NATO vs Warsaw Pact

[altipueri]

Given that in the British sector it was impossible to get hold of a gun on a Wednesday afternoon or a Saturday (everybody was out playing sports) and that the entire British Army is immobile if there is more than an inch of snow, I would say that a Wednesday attack in winter would have the whole thing done and dusted by the weekend.

[Grognard]

14th Armored Cavalry Regiment; Suivez moi! - Follow me!

Jawohl ! I Troop, 3rd Squadron - Bad Hersfeld. The colors were retired in January '72 and we became



where I drove the venerable and odd M 551 (152 mm gun/launcher!!!). Our life expectancy was about 20 minutes if the WP came [:(]

[sapper32]

ORIGINAL: altipueri

Given that in the British sector it was impossible to get hold of a gun on a Wednesday afternoon or a Saturday (everybody was out playing sports) and that the entire British Army is immobile if there is more than an inch of snow, I would say that a Wednesday attack in winter would have the whole thing done and dusted by the weekend.

As an ex British Rhine Army soldier i remember wednesdays and saturdays out on countless training exercises regardless of weather conditions or time of the year,Our general start to the year was troop training followed by squadron training followed by battlegroup and brigade concentrations one year i think i saw my barracks in munsterlager for one night for a shower in twelve weeks.

[Alpha77]

Great, so many cold war warriors here, I was almost one too -I guess when I was in the Luftwaffe the cold war was kind of over, it must have been 1992-1993 and also 95 or 96 for a reserve training at Burbach - FlaRakGrp 38 with I Hawk missiles. But I know that untill middle of 90ties Russians were still seen as the possible enemy and we accordingly trained to detect and shoot down Russian aircraft types.

Today its all about so called terrorists and further bullshit. But thats another topic.

So here are my ex-unit colours (both dont exist anymore btw. It is assumed air defense insnt important in these days it seems)





Here 2 cool cold war area videos:

A) Luftwaffe "promo" from 75

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlGQZ5s9ZRk

B) Belgian air defense guess late 80ties area:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJH7ch9YLuk

[;)]

[Alpha77]

But back to the Red Lightning....

General strategy for WP was as follows: Push hard forward, disregard some urban area, disregard some strong enemy units but push the weak sectors. In the forefront were all the Allies, which had to attack on "ignore losses", behind them were the Russians waiting to push over the now weakened Nato units. Works not everytime but is an easy and fast strategy for limited time players. If you ask for losses, better do not ask. They were terrible, of course mostly for the DDR, Polish and Czech.

a) The north brought some more serious fighting when Dutch mech stuff arrived. They were worn down over the time and finally Bremen was taken. Later some reeinforcements from the east arrived and the units that bagged Berlin also were mostly send north. As of turn 24 the Netherlands were overrun, A´dam taken. But the Dutch won´t surrender and fought on. They fought together with the Belgians at the bridge of Arnheim for example as the Northern WP group now was directed to drive south of course to cut off Nato in the Ruhrgebiet and Düsseldorf area.

b) Center: Northern units finally met up with the center group which pushed and took Dortmund before but then stopped at the Ruhr - urban fighting to difficult, French also arrived there. Instead they took the route north and south of the Ruhr. The north route was easy as more flat terrain. But they had to stop at the Rhine river, no bridges there. So joined their northern comraded in the battle for the Rhine bridges at Arnheim and Nijmwegen. The south route led through the Sauer - and Siegerland. Mostly hilly and wooden terrain. So a bit better to defend. But finally also arrived at the Rhine near Bonn/Cologne...Nato started a counter there btw. They send airmobile troops to the WP hinterland around Hannover and cut of our supply for while. Also Heimatschützen in Hannover and another place mobilized when Nato liberated that area for a while. So had to eliminater that pesky thread which took some time, they always will flee and you need to chase after them (the airmobile stuff I mean). You need a lot of units to completly kill them off - only complete pocketing of them will work to destroy ém all.

Center more south Nürnberg and Frankfurt finally taken. However there were now a lot of US stuff which was still fresh and strong, some of them Reforger units. Which leads we believe that it would be better to try and take these Reforger sites. They really cause a lot of trouble and stall our advance as Russian. Somehow also the Germans had a lot of Pz. and PzGrn there, so together with the US they could stop the WP. Not to forget the French. Even if this area doesnt seem as important as the northern one, Nato chose this place as their main effort. Probably wanted to save Frankfurt ? Did not work but either way WP was stopped. And most units totally exhausted. Due to low supplies and appalling losses. Luckily the USSR had more than enough fresh stuff. But some of them had to diverted to deal with the Nato counter in the Hannover area. They werent so fresh anymore when this threat was eliminated. They had to move around a lot and took some losses too. Seems Nato sensed that and they also attacked, the US and Germans mostly. They drove back the weak allied WP with ease and as it seems tried to link up with the - meanwhile contained - Nato force around Hannover. Worked for a while, but then all the Russians finally bottles the Germans+US up. Some evaporated but most only retreated back. They were able to push out some WP garrison at a beidge and got back to save terrain to fight another day. With all Nato counter attacks defeated I had to rest some of my units (or better most of them) as all the movement and fighting took a heavy toll. Shockingly in this sector also masses of British appeared (which should have been more in the north-center section normally....). The US+Brits and remaining Panzers could have easily pushed back the WP in this sector some hexes. But I am confident that my resting USSR would have stopped them also, not to forgot the Unified corps and the 5GTA arrived. Also send some left over DDR troops from the north to this sector.

c) The far south, there the Czechs took Munich and bagged up German Gren and Gebjägers with their backs to some river (Isar?). They had no bridging eqipment and could not escape, but also could not attack. So we left them sit there, guarded by a portion of the Czech army. Also the Czechs were stopped later after they crossed a river and had to wait until Russian help arrives.

