AAR: Fortress Keflavik - GIUK 6.0 - RED

[mack2]

[font="Verdana"]AAR - GIUK 6.0 - Fortress Keflavik - RED[/font]

This was one of my favourite scenarios years ago when all I had was the demo of the various older versions of Harpoon. Having played it earlier as blue for a total defeat of the Soviet forces, I now play it as the Soviets.

Orders - Invade Keflavik.

Soviet Forces
3 Bomber Regiments based in continental Russia, and a squadron of fighters based out of Bodo, Norway.

The Invasion SAG comprised of:
CV Kiev with a flight wing of approximately 20 assorted Helos and 12 Forger VTOL.
CG Slava
DDG Sovremenny x2
FFG Krivak II
CL Sverdlov
DDG Udaloy x2
And another 10 or so merchant and amphibious ships.

Some scattered submarine forces comprised mainly of 2nd rate Charlie, Echo, Foxtrot and Victor submarines.

Nato Forces
F-15 Eagles, a large contingent of ASW patrol planes, attack planes such as Phantoms and Buccaneers, an Iowa Battleship Task Force, and presumably some submarine assets. Keflavik was also reinforced with of E-3 Sentry AEW craft, and there was some forces at Storonoway in the UK.

The Battle Begins
First orders were to relocate my 27 Backfires, and 16 Bear-G to Bodo, and launch a strike with the Badger G against Stornoway.

I also started on rearming a handful of Forgers set to Guided, and setup my formation.

I'd set up a small amount of Forgers in the SAG formation to try and shoot the expected Harpoon assault, and shortly after doing so, not less than 10 real-time minutes into the scenario, one of them visually spotted a wave of Tomahawk Missiles, launched either via Submarine or very early on in the battle by the the Battleship Battle Group.

A flight of Helos were dispatched to the location of the sighting, the radar of the group was lit and the group succeeded, along with the hastily launched Forgers, in launching a hail of Goblet, Gecko, Gadfly, Aphid and Grumble at the incoming missiles.

I thought thankful that the only missile that got through the Slava's point defences missed, but time seemed to hang as 8 more made a beeline straight for the Kiev.

Having apparently come inside the minimum range for the Goblet and perhaps having expended it's Gecko magazine, I hoped beyond hope that it's guns could do the job.

2 waves of missiles struck the Minsk, with 6 of the powerful Tomahawks ripping it in two, and gutting the SAG of it's fighter cover, however light, as all the Forgers scattered to all parts what they hoped was survival, some choosing to head for Jan Mayen, or Greenland, or ejecting near one of the ships of the surviving group.

The radars detected another wave of incoming Nato planes. Despite the shock of the loss of the Flagship, Slava shot down the low flying Phantom's before they could launch their deadly payload of Laser Guided Bombs, but could do nothing as a group of Orions launched a Harpoon strike from long range.

The Harpoons annihilated the Udaloy Admiral Tributs, it firing to the last, knocking down over 75% of the incoming missiles but to no avail.

One of the Victor III submarines had detected the Nato SAg and had moved inside the out ring, hoping to get a shot at the centre of the formation and get some payback for it's fallen comrades, even if it didn't know that it was doing so.

The Badger's had also launched their own variety of death and destruction, with 24 Kingfish Missiles completely destroying all the parked planes and putting Stornoway out of commission for weeks. It was a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.

16 More Harpoons incoming. More Gadfly leapt from the Sovremenny, emptying the magazine to try and defeat the threat. One harpoon hit the ship, causing heavy but manageable damage to the ship, including some flooding and a quickly put out fire, as well as destroying one of the AK630 mounts.
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The Backfire and Bear squadrons were ready to fly, and was sent via a circuitous route to, sent north of the Soviet SAG, the Bear would break off and attack the Nata Battle Group, and the Backfires would continue over Greenland and attack Keflavik directly.

The Victor realised it would not be able to intercept the Battle Group centre without making high speed and high noise, it fired at the CG Leahy with 1 Type 65 and 1 80A Torpedo, hoping the ships would detect the Submarine, and the group would turn toward away from the Torpedos towards the Victor.

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Unfortunately for the crew, the Leahy did not detect the torpedos at all until far too late, only having enough time to brace for impact before it was hit in the bow, and sank. Shortly after the Victor was hit and sunk by Stand-Off ASW from the CGN Virginia.

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Losses at this point were:
Blue - 1 Ship, 22 Aircraft, 1 Base.
Red - 1 Carrier, 1 Ship, 1 Sub, 18 Aircraft, 16 Helo.

