkur]

“The Empire Strikes Back!”
{9 December, 1940 – 9 March, 1941}​

London HQ

The unity of the Government has been very solid but on 25 February we had a Rogue-Politician and lost 1 Unity and lost 5% leadership for nearly a month.

Convoy-War

By the start of this update we were down to 64 free. By 29 Jan. 41 Britain had 239! With a much healthier number of free-convoys we began accepting supply-trades to assist any Ally that offered – these are usually brief but we hope they help.

Production

* 9 Dec. a Marine-Army of 4 brigades in a series of 4 was started.
* Radar in Dover reached level-8.
* Radar in Malta reached level-4. (Work at Singapore was halted months back)
* CV HMS Victorious completed on 1 Feb.
* 4 Feb the new King George V – BB Prince of Wales launched with improved minor speed at 19kph from 18.5 but with expanded Range from 3100km to 3700km – our outdated techs are not improving our ships that much.
* Our 2nd LC-flotilla came out 5 March and was sent to join the first LC in the Med.


Completed Techs

Before getting to the list. Pursuing one typically important Tech is not without a huge cost; Rocket-Tests. Since a Test-Site will require over 30 IC to be used for a long period of time to complete the site, I considered not pursuing this Field. However, with the USA soon to come into the war, I decided to count on their support in this research and when we begin receiving LL, to start the site at that time.

Also, the next level of all Production & Supply-Techs will be pursued, as well as provincial AA guns for home-defense, all Naval-Training-Techs for Battleships and Cruisers and Basing. Other than AA, Carriers will be neglected for at least a year.

* 11 Dec. Good for SE-Asia, Guerilla Warfare-2 finished.
* 12 Dec. ENG Assault Weapons-2.
* On 29 Dec. all Capital-Ships AA taken to Level-4.
* 3 Jan. Tactical Command Structure-3 for our TACs. And still behind.
* By 19 Jan. 41 Destroyer-Crew & Escort Role training both reached Level-2. Level 3 began immediately.
* The next day 20 Jan. Level-1 Small Search Radar-1 finished and Small Navigation Radar-1 began. Superior Firepower started this same day, which when completed will allow us to leave some current MOTx3-divisions alone and add 2 support-units. Note: many have already been made MOTx2 in the battles of Africa & Egypt.
* Delay Doctrine-2 completed on 26 Jan.
* 28 Jan. Capital Main Armament-3.
* 2 Feb. CV Crew Training-2
* 21 Feb. Medium Search Radar-1 for NAV & TAC completed but Large Search Radar will not be pursued since we cannot expand our STRAT-wing. Also on this date DD AA-5 finished.
* ! Militia Small Arms-4 finally caught-up on 2 Mar. It took 1 ½ years.
* 4 Mar. Radar Training-2 for our Carriers, greatly improving surface-detection – Encryption Machine-2 started.


The Army

* We continue to send some GAR abroad to free up fighting units but we have also placed a few units on the home-island to protect airbases in central England or lesser-ports.
* 12 Dec. we sent II MOT back to Glasgow, to save on supply and transport.
* As of 27 Feb. we still have only 158 fighting-brigades. 55 garrisons.
* 24 Dec. With Africa secure Monty’s 1st Armored was sent back to Glasgow.
* 25 Feb. Our first solid MOT-division is formed MOTx2/AC/SpART it is called the “Tea & Crumpets” MOT-division.


The RAF

22 Jan. we total 38 Squadrons. 17 CAG, 12 INT, 2 NAV, 5 TAC & 2 STRAT.

Against Germany

Our Portsmouth-INT-Wing continues to fight-off German-fighters & bombers patrolling into and past the Channel. Also, we have our 3 CVLs in the general area hunting U-boats, further making it difficult for the enemy planes.

Against Italy

* We do not know how many fighters Italy has but we count 5-groups because we met that many in a single dogfight over the Straits of Messina. This is a concern because we have only 2 INT-groups in Malta. We’ll need to depend on our 2 CVs.
* After numerous sea-strikes against our fleets, recon revealed Italy had 5 NAVs, 2 STRATs and 1 MR based in Catania on 12 Dec. Portal’s STRATs attacked & cratered that airfield. The next few days Commander Portal took out the Supply, Fuel and infra of the Province. However, we know this means little. Bases must be captured.
* 19 Dec. The RM Ciao Duilio with 2 CLs & 2 DDs remained in the port of Siracusa and we sent Ludlow’s TACx2 from Tripoli & Coningham’s NAVx2 from Bengasi and though we again destroyed the shipyards we sank no ship.
* 1st Fighter-squadron was sent to Alex on 27 Feb. We need more in the Med.


