Jesus, I don’t see how it could be anything but a split economy; if the US has a peacetime/wartime footing like in AA1940Pac, 80 IPCs plopped down on either side of the US on any given turn is completely unbalancing (how is 8+ planes a turn remotely fair to the Axis players on either front?). Even with split incomes, it looks like it won’t be feasible for the Axis to win extended games simply due to the fact that the US will be banking TWO incomes for the Allied side once war is declared. That’s something any axis player would have a hard time chewing through, not to mention how EUS/WUS incomes will be dealt with the production markers, and which captured territories belong to which US income.
With an Axis breakdown of 50-60 Ger, 15-25 Ita, and 60-70 Jap income w/ NOs (with a perfect opening game) vs. an Allied income of 30-40 UK, 20-30 USSR, and 100+ USA income w/ NOs (guestimation), it seems balanced until you realize that the US can put ALL those IPCs into one front or, in the case of split economies, simply losing a few turns merging its fleets through the panama canal and making the split economy point moot. Since the Axis are the most hard pressed to combine their forces against Allied stacks, and those opportunities generally only present themselves in the middle of the board around Egypt and Persia, I just don’t see how even a 70 income german player can stand up to a 100+ IPC US juggernaut with a 30+ IPC UK sidekick for long. I’m guessing this is supposed to “balance” out the first 1-3 turns of reduced peacetime income and prevent the game from lasting till round 32 two weeks from game start, but since all the Allied side has to do is build infantry in Russia and the Axis has to roll well for most of its important battles, unless the Axis can take out Russia by turn 6 the game is already finished.