Order of battle information on the Soviet involvement in Poland is rather sketchy. First, the Soviets didn't like to admit that they were "on the wrong side" in 1939, helping Hitler instead of fighting him. Second, the Soviets were participating in what they condemned other nations for doing- making an imperialistic land grab.

So, for the fourth time in less than two hundred years, the Russians and Germans got together to partition Poland. The Soviets, to hide their complicity, pretended that they intervened in Poland to liberate the Byelorussians and Ukrainians there. They claimed these groups were oppressed by the Poles (true), didn't want to come under German rule (true), and yearned to be reunited with their kinsmen in the Byelorussian and Ukrainian SSRs. While the Ukrainians of Poland in particular disliked the Poles, they wanted their own independent nation and abhorred the idea of becoming part of the Soviet Union. Once these regions were part of the Soviet Union, the NKVD began to "communize" them-as with the . germanizing" of western Poland by the SS, communizing meant mass executions and deportations.

The Soviets invaded Poland with two fronts (a front is equivalent to an army group), one from each military district bordering Poland. The order of battle of the major Soviet ground forces is fairly well known, being pieced together from memoirs of Soviet generals who happened to be in the intervention forces, articles in Soviet military magazines, and German intelligence reports. Gaps in the OB are filled using best guesses. The OBs for tank corps and rifle divisions are mostly solid, and cavalry divisions and tank brigades are fairly good. The non-divisional units of artillery, AA, and engineers, however, are based on estimated levels of support the Soviet forces would have. Their unit identifications do not reflect known IDs but are provided simply to identify the unit when playing the game by mail.

A Soviet tank corps was a combat formation like a division, and not a command headquarters like most corps. It consisted of two tank brigades and one motorized rifle ("rifle-machinegun") brigade. A tank brigade on paper had from 155-275 tanks, which made the corps extremely tank heavy and unwieldy. Note that the cadres of the tank corps in the game are not supported, due to a shortage of supporting arms in the formation.

A rifle division consisted of three rifle regiments (each of three battalions) and one or two artillery regiments. At full strength, the division would have 18,400 men. In the western Soviet Union, however, divisions were not at full strength. The Red Army had just expanded from 75 rifle divisions in 1937 to more than 115 in 1939. This was accomplished by splitting cadres off older divisions without rebuilding their strengths. Thus, divisions on the borders had about 7,000 men, and those in the interior had about 5,000.

A cavalry division consisted of four small cavalry regiments and an artillery regiment. The cavalry was in fairly good shape at this time, well-trained by Soviet standards and nearly up to strength-this was before the Soviets gutted their cavalry arm in order to expand their mechanized forces.

Tank brigades, whether independent or in tank corps, came in two varieties: light brigades with 275 tanks and heavy brigades with 155 tanks. There is one independent heavy brigade in the game; the rest are light. It is questionable if any tank brigade in the western Soviet Union had a full complement of operational tanks. Soviets tanks at this time were mostly unimpressive and often mechanically unreliable.

Affecting all units was the poor quality of Soviet officers. The Soviet officer corps had been extensively purged, on Stalin's orders. Most officers commanding divisions or larger formations were imprisoned or executed. Overall, the Red Army was short fully one third of its officers in 1939, with its new officers virtually untrained and its older officers mostly demoralized. Most good officers, further, were in the Soviet Far East, involved in the confrontation with Japan along the borders of Manchuria and Mongolia.

The exact composition of the Soviet Air Force in the western regions of the Soviet Union is unknown, due to a lack of published sources. The air OB in the game is based on estimated air strengths of the two military districts adjoining Poland. In short, each army in the region is assumed to have an air brigade of one fighter regiment and one light bomber regiment. A regiment had a paper of strength of 50-60 aircraft, but the bomber regiments were often under strength in 1939. Thus, seven fighter and four bomber counters represent these aircraft. In addition, each front is assumed to have a medium bomber regiment, and each parachute brigade is assumed to have a transport regiment.

The types of aircraft are again estimated, based on known Soviet deployments, production figures, and foreign intelligence reports. See Table 1 below.

Soviet Border Forces (FtF Option)

The Soviet forces that entered Poland were a mixture of troops from border and interior districts. Numerous troops in the border districts remained in the Soviet Union, guarding against any possible enemy incursions.