Nato won all campaigns outside that central front btw: Island, the Atlantic etc. So they got supply bonuses and guess also some more replacements for that.

Will later post some pics, the one with the WP losses should be most interesting (or shocking). Tanks have not much survival chance in that scenario, too much AT-missiles. To that end I chosse to rate down all ATGMs in my modern eqp. file.

[Oberst_Klink]

Ja, the good old days when we still had the draft. Participated at a reservist training 2 years ago, after 15 years (!!!) absence... Generation iPod and lack of morale... kids really. Most of my so called superiors where kids, too and I sensed that Innere Fuehrung was dead as well



My old outfit during my time as W12-er, back in 92!

Klink, Oberst

[Alpha77]

ORIGINAL: Oberst_Klink

Ja, the good old days when we still had the draft. Participated at a reservist training 2 years ago, after 15 years (!!!) absence... Generation iPod and lack of morale... kids really. Most of my so called superiors where kids, too and I sensed that Innere Fuehrung was dead as well

Really 2 yrs ago ? Did you volunteered for this ? Cause I cannot image what sense it would have after 15 yrs.

I remember my 1 week reservist training in 95 or 96 as quite interesting in severall respects. We also did quite a lot of shooting which was not so common during normal draft duty (guess to save ammunition costs). But I had the impression they had loads of ammo up there (it was at Trpübplz Daaden near the Westerwald)...
The reason that we were supplied so good is what I think (imagine after some thinking about it) that they changed from the G3 to the G36 in these years. So there must have been G3 ammo on storage which was not so much needed anymore. Was quite a fireworks. 8 G3 plus 2 MG3. Very bad for any attacker without heavy weapons. Evil firepower. I was G3 rifleman everyone of us had 3 mags a 20 "zum rausrotzen" even shot full auto. During the 12 months, we never shot full auto with G3. Always only aimed single shots and I think only 10 or so per shooting.... They must have also severall belts of MG3. Took a look in the little hut where they stored ammo and it was full of crates [X(] Later we had a night shoot too. This was cool, in the background some heavier firing (I guess Marder, Luchs, Gepard maybe even Leo1). Better then sylvester [:D]

Also remember some Fallschirmjägers at the barracks near ours. They were still behaving military lol. We were Luftwaffe reservists and so more or less quite relaxed. Some of the Fallschirm guys yelled at me something like how my uniform would look like etc. I stared amazed at him....and more or less went my way to the casino. Then he said "Ah, you are from the Luftwaffe, then ok" and he grinned. I noted he was Hauptmann and the leader of the Fallschirmjägers. [:D]

We also got an introduction for Improved Hawk there, these would simulate a march to a new firing position. Our job was to protect their operations. Went all smooth as far I could tell. With the exception that I had shot my comrade in the foot almost (if we had live ammo). Accidents might happen in the haste of battle and no one noticed it. The guy only wondered why I would shoot when no "enemy" was in sight [:-] Also advised the Stuffz there on some Luftwaffe rules, as he seemed to come from some other ground buggers unit [:)]

Ah regarding weather: We trained in all weather. Up there at E´brück barracks its quite cold and windy in winter. So shovelling snow was an important duty too. And working on the companies hut near their barbecue place in hot summer. The tear from the huts roof melted and ruined uniform trousers. Not esay to wash out Ah well the sorrows for the common soldier...lol Later at tac eval we needed to guard the Radar - it was the "longest" stay in the field for us, which was ca. 24 hours long. They also had some actors as "demonstrators" there which tried to break into the inner safety zone. They succeded cause we werent allowed to use force...[:D]
And the "enemy force" leader (which was the major 2nd in command) stole a MG3 from some sleeping guy. Oberst wasnt so pleased and said they should do this whole thing again. But it never happened, guess in this case the woods up there were still filled with too many insects and stuff and a bit rainy/muddy. Leaders might have figured that no one in this century would attack the Radar anymore. And for sure there were no real demonstrations against the Luftwaffe, they were a major factor of the economy in this area. People were glad BW was there. And we had no tanks to run over their fields.....[:'(]

[Alpha77]

Well Nato does still fight, even if they only hold area around Stuttgart and Strasbourg. Brussels and whole of Belgium was taken..they surrendered 2 turns later.

Next 2 posts are the losses as of turn 14. That means these horrible losses (probably the highest I ever experienced in any game in this timeframe, which is of course also explained by my so called "strategy" to use the WP allies as cannonfodder)...

[Alpha77]

2nd

[Alpha77]

3rd (LOOK AT THESE TANK WRECKS ALL OVER GERMANY!)

[Alpha77]

This was pretty funny btw:

The bridge of Arnheim was destroyed and the Reds had to stop and wait for bridging stuff to arrive. However this white NATO bridge engineer unit appeared suddenly and repaired the bridge (for the enemy in this case) [:D][X(][&o]

[altipueri]

I was at Rheindahlen (HQ BAOR) when my parents were based there 1970-73.

As a teenager it just seemed one long drunken series of parties. I used the basement fall-out shelter (Protect and survive - here's a can of beans to live on)- as a huge play area with wargames played on the ping-pong table.