The Royal Navy

22 Jan. the RN had 137 vessels of which 116 were warships. BC 3, BB 12, CV 6, DD 31, CVL 3, CA 15, CL 32, SS 14. Cap-Screen ratio = 1.6 {39 to 63}

Home Waters

14 Dec. Info on the sea-fight is very sketchy but it seems the CA Admiral Hipper was found sailing with a single screen? HMS Rodney sent her down and HMS Nelson sank the DD-flotilla. However, the next day, 1st Battleship Fleet found the new German BB Bismarck in Eastern Fladen and salvos from HMS Rodney sank the massive ship. We think that these ships came from Brest on a mission to join newer German warships because the same day Intel informed us the Graf-Zepplin was docked in Stavanger, Norway accompanied by an unidentified large warship, a heavy cruiser and other ships. It is impossible for us to think this was Bismarck...could it be the Tirpitz?

Since our old BBs were outrun by the German CV, it was decided to keep our BC-fleet patrolling of our Eastern-shores.

31 Dec. The new 1st Cruiser returned dividends, finding Graf Zeppelin in Baymans Hole. She was accompanied by Gneisenau, Deutschland and a screen.

As HMS Hood sent down Gneisenau HMS Reknown sank the Deutschland. Graf Zeppelin and 1 escort escaped to Dutch Den Helder and joined another large warship.​

1 Jan. 41 We sent planes from 1st CV to bomb the port of Den Helder. A dogfight between our 4 CAGs and the 2 German-CAGs, supported by a 109 group proved a draw; we sank none of the damaged ships repairing there. However, the next day, the 2nd Graf Zeppelin left port and sailed south. We sent 1st BB to intercept our BCs were repairing in Newcastle. Graf Zeppelin and its escort safely made it to Middelberg...again.

24 Feb. A large German warship was spotted in Middelberg.


The Med

21 Dec. DD Thetford, of 3rd-Combined sank Italy’s 71a-SS-flotilla off port Bengasi and DD Malta scored a second-success in sinking 49a-SS-flotilla.

Italian bombers struck Crete in late February killing over 200 Brits over 3 days. 2nd CV had to stop the attacks. We soon discovered why – we sank 2 Transports by the port.

We had to move more troops into Crete​

This is not good​

12 Jan. Italy’s 13a-SS-flotilla was found by 2nd CV in the Straits of Messina.


Operation “Suez” – One Plan, Two Invasions

Saudi Arabia

When we saw the Saudi’s were moving towards the Axis we decided Britain needed to capture the country and install a puppet-Government. On 7 Jan we planned to use Aden but found it supplied by Oman – the same with Dubai. This was far from ideal.

Early Feb. we decided to strike Saudi Arabia from Silah, northwest of Dubai, with elements of General Dempsey’s IV MOT Coprs, 2 MOTx2. We set up an OOB, Horrocks (Army) and Festing (AG) and then gave Oman 5 LL since we could not supply this small invasion ourselves. We finally wheeled into and attacked Riyad on 9 Feb. Late at night the next day after losing 110 men we took the capitol. 300 defenders had died. The next day we installed a loyal-government.

The first part of Operation Suez was over.

Vichy France

At the same moment we opted to make Saudi Arabia our puppet we also planned to take Vichy France.

4 Feb. a INFx3 was sent to Tunis but we had no battles on land or sea. 1st MOT was organized into MOTx2 and the Corps sailed in a process of continual port landings along the north-African coast. This Corps rolled into Casablanca, Oran and Algiers while Army group-Med sent a unit to claim our one-time held Obock on the east-coast. We met no defense-forces anywhere and by 15 February we eliminated Vichy France, returning all the captured ground to...Viva La France!

France immediately wanted 20 Supplies/day. So the Free-French would have units to hold their territory we gave them an expeditionary force of 2 MOTx2, 1 INFx3 and a GARx2m of which we will likely send more until those ports are protected and we can retrieve our units.

Around The World

By the last day of 1940 Greek troops were retreating to Athens. The only troops on Crete were now British.

By 9 March this is the picture​

Beginning the New Year 41 the USA will now occupy Iceland and Greenland. The next day the USA enacted Lend-Lease, though it will be months before we can use it.

Nothing is known about Imperial Japan

 

[markkur]

“Bomber-Runs”
{10 March – 9 May, 1941}​

I am doing this update in two parts because I wanted to zoom-in on the intense air-war that is underway.

By the end of last year and the first four months of 1941, Luftwaffe bombers have seldom hit our ports and cities. However, enemy bombers continually harass our ships fighting the U-boat war. Constantly our Hurricanes, in large numbers, are meeting the Dorniers & Heinkels. We repeatedly send them home before they are able to inflict much damage. Most of these dogfights are happening in the Channel-Approaches but some targets run up to the Bristol Channel.

