I won't go into too much detail here because if you're reading this, you most likely know how A&A works and besides, it's almost 2:00 AM!

This strategy works best if Germany and Russia are knocking heads and England and the United States have the ability to build transports unmolested by U-Boats and the like.

Best case scenario:

1.) England makes an amphibious assault on Spain, paying 3 IPCs for violating neutrality. Land as many infantry as you can. England's purchases for this round are really dependent upon what the US has available to reinforce Spain. More transports to funnel English units to Spain in the next round is an option, as are fighters to reinforce Spain.

2.) The United States lands with all available units in Spain to reinforce Britain. Infantry again is preferable this first round. Of course, if you can land fighters, land them! Purchases are dependent on the situation, but more transports and infantry aren't a bad idea if the objective is to hold on to Spain.

3.) Germany might be in a heap of trouble:
a.) If the German player has been building tanks and hasn't reinforced Europe with much infantry, he's going to find himself with a horrible option. Does he turn his tanks destined for the Russian Front to deal with the new front in Spain? If he does, those tanks involved in the fight will be at least 2 turns away from getting back to the action in the East (Spain, Western Europe, Germany, Eastern Europe, Ukraine...).
b.) Does the German player throw what few infantry (probably) that he has in Western Europe to attack Spain, thereby weakening Western Europe and forcing him to redistribute troops to defend Western Europe?
c.) Does he ignore the threat for a turn, allowing the English and US to reinforce Spain even more?

In any event, the Allies capturing Spain forces the German player to defend it or defend against it. This causes Germany to become overextended in the West. It is a lot harder to defend Spain than it is Western Europe: newly purchased infantry takes 2 turns to get there. Germany having to occupy Spain makes Western Europe weaker. Suddenly instead of having to defend one territory to the West, Germany must defend two.

Of course, the US needs to be in a position to be able to commit forces to the European Theater. If Japan is giving the US trouble in the Pacific, it'll be harder for the US to commit forces.

However, one good coordinated landing at the right time can absolutely seal the game for the Allies. A combined force of 8 infantry and a fighter (4 British Infantry transported by 2 transports, 4 US Infantry transported by 2 transports, 1 US fighter) commits only modest resources and provides a pretty good defense. The German player will almost assuredly be forced to pull tanks and/or aircraft from fighting the Russians to attack Spain if he chooses to do so. This gives the Allies a chance to inflict casualties on the attacking Germans and gives the Russians a major opening in the East- either by buying them time or by making an assault into German territory a bit easier.

This option has worked so well that it probably could constitute as a "glitch" (explotation?) in the game mechanic.

VERY interesting strategy. If spain is not recaptured every turn you can make an attack against WE with all units in spain AND the transports throwing in amphibious units, which should make for about 12-24 units between the brits and the yanks. From there you can again assault germany with WE troops and amphibs.

Not that the allies NEEDS a killer strategy in order to win the game, as it is a general concensus that the game is stacked for the allies. But this is an interesting little strategy I think I will try out as soon as possible.

Thanks for the feedback, Edward!

With the pressure off the Russians, it's VERY hard for the German player to do anything but defend for the rest of the game- and that's putting it nicely . As much as any A&A player hates it, buying infantry and waiting for the inevitable seems to always be the result!

However, if the German player has been purchasing a good mix of infantry and other units from the beginning of the game (instead of all armor, for instance), the German player has a good chance of beating back a weak invasion or two of Spain.

One thing I may have failed to mention is that my friends and I usually play a game variant by a Mark McLaughin found in an article called "1941: Axis and Allies". It originally appeared in an old "Wargamer" magazine, but I don't know what issue. It can be found here:

http://www.wargamer.com/axisandallies/original/scenarios/his...

(...and the main site has a plethora of other variants).

It gives the Axis more than a fighting chance to win and does a great job of simulating the whooping the Allies got early in the war! In fact, the invasion of Spain was initially a desperation move that panned out really well.

By the way, in case you didn't know (which I admit I didn't until I tried to search for the article above), McLaughin is a game designer and game reviewer.

Lee