Showcase - Ford Class 1/6/26

[fitzpatv]

Situation

In this scenario, a civil war has broken-out in contemporary Angola, with the pro-Russian government facing the re-born FNLA and UNITA factions, as well as separatists in the Northern Cabinda enclave and the frontier region with Namibia in the South. Russia has been using Angola as a conduit for exports of oil and grain to Africa, thereby evading Western sanctions and, to defend its interests, has sent a force of ‘peacekeepers’, supported by a formidable SAG based around the nuclear battlecruiser Nakhimov.

During the ensuing turmoil, the US Embassy in the capital, Luanda, has come under siege and the small Marine garrison need assistance. Washington has stubbornly insisted that the facility will remain open. Meanwhile, British and French troops have secured Luanda Airport, to the SE of town and are using it to evacuate the numerous Western oil workers and other civilians working or otherwise in the country.

The US Government has diverted the new carrier Gerald R Ford from a scheduled visit to Brazil and has ordered her to carry-out a challenging range of tasks. Escorted by the destroyers Black and Sherman and designated CSG 12, she is to take-up position 350nm from Luanda, support the Western ground forces, track the Russian SAG (without flying within 50nm of it due to Moscow’s warnings), locate the Russian SSN Severodvinsk and cover the expeditionary ship Newport as she ferries extra Marines to the Embassy by Osprey.

Detached from CSG 12 are the DDGs Gravely and McFaul. The former is reasonably placed to come to the assistance of the Newport, while the latter could support the oiler John Lewis, which is en route to top-up Ford’s escorts’ fuel levels (all of the American surface ships, apart from the nuclear-powered carrier, are low on fuel to one extent or another). While Gravely starts 72nm from Newport, all of the other scattered elements are hundreds of miles apart.

The SSN Mississippi begins 354nm N of Ford and is somewhat handicapped by the aftermath of an accident which has damaged a torpedo tube and decoy dispenser.

The player can choose between three different core air group compositions for Ford, giving her between 10 and 20 F-35s and 24 to 32 F/A-18s. I opted for the medium choice of 14 Lightnings and 28 Hornets, of which 12 and 18 are actually available. This option also gets you six Growlers (though there are only weapons for five of them!), plus four Hawkeyes, Seahawks, a couple of utility Ospreys and seven Stingray UAVs, which can apparently serve as tankers or for recon.

At Ascension Island, there are three Poseidons, one of which is aloft with a recon-only loadout and some Triton and RQ-180 UAVs, which have excellent endurance and good surface search capabilities. There is also a Seahawk from Ford, which is undergoing repair.

Numerous transport planes are primed to do reinforcement or evacuation runs to and from Luanda from a range of bases from Djibouti and Nairobi to Port Bouet (Ivory Coast) to Ramstein in Germany and RAF Brize Norton in England. All of these are AI-controlled and will keep mindlessly coming and going, however bad the situation gets.

As for the Russians, their SAG consists of the Nakhimov, a Slava, a Sovremenny and a Gorshkov FFG. This is a daunting force, with the battlecruiser mounting 80 Strobile supersonic missiles with a range of 325nm and a double battery of Gargoyle SAMs. The other ships add another 40 long-ranged, ship-killing missiles, with the Gorshkov having 16 Zircons, which can hit targets 700nm away and can’t be engaged by anything you have apart fom RIM-174s. For good measure, the Severodvinsk has another 16 Strobiles and 16 Sizzlers.

At Luanda, they have installed two SA-10 Grumble regiments and an SA-22 Greyhound with (you are told) 48 launchers and some 500 missiles, with some special forces and local hirelings to protect them.

The Angolan Navy has no more than a few feeble patrol craft, but their Air Force has Flankers flown by Russian contractors, plus some Flogger and Super Tucano attack planes and a few elderly MPAs with no ASW abilities.

Assessment and Planning

This is basically a humanitarian mission, but there’s every chance of the Russians and Angolans turning nasty and, if they do, it’s going to be tough. The transport planes are hopelessly vulnerable (and you don’t control them). All I could think of to have a chance of protecting them was to somehow station F-35s with fighter loadouts over Luanda (trusting to their stealth to reduce the danger to themselves from Flankers and SAMs) or to put ships offshore to provide SAM cover.