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The Bear moved towards the Nato Group, along with an escort of Flankers in Long Range setup, who engaged and destroyed a flight of F-15 who threatened the Bear. A Hormone Search Helo also headed to the Battle Group, and located the group for the other assets to shoot at. They paid with their lives as a Sparrow missile from an Eagle took them down with no chance of rescue.

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The Slava launched a strike of 12 Sandbox at the Spruance, exposed at the edge of the formation. The long range missiles of the centre failed to reach in time, and it was hit by 5 missiles leaving barely a trace of the ship or it's crew. The Bear's also fired into the formation, hoping to hit the main AAW assets that survived, those being the CGN Virginia and CG Belknap and it's long range SAM.

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The Kitchen Missiles streaked into the formation, and despite heavy SAM fire, hit the CG Belknap class and sunk it, but unfortunately the only missile that made it to the CGN Virginia was shot down by it's point defence. It was still a major loss for the SAG.

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4 Eagles who strayed too close, or possibly decided to risk moving towards the SAG in an attempt to shoot down the Bear, were shot down by Gadfly from one of the Sovremenny class ship.

A lull in the fighting against both Surface groups occurred as the air forces arrayed against them withdrew and rearmed, reloaded and regrouped. The Nato group pursued the Soviet Group, who moved northwards and away, hoping to buy time for the bombers to kill Keflavik and then return to attack the Nato Battle Group.

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The 2 bomber formations were in range, and both launched their Kingfish Missiles at Keflavik. 81 from the Backfires, and 36 from the Badgers.

6 Fighters, 24 Attack, 18 ASW and 2 AEW were reloading or rearming, and a desperate scramble resulted. Every Patriot missile in the base was launched, in a vain attempt at reducing the overwhelming number of incoming missiles.

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The inevitable result, the huge warheads destroying everything they hit, causing a massive loss of life and equipment, if the Soviets did manage to take Keflavik, they would have to rebuild it from scratch. The orders did require reducing the defences, and with the threat from the base making the invasion extremely difficult, it was the only sensible option.

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With one half of the mission complete, that being the destruction of the Nato Forces on Keflavik, it left the destruction of the Nato battle group, the thorn preventing what was left of the Amphibious group from completing their mission.

The aloft E-3 Sentry flew towards Thule Air Base in Greenland, whilst the Soviet SAG moved to avoid a possible short range missile duel, or even worse, coming up against the Iowa in a gun battle, even with a Sverdlov class Cruiser, the Iowa could break the entire formation without raising a sweat.

The Bombers all moved back to refuel and rearm after some very long missions*. A handful of Harpoons were launched at the SAG but shot down. I was expecting more to come though.

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I launched a succession of the bomber squadrons, in a race against time, which I believed I would win, to locate and attack the very danger close Nato Battle Group.

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The only Nato ship that had been fixed was an OH Perry Class, at which was launched a half-dozen Sunburn missiles from the Sovrenemmy class ships. With the Nato Group depleted by both ship loss and attrited by previous missile attacks, only 1 missile was shot down, the rest sinking the fragile Frigate.

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8 more Harpoons attacked the group, and after a quick course change to allow more of the SAG's remaining SAM's to fire, they were shot down by a mix of Gecko and Gadfly from the Sverdlov, Slava and 1 of the Sovrenmenny, the last Harpoon being shot down only 2nm from the Sverdlov.

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The Tu-95 Bear were first on scene, and loosed off a series of missile attacks at the Nato Battle Group. First to sink was the Knox Class, then the Coontz, Virginia was lucky with 4 of the Kitchen being shot down or missing, but the Wichita was not so lucky, being hit by one of the misses and sunk.

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The Iowa was hit in the stern by a single missile. At this point the remaining ships attempted to flee, but it was too late.

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The Virginia was leading an apparently charmed lif, (as charmed as you can be when the entire SAG has been sunk around you, as the next wave of 4 missile all missed entirely. Iowa was hit twice more, but was still not sinking, nor had the crew abandoned the ship. Surrender was offered but not taken.

A final, decisive attack of 28 Kingfish followed, Virgina putting up resistance to the end with the destruction of a handful of the incoming missiles. Virginia was hit 4 times, Iowa by 10, finally ending the threat of the Nato Surface Group.

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The Ivan Golubets, who had completed it's refuelling, and the damaged Sovrenmenny as an escort were detached back to Bodo with the rest of the group proceeding to Keflavik.

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The SAG proceeded to Keflavik, landing some troops on the opposite side of the Island, and some of the Submarine assets made their patrol sectors, joined the group or stood outside Keflavik landing commandos in preparation for the landing. Nuclear Release was granted, but at this late stage using it for anything seemed unlikely.

