Jeppy, Daryl and George played the Russians and had part of the 39th Motor Rifle Division (MRD). Specifically the BMP Regiment (BMP-2s), Tank Regiment (T-80Us), Artillery Regiment (2S3, 152mm Howitzers, off board), Divisional assets (AT Battalion, Recon Battalion, some Engineering units, Independent Tank Battalion [also T-80Us], some extra SAM units, and lets not forget the helicopters).
Their job is to capture Ilawa and push at least one regiment on past the town. Their main force would start to arrive on the map at 0900. They could send the helicopter in at any time. And this provided the entertainment for the evening.
They decide to send three platoons into the town on the Mi-8 they had. They pick a command engineering platoon and two infantry platoons. They landed them right in the center of the town and had them hide out in some of the buildings with orders to slow down whatever might come by. The troops landed shortly after dawn.
Here is a map showing the Russian plan and what they expected NATO to do.
NATO
John and Jeff D. played NATO. They had a German Panzer Brigade and the option to request help from either the Canadians south of them, or the British (who had just gotten shot up) from the north. They opted for the British, which turned out to be a company of Challenger I, Mk 3s and a company of infantry. They arrived at 0945.
The brigade has two panzer battalions, one grenadier battalion, a mixed battalion and a battalion of M109 (155mm Howitzers). They also got the Divisional Recon Battalion.
Their orders where to hold Ilawa and not let the Russians thru. They entered the board at 0830.
The Recon infantry advances up the street with their Fuchs transports, they sent one ahead of the group. It had a close encounter with the other infantry platoon and eat a RPG (the last the platoon had). Again no one saw what happen because of the smoke.
More grenadiers entered the town. At this point, pretty much the whole battalion was in town looking for a company of Russians.
The remaining Germans continued to maneuver around the town and take up their assigned positions.
The first Russians enter the board. Two platoons of recon pull up behind a hill and dismount. (Next turn they walk to the top of the ridge line and started looking around.)
The Recon Infantry advanced up the street, and guess what, yep, the Russians in the house hosed them down. Now they can't do anything about the Luchs (have not RPGs left), but they did a number on the infantry with it. And the Recon unit managed to only get one platoon were it could see what was happening. The German infantry ends up falling back away from the Russians while the Fuchs returned fire (not doing anything).
Mean time the remaining Recon company (a "light" one) was running towards the top of a hill east of town, and had a close encounter with the lead element of the Russian Recon battalion. Of course they don't know that for sure, since all they saw was one lonely T-80 sitting on top of the hill.
The Leopard I got both shots off, which were really nice hits, but no penetration. The T-80 brewed him up with one shot. Then killed the Luchs behind him. The remaining Luchs (hiding at the bottom of the hill) decide it was time to pin and hope no one sees him.
The T-80 was the lead element of the 39th's Recon Battalion.
This is where we stopped for the night. Score so far?
Germans:
Russians:
Here are the pictures from the 0915 turn:
The northern part of the German force (1 Panzer battalion and the Mixed battalion) continue to run along the north edge of the board. The Recon battalion HQ tank runs out in the open northeast of the town.
The Russians have hordes of recon patrol stands sitting on top of the hill on the east side of the board watching everything they can.
Germans in the north continue to advance. The Recon battalion HQ tank goes over the ridge (does not see the patrol stands there) and dives into the woods behind the ridge. And finds a BRDM-2 and lites it up! (Notice that it did not fire at him. Now granted, it only has a machine gun, but still . . .)
The Germans in the north come around the ridge and dive into the woods also. The Recon HQ sites and looks east. (Of course the only Russians in the area are *west* of him.)
The Germans repositioned their Panzerjager company.
The Russian Advanced Party moves over the hill, and towards the town. (One company of T-80s, company of infantry in BMP-2s, an ATGM battery (with BRDM-3/AT-5s), an engineer platoon, and the FO [see above] for the artillery battalion.)
Their Advanced Guard (the remainder of the battalions used to create the Advanced Party, i.e. T-80 battalion, BMP Infantry battalion, other assorted assets) enters the board behind the east hill.
The Russians show what real artillery (and good rolling) can do. They kill a German infantry platoon in a building of the edge of town! But before they died, they fired their Milans at the advancing tanks, and missed with both shots. (Really bad rolling.)
The Germans continue to move thru the wood. The second battalion (the Mixed one) gets almost to the woods. The Recon HQ starts moving again and finds a BMP-R, which he flamed. Funny thing, the BMP-R did not fire or do anything either.