Distance is a constraint. It would take 10 hours to get CSG 12 within 350nm of Luanda at Flank or 17.5 hours at Cruise. As the Russian SAG was, no doubt, heading there too, this would guarantee putting our task force within range of their arsenal of weapons and I wasn’t at all confident about the outcome. The carrier’s fighters would have to balance protecting the transports with helping to shoot down Strobiles. At first, it would take about an hour-and-a-half for our aircraft to reach Luanda and that would not leave much time on-station. There was a real risk of planes being absent or low on fuel as and when trouble started.

Should things deteriorate, with the Russians involved, we would need to take-out the SAMs at Luanda quickly to stop them shredding the transports, but this would reduce the number of SEAD planes available to penetrate the Nakhimov’s mighty air defence. The NATO troops at the airport had a mortar, but we couldn’t use this to bombard the Russian SAMs, because we didn’t control it.

Given the Zircon threat, I felt obliged to forbid our RIM-174s to fire at anything by default, so as not to waste them on other targets in the interim. Much would depend on spotting the Zircons coming in time. With radars having to be off, this put the onus on the duty Hawkeye and Ascension’s RQ-180 UAVs.

It seemed that, busted tube or not, Mississippi was our best bet for dealing with the SAG. The Russians had Helixes, but there was a fighting chance of the SSN getting close enough to use her 21nm-ranged Mk48 torpedoes (assuming that Ford hadn’t been sunk beforehand). Finding, then shadowing the Nakhimov group had to be her main priority.

Finding the Severodvinsk (location unknown) in such a large expanse of ocean was akin to looking for a needle in a haystack and we only had a couple of Poseidons, which couldn’t spend much time looking per sortie. The most likely place to search seemed to be the replenishment zone where Lewis was supposed to be meeting Ford.

As for Newport’s mission, it would take a considerable time for her to get within Osprey ferry range of the Embassy and such flights would be impractical if the Angolan and probably Russian defences had not been neutralised first. Even a Grail or AA gun could be fatal to the trimotor.

Events

1/6/26 02:00Z : I decided, for better or worse, to put all of the F-35s on fighter loadouts with a view to putting CAP over the carrier and/or Luanda. The Hornets were all given AGM-88Es on the basis that these could be used against a variety of targets and that we would need to deal with the Luanda SAMs or those on the SAG, if not both. None of these planes would be ready for 3-6 hours and none were on Quick Turnround, so I couldn’t waste sorties.

The recon-only Poseidon soon identified five Angolan patrol craft and a lot of fishing boats West of Luanda, as well as a couple of neutral freighters.

A Hawkeye was sent North to look for the Russian SAG and duly spotted a chopper some 520nm NNE of CSG 12.

A Stingray was launched to test its suitability as a tanker. At maximum altitude (39k’), it proved to have an endurance of 5 hours, 40 minutes, which was nowhere near good enough beyond extended CAP time over the carrier.

Another Stingray was trialled as a recon plane, being sent to investigate an unknown ship approaching from the NW at 22 knots. As I’d feared, being a pilotless craft with no radar, it was even more hopeless in this role. I left them alone after that. A Seahawk then identified the neutral freighter.

An Osprey arrived from Ascension with a briefing team.

03:00Z: The Seahawk at Ascension was now ready in Ferry mode, but couldn’t get anywhere near our ships, leaving me wondering why it had been included at all.

The Hawkeye confirmed the location of the Nakhimov group, 530nm away and heading SE at 20 knots, with an AEW and two ASW Helixes scouting ahead. They clearly intended to take-up station off Luanda. I decided to send CSG 12 to the SSW of the Angolan capital, which would hopefully get her within the required distance while staying out of Strobile range. Our UAVs thenceforth helped track the Russians from a safe distance.

As the Russians would need to find us to attack, it would be important to take down the Angolan MPAs (much in evidence) quickly should hostilities break out. This would be best done with fighters, to avoid using-up SAMs. There were also Russian satellites about and these might have to be downed by our limited store of RIM-161s, which were useless against anything else.

04:00Z: The briefing from the Osprey team gave us useful estimates of Angolan Air Force numbers and basing. Usefully, the Flankers were at Lubango, some way SE of Luanda and we could probably intercept them en route to the transports from our intended station.