After some days sailing, the group anchored outside Keflavik, and launched the Invasion of Iceland. The Soviet Navy had won a great and decisive Victory, but not without cost.

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Total Losses:

Nato:
9 Ships: Iowa, Virgina, Leahy, Belknap, Leahy, Spruance, Knox, Coontz, Wichita.
81 Aircraft.
7 Helos.
2 Bases destroyed, Keflavik Invaded.

Soviet:
1 Carrier: Minsk.
1 Ship: Udaloy.
1 Ship Damaged: Sovrenmenny.
1 Submarine: Victor 3.
22 Aircraft.
20 Helo.

After-Game Notes:
The loss of the Kiev followed by the Udaloy was one of the worst hammering's I'd had that early on in a game. When I lost the Udaloy, I was seriously thinking I was looking down the barrel of a defeat.

I wasn't attacked as hard after that, despite taking some more damage/losses. If that Tomahawk that missed the Slava had hit it instead, I probably would have lost the amphibious group, as it was the key to defeating another 3 or 4 missile attacks. Even losing the Sovrenemenny instead of it only taking 50% damage could have swung the battle.

I had to reload an autosave after I had a fast time compression on and also Afterburn on the Backfires. I was doing a screenshot, alt-tabbed and had forgotten to either turn off the time compression or take off AB, crashing the Backfires from lack of fuel.

Luckily I had an autosave from just enough that nothing changed in the scenario, but the Backfires made it to base on 0% fuel somehow. It didn't really matter either way, but it would have slightly skewed the scenario status.

I believe this scenario has a big balance issue when the player is Soviet. The 3 bomber squadrons can easily take out all 3 of the major units (the Nato Surface Group, and the 2 bases), the 27 Backfires could probably do it on their on within the time of the scenario. Without even going the long way, they could probably just punch through on AB straight at Keflavik and get out.

This scenario would probably be more difficult b only having the Bears or the Badgers. Might be an idea to try it out in the future, by running the Backfires off the map on AB. Or just not using them.

All in all, this is a reasonbly challenging scenario, the blue forces do take some work to defeat, and requires handing of most aspects in this game.

[hermanhum]

Great AAR, Mack.  Thanks for sharing it.

[TonyE]

Thank you mack2, great AAR. I'm not sure how anyone can stand the light gray land color - to each his own I guess [:)]

I'm impressed by all of the close in action where ships are within Harpoon range. Somehow I tend towards air heavy scenarios and miss out on most of the ship vs ship missile action (except the long range Soviet SSMs) so it was good to read about your exploits.

[mack2]

Fixed up the images. Had pretty all of them after about #5 from the wrong location. They should all work now.

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: TonyE
I'm impressed by all of the close in action where ships are within Harpoon range.

I enjoyed this AAR for the same reason. Fun to see some 'knife fighting' action. [:D]

[VictorInThePacific]

I would like to draw people's attention to some serious weaknesses in the Soviet arsenal, all of which are present in this scenario.

This is not a commentary on Mack's strategy, which I consider to be the best possible one for the Soviets in this scenario.

1) Lack of detection. The Soviets simply do not have any good search unit. With AWACS, NATO generally knows where everything is at all times, while the Soviets are generally flying blind.

2) Lack of air superiority. The Soviets may be able to control the airspace within several hundred miles of their bases, or over continental Europe, or within 50 nm of a Grumble launcher, but NATO generally controls the airspace everywhere else.

3) Poorly integrated air defense missile systems. Their missile systems have an attitude problem. The Grumble is the only missile that can engage targets at all altitudes. If you can run the Soviets out of Grumbles, you may be able to attack specific units at specific altitudes where they are defenseless while all the other units stand by helplessly due to range issues. In other words, the 3-dimensional airspace near a Soviet fleet will be full of holes. This is based on published data (Harpoon BattleBook), which I hope is correct.

How could these weaknesses be exploited in this scenario?

The following plan has been significantly revised to incorporate feedback received. See later post.

First, use aspects 1 & 2 to figure out exactly what the Soviet fleet consists of (Mack provides a list), and to park the NATO attacking air assets anywhere you like outside of Grumble range.

The NATO attacking air assets will be:

12 x Orion (4 Harpoon each)
12 x Corsair (4 Walleye each)
NOT the Phantoms (used as interceptors)
6 x Buccaneer (Sea Eagle) flying from Stornoway, if you desire
6 x Nimrod flying from Stornoway, if you desire

but even one strike with the Orions and Corsairs should shatter the entire Soviet fleet.

Start by launching 24 Harpoons into the fleet. Do this fairly slowly, because you are trying to kill Grumbles, not ships, in this phase. This will soak up on average 48 Grumbles, and that's almost all the Grumbles in the fleet. You may need to launch a few more Harpoons to get the rest of the Grumbles.

