Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Elysian: I Even when operating offensively, trying to gain territory or a VL, I find it helps to think defensively. Think "moving ambush". Elysian<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> That's good advice,and corresponds to Liddell Hart's"offensive defensive method" in his "Strategy of the Indirect Approach". Meeting engagements are good for this kind of tactic: quickly take a good positionand force the opponent to try to remove you, thus profiting from the advantage of the defense over the offense. The rushing tactic to accomplish this in a meeting engagement requires some judgment about potential locations of the enemy, and can backfire if he correctly guesses your location and pre-targets it with artillery. It is important to know that in CM, it is not necessary to occupy an objective to control it, having more good units in the vicinity usually is sufficient, even if the enemy actually occupies the flag! Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Maj. Bosco: About infantry, American inf is better at long ranges. Unless your opponent bought regular Heer rifle squads then at close range you will get your ass handed to you by a bunch of MP40's and MP44's. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Fromthegamesofwarwebsite tactical guide: "the US rifle squad - lacking the fire support of a machinegun like the German MG42 - is a good fighting outfit for close to medium ranges, but lacks punch at distances above 200 meters. When establishing a base of fire to suppress the enemy, try to close in within 200 meters of the enemy position before doing so."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by russellmz: how do i take and hold a victory location as the americans? i usually ask for meeting, combined arms. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> two main things to remember(OK, three...) 1)In meeting engagements, since both players are at the ends of the map, so the winning strategy involves rushing the objectives since you know that the enemy is not there (OK, this is gamey, but if he does it and you don't, you will always lose); however it is usually best not to take the objective immediately ( your opponent will have it targeted or you can be shot at as you approach) but rather to take a covering position nearby from where you can blast the enemy when he does. 2) German infantry is better than US at long range,and the opposite is true at close range;if you are the US, avoid fighting attrition battles with the Germans from long range(more than 200m). Try to get in close. 3)Use artillery to target potential areas where the enemy is likely to hole up,and pre-target the area(you can always move it if he's not there). This way, assoon as heappears, he can beblasted by your artillery within a minute of the time he is spotted. The above willimprove your chances immensely. If you play against me,disregard the above,they are all lies...

One of the things to note, is that no Allied tank is a match for a Panther at long range -the longer the better for the Panther. Another thing to note is that a Stuart is no match for a German medium tank -in 1944 Stuarts should be used only for recon, or possibly pinging against enemy armored cars and infantry. Finally, in general German tanks had superior optics and often more experienced crews, so in tank to tank battles, the Germans usually have the edge. Moving tanks fire less accurately than stationary tanks, so don't go to him, let him come to you and try to hit him while he's moving. Put your tanks behind some infantry with AT guns, in positions where thy can get a flank shot if possible (insist on having some trees, using the argument that there is no steppe in Western Europe...); if he sends infantry in front, remember that German infantry have the edge over Allied over long range but the opposite is true at close range, so back up your infantry with artillery and/or keep them hidden until the German infantry is in range, then ambush them. Your opponent is forcing you to fight in ahistorical circumstances over ahistorical terrain that favor his OOB. And he's psyching you out. It is time to turn the tables. Bottom line: in an armor-only equal-points battle over flat unforested terrain, German tanks have a significant advantage.

Why don't you just start a moderated Usenet newsgroup? (I prefer non-moderated, but...). It is much more convenient than this forum, because one sees only the unread messages that one has not seen before, so one is less likely to miss interesting posts; and one can do a search on all messages by marking all messages as unread first. The only downside is that users don't have to register, but I don't se why that is useful, since the moderators can reject any message that they decide is not relevant.Another downside is that messages are removed from the servers after a while.If you need the archives, you can always copy them into a text file and put them on your site where people could acess them, although I personally don't see any reason to do that. The upside is that you don't need any server AT ALL!

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by WaffenSS: Can you help me guys ?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Go to cmhq.tzo.com:8000/, where you can chat online and easily find opponents.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Warren Peace: I'm experiencing the same problem. warren<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Me too

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Germanboy: Hmm, I haven't tried the black label, so my comment was aimed at the red. So maybe I should give the Black Label a try. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Maybe you want to try the JW Gold (if you can afford it): it's only half the cost of the JW Blue, but a lot better than the JW Black (which is not bad itself, I have to say).