It was clear from the briefing that none of the Angolan factions were our friends. We were told to aggressively punish any Angolan or Russian aggression. No-one in Washington seemed to realise just how powerful the Nakhimov group was…

Just in case I’d thought of employing Mississippi against the SAG, we were advised to use her ‘conservatively’, as her loss wasn’t to be contemplated.

A French Atlas transport had departed Luanda for Port Bouet, while a US Boeing was inbound. So far, there had been no hostile action. A German Airbus also got clear in one piece.

The Angolans were observing CSG 12 with an MPA, but we couldn’t really justify shooting it down. In any case, Russian satellites had likely detected us as well.

05:00Z: The Russian oiler Academician Pashin was located in advance of their SAG.

I noted that the default score of zero was a ‘Disaster’, which was a bit ridiculous, as the status quo suited us fine.
06:00Z: The Russian SAG turned S to close with us.

A Poseidon had tried searching the Oiler Zone for the Severodvinsk, but found nothing and had to RTB. No doubt the SSN’s missiles would find us in due course…

As for the John Lewis, she had no intention of going into the Oiler Zone and planned instead to meet with McFaul and follow-on after CSG 12.

Suddenly, an infantry unit of unknown allegiance took-out one of the guard towers at the Embassy. The Marines fired back autonomously and eliminated it. Losses and Expenditures told me that it had been from the FNLA, traditionally the most pro-Western of Angola’s factions. None of this scored or cost any VP. It would still be three hours or so before we had any strike aircraft available and I didn’t really want to squander AGM-88Es on rebel infantry.

07:00Z: More civilian flights landed safely at Luanda.

Perhaps because the satellites and MPAs had lost contact, the Russian SAG resumed its previous course toward Luanda. This spared Mississippi the awkward choice of whether to attack them or watch as they sailed by. She steered a parallel course at a safe distance.

08:00Z: The Embassy reported hostile crowds and urgently requested reinforcements. Newport was 722nm away and needed to be within 400. To make matters worse, the Osprey would need several round trips to deliver everything, as her carrying capacity was slight (the Cargo rules were in use). In any event, Newport and Gravely would have to go perilously close to the Russians to accomplish the mission.

At 8:15, reports were received of faction fighting across Angola, though not yet in Luanda itself.

At 8:30, the State Department requested that we use a chopper or Osprey to board and capture the Russian tanker Sadid, then take her to Abidjan in the Ivory Coast for inspection. To do so, the chopper had to approach within 500m of the ship. Success would earn VP, but would also seriously upset the Russians. On the one hand, we could see no shipping near the Sadid’s last reported position, on the other we had no suitable assets anywhere nearby. In any case, I felt it would be irresponsible to provoke the Russians in this way. I’d already decided not to implement a Special Order which would have sent a propaganda-broadcasting C-130 from Port Bouet off the Angolan coast, both to avoid provoking Moscow and because it would have been all-too-easy to shoot down.

10:00Z: A US satellite pass revealed lots of Angolan air search radars that we hadn’t known existed.

12:00Z: An update was received on the fighting in Angola, which had now spread to the capital.

McFaul and Lewis had met and were following CSG-12 at a considerable distance.

Reports then arrived of a sniper taking shots at the Embassy. Not a lot we could do, as Newport was still five hours away from being able to send help.

13:00Z: We were notified that the FNLA were making ready to assault the airport (as if they didn’t have enough problems without attacking us).

CSG 12 reached its planned position within 350nm of Luanda, which scored 25VP and brought it down to a Major Defeat.

The FNLA attacked the airport with ‘technicals’ and infantry but took heavy, unanswered losses from British mortar fire. As ever in CMO ground combat, the side with the better artillery wins and the FNLA had none. The Brits did, however, fire-off all their ammo. The last two FNLA units halted, irresolutely, near the airport boundary.

14:00Z: This enabled CSG 12 to take the FNLA out with TLAMs (it would have been much harder had they not halted). This was achieved despite the Russians helpfully firing Grumbles at our missiles – fortunately, two out of three missed. No points were scored.

The game then crashed when I tried to launch Hawkeye #4 to replace #3 (‘object not linked to instance of object’). I was able to re-start and avoided using that Hawkeye going forward.

15:00Z: The Embassy guards had dealt with the sniper, but repeated their appeal for help, as the crowd outside was growing in size.