The remaining area defense on the Kiev (Goblet) cannot engage Harpoons. Most of the Soviet ships can still defend themselves against Harpoons with Geckos, but the Gecko has a pretty short range. However, the Gadfly cannot engage VL targets, so a Sovremenny is helpless against a Harpoon attack. Launch 6 Harpoons at each of these and watch them sink.

This leaves about 6 Harpoons.

At this point, the remaining Soviet point defense is pure Gecko, which cannot engage targets at high altitude. If we had a bunch of Harpoons left, we could saturate the Kiev with these, but that would require a second Orion strike.

Next launch about 24 Walleyes into the fleet. Walleyes fly at high altitude, so the Geckos are useless. Do this fairly slowly, because you are trying to kill Goblets, not ships, in this phase. This will soak up on average 48 Goblets, and I think that may be all (needs to be checked).

Finally, close with the Corsairs at high altitude and wallop the Soviet ships with Walleye: 6 each on the Slava, Kiev, and Udaloys. They are helpless. Watch them sink. If you object that the goal of the scenario is to kill the transports, you can shoot at them instead of the warships in this phase. They are just as helpless.

Bear in mind, this is only one small airstrike, using 12 ASW planes and 12 bombers. NATO has lots of other assets in play, and may be able to bring them in multiple times.

The point about this approach is that it relies on 3-dimensional weaknesses of the Soviet air defense, and you don't have to saturate all the missile systems to score hits, only the area defense.

The conditions I describe in this post require certain preconditions, which can be achieved in various ways. That will be the subject of another post.

[hermanhum]

Interesting and well reasoned attack approach.  Have you tried it?

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: VictorInThePacific
Walleyes fly at high altitude, so the Geckos are useless ... and wallop the Soviet ships with Walleye: 6 each on the Slava, Kiev, and Udaloys. They are helpless. Watch them sink.

Firstly, while the Walleye in the old GIUK database may fly at High altitude, the Walleye in the new database does not. And, secondly, while the SA-N-4 Gecko may not be able to engage targets at High altitude, what goes up must always come down. Each of the ships you mention have point defenses that are still quite capable of knocking down a Walleye.

The point about this approach is that it relies on 3-dimensional weaknesses of the Soviet air defense, and you don't have to saturate all the missile systems to score hits, only the area defense.

I think that rather than suggesting much of anything about Soviet naval air defense, it more probably suggests that if you "saturate" a naval target (i.e. ship) with enough weapons (and particularly when you have an infinite source of them, while the poor ship does not), the ship always loses.

[mack2]

I just tried it in the same scenario.

24 Harpoons fired off in roughly 2-3 groups will take out all the Grumble. I will say however, in this scenario the Soviet fleet won't radiate and fire with their missiles until someone actually shoots at them.

I fired 12 Harpoons 6 at each Sovrenmenny. They all get take out by either the Udaloys SA-N-9 or the Slava's Gecko.

I shot the rest of the Harpoons at the Kiev. Same thing.

The Walleyes can get taken out by Goblet, the other issue is staying in range without getting shot down, if they get targetted by a missile system instead of a walleye, half the group goes down if you are lucky. I did hit the Slava twice and sink it, the Kiev 2 but only did 23% damage.

It's almost a moot point though, because the Soviet fleet won't shoot until a missile hits them, so you can detach into groups of 4 planes shooting walleye, get to 10nm and shoot 16 or whatever it is at the Udaloy, the Slava and Kiev and take out their main ships in one go, before they even shoot back.

[VictorInThePacific]

Firstly, while the Walleye in the old GIUK database may fly at High altitude, the Walleye in the new database does not.

Thanks for correcting me; looks like I was using bad data again.

And, secondly, while the SA-N-4 Gecko may not be able to engage targets at High altitude, what goes up must always come down. Each of the ships you mention have point defenses that are still quite capable of knocking down a Walleye.

This will depend on the exact flight path of the missile. Assuming a high launch point and a ballistic trajectory, where exactly does the missile dive down onto the target? If the missile stays at high altitude until very close to the target, you may just have dramatically reduced the effective range of the defensive system, which means that it shoots less often, and less attacking missiles are required.

I will be continuing and generalizing this topic in tiemanj's "attacking surface groups" thread in the general section.

[VictorInThePacific]

I fired 12 Harpoons 6 at each Sovrenmenny. They all get take out by either the Udaloys SA-N-9

Yes, this is my mistake; my book lists the Udaloy as having a Gecko launcher, when it actually has the SA-N-9, which has a greater range.

or the Slava's Gecko.

