Chevalier Plays AGEOD Let's Play/AAR

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Late September, 1915


Operationally, I have no idea exactly how to proceed in this theater, I've never campaigned here before and didn't plan on landing here prior to a month ago.

Are you sure you're not letting your inner Churchill run a little wild? 

Believe me, I'm well aware of how dangerously close I am to treading the path of a Former Naval Person! That's why I've tried to avoid a damnfool landing in the Dardanelles. And yet, I'm getting close to that anyway, operating in the Anatolian hinterland...let's just hope the wider landscape lets me effectively use my wider numbers, and not get bogged down like my unfortunate counterparts in the real-life 1915 did. 

Early October 1915

October 1 sees the BEF overrunning the 40,000-man garrison of Smyrna, losing 20,000 killed, wounded, and missing in the process:


Taking those Turks out of hte Ottoman order of battle is nice, as we continue to drain Central manpower, but the supply base is the important thing. Now I have a working port in Anatolia. I have no idea if it's big enough to support 6 armies, nor am I sure how to calculate it, so we're just going to cross our fingers! Learning experience!

To the north of Smyrna, two weeks later, General Creagh's Third Army runs into a beefy Turkish corps with supports attempting to dig in at the vital Balikesar railway junction. In a sharp fight through the afternoon, the Turks are ejected from the town, and Creagh begins to fortify the junction:


10,000 British soldiers fall as compared to 8,000 Turks. 

Situation in Anatolia in mid-October is thus:


To the north, on our left flank Third Army has taken Balikesar, but I won't push further north against unknown opposition until my supports are up. 3 more armies are either in Smyra or moving north from there. A fifth army has secured our southern, right flank against the river, and is now contemplating a difficult autumn march over Lydian mountains to the southern coast, to seize a second port and hopefully ease supply problems. A sixth army (Fourth Army, after its failed landing at Antioch) is coming ashore, too. 

The plan here is to leave one army ot secure the port against coups de main until I can get some garrison corps, cavalry, and air into the theater. One army will cautiously probe along the south coast for opposition, with the objective of securing secondary supply bases and clearing more areas to land reinforcements. My main effort will be 4 armies in the north, though. If the Turks hold position this turn, we will flank them on either side, attempting to surround and destroy them north of Belikasar. If they retreat, then we will follow, with the ultimate goal of pushing north to Nicaea and cutting the railroad from Constantinople to the Caucasus and Levant. The Tsar reports taht only one Turkish corps has vanished from his front - probably the corps I defeated at the junction - but more should react next turn. I know the Ottomans have 4 armies from my own historical knowledge, BUT the Germans can't send reinforcements since Bulgaria is still neutral! So those 4 have to contend with my 6, a 7th is in Egypt ready to invade Palestine once the railroad is built in January 1916 (scripted event), and the Russians have one or two armies near Georgia pressing on that front. So the Ottos might be in serious trouble here. 

Austria and Germany can't send help, either, I think, certainly not without Bulgaria on-side. Austria has a Russian invasion on the plains of Hungary:


I have to rely on spotty diplomatic reports from our ambassadors in Constantinople, but htat green tentacle is over the Carpathians and reaching level ground near Budapest. The Austrians have a counter-invasion of Galicia further East but that doesn't threaten anything important. As long as the Russians maintain that railway they can supply forces threatening the heart of Habsburg dominions, and they're close to succoring Serbia (which, without a Bulgarian stab in the back, is holding out strongly against the Austrians along the Danube). 

On the whole, I think pursuing Rumania was a diplomatic mistake by the Centrals. Rumania joining pissed off Bulgaria, who swung from likely Central to likely Entente and is hovering at 60% Entente support. Bulgaria joining would seal the doom of the Ottomans, as there's nothing to stop them moving on Constantinople, and then Serbia can be reinforced and Rumania invaded. If Rumania collapses, then the entire weight of the East falls on Austria and I don't see how long they can hold out.

Germany has its own problems in the East, even without French activity holding down troops on the western front:


A Russian invasion of East Prussia has cleared the lake country on the southern border of the country, and in the eastern section they've moved almost to the gates of Konigsberg itself. The Tsar reports very bloody battles but great victories!

Nothing changes on the Western Front, no offensives on either side. I'm re-organizing and re-equipping my forces with heavier artillery, and then in the winter I'll move my armies into northern Luxembourg/eastern Belgium. From there I want to launch an attack up the Moselle, using it to shield my right flank from interference, until I reach the Rhine, then attempt to exploit in one of three ways as mentioned (surrounding 2 German armies in Aachen, outflanking the German defenders at Thionville and Metz and invading Alsace in force, or pushing over the Rhine to stretch German defenses if neither of those options is viable). I think if I could rupture the front in this way - big if - then the war would be as good as won. 

