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kfsgo -> RE: JFB Beware (11/3/2011 6:27:47 PM)
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Just a heads-up on the 'plan' for China v0.1:
I am currently going through and working out China's exact (+- errors%) strength - troops, guns, aircraft, resources, industry, supplies. Will take a few days at least. This will obviously change...how, and where, I won't know until I can see exactly what it is at present. I have an approximation of what the 1938 and 1939 Chinese armed forces were - not ideal, but a better starting point than their 1942 equivalents. I don't intend to worry about OOB continuity too much - I only have one life to live...
Starting positions for the IJA will be relatively restrained. Part of North China Plain, a relatively short distance up the Yangtze, some probes along the southern coast. I may leave some Chinese bases under nominal Chinese control for infrastructural reasons - will go into more detail when I get that far.
Navigability on the Yangtze should be extended. This requires pwhex changes, but can be done without allowing cruisers up to Chungking - a "coral reef" can be added between Hankow and Wuchang, giving you effectively separate river systems (100t max for ships to transit between them) between Shanghai-Hankow and Chungking-Wuchang-Changsha-Hengyang. Ships on the latter will mostly be small (and expendable - I'm thinking Chinese river junks/barges as LCVP/LB, so they can be given a fixed pool that will rebuild if destroyed but not expand), but some British, US, (French?) river gunboats will add a bit of firepower. This will give the Yangtze a significantly greater role to play in moving troops and supplies around, along with creating an entirely new naval warfare arena - since the Japanese have a bunch of light craft to insert into the river should they want to. Should be fun!
Railway links should be restored between Changsha and Wuhan at least, along with (possibly, depending on who ends up where) Canton and Changsha.
How exactly a quieter China would have affected everyone's economies is a frighteningly open question. The Chinese have breathing room for the expansion of key military industries exactly when they need it (and wanted it) most; the Chinese war economy will be stronger than it was in reality. It'll also be more vulnerable, in a way - lots of stuff at Wuhan, Changsha etc that can't evacuate if things go horribly wrong. At the same time, the Japanese will likely see a greater economic benefit from territories under their control - at least, those parts of them they haven't blown up in obtaining control of.
The political situation - effectively represented by garrison requirements, I guess - will also be confused. The larger Chinese army will need to leave more forces 'at home' - the Communists are a more troubling force without a life-or-death situation vis-a-vis Japan, and the warlords will be more inclined to hang around and loot their own backyards if the central government's troops are Busy. I intend to make a lot of warlord and provincial units 'static' - giving them static devices not in their TOE, such that they'll leave the Japanese alone if the Japanese leave them alone, but will become mobile and dangerous if disturbed. There will probably also be a sense that the KMT has been less Anti-Japanese than it should - so domestic strength will be more important there. The Japanese will also have to leave more troops loitering around guarding things - the Chinese of whatever political stripe have more men to go around in the background blowing the greater Japanese economic developments up, and more weapons and explosives to enable that.
So, desired end result is a China that is relatively quiet to begin with - maybe a few divisions' worth of troops roaming around without much to do - but will slowly ramp up in intensity over time, as the 'mobile' armies of both nations expand. Contrast with the current situation, which is that China is usually extremely active for the first ~9 months and then quiets down. The choice for Japan then becomes, in theory:
- draw troops out of China and use them elsewhere, leaving the Chinese to grow but allowing Japan to add heat in other places
- keep troops in China and use them to 'prune' Chinese strength through raiding without enormous, costly occupations
- attempt to conquer China, requiring enormous, costly occupations (ie, unlike in the stock game ones large enough that conquering China entirely isn't much of a net benefit militarily) but delivering significant economic returns close to home
That's the outline of a plan, anyway. We'll see how it goes...
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