I’m certainly no expert but I get the impression that Sweden as a whole wasn’t too keen on the Nazis, especially after watching them trample the sovereignty of their Scandinavian neighbors. Sweden was really in an impossible place, being surrounded on all sides by Nazi-controlled territory. I reckon they figured their best bet was to avoid an ugly fight and occupation and acquiesce to German trade and transportation demands. I think it’s very telling that as soon as the tide started to swing against the Axis, the Swedes were entering talks with the Allies about liberating Denmark, even though they were still surrounded by the Nazi empire.

Very few Swedish volunteers joined the German Army or Waffen SS. Many fought with the Finns again in the Continuation War, but Swedes in the Wermacht/SS were very small relative to other nations like Norway, Belgium, France, and others. I wouldn’t advocate any A&A trigger for Sweden to join the Axis. I haven’t read anything that indicates a serious leaning toward the Axis. But again, I’m no expert on Sweden; I would love to hear dissenting opinions.

feldgrau.com/sweden.html
waffen-ss.no/sweden.htm

I like the idea of the blocs. I would just as soon lump Sweden and Switzerland into the Europe-Africa bloc to keep things clean and semi-plausible. That would be the simple recommendation. However…

Since Sweden was kind of an interesting case, you could consider making them the “if certain conditions are met…” country for the Allies as an answer to the proposals for Spain to become a pro-Axis neutral if certain conditions are met. According to my very cursory online research, Sweden was apparently drafting plans in 1943 to join the Allies for liberating Denmark. This even with the Axis still historically in control of Norway and Finland. Perhaps if the following conditions are met:
-UK is not Axis occupied
-Norway and Finland are Allied controlled
?-US has at least one ground unit in mainland Europe.

I think changing values of units would add fun and accuracy to without adding new rules to remember. After all, the OOB setup is already mangled anyway, what’s the trouble in adding a few extra lines to the initial setup for some of the neutrals?
These would be my modifications:

Mongolia: reduce to 2-3 INF total. The Mongolian army was only ~80,000 personnel in 1945. I don’t know the country’s total population in 1940  but the almighty wikipedia says < 1 mil in 1939. As it stands now, they have 3x the military of Switzerland, a nation with far more people and more organized conscription. Even with the scale of historical divisions to A&A pieces being smaller on the Pacific board than Europe, Mongolia is way too large of a force. Historically they were pretty insignificant in WWII.

Argentina: add a cruiser (sz 85)
Spain: add a tac bomber
Sweden: add a cruiser (sz 114), add a tac bomber, maybe replace an INF with an ARTY

Thanks for those numbers. I’m inclined to say nothing then to represent the Brazilian navy in A&A, especially considering how limited their battleships were.

@knp7765:

@Peck:

The reason USA battleships are under represented in this game is because most were old decrepit models and were no match for the “modern” units being built by other contrys of the time.

That may be true when compared with battleships built by Britain and Germany, perhaps even Italy and France as well.  However, many of the Japanese battleships of the time were easily as old as the US battleships.  With the exception of Yamato and Musashi, the battleships in the IJN were built back in the teens and twenties, most of which were outclassed by the US battleships.

Exactly. Actually, Italy entered the war with four WWI era battleships (Andrea Doria class and Conti di Cavour class), France with three (Bretagne class), Germany had the Schleswig-Holstein, and I’m quite sure UK had some holdovers as well.

I imagine the USA’s naval power in A&A is reduced for gameplay balance reasons.

@Gargantua:

No swiss navy is represented!  This is hogwash!

On a serious note though…. if you are going to include neutral navies… what about neutral armies?  Spain Turkey etc, had better than just plain old inf.

I wanted to take a look at both neutral armies and navies. Haven’t really done much research on Turkey but I did on Sweden and Spain. Spain was in a terrible place militarily in 1940, their units were under-equipped and under-supplied. They had very little in the way of modern tanks or artillery. At best, I could see them with an artillery or mech unit in place of an infantry piece. I think their total air strength was about 450-500 aircraft of various obsolete and modern models in 1940. I guess I can’t post links here, but do a search for “The Spanish Military During World War II”, “wayne h. bowen”.
I believe I saw Imperious Leader post a rough scale of 1000 or so aircraft to equal a piece in A&A. Of course, scale isn’t everything, capability plays a huge part as well in determining what armies get pieces. I’m not so sure Spain would make the cut via scale or capability for air representation in A&A.

I could see Sweden with an artillery unit, but their air force in 1940 was pretty small. I think their air force quadrupled between 1940 and 1945 though. It’s a tough one to call.

For the sake of some game flavor and historical accuracy, I like the idea of adding some neutral navies to the mix. Having done some research on my own and on this and Larry Harris’ forums, each navl unit in A&A 1940 roughly breaks out to the following historical numbers:
CV: 4-6
BB: 4-6  –exception: USA with only one battleship unit to represent a historical 15 in 1940
CA: 8-12
DD: 25-30
SS: 50-60 --exception: Germany, which only had 50-60 operational U-boats in June 1940.

Bearing that in mind, I came up with the following true neutral naval recommendations:

Argentina: 1 cruiser
Supposedly the 8th largest navy in 1940. They had a couple old but modernized dreadnoughts, three modern light cruisers, and 12-16 destroyers, and three subs with the usual array of smaller ships.

Sweden: 1 cruiser
With six cruisers, including three heavily-armed Sverige class coastal defense ships, 18 destroyers, and ~8 subs.

Brazil: 1 destroyer?
I found it hard to get data on Brazil. I know they had two antiquated dreadnoughts that were relegated to training/shore defense duty, as well as at least two cruisers. Past that, I don’t have numbers. I know they played a part in WWII as a convoy escort/ASW naval force.

Greece: 1 destroyer/nothing?
This is a slight stretch. The Greeks had two cruisers, 10 destroyers, and six subs, as far as I can tell. This is pretty borderline for inclusion in A&A, I’m inclined to put nothing. However, if Italian sub numbers are accounted for, a single destroyer for Greece might be a balanced addition.

Unfortunately, no other navies (including the depleted Spanish navy) came close enough to merit A&A representation.

Any thoughts?