In the town the Russians are stuck. The engineer was the command unit, so the other two units can't move. The Germans kill one of them and find the third one the hard way. The dice also seem to desert the Russian infantry, who miss most of their shots.
The Germans decided to move one of their M981 (a FO) up close to the Russians, who spot it. Then one of the T-80s in the Advanced Party kills him with an ATGM.
And in another display of real artillery, the Russians knock the daylights out of another infantry unit, but didn't kill it.
NATO, not to be out done, fires it's artillery trying to counter battery the guy who fired the turn before (but he'd moved). They also fired at some of the infantry in the Advanced Party, but missed.
The score this week:
Germans:
Russians:
Here are the 1030 pictures: (Note that some units are in their 1045 positions.)
Some pictures after part of the 1045 turn was completed:
The Mixed Battalion following them moves up behind the Panzers. They left one company behind to guard the road by the edge of the woods.
The Luchs comes around the edge of the hill only to be shot up by the ZSU-23/4 sitting there. He sees the BMPs on the road, the AT guns west of the road and the AA assets sitting around (although he did not see the ZSU until it fired on him the second time). He did not see the tanks sitting facing towards the east woods.
The grenadiers finish off the last Russian stand in the town.
The remaining Jaguar pulls back from the edge of the woods.
A German recon stand runs out of the town and into some rubble east of town. For his troubles the Russians drop artillery on him and kill him.
The 39th Independent Tank Battalion enters the board north of the east woods. It only moves on a short distance then stops and looks around.
The Panzer Battalion in the east woods, along with one of the companies from the Mixed Battalion moves out of the woods. (Altogether 13 platoons.) They find 8 T-80Us waiting for them. The T-80s fire first, and because of some horrid rolling (three 10s out of eight rolls) only kill 5 Leopard 2s. With the return fire the Germans discover that they only have about a 50% chance to penetrate the T-80s (which does just 1 hit, instead of brewing them up). The Germans manage to do a couple hits. During the next fire phases the Germans manage to do some more hits (and actually disable one tank) and lose 6 more Leopard 2s.
Final tally? Eleven dead Leopard 2s (including the entire Panzer battalion) and 1 disabled (can be recovered and repaired after the game) T-80.
And the last Leopard 1 from the Recon Battalion (the battalion HQ) moved to the edge of the woods so he could see the Russians on the west slope of the hill. They see him and exchanged fire. The Leopard killed one BMP and they killed him.
The grenadiers move about in town, and lay smoke in front of the T-80s on top of the hill.
The Recon infantry company mounts up and move towards the east edge of town.
The Germans Panzer Battalion in the south woods, near the bottom of the hill the Russians have been sitting on, decide to come out. They move up the hill, getting into a position where they can get flank shots on the T-80s there. The two unsmoked T-80s fire and kill two Leopards. A BMP also fires, but can't penetrate the front armor of the Leopard. The Leopards fire back and kill the two T-80s.
Then the smoke covering the other two T-80s on the hill goes away and the T-80s on top of the hill kill two more Leopards, but die for their trouble. (More flank shots.) Then a Mi-24 shows up and blows up two more Leopards with ATGMs. The Mi-24 then tries to make a strafing run, but is aborted by AA fire from the remaining Leopards.
During the moral phase the Leopards (operating as one battalion) blow their moral and abandoned their tanks.
The Recon infantry company does a full moves out of the town, up the road towards the east woods. As they crests the ridge right before the woods they spot the Russians patrol stands there and stops moving. The infantry German dismounts. The other thing they see is the battalion of T-80 moving across the open area north of the east woods (they moved last turn also), towards the ridge the germans are now sitting on. The Russian patrol stands do not get to fire until the close fire phase, so the German infantry gets to fire first, but only does one hit. The T-80s on try to do something with their machine guns, but can't hit anything. But they use reflects to take out the armored "mini-vans".
During the close fire phase the Russian patrol stands get the M577 behind the ridge (that the T-80s can't see) and do a hit on the German infantry. In return the Germans do three hits, forcing both stands back into the woods. In the moral phase the company fails moral, is demoralized and falls back down the road where they pin.
The Russians counter-battery the German mortars and do one hit.
The British move up into the town, but its to late to be much help.
The main body of the Russian force entered the southeast road this turn.
At this point the German divisional commander orders the NATO forces to get out as best they can. (I.e. We stopped here.)
Here are the 1115 pictures:
Russian loses:
German loses:
Copyright © 1997 Dallace Unger, Jr.
Last Updated: July 31, 1997
