AAR A Hill West of Port Stanley

Big Tony and his GPMG...

The last couple of weeks has been flat out on the day job - lots of travelling and not enough time at home for gaming related activity.

I did manage to squeeze in a solo Cold War 83 game yesterday afternoon though. I've been working on adapting the army lists and scenarios from Great Escape Games's 'Rules of Engagment' to the Falklands and Cold War 83.

My adapted 'Hold the Line' Scenario pitched a platoon of Paras with on call fire support in a night attack on a fortified Argentinian position held by a couple of infantry squads supported by two HMGs and a mortar.

Here are the Paras on the start line in canonical two up-one back formation (rather like England playing 4-4-2). In the foreground there is a firebase of two GPMGs in sustained fire mode.

The Argies used hidden deployment. The six elements in their force (1 x Pltn Command; 2 x rifle Squads; 2 x HMGs and a 81mm mortar) were deployed using hidden unit markers together with 3 dummy markers to add a bit of suspense. Given the Argies historically used a poorly deployed all round defence in most for the set piece battles I wasn't too worried where their troops popped up in the event. Here are their markers: the Brits are attacking from the right.with objective of capturing the central rocky hill. The white die marks the objective.

 It was a great scrap with the Paras going in silent on a cloudy night with no moon. Visibility was down to 100m so when the shooting started it was at close range. Things went noisy very quickly and the Paras soon moved in for some pretty desperate close quarter combat. The rules worked well with entrenched Argies holding out until the Para's platoon commander called in artillery right onto their position. The picture below shows the effect of this with the red circled figures suppressed and the pink dice showing their bottle rating (the Argies started on 6, except for their commander and squad NCOs who were on 7).

The picture below shows another British salvo hitting home - I got these markers from Early War Miniatures and I really like them.

I called it a day (night?) when the Argies started to take such heavy casualties that their position became hopeless. They had lost six killed, nine wounded and another dozen taken prisoner while the Paras had three dead and four wounded. The three British fatalities all falling to one surprise burst of HMG fire as they crossed the field of fire of a hitherto hidden machine gun...

I need to work on the orders of battle and tweak the rules for artillery support so it's not quite as devastating as it was in this game but I'm pleased with this little project so far - with a bit of work I'll have a good scenario based campaign going. And I have plenty of Argie marines and commandos to paint, not to mention the British marines and the SAS/SBS as well as some helicopters.

Now I just have to work out how to spend more evenings at home instead of in hotels like tonight...

Fighting Patrol, somewhere south of San Carlos

Yesterday evening we had our first foray into re-fighting the Falklands war. Using Cold War 83 rules, two fighting patrols clashed on a rainy night a couple of days after the British landed at San Carlos.

 

The British Paras force consisted of a platoon headquarters with a recently graduated 2nd Lieutenant, and a signaller both armed with Sterling SMGs and a veteran sergeant with an SLR, together with a rifle section with GPMG, Bren Gun, Corporal with Sterling and five toms with SLRs. All the Paras had bottle ratings of 8 (experienced regulars - they'd all done tours in Northern Ireland) and with the exception of the officer and sergeant who were rated at a bottle of 9, to reflect their leadership qualities, and a tactics skill of 2. Eleven men all up.

 

The Argentinians fielded a platoon command group of one pistol armed officer, a radioman and NCO, both with FALs plus four other soldiers armed with FALs. A sniper armed with a Mauser bolt action rifle completed the group.

 

A full strength section of ten men led by an SMG weilding NCO completed their force. One MAG LMG, a rifle grenade launcher and seven FALs equipped the balance of the section.

 

The Argentinians were rated at a bottle value of 6 as conscripts, with the exception of the officer and the NCOs who were rated at 7. The Argies lack of training and experience was partially offset by some better kit, particularly night sights and goggles.

 



 

The paras' platoon sergeant follows two toms as they advance to contact. The leading para is armed with a Bren gun.

I'd not had time to write up a formal scenario so the two forces were simply instructed to advance to contact and to try and inflict enough casualties to break their opponent. The Brits had to roll against their leader's bottle once they sustained 50% casualties rounded down i.e. six men and the Argies had to do the same at 33% or six casualties. A failure meant the force broke. Further rolls were to be made at 66% and 50% casualties respectively and so on.

The two little armies could only see one another at around 100m on a dark, wet night so we only diced against bottle for movement once contact was made. Until that point both sides were walking. There was a little positioning as this occurred - obviously the players could see their opponent's figures - but by alternately moving units no-one gained an advantage and we felt that the two sides knew the enemy was about and could probably hear them on the wind so this wasn't entirely unrealistic.

