AAR - Vengeance of the Beast Hunters

[heinrich55]

“A HIT, A HIT! It BURNS!” screams the gunner.

Anatov stops punching the driver for a moment as he suddenly realizes what that idiot gunner meant. He thought they were hit again and they are on fire but it now dawns on him that their shot killed the enemy tank after all. He slumps back in sudden relief, the insanity of the moment apparently over.

“Nyet, Tiger DEAD AHEAD!” The gunner’s voice pierces the momentary lull in the tank interior. The absolute dread of that one word cuts through everyone in the tank.

The driver panics and starts to climb over Anatov in his haste to escape the tank from the upper hatch. He has no desire to return to the front of the tank after almost eating two enemy shells fired directly at him.

“You filthy pig! You’ve killed us, you bastard!” roars Anatov, as he starts punching the driver again. They are moments from death and all he can think to do is punish the idiot driver who drove them too far up the rise and into the killing zone. He no longer cares about anything except punching this worthless bag of filth.

[heinrich55]

The Tiger commander sees a Mark III medium Panzer explode just to his left and follows the line of the shot, seeing the smoke clearing from around the barrel of a T-34.
“Target 1 o’clock, 160 meters, silhouetted, just beyond the halftrack wreck,” he intones in the microphone. From his view outside the hatch of the tank it is a clear shot but he is higher and to the rear of their cannon.

The gunner is lower and to the left, and he sees that the halftrack is partially blocking their shot. He makes a quick adjustment, knowing that at this range the T-34 can kill them just as easily as they him.

“Fire when ready,” orders the commander.

The infantry riding on the back deck of the tank hear the commander and they all grab for handholds and try to cover their ears. It is going to be loud.

[rickier65]

+1

Heinrich,

what a great read! Thanks!

Rick

[heinrich55]

As all this is going on to the right flank, Major Sankovsky is trying to maneuver the remains of his lost command into position at the front of the wooden copse. He is painfully aware of his losses, as he is sliding his SU-152 in between the broken hulls of the tanks of Boradin and Alenkin. He hopes the enemy won’t catch on that his is the one that is still operative.

As he directs his tank into position beyond the tree line he is confronted with a chilling sight. He spots a Tiger directly ahead and orders his driver to stop immediately.

At the same time, his gunner spots a Tiger just off to the right at 2 o’clock and the gunner shouts to spin right. The driver is completely confused by what he hears, both apparently contradicting one another.

He clutches in and brakes faster for the right track than he does for the left track, this causing the massive tank to slew to the right. It is already nose heavy from the massive gun mantle and this causes the tank to dip heavily into the soft Russian earth.

Sankovsky sees the death bloom from the Tiger that he saw (now to his left), and knows they will be killed in moments. He drops from the open hatch into his commander’s seat – it is all he can think to do in the time allowed before they are blotted out.

[heinrich55]

As skill and training are great assets on the field of battle, so also are luck, providence, and fate. Sankovsky and his crew are saved by simple turns of random actions. The Tiger’s shell impacts viciously against their turning front face, sparking brilliantly and scoring a deep gouge in the thick Soviet steel. The remains of the shell then carom off with a wild shriek of tortured metal.

The Tiger gunner had them perfectly lined up when he was ordered to fire. As he fired, Sankovsky’s driver, confused by the conflicting orders, accidentally slewed their tank to the right. Due to the extreme weight of the already front-heavy chassis and the momentum being carried into the rapid turn, the suspension dipped heavily while the treads shoved into the dirt.

These split-second actions caused the perfectly lined kill-shot to suddenly hit at more of an angle and higher on the target than intended. The AT shell could not bite into the steel plating at enough of an angle to allow it to tear through and impact inside the SU-152. The Soviet tank men were saved by an accident of fate – as it all happened so fast they have no idea why they are still alive, only that they are!

Sankovsky’s gunner now has a clear flank shot on the Tiger he spotted. They are dead on, barely 450 meters out, and the Tiger is stopped, probably lining up a shot on someone else.

“Major, I can fire,” he shouts. “Orders?”

Sankovsky is partially stunned by the hit that almost killed them. He is confused because they aren’t pointing at the Tiger he saw. He never noticed the one the gunner spotted. Because he can’t comprehend what has just happened he instinctively reacts.

[heinrich55]

“Fire!” he calls.