Because of Fighter-Command’s “Overlap-Defense-Strategy” we command our skies.​

The Germans have made their presence felt in and around the Balearic Islands and other seas in the Mediterranean, sending a Wing of five bomber groups after any of our troop-transports that come within range and hitting our fleets at Tunis and supporting a French assault to retake Ajaccio.

Italy has 12 bomber-squadrons in 2 Wings, that we know of, in the Mediterranean but between our CVs and the RAF, we have stopped them flying for now. While in turn, our bombers hit their airfields and ports wrecking havoc on port-repair facilities, cratering their air-strips and destroying whatever we can.

We also had another air-battle with Germany and this time we were the aggressor.
The fight over Germany came on the heels of this brief naval battle.

More 109s soon arrived, and we had to end the attack. The Konigsberg was saved.​

 

[markkur]

“The Persian Gulf”
{10 March – 9 May, 1941}
{Part Two}​

Home Command

During a cabinet meeting led by Head of Intelligence, Sir Robert Menzies, he advised us that Persia now held Axis sympathies even greater than Saudi Arabia had before. He explained that Britain had established no trade-ties with Persia, after our Blitz into war and that we had recently further intimidated Persia’s leaders by our unexpected invasion of Arabia. When asked what the diplomatic situation now was in Turkey, he calmly and confidently stated; “that Turkey would not pose a problem as they were aligning towards no faction and were obviously making every effort to remain neutral”. With this assurance it was decided that Britain would seek to install a puppet government in Persia, which in turn would grant the Allies control of the Persian-Gulf. The Allies absolutely need to capitalize on every strategy within reach, to counter-balance the growing Axis threat. Opinions in all Allied diplomatic circles are nearly in complete agreement in regarding Japan as a growing and ambitious Axis ally.

In another development we considered what to do with Australia and The Netherlands. both were not defending their most important cities. We sent two Garrisons to Sydney but upon arrival decided to defend our own islands of Tarawa and Fiji to secure our own Naval bases in the region.

Before getting on to reporting on the War, I need to cover a few bases.

Research

* 23 March – Light Cruiser AA-guns 5 – now all warships, besides subs, are current.
* 25 March – Integrated Support 2 – Marines are now in training, will have better Morale
* 02 April – Schwerpunkt 3 – Armor Morale
* 03 April – Blitzkrieg 3 – Armor Organization
*** About now I realized I had NOT yet started Superior-Firepower! Now I did.
* Supply Production 6
* 04 April – Heavy AA Guns 3 – Bring on the 109s!
* 07 April – CV Group Doctrine 3 – Carrier Positioning
* 14 April – Basing 2 – Naval-Base efficiency
* 16 April – Industrial Production 6 – IC-Prod +15%
* Industrial Efficiency 6 – IC-Eff +15%
* 29 April – Light-Cruiser Escort Role 3 – CL positioning
*** Completing that last Tech, we start at once on Carrier Task Force. We need Elite CAGs.

On 4 May, with officer-ratio at 120%, we switched to 32 Techs, starting both AC-techs but will not be here that long...we need too many new ground troops.​

Production

* Radars in Dover (9) and Malta (4) improved again.
* 2nd Armor (1st fully supported div.) will be ready 16 May, with “Guards” Arm-div. coming on 2 July.
* The first of three new CLs, HMS Glasgow should launch in late August.
* We have 4 plane-types, NAVs, TACs, INTs and CAGs, that are all in “series-builds”. This is the only way for now ahead until we get LL from the United States.
* 26 May 1st “Wessex” LARM received AC-support. LARM/MOTx2/AC Note: Our 1st SpART will not be ready till 5 June...it is going to take a long time to support our existing mobile-units!
* 9 May HMS Battleship King George V completed. Duke of York was already being built.
* Our 1st Marine Corps, MARx2/ENG 16-Brigades, will fully deploy on 27 May.


The Royal Navy

Home Waters

I’ve already covered one naval-battle and will report now on a quieter convoy-war.

Transports lost

Date Location Number Sinker
14 March – Gulf of Tunis – 1 ITA transport – UK
20 March – Boknafjoreden – 1 GER transport – UK
20 March – Nile Delta – 1 UK transport – ITA
25 March – Northern Seychelles Banks – 1 UK transport – ITA
28 March – Northern Seychelles Banks – 1 UK transport – ITA
28 March – Eastern Mediterranean Sea – 1 UK transport – ITA
29 March – Cape Oregal – 1 GER transport – UK
2 April – Coast of Egypt – 2 UK transports – ITA
4 April – Northern Seychelles Banks – 1 UK transport – ITA
7 April – Western Aegean Sea – 1 ITA transport – UK
17 April – Cape Oregal – 1 GER transport – UK
1 May – Western Aegean Sea – 1 ITA transport – UK
2 May – Cape Oregal – 1 GER transport – UK

As you can see above there are three items to notice.
1. Comparatively, this is not many total sinkings for this length of time.
2. Germany sank no convoys during this stretch.
3. Since our CVs were diverted to protecting the RN, Italian subs are back in business.