GPMG gunner Big Tony goes 'firm'.

 

Once contact was made the initial exchange of fire was brutal. Barry the Bren Gunner tried to fire the first burst as an Argentinian emerged out of the darkness in front to him - critical failure! Dud rounds meant he pulled the trigger and nothing happened!

 

After that debacle the paras reacted characteristically and got plenty of rounds down range and moved quickly and aggressively to close. Barry ran straight at a terrified Argie conscript swinging his Bren like a club and was promptly shot dead at point blank range...

 

 

Argies taking fire

 

The Argies were taking hits though and a number were suppressed and one killed- SMG fire being particularly nasty at short range. Our intrepid young para officer climbed up some rocks above three of Galtieri's finest and pulled the pin out of a grenade...which promptly exploded killing him instantly. Sergeant Watson immediately assumed command and the toms began working round the Argies right flank in a series of hand to hand fights. It wasn't at all a pushover - another para was down, wounded by a desperate Argentinian conscript literally fighting for his life. There was a nasty little episode as two paras bayoneted their opponent in revenge.

 

The action began to slow as both sides drew breath and nearly everyone went to ground. NCOs on both sides could be heard shouting orders and as dawn approached the Argentinian casualties reached their first break point. The bottle roll was duly passed but, using his night vision binoculars Lieutenant Tevez had spotted a para armed with a GPMG hiding in a cluster of rocks. He rightly decided that it was time to break off before the light improved and his men were both outgunned and out ranged.

 

The butcher's bill was two paras killed and one wounded and two Argentinian dead, three wounded and one missing. The missing man was later found hiding behind a gorse bank half way down the road to Darwin...

 

Thanks to Chris and Jeff for being so sporting and patient as we worked through the adaptations we'd made to the rules and learned about the strengths and weaknesses of the opposing sides.

 

Next time we might introduce mortar fire and hidden deployment and once the slit trenches and foxholes arrive that I've ordered then the Argentinian prospects of survival will increase.

 

What was realistic was that with poorer quality troops the Argentinian ability to manoeuvre was heavily restricted and they did better if they simply got their heads down, stayed put and fired when they could.

 



Work to Rule: Cold War 83

I've been trying out a variation of these rules for the lst three games in War for Slow Readers.

The variation has largely been prompted by the fact that my figures are not individually based, rather they are 3 or 2 figures to a base as I originally based them up for AK47 Reloaded. The few games I played with the latter rule set were good fun but I’ve not enjoyed them as much as the three games I’ve played using Cold War 83.

Why is this? I like the ‘Bottle’ mechanism that Cold War 83 uses to model training, experience and morale and how this is used to influence the chances of troops’ success or failure at just about anything they try and do. To my mind this far better than separating out factors like morale and subjecting troops to ‘morale checks’ as part of the turn sequence. The CW83 turn sequence is stripped down to alternating unit activation, after an initial die roll for initiative, within which individual stands of figures (in my games) or vehicles, attempt movement actions and/or combat actions. These can be attempted in any sequence, for example a fireteam may fire as a combat action and then move or vice versa, or all the fireteams in a unit may fire before they move or some may fire and some move in any order the player chooses.  You can keep things simple and confine movement actions to crawl, run and walk and combat actions to ranged firing and close combat or you can add as much complexity as you like – figures can attempt to jump, climb, hide, observe, set or defuse a demolition charge, radio for artillery or air support, or just about anything else you can think of.

I’ve adapted the rules to include command and control and to average out a fireteam’s weapons factor if the figures are armed with more than one type of weapon (e.g. two SLRs and an LMG per stand) then they still only perform one combat action.

One potential problem is the requirement to  keep track of Bottle as it changes, usually downwards, during the game. Also stands come suppressed as a result of mortar or artillery fire and er…suppressive fire from machine guns. With a couple of dozen bases per side this can still get complicated. I’ve resolved this by:

a)      Giving all stands in a unit the same Bottle with the exception of the leader’s stand which has the rear base edge painted to signify his exalted status.  This means that until contact you simply have to remember that  9 Platoon has a Bottle of 8

b)      Placing small dice next to the stand to show its Bottle once this changes from the value it begins the game with.

c)       Putting very small rubber band (I found these at Early War Miniatures) around the base of a suppressed stand.

