Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: DivePac88

ORIGINAL: FatR

Your arrogance is pretty hilarious. But don't worry, it would have been quite stupid to pollute my mind with information that comes from a source I consider entirely dishonest, so I'm not going to even read your posts unless I'm paid for it.

You are a sad silly little person there FatR, if you have nothing other than garbage to add to someone-else's post. I would take your own advice, and stay out.

as none of us, except the 3 involved in all this, know what exactly happened, I consider it unnecessary to point fingers or to start "bullying", to use a word used in one of the above posts, anyone,as we might point fingers at the wrong one after all....

why get involved and make sure that this discussion continues in this forum in the future?

we can't help, as we aren't pertinent to all the facts - if we were, yes - then we could take sides, if we wanted.

personally I am convinced that everyone has to choose for himself what he types in this forum - if Nemo chooses to post that he would like to keep someone out of "his" thread - fine - but that there is a certain "let's see if he can't resist" idea behind that, is pretty obvious - having two psychiatrists in ones family makes certain things, shall we say, "more common"...

now enough from me, as I have done exactly what I thought would NOT be best - I continued the "discussion" on this subject...

ORIGINAL: Nemo121

OH I don't know all the details so I'll stand idly by."

if you really expect people to "act" when they can't be sure that they "act" on behalf of someone who is "right" - then you are only half the man I thought you'd be!



OTOH - this discussion is quite interesting on a military basis - so let us, if I may, continue this discussion, and this one only...

Divepac, that comment was meant purely in fun - a stab at my own lack of understanding, not as a criticism of the smart people that post in here.

Since this is now totally off topic and worthless....

Solinvictus: The threads are there. What happened is public and easily available to all. Basically it boils down to FatR deciding I cheated in a game vs another player. He has no proof for this ( he's been asked for it on multiple occasions and states he has none except happenstance ). He then on TWO occasions leaked my AARed plans to my opponent ( he admits this ) and ruined the game which we had to call quits to. He acted as judge jury and executioner with no evidence and ruined a multi-month game leaking from one AAR to another. Those are facts which I think no-one would object to.

All I've asked is for an apology. I'm willing to move on IF he apologises. Instead he chooses to continue calling me a lying cheat despite having no proof. I, needless to say, am less than happy about this but whenever I say something about it it seems I'm somehow being aggressive and suchlike. As I understand it FatR's version is that since I changed a plan after a third party warned me my plan had been leaked that that proved I was cheating and so he was justified in what he did. Of course its very chicken and egg. I changed my plan because he leaked it. He believes I MUST have been cheating because I changed my plan - which wouldn't have happened if he didn't leak it.


As to expecting people to act without the facts... No, but the facts are easily available and if you ask you can be directed to them. As to the half a man thing. Well, I'll let you think about whether that was utterly appropriate.



soticrandy,

Well it really depends on what level you want to approach this from. Basically though Glantz's "Soviet Military Operational Art: In Pursuit of Deep Battle" is probably the best work available right now on the Soviet view of deep battle - and they're the ones who invented it.

One really good Western source is the USMC manual on the operational level issue concerning amphibious landings. They have a lot of focus on paralysing the enemy tactical and operational reserves and on how to transition from a local beahchead into one which acts as a good springboard for strategically decisive operations. The last time I read that was quite a few years ago though so I can't remember which FM number it was. I'm sure someone here is current and will have read it recently.

I don't enjoy posting in a drama charged environment, but I have seen Nemo articulate on several occasions (from my lurking vantage point) that he feels the community hasn't backed him up in this conflict.

So here:
OpSec violations are just about the worst thing I can imagine someone doing on these forums. It's just death to AARs in general. No matter how righteous one feels their is no excuse for it. It doesn't just effect Nemo, it has to make anyone considering an AAR nervous that they could invest years of their life and have someone casually bring that down.

The whole "thing" might be out in the public on the forum to find, but I honestly am disgusted at the idea of it, so I don't feel like wading through old threads to rehash it. As someone who has read AARs since UV the idea of someone stepping in and blowing up a game I enjoyed reading sucks - can't imagine what it would be like to the person playing the game. Just don't think that wound would heal easily.

