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As seen on the livestream yesterday, here is my Operation El Dorado Canyon, 1986 scenario rebuilt from the ground up for CMO! Overall I think the scenario plays better and more historical than the previous version.

On the 5th of April 1986 terrorists detonated a bomb in a Berlin nightclub. The bomb killed 2 American soldiers and a Turkish woman and injured 229 others, 79 of whom were American.

In response, citing evidence that the government of Libya was responsible for the bombing, US president Ronald Reagan ordered airstrikes against Libya on the night of April 14/15, codenamed OPERATION EL DORADO CANYON.

It can also be found on the Steam Workshop!

Custom Overlays can be found HERE

Lots of changes from the original CMANO version:
- Implemented Apache85's lua scripts, including SAR and weather! I also rewrote all of my lua scripts based off of Apaches.
- Adjusted locations of the US objectives. The Aziziyah Barracks, Sidi Bilal, and Benghazi Barracks were in the wrong locations.
- Rebuilt the Libyan IADS using SAM Site Overview, SAM Simulator locations, and some other sources.
- USAF Tanker Callsigns! Huge thank you to Switchblade Ops & [40-1]Havoc11 for pointing me towards USAF communication transcripts.
- Various other tweaks and adjustments.
- One change from yesterdays stream version, removed Crotale and SA-9 from the AAA options.

6/24/2021: v1.2.2
• Minor scripting fixes.

6/19/2021: Updated to v1.2! Update is not available on Steam.
• Updated to DB 488.
• Added: Historical messages; Admiral Mauz pre-strike message to TF60 and Admiral Crowe/CJCS Well Done message.
• Added: Tripoli FIR reference points for the player.
• Added: Separate briefing for F-117 option. Can be replayed via special action.
• Tweak: Removed unneeded tankers when using the F-117 option. Unneeded tankers are not removed for France/Spain overflight option.
• Tweak: Split RTB events into two events for the two USAF strike waves.
• Tweak: Additional tweaks to scoring.
• Tweak: Mission briefing formatting
• Fixed: Script and triggers for F-117 in air spare RTB event.
• Fixed: USN Deck check event.
• Fixed: USA Doctrine; No RTB after weapons released, no RTB for fuel.

Look forward to comments and critiques.

Thanks for all the hard work you put in on this!

I looked all over yesterday for the livestream but couldn't find it.
Is it going to be uploaded to YouTube?
Thanks

Posted some hints and suggestions to Twitter. I'll add these to the end of the briefing in the next version.

ORIGINAL: Tom Konczal

I looked all over yesterday for the livestream but couldn't find it.
Is it going to be uploaded to YouTube?
Thanks

The VODs can be found on the SlitherGroup Twitch Channel. I may upload a cut of it to my YouTube channel at some point. Not sure if Slitherine is going to upload it to their YouTube Channel.
Part 1
Part 2

I had a hiccup with OBS that required me to stop/restart the stream.

I've uploaded it to the Steam Workshop. See the first post for the link!

Will it be part of the Community Scenario Pack (Official) once the pack gets reuploaded on steam with the new scenarios?

ORIGINAL: JDLgnd
Will it be part of the Community Scenario Pack (Official) once the pack gets reuploaded on steam with the new scenarios?

It should be in the next version of the CSP.

Thanks, working on a Second "Putin's War" scenario but will try to take a peak. Always been an interest of mine as I briefed Strike Fighter Wings Atlantic at NAS Cecil Field just before ops began. Amazingly the Libyans were providing weather observations right up until the bombs fell.

Kushan, thanks for nice stream and scenario!

Really curious what you think of it BeirutDude!

Thanks Mikkey! It was fun to do. From what I saw and heard the stream numbers were really good and I've heard nothing but good feedback. Might consider doing something similar again in the future.

Finally got my hands on "Raid on Qaddafi: The Untold Story of History's Longest Fighter Mission by the Pilot Who Directed It" by Robert E. Venkus, who was the assistant wing commander of the 48 TFW. Never came up when I was doing research but someone pointed it out to me a few weeks ago on stream and it came up when I search directly for it. Amazon seller cheated me and never sent the book but I did manage to find it on Google Books of all places. Learned that the Libyans turned off their air search radars around midnight. I'm going to finish reading it before I decide if there are any changes I want to make. Probably be just some minor event tweaking. SSN754Planker did request I put some RP's on the map to mark out the approximate refueling areas. Going to tie those into a Special Action for those that might not want the extra help...or can't be bothered to read the briefing [:-]

Toying around with doing an F-117 variant. I've seen some references here and there that they were considered but nothing ever official. If they were considered I don't think it was done seriously but its a fun concept to play around with.