I don't feel the need to make any cahnges to allow Crossfire' style reactive fire. I think the the alternating unit activation and the requirement that initiative passes to th eopposing player when a unit suffers Bottle failures to the tune of one third of the number of figures it has means there is scope for reaction and overwatch.

I played another game last weekend so look out for an AAR soon.

AAR Triumphant March of Socialism?

A small village in NE Angola, mid November 1975

I used the above table for this battle. The rules were an adapted version of Cold War 83. Instead of individual figures I had three or two man fireteams per base. Vehicles were mounted invidually. This means I can use my 15 mm figures as they are based for the AK 47 Reloaded rules.

Cold War 83 uses an ingenious mechanism to represent training, morale and fatigue called 'Bottle'. Simply put, a figure (or base in this case) is assigned a Bottle value and all actions and attempted actions are influenced by this value. Unusually, the player as to throw a score on 2D6 below a base's current Bottle value to succeed in movement or combat actions. So, the higher a base's Bottle, the more chance it has of actually doing what the player wants it to; whether that's moving, spotting, firing and hitting a target, unjamming a weapon or just about anything else you can think of. Bottle changes during a game, usually downwards, as your men respond to the stress of combat, are wounded or, in some cases, are inspired to bravery etc.

When their Bottle falls to below 2, they're assumed to rout, curl up in a ball, surrender or othrwise find a way of no longer taking part in combat.They can also be killed outright, most often when the firing enemy scores a 'critical success' - that is a successful 2D6 score that is a double.

In my game I assigned the FNLA's two mercenary stands, armed with a total of 6 G3 Rifles a Bottle value of 8 to reflect their training in the Foreign Legion or the Paras etc, as well as their experience as hard bitten dogs of war. Their Angolan FNLA comrades were only rated at 6, indicating they are conscripts with little experience but who have gained some appreciation of the dangers of war. They're armed with a total of 7 x AK47 Assault Rifles, 2 x PK LMGs and a couple of RPG 7 Grenade Launchers, presumably courtesy of the Chinese before they lost faith in Holden Roberto. Crucially the FNLA have one vehicle that's a runner, a Toyota pick up truck armed with a .50 cal HMG, and crewed by two Angolans also rated at 6. One item there is no shortage of is hand grenades.

I decided that the village was deserted, the locals having made themselves scarce when the soldiers showed up. All the built up area, rough ground and woods templates were assigned a 'clutter value' of 3, meaning that once contact is made then a stand has to subtract that number from its Bottle value if it wants to move anywhere or hit anything in the template. There are three gentle hills to the NW, NE and SW of the village that don't impede movement but block line of sight. Most of the area is light bush with a clutter value of 1. The roads are rated 0.

The mercenary Jean Langarotti set up as all round a defence as he could manage with the resources to hand. I decided the FNLA would deploy first and then the road entrance tthat he MPLA would enter on would be chosen randomly. This simulates the 'frontless nature of the fighting' (see the previous post). The MPLA would move without dicing for success against Bottle until contact.

The MPLA were represented by a full platoon of motorised infantry, transported in three newly aquired URAL trucks, with an 8 men squad per truck split into 3 fireteams with a total of 6 x AK47s, 1x PK LMG and an RPG 7. Like their FNLA opponents they were rated at 6 for Bottle.

Six Cuban Special Forces soldiers provided the leadership and expertise. Two were in a GAZ jeep mounting an HMG on point, and another five, including the force commander, Leiutenant Alonso, in the follwing GAZ jeep, also equipped with an HMG. These were given a Bottle rating of 9.

The MPLA attempted to get on table on turn 1. The point jeep was hit by the HMG mounted in the Toyota technical, obviously the Cubans weren't anticipating an ambush! So much for their training and experience. Although they suffered some damage, neither the vehicle or the crew were incapacitated by this first burst of fire. As their comrades followed them into he kill zone however, an FNLA fireteam, emboldened by the noise and the obvious power of the technical's HMG, opened up with everything they had, namely an LMG and two AK 47s.

The leading Cuban jeep was destroyed and the following one accelterated into the cover of the buildings south of the FNLA technical. Two URAL trucks followed, taking rounds on the way in. The third URAL didn't make it on to the table, the sound of the firefight obviously leading the driver to stamp on the brakes.

