“Command - Desert Storm” is a DLC for Command: Modern Operations, the premier game of air, naval & strategic warfare and the choice of serious hobbyists and defence professionals alike.
I'm planning Scenario 1
I make no navigation zone for seeing the flight path (Any other solutions please propose)
Also i mark the position on the map where i need tanker support
for example the C-5A Galaxy need at about 4800nm support from a KC-10A Extender from Ramstein.
The Galaxy will arrive at 09:00 Zulu time.
I was actually playing with map projections for this as well, and used the Wolfram tools to create a map. The Gnomonic projection makes great circle routes into straight lines at the cost of substantial distortion. Basically draw a straight line through the start and ending locations, and that's the path the aircraft will try to take.
What are the tasks and objectives for Scenario 1? The briefing in game provides no guidance as far as I can tell, on what the player is supposed to do in this scenario. I searched the doc directory but don't see any information on Desert Storm.
The tasks are revealed as special messages as the game clock (and your progress) moves.
The first one is to set up several refueling tracks with the KC-10s, get the majority of the fighters/attack/recon/cargo aircraft to Incirlik, and the F-15s at Langley to Dhahran.
As the special messages are not repeated, I recommend copying-pasting them to a text editor.
Thanks. Where are the aircraft located that are supposed to be moved? It would be really helpful if the briefing outlined what needs to be accomplished. Isn't that the purpose of a briefing?
I'm planning this scenario now, and I created a no-nav zone over Switzerland, Austria, and most of Eastern Europe.
Historically, the Coalition didn't get permission to overfly Switzerland and Austria until some time after Iraq invaded Kuwait. The Warsaw Pact was still a thing in August 1990 even though the Berlin Wall fell in November 1989. East Germany was still a separate state (though not for long), and the Soviet Union didn't disintegrate until 1992.
Bottom line: in 1990 aircraft on their way from CONUS to the Middle East would not have flown over eastern Germany, Poland, or Soviet territory.
This is my no-nav zone for the neutral countries (Switzerland and Austria) and eastern Europe. The zone extends to 80°N so I can assign aircraft in CONUS to Ferry missions without CMANO picking a shortest route that goes around the north side of the zone (over Soviet territory.)
Aircraft ferrying to Incirlik from CONUS will follow a great circle route across the Atlantic then pass over Chambery, France and Corfu, Greece en route to Turkey.
Aircraft based in West Germany and the UK will avoid Swiss airspace, then head east near Chambery to Corfu and on to Incirlik.
Interesting on the No-Nav zone for parts of Europe.... I'm having trouble getting all my Ferry missions to re-fuel without a lot of micro-management. I have another post outlining the refueling logic gaps I've observed so far. Happy to get input on solving multi-mission, multi-part refueling scenarios like this. Please read my other post on refueling for some context.
All this talk of not violating Eastern European airspace and no one mentions the fact that your orders specifically tell you to set up a tanker orbit over Romania. I kind of got the feeling that at the time, the Warsaw Pact had bigger problems than NATO aircraft violating their airspace.
My guess is that the scenario author(s) didn't think to model airspace restrictions that existed in 1990.
I can say for sure that, less than a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall, US / NATO military planners would not have even imagined the possibility of setting up tanker tracks over former Warsaw Pact countries.
As is mentioned in the campaign overview, this campaign and its individual scenarios is not meant to be historically accurate. Rather, it is a framework for the real world and many "what if" options.
“There is no limit to what a man can do so long as he does not care a straw who gets the credit for it.”
Charles Edward Montague, English novelist and essayist
~Disenchantment, ch. 15 (1922)
If you really want, I can go back into my notes, but I'm fairly positive that the planes from Langley left with tankers to support 4 F-15's each, and they covered the fueling from CONUS to Lejas where the first of 6 inflight refuelings happened. They then flew through the Med, not overflying any country's airspace, with the exception (I believe) of Egypt, and (of course) Saudi Arabia. I the tracks somewhere, and I know that SAC tankers were operating from Al Dhafra, Lajes, Moron, Zaragoza, Mildenhall, Anderson and Diego Garcia as soon as 6 Aug. Knowing that, it's pretty easy to make up your own tracks.
I do know that on 3 Aug all of the F-15Cs were reconfigured to add fuel tanks to maximize their range.
On 7 Aug, the 1st TFW is given orders to prepare, and 24 F-15Cs of the 71st TFS depart. They conduct 6-7 inflight refuelings and it takes 14-17 hours to transit to Dhahran AB.
On 8 Aug, the 27th TFS departs Langley at it takes them over 14 hours to get to Dhahran. Planes land there every ten minutes.
The tankers (KC-10) tankers stay with the F-15's the entire trip and are used for the TFS throughout. One of the 71st TFS does not make it to Dharhan and has to divert enroute.
I had a go at this scenario for the first time last night. After setting up all the ferry missions and the tanker orbits as directed in the orders I hit play and maximum time acceleration to see how everything turned out. It all seemed to be going pretty well - some F-16s made it from Hahn to to Incirlik via the tankers over Romania alright, but then disaster - the F-15s from Langley got to the mid-Atlantic and started dropping into the oggin for lack of fuel! Eyeballing it I reckon the tanker orbit northwest of Ireland is about 5 degrees to far north. If it had been in the vicinity of 55N 20W then the F-15s could have hooked up and carried on.
Can anyone else confirm this or did I do something wrong setting up the F-15 ferry mission? I told them to go from Langley to Dahran via the north Atlantic and Romania tanker orbits.
