The answer is obviously yes.
It seems from the structure of the Commanders, loadouts, and war spoils that they must have had something like this in mind at the beginning. Especially considering their foray into COH
nline.
At this point the game is getting long in the tooth and basically everyone who would have bought the game already has. By making it free to play they can bring new people in that might eventually buy commanders and factions. As a owner of the COH2 bundle I'd be happy to have an increased player base so that a more balanced automatch might be possible. If this game stagnates newer games like Iron Harvest will chip away at the player base making matchmaking more difficult.
As long as they can keep out the cheaters.