One brewed up Cuban jeep in the background, the FNLA technical and fireteam that did the damage in the foreground. Note that the FNLA firteam's bottle rating is inicated by the two small green dice. It's at 7 because of the proximity of Langarotti who can be see in botom of the picture



From this point on things went rapidly downhill for our heroic revolutionaries. Of the two URALs that drove towards the village, one copped a burst from the Toyota's .50 cal and the resulting mayhem led the hapless Alonso and his comrades to go to ground and become suppressd as they were within 7.5 cm of the truck that was hit. The second URAL truck came under fire from another FNLA fireteam before it reached the cover of the buildings and the crew were killed and the troops on board all suppressed. The only postive thing the MPLA managed to do was get the third truck on the table and under cover in the woods to the north of their entry point.

By  the end of turn three more and more fire was being poured into the MPLA and Cubans either in, or just outside, the buildings and casualties were mounting. The squad in the third truck disembarked and moved forward to engage Langarotti and his men from the cover of the woods but by then it was all too little, too late. The rest of the MPLA's force was either suppressed and/or had a Bottle rating of 2, meaning there was nothing they could do about their predicament.

Here you can see the MPLA & the Cubans with their rapidly dwindling Bottle scores


At this point I decided to end my little experiment. What have I learned? Firstly, I really like the rules and especially the Bottle mechanism. At last I can see what others rave about. This is a fast play rule set that gives a flavour of how I imagine the chaos of a firefight to play out. As the player, you can see the danger your litte men are in, but getting them do do what you want to get out of it is another matter. With a little thought I think I can come up with plenty of scenarios involving all sorts of pressure on the protagonists - not shooting at civilians in the war zone, securing the merchandise from Mr Arms Dealer, avoiding being filmed by a news crew as your men go on the rampage/break and run/loot and pillage - are a few that have just come to mind. Secondly, get out off your trucks and spread out as soon as you hear incoming fire...

The Truimphant March of Socialism?

Mid November 1975. The FNLA offensive on Luanda in the north has been halted. The South African led forces  on the southern front have started to retreat towards Benguela. The MPLA's grip on Luanda becomes more secure as each day goes by. Soviet Anatov transport aircraft fly Cuban troops into Luanda round the clock. The Cubans are supplied with heavy equipment from freighters docked in Luanda's harbour. One of the freighters is 'The Carlotta', the same name that has been given by Fidel Castro to the operation that is sending thousands of Cubans to Africa. Carlotta was a the leader of a slave revolt. For Fidel and the Cuban leadership Angola represents their revolutionary destiny - more slaves came from this part of Africa than anywhere else, many of them were shipped to the Caribbean, now their descendants are coming home to liberate Angola from the Imperialists.

At least that's the official version. The Soviets have swallowed bile and are providing arms and transport to their 'tropical socialist' allies. The MPLA is now trying to secure the approaches to Luanda to the north and south using recently recruited Cuban led troops kitted out with Soviet supplied weapons and transport.



But where is the front? Comrade Farrusco, fighting near Lubango for the MPLA , told Ryszard Kapuscinki:

'In Europe they taught me that a front is trenches and barbed wire, which form a distinct and visible line...on a river, along a road, or from village to village. You can trace it on a map with a pencil...here the front is everywhere and nowhere...there is too much land and too few people for a front to exist...so the front doesn't consist of a line but points, and moving points at that...Every unit is a front, and a potential front. If our unit runs into an enemy unit , those two poteial fronts turn into a real front. A battle occurs.'

'This is a war of ambushes. On any road, at any place, there can be a front.'

'You can travel the whole country and come back alive, or you can die a metre from where you're standing. There are no principles, no methods.'

'This war is a real mess. Nobody knows just where they stand.'

Jean Langarotti and Kurt Semmler know where they stand. They're holed up in a small township at a crossroads about 100 km east of Luanda. Since the defeat at Caxito and the death of their leader Carlo Shannon, the two mercenaries have been retreating into the interior. Their transport has all broken down or run out of gasoline. They have one Toyota pick up truck that is a runner, and mounts a 50 cal machine gun. The South African Jan Dupree and the Briton Gary Watson, together with two Portuguese, are the only other trained and experienced men they have. There are thirteen Angolans with them, all of them FNLA, poorly trained conscripts. Between them they have a couple each of PK LMGs and RPG 7s, half a dozen G3 rifles, and seven Kalashnikovs.

They know they have to move, and move soon. The trouble is there is a dust cloud on the horizon and that can only mean one thing. The MPLA have caught up with them.

Langorotti softly whistles 'Spanish Harlem' and makes is dispositions.

The battle that followed was fought using an adapted version of Cold War 83 rules by Wessex Games. Full AAR in a couple of days.