Ok, I'm back to lurking and avoiding drama

SoliInvictus202,

ORIGINAL: SoliInvictus202
why get involved and make sure that this discussion continues in this forum in the future?

Because it is stimulating and interesting to read?

we can't help, as we aren't pertinent to all the facts - if we were, yes - then we could take sides, if we wanted.

THAT is an argument against getting involved in anything. We are never pertinent to all the facts. So maybe there is a justification of what appears to be bad and what seemed good is bad in reality, we are just not pertinent to the decisive fact needed to recognize that fact. So let's just accept the bad, as we cannot be sure it really is bad.

Personally, what I have seen is that all threads started by Nemo after FatRs intervention into the game between Hortlund and Nemo came to a rapid end. I do regret that, because his threads are always interesting. I want to read them.

Hartwig

ORIGINAL: Nemo121
Since this is now totally off topic and worthless....

maybe we should have stayed inside the club after all.

Anyway,

Solinvictus: The threads are there. What happened is public and easily available to all. Basically it boils down to FatR deciding I cheated in a game vs another player. He has no proof for this ( he's been asked for it on multiple occasions and states he has none except happenstance ).

To be more precise, FatR presented his case on page 1 of Nemo's "nemesis" thread.

Hartwig

I will just state for the record that CR's post poking fun at me is part of a long tradition between us. On the boards and elsewhere we often joke about the fact that we are both lawyers and both Southerners, but that I tend to use big words and he doesn't. Therefore I take no offense whatsoever as I understand he was pulling my leg in the context of that long-standing semi-inside joke between us. For late comers, note that I posted everything up to the word "Abrams" and then came back with the rest as an edit, so there were a few minutes when it appeared I had collapsed in mid-sentence. [:D]

I will also add my voice to those who are interested in hearing Nemo's ideas in this thread and on these boards. Whatever their past disagreements, FatR should abide by Nemo's request not to post to his threads.

edited to stop this entire discussion and help in getting all this back to the "main" topic of WAR - which is why we are all here I gather....


personally I just put on Mozart "KV 475" or Handel's "ombra mai fu" from Xerxes and a few other pieces to get my head clear of such things...

ORIGINAL: FatR

ORIGINAL: Nemo121
I'd like to invite anyone and everyone to comment - except for FatR as usual. I don't believe he has any role to play in adult, reasoned discussion until he can apologise for his behaviour.

Your arrogance is pretty hilarious. But don't worry, it would have been quite stupid to pollute my mind with information that comes from a source I consider entirely dishonest, so I'm not going to even read your posts unless I'm paid for it.

For what it is worth, I think you both should be at least a little embarrassed at this type of exchange. Nemo, you intentionally teed the ball up, and FatR took the borish swing. You are both letting anger over prior events lead to current, public embarrassment. This takes the thread rapidly off topic.

This is unfortunate, because the concept of Deep Battle and how to apply (or not) its tenets to the Pacific War is a great topic for a Forum discussion. There is no single book to read, no defining work to reference. It is taking a theory that was elegantly developed for one nation, fighting one type of war, and seeing if those concepts can be effectively applied in a completely different set of circumstances. It would be hard discussion to have without Nemo.

Mike

Posting "xxxxx not welcome here" is like using bacon grease for sunscreen in the Yellowstone backcountry.

It just is NOT going to end well.


Now..as to this question of the application of this "Deep Battle" concept to AE, I presume you are talking about the combined use of surface naval forces, carrier-based air forces and land-based air forces because the land battles are quite abstracted in AE.

Perhaps the carriers are the armor, the heavy surface forces more like motorized infantry and the land-based air a sort of long range artillery.

The scale and discontinuity (of island geography) are completely different but it is still necesary to secure a broad "breakthrough" if one is to push an offensive effort up through the Dutch East Indies for eg.

Let's say one wanted to take Luzon from Australia. One can't simply put a couple of divisions on transports and set sail without "pinning" Kendari and the bases in the Lesser Sundas. The enemy airbases are like the "shoulders" of an offensive salient. If they are held and the base of the salient is too narrow then artillery will impede resupply of the spearhead.