As of 29 April we had 179 free with 20 new due on 17 May.

The RN has sank 32 German warships of all types.​

In The Mediterranean

* We received late word that our CL HMS Belfast had been sunk? We now know that our our sinking of our most dangerous nemesis in the Mediterranean Sea, the Italian Battleship Caio Duilio, while it underwent repairs and we bombed it in port at Syracuse, was a timely counter-strike.
* On 18 March HMS Victorious arrived in Bengasi to provide air-cover where needed.
* On 3 April we found a small Italian landing-fleet, consisting of the CL RM Eugenio di Savoia escorting two transports headed somewhere? and sent all three to the bottom.
23 April 2 Sub-groups were sank off the southern-coast of Crete – RM 42a & 52a. And also a TRP.
*With our HK groups all proving incapable of finding subs, these changes were made.
25 April – 1st Combined Fleet was brought to its full strength to 3 Caps & 6 Screens.
30 April – 3rd Combined Fleet while repairing is for the first time in the war brought to full strength. 4 Caps, 8 Screens.

The RN & RAF has sank 74 Italian ships of all types​

Britain’s Support of Her Allies


Greece

Contrary to my usual game-play, I am making a more serious effort in helping my Allies. Since I got our Convoy situation in much better shape I have been accepting all trades in the Western-hemisphere and for the present time we give Greece 5 LL in an effort to keep the small Greek fleet attacking Italian shipping. In addition, that support also carries over to a Yugoslavian sub-group and Fighters stationed on Crete. The battle to hold Crete is intense at times with Britain having to keep planes dedicated to defending the island or attacking nearby enemy air-fields. We also continue to protect a motley-crew of Polish, Dutch and Norwegian SS and DD in the Home-Islands.

France

Since restoring Vichy-held lands back to French control, we are trying to make the Free-French a more potent ally. We have provided a few fighting units as well as a few Garrisons. In addition, though we cannot give LL and help them off the ground in any big way, we did manage to send a one-time transport-shipment of 10,000-Energy, 5,000-Metal, 7,000-Fuel, 2.000-Crude oil and after the debacle of Dunkirk we were able to round-up and transport 200 MP from England to the larger Free-French territory in Africa. France only has 24 IC to work with but a least that is something. General de Gaulle’s command is in Brazzaville and General Catroux commands 7 INF brigades in Libreville.

This move has already paid dividends with 2 respectable French fleets now on patrol in the Med. Admiral Muselier commands a BB, CV, 2 CLs & 2 DDs and Admiral Abrial has 4 CAs and 3 DDs. The French also have a x3 sub pack hunting German shipping off the coast of occupied France. Our spies tell us that Germany has few U-boats still floating at the moment...Admiral Donitz must be furious.

France also made a major move that I touched on in part-one of this update. They took back Ajaccio and removed a nasty German airbase from from middle Mediterranean seas. Our CAGs had to support this landing or the French transport would have been sunk by that 5-bomber Wing previously shown.


Persia

Prior to the invasion of Persia, we reconstructed the same OOB we used in Africa and Saudi Arabia. The AG is General Festing, Army-General Horrocks (nearly skill-4 now) with General Gort commanding the Corps HQ,

Soon after the 3 port-invasion (+ Bandar e ‘Abbas) began, 1st & 2nd Infantry Divisions
were sent to support the vital Bandar e ‘Abbas. We now had 5 divisions pushing into Persia.

 

[markkur]

“One by One”
{9 May – 5 July, 1941}
Part-One​

*** Report from the Chief of the Admiralty ***
Office of Sir Dudley Pound


The RN-AAR that follows was taken from the ship-log of Captain Robert Lancaster commanding the 34th Destroyer Flotilla.

​

19:00 hours 2 June Under a crescent-moon, a coastal-alert was sent to Admiral Ramsey’s 1st Cruiser Fleet. Dover Coastal-Patrol sighted, in the pale moonlight, at least two enemy ships leaving the Dutch coast which they believed to be the German Aircraft Carrier Graf-Zepplin, escorted by a large warship on a NE-heading. The Alert ended with; “Ram the bastards”. Our Admiral’s nickname is “Ram”.

​

​

19:03 hrs. – Adm. Ramsey ordered our Fleet to a heading of due-South on an intercept-course to the Mouth of the Tyne.​

​

01:37 hrs. 3 June – 1st Battleship Fleet, Rodney, Nelson and King George V “all ahead full” to Firth of Forth.​

​

03:22 hrs. – 1st Carrier Fleet, HMS Courageous and HMS Glorious ordered out of repair-docks in Newcastle. The sea-battle expected to occur east of that port; four CAG-wings got-up immediately.​

The Engagement
​

07:00 hrs. – Radio-traffic intense. CVLs HMS Eagle and Argus and DD-squadrons Stoke & Barrow of the Norway-ASW group had responded on their own initiative. Flying from the Wash, the two CAG-wings from our CVLs intercepted the German fleet in The Mouth of the Tyne. The two CAG-wings were engaged by two German CAG-wings – one of the ships WAS indeed the Graf-Zepplin!