OK, I can't resist butting in here; why has no one mentioned that Windows has a set of keyboards that one can load? For instance, I have a French Win 98, but I have installed both French Canadian and US keyboard sets with the Win CD, and I can shift between them just by clicking on a small icon on the bottom right.

OK, I've had enough; I have started some admittedly controversial discussions, but the last series of messages on my thread about "What is maneuver warfare" is the last straw. Steve of BTS among others accuses me of disrespect towards other participants whereas I have carefully avoided any personal attacks despite being the object of personal attacks and my statements being qualified by Steve as "pure unadulterated BS", and contradicting other posters' comments by posting quotes from relevant authors. Some of the participants have been throwing oil on the fire by misrepresenting my position then tearing down the straw man. I have come to the conclusion that it is not possible on this forum to have an intellectual discussion that has any hint of criticism towards, Combat Mission, and therefore I respectfully bow out.This is not new for me, because I have received exactly the same treatment on the long discussion on gamey issues. To those who have attempted to have a civilized discussion about the admittedly confusing subject of maneuver wardare, I give my thanks, and if our opinions differ beyond and above the confusion, I fully respect your right to have a different opinion. Don't bother to reply to me on this forum since I won't be here to read it.If any of you are interested in discussing with me in a civilized manner, you will find me on the usenet war-historical forum. Goodbye to all... Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by IntelWeenie: Will the real Henri please stand up? Which quote of yours defines manuever warfare? Neither of them, they are not a definition of maneuver warfare but aspects.There is no contradiction between using fire in order to facilitate maneuver and then to hit hard when you finally hit. No one ever claimed that the objective of maneuver warfare consisted of avoiding combat when necessary. The opposite of maneuver warfare is attrition warfare, not combat. Do you include yourself since you don't seem to be consistent in your own statements?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> There is no inconsistency in mny statements. The supposedly contradictory example that you gave is ludicrous, and only shows that you don't understand what maneuver warfare is (no insult intended). I know this post comes across like a personal attack on Henri (it's not intended that way), but the above quotes when taken as "the whole enchilada" bug the bejeezus out of me. Don't accuse others of making bad arguments and "not getting it" when it seems you're in the same boat. Read the above posts CAREFULLY, then either show me where I said that when entering combat, less than the amount required should be used, and show me where I said that combat should always be avoided, or please apologize to me. Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jackhammer: I'm so sick and tired about hearing all the BS about maneuver warfare. I've read all the books mentioned in this thread, and to quote CAVSCOUT, they all suffer from Whermacht penis envy. [snip] It took good 'ole attrition warfare in the form of massed stuka attacks to get von kleists panzers across. .<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> If you had paid attention to what you read, you would have seen that one of the tenets of maneuver warfare is that when you hit, you should hit hard, which is what the GErmans did. It is a gross distortion of Maneuver Warfare to characterize it as "driving around" and of avoiding combat. If Maneuver Warfare is such BS as some here claim, why is it that they can only criticize it by putting up straw men and then tearing them down? I raised a serious issue in this thread, and so far for the most part all I have seen from those who disagree with me is arguments calling upon ridicule and distortion of what maneuver warfare is. I have said it before and I will say it again 1) Contrary to what some here claim, the US military HAS adopted maneuver warfare on occasion as its doctrinal basis (so it CANNOT b e just BS as some claim), and it has been continually opposed by some conservatives in the military. So quoting Colonel Blimp objections from supporters of attrition warfare is not surprising and doesn't add much to the discussion. 2) Although I don't have the first-hand experience to judge, serious writers like Leonhard have criticized the military for backtracking on their decision to adopt maneuver warfare as doctrine. 3) Contrary to what BTS claims, maneuver warfare does NOT apply only to higher operational levels than that depicted in Combat Mission, since most of the exercises in Lind's book were designed for Company Commanders and required decisions BY company commanders. What IS missing in CM that is found in real life is how the Company Commander's decisions are related to the intent of the orders received from higher levels, which it MIGHT be possible to model in pbem games, but which cannot be programmed in the present state of programming. These are serious issues that cannot be dismissed just by calling them BS. Although I appreciate the input of some of the military experts on this discussion, I am really disappointed with the generally low level of the arguments by some of the participants. Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software: Utter and absolutely BS If I am wrong tell me, Henri, how would you deal with this situation in a game setting: You are the company commander ordered to take a bridge. Specifically, your orders read "Captain, take your company and assigned assets, secure the railroad bridge over the Schwift River by 10:00 hours, and hold out until releived. It is the ONLY bridge in the sector and the river is not crossable by any other means. In your opinion, if I understand you correctly, the company commander should be able to bypass the bridge because this is the propper way to conduct "manuever"? In other words, "gee, assaulting that bridge would be rather dumb. I will just disregard my orders, load up my men, drive through the phaselines of 2 divisions and simply drive over the bridge that the neighboring Corps has already secured. That would be so much easier". Steve<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> A commander versed in Maneuver Warfare would not usually give orders of the type that you cite above, and the stupid reaction that you characterize has not been proposed by anyone. An example of the type that you mention is discussed in detail in Lind's book, showing how a Company Commander should interpret the INTENT of his commander's orders, and adapt his attack to the situation. In one exercise of Lind's book, a Company Commander is told to block a road access, but when he gets there, the situation has changed, and as Lind explains, the thing to do is not to mindlessly hold the hill, but to attack a nearby mortar battery or a weakly protected HQ in the vicinity before the enemy can react to the danger. And there ARE cases where the thing to do is to follow orders, even if they are not as flexible as they should be.But just suppose that in your example, the Company arrives on the scene and find that the enemy is not trying to take the bridge, but is building a pontoon bridge a quarter of a mile down the river, and the pontoons are snaking down the road nearby and the Germans are unaware of his arrival. What should the Company commander do? Follow orders and sit on the bridge? Keep calling my statements "pure and utter BS" if you like, but don't expect me to remain polite about your own for very much longer... Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bobbaro: Manuever Warefare seems an unfortunant phrasing as it lends to confusion with simple fire and manuever- or even (God forbid) complex fire and manuever. The indirect approach seems to better embody the concept, although it lacks the ring of an adequate catch phrase satisfying to the ear. .<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I totally agree; it is not clear to me why proponents did not keep Liddell-Hart's term of "The Indirect Approach", which is much clearer and which does not require having two meanings for the word "maneuver". Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by CavScout: This assumes you can win without combat. This is an "ideal" maneuverist wish for but I doubt it is grounded much in reality Cav<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I have quoted cases where this has actually happened, and there are others, so it IS grounded in reality. No one claims that it can always or often or usually be done, quite the contrary. Henri [This message has been edited by Henri (edited 10-16-2000).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Blackhorse: Innovative? Yes. Audacious, bold, daring, and ballsy as hell? Yes. Maneuver warfare in its purest form? No...How do you come up with that? Is anything audacious considered maneuver warfare? I ask you, where was Rommel going? What was his mission? Was he racing to the Meuse River Crossing? Was that crossing considered an objective of his and was this hanky- waving fake surrendering a means to get to the objective? If so, I hardly see it as anything more than traditional warfare carried out by a very creative commander. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> It was maneuver warare in its purest form in the sense that the ideal of maneuver warfare is to achieve one's objective (in this case breaking out into the open behind enemy lines) without firing a shot, which is what Rommel achieved. Instead of asking himself what are the rules for breaking through enemylines, Rommel asked himself what was the best way to throw the enemy off balance to get through his lines with the best economy of resources. This was typical of Rommel who seemed to have a bottomless bag of tricks to befuddle the enemy, but he rarelyrepeated the same maneuver twice. Rommel's charging of enemy lines with all guns blazing was another unconventional technique that he developed to a fine art, and although it appears on the surface like pure attrition warfare to charge headlong into the enemy, Rommel did it in France because he guessed correctly that it would reduce casualties because the enemy would not expect it and would become totally dislocated by the speed and surprise of the action -and he was right. If he had fought on the Eastern Front, he certainly would not hafve tried that against the Russians after 1942 Sure deception and surprise are not exclusive to maneuver warare, but winning battles by avoiding combat IS ideal maneuver warfare. Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by MantaRay: Maneuver warfare is where I get in my Tiger Maus, go in continous circles, while firing as fast as I can until I run out of gas. [snip] Ray<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I know you probably mean this as humor, but consider the case where Rommel had his tank commanders wave white handkerchiefs as his tank battalion rolled unmolested right through French lines. Although about as "gamey" as it can get , this is maneuver warfare in its purest form: if it follows rules for combat, it is not maneuver warfare! Henri