The gigantic roar of their artillery piece is deafening, even though their leather headgear partially dulls the sound. The interior of the tank is instantly filled with expended gasses and smoke. The breech operator and the loader immediately snap to action as they begin the laborious and time-consuming task of reloading the cannon.

Sankovsky quickly looks to his vision port, trying to see how badly they missed their target, because they are pointing in the wrong direction. What he sees takes his breath away.

[heinrich55]

The Tiger gunner depresses his trigger, and the Tiger roars in anger. The tank is rocked back as the 8.8-cm cannon launches the massive shell and a gout of flame and smoke as well. The gunner is following the shell and sees part of the destroyed halftrack fly up. “Damn,” he thinks, “They clipped the halftrack after all.” He has time to wonder if this will affect their hit….

[heinrich55]

A deadly freight train slams into the side of the Tiger tank. Sankovsky’s gunner is dead on with his aim. The riding infantry are hurled from the tank as the Tiger’s interior is shattered. The 15.2 –cm shell spares no one. The Beast Killer has finally lived up to its name – Sankovsky and his gunner watch in amazement.

In the distance the Tiger’s last gasp can be seen sparking against the sloped front armor of Anatov’s hapless T-34. The German gunner will never know that the shell trajectory was altered just enough by the dead halftrack that it sheared off from its target and failed to get the kill.

As the errant Tiger’s shell strikes the front of Anatov’s T-34, the crew are stunned and pitched about. Anatov is knocked unconscious as his head strikes the breech block of their gun. This is good news for the driver, as he manages to push away from his enraged commander, now lying silent on the floor.

He looks at the gunner and sees his wide-eyed fear reflected back from the face in front of him. “What should we do?” he asks in a quivering voice.

“Maybe we should shove the commander out the hatch and drive away,” suggests the gunner in a shaky voice.

“Someone might see,” reflects the driver, remembering the infantrymen in their foxholes nearby. “Back to stations,” he says, with more confidence than he really feels. “Let’s pretend everything is alright and the commander was having a breakdown or something. That might work.” He doesn’t sound convincing.

The machine gunner and the loader quickly agree to the plan and they immediately re-crew their stations, loading the cannon in the process and scanning for more targets.

[heinrich55]

A blizzard of steel rips from the gutted Tiger; those infantrymen still alive from being thrown or jumping from the back deck are now carved to shreds by the Grim Reaper’s scythe.

[heinrich55]

Flames roar in a towering funeral pyre some 30 meters into the sky as black smoke marks the death of the once mighty hunter.

[heinrich55]

As the flames and smoke rise into the sky, bodies can be seen scattered around the dead Tiger. The burning Mark III Panzer is close by, as well as several other destroyed German vehicles. In the distance Anatov’s T-34 still stands, the lucky survivor.

[heinrich55]

Just as Sankovsky’s SU-152 scores the killing blow on the Tiger they fired upon, the first Tiger is still at large. When the first Tiger stopped to fire at Sankovsky, they turned and exposed their flank to Tchevski’s 76.2-cm AT gun. Before the Tiger can fire again, Sankovsky gets accidental help from Tchevski’s gun crew. They needed only minor range adjustments before they let loose their AT shell.

In the distance the gun crew can see the brilliant golden sparks of their flank hit on the fascist Tiger.

“Come on boys, it’s not dead yet,” Tchevski encourages his gun crew. They are loading fast as they don’t want to waste flank shots on a Tiger. They have a real chance here.

[heinrich55]

Knowing now that they have killed a different Tiger and not the one he saw first, Sankovsky orders full reverse, the urgency reflected in his voice. His driver now drops both clutches and the gears scream as they are tortured into full speed. Looking through his left viewport the Major can see another blossom of flame coming from the enemy tank. “Faster!” he urges, imagining it is not fast enough. His tank is rocking with the violent jerk rearward.

[heinrich55]

This time the violent lurch from the driver slamming the clutches into already spinning gears causes the tank to tip slightly backward. The enemy shell now hits the front plate, still at an angle, but at a much shallower one, and again the shell scores a deep furrow into the steel but ricochets off and up. The force is still violent enough to rock their tank and Sankovsky starts to consider religion again – “why else have they been spared so many times in the past few minutes?” he wonders.

[heinrich55]

Sankovsky’s gunner lets out a shout, and he sees the reason. The side of the Tiger that is trying to kill them has just erupted in a golden shower of sparks.
“Someone is trying to kill him!” shouts the driver. “We still have a chance!”

