• 2023 '22 '21 '20 '19 '18 '17 '16 '15

    Maybe, there are posts about this, but I dont find it.

    I am curious what is the best way for the allies to prevent Italy to take Egypt? Seems to me Egypt is easily lost to Italy with all the dramatic consequences that have


  • Taking out Tobruk round 1, I hear, really helps a lot to keep italy out of africa.  Also, buying units out of south africa and flying planes from london would be useful.

  • 2024 2023 '22 '21 '20 '19 '18 '17

    Give up on Moscow and march the Red Army into Cairo. Suppose Germany is killing Russia anyway, then it may be better to move Russian units to Africa where they can make a difference, than having them destroyed by superior enemy forces while trying to defend the Motherland. London should be safe in such a scenario, so holding Cairo denies the Axis a European victory. It may buy you just enough time to allow the US and the UK to turn the tide.


  • As far as I know (and that is just 1 way to do it), allies must first make a decision: fly the Indian RAF over to Africa or not. If you do it, Egypt is a whole lot better to defend but Calcutta looses its teeth.
    If you don’t, Egypt should be lost and Japan will have Calcutta anyway (the RAF will only buy 1 turn respite for India -if at all).

    Second, The allies must pay very close attention to (and understand) German build-strategies. Come round 2, Germany will have revealed its targets by positioning but especially by production. If London is not the target, UK should start a FTR-production in SA. And if German support for Italy looks very serious (lots of bomber production), an IC in Egypt is also necessary.

    Third, UK must prepare to move its starting FTR/INF into Egypt asap. Experiment with this but you can have all FTR in Egypt by UK3. If stacking two more INF in Egypt will help you keep it, but will cost the UK a TRS, do it.

    Last but not least, Russia can help defending Cairo RU3 (landing its aircraft there after attacking Iraq). RU4 they may need to leave again (defending Moscow), but it gives the UK an extra turn of putting 3INF + 2FTR there (max; 3INF produced in Egypt, 2FTR from SA).

    Strategic rationale: the combined German Luftwaffe + Italian navy + land units cannot beat this defence. Sure, if they attack, UK + Russia will loose all their aircraft and land units there, but Italy will loose all its land and aircraft units as well and Germany looses as much or even more aircraft than UK + Russia combined. And still this does not give them Cairo. And, after producing a lot of bombers and loosing all but a few over Egypt, the Axis cannot ever hope to take Moscow anymore. In fact, the Red Army could be marching into Eastern Europe by now because so many German luftwaffe is produced and lost.


  • @ItIsILeClerc:

    Second, The allies must pay very close attention to (and understand) German build-strategies. Come round 2, Germany will have revealed its targets by positioning but especially by production. If London is not the target, UK should start a FTR-production in SA. And if German support for Italy looks very serious (lots of bomber production), an IC in Egypt is also necessary.

    LeClerc,
    What if there is a sea lion threat? Egypt is now much harder to defend. Do you concede Egypt and max protect London?


  • Good question IKE.
    That would be very true to the difficulty of playing allies: Giving up London or Egypt is the dilemma, what will the allies choose… I don’t know what’s best but I think both strategies can work.

    Much depends on what happened UK1 and IT1 of course, so lets assume ‘Taranto’ happened (a rather standard move, especially with an allied bid). Without aid of the German luftwaffe (they will be massing against London), Italy cannot safely approach Egypt. Thats 1.

    2: After Taranto and Germany pushing through for SL, London is very likely to fall but it is also very likely that it will be a pyrrhic victory for Germany. Russia will be a monster and the USA just needs to destroy the kriegsmarine.

    If ‘Taranto’ did not happen UK1 I guess the situation does not change a lot if Uk2 still goes for it and stop Italy in the med… But in this case Uk2 also has the option to superdefend London, indeed possibly giving up Egypt in the long run (but only for a short amount of time if London survives).

    I’ll not talk about the the possibility of the USA liberating London, as that also depends on what Japan is doing (and thus, how much investments the USA must make to prevent a pacific sudden death) but the USA should definately have enough ground and naval forces left to prevent Italy from breaking through.

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