Not so Kurz und Vives (short and lively) - A Postcard from The Seven Years War

My choosing of the sequence to achieve strategic goals ... The King would never approve.

This blog entry is from "The Road to War", a campaign scenario from The Seven Years War. The goals are in the bottom right corner.

Right from the start, the Kingdom had to sink deep into depth in order to afford its way to war.

That small army of 5 divisions takes almost all quarterly tax revenue just in salaries. Keeping it fed is another 5K from the Kingdom's coffers. That force marching west is the 1st Division  marching towards Mecklenburg.

Berlin is the only city that offers reasonable resources for expanding the Kingdom's Army. This window is used for recruitment.

The Prussian 1st and 4th Division await a complete resupply before initiating hostilities against the Swedish Pomerania. Rostock has only one supply train available. Berlin (south of this screenshot)  has two supply trains. But the resupply operation takes very long nonetheless, almost two months. It is good that the march of the 1st Division was initiated during the winter (desertions and all).

After declaring war against the Kingdom of Sweden, the Prussian's make first contact is in the frontiers on the early hours of 29 May 1750.

The briefing for the Battle of Stralsund.

With narrow corridors of open terrain, the battlefield is almost a trap to deny our troops of  their main advantage (the numerical superiority). On the left, the 4th Division (flag icons) and their intended deployment ahead (blue rectangles). On the right, the 1st Division and their intended position (blue rectangles).

The chaos of the battle, with our troops frantically maneuvering to outflank the Swedish infantry. In the center of the screenshot and to the left of the road junction, an embarrassing cavalry skirmish that ended with 3 Prussian Regiments routed.

The Swedish forces' morale broke and they retreated north.

The Swedish force (north) and the Prussian 1st and 4th Division in pursuit.

And almost two weeks after our victory, we force the Swedish into battle. They had nowhere to go.

Is either defeat/surrender or fall into the sea for the Swedish. They finally surrender in mass after the first shots.

And this is our new city, Stralsund. A piece of nowhere that is more of a problem than an asset.

And this where I would like to pause to reflect on a few issues.

The Swedish Kingdom didn't come crying and asking for peace (I have not accumulated enough victory points accumulated in game's parlance). The started plundering on my maritime trade. The Kingdom of Prussia is now scrambling to assemble a fleet. A very expensive fleet that it can't afford.

The choice of the place and time to start a war was a very poor one. I can't go on a war without a fleet against an enemy that controls the very front door of my maritime trade.

As Frederick the Great said, keep wars short and lively. Prussia can barely afford otherwise.

Cheers,