This will depend on the Soviet formation i.e. placement and separation. I was assuming that the Sovremmenys were on the edge of the formation, and that the Harpoons come in from the outside.

I generally use very small ship separations (5 nm, everything in the main body) to ensure that every ship is covered by "point defense" from multiple ships.

The Walleyes can get taken out by Goblet,

The Goblets first need to be used up as the Grumbles were, but, as Brad points out, the Walleyes no longer come in at high altitude, so the method probably won't work, and in any case, will need more careful analysis.

the other issue is staying in range without getting shot down, if they get targetted by a missile system instead of a walleye, half the group goes down if you are lucky. I did hit the Slava twice and sink it, the Kiev 2 but only did 23% damage.

Once the Grumbles and Goblets are used up, and the Sovremmenys sunk, the Walleyes outrange the Gecko missile system, as well as the SA-N-9. Both have an altitude restriction as well.

Now if we had a weapon that comes in at high altitude, we would waste each of the remaining targets with just a few missiles.

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: mack2
It's almost a moot point though, because the Soviet fleet won't shoot until a missile hits them, so you can detach into groups of 4 planes shooting walleye, get to 10nm and shoot 16 or whatever it is at the Udaloy, the Slava and Kiev and take out their main ships in one go, before they even shoot back.

Only true if you haven't illuminated the Soviet group with your radar, or if they do not detect the incoming missiles. (They're very well disciplined re EMCON.[:D]) In which case, they most certainly will shoot back.

[VictorInThePacific]

One more comment about my post: this is not just a general musing. There is a very real practical consideration, as it applies to this scenario.

Mack has shown the best Soviet approach to wiping out the NATO airbases. But suppose the NATO airplanes didn't just sit on the ground and die. What if they launched a final strike at the Soviet SAG? They are flying a final suicide mission, and they need to sink the Soviet transports. They have exactly one try; they can neither survive nor rearm. What NATO has available is exactly what I have listed above, plus enough fighters to keep any Soviet fighters away (Forgers aren't fighters, merely targets. Bring in the Sidewinder-armed Nimrods to shoot them down and laugh hysterically as you do so. And broadcast "Born to be Wild".) Most of the NATO air assets mentioned have a lot of fuel, especially on a suicide mission. So enough time will be available to execute a phased attack as I have indicated.

Now, despite the fact that the Walleye no longer comes in high, I think that this strike group still has enough punch to crush the transports of the invasion force.

[VictorInThePacific]

Based on feedback received to my earlier posts, my 3-D hole exploitation plan for airstrikes has been significantly revised and upgraded. The current plan is presented here. Feedback is welcome.

Disclaimer: I am working with Harpoon Classic and the Harpoon BattleBook, and my statements are correct for that published data. However, the current version of Harpoon is using different data. As I understand it, the essential difference in this situation is that Walleye and HARM no longer fly at high altitude. Due to this, the airstrike as described below isn't instant death to the entire Soviet fleet. However, it still is pretty nasty.

First, use aspects 1 & 2 to figure out exactly what the Soviet fleet consists of (Mack provides a list), and to park the NATO attacking air assets anywhere you like outside of Grumble range.

This is only a first approximation. For instance, I parked an AWACS 100 nm away from the Soviet fleet for an hour, game time. Both the plane and the fleet had all radars active. Yet all I got for that was ship sizes, location, etc., but not ship class. I only got ship class much later. Nevertheless, we can learn a lot by inference.

If it looks like a carrier and acts like a carrier, it's a Kiev. If it's medium size, it's a small DD, FF, or smaller. If it launches Grumbles, it's a Slava or Kirov, which are distinguishable by fire rate. You can also learn what the ship looks like in the launch animation, and that should be considered legitimate information. The Soviets also have rather typical fleet organiztions, and ship position will also give you some information.

If you want to be sleazy, you can determine ship class by sonar circle size, but you don't have to use such information.

It isn't actually necessary to assemble all the attacking air assets at the same time. They can arrive at different times. The following plan has a series of phases, which happen sequentially, and air assets don't actually have to be present during any phase in which they are not used.