In a pbem campaign, I offered to resign near the end of the first scenario when all I had left was an immobilized tank and a few sorely battered infantry platoons, and I could still see at least four enemy tanks and a considerable amount of infantry. My opponent convinced me to wait till the end of the scenario to see what reinforcements I would get, and I belatedly agreed to keep playing for a bit, with a bit of suspicion that my opponent was a sadist... well, my immobilized tank managed to knock out three of the enemy tanks, and when my reinforcements arrived, they included a half-dozen tanks, which I then used to kick my opponent's ass. Now in the last scenario of the campaign, he is hiding out in the town (presumably hoping to last until the end) while I have a half-dozen tanks with infantry trying to flush him out. Henri "The game ain't over till it's finished" (Yogi Berra).

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by CavScout: "Maneuver adherents refuse to be content with explaining a few pieces of the issue. Like all good social scientists, they seek to swallow the whole enchilada. [snip] Bolger has an interesting paper wish all should read if they can. My favorite line is: Maneuverists have a bad case of what may be called, to borrow from a sister social science, "Wehrmact penis evy." <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Thanks for posting this to show the quality of some of the arguments raised against maneuver warfare. Like all "new" ideas that rock the boat of conventional thinking, maneuver warfare has it vocal opponents. The nice thing about your post is that it proves that the ideas actually EXIST, which some of the participants in this forum might have come to doubt. To read seious replies to serious objections (as opposed to pooh-poohing the thing away as in the above )about Maneuver Warfare, one should read "The Art of Maneuver" by Leonhard. here is part of the forward of Lind's book by Col. John C. Studt, USMC (ret), "I served in 31 years of active duty witht the Marine Corps, saw combat in both Korea and Vietnam, and attended service schools from The Basic School to the National War College. Yet only toward the end of my military career did I realize how little I really understood the art of war. [snip] But why all this from a civilian instead of a professional soldier? In fact, the entire movement for military reform is driven largely by civilian intellectuals, not military officers - one notable ewxception being retired Air Force Colonel John Boyd.[snip] Proposing significant changes is frequently viewed as criticism of superiors, since they are responsible for the way things are and borders on disloyalty if not insubordination." "Maneuverists really do not have much to offer beyond their restricted area of interest, other than exhortations to apply a "maneuver mindset" to all pahses of war." It has been known and forgotten since the time of Sun Tzu thousands of years ago that any valid theory of war must encompass "the whole enchilada". Should one be surprised that Leonhard who says "...The developers of Airland Battle have flirted with maneuver but have been unable to shake off American traditions of the past" should have generated some animosities among the traditionalists among the military? Henri "What is this Paulus, you laugh? Is this some new kind of argument where you ridicule something instead of proving it wrong?" (Plato)

