Hi all,
Been thinking about this some more and come up with the following ideas.
The problems with an Africa first strategy are as follows.
1. Vulnerability of Axis shipping in the med.
I think if the axis are going to go the Naval route they need to commit to a naval building program. By turn 5 they will need something like
5DD
1CR
1CV + 2FTR
5SS
A fleet such as this would be able to stand up to about 10 enemy planes. The problem I have always found is you can’t protect transports and new builds. So where do you build them to stop the new ships being bombed straight away. There are plenty of spots allies can base planes on including carriers. This limits the Italian navy to operations in the Adriatic Sea only. :-(
A solution would be to try and save up and buy them in chunks or to try and scare off allied planes somehow.
It would be fairly easy for the Germans to pop out 1-2 subs a turn from Marseilles each turn. These subs could keep the Med clear or even chase away the allies from SZ91 if you can build enough, but again its the vulnerability of transports that is the problem. I think a too heavy ship building program will leave Germany very weak on the ground.
2. IPCs.
If you do the math there are about 20 IPCs Italy and Germany can collect in places such as Turkey, Persia, Caucasus, etc, This does not include Egypt or Africa. The problem is that while Germany and Italy are fighting their way through the Middle east, Capturing these territories does not hurt Russia or UK. Most of the money comes from Neutrals or NOs. So while it will be great for the AXIS to boost their income, they really need to hurt the Allies harder.
Solutions.
I think a focus on getting a decent chunk of troops into the Syria/Iraq area by T4 opens a lot of doors for the Axis. I think Germany really needs to boost production by building factories in Turkey/Iraq or even Egypt. Tanks/Mec can be built in Germany but Inf/Art are needed too and they are too slow to walk. If this is combined with a focus on capturing the Russian Factories in Stalingrad and Ukraine, Germany can pump out enough to devour central Asia as well as push into Africa.
Building the Italian Navy has difficulties but if it can be done would safeguard the north African coast, as well as protecting Italy from invasion.