Slitherine

As per manula Spain will join the Axis if the French armistice offer is rejected and
Casablanca, Oran, Algiers,Tunis, Rome and Paris are all Axis controlled
Does this mean
1) that those cities must be under Axis control at the moment the French armistice is rejected
2) That whenever those cities are under Axis control after French armistice is rejected Spain join will join Axis

I guess its 2nd, but you can't reject armistice after certain date, as I remember.

It is number 2.

What strategy and tactics did you employ in order to take North Africa from the Free French and how long did it take you to complete it? Also by rejecting the French Armistice after taking Paris, does the frequency of Free French partisans increase?

my strategy involves intricate timing and depends on if the French have abandoned the ports or not. I land one German GAR in Oran if he survives to make it through. If the other ports are empty I send Italian troop transports protected by subs and fleet to the other ports. I land 1 Italian first and then wait for the others. If the Allies don't bother me or suicide Paris I hold off on the armistice offer until I can land all the Italian transports without a landing penalty. If the Allies intervene you have to land them quickly and take the landing penalty.

If the GARs are still in the port it takes a while longer but start in Tunis with a landing, FJR drop and TAC attacks and then move westward towards Oran (unless the German GAR has been successful). It takes a number of turns to get there and you have to have several TACs as well. If the French force the armistice you just have to fight Free French instead of French. From my experience the Allies really can't stop you but can significantly delay things making Barbarossa a problem.

It just doesn't seem worth the effort or trouble to have Spain join the war. It's not like the Spanish have an army to write home about or a Navy that can rival anyone else in the game. No offense.

Well - you get 20 PPs, allows you to easily take Gibralter and close the Med and you can use all those Spanish troops for garrisoning France. All in all quite nice if you can take it without much cost.

I persuaded Franco to get off the bench and I think it was well worth it. (though in most other aspects my game as been a How-To manual on what not to do as the Axis) Note also that Spain comes along with several ports amenable to U-boat R&R. And it opens up the prospect of rolling Portugal, though in my game I was spared the effort when the Americans decided to land in Portugal. (fortunately for me Lisbon appears to be Portuguese for Stalingrad)