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Blackhorse: As defined in FM 100-5 (Operations) "Maneuver is the movement of forces in relation to the enemy to gain positional advantage. Effective maneuver keeps the enemy off balance and protects the force. Here is what Leonhard says about FM-100-5: "...all maneuver is not maneuver (pardon the expression). What Fm-100-5 was referring to as maneuver was simply the practice of racing units around the battlefield in order to rush into battle".For instance from your quote from FM-100-5: "Maneuver is the movement of combat forces to gain positional advantage, usually in order to deliver -or threaten delivery of- direct and indirect fires. I think that this says it all. Maneuver warfare uses fire in order to allow movement, whereas attrition warfare uses movement to allow fire (Leonhard). I'm not sure what your point is Henri, but in my opinion, CM models these particular definitions of maneuver quite well. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> You are not alone in not getting the point, and yes, CM DOES model well the type of maneuver that you and FM-1---5 describe. Henri [This message has been edited by Henri (edited 10-15-2000).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bobbaro: A most intriging discussion; don't see old K. Godel mentioned that often. We understand the elements of our existance in many ways, language being the most noisy one of them. Old K.G rigorously proved that every symbolic system contains a contridiction, if I am putting it rightly, hopefully at least approximately. [This message has been edited by Bobbaro (edited 10-13-2000).]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Close but not exactly; there are a number of ways to express what Godel proved, but the simplest to understrand is that "Every logical system must be either incomplete or inconsistent", which among other things, implies that there are logical truths that cannot be proven, and Godel's theorem killed logical positivism, the idea that everything can be reduced to simple logical elements (an idea nevertheless still very much alive today). It also means that there will never be a perfect simulation of reality, so it is not only a question of faster computers and better programming. BTW, Quantum Computers (if ever) would be a lot faster than 10^9 operations per second, which is about the speed of the fastest computers today.Hybrid opto-digital computers shuld surpass 10^12 /s in the next few years. I hope this clears things up a bit. Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by ScoutPL: The concept of Maneuver Warfare as your two favorite authors dealt with it (interesting that they didnt bother to define it) deals with maneuver on a much larger scale than what is addressed in CM. Airland Battle is a doctrine not a tactic. Be sure you can distinguish between the two. The example you offer about orders is actually the defintition of commanders intent. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Sorry, you are wrong, the example I gave is a simple version of an example given in the book by Lind, where he discusses an example of "mission orders" just as this one regarding a hill in terms of orders given to a battalion, which is the top end of the scale of Combat Mission, not "a much larger scale". Yes the book by Leonhard deals in the second half for the most part with criticism of the US Army's Airland battle doctrine, but in no way does either Lind or Leonhard nor any of the writers who have dealt with various aspects of the strategy of the indirect approach (which is essentially what maneuver warfare is) limit the concepts to any scale of battle, large of small. As I expected, the responses to this thread show on the part of many a total misunderstanding of what maneuver warfare is about. It is NOT about movement, nor is it about gaining a better position for an attack, nor is it about mission orders, although all of those items can be involved. And just for the record, the exercises given by Lind, although they are part of a larger division size battle, actuelly deal with specific orders at the platoon level! Replying in detail to the above misconceptions would require more space that I care to take up for the moment, but let me just say that you and Steve are dead wrong when you claim that maneuver warfare is limited to the operational level, and others who identify maneuver warfare with movement are simply confused by the word "maneuver". Henri

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lorak: Nice post. Obviously This scenario would have absolutly NO flags, the only points are for exit/non-exit. This battle would be perfect for a Human-Human battle. Not sure how the AI would handle a straight exit map. thoughts? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Actually I'm a bit surprised that no one has thought of doing this for human vs human games; as you say, the objective flag business seems to be necessary for AI play since it is extremely difficult to program AI with vague objectives that depend on context. This is precisely where so far ALL artificial intelligence falls on its face, when context has to be taken into account. But there is no obvious reason why a scenario designer could not make a human vs human scenario of the kind you describe. Henri

In my experience, you have to keep all your enemies on the same side of your tanks, because of the slow Tiger turret traverse. One way is to pop off a few enemies by advancing between the two houses, then bacing back to the road and zipping far to the left, then working Wittmann's tank left until he is on the E-W road just at the entrance of the town, from where he can pick off enemies as they exit the town. The PzIV is usually killed as soon as he appears, but the other Tigers should also head left to fight long distance along with Wittmann while avoiding enemy infantry getting too close. You should enter the town only at the end, just in time to capture the flag. The main idea is to take on the enemy tanks piecemeal. Don't expect this to work more than 1/3 of the time. Henri