Part 101: Turn 108: July 8, 1943
The Germans have given up some land for free again, they seem to be prioritizing keeping a straight line over slowing me down which is crazy this deep in German territory.
The rate at which that pocket is shrinking means a lot of troops are escaping via the port. All I can do is keep pounding them while I've got them trapped and try to cut off the port.
The first objective hex is taken so now I've got 2 hex-sides on the target but it's going to be difficult, at best I'm going to be able to muster around 60 offensive CV so I'm going to have to lean heavily on my artillery to reduce fortifications and disrupt the defenders. Alternatively I can easily take the 9=32 hex to the southwest of the target hex if the Germans don't reinforce it with stronger formations
The Leningrad front traps a division just outside of Danzig that will probably escape via port during the German turn. In the meantime the Volkhov front presses forward and brushes aside any German forces in forward positions even with multiple reserve activations. Having 2-3 panzer-grenadiers joining every battle I launch is bleeding my corps something fierce but I can afford to lose thousands of men every attack, the Germans cannot.
Pathetic, they give up 20+ miles along the front and this is the best they can muster. Fortifications this small won't even slow me down, it will just cost me more men to take.
The largest withdrawal on the map. It looks like the Germans are trying to shorten their line by falling back to the mountains. It makes sense since their line is looking so weak further north but they don't have the room to spare right now.
Well first things first, gonna blow a hole in this line by dislodging that 3=3 infantry division. Once it's out of the way I can break the line more with cavalry and then breakthrough with some armor.
Or... not. Fucking panzer-grenadiers.
Further south down by Breslau I actually manage to break through the line despite the intervention of the panzers but it's too small to destabilize the line. I could break this open with armor but my tanks are low on gas after last week so I'll leave this be for now.
The rest of the front slowly advances while refitting. These two fronts are pretty battered so this is a good chance to bring them back up to strength while I finish converting their divisions.
This is still a huge mess but it's getting better. I just need to keep pushing north and never give the Germans a chance to rest. There's a shitload of German counters down here fighting in a very small amount of space so the going will be slow.
Speaking of slow going, only a few formations are left in Slovakia, within a few weeks the whole country will be mine.
North of Vienna my forces are starting to untable themselves from the roadblock and get into fighting positions. Progress should be slow but steady here, there's too many Germans for a huge breakthrough but they're not strong enough to stop me completely.
And down in Austria the Germans are driven back into the mountains by my extremely understrength forces. I might activate a Romanian army or two to come hold this section of the line in the future, there's no point in wasting real troops on this.
The pocket should be cut in two next turn, cutting ~21 divisions off from supply.
A panzer army with nearly 1,000 tanks materializes out of nowhere to butcher the Leningrad front. Over 12,000 Soviet troops are lost in exchange for 5,000 Germans and 49 panzers. I don't have any real armor this far north so punishing this will be difficult but we'll see what I can manage.
Well that's exciting. I very much doubt those panzers are going to stick around for another week but I'll gladly take any chance to blow up some tanks.