I had to detach the DDG Sherman from CSG 12 to stop her racing ahead by default and tightened-up the formation. After I then re-united the group, things worked fine.

16:00Z: As more reports were received about the chaotic situation in Angola, Nakhimov closed to some 360nm of CSG 12, doing 30 knots. I decided that I simply couldn’t allow the Russians to get into Strobile range and backed-off to the SW, aiming to rendezvous with Lewis off Namibia.

It was increasingly apparent that what the scenario was showcasing was the Ford’s unsuitability for this type of mission. Without a stronger escort (preferably another CVBG or two), she couldn’t fight the Nakhimov group with confidence and her aircraft were not well fitted for engaging guerrillas at short notice from 350nm+ away. This was without getting into the shortcomings of her ASW (no replacement for the Viking), AEW (still using the low-endurance Hawkeye) and her Stingrays (a waste of space). She could also do with a lot more SAMs instead of relying on her escorts (and two of these weren’t enough here).

17:00Z: The Embassy was now under imminent threat of attack from several hundred FNLA and requested immediate assistance. Some 350nm away, all I could offer were TLAMs and I knew that the Russians (and probably the Flankers that the Angolan government now had on CAP) would oppose any such attempt to intervene.

As for Newport, she was almost in range now and her Osprey would have to run the gauntlet of the defences and be flown manually into a marked Landing Zone near the Embassy before unloading her Cargo. Given the proximity of the Nakhimov, I really needed another hour so that the plane could be flown around the Russians and given some leeway endurance-wise.

At 17:30, the FNLA spawned more infantry units and assaulted the Embassy. The situation was confused, with units emerging from the shadows, the Angolan government actually helping by engaging their rebel enemies and much difficulty telling friend from foe. Using TLAMs from a distance in this situation was totally impractical and any F-35s with Mavericks or similar would have had to have been on the spot when the crisis arose. In the end, helped by the Angolans, the Embassy survived with losses to the garrison and the attacking force was wiped-out.

18:00Z: Unfortunately, the main Embassy building had been set on fire during the attack and now burned-out, costing us 150VP and making it a Disaster again. There were still other buildings in the complex and guards surviving on-site, so the reinforcement mission was still on.

Civilian flights were still using Luanda Airport unhindered.

20:00Z: There were further reports on the fighting in Angola, which added atmosphere, but had no practical impact.
The Osprey launched from Newport, re-basing to Luanda Airport to avoid fuel issues.

21:00Z: The Osprey delivered a whole two Cargo Points to the Embassy compound, which scored a magnificent 5VP. It was hard to imagine what difference such token reinforcements would have made had it been possible to deliver them earlier.

22:00Z: The Osprey returned safely to Newport and loaded more Marines.

23:00Z: I moved the Marine reinforcements into the No Nav Zone around the Embassy, despite the best efforts of Pathfinder to hinder me. It was necessary to move them in very small steps to prevent the software sending them wandering all over Luanda.

2/6/26 02:00Z: The Osprey returned with a few more Marines, but no VP were scored for this or subsequent runs.

06:00Z: The trimotor made a third run. Both it and an Italian cargo plane leaving for Mali were harassed by Angolan government Flankers on the way out, but were not fired upon.

07:00Z: A Poseidon made another futile attempt to find the Severodvinsk and gave up.

10:00Z: The Osprey made a fourth return trip. Flankers came down to 200’ to scare it on the way back but, again, did not actually attack.

12:00Z: There wasn’t time to deliver the last load of Marines, typically enough.

14:00Z: The scenario ended, officially as a Disaster with a score of -120.

The US lost the main Embassy building and 10 ground elements from the garrison.

The Angolan Government lost 4 ground elements (to the FNLA).

The FNLA lost 49 ground elements.

Presumably, the defence of the airport and, against heavy odds, the Embassy, was not spun in a positive light by the media. The main building had been lost, but not other parts of the compound, the attackers had been defeated and the garrison had then been reinforced.

More importantly, we had avoided conflict with the Russians and Angolans and the evacuation flights had, consequently, proceeded without loss of life.

I could have played much more aggressively and provoked/engaged the Russians and Angolans, but that would have meant World War 3 and even the local outcome might well have been a far worse disaster.

All-in-all, atmospheric, but rather an unusual scenario.

[Eboreg]

Consider me interested. I might actually get this scenario.