A real out-there option would be to use the hypothetical F-19 unit.

Thank you.

So just getting into it. Question, are the tanker ready times historical or just for the scenario. If the latter, I would suggest making the KC-135s ready initially, as the KC-135s and KC-10 really get mixed up on launch.

Very detailed!

The F-111/EF-111 transit and tanking is a scenario all to itself! To be honest I have started it 5 times and have never been able to coordinate the refueling and timing. I-ve tried small groups, large groups wings by type, the different air speeds make it very hard and if I get the aircraft to the Straits of Gibraltar with plenty of fuel I'm hopelessly behind schedule. So this is a refueling issue I've never tried before (so other than this op who has [:D], maybe the IAF??? [8D] ). It's a testament to the USAF (and having been a USN "Squid" assigned to Marines, I love to bust on the USAF), Skills that they pulled it off with appropriate TOT!!!!

Now I do tend to be a bit of a perfectionist, but then I hit the Straits about 3 hours in its clear my TOT is busted! I'm a BAD CMO player! [:D] [:)] [8D] [X(]

Oh one other thing, and I'm going off my memory here, but didn't they cut the corner a bit over Portugal?

So giving it another try, as I recall the aircraft few about 25,000 ft (if memory serves me right it had something to do with staying below the average height of commercial traffic). Taking the KC-135s up to 36,000 gives them more airspeed. So lets see if I can time it better!

EDIT: So one thing that is messing me up is when the KC-10s start to fuel they drop to Loiter (230 mph), which makes sense. So to keep things from getting strung out need to manually go to each tanker/tanker group and increase the airspeed to 520 mph. Not sure if that slows down refueling (or stops it???). We'll see, but if you let the aircraft drop down to loiter, timing is blown!

ORIGINAL: BeirutDude
So just getting into it. Question, are the tanker ready times historical or just for the scenario. If the latter, I would suggest making the KC-135s ready initially, as the KC-135s and KC-10 really get mixed up on launch.

It was a really complicated launch, so I didn't even try to get exact ready times for each tanker but in general I have it close. The first wave of tankers started launching about 17:15. What I've found works best is to launch the KC-135s first. When the first wave of F-111s is ready (PUFFY and LUJAC) I begin to launch the 4 KC-10s for that group. Then when that group is assembled, I start to launch the second wave. Probably need to adjust some tanker ready times as well here.

Note: Second wave ready times are wrong, they shouldn't be ready to launch until about an hour in.

ORIGINAL: BeirutDude

Very detailed!

The F-111/EF-111 transit and tanking is a scenario all to itself! To be honest I have started it 5 times and have never been able to coordinate the refueling and timing. I-ve tried small groups, large groups wings by type, the different air speeds make it very hard and if I get the aircraft to the Straits of Gibraltar with plenty of fuel I'm hopelessly behind schedule. So this is a refueling issue I've never tried before (so other than this op who has [:D], maybe the IAF??? [8D] ). It's a testament to the USAF (and having been a USN "Squid" assigned to Marines, I love to bust on the USAF), Skills that they pulled it off with appropriate TOT!!!!

Now I do tend to be a bit of a perfectionist, but then I hit the Straits about 3 hours in its clear my TOT is busted! I'm a BAD CMO player! [:D] [:)] [8D] [X(]

Oh one other thing, and I'm going off my memory here, but didn't they cut the corner a bit over Portugal?

ORIGINAL: BeirutDude

So giving it another try, as I recall the aircraft few about 25,000 ft (if memory serves me right it had something to do with staying below the average height of commercial traffic). Taking the KC-135s up to 36,000 gives them more airspeed. So lets see if I can time it better!

EDIT: So one thing that is messing me up is when the KC-10s start to fuel they drop to Loiter (230 mph), which makes sense. So to keep things from getting strung out need to manually go to each tanker/tanker group and increase the airspeed to 520 mph. Not sure if that slows down refueling (or stops it???). We'll see, but if you let the aircraft drop down to loiter, timing is blown!

Going to answer these two together. The refueling really could be a scenario unto itself. When I originally started making it I had more than one person suggest to me to cut that entire part of the raid out. never entertained it very much, IMO taking it out would cut out a huge part of what made the operation a feat of aviation.