The NATO attacking air assets will be:

12 x Orion (4 Harpoon each)
12 x Corsair (4 HARM , 2 Sidewinder each)
NOT the Phantoms (used as interceptors)
6 x Buccaneer (4 Sea Eagle each), flying from Stornoway
6 x Nimrod (4 Sidewinder each), flying from Stornoway
enough fighter/interceptors to keep the real Soviet fighters away

Notes:
1) These are all standard loadouts. I think that is is fair to assume that each airplane will be able to fly once with that set of weapons.
2) Some of the airplanes also carry other stuff, which we don't really care about here.
3) The Orion loadout is completely standard.
4) HARM is used on the Corsair instead of Walleye for several reasons. HARM flies farther and faster than Walleye. The main disadvantage is a smaller warhead, but it does target specific important systems. You may want to bring 36 HARM and 12 Walleye instead.
5) Make sure to stuff as many weapons as possible onto the Buccaneers. They are needed. The reduction in the operational range of the plane is not important here.
6) In general, I prefer using Sidewinders as the secondary armament on Nimrods.
7) The Corsairs should be able to shoot down 12 Forgers by themselves. The Nimrods could shoot down 12 more. This is a bit of a joke because, of course, the NATO fighters are quite capable of dealing with the Forgers.

Assumption:
The exact Soviet formation will be significant. The original setup has the formation very spread out (more than 10 miles between ships), and the AI won't change it. One reasonable and likely formation will put the Slava and Kiev in the main body and the 6 other warships in a hexagonal pattern about 5 nm out. Unfortunately, this will mean that each Gecko system will probably only be able to protect one warship. If the Soviets put their ships closer together, then in real terms, NATO will just wait for them to collide and sink each other. [:'(]

Phase 1)
Start by launching 24 Sea Eagles into the fleet. Do this fairly slowly, because you are trying to kill Grumbles, not ships, in this phase. This will soak up on average 48 Grumbles (first-order approximation), and that's almost all the Grumbles in the fleet. You may need to launch a few more missiles to get the rest of the Grumbles.

The second-order approximation to this calculation shows that the number of Grumbles actaully used is always at least 2 per attacking missile. The computer defense system will always launch exactly 2 Grumbles at each attacking missile, limited by the fire rate of the launcher. But 2 Grumble hits on one missile is a wasted Grumble, and 2 misses means that 2 more Grumbles will be launched. Therefore 8 Grumbles shoot down only 3 missiles, on average. 24 Sea Eagles should require 64 Grumbles.

I won't show the the third-order approximation calculation, where 8 Grumbles kill 3.5 missiles. With large numbers of attacking missiles, there will be very little scatter around this result, and you can see that the Slava, which carries at best 56 (non-nuke) Grumbles, is going to be out of Grumbles at the end of this phase. Count them to make sure. Occasionally 2 Grumbles will be left. In the rare situation that one attacking missile survives, the point defense will kill it.

Phase 2)
The remaining area defense (Goblet on the Kiev) cannot engage Harpoons (VL altitude). Most of the Soviet warships can still defend themselves against Harpoons with Geckos, but the Gecko has a pretty short range. However, the Gadfly cannot engage VL targets, so a Sovremenny is helpless against a Harpoon attack. In this phase, we are going to locate and sink those ships. So far, all we have located is the Slava, Kiev, and a (probable) FF.

Launch 6 x HARM at the Slava. You may need to drive the Corsairs to a different point on the periphery of the fleet. The Kiev will launch some Goblets. At this point you will realize that the Goblet system is far less capable than the Grumble system. Goblets have 60% of the Grumble range, half the speed, and can't engage VL targets, PLUS the launcher has a slow fire rate. Couple this with the fact that a High-speed Anti-Radar Missile flies more than 3 times as fast as a Harpoon or Sea Eagle, and you can see that the Soviets have a further problem. The 80 Goblets on the Kiev may not need to be completely absorbed before NATO starts scoring hits on the ships. You can expect to see only 4 Goblets in this first HARM attack, which should kill 2 HARM.

Probably one Sovremenny will decide to earn a Hero of the Soviet Union and will launch some Gadflys. Too bad for that ship. Drive some Orions around the fleet to where the other ships' Geckos won't get a shot. Launch 6 Harpoons at the Sovremenny and watch it sink.

Comments)
At this point NATO may deeply regret reprogramming the HARM (and Walleye) to fly at medium altitude. If these missiles still flew at high altitude, NATO could have brought 36 HARM and 12 Walleye to the party on their Corsairs. The 36 HARM would be used to eliminate the 80 (non-nuke) Goblets on the Kiev, by the same procedure used for the Grumbles in phase 1 above, after which the 12 Walleye could be used to safely sink 2 Gecko-armed ships, such as the Slava and Kiev, free of charge. However, NATO still has some other tricks up their sleeve.

In the phase 2 attack, you may have noticed that the Gadfly will have difficulty solving the pursuit problem if the HARM is not launched at the Sovremenny. If the Gadfly is not coming in head on, it will miss, after which it can never catch the HARM. The same applies to the Goblet, as well as the SA-N-9 on an Udaloy, but not to a Gecko, which is faster than a HARM. You may be able to use this fact to advantage.