Diplomatically, Germany manages to stave off US intervention a few weeks longer:


The +5 NM is rough, a very big boost (mine is only 84). The fall of Smyrna cost the Centrals 2 NM, though, so it's a bit of a wash. War weariness is growing worldwide, as you can see my NM slowly dwindle, too. 

US intervention is at 62% after the submarine shenanigans. 38 more turns to go at natural rates, faster once I move my diplomat. 
Italian intervention is at 79%. Once Italy joins, I will move my diplomat to the US to speed their intervention. The Italian fleet will lock up the Mediterranean for all time, and I have some ideas of using their troops offensively in Anatolia. 
Bulgaria at 60%.
Overall, diplomatic outlook is very positive. We have 3 reinforcements from minor but strategically well placed (Bulgaria) to modestly useful (Italy) to enormous but needing time to mobilize (the USA) all coming within the next 6-18 months. The Centrals can expect nothing, except perhaps Mexico. Which will piss off America even faster.

Losses & Objectives:


CP NM down to 75, meaning it was at 70 before Deutschland. Ours is 84 and the Russians at 92! 1.7 total combat power vs 1.1 still, about a 1.5 advantage in numbers. Total losses are 2.1 million to 2.04, almost dead even. 

Week by week the picture looks brighter. Gotta keep the pressure on.

[Brian Shanahan]

Looking good.

As always thanks for the writeups.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Late October 1915

No major engagements. Reinforcements arrive to join the Turks in the hills around Balikesar, while the British army (correctly identified as Second Army, not Third, my mistake - I shuffled army designations during the great re-organization in Egypt) is joined by Kitchener's reserve. 


1200 power to 900 Ottoman power in the neighborhood, and I hold the city and the railroad leading south (ignore the position of unit card within the province, the positioning within a province is meaningless in the engine - just look at the Entente flag flying over the city icon). 

My working theory is that the Ottos are in deep trouble here. Without Bulgaria, there's no direct land link between Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. Any connection would need to march through Rumania and then embark over the Black Sea to land reinforcements in Turkey, and I'd be shocked if the Rumanians or the Turks had the shipping capacity capable of doing such a thing. That indicates the Ottos are on their own resources to resist the British invasion and the Russian pressure on his northeastern border. Now, he can probably recruit more armies in desperation, but those are going to be militia. I can assume, with safety I think, that I shall face only about equal numbers, and probably lesser quality, on this front. 

So, I try to use my superiority in numbers against this large Turkish army in front of me. I plan to throw Kitchener around the flank on my left, and my Third British and First Indian armies around their southern flank, my right. First South African army will seal off the road south and we'll force the Turks to either displace to the rear or be enveloped and captured:


It's hard marching over mountains, however, and will probably require all of November and December to bring off. So no Constantinople by Christmas, but possibly by spring? 

Elsewhere we fan out over southwestern Anatolia, securing the rail lines and moving towards more ports:



We achieve an important technological breakthrough. French scientists working hard to think up ways to break the stalemate in the trenches along the German border have developed an armored vehicle, with wide, heavy treads, capable of trampling down barbed wire, resisting machine gun fire, and hopefully serving as a breakthrough unit. It's codenamed a water tank to fool German spies, or simply a "tank" for short:


I order 3 squadrons of 'tanks' to be built over winter. They'll join the French army in time for our projected spring offensive on the Mosel. I've also got recon and fighter squadrons building for the Anatolian front, which should both lift the fog of war and secure air superiority. 

Objectives & losses:


25,000 dead Russians and 13,000 dead Germans - a minor setback for the Tsar in the East, maybe?

[Brian Shanahan]

Hope your scientists are favouring French designs over English ones.

[shallow_thought]

Hope your scientists are favouring French designs over English ones.

Nothing wrong with British WWI tanks (although the French Renault light tank was undoubtably the one that showed the way to the future). WWII is perhaps a different matter ...

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Don't worry, they're Chars. France will be doing all the heavy assaults on fortified trench lines, while the British concentrate on mobile warfare to try and knock the Sublime Porte out of the war. So, all armored vehicles are bound for the Western Front.

