The EW seems to be lacking, if you log in and jump to the side with low numbers you quickly realize that the other two sides are attacking each other and there is no one for the third side to fight...or too far away to make it worthwhile to fly there.
EW is only lacking by number count relative to LW. Once in EW the fights are usually great and long lasting.
I especially love the fact that when the horde/land grabbers find the furball all you have to do is annouce a move to another set of bases and the good fights continue. Happily this does not happen that often because most people that come into the EW are looking for fights not winning the war.
The only time the EW arena stinks (ala last Friday night) is when the LW guys go there because they are capped out. The good news is HT raised the cap on LW so EW will mainly always consist of people that just want to fight.
Seem like a win win to me.
As for the country, it is true with the beta map. It seems this time around Bish fields were so far away from either enemy country that it was pointless to fly Bish.