There are two separate but equally important points. (1) Why should Turkey attack Russia from the get-go? (2) How do you do it? The first is harder to answer, as it plays into the same question that arises no matter who you're playing. Once you pick up your one or two neutral dots, you have to attack someone to expand, so you've got to decide who that is. As Turkey, you really have three options for a primary target, though you're often forced into fighting more than one at a time. Of course, I'm referring to Austria, Russia, and Italy. Let's look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of allying with each. Austria. Forces you to be predominately a sea power, which is okay as Turkey, but often you're unable to get too far into Russia, and Austria ends up picking up a lot of the spoils. On the other hand, you can get into such a position that you're really hard to stab and may have the edge in the endgame. Italy. Really tough to work with as Turkey. Forces you to be primarily a land power, which means you're probably contending with both Austria or Russia, unless you have one of them as a secondary ally. I've seen IT alliances work really well, but they are pretty rare. Russia. Gives you some flexibility to balance between land and sea. Often will create great paranoia on the rest of the board and form large anti-juggernaut alliances, particularly strong AIs. Okay, so let's say you're playing Turkey and you want to pick Russia as your first target. First thing to do is make sure you're talking a lot with all your neighbors. See if Austria is on board. See if Italy will move west and stay out of your hair. Find out if Russia is going to cover the Black Sea or not. Second, talk to people on the other side of the board. Encourage England to send an army to Norway "just to be safe." Remind Germany that he probably wants to bounce Russia from Sweden to stop him from growing too fast. Then go back to Austria and tell him that England is aboard for attacking Russia in the north. Tell him Germany is going to bounce Sweden. It doesn't matter if its true or not, if they move differently you can blame it on them giving you bad information. So how do you move? Well, the killer is if you can get into the Black Sea. Ank-Bla, Smy-Arm, Con-Bul. Now you've got influence on Rum or Sev, and often Russia has to guess which to defend. If you can get Austria to help you into Rum, or move into Gal, even better. The key is to coordinate your moves with Austria while keeping Italy occupied elsewhere, probably with France. Austria-Turkey alliances are often very successful, and with a flexible player in Austria and some luck around the board, you should be able to organize one early in a game. Back to Table of Contents -- Game! # 9 To Game! List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2004 by George Phillies. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com