In First to Fight, the troops that stayed behind were factored out of the game and Polish forces were prohibited from entering the Soviet Union. Since this is Europa, what player in his right mind (if this is indeed the correct phrase) would settle for half an army and simpler rules? If you have access to the Soviet counters in Fire in the East, use the following option:

Delete Rule 27C3 (Soviet Defensive Forces). Instead, Polish forces may enter or attack any hex of the Soviet Union once the Soviets intervene. The following order of baffle lists some Soviet units as border defensive forces. These units may not voluntarily enter or attack any hex outside the Soviet Union until an enemy incursion of the Soviet Union occurs. (An enemy incursion is defined as any enemy unit or air unit entering, attacking, or bombing any hex in the Soviet Union.) Once an incursion occurs, all defensive forces are freed of this restriction.

Add the forces on the following page to the Soviet order of battle:

Initial Conditions

Stalin Line: Place 20 fortified areas inside the Soviet Union. A fortified area may not be placed in a swamp, wooded swamp, or forest hex and may not be placed next to another fortified area. Place as follows: 5 adjacent to the Soviet-Polish border on or north of 37:4213 and 15 within 5 hexes of the Soviet-Polish border on or south of 37:4622. A fortified area has combat effects as described in FitE. Byelorussian MD.

Polish Border Defensive Force: Place the following units in any hexes in the Soviet Union, north of the

Pripet River.

1x 4-6 Rifle XX 2
1x 5-4-8 Cav XX 7
2x 3-2-8 Tank X 25, 29
6x 0-1-5 Border III any (NKVD)

Ukrainian MD.

Polish Border Defensive Force: Place the following units in any hexes in the Soviet Union, south of the

Pripet River.

1x 3-4-7 Mtn Rifle XX58 (w)
1x 4-6 Rifle XX 100
2x 3-6 Rifle XX 24, 102
4x 4-3-8 Cav XX26, 28, 32, 34
1x 3-2-6 Tank X 5
6x 0-1-5 Border III any (NKVD)

Romanian Border Defensive Force

These units are off-map, guarding the Romanian border. Once an enemy incursion occurs, they appear as reinforcements in the German player turn following the incursion.

The German player places these units in any friendly-owned hexes south of the Pripet River on the east edge of the map in the Soviet Union.

1x 6-4-8 Tank XXX 20
1x 3-8 Mot Rifle XX 95
2x 4-6 Rifle XX 3, 15
3x 3-6 Rifle XX 41, 51, 80
2x 0-1-5 Border III any (NKVD)
1x 0-5 Cons III any

Notes:

Year. The year the aircraft entered production.
Engines: Number of engines.
Speed. Maximum speed in mph (multiply by 1.61 for speed in kph).
Armament. Number and caliber (in mm) of the guns. 20mm guns are cannon, all others are machineguns.
Bombs: Bomb load in lbs (multiply by.45 for load in kg). When two numbers are given, the first is the standard load and the second is the maximum load.
I-15: The 1-15 came in two main variants; the 1-15 counter factors both variants together.
I-16. The 1-16 came in a number of "types" with varying characteristics. In the game, the I-16/t18 counter represents the type 18, while the 1-16 counters factor together the earlier types.
SB-2: The SB-2 came in two versions, one with M100A engines and one with M103 engines. The designation "SB-2bis" is used in Europa to designate the M103 version of the SB-2.
TB-3: The TB-3 was a large bomber, with a Europa rating of 2B2 1-6/26. A number of them had been converted to transports by deleting the internal bomb bay and reducing armament, for use by the paratroops. The transport version of the TB-3 is depicted in the game.
G-2: The G-2 was the unarmed version of the TB-3, produced for Aeroflot. In 1939, all G-2 aircraft were being used as cargo freighters; the game assumes some were diverted for possible use by paratroopers.

Acknowledgements

As with every Europa game, First to Fight was a collaborative effort by many talented people. Making his debut as game developer, Rick Gayler had the excruciating task of translating the game's design into comprehensive and comprehensible rules.

Shelby Stanton produced the order of battle for the German forces that invaded Poland plus notes on the Slovakians, while John Gee worked out the 1939-40 Polish order of battle. Charles Sharp weighed in with the Soviets. Paul Dunigan worked out the air OBs for all sides and supplied more notes on the Slovakians Michael Parker worked on the Baltic States (the forces of Lithuania were tentatively scheduled to appea in the game as an option, but were cut when we ran out of room in the counter mix) and the Army of Bohemia-Moravia (see the above designer's notes) Jason Long helped out in various ways, particularly with German siege and railroad artillery.

These people, and everyone else who helped with the game, have my heartfelt thanks.

Slovakia and Bohemia-Moravia