Bil Hardenberger

Well thank you. It's my pleasure, I really enjoy pulling these together. Bil

Heh.. I was an Intel analyst with 1st Cavalry Division. The exercises I participated in at Ft. Irwin were among my fondest Army memories. I missed all the wars (too early, too late, or not in the right place) so this was the only time I was able to realistically apply my trade. It was a hoot discovering where the enemy was, and recovering their OB through their radio communications, SPOT reports, etc., and even more satisfying when our pre-battle analysis proved correct over and over.

Welcome back John.. we've (well some of us) have missed your smiling face. Bil

Before I begin this turn report I wanted to say that GreenAsJade and I have reset this game to improve the lighting so the screenshots don't look so "dreary". We kept all purchases and orders exactly the same so our previous posts will still apply. Who loves ya?!! I must say that this terrain really reminds me of my time at the National Training Center (NTC) a bit too green however. The First Minute At the end of the first turn my Stuart Section had reached its OP position. No visual contacts were reported. They will remain here for a few turns until I am certain nothing is moving on this sector... then I will bound them forward slowly. My Sherman Platoon has a slow climb ahead of them to the top of their mountain.. they had yet to reach the summit by the end of the turn. I want to start getting my infantry into good jump off positions so I am transporting my mounted platoon and one HMG section to the center of my line just behind the ridge. They will dismount here and the trucks will return to load up another Platoon. Finally, here is an overview showing all forward positioned units and movements:

Trust me I tortured myself about it.. but came to the conclusion that I would rather have direct fire capability than indirect fire capability for this scenario. Firing behind the crests could be done with indirect weapons using TRPs scattered on the reverse slopes, but at what? An unknown target? Just fire and hope you hit something? I never like using artillery like that. We'll see how my decision works out as the game unfolds. Bil

My main goal at the beginning of this battle is to ensure that I have eyes on as much of the enemy territory as possible. To do this I am moving my Sherman Platoon up on my left to Point 523.. which is the highest point on the map and will give me excellent views into GaJ's setup area and onto the tops of most hills and ridges. Most points where I checked LOS find my tanks in hulldown or partial hulldown positions... the example I captured in this image is not however. My Stuarts will be moving to the ridge at the extreme right of the map to get eyes onto the other side of GaJ's rear area. If these tanks can manage to kill something then that's great.. but my main goal is to get an idea how he is maneuvering.. hopefully without losing anything in the process. I've crossed my fingers, given the command to move out and sent the next file to GaJ.. things should move much faster now.

I agree with you.. that would be why I didn't buy any ATGs.. my main combat power is self propelled.. and I have enough transport to shuttle one Platoon at a time to wherever I need/want them. Mobility is key for sure.. but I am also interested in being able to "see" as much of the map as possible... my opening moves will answer this need. I need to discover what my opponent is doing before I commit my forces to any plan. I will be using the tops of at least one of "those barren mounts" in order to do this. Bil

Okay, here are my unit purchases. I purposely went without any indirect weapons... I wanted to maximize my direct fire capability as I have a feeling that getting a good indirect spot is going to be a challenge in this game and I really dislike firing blind. The Parachute Companies are pure infantry.. I stripped out all of their inherent support (snipers, AT teams etc.). I wanted to get enough armor to make a difference.. I have no clue what GaJ is going to field armor wise and I wanted to maximize that aspect of my force.. and I did not want to drag around AT guns to provide that long range AT role so went with three Shermans and two Stuarts to give me some recon punch. This is the force I will be fighting in this scenario: Next: My plan of action

I am going to do a down and dirty high level terrain analysis here. At this point all I am interested in is identifying the key pieces of terrain and the main avenues of advance. First of all this is mountainous terrain, devoid of most cover (other than that presented by the covered approaches caused by LOS dead zones, intervening elevation, etc.), as is about 1 square kilometer.. or it encompasses a grid square in size. This image illustrates how I have identified the main avenues of advance (in red), the key pieces of terrain (Key Terrain) for this battle.. he who controls these terrain features should be able to control the flow of the battle. KT1 I feel is the most important piece of terrain on the map.. almost all of the covered approaches (red areas) converge on this one spot. KT2, KT3, and KT 4 will play an important role for me in the opening phases of the battle. KT5, and KT6 lie closer to my opponents side of the map, so of course I expect him to place some kind of firepower on them as soon as he can.. perhaps a tank or two. The hills are mostly flat plateaus.. this will make it tough to hide combat elements on top of them.. especially from anything placed on KT2, which is the highest point on the map. Now with all this in mind I am of course aware that my opponent could indeed approach over the back sides of some of these hills and ridge-lines... I do feel that this could be exhausting for his troops though, unless he spends some precious points on transport. We will see very soon I think. Here are a couple images showing the map from my side of the field: Next: My Unit Purchases.. stay tuned.