So, situation report for

Early November 1915

The first week of November sees more bloody fighting in the hills north of Balikesir, as Kitchener's 500,000-strong BEF badly roughs up the 125,000 Ottoman Second Army. 1 out of every 5 Turkish soldiers is killed or wounded:



And the Ottoman army retreats into the wooded areas just to the north of the railroad junction, now unassailably in British hands:



Many of my troops are worn down from the rapid marching in autumn, but I still have 2 fresh, activated armies (Third Army & First Indian Army). The Turkish army is in a desperate position and I see an opportunity to destroy it. First Indian Army, coming up from the south, will pass to the west, outflanking the Turkish defenses and driving them back towards the sea. Third Army, though, will thrust northeast and then north for Bursa. If the Turks don't retreat right away on this turn, I shall be able to cut the railroad behind them and pocket the 100,000 surviving defenders against the Sea of Marmara, like so:




I have very high hopes for this maneuver. If it works, we'll blast a massive hole in the Ottoman order of battle, and be in prime position to cut the railway between Constantinople and the rest of hte empire. We'll have excellent chances to knock the Turks out of the war entirely in the spring of 1916, freeing hundreds of thousands of Russian and Commonwealth troops to reinforce other fronts. I don't think the Turks can outmarch me to Bursa - I control the bridge over the Simav River, so they can't block me directly. Instead, their only chance is to immediately order a rail evacuation backwards towards Bursa (ceding the neighborhood to me entirely), OR rushing up fresh troops to hold the city before I can get there. The Central Powers player has proven very stubborn in holding hopeless positions (see: Belgium in the spring), so I don't anticipate the retreat, but he may bring up men to hold Bursa, in which case I'll have a sizable battle on my hands around New Year's.

Anatolia is the only active theater for me at the moment, but as winter settles over the Franco-German border I quietly begin my redeployment for the spring offensive:


Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Armees are pulled out of the southern end of the line and will rail to a line from Rheims to Liege, where they will receive their tanks and artillery and hopefully drop out of German view. Come the spring, they'll rail forward just behind our offensive and take up the second wave of attacks once my frontline armies (hopefully) pierce the German defenses. 

Here's the projected spring offensive:


We will attack on a front running from Thionville on the Mosel to Aachen in the north, aimed at the German III Armee and a corps holding the flat ground next to the river. We'll hit this with 4 armies in the first wave, and 3 more in the follow up, hoping that our superior weight of firepower in the form of guns, planes, and tanks enables us to win an offensive battle. Then, the follow up wave will move straight on the Rhine, using the Mosel to shield our right flank and the Belgian army & First French Army in reserve against intervention from the German armies in Aachen on the left. 

If I can reach the Rhine within 6 weeks or so from the start of the offensive, we'll have 3 (or 4) options. Option 1 will be to turn north and outflank Aachen, forcing those armies to either retreat over the Rhine or be surrounded. Option 2 is to stretch the front via an offensive straight over the Rhine - putting a strain on our own forces but possibly also overtaxing Germany's ability to patch together a front line, in the most optimistic case. Option 3 is to use the position on the Rhine to turn south and outflank the German armies in Alsace completely, possibly coupled with (4) an attack on the weakly held southern end of the line, hoping to bag the massive concentration of armies around Thionville and Metz and winning the war that way. 

In the best case, we break the front wide open and begin a war of movement which the outnumbered Germans can't cope with. I nthe worst case, our initial attacks are bloodily repulsed and we settle back into the siege of Germany, counting on the blockade and diplomacy to do its work while we continue to pick off German allies. Realistically, we'll probably end somewhere in the middle, but I hope to at least clear the left bank of the Mosel of Germans all the way to the Rhine and to take Aachen. 

In the East, Russia is running wild:


East Prussia, apart from Konigsberg, ahs been overrun up to the Vistula, and in Poland Russian scouts have even reached the borders of Silesia. Warsaw & Congressional Poland have seen heavy fighting but are still in our allies' hands.

In Hungary:


The Russian offensive is well over the Carpathians and threatening Debrecen, in theory with no major natural obstacles other than the Danube between themselves and Vienna & Budapest. This advance is entirely dependent upon a single railway through Galicia and looks a bit pencil thin to me, so I'm nervous, but it's definitely a crisis that demands the Centrals respond. 

