Autumn Fog - Allied

[MikeJ19]

As mentioned earlier, the Germans continued their eastward movement, they have withdrawn most of the units from the West edge of the pocket. I was surprised that they did not launch a breakout attack this morning, they have the forces in place to try something, but they certainly lack the supplies.

Overall, my intent remains the same, keep the gate closed at the Eastern end of the pocket, reinforcing it where possible and applying pressure across the rest of the pocket. So far, this approach has resulted in the destruction of lots of German units and successfully cutting off their supply lines.

This morning, the 2nd Armd is going to push South towards Ligneuville, while the 1st deals with the significant German force caught in Stavelot.

The 10th Armd, 75th and 5th Armd will continue to push East, bypassing German units wherever feasible – this is to keep the pressure on the Germans forces and to pick off their artillery, supply and HQ units.

The 106th and 82nd AB will picket bypassed German units.

The 101st AB will again try to push North out of Houffalize while moving NE along the river.

The 4th Armd and 80th will deal with some of the German units in their area. I would love to push them North, but I do not want to overextend my forces in this area, thus their orders to do some attacking but no ambitious advancing.

I want to whittle down the strength of the German force NE of Prum. So, the 5th, 11th Armd and 35th will focus their efforts on attacking these forces, while strengthening the defences in the area.

The 9th Armd is going to dig in and hold the area around Loshiem.

[MikeJ19]

Things are pretty quiet in this sector, with some minor jockeying for position being the major activity.

The 26th and 28th will entrench some more, while the 4th will continue to push towards Bitburg, which would complete the encirclement of these German units.

I’m going to bring the 87th up to the area NW of Konz and using a bridging unit have them cross there. I have to be careful, as I do not want to trigger the release of the German 1st Army.

The 103rd is going to head farther North to join the battle at the main pocket.

The 17th AB remains the reserve in this area.

[philturco]

A very interesting scenario. I've managed to soundly beat the AI as the Germans by quickly seizing bridges before the US forces can blow them and surrounding and killing allied forces in numerous small battles . These small encirclements usually are regimental or less in size. I think the multiple small battles of encirclement are key as the Germans often enjoy a local superiority of forces and can do considerable damage by exploiting a local or tactical superiority to an allied force that has an overall strategic superiority that they cant always exploit. The other key is to keep pushing west and to flow around the allied forces before they arrive in strength. I suspect its easier to defeat Elmer than a human opponent who responds deftly and faster to threats.

[MikeJ19]

Hi Phil,

Thanks for the post. I've been thinking of trying this as the German player. My thoughts are similar to the approach you outlined, destroying the Allied forces early on and flowing westward would be key. I may try that next, although I am finding this scenario to be dragging on. This is more likely that I can only get one-two turns in a week.

Have a good day,

[MikeJ19]

I launched about 40 attacks in the morning, with some very good results.

The Germans did not do much this afternoon. They moved some units eastwards overall. The number of German units around Prum increased throughout the afternoon, but they did not try any attacks in the area. In fact, they only launched one attack.

As I begin my moves, the vast majority of the German units remain unsupplied and the number of escape routes for the units in the centre or western portions of the main pocket are dwindling.

My intent remains the same this afternoon, continue to tighten the pocket and to destroy units within it.

In the North, I’m going to continue pressing home attacks against the German units that are trapped on the West side of the river.

In Koln, my forces have run into a bunch of anti-aircraft and garrison units, which they will continue to weaken.

The 87th is almost ready to put a bridge in place South of Bitburg and start another push to surround the Germans in the area.

As the situation has not changed much, I’m not doing more detailed reports for this afternoon.

Should be a fun day.

[MikeJ19]

Just one slide again this morning...

[MikeJ19]

Off on vacation at the cottage for the next week and a half. No internet connection for my PC there, so this is the last post for a while.

[MikeJ19]

After a great holiday at my cottage, I am back. I'm finding this scenario is dragging. This is mainly because with my summer activities, I do not get to game as much. But, I have been playing and thinking of this scenario since early June. I'm going to play for a couple of more weeks - at most - before moving to something new.

I'm thinking of making some minor tweaks to the scenario - adding an airfield or two for the Allies on the main map, so that they can use their paratroopers, and adding overextended thresholds - and trying it out as the German.

Here is the latest update.

Good to be playing again...

[MikeJ19]

A quiet day passed

[MikeJ19]

Things continue to look good for the Allies

[MikeJ19]

The push continues, with the rivers and missing bridges slowing down my destruction of the Germans in the many little pockets in the centre of the overall battle.

In the North, I am pushing East at a slow pace, mopping up the German defenders that are left.

Along the East edge of the map, I am seizing more victory locations.

On the map below, I am working on the destruction of German units. I have almost completed the destruction of the 9th SS South of Andler. The German forces that had pushed past Salmchateau are also almost all destroyed.

The German units West of Malmedy are in positions that I can not attack, so I am picketing them at the moment.

I have been lazy in moving up some rested units. My three AB Divs have not done much for a few days. I may move the 82nd AB into the area near Malmedy to let the 1st Inf and 2nd Armd start moving East.

[MikeJ19]

I'm getting close to the end. Once I get an overwhelming victory, I plan to end the game. Here is the current situation.