I know I mention the strict TOT, but there is no harm for missing it. The live stream last week was the closest I've come to hitting the TOT. Its a 6.5 hour trip. 3 hours at the Strait of Gibralter sounds about right.

I've never seen the actual flight path taken, just a approximate estimate. To my knowledge they stayed in international airspace the whole time. In order to make up sometime, they did cut some dog legs out of the course in the Med, which brought them "uncomfortably close" (The words of Robert Velkus, deputy CO of the 48th TFW) to non-participants airspace.

Your right, they flew down at about 25-26,000 ft. I normally fly my force down at 36,000 ft due to game mechanics. The actual raid flew down at a speed around 400+ kts, can't do that at lower altitude in the KC-10 in CMO.

You've also hit the head of another game mechanic which makes hitting the TOT exact difficult. The actual raid did high speed refueling at 400_ kts. Velkus mentions multiple times in his book that they had to use afterburner to maintain position and speed as to not drop off the tankers while refueling.

Unfortunately, high speed refueling like that can't be done in CMO right now. The current game mechanics envision the standard tanker orbits & rendezvous. The tanker slowing to loiter helps the AI with pathing.

What I've seen works best is to:
1) The first refueling is the hardest IMO. Refuel the KC-10s and the F-111s from the KC-135s over the Bay of Biscay. The F-111s didn't actually refuel this way but with the tankers slowing to loiter mechanic it works best IMO. It allows the whole strike force to slow down to the tankers loiter speed while the KC-135s can refuel the KC-10s. Otherwise the F-111s will shoot out ahead. 1 KC-135 should be able to top off the tanks of 3-4 KC-10s that early. Should have a few left over to refuel the F-111s at the same time as well.

2) I maintain about 350-400 kts for all my groups. I gets tricky when giving course corrections to multiple types because the F-111s will always want to speed up to 480 kts so you have to watch them. If you select them in the right order they will maintain speed. Can also assign them to a patrol mission and leap frog the reference points.

3) Make sure to refuel all F-111 groups at the same time, from one group of tankers. I do use the mother tanker to some extent by having the same group refuel from the same tanker each time.

4) When the F-111's are refueling, slow my other tanker group(s) to loiter speed manually. Have to pay attention because once the F-111s finish they will speed back up to their manually assigned 400 kts. If they all refuel around the same time they should break away close enough to where there isn't too much separation. When the F-111'sd are finished, I manually set the speed of the tanker groups back to 400 kts.

5) Refuel the F-111 mother tankers after the strike force breaks off to attack. I normally hold their orbit around Sicily. Refueling them enroute just causes headaches.

I'm going to try and make a video this week showing the refueling. Forgot to have OBS record the footage from the livestream a few weeks ago. So I'll have to re-record it. Thankfully I can do that with TC this time [;)].

Appreciate the feedback, keep it coming.

one other thing I was going to do, maybe a cheat but I was going land and refuel the KC-135s at Rota.

What I've seen works best is to:
1) The first refueling is the hardest IMO. Refuel the KC-10s and the F-111s from the KC-135s over the Bay of Biscay. The F-111s didn't actually refuel this way but with the tankers slowing to loiter mechanic it works best IMO. It allows the whole strike force to slow down to the tankers loiter speed while the KC-135s can refuel the KC-10s. Otherwise the F-111s will shoot out ahead. 1 KC-135 should be able to top off the tanks of 3-4 KC-10s that early. Should have a few left over to refuel the F-111s at the same time as well.

2) I maintain about 350-400 kts for all my groups. I gets tricky when giving course corrections to multiple types because the F-111s will always want to speed up to 480 kts so you have to watch them. If you select them in the right order they will maintain speed. Can also assign them to a patrol mission and leap frog the reference points.

3) Make sure to refuel all F-111 groups at the same time, from one group of tankers. I do use the mother tanker to some extent by having the same group refuel from the same tanker each time.

4) When the F-111's are refueling, slow my other tanker group(s) to loiter speed manually. Have to pay attention because once the F-111s finish they will speed back up to their manually assigned 400 kts. If they all refuel around the same time they should break away close enough to where there isn't too much separation. When the F-111'sd are finished, I manually set the speed of the tanker groups back to 400 kts.

5) Refuel the F-111 mother tankers after the strike force breaks off to attack. I normally hold their orbit around Sicily. Refueling them enroute just causes headaches.