You are unlikely to score any hits with just 6 HARM against a Gecko-armed ship. If you do, you should see that important systems get wiped out on the target ship. You may also see that the actual damage done is usually greater than the warhead size would indicate. Finally, even a few HARM (or anything) hits on a large ship may sink it due to critical damage.

Phase 2a)
Now we are going to reverse time and go back and do phase 2 over again, the way it should be done. We are going to exploit the above-mentioned weaknesses in the Soviet missile systems to try to sink the Kiev and Slava by main force.

Position the Corsairs appropriately so that as few of the other ships as possible can engage the missiles you are about to launch. Launch 24 HARM at the Kiev and 12 HARM at the Slava. I think that the Kiev can launch Goblets twice, which should wipe out 4 HARM. Both Sovremennys will try to get those medals, to no avail. The Kiev and Slava will defend themselves with Geckos, but I would expect at least 12 hits on the Kiev and 6 on the Slava. Both ships will be wrecked and (probably) slowly sinking.

Phase 3)
Sink both Sovremennys as in phase 2 above.

Score so far:
2 x Sovremenny, sunk
Kiev, wrecked, probably sinking
Slava, wrecked, probably sinking
Grumbles, used up
Goblets, launchers destroyed
Harpoons, 36 remaining
HARM (or Walleye), 12 remaining

You will also now know something about the remaining Soviet warships, even if only by negative inference. The big ships on the periphery that didn't shoot are probably Udaloys. The smaller ship on the periphery is probably a Krivak.

At this point, the remaining Soviet point defense is either Gecko, which cannot engage targets at high altitude, or SA-N-9, which cannot engage targets at VH altitude.

All NATO airplanes present can fly at VH altitude. Frankly, I don't see a Corsair (or Buccaneer) doing this, but what the heck. If you want, you can now fly the remaining planes in to within 5 nm of the ships (not too close, they still have guns !). Then you could drop Harpoons 20 km straight down. When they reach sea level, they make a right angle turn and cruise along the surface of the sea. The point is that the point defense gets only 6 nm to respond, instead of 8 nm. Dropping missiles from VH altitude is probably ridiculously unrealistic, but it's also not important to this attack plan.

Phase 4)
I think that the remaining NATO ordnance is sufficient to wipe out the remaining Soviet warships, or the transports, or some combination, but not both. If for whatever reason, no further airstrike will be possible, go for the transports.

The rest is left as an exercise for the reader.

You may want to amuse yourself by shooting down helicopters with Nimrods and such.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

Bear in mind, this is only one small-ish airstrike, using 12 ASW planes and 18 bombers. NATO has lots of other assets in play, and may be able to bring them in multiple times.

[mack2]

ORIGINAL: CV32

ORIGINAL: mack2
It's almost a moot point though, because the Soviet fleet won't shoot until a missile hits them, so you can detach into groups of 4 planes shooting walleye, get to 10nm and shoot 16 or whatever it is at the Udaloy, the Slava and Kiev and take out their main ships in one go, before they even shoot back.

Only true if you haven't illuminated the Soviet group with your radar, or if they do not detect the incoming missiles. (They're very well disciplined re EMCON.[:D]) In which case, they most certainly will shoot back.

I don't think that's the case.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot1.png
- I have an E-3 illuminating the entire group, and 12 corsairs within walleye range lighting them up with their surface search radar. Still nothing.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot2.png
- Having shot the walleyes, still nothing from the soviets. That attack took out 7 ships, Ivan Rogov, Kiev, Merchant, Alligator, Alligator, Boris Chilkin, Slava

The corsairs eventually get shot down moving past an Udaloy. Total Victory for Nato in about 2 in-game hours. I've done the scenario again and managed to get the Guided Phantoms with their 3nm LGB's and still sink half the group before being taken out, and only lost them before because I went to high altitude.

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: mack2
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot1.png
- I have an E-3 illuminating the entire group, and 12 corsairs within walleye range lighting them up with their surface search radar. Still nothing.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot2.png
- Having shot the walleyes, still nothing from the soviets. That attack took out 7 ships, Ivan Rogov, Kiev, Merchant, Alligator, Alligator, Boris Chilkin, Slava

Hard to tell, but it looks like the Soviet groups' radars are not radiating?

I built a test scenario based on your first example, lit up a Soviet group with an E-3 radar and then attacked with A-7E Corsairs. I couldn't get them close enough to launch Walleye without being fired upon.

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: VictorInThePacific
If it launches Grumbles, it's a Slava or Kirov ...

What about the Azov?

You can also learn what the ship looks like in the launch animation, and that should be considered legitimate information.