In the case of AE, the "salient" needs to be many hundreds of miles across.

Here I was eager to learn something and expand my knowledge in what I thought would be an interesting thread. Instead...

Well, I've done the next best thing. A quick search of my local libraries' online catalogue and I've requested a book by Glantz. At least I can get a start on reading up on the subject matter and hopefully being able to contribute something, if anything, to this thread once the air clears and we get back on topic.

[8D]

Blitzkrieg was a motorised version of Stosstruppen tactics from WWII. It began in the midst of the defended zone and kept evolving its way to the rear. Think light infantry tactics with motor vehicles. Deep Battle was a motorised version of Russian Civil War cavalry tactics. The units were released at the rear of the defended zone and kept going until they reached strategic goals deep in the enemy position. The mechanised corps was designed to hold key terrain (usually an urban logistics hub) until the RKKA infantry could catch up. The three tank corps were designed to overrun everything significant on the way to that goal.

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Now..as to this question of the application of this "Deep Battle" concept to AE, I presume you are talking about the combined use of surface naval forces, carrier-based air forces and land-based air forces because the land battles are quite abstracted in AE.

Perhaps the carriers are the armor, the heavy surface forces more like motorized infantry and the land-based air a sort of long range artillery.

The scale and discontinuity (of island geography) are completely different but it is still necesary to secure a broad "breakthrough" if one is to push an offensive effort up through the Dutch East Indies for eg.

Let's say one wanted to take Luzon from Australia. One can't simply put a couple of divisions on transports and set sail without "pinning" Kendari and the bases in the Lesser Sundas. The enemy airbases are like the "shoulders" of an offensive salient. If they are held and the base of the salient is too narrow then artillery will impede resupply of the spearhead.

In the case of AE, the "salient" needs to be many hundreds of miles across.

Cap Mandrake,

this is true, but what makes this a very interesting topic are the Soviet tenets for achieving a decisive victory (in a given operation), which they labelled "Deep Battle", were different than German, English and American concepts. They approached the initial operations very differently, using attacks across a broad front, followed by exploitation of local success versus a concentrated attack across a small fontage to achieve a breakthrough.

This has different implications for overall force ratios, recon, deception, and operations to fix and/or deplete enemy reserves.

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Now..as to this question of the application of this "Deep Battle" concept to AE, I presume you are talking about the combined use of surface naval forces, carrier-based air forces and land-based air forces because the land battles are quite abstracted in AE.

Perhaps the carriers are the armor, the heavy surface forces more like motorized infantry and the land-based air a sort of long range artillery.

The scale and discontinuity (of island geography) are completely different but it is still necesary to secure a broad "breakthrough" if one is to push an offensive effort up through the Dutch East Indies for eg.

Let's say one wanted to take Luzon from Australia. One can't simply put a couple of divisions on transports and set sail without "pinning" Kendari and the bases in the Lesser Sundas. The enemy airbases are like the "shoulders" of an offensive salient. If they are held and the base of the salient is too narrow then artillery will impede resupply of the spearhead.

In the case of AE, the "salient" needs to be many hundreds of miles across.

Cap Mandrake,

this is true, but what makes this a very interesting topic are the Soviet tenets for achieving a decisive victory (in a given operation), which they labelled "Deep Battle", were different than German, English and American concepts. They approached the initial operations very differently, using attacks across a broad front, followed by exploitation of local success versus a concentrated attack across a small fontage to achieve a breakthrough.

This has different implications for overall force ratios, recon, deception, and operations to fix and/or deplete enemy reserves.

Yes, I see your point. My analogies did apply more to the German style blitzkrieg.

So a "Deep Battle" approach might be 3 carrier groups and support forces, one in the Aleutians, one in the South Pacific and one in the Indian Ocean. They all attack simultaneously...and when the KB shows up, the two groups not opposed by the KB push ahead.