[MikeJ19]

I have gotten to the overwhelming victory mark and it is time to stop this scenario and try something else...

[MikeJ19]

Turning Point

On Dec 23rd, I launched a couple of counter attacks, one East of Aachen and one near Clerf. These two attacks started to turn the flanks of the German advance. I was able to reinforce each of these attacks and then build momentum to roll up the German flanks.

The Germans did not react to these attacks until the 27th by which point it was too late. In fact, they continued to push Westward, hoping to force me to stop my attacks and rebuild my defence line.


Another option would be the defence along the line from Robertville-Malmedy-Trois Ponts. By getting there and destroying the bridges, I forced the Germans to head West. This started my containment of the attack

[MikeJ19]

What did I do right

Withdrawing slowly

I was able to pull my units back slowly, but prevented them from getting cut off in the early stages. This was very important as it let me keep a line intact.

Keeping a reserve

Early on, I established a reserve and resisted the pressure to employ it too early. This paid off on a couple of occasions, especially when the British withdrew.

Counter attacks

As I have mentioned, the counter attacks on the 23rd turned the tide of the battle. Combined with the establishment of a strong defensive line, the counter attacks began the rolling up the German line. I was able to start taking out their artillery units and then cut of the supply to the strongest part of the German push.

Encircling the Germans

Even unsupplied, the Germans put up a big fight. I was able to create smaller pockets and encircle units so that they could not retreat. This helped me completely destroy German units and shrink the battle space that they owned – which helped me with movement and supply.

What could I improve on?

Use of my Air Force

I tried a couple of different options for my air force in this game, and then forgot them completely. This is one the first scenarios where the two air forces are maybe evenly matched. I was constantly surprised at the effectiveness of the German Air Force. I seemed to take lots of losses throughout (over 1000 planes), yet I did not feel that my Air Force was effective in supporting my ground forces. I might have been better off, if I had used my bombers to attack the German airfields instead of going after bridges or troop concentrations.

Reading the ground

This is a tough area of operations with lots of rivers that restrict movement. I think I could have better defended the rivers if I had spent more time looking at hexes that no one could attack into. I found this very frustrating near the end, the Germans had a supply unit in Salmchateau and the only units I could attack with were my engineers. I took lots of casualties in these attacks, whereas a picket would have held them in check.

[MikeJ19]

Final Thoughts

I enjoyed this scenario. It was very interesting for the first few weeks. It was run trying to figure out how to stop the German push West and then identifying how to counter attack.

A couple of issues with the scenario:

Lack of an airfield on the main game map for the Allies meant that I could not use the air lift capacity. This is not a big deal, but would have been helpful.

No use of the overextended supply rules. This would have made the game much more realistic. Some German units were still defending very hard after having been cutoff for over a week.

One game issue:

The AI does not know how to respond when cutoff. The Germans had opportunities to breakout from both main pockets, but did not even attempt the attacks. In the case of the Northern pocket, I think that the Germans had a very good chance of breaking out.


Overall, this was a good challenge and made me think a lot. I hope you enjoyed reading about it. I’m planning on making two adjustments (airfield and overextended supply) and trying this as the German.

[sPzAbt653]

Thanks for the very nice AAR MIke! A few comments on your final thoughts:

The Allies Air Trans Cap is for Air Resupply to cutoff units, not for Para Operations. That is why there are purposely no airfields within the main map area.

I would only use Overextended Supply Rules in situations where they are really warranted. They aren't going to make any difference to units that are cutoff. This scenario already has things in place to restrict German movement due to supply. You will find this out if you play the German side. Adding in OSR's would require other adjustments, I think.

For the Germans not escaping pockets issue, if you have save files that pertain to those turns where the Germans were inactive while cutoff, I would suggest replaying some of them with 'Active Disengagement' turned OFF to see how the results might differ. I've never tested this myself as I think it would change some/most scenarios too much to be a valid answer, but I would be interested if anyone else spent the time to do it. [Elmer's behavior when in contact with the enemy was changed in the past, and this keeps him from making strong attempts to break pockets in some cases].

[MikeJ19]

Steve,

First off, that was a fun game. I really enjoyed the challenge.

Thanks for the comments on the air trans cap and the overextended rules, they make sense to me. I will not add the airfields.

As for the OSR, I was going to put it really low (4). My look at the scenario saw that there were things in place to replicate supply issues for the Germans. Overall, I was really thinking about units that have been cut off for a couple of days and thinking that the OSR would make it more realistic.

I will think about whether to use it. I have not tried a game with OSR, so I remain tempted.

As for turning off the active disengagement, it is too late. I deleted my saves this morning. It would have been very interesting.

Have a great day and thanks again for an interesting scenario.

[sPzAbt653]

A unit is “Overextended” if it has a line-of-communications to a supply point ...
So as I said, it has no effect on units that are cutoff.

Too bad about the save files being deleted, they could have been an interesting replay [;)]

[MikeJ19]

Steve,

Thank you for that clarification. It would be interesting to understand the rationale for a unit being overextended only if it has a line of communication to a supply point. I think that a unit that is cut off from its supply would suffer very similar effects to one that is getting supplies, just not enough.

That being said, I will then use the original scenario for my fight as the German.

Have a good day,