Axis August II

My good luck (or rather, the Soviets' poor luck) seems to be holding. I narrowly escaped disaster in Ploesti, where the Soviets surprised me by actually being able to put over 90 points on the ground in two hexes, but an AR didn't exactly pave the road into Ploesti for the Soviets.

My own counterattacks in Romania only succeeded in destroying a 16 point non c/m stack, but I did push one of the Soviet Mech stacks back a hex. For the first time in this game, Ploesti is relatively safe, since it is now well screened by my mobile troops, and the Soviets are no longer adjacent to it.

I finally secure the rail line in the 3rd Romanian Army area, and just in time, too, since my forces in the region became U-2 at the beginning of my turn. Surprisingly, a substantial portion of 11th Army and the Romanian 3rd Army have managed to survive in the mountains, including the Romanian Armored Division. Now that I've firmly stabilized this sector, perhaps I can push towards Cernauti, although this seems doubtful given the still numerous Soviet forces in Bessarabia.

An unusual combination of mountain, cavalry, and motorized troops pushes into the Carpathians along the SovietHungarian border, and I actually manage to squeak past it in two spots. Of course, grinding my way through the wooded rough terrain just past the mountains will be no cake walk, but at least I'll force my opponents to divert substantial forces to cover the gap between Odessa and Kiev MDs. The crumbling front here also allows me to lever the Soviets out of the Lwow region by forcing them to extend their lines southward. I hope also to draw forces away from the 11th Army region in order to facilitate offensive action in this area.

Additionally, I now have two uncommitted Panzer divisions in Hungarian Transylvania as a result of regaining all of Hungary. Depending on where opportunities present themselves, I can operationally rail these two units anywhere south of Lublin, giving me the rare chance to cause consternation with a mobile reserve.

My attacks just past Lwow all succeed with few losses. The large Soviet group near the Slovakian-Hungarian border faces a serious chance of being pocketed. The bloodbath over the Galician skies continues to hemorhage away both air forces, and despite my most stringent efforts I simply cannot gain air superiority, especially since some halfdozen of my fighters stubbornly refuse to recover from aborts.

Both air forces, in fact, are slowly becoming crippled by large air losses and an incredible number of aborts. I've got over a dozen aborts scattered around the map, and the Soviets have maybe twice that amount.

Despite the much larger Soviet losses, however, the Luftwaffe's position versus the VVS doesn't seem to be improving in the least, and may in fact be getting slightly worse since I simply cannot afford losing 3-5 fighters a turn due to aborts and air losses.

The Soviets, on the other hand, can lose a dozen I-16s and dip into their endless supply of crummy aircraft. Still, my position on the ground continues to develop favorably, if slowly. I can now put great pressure on the Soviets along a continuous front running just south of Lublin down to the Cluj region.

The fighting in AGC is the usual bump and grind, although I do finally take Brest-Litovsk. The pure infantry forces here have no further objectives save to attrit whatever Russians they can and force the Soviets to maintain some units in the area. Otherwise this region is basically a dead zone.

Big things happen in AGN. I manage to pry open a significant hole along the Baltic coast and rush 5 c/m divisions along with supporting forces into the gap. These units are admittedly somewhat exposed to counterattacks. However, the Soviets have only one c/m division in the entire Baltic MD, and virtually no air power save their long range aviation. This will hopefully force the Soviets to fall back to the river in front of Riga and gives me a real shot at taking the city.

Moreover, their rail lines near the coast do not allow ideal placement of units from the interior, especially since the easternmost rail lines are now adjacent to my army and thus ineligible for strategic rail. Additionally, I am now adjacent to Kaunas and only three hexes away from Wilno. The Soviets will have to redeploy quickly or the rupture in this part of the front will become a flood. My only problem is that I'm a little short of units in the area, a worrisome prospect given the lengthening front. Still, I've finally got the breakthrough I've been looking for, and can now make some real progress.

I inflict fewer Soviet casualties this turn than I'd like, given the great force densities of the Red Army in such crucial areas as Ploesti/Bucuresti and the Lwow region. From a positional perspective, however, my situation continues to improve, and I'm very pleased with AGN's breakthrough. My Soviet opponents seem to be fairly disinterested in this area, which is fine by me. Unfortunately, they are quite sensitive to the Kiev-Odessa MD boundary, and by shifting units from Bessarabia northward now probably possess the ability to greatly slow down what might have been an enormous breakthrough out of the Carpathians. Sigh.

Soviet August II

My tiny hole along the coast exploded in my face as some unnoticed c/m units were railed north or rebuilt in the region to exploit it. This wouldn't have been a problem except that none of my attacks worked last turn, so he was able to free up some armor unexpectedly. At least one of the damn attacks should have worked!

I rail mucho troops to quash his adventurism in the Carpathians and it looks like I've succeeded quite nicely. Next turn I'll undoubtedly be able to shift some of these troops to the Lwow area without using rail capacity as he begins to withdraw from the Carpathians.

I attack a 19-point SS Korps comprising LSSAH and Das Reich that has ventured into the foothills on my side of the Carpathians and must be punished. A DE is punishment enough, I suppose. I continue to ooze slowly out of Slovakia as he is content to let me do so. Lwow looks reasonably solid in terms of defense. He will go nowhere quickly in this sector, particularly since I've flown 39 points of DAS to one of my choice hexes near Lwow during which mission I killed four Messerschmitts for one of my own. Undoubtedly he'll send some of the DAS home next turn with his AA, but it should still be troublesome.

He has quite foolishly advanced after combat in Romania to a hex where I can attack him on four sides. Considering that I have the absolute cream of the Red Army here I plan on enjoying this one.

With heavy air support, most of which is turned back by his 13 points of AA, I attack with a 6:1 (-l) and roll the DR.

Aaaaarrrrggghhhhh! What do I have to do to kill somebody on this front? I've not killed anybody south of the Carpathians since the second turn of this farce. I form the officer's penal regiment with recruits from Romanian Front.

The Baltic is troublesome as I try to hang on to as much of the MI) as possible so I can begin my withdrawal. I don't want anybody pocketed in this area. I have to op rail stuff in since I need to move off the rail line, so again my strategic reserves accumulate. It's in these situations that having Leningrad MD separated from the Interior MDs would be really handy so that I could op rail directly from it.

Total Losses August II
Hungary. 4
Italy: 3 air
Gerinany: 44 (21 c/m), 7 air
Soviet: 138 (15 c/m), 18 air

Groza II: The Great Eastern Grand Slam A Europa Series Replay

Introduction, Set Up and July I Turn
July II Turn
August I Turn
August II Turn
September I Turn
September II Turn
German and Soviet Commentary