HOI4 Historical Battle Plan: Operation Barbarossa [With Special Guest Lt. Joker]

It is my pleasure to be joined by Lt Joker for a grand discussion on Operation Barbarossa. I have set up a Hearts of Iron 4 game playing Germany as historically accurate as possible. We will be discussing the game set up and the German battle plans. I will have another video with gameplay of the battle plans we set up in this video. Please check out Lt Joker's channel below. Cheers!

Edited Photo: Bundesarchiv, Bild 101III-Merz-014-12A / Merz / CC-BY-SA 3.0

Focus Tree Build:
1. Rhineland (May 1936)
2. Four Year Plan (1936)
3. Autarky
4. Anti-Comminterm Pact (November 1936)
5. Reichsautobahn (April 1938 ceremony date)
6. Coal Liquidization (accounts for 50% of German oil production in 1940)
7. Synthetic Rubber
8. Hermann Goring-Werke (July 1937)
9. KDF-Wagen (started pre-war)
10. Extra Research Slot (why not?)
11. Army Innovations
12. Anchluss (March 1938)
13. Treaty w/ USSR (I think this simulates the tank school in Kama (USSR) November, 1926. Not sure)
14. Grobraumwirtschaft
15. Demand Sudetenland (September 1938)
16. First Vienna Award (Nov. 1938)
17. Fate of Czechoslovakia (March 1939)
18. Reassert Eastern Claims (Germany takes Memel: March 1939)
19. Molotov-Ribentrov Pact (August 1939)
20. Danzig or War (October 1939)
21. Around Maginot (May 1940)
22. Operation Weserubung (April 1940)
23. Befriend Japan (simulates tripartite pact of Sept. 1940)
24. Align Hungry (November 1940)
25. Align Romania (November 1940)
26. Integrate War Economies
27. Form the Reichskommissariats
28. Army Innovations II
29. Befriend Japan
30. War with the USSR
31. Reintegrate Alsace-Lorraine

Affordable Gaming Gear I Use on Amazon:

[general-cromwell]

Initially, the plan called for a grand strategy of large scale pincer movements, sealing off the north/south, then like two giant swinging doors that would have linked up behind Moscow.

Of course, this is the classic example of mission creep + a plan rarely survives enemy contact.

Great stuff.

Cheers.

[raimobin]

What many people forget is that in Hitler's core concept of race, he considered all the western aryans nations as brothers and did not want any war with them. That was why he was cautious at beginning with sporadic outbreaks of claims and counterclaims.
Also, I think the game simulates the role of vichy france and others as well as they can and it is quite difficult to represent.
With that being said, it was a quite interesting video and would like a video based on the North Africa campaign and how it could have gone better.

[bigvinnie]

Hitler hated Vienna but he did love Linz. Also Serbia was German occupied and they had a Croatian puppet. But other than that its not to bad.

[marcelwachter]

It wasnt an ad hoc decision with austria.... thats crap. austrian troops marched in german citys at the same time to show it is peaceful and so on

[joecrowell]

Would be nice if you did your homework before putting the video together. Way too many unknown's on your part about history. "Talking out of your ass", comment> Lol.