So yes I've seen and done some variant on all of this at one point or another. Guess I should have kept going when Hit the Strait at 3 hours! Right now I have the KC-135s in a nice clusters in 2 and 1 aircraft groups. I'm finding keeping them to that size allows you to more easily assign tanking. The F-111/EF-111s are drinking right now just west of Portugal and then I'm going to tank off the 135s. The way I did that was building three (3) "Form-up" SUPPORT missions over southern England, One for the KC-10s, One for the F-111Fs and one for the EF-111As. Then I built a Support Mission for my mission track for all the groups to head down (that way I can assign Groups altitudes and speeds and when the KC-135s passes each I reassign the Formed Up group to the Track Support Mission. So it's echeloned 135s, 10s F-111s and EF-111s and just let the F-111s & EF-111s come up to refuel. Once the Strikers are done drinking I'm going to refuel the KC-10s and send the 135s to ROTA. Wonder why they didn't do that in the original mission? seems like refueling some 135s would be something the Spanish would have looked the other way on.

One way to keep everyone on track is to move the "Track Support Mission's" first reference point ahead of them and then deleting the RPs as they're not needed anymore. That way they aircraft always tracking toward the RP and you don't have to worry about so many tracks!

KC-135s in line in the lead
KC-10s and F-111s in middle
KC-10 refueling EF-111s in the van.

F-111's done drinking and getting ready to refuel one more time after the Spares depart, then the KC-10s.

Might consider finding some way to not allowing the 135s to land at Rota if you want it represented for the cripple(s) but not as a refueling point (historical).

ORIGINAL: BeirutDude

one other thing I was going to do, maybe a cheat but I was going land and refuel the KC-135s at Rota.

So yes I've seen and done some variant on all of this at one point or another. Guess I should have kept going when Hit the Strait at 3 hours! Right now I have the KC-135s in a nice clusters in 2 and 1 aircraft groups. I'm finding keeping them to that size allows you to more easily assign tanking. The F-111/EF-111s are drinking right now just west of Portugal and then I'm going to tank off the 135s. The way I did that was building three (3) "Form-up" SUPPORT missions over southern England, One for the KC-10s, One for the F-111Fs and one for the EF-111As. Then I built a Support Mission for my mission track for all the groups to head down (that way I can assign Groups altitudes and speeds and when the KC-135s passes each I reassign the Formed Up group to the Track Support Mission. So it's echeloned 135s, 10s F-111s and EF-111s and just let the F-111s & EF-111s come up to refuel. Once the Strikers are done drinking I'm going to refuel the KC-10s and send the 135s to ROTA. Wonder why they didn't do that in the original mission? seems like refueling some 135s would be something the Spanish would have looked the other way on.

One way to keep everyone on track is to move the "Track Support Mission's" first reference point ahead of them and then deleting the RPs as they're not needed anymore. That way they aircraft always tracking toward the RP and you don't have to worry about so many tracks!

Spain refused overflight. The 1 F-111F that did land there with engine overheat issues wasn't revealed until a few weeks (a month?) after the raid. The Spanish government didn't want to do anything that would potentially invite an retaliation. Landing tankers at Rota probably would have violated an agreements between the US and Spain. I intended for Rota to be divert base. Especially on the way back, fuel levels might not allow everyone to make it back to the UK.

Interesting enough some members of the Spanish military didn't feel that way as their government. After the raid some of them invited a group of USAF officers to an officers club for a meeting. When they USAF officers arrived they were greeted with champagne and a toast. A British officer in the Lakenheath command center, when the RAF personal were asked to leave, told the USAF personal to bomb him (Qaddafi) good.

I like the individual mission track idea. Will give that a go next time I play through. I did something similar on the livestream but I assigned all my aircraft to one support mission. Be careful with the F-111s on support missions. They like to dive down to 200 AGL when they pass a waypoint.

I don't ever let the mission pass a waypoint, I keep moving the waypoint ahead of them so they are always in transit.

I think we have reached the same way to do this, but if I play it again I think setting up nine (9) individual support missions tracking along the flight path. Each would have 1 or 2 KC-135s, 2 (one with 3) KC-10s, 2 or 3 F-111Fs and every other one with a single EF-111A. Then track each support mission parallel, but slight off of each other, so that each has their own individual track. That makes keeping them sorted easier. Then you just assign the refueling aircraft to hit the tankers in their mission, and remove the waypoints just ahead of the mission as they approach it.

In any case, the strikers are refueled and the KC-10s are just about to drink off the 135s. To keep with the spirit of history and the scenario, will send the 135s back to England. [:)] [8D]