What is completely insane about boak is that Chesterton is better protected than his capital.
To be fair, he added a longbow and a pike into his capital since I took this picture but still less units than in Chesterton. He also reinforced Porthill and have 5 additional CKNs moving into my direction. That is unpleasantly sirprising: I was like 80% sure he would just evacuate the whole area after I started to advance.
Also, observe super-pike, he and Tsargon seem to share a civ tutor.
(This kind of behavior actually has historical precedents: USSR invaded Iran in August 1941, just when Germans exterminated Soviet main army and were rapidly moving towards Moscow.)
(February 23rd, 2016, 09:25)Gavagai Wrote: (This kind of behavior actually has historical precedents: USSR invaded Iran in August 1940, just when Germans exterminated Soviet main army and were rapidly moving towards Moscow.)
This historical precedent was very likely the result of an analysis which concluded that the defense of the Motherland required Iranian oil deposits, right? I'm guessing that the Russians would have had very little (in comparison to the invading Germans) resistance in securing their required strategic aims. Germany was also conducting or considering operations in the Caucasus region around this time if I remember correctly, which would have hugely threatened the USSR's oil supplies. Sometimes bad choices are all you have?
Note: This is not in any way an endorsement or indictment of boak's troop positioning. Also, this says 1942 for the German advances in the region. Lastly, it appears that oil was not the only consideration for the invasion of Iran. Stalin needed to secure a supply line for the import of war materials from the Allied nations.
After Germany broke its pact with the Soviets and invaded the USSR in June 1941, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union jointly occupied Iran as a preventative measure, starting on August 25, 1941, and justified their invasion by the need to use Iran as a gateway for delivery of Lend-Lease supplies to the Soviet Union.[4] As a result, Rezā Shāh was forced to abdicate and exiled to Mauritius; his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the crown prince, became the new monarch. Their joint ‘Tripartite Treaty’ of January 1942 declared that their military presence was not an occupation, proclaimed Iran to be their ally, and pledged to withdraw their troops within six months of the end of the war.[4]
Throughout the rest of the war, the United Kingdom and the United States used Iran as an important supply line to the Soviet war effort against Nazi Germany. Thirty thousand non-combatant US troops arrived to move these supplies, and transit through Iran was later termed a "bridge to victory". At the Teheran Conference in 1943, the Big Three gave additional assurances concerning Iran’s future sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as a promise to assist in its post-war reconstruction and development.[4]
Although the occupation of Iran was scheduled to end after the war at the Potsdam Conference following Germany’s surrender, Stalin objected to Churchill’s proposal for an early allied withdrawal from Iran ahead of the agreed-upon schedule set at the Teheran Conference.[5] Following VJ Day in September 1945, first the US and then the UK withdrew their forces within the treaty-stipulated period. The Soviets not only violated the March 2 withdrawal deadline; in that time they had expanded their military presence southward. By mid-December 1945, with the use of troops and secret police, they had set up two pro-Soviet "People's Democratic Republics" within Iranian territory,[4] the Azerbaijan People's Republic headed by Sayyid Jafar Pishevari and the Kurdish Republic of Mahabad under President Pesheva Qazi Muhammad.
I love getting sidetracked on Wikipedia for stuff like this.
Yeah, Iran's oil is all in the South and has to be shipped via the Indian Ocean, so no use at all to the Soviets. Actually, Iran is currently in talks with Russia, whereby Iran would import Russian oil from the Caspian to supply its northern regions, and pay in the oil it itself produces in the south.
I don't see the analogy, though. Clearly, Boak was just not expecting an attack from Adrien, and once it did come, the Chesterton force was simply too far to bother bringing it back. WWKD? Is the question we will never know the answer to.
(February 23rd, 2016, 12:08)Bacchus Wrote: Yeah, Iran's oil is all in the South and has to be shipped via the Indian Ocean, so no use at all to the Soviets. Actually, Iran is currently in talks with Russia, whereby Iran would import Russian oil from the Caspian to supply its northern regions, and pay in the oil it itself produces in the south.
I don't see the analogy, though. Clearly, Boak was just not expecting an attack from Adrien, and once it did come, the Chesterton force was simply too far to bother bringing it back. WWKD? Is the question we will never know the answer to.
I seriously don't understand this logic: he should want to stop Adrien somehow somewhere and he clearly isn't able to produce new units fast enough to do it timely. If he had pulled back his units immediately after Adrien attacked, they would have got to his capital by just about now. Actually, army I see near Chesterton is just big enough to possibly save boak's capital: Adrien actually doesn't have that many units.
Adrien is losing his momentum. He doesn't really have much left and his eastern flank is dangerously expoused. On this picture he has only 8 Knights total, about a half of them wounded and some assorted crap like swords and cats.
Poor boak, if only he had an army which can kill 8 Knights!
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Bacchus, you may say whatever you want but if you don't see how this is the stupidiest unit positioning ever, I don't know how you are any good in this game. And don't feed me with this crap about "Chesterton is too far". It isn't THAT far, these units could be in the north by now easily. And if they were in the north, boak would be taking back his cities by now.
(February 27th, 2016, 09:43)Bacchus Wrote: BTW, why didn't you just go to HAK directly, given how strongly protected Chesterton is?
Good question. I, actually, hesitating once again about my plans. I now think that may be I should attack Adrien. The thing is that boak has collapsed beyond the point of now return, HAK will just vegetate, he isn't going anywhere. Adrien is my only competition in this region, if I remove him from equation, I can just take EVERYTHING. The only issue is that I may be overestimating the extent of boak's problems. He still has 16 cities and he will surely take back some if I backstab Adrien. On the other hand, he will still have HAK to deal with, they are now pretty evenly matched.