07:12 hrs Just as the dogfight was underway, our Fleet came in contact with the enemy ships.

* We identified the large warship as the Bismarck class...it was the Tirpitz. The BB took evasive measures and headed SE. Graf-Zepplin held an N/NE bearing.

* The Fleet-Flagship BC HMS Hood opened-up while Ramsey ordered “forward-screens” to also target Tirpitz for torpedo-attack. BC HMS Renown shadowed the German CV.
* My 34th DD was the most forward and I radioed “34 out-front”. I made a torpedo-run in a spread of 4. Tirptiz was on zig-zag, I missed on 3 of 4. The last hit Tirpitz astern. Tirpitz slowed considerably.
* Salvo from Hood struck rear main-gun on Tirptiz just after Tirpitz had hit Hood amidship. Large fire on Hood. Minor fire on Tirpitz but the fire made her more visible for our next “predator in-line”.
* Tirpitz Salvo towards my Flag-ship hit alongside bow; impact killed forward-5” gun-crew. Two by concussion, one swept overboard. No damage to the ship.
* CL HMS Norfolk fired next. Long wait for the torpedo-runs.
* Tirpitz shells hit Norfolk just forward of the Bridge...large fire. Loss of seamen probable.​

Two explosions. The first hit Tirpitz forward of Rear-turret on port-side. The second hit just back from the 1st impact and even with the Rear-turret. Massive explosion. Tirpitz began listing terribly. My crew cheered little. Some had tears. Most were horrified but I messaged the crew; “We are in-action! AA gunners...on your toes!”.

​

​

​

​

​

10:04 hrs. 3 June, 1941 Tirpitz sank while Graf-Zepplin broke contact with our Fleet.
10:44 hrs. 34th DD ordered to escort the damaged Hood & Norfolk to Rosyth for repairs.

​

​

Note: Ahead of this action Captain Lancaster’s 34 DD-squadron found and sank 4. U-boat-flotilla near the Orkney shore and the 34th would soon be re-Christened HMS “DD Larne”.

What happened next was a repeat of at least two previous encounters with the Graf-Zepplin. Like before, upon contact with the RN, the Admiral Donitz divided his small force, sending the Battleship home while trying to lure our fleets north. Bismarck sank alone and now Tirpitz had met the same fate.

Graf Zepplin was fast and Donitz a fine Admiral. He now made his trademark-move and changed course a few times before making his beeline south to safety in Middleberg. However, the Admiralty well knew this strategy from Donitz’s previous escapes and this time we had three fleets sailing south right along with him and trying to keep pace with the Admiral’s evasive actions.

The speed of Graf-Zepplin was very good and like before, by the slimmest of margins Donitz escaped several CAG-strikes and evaded our big-guns in consecutive sorties in Bridlington Bay, The Wash and The Mouth of the Thames, before making it safely to the port of Middleberg a third time.

But by this time, 14:00 4 June, the “Admiralty and Fighter-Command” were a coordinated team and when 1st CV Fleet sailed into the waters just off the Dutch-shore, 2nd RAF Interceptor Wing flew Intercept-missions over an all-out port-strike from both Carriers, HMS Courageous and HMS Glorious.

08:00 6 June – 5. DD-flotilla was sunk

06:00 7 June

Carrier-planes from HMS Courageous sank both.​

 

[markkur]

“One by One” {Part 2}
{9 May – 5 July, 1941​

London War-Room

– Believe it or not, the resignation of Stanley Baldwin did not happen until 4 June, 41. Winston Churchill is nowhere to be seen.
– When the first full Marine-Corps were trained it knocked our Officer ratio from 122% to 107%. We had to return to researching 30 techs from our brief 32. With more Marines, Infantry and Support-units on the way, Research will be further hampered because I can see 28 (or less) coming soon. My Off/ratio target is 120. 140 is not realistic.
– I should have kept quiet. The convoy-war continues, we sank 8 Axis convoys while Axis subs sank 15 of our Allied convoys. Japan is not even in the war yet.

Research

– Techs completed. Tac-Pilot 3, Tac-Ground Crew 3, Tactical Air-Command 2 (this began again), Operational Command Structure 3, Bridging Equipment 1 (meaning, we have some), Naval Strike Tactics 4, Small Navigational Radar 1 (finally). Queued both Light Bomb Development 2 and Air-Lunched Torpedo 2. Supply Transportation 3, Supply Organization 3, Mobile Warfare 3 which allows Spearhead Doctrine but not yet queued. Commander Decision Making 2. Better for our Battleships in the coming battles with the IJN. Further good news regarding the IJN, both DD Escort Role and DD Crew Training are level-3s now and none too soon.

