[WarInEur] The France 1940 experience

[Kent & Sue Haunschild]

The problem with jiggering the France 40 campaign to give the Allies more of 
a chance is that if the Allies do in fact do better then the simulation is 
derailed and we"re are no longer playing anything even vaguely historical.

France suffered huge casualties in WWI and as a nation was not willing to 
pay that sort of price again.  This thought process skewed their entire 
military equipment budgets between the wars and the military tactics in 
which the French troops were trained.  The expected to fight a defense from 
prepared positions until the enemy was worn out.  As a consequence ,while on 
paper they "appeared" to be equivalent to, if not stronger than the Germans, 
they were a paper tiger.  Their officers were not mentally able to grasp the 
new realities and come to grips with them emotionally in time to regain 
their balance and give coherent orders.

In terms we use to day we would say the Germans got inside the French 
command's decision loop.  The effect on operations is also known in command 
circles as the Order=> Counterorder=> Disorder or orders followed by 
counterorders leads to disorder.  In effect this is what happened to the 
French and as the gentleman who has proposed the attack on the march has 
pointed out, the French were incapable of restructuring their armed forces 
in the time allowed.  The cold hard fact is the French showed up at a gun 
fight carrying a knife.

So the answer to Steve's question below is: "yes" the allies were doomed the 
moment the first motorcycle rider crossed the frontier in to Holland.

The answer to the other is that the campaign must play out historically or 
it derails later events.  I don't care what happens in the scenario, if 
players want to experiment with "what ifs" then that is the proper venue, 
not the WiE 1939 or 1940 campaigns.

In game terms we have skewed the situation enough when we do not use the 
historical rules but rather allow the Allies to set up their four high / two 
deep stacks along the Belgian border and turn the France 40 campaign into a 
WWI sluggest.  If your not going to use the historical rules then a better 
simulation would be to drop the French defense factors by 1 so all the 3-4 
become 2-4, etc.  I also think tha given the command paralysis and 
contradictory orders that units were given the 4 movement factor is 
overstated and should be a 3 as well.

For what it's worth the Italians are short changed.  The Italian NA pattern 
divisions were fully motorized and should be 3-10's and 2-10's and they 
should have about ten of them (substituting a 3-10 for a 2-4 and a 2-10 for 
a 1-4).  Their omission pretty much gives the Allies a free ride in Lybia.

Kent

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "sgminfo" <sgminfo at aol.com>
To: "Computer War In Europe" <warineur at mailman.halisp.net>
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 9:29 AM
Subject: [WarInEur] The France 1940 experience


> Ignoring the basic qyestions about units strengths at this stage...
>
>
> How accurate s h o u l d  the France 1940 scene be?
>
> 1.From the point of history?
>
> From the point of gaming?
>
>
>
> At our scale of conflict much of the key differentials between axis and 
> allied units are factired so heavily that you end up with an allied 3-4 
> stacked up against a German 10-8. With changing unit strengths the 
> positiob for the British is comparatively much worse.
>
> With attrition heaped upon this further,
> the French position,
> aided (or even hindered) by the deployed British,
> is a hard act to beat.
>
> 1.If the allies are under the hammer...i.e. the French position under such 
> handicaps is a real hole in the ground....
>
> 1.Is this a fair summation? (I have a feeling that it might be)
> Under such circumstances,
> a schleiffen plan mark II is indeed a viable option...
>
>
> In reality was this the case,
> if Manstein's appreciation had not been adopted,
> would the allies none the less have been doomed from the moment the first 
> motorcycle outrider crossed the wire in Holland?
>
> in a frontal clash was the allied position destined  to crumble under the 
> onslought, noting that as a secondary axis, the Germans did pretty well 
> against the majority of the left wing of the allied line without the sykle 
> cutting the ground from under the allied position.
>
> In a straight frontal clash, would the allies nonetheless lost control of 
> the battle and been doomed to defeat in detail as the line disintegrated 
> into a piecemeal shambles somewhere along the point of decision?
>
>
> In game terms...
>
> If the onslought is indeed nearly unstoppable,
>
> does that detract from a good game?
>
> Or does this badly affect the experience of newbies faced with endless 
> certain defeats through 1939 to 1941?
>
> The question of how much of a 'run for their money' the French should give 
> the Germans is an issue that affects both the simulation, and the appeal 
> of the game.
>
>
> -|steve|-
>
>
>
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