ORIGINAL: herwin

Blitzkrieg was a motorised version of Stosstruppen tactics from WWII. It began in the midst of the defended zone and kept evolving its way to the rear. Think light infantry tactics with motor vehicles. Deep Battle was a motorised version of Russian Civil War cavalry tactics. The units were released at the rear of the defended zone and kept going until they reached strategic goals deep in the enemy position. The mechanised corps was designed to hold key terrain (usually an urban logistics hub) until the RKKA infantry could catch up. The three tank corps were designed to overrun everything significant on the way to that goal.

Harry, this is nicely put. I think the challenge is to step back and look at why the Soviets developed their deep battle doctrine the way they did and see if it offers any insite into different tactics, operational art and strategy in the Pacific.

As an example, why did the Soviets develop a very detailed concept of echeloned forces when developing deep battle doctrine?
Mike

No, the phasing, force structures and relationship between temporal and geographic components was very different. Blitzkrieg ( which isn't even a German concept but a Western media concept ) was much more basic and limited.

Blitzkrieg was Barca to Deep Battle's Subutai. That's really the clearest historical example of the difference in style, breadth and depth of vision, components and outcome.

Since I missed the first in-depth post that kicked this whole thing off could you please post it in the other thread or PM it to me? I would be interested in reading it.

I believe Russian doctrine was a result of leadership issues. Orders were not open to interpretation or deviation (paranoia?). Given the size of their forces and lack of independent leadership below Corp orders were issued for up to a week at a time. A layered and echelon assault was the only way to force a break through. 2 cents.

I think a discussion of Soviet versus NATO doctrine outside of the context of Western Europe is missing the elements that played into formulation of those plans. While the West likes to portray the Soviets as likely aggressors in the Cold War, their doctrine had its roots in the suffering the populace endured in WWII. The political and military leadership basically developed plans hinged on if there was going to be another war that it would not be fought in the USSR. Therefore their war plans and doctrine evolved around attacking their enemies before they could attack the USSR. That battle was to occur in the enemy's territory with resulting destruction of infastructure and civilian populace occuring some place other than the USSR. Considering how many times Russia/USSR had been invaded dating back to Napoleon, can we really consider this attitude unjustified? Also the history of global conflict has seen an ever increasing price paid by non-combatants with each successive war. If WWIII had broken out, the territory that held the main battle area would likely have been decimated.

NATO on the other hand was largely a defensive organization. Its roots were also in WWII. However, the NATO approach was not so much how to fight a war but how to avoid a war. Its force structure was based on acting as a deterrence. Also, considering the one area where the West had a measurable qualitative edge throughout the Cold War was in aircraft, there overall strategic plan heavily relied on the air battle.

As to actual doctrine, both the NATO Doctrine and Soviet Doctrine were based on two things. The first was national/Alliance strategic goals. The second was the relative strengths and weaknesses of their own forces. While there are lessons to be taken and tatics/strategies to be devised by looking at the concepts of both doctrines, applying to the PTO in WWII seems a reach to me. Especially because AE really has no political model as part of the system. The only true political aspect of the game is Autovictory. At least this could be portrayed as either the point where the Allies had to abandon the "Europe First" strategy or the point where the Japanese leadership acted to preserve some sort of post-war Japan.

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

ORIGINAL: herwin

Blitzkrieg was a motorised version of Stosstruppen tactics from WWII. It began in the midst of the defended zone and kept evolving its way to the rear. Think light infantry tactics with motor vehicles. Deep Battle was a motorised version of Russian Civil War cavalry tactics. The units were released at the rear of the defended zone and kept going until they reached strategic goals deep in the enemy position. The mechanised corps was designed to hold key terrain (usually an urban logistics hub) until the RKKA infantry could catch up. The three tank corps were designed to overrun everything significant on the way to that goal.

Harry, this is nicely put. I think the challenge is to step back and look at why the Soviets developed their deep battle doctrine the way they did and see if it offers any insite into different tactics, operational art and strategy in the Pacific.

As an example, why did the Soviets develop a very detailed concept of echeloned forces when developing deep battle doctrine?
Mike

The Red Army didn't use reserves, except for small anti-tank forces. Each echelon had a mission and was expected to burn itself out performing that mission.