I suggested this map exactly because I really liked the covered avenues of approach, even though it looks wide open. I think it's going to be a very interesting fight personally and quite a challenge. I think its around 900m square... with that though I do expect sight lines to be very short and most firefights to be at arms length.. key will be to not walk into too many ambushes. I played GaJ once before.. and though that battle was an easy victory for me I don't think it was a balanced scenario and when he was defending in anything like even odds he put up a good fight... so I expect good things from him in this battle. if nothing else he will be motivated to do well.. nobody wants to be embarrassed in a public AAR. Bil

Less than a Regiment.

Allies. I will be fielding the Red Devils (Brit para).. and some unknown support assets.. I haven't decided on those yet, but the main force will be airborne infantry on both sides.

Attack I will Ken.. if my opponent ever stops pussy footing around and makes his damned purchases already... how hard can it be?

The arrow points to the direction you are looking.. so if it is pointing South why then you happen to be looking South. Bil

QBs are my favorite actually. I play the occasional scenario (have two going on right now) but a QB ME with roughly equal forces really separates the men from the boys. Bil

Watch this space. Myself and GreenAsJade are starting up a Gustav Line BETA AAR. This will be the thread where I will post my side of events. This will be a medium QB, Meeting Engagement. Neither of us has bought our forces yet.. expect a good pre-battle analysis coming up in the next couple of days from me. Not sure what my opponent has planned. Bil

Sounds tasty George! Which tactical vignette specifically are you using as a base.. or would you rather keep that under your hat for now? Bil

It is a shame this can't be sold in an eReader format.. would be far easier to sell. Perhaps you can create a version only with the Sicily and Italy content, call it the CMFI companion and retain the rights to the digital versions for yourself. Bil

Thanks Steve, but as Pope I would be able to choose my name.. and I think I would choose: Pope $hithead I (pronounced Shi-thayd) Hey, send me a setup and we'll play a game.

Yeah that definitely helps.. but I think his main task is ensuring that the water in Charles' tank is clean and his cerebellum gets its weekly massage. Cerebellum, I think that's where all the "battle" thinking goes on isn't it? A little humor for those Latin scholars out there. Sorry.

I never understood the need or want to game the slog of a battle that was Stalingrad. The Soviet counter-attack that surrounded the 6th Army in the first place, or Manstein's attempt to relieve the garrison yes.. but Stalingrad itself? <shudder>

Just wanted to throw my comments in with the rest.. great looking maps, excellent subject matter for a campaign, 11th PD was an amazing unit... my only problem is that I never play campaigns as I can't play them multiplayer... any chance we will eventually see these as stand alone scenarios?

Great interview with James. Highly recommended. Try not to get too jealous of his profession though.

Hey Steve, you missed the CMBN BETA AAR I did along with The_Capt.. first link in my sig. Bil

Who didn't? My one big fear before the second set of reinforcements arrived was that you would advance the one Sherman you had to attack the Orchard objective. I had nothing to fight it with and it would have caused havoc. The truck rush was ordered purely on the spot when you lost the first T30 and your Sherman backed off the hill the Villa sits on leaving no big guns defending the approach to the Villa... if you had concentrated your armor to attack my two Pz-IVs in the West then the Villa would have been ripe for just this sort of truck rush. I also fell foul to splitting up the armor at times.. sure I had a nice line of Pz-IVs overwatching the Villa, but when I started to advance I lost that mutual support and ended up losing two Pz-IVs and a Grille that I should not have. My Italian armor usage was abysmal. I didn't see it that way at the time.. they just seemed to appear... scared the sh*t out of me a time or two. I never realized you were trying to regain the bazookas until I read your side of the AAR. I was very happy to see you pull off the Hill objective ND.. that contributed to my decision to send the truck charge there. Until I lost my two tanks to your cross map Sherman on the Hill objective it would have been very hard for you to recapture with your reserve platoon... after they were gone though.. well it would have been a tough fight but you might have succeeded in pushing me off for sure. Other than taking out my FO with it.. I didn't feel too many negative effects from your artillery. Whew. Isn't hind sight wonderful? There are a lot of things I would do differently as well.. too many to list here, but I hinted at some of them in my thread. Mainly I would have handled the Italians a bit differently.. and I would have sent at least one squad in support of the two R35s that ended up falling to your demo team. I think you did a wonderful job ND... there were a few times, after the Italian failure and losses on the Orchard objective.. after I lost 4 vehicles in two turns that I was ready to call it quits. It was a very tight affair.. if we had gone on I would have captured the Villa I'm certain.. but the cost was very high and I have no doubt would not have felt worth that bill.