thor

Didn't know that about the JTs. But what kind of numbers are we talking about?

A lot of good suggestions have been made thus far, including Wavell and Von Manstein (the latter in particular proved himself again and again). I want to throw in one candidate, who changed the course of the war in the Pacific (and thus of the war overall) -- Admiral Spruance. He defeated the Japanese at Midway, with forces inferior both in numbers and experience. He did have superior intelligence, and he put that to good use. If things had gone the other way, as they well might have, it could have set the US back YEARS in that theatre. We would have lost most of our experienced carrier pilots, and thus not only our fighting force but also our pool of trainers.

This is a great work on WW2: Total War: Causes and Courses of the Second World War, Revised 2nd Ed., Peter Calvocoressi,Guy Wint,R.John. Pritchard / Paperback / Pantheon Books / September 1990 The thing is, I think it is now in two volumes, so doesn't exactly meet the one-volume specification. That said, it has an amazing treatment of the Pacific war, something that sometimes lacks in more euro-centric coverage.

quote: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Admiral King let down his command at Pearl Harbor. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ I suspect you mean Admiral Kimmel? Rear-Admiral King was appointed as his replacement, after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Whether Kimmel really let his down his command is highly debatable, probably untrue IMO, and certainly does not qualify him for any list of "war's worst". Rear-Admiral King certainly thought Kimmel was "sold down the river" (his words) as a scapegoat for Washington's responsibility and embarassment. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Yes, thank you, I did mean Kimmel, not King, sorry. But I stand by my assertion that he let down his command. As someone noted in an earlier post, warnings of possible hostilities had gone out to military commanders in November. Kimmel had no CAP, had not alerted the air observation posts, and had no units on standby in case of immediate mobilization. Sure he was scapegoated but rightly so. A military base is a military base and Pearl Harbor's defenses weren't poor, they were not existent. You're right, though, that this does not qualify him for a list of the war's worst.

As interesting as these discussions have been, I really think that comparing strategic commanders to field commanders is comparing apples to oranges. These two endeavors require quite different skills and face different challenges. Strategic commanders have to weigh the long-range consequences of certain choices, and the trade-offs between resource allocations to different fronts. They have to pick good operational commanders, and replace them when necessary. Operational command, on the other hand, has a narrower focus, requiring quicker decisions with a specific set of forces in a specific situation. Von Manstein may be the best of such commanders in the war. Hitler was unquestionably the worst strategic commander of the war for all the reasons mentioned in previous posts. He understood his enemies poorly (he declared war on the US!!), he meddled in operational matters, and as he considered himself a genius he always had his way. Contrast his behavior with that of Churchill, who would use all his powers of persuasion to get his general staff to buy into one of his many hare-brained schemes, but who also would ultimately acquiesce when they said NO. Or Eisenhower, who let the field commanders command in the field. I don't like MacArthur because his ego forced the U.S. to split its Pacific command between the Army (Mac) and the Navy (Nimitz). A more unified approach may have served the U.S. better. Graziani was execrable as field commander, a good choice for worst. Admiral King let down his command at Pearl Harbor. Percival put up a rather unspirited defense of Malaya. But overall, the allies didn't have many terrible field commanders, imo. The Soviets did, early in the war, but they were soon gone. Well, food for thought, anyway. Thor Skov

For Germans, Hetzer or Stug or Panther. For US, Hellcats and Challengers. Just wanted to add that, for those of you who like the Jagdtiger, I believe those never appeared on the Western Front (solely an east front phenomenon) and thus really have no place in CMBO.

I too love the 2in mortars, if I have to play the Brits (whom I don't love). In addition to the advantages that Cybeq notes, I think their range is their greatest strength, because they have no MINIMUM range. If you're playing in really rough terrain and/or poor visibility, this is a huge asset. In fog, the German 80mm mortars and the US 60mm are useless, cause you can rarely get far enough "away" to use them, even with spotters. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Cybeq: Somebody mentioned the 2in. mortar's chief weakness being it's short range. Yea, that sucks but I think it's small ammo loadout is another weakness. Despite these weaknesses I find myself loving the little guys. I don't attach them to a company CO. I prefer to leave them with the platoon. They are fast enough to advance with the platoon and will be there to provide supression when you need it. They can also throw smoke to cover your movements (very handy!)<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Thanks Maxx. Guess we'll just have to wait for BF to figure it out.

I'm playing a PBEM game, 3000 points, large map. We're on turn 10 and suddenly experienced the following problem. The program would not load my opponents email. It happens thus: I'm on the "load email / join network game" screen. I select load email and the file window appears. I choose the file, hit "open" and then I hear a *ping* and the "load email/join network game" screen appears again. It is as if the game does't recognize the file as a CM PBEM file. We've tried both reloading the file and replotting the turn and saving it as a new file, with the same results. The only thing notable about this turn, from previous ones, is that turn 9 is when our forces first made contact. Any ideas?

Thanks for all the helpful leads, everyone. I now have more mods than I know what to do with. Can't wait to see how they look!!

For the axis, I like Tigers, tho I tend to prefer more and cheaper than fewer and larger. I have to concur that the Stug III and the Hetzer are pretty good tank destroyers. For the allies, there are a lot of tanks I haven't played much with, but I did like the Chaffee because of its speed and FAST turret rotation. I had a Chaffee run circles around some Panthers and take two out.

Does anyone know if the many awesome modules that people have created for the PC version are usable by Macs? Seems that graphics and data files should be easily shared, but I really don't know. I couldn't find any info on this on the combat-missions.net module site. Anyone know of a mac-centered module site? Thanks.

Does anyone know if the many awesome modules that people have created for the PC version are usable by Macs? Seems that graphics and data files should be easily shared, but I really don't know. I couldn't find any info on this on the combat-missions.net module site. Anyone know of a mac-centered module site? Thanks.

I love the demo and want to purchase the full version. However, I would like to know if scenarios posted on the web written by people using the pc version will work with the mac version. Oh, also, are there any problems with head to head net play between macs and pcs? Thanks.