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Treetop64 -> RE: Bulking up Chinese units (9/3/2014 1:28:20 AM)
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What's worked best for me is to first fall back and organize your Chinese units to properly defensible positions at the start of the campaign, usually along the Tuyun-Kukong-Changsha rail system and surrounding regions, as well as along available rail and road systems further north. This has two advantages: It shortens the supply links from Chungking as well as maintaining good LOCs between units/HQs, and it significantly thickens the Chinese defensive line against any further incursions. Personally, I've organized the Chinese armies according to their assigned War Area HQs/Corps HQs/LCUs, and always kept Corps HQ and it's assigned LCUs together. Once your units have fallen back, have been organized, and are in good defensive positions, expect to maintain a strictly static defensive posture for - at a minimum - the next year. During this period, keep movements, and especially offensive operations, at an absolute minimum, or avoid them altogether as you simply will have either very little or not enough supplies needed to sustain any ambitious operations.
Meanwhile, for as long as possible, and as soon as you have adequate British air cover (and later, 51st FG Yankee squadrons of the 10th AF, if you're still holding Rangoon), cram in as many supply convoys into Rangoon as you can afford, and make sure the task forces used are able to dock and utilize the maximum dock space at Rangoon. Build efficient supply convoys (enough endurance, same ship type or same cruise speed, etc...) When they arrive, move in the 23rd FG to suitable airfields in China to aid in the defense, as the Japanese Air Force will really start pounding Chinese units and bases in 1942.
As long as you maintain an uninterrupted rail and/or road link into China from Rangoon, a bulk of the supplies shipped into Rangoon will go to China for distribution. Of course, this only works as long as you hold Rangoon and have a rail/road link to China. Obviously, you'll want to make holding Rangoon and, if at all possible, Pegu a strategic priority at the start of the campaign.
Another important point is that you'll want to start repairing production facilities in the industrial Chinese cites you hold, particularly in Changsha. Turn off all repairs in China, then repair only one production center in one city at a time so that it is repaired as quickly as possible with the limited supply resources you'll have.
Depending on how your situation develops, think about how you want to start prepping your Chinese troops for offensive operations in early-mid 1943, and plan accordingly. Carry out any major and potentially costly operations only if you have adequate supply stockpiles in China.
This can work fairly well against the AI, even if you're "playing fair" against the computer. However, successfully doing this against a human opponent who knows what he's doing can be much more difficult to pull off...
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