Losses:


Central Powers at 75 NM and 2 million, 81,000 casualties - a gain of +1 NM from last turn, why? Did they smash the Russians somewhere? Russian losses climb from 847,000 to 882,000, 35,000 casualties - roughly even to the CP losses. But I inflicted 25,000 of those in Turkey, so it might have been a 3:1 Centrals victory somewhere along the Ostfront. That would also explain the decline in Russian morale from 91 to 88. My own losses climbed from 1 million 254,000 to 1 million 276,000, roughly the casualties in Anatolia, makes sense. Overall the two sides have lost almost exactly the same amount of men (nearly 4 million casualties overall so far), but that's a loss rate the Centrals can't sustain.

[Brian Shanahan]

Hope your scientists are favouring French designs over English ones.

Nothing wrong with British WWI tanks (although the French Renault light tank was undoubtably the one that showed the way to the future). WWII is perhaps a different matter ...

Replace the rivets with welding or single cast and the Brits had some very good tank designs in WW2, some shocking ones too. But the WW1 ones were a bad design from the word go.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Late November 1915
Winter begins to close down most of the fronts, even Anatolia.

Starting in the West:


Our redeployment for the spring offensive continues. Our first heavy artillery batteries finished working up near Paris & Lyons today, and are shipped to join First and Second Armees, which will spearhead the attack. Experimental tank brigades are forming up, as well- 4 in total, my entire French forcepool. When they join and the weather clears, hopefully around March, we'll launch our offensive and hope to rupture Germany's entire front. 

In Anatolia, the Ottomans wisely retreat. Combined with autumn mud sapping my march, and they've escaped the nascent Bursa pocket:


The rapid marching has badly depleted my units - see how low Cohesion has dropped for most? I cancel my more ambitious orders and will move slowly and steadily now that the Ottoman army has escaped. We'll want to have our cohesion up for a battle, so I reluctantly grant the men a few weeks rest across most of the front in an effort to restore order. In southern Anatolia, I have divisions steadily securing the railroads and the countryside. I do want to send an army to Eskishehir Junction, due east of Bursa, which will cut the only railroad between Constantinople and points east. Then I should be able to safely dispatch 2 armies to land in Gallipolli or Keshar and march on Constantinople, which I don't THINK has a massive garrison. Remaining armies will continue to push until we own the entire railroad between Constantinople and Eskishehir. 

It looks like Russia's East Prussian offensive has fizzled:


The land connection to Konigsberg is restored and the line seems to be stabilizing. German press reports a large battle in the East, but is mum on the victor. No changes in Hungary visible. Let's see what the casualty report brings:



CP losses up to 2.1 million, adding only 10,000 in the last round. Russia's losses have climbed from 882,000 to 922,000, 40,000 men. A good turn for Germany. I cable the Tsar to take no risks and remain on the defensive if he sees no good opportunities, giving him notice of the West's planned spring offensives in Anatolia and in Germany. The blockade is also up to level 4 in the Atlantic - 60% chance of rebel alignment gain each turn in Germany, so expect 3% gain every 5 turns, on top of the usual ticking time bomb. Hopefully the Mediterranean follows soon - Austria and Ottomans are up to 25% rebels already, and CP morale is only at 74...

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Early December 1915

Winter snows and mud close all offensive movements to a halt. In Anatolia my men's cohesion is absolutely destroyed via soul-sucking "mud marches," and Kitchener reluctantly orders an operational pause across the front. In France, heavy snows see a quiet Christmastime descend on the Western Front - even the steady drumbeat of air battles fades to just a trickle, while behind the lines fresh divisions and new, heavy artillery units move towards their armies to prepare for the spring offensive. Tanks continue to work up and develop doctrine, diplomacy sees Italy begin to race towards Allied commitment - perhaps by February 1916?, and otherwise all is quiet, worldwide.








The war drags on.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Late December 1915

A second Christmas in the war that would be over "before the leaves fall" comes and goes. Mud and snow continue to shut down all operations:



My cohesion just destroyed by even the shortest of movements. No maneuvering, let alone offensive action, is possible in this mess.

In the West, we continue to gather arms and supplies. I confirm that the Germans are in range for our first poison gas attack of the war, which will come when the weather turns:



Otherwise the winter pause continues. Sorry for the lack of action, but the weather just isn't cooperating. Give me 2 or 3 more months - 6 turns - and things should open up. 

Diplomatically, Italy is at 95% Entente. They'll join in 10 weeks or so, so I pull my diplomat out of Rome and let natural momentum carry Italy from here. Instead he's moved to Washington, where we will attempt to shake the Americans out of their neutrality. The US is at 71% Entente, so figure optimistically I can move 2% per turn, or 1% per week, that's about 30 weeks - 4 months. We could have American intervention before summer, 1916.