Production

– Our 3rd LCT finished on 20 May.
– Our first Royal Marine Corps (MARx3+ENG) deployed on 23 May. General Anders commands.
– “By” 30 May 6 GAR-brigades deployed and were sent to Ceylon to free-up an INF-div.
– 31 May our first support SpART deployed for a MOT-division.
– 4 June 2nd Armored Corps was formed, two divisions, (ARM+MOT+SpART+ENG) and (“Guards”-Div. ARM+MOT+SpART+AA) with General Messervy Corps-HQ.

Bollocks!​

Strategy

– At this point in time British High-Command is “content” all that can be done is being done. However, we continue to be plagued by this <ahem> less than ideal start.

1. Converting nearly an entire standing-army based on MOT x3 has been and is a logistical nightmare. Nearly all Motorized units in Africa and Egypt were reduced to x2 to save on fuel in many nasty terrains but getting any support unit for those smaller units quickly is not remotely possible. I am now 8 months into the Blitz Scenario and we have built so far only 1 AC and 1 SpART. I started with 84 brigades of MOT. Divide that by two per the ideal division (for me) if I want a dedicated Motorized-division without Armor, and also later to upgrade to Mechanized, which means we started with a baseline for 42 divisions. That necessitates we need 84 divisions of support-brigades to get the Combined-Arms punch that Germany certainly fields.

2. I could delete that Motorized but Britain will have an Army of 40-something Infantry brigades. It is mid 1941...that would be suicide and would not address our catch-up problem in any way.

3. We still have to build planes. England is well-protected but no other Theater. Further, we only have 5 TAC and 2 NAV and zero CAS. As I mentioned earlier, at an IC level of 200 (usually much less) something had to be left behind, I chose strategic-bombers and all of those Techs. Subs are in the same situation, but on that note, we were not a u-boat powerhouse but still sinking Axis shipping.

4. As has already been mentioned, the backbone of our Army should be Infantry but I can only build a couple of divisions here and there, since a full Marine-Army is underway.

Decision for my Staff

What do YOU think about this. We must build lots more infantry...I think we all would agree about that. Armor, just like I mentioned about STRATS is a lesser problem but to continue with both machines and all Techs, combined with so many needs, it seems will impact the Quality of our Planes and Ship Techs. Also, our Land Techs are not in the best of shape. However, we could consider taking a huge MOT-Army and making it a MECH-Army but int that we must build all the Armor-techs. If we had lots of Mechanized...do we need more than the 6 ARM-brigades nearly finished? Should I forget Mech and Light-Tanks and build tons of ARM?

With all those balance-questions in mind, at the moment I am trying to bounce around and take something, anything to the next level. SS, STRAT, new-class BBs & CVs are not on my radar now. Should I ignore any more areas of research? i.e. Capitol-ship techs from now on? Forget CAS entirely? Remain at current Industry-Techs when they come due and try to catch-up on Tanks & Men? Etc.
If you need the Overviews because you cannot grasp the situation...just ask for them.

The Royal Navy

With Battleship King George V “cleared for action” the Admiralty reorganized three fleets.

KG V goes into 1st Battleship Fleet and Hood remains leading 1st Cruiser Fleet.​

BB HMS Prince of Wales and BC HMS Repulse sail to their fate.
The Far-East Fleet arrived in Singapore on 13 June.​

Persia

Persia of course was a cake-walk but it was one long lasting stumble.

Battles – Won and Dead.
– 03 Apr. Yasuj losses 166 - 545
– 12 Apr. Estabhan losses 48-115
– 23 May Shiraz losses 308-347 (enemy dug-in and in Mtns.)
– 03 Jun. 2nd Estabhan losses 43-186

Total killed – Britain 565 men – Persia 1,193 men.

1 July, 1941, 2nd Motorized rolled into Tehran and established an Allied Government​

{{{Tip: Saudi Cavalry joined the Iraqis in attacking into NW Persia while British troops moved inland from the coast. However...they stopped. I TAGGED to SAU, and (took it out of the A.I. command) and made the Saudi Cavalry attack next-door into Tabriz, a VP. Upon tagging back to your own nation, sometimes the A.I. will re-claim a unit and stop my attack but this time it didn’t. }}}

Helping our Allies

– RAF fighters protected Soviet subs heading east in the Channel on 7 June.