I'd have to respectfully disagree with that. The animations are pretty much entertainment.

If you want to be sleazy, you can determine ship class by sonar circle size, but you don't have to use such information.

Makes more sense to try and determine identity by the strength of its active sonar, than relying on the launch animations. Though, I've never used the sonar method.

[VictorInThePacific]

quote:

ORIGINAL: VictorInThePacific
If it launches Grumbles, it's a Slava or Kirov ...

What about the Azov?

OK. Use the launch rate to ID the ship. But the ship we are talking about IS a Slava. We need to ID it positively to know what it can shoot at us with.

quote:

You can also learn what the ship looks like in the launch animation, and that should be considered legitimate information.

I'd have to respectfully disagree with that. The animations are pretty much entertainment.

noted

quote:

If you want to be sleazy, you can determine ship class by sonar circle size, but you don't have to use such information.

Makes more sense to try and determine identity by the strength of its active sonar, than relying on the launch animations. Though, I've never used the sonar method.

What I meant is that you can set the game to display sonar range circles and ID the enemy ship accordingly (large circle for the Udaloy). Of course, you have nothing there to actually measure enemy sonar range, and even if you did, there is nothing TO measure, because these are passive sonar ranges, which is why I call it a sleazy tactic.

[VictorInThePacific]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot1.png
- I have an E-3 illuminating the entire group, and 12 corsairs within walleye range lighting them up with their surface search radar. Still nothing.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v369/ ... shoot2.png
- Having shot the walleyes, still nothing from the soviets. That attack took out 7 ships, Ivan Rogov, Kiev, Merchant, Alligator, Alligator, Boris Chilkin, Slava

The corsairs eventually get shot down moving past an Udaloy. Total Victory for Nato in about 2 in-game hours. I've done the scenario again and managed to get the Guided Phantoms with their 3nm LGB's and still sink half the group before being taken out, and only lost them before because I went to high altitude.

Cool pictures.

What is not clear from the 2-D scan is the altitude of your planes. Could that be a factor?

Oh. I get it.

Mack is exploiting another weakness in the 3-D airspace around the Soviet fleet. The Soviet formation is very spread out. The Corsairs come in VL, which is one thing these types of planes are intended for. Since the Grumbles are used up, only Geckos and SA-N-9 can engage targets at this altitude, but these systems only work out to 8 nm. So the Corsairs can fly right past the Sovremennys. And while it looks as if they are right in the middle of the Soviet formation, they aren't REALLY that close.

Watch out for tall waves, though! [:-] And stay away from those Geckos!

Mack's attack will kill more than mine, pimarily because he uses probably 12 units of ordnance against the Kiev, whereas I use 24. On the other hand, all my airplanes are guaranteed to survive.

Mack and I agree on the following important point:

If you can run the Soviets out of Grumbles, you may be able to attack specific units at specific altitudes where they are defenseless while all the other units stand by helplessly due to range issues. In other words, the 3-dimensional airspace near a Soviet fleet will be full of holes.

[CV32]

ORIGINAL: VictorInThePacific
What I meant is that you can set the game to display sonar range circles and ID the enemy ship accordingly (large circle for the Udaloy). Of course, you have nothing there to actually measure enemy sonar range, and even if you did, there is nothing TO measure, because these are passive sonar ranges, which is why I call it a sleazy tactic.

Yes, I think I understood what you meant. I'm just pointing that if you had an asset with a decent passive sonar nearby (which I understand you do not, here), they may be able to identify the enemy ships by their active sonar signatures. Which, in turn, would add realism and hopefully reduce the "sleaze" factor. [:D]

ORIGINAL: VictorInThePacific
If you can run the Soviets out of Grumbles, you may be able to attack specific units at specific altitudes where they are defenseless while all the other units stand by helplessly due to range issues. In other words, the 3-dimensional airspace near a Soviet fleet will be full of holes.

Maybe I'm missing the point of this whole exercise, VitP, and if I am, please enlighten me. Isn't your "thesis" true of any naval surface group (regardless of nationality) that lacks air support? In other words:

If you can run the Americans (or British) out of Standards (or Sea Darts), you may be able to attack specific units at specific altitudes where they are defenseless while all the other units stand by helplessly due to range issues. In other words, the 3-dimensional airspace near an American (or British) fleet will be full of holes.

(Notwithstanding, of course, and perhaps most importantly, that many of your arguments are based on facts that are no longer true in the modern version of this game - Harpoon: Commander's Edition (HCE) - upon which this forum is premised. Which, btw, I again strongly recommend that you buy, so that at the very least, we can all be on the same page when having these discussions). [;)]