Play as · WW2 1939 · L1 · British Crown Colony · About to Be Bombed

Malta - 1939

Malta in 1939 is the British Crown Colony - under British administration since the 1814 Treaty of Paris formalized the post-1800 transition from the French-occupation period that had ended the Knights of Malta governance - operating as the principal Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet base at Grand Harbour. Population about 280,000. The country's strategic identity is the British Crown Colony fortress in the central Mediterranean, the principal Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet base, the substantial Royal Air Force and British Army garrison, and the looming June 10, 1940 Italian declaration of war that will inaugurate the substantial two-year Siege of Malta - one of the most-intensive sustained bombing campaigns of WW2 (Malta will receive 6,700 tons of bombs in the worst six months of 1942), the substantial Malta Convoys strategic-significance, and the April 15, 1942 awarding of the George Cross to the entire Maltese population (the only such collective award in the history of the decoration, with the cross now displayed on the Maltese flag).

Starting position

Malta's defense-architecture in 1939 includes the substantial Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet (the principal British naval-strategic positioning in the Mediterranean) based at Grand Harbour, the Royal Air Force Mediterranean Command facilities at Hal Far, Luqa, and Ta' Qali airbases, the British Army Malta Command formations including the King's Own Malta Regiment and the broader British-imperial regiments, and the substantial coastal-artillery and anti-aircraft architecture. The Maltese Auxiliary Corps and other indigenous-military formations contribute the additional manpower. The strategic-significance has been continuously elevated through the post-1930s rearmament - the substantial pre-war investment in the air-defense architecture, the Grand Harbour facilities upgrade, and the broader Mediterranean Fleet capacity has institutionalized Malta as the principal British central-Mediterranean strategic position.

What turns the campaign

What Malta in 1939 wants is the substantial wartime strategic-positioning preserved through the looming Italian-and-German bombing campaign that will substantially damage the civilian-and-military infrastructure, the Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet operations preserved at Grand Harbour against the substantial Axis air-and-naval pressure, the Malta Convoys (Operation Pedestal in August 1942 was the most-celebrated, with the SS Ohio tanker arrival being the strategic-historical inflection), the indigenous Maltese political-and-civil-society support sustained through the substantial wartime hardships, and the broader British Mediterranean-strategic positioning preserved through the multi-year sieges. What Malta fears is exactly the historical answer - the June 1940 Italian declaration of war initiates the bombing campaign, the post-1941 German Luftwaffe Fliegerkorps X intensification of the campaign produces the most-acute siege period, the substantial civilian-and-military casualties and infrastructure damage compound through 1942, and the Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet effectiveness is substantially-compressed through 1942-43 before the post-Operation-Pedestal restoration.

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