They cannot know that fate, providence, or whatever one might call it, has placed the Tiger flank on to another cog in the AT front, that being Tchevski and his AT gun. Their very survival now rests on the accuracy of someone else as they cannot fire for quite a while yet and they would have to turn to bring their gun to bear.

The crew and the Major are becoming painfully aware of the limitations of their Beast Hunter.

[heinrich55]

Epilogue

With their flank in peril, the Tiger begins to back away, allowing Sankovsky to escape to the cover of the woods. The German force has been almost totally annihilated, with only the Tiger and one Mark III Panzer surviving, along with one or two squads of infantry. It is a decisive Soviet victory and a high-water mark, as the Germans will not come further in the following days. Their bolt has been shot.

Major Sankovsky has somehow salvaged his reputation, coming out as the savior of the right flank. If not for his “tactical and timely heroic” intervention as well as his spectacular destruction of one of the two indestructible Tiger tanks, the right flank might have been turned. He receives the Order of the Patriotic War 2nd Class for his heroism.

Not much is said about the 4.5-cm AT guns that somehow managed to destroy two Tigers – it wouldn’t be heroic to note that small guns downed legends. It is better to have great vehicles like the Beast Hunter be the hero of the battlefield and so it is written that way in the history books. The destruction of five SU-152 tanks, the best the Soviets can field, at the hands of two Tigers and two medium Mark III Panzers somehow fails to be mentioned. Only the survivors of those broken Beast Hunters will know, but they will, of course, keep quiet and accept new assignments in new SU-152 guns that are already being delivered to the front.

Corporal Belov survives the battle and remains a corporal. His score was only one fascist tank less than his fellow corporal Deska, so he is okay with the outcome. He is still saddled with Popov and remains convinced that there is a village out there somewhere that is missing their idiot. His gunner Markov keeps applying for a transfer to another unit but Belov knows a good gunner when he sees one and keeps blocking Markov’s attempts to escape the Belov circus.

Romanov will have to “break in” a new commander, as there are plenty of sergeants to go around and he was not considered skilled enough to command an SU-152 of his own yet. The survivors of his tank see this as an insult and know the man should be their next commander. He can see it in their eyes and it brings him to tears. They love him all the more for that expression.

Tchevski can rightly be said to have saved things on the right flank. His able command of his AT gun was what slowed and then repulsed the final Tiger. His gun kept punching shells into the flank of the last remaining Tiger until they backed away and allowed Sankovsky to slink back into the woods. He is rightly decorated, receiving The Order of the Patriotic War 2nd Class as well as The Medal for Military Merit. He is the only one to receive this award out of all who participated. His gun crew is bursting with pride for Tchevski has managed to “find” several bottles of really good Vodka and he “decorates” them by awarding them the precious liquid. To the crew those bottles are worth more than any shiny ribbons or pressed metal medallions.

And what of our heroes from the lone T-34 that attacked the flank? Moments after they re-crewed their stations, the bruised driver announced that their engine was dead. That last hit from the now-burning Tiger killed their transmission and drive shaft. They are dead in the water.

As shells are still flying and there is still very real danger all around, they quickly opt to abandon their tank, carrying their unconscious commander Anatov on a blanket. They slowly and carefully carry him back to the aid station.

Each time Anatov stirs and shows he remembers their abject failure in the battle, the gunner accidentally cracks him into unconsciousness with the hammer the driver uses to “help” change gears on the transmission. By the time they get Anatov back to the aid station he has been anesthetized so many times that he cannot really remember his name, let alone his recollection as to how he received his head injuries.

Anatov will be hospitalized for a time until he recovers from his head injuries. He will be assigned a new crew and tank, never fully remembering or figuring out what happened that fateful day in July. When he tries to think things through he gets a severe headache and then gives up the attempt.

His old crew will receive a new commander – their secret will be forever kept between the four of them.

[heinrich55]

Happy New Year to All!

The internet was not cooperating too well but I managed to sneak this one in before the new year started. I hope that all your hopes and plans work out well in the upcoming year and that you still manage to find some time to enjoy this excellent game.

Heinrich55

[rickier65]

Heinrich,

this was a very enjoyable New Years surprise! thanks for doing this! I've been clicking through each post as you went.

Happy New Year to you!

Rick

[junk2drive]

It is so nice to see someone enjoy the game. Thanks for taking the time to do these AARs.

[heinrich55]

Thanks Rick and J2D. This one was longer than the previous ones but played out nicely.