BletchleyGeek
Posts: 4713
Joined: 11/26/2009
From: Living in the fair city of Melbourne, Australia
Status: offline
|
Turn 30 – 8 January 1942
I've been very surprised when I opened this turn. Q-Ball was apparently riled by the amounts of CV I was concentrating on his forces, and deciding that discretion is the better part of valour, has decided to retreat towards Orel. With this and his previous retreat towards Rzhev, my main two Winter operations have become more succesful than I expected, but not for exactly the most convenient reasons.
Operational Situation Report
I'm leaving MP's and supply soft factors display on, so you all can get a better picture of the logistics and mobility of my forces.
In this picture, and from north to south, you can see the positions of Volkhov, Northwestern and Kalinin Front, which are cooperating in the effort of liberating Rzhev
I've marked where gingerbread's gnats are working. These brigades in particular are under command of the STAVKA. I really want the Torzhok – Rzhev rail line to be repaired quickly, so I will attach two or three RR brigades to Northwestern Front. In red you can see the line I'd like to have next Spring, following the river lines and including, of course, Rzhev. Q-Ball has almost ceded it to me.
In this picture you can see the messy carpet of units to the rear. These are basically either brigades or crushed Rifle Divisions which are used to keep the forts up where I want them.
Q-Ball position in front of Moscow is very solid, and is hard to find weak spots to concentrate and crush German positions
I'm realizing that the enveloping move I had envisioned to approach Kaluga from the north was perhaps a bit far fetched. On the other hand it would probably help Rzhev operations to keep pressing, just to divert the already stretched German resources. The Moscow MD army to the south, the 40th, was the one who got so badly mauled last turn. Here you can see how limited is the recovery of these forces when being adjacent to the enemy (I couldn't pull them back because of limited MP's).
And here's the situation in the Tula – Voronezh sector
the red line shows the line I'm looking after. Note as well the build up along the Don. 2nd Shock Army (north) is about to achieve its goals. Once it reaches the Oka, will join 1st Shock Army push on to Orel. The other offensive axis seems to have some stout opposition in front of it. There'll be battle there this turn.
Q-Ball doesn't want me to reach the Oskol river
and unfortunately, I don't think I'll reach it. In this sector I'll remain mostly passive, and will start to dig in – but always poking German soft spots. However, I don't think it's right to be completely passive in the south
Last turn I was pondering what to do with the two southern Shock Armies. I'm running out of time, but I would really want to draw a wedge in the German positions between Kharkov and Stalino. The gnats I assigned to 18th Army have started to work extending my supply line from Starobelsk and it might just work.
Logistics & Organization
This turn I put a whooping 180,000 guys into the front lines. Armaments production has really recovered, reaching 88,250 points this turn. The highest since late July 1941. Many factories have been already repaired, and those which still are damaged are well below 50% damage.
Here you have the soft ground element production figures for the last six turns
I'm capitalizing on the vast Manpower pool I accumulated during the Armament production crush. As soon as that is gone, and at this rate that will be by late February, I might even start accumulating Armament points in the pool. The Red Army is growing in size
and if losses during January and February don't skyrocket, Q-Ball will be facing in March the biggest Red Army to date. It's ironic that I get this production boost six turns later than it would have been most convenient.
Gingerbread requested a breakdown of figures, here's the updated spreadsheet with ALL the numbers I think that matter in WitE that I've been tracking since Turn 1 (mostly) :)
However, for those who don't want to wade across that data, at the end of the update I'll go over gingerbread requests in an abridged form.
Operations
This turn I have made good use of the 1:1 rule. I decided to trust the Dice Gods and got a couple interesting successes (and a nasty rebuke). I've done a total of 15 attacks, 4 of which have end up in failure.
Kaluga must fall
I've managed to really stress German resistance here. Losses haven't been too high and the situation doesn't look too rosy for the Germans. While the bulk of the forces I've tasked with the liberation of Orel move to contact with their German counterparts, 37th and 61st Armies strike an important success just northeast of Krastornoe:
A few German divisions are now in a difficult position. I said I wanted a bulge, and one seems to be in the making :)
I give the green light to the operation I was talking about before north of Stalino
3rd Shock Army gets into the line and his first task is to crush the Gebirgsjäger division bracketing our left flank. I'm not sure what front will have the overall command here, my bet is Southern though. But south of Stalino I suffer a sharp reverse
29th Army has been crushed while trying to widen my bridgehead over the Mius river. 11th PzDiv marched to the sound of the guns and crushed the attackers:
Ouch!
Evaluating the last Six turns
Since Turn 24 Axis losses have been:
KIA: 31,567
POW: 24,228
WIA: 317,066
Arty: 2,798
AFV: 492
of which 10,176 have been due to attrition. Blizzard losses must be around 200,000. Soviet losses have been substantial:
KIA: 162,209
POW: 2,335
WIA: 158,535
Artillery: 2,922
AFV: 1,285
of which 19,996 have been due to attrition. Loss exchange ratio is of about 2 to 1 in favour of the Axis, after deducing those estimated 200,000 disabled due to blizzard. My AFV losses have been very high, basically because I've used the Tank Brigades to exploit any breakthroughs and to force the Germans to counterattack.
I've been causing very little permanent casualties, though the Red Army hasn't really been bled white during the offensive. Replacements have been of about 600,000 men, well above the butcher's bill, and RKKA OOB numbers have increased.
Perhaps I'm being a bit too pessimistic about the counteroffensive results. I just think I've done fair given the huge casualties I suffered during Summer and Autumn.
_____________________________
|
Printable Version
RE: Clash of Steel: 1941-1945: Q-Ball vs Bletchley_Geek - 
No need to apologize. At first I was a bit like - what? - but then I realized I hadn't updated the spreadsheet for a long time. So thanks for the heads up :) 
I found funny that you referred to them as "gnats", because it's indeed what they do look like ;) 
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread