My apologies for the brevity of this summary of Long's talk. Thursday was a travel day, and a delayed flight and four-hour drive across Wisconsin numbed my senses enough to forget notes, so this is from memory...

The Germans had planned five main axes of attack, although one from Southern Germany to the Northwestern portion of Czechoslovakia was more a pinning attack due to the strength, or lack thereof, of the German forces. The main idea was for a strong two-prong attack into Western Czechoslovakia to punch through the length of the country, west to east. The Germans concentrated most of their armor and motorized strength here. Two other attack points, one from the German-Polish border area heading south and one from Austria heading north, would serve to tie up forces and put pressure on the middle of the country.

The Czechs were not helpless and indeed had a thriving armaments industry. They had started construction of a series of fortifications around their border--a sort of a mini-duplication of the French Maginot line--with turreted guns, concrete fortifications, and layered defenses. The French version had the lighter fortifications closest to the German border and increasingly heavy fortifications the further into France an attacker would get (the idea being to attrit the enemy as they attacked). The Czech version reversed that, with the heaviest fortifications at the border and lighter covering layers supporting the heavy fortifications. The Czechs were smart enough to begin construction at the most vulnerable points, but their line was no where near done, and the successive defensive lines between the border and Prague were even in less readiness.

Long presented several charts with numerical analysis regarding the force totals. It was pretty close in strengths, with the Germans having a significant superiority in armor, but mustering a roughly 1:1 ratio in non-mechanized forces. In machine guns, most fixed in the fortifications, the Czechs dominated. In mortars, the Germans possessed a significant advantage, but these were mostly light 50mm mortars instead of the heavier 81mm mortars used by the Czechs.

The battle is left to speculation, for Czechoslovakia passed into German hands. As for that speculation, the numbers indicate a tough fight, although part of the German army was made from Austrian army units incorporated after the Anschluss, and Long indicated that they may not have fought with as much ardour as the German units. That too is speculation, but that's exactly why Europa exists--to offer a way to simulate these what-ifs...and other what-ifs.

For example, the Hungarians were ready to pounce on the Czechs as well, except the Romanians would have bounced the Hungarians and Long contends the Romainians would have had a relatively easy time doing so. There is also the possibility of the Poles joining the Germans against the Czechs to recover territory, although the Russians would have ended up supporting the Czechs and steamrolling into Poland in retaliation. The French and British probably would have joined the Czechs, although what they could offer is open to speculation. Britain perhaps could contribute two divisions in a BEF and the French Army structure required considerable mobilization to fill out the divisional cadres in order to mount an attack. Again, these options and what-ifs can be decided upon the battlefield of paper maps and cardboard divisions of Europa.

Lectures

Convention Introduction and Overview
Possible German-Czech War of 1938 by Jason Long
1943: Orders of Battle and Early D-Day by Walter Dunn
Kiev Offensive: October 1943 by Col. David Glantz
WWII Soviet Armor by Charles Sharp
Grand Master Europa and GR/D by Tom Johnson
Kiev Offensive: November 1943 by Col. David Glantz
WWII Soviet Air Force by Charles Sharp

E2000

Last Year's Convention: E2000

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