Okay,
So I need to be a lot more careful with movement and pay more attention to microterrain, attack or defend slices of the opfor formation, and have consideration for fallback positions after firing.
I have also noticed some strange LOS issues. During the NTC campaign, I placed a FO at the top of the ride on the US Left. I did not have the team skyline themselves, I gave a Move command to a couple of tiles below the plane and then a Sneak + Hide and short fire arc to the top. The team was able to observe enemy movement as normal, but they were also instantly seen by the opposing force and obliterated in short order. Fine, there's no cover or anything on the ridge and that's fine; I can make a semi-reasonable argument for how a buttoned BMP was able to see a couple of dudes on a hill from it's flank. But I've also seen this in other examples: infantry teams who sneak into wooded areas and observe enemy troops or vehicles who then immediately get spotted. I haven't played since Black Sea first came out and there have been some Engine updates since then; could that be part of it? Did troops suddenly become more observant over the last few years?
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For a more detailed look, this is the field manual:
1x Tank platoon
2x M113 platoons
1x M150/M901 TOW platoon
1x 60mm mortar platoon
Since the US in this period (especially 1979) are behind both in quality and quantity, you're forced into using tactics which are most similar to the Syrians in CMSF- getting the most of of this combined arms unit is the goal, and relying on a defence in depth, supported by artillery fire and close air support.
With the highly mechanised environment, the anti-tank weapons are the most obvious component of this firepower.
These come in three distinct bands. Your long ranged firepower consist of the TOWs and the M60s, which have an effective range of approximately 2km. Your medium range firepower are the Dragons, which have a 1km range, and finally the LAWs, which are sub-300m. There are (typically) enough Dragons for one per squad, and enough LAWs for one per man.
Your tank platoon is the most powerful and mobile of the company, and is really the core of your firepower - the infantry are there to define space and protect the armour, but the deployment of your tanks, supported by your TOWs are the central problem.
Shock Force teaches bad habits. In that game, an Abrams platoon can sit on a ridgeline and dominate - you really have to do something wrong to take serious Abrams losses. This isn't the case for any version of the M60, especially the earlier ones.
Cold War in particular is often about relative mass - you're talking about US tanks that don't even have laser rangefinders - you're fully on WW2 gunnery here - so getting maximum guns on target at one time is the key, but you also need to make sure that you're engaging the smallest proportion of the enemy that you can. This usually means using terrain effectively to control the enemy's position - having them advance into prepared killzones, etc.
On a broader level, Active Defence was the doctrine. This was an elastic defence, a fighting withdrawal. Typically each company team would act as an independent unit, and would withdraw to a secondary prepared position as the enemy got into medium AT range. A second company would then take up the long-range fight as the first is repositioning, and then this would repeat.
In terms of supporting fires - the company has an FO for a reason. The 60mm mortars don't have many good targets for themselves. They're good at keeping BMPs and BTRs with exposed gunners buttoned, and smoke missions can be useful to shape the terrain. When the Soviets are forced to dismount they can be useful, but they're a bit difficult to justify in general. Air-launched cluster rounds are stronger than artillery, since the shells are larger. 155mm clusters are best used as point targets with maximum duration, and with the FO adjusting their fire over the period of the mission. The best targets are forming-up points - areas where the BMPs are going to concertina before building up for an actual attack.
