Soviet Tank Rush - Brits

[MikeJ19]

CapnDarwin,

You are right, they were building bridges to get across the river! Not on this post, but on the next one.

[MikeJ19]

Here they are across the river

[MikeJ19]

The Soviets soon decided that they had lost too many units.

[MikeJ19]

AAR

What did I do right?

Artillery minefields – I laid them as the battle progressed and they helped slow down, and whittle down, the Soviet attackers.

My initial plan was okay. Deploying a squadron across the river helped take on the Soviets early. Having subsequent squadrons come into Resenbach to hold worked well, too.

I had recce watching the area where the Soviets forded the river, that meant that I saw them coming and was able to react fast enough.

What could I improve on

My artillery had only limited amounts of ICM, I should have held the one mission until a critical time or an very congested targeted showed itself.

I need to monitor ammunition levels better. A couple of times I had units resupplying at the wrong time.

I should have had my Bn HQ set to move randomly from the start. It kept getting hit with arty fire because I never moved it!

Air support – I used it right away and it got shot down. I would have been better off to wait until I had destroyed some of the Soviet air defence units and then launch attacks. I had the time and targets were available.

Final thoughts:

This scenario was fun. The Soviet plan was okay, they should have tried spreading out and going for the fording site earlier. My reinforcements all arrived in the nick of time. It was a good scenario to play after not playing for over a year.

[MikeJ19]

I thought about playing this as the Soviet player. Decided to try out the river crossing first, to get a better understanding of the situation without the Brits firing at my units.

I gave some units orders to cross the river and others to close with the river bank

[MikeJ19]

Here you can see that my units that I sent to move across the river, arrived on the edge, built a bridge and then crossed. This is great!

There is no version of this scenario to play as the WP against the computer, so I will look for a different option.

[StuccoFresco]

Very interesting.

Do you think 30 minutes is too few to build a bridge? Are specialized equipment and vehicles "implied" in the Build Bridge action regardless of unit composition?

[MikeJ19]

I'm not sure. I was not an engineer and they do not have engineers portrayed in the game. I assume that for the game purposes, an engineering element (bridging) was attached to the Soviet companies trying to get across the river. 30 minutes seems reasonable ...

[CapnDarwin]

Engineers are abstracted in the game and the time is based on bringing up the asset to the area, scouting a good crossing point and then dropping the bridge. Steve Overton, our scenario guru, was an engineer in the 80s so we do have a good idea of how the operations go.