– We will try to hold the Dutch East-Indies and prevent the Japanese from accessing the Oil-Refinery, the Gold Mines and the Rubber located on Java and Sumatra. The DEI-Defense OOB was organized with General Mountbatten (Skill-4 COM) commanding; he reports to Singapore AG. Lt. Gen. Leese (Skill-4 BM+LW)was given Corps HQ. Leese commands, the 7th Indian Inf-Div, guarding Batavia and its nearby Gold and another division is in route to Oosthaven. Soon a third will be sent to hold those three ports.

Around the World

– Our Intelligence service through our Diplomat to the S.U. tried repeatedly to warn Stalin that Germany was building a very strong force on the German/Soviet border.

On 1 June, 1941 Hitler attacked Stalin.​

We later learned that Stalin thought we were trying to make the SU Germany’s enemy. Hitler has proved Stalin’s paranoia was a huge blunder.

– America enacted the Pan-American Security Zone. A USN DD soon sank a U-boat.
– Both Portugal and Nationalist-Spain move towards the Axis. Portugal already gives the Nazis Tungsten.
– Liberia gave Britain Transit-Rights and Military Access on 17 June.
– 20 June A major Danish revolt. But it was soon crushed by Italian troops.

Around the RL War

22 April 1941: The British, both military and civilian, begin to evacuate Greece.

May 1941
01: – Seven nights of bombing of Liverpool by the Luftwaffe began, resulting in widespread destruction.
09: – A Japanese brokered peace treaty signed in Tokyo ends the French-Thai War.
10: – Rudolf Hess was captured in Scotland after bailing out of his plane wanting to make peace.
– The United Kingdom's House of Commons was damaged by the Luftwaffe in an air raid
12: – The RAF bombed several German cities, including Hamburg, Emden, and Berlin.
24: – British battlecruiser HMS Hood was sunk by the German battleship Bismarck.
– The Greek government left Crete for Cairo.
28: – British and Commonwealth forces began evacuating Crete.
– "Operation Brevity" failed.

July 1941 3: – Stalin announced a "Scorched-Earth policy".

 

[markkur]

“No News is Good News”
5 July – 2 September, 1941​

London HQ

– Level 10 Radar started in Dover and finally out of the Queue. Malta to Level 5 on the way to 10.
– Our Army sits at 265 Brigades. MOT=86, INF=60, MAR=12, GRK 2, LARM=4 and ARM=4. Support-Units are AT=5, ART=9, ENG=7, SpART=4, SpAA=1, AC=2 and 65 Garrison.
– The RN has 3BC, 14BB, 7CV, 34DD, 3CVL, 15CA, 4LC, 32CL, 14SS, 19TP for 145 ships.
– The RAF is 18CAG, 13INT, 2NAV, 2STRAT, 5TAC for 40 squadrons.
– Britain and the SU both receive 10 LL from the USA. Not much help for the Soviets and only a third offsetting what it takes for us to build a Rocket-Test-Site.
– 1 spRart put in queue in a series of 10. Probably will go nowhere.
– CL HMS Glasgow was launched on 27 Aug. and 2 DD groups about the same time.

The Convoy-War

Of course we still have the convoy-war to contend. Last update, total losses were down but we lost more than we sank and continue to lose our merchant shipping. This go-round, we lost 13 convoys while sanking 4. What we think has happened now is that the overall Allied effort between British and French ASW and some help from several other nations, has likely destroyed German and Italian trading. We can safely guess this now because a large Soviet effort is also underway and their subs are constantly relocating trying to find something to sink.

From our own efforts. we may have already struck back at the German re-emergence of U-boat attacks by our sinking of 3 U-boat flotillas on 28 July in the Moray Firth. CL HMS Neptune sank two and DD Larne, commanded by Captain Lancaster and recently made famous during the battle with Tirpitz, also found his second enemy wolf-pack.

Ship Losses to date by Nation

France – BB/1 & DD/3 = 4 ships Total
Germany – CV/1,BB/2,BC/4,CA/5,CL/5,DD/6,SS/16,TP/2 = 41 ships total
Italy – BB/6,CA/8,CL/11,DD/16,SS/21,TP/21 = 83 ships total
Netherlands – 1 CL = 1 ship Total
Norway –1 CA & 1 DD 2 ships Total
UK – CA/1 CL/11 DD/10 = 22 ships total.

Research

It seems the bonus from controlling the Persian-Gulf is helping us advance this nation forward.

Completed – NAV Pilot Training 3 & NAV Ground Crew 3...both started again for our CAGs, Combined-Arms Warfare, Fire-Control System 2...our BBs made better, AT Barrel 4, Special Forces 3...we have Marines now and restarted, AT Ammo 4, Encryption Machine 2, Amphibious Warfare Equipment...Cheerio! right on time, Carrier-Task Force, Rocket Tests...Rocket Test-Site Started. Small Search Radar 2...for our RAF and RN Cags...Small Navigation Radar now started. Artillery Barrel 6 & Artillery Sights 6, Cruiser Warfare 2 & Cruiser Crew 2...both needed since we have 3 BCs and lots of CAs. Spotting and Basing both started, anticipating the IJN.

The Royal Navy

Sir Dudley Pound, quite the name for the leader of the RN, ordered 1st Battleship-fleet to Alexandria. Admiral Cunningham’s 1st BB has the new KG V sailing with the fleet. 1st Combined-Fleet, after the fleet had sank 20 Italian vessels in the Mediterranean, was ordered to re-base in Dover, for some R & R (repair and rest...in that order) before going on patrol in the Channel.

Around The World.

India

We have been having a supply-problem that affects our Bombay-Theater. Although only a few divisions report to this HQ, Rangoon is a long way for supplies to travel. In attempt to ensure our garrisons are in good supply and not to be later walked-over by Japan, we started a half-supply convoy of supplies directly to Bombay. It took effect immediately and we will need to see if the number of ships can be halved again etc. and still make sure supplies are flowing to our Garrisons and Infantry at vital ports.

Italy

The RAF continues to keep a strong grip on the Italian planes in Sicily, primarily Catania and Palermo airbases our targets. We must, we’ve already seen by our own runs against several airfields that Italy has more NAVS and TACS than we do. To further hinder Italian air-missions, our STRATS destroyed the infrastructure in both Catania and Messina in trying to block the flow of fuel and supplies to all of Sicily. On 10 Aug. Coningham’s NAVs were sent after a small transport fleet that arrived in Catania. Soon he sank 2 of the 3 transports in port there before having to repair his planes.

We attacked Cagliari on 5 Aug. did not wait for our Marines, they were only about 25% finished in getting their equipment and instead opted to attack now and have General Gort’s Infantry gain the combat experience. In addition, we sent Wing Commander Ludlow-Hewitts 2 Tactical Bomber squadrons over Cagliari. Our bombers killed 1,808 defenders over several days.

Our victory-message never appeared but we occupied Cagliari on 9 August. Losses unknown.​

The advance across Sardinia was not hard but we did have some stubborn resistance. More Italian troops were ferried across to Olbia from the Italian mainland and soon we had more enemy troops to contend. In Oristano, General Crocker’s 1st Indian infantry division fought Italy’s 10a Motorized. In Nuoro, Robertson’s 6th Infantry met the Italian 1a Motorized. In Sassari, Crocker, now pushing towards Olbia from the west, faced Italian General Ricagnc again but now he had with him the 30a Infantry-div as well as his 10a Motorized. We were now facing over 30.000 enemy troops and I was glad we brought a full Infantry Corps to the island.

By 20 Aug. Crocker’s fight in Sassari was was joined by 1st Infantry. 1st Battleship Fleet including the new guns of HMS King George V, supported our battles as we took the provinces.

After two skirmishes where we lost 15 men to 24, on 22 Aug, the Battle of Nuoro was won. 366 brits were lost and 798 enemy; we had 8,000 men fighting 15,000 there. The next day in the early morning hours of 23 Aug, Sassari fell to General Crocker’s troops. 497 British dead vs 1,201 Italians.​

Total Dead taking Sardinia, minus the losses at Cagliari, British 1,442 – Italian 3.984; approx 29,000 enemy troops captured​

Upon the fall of Olbia, the light-cruiser RM Alberto da Guisanno made a break to safety. HMS King George V scored its first sinking after sending a tremendous broadside that devastated the enemy ship.​

In the closing days of this report two more Italian-sub flotillas were sunk by our CAGs.

Greece remains because Britain holds Crete. I considered abandoning the island but with the Germans in Salonika, I will not run the risk of the Luftwaffe that far in our Mediterranean back yard, especially when I am having to depend primarily on our CVs to corral Italian bombers.

Soviet Union

If “No News is Good News” than I can definitely confirm that “This News is Bad News”. Today it is two years since we took this nation to war behind a <clears throat> questionable start. All I can say is it seems Germany was well looked after in this Blitz 39 Scenario but no other nation.

With Barbarossa in full-swing I thought; “’Just this time’, I’d ask a meeting with Stalin and see how the Soviets are fairing.” It’s bad my dear Generals...very bad. I’ll not spell-out all the details but the Soviets are behind the 8-ball on many Techs. However, the real story is in the following screens.

What do you think guys...is the SU in trouble?

However, just for clarity and for an exclamation markkur.​

Alright, that means a very different animal will be waiting for the USA to join the war. And that Nazi beast will also have a strong Japan for the free-nations of the world to defeat. I don’t know if Japan is fighting the SU but it doesn’t matter, the Soviets are in serious trouble and I don’t have any way to help them unless I do some crazy “bonsai” of my own.

Good grief! Yes, with this news. No more Garrisons. I thought we had some time...we do not.​