Zveroboy

A tank counter-attack while the attacker is busy destroying the gun front ?

How do you deal with flanking fire with that drill ? If you have to park your tanks in platoon strength 200 m from a trench line, there could be another fort that you haven't spotted yet to your left or right. And if a pak front opens fire on you from the flank, you could easily lose the whole tank platoon before the overwatch deals with it.

Simovitch, I will test it if you want.

Another vote for "When Titans Clashed" by Glantz. You can read on specific operations later when you have a global view of the war. Colossus reborn is more about the Red Army itself than the war on the East Front although it deals with both. War without Garlands is very good but only about Barbarossa. [ May 18, 2005, 09:01 AM: Message edited by: Zveroboy ]

Damnit I was hoping it was just my test that was flawed. The first time I tested it, it dropped all its bombs but when I reran the tests it would just make the bombing sounds like you said. Good tip on the BF-110E. Have to try it sometime.

Thanks Jason. Personally I think Glantz book on Kursk is top notch, probably the most interesting and detailed book I have read from him, with his book on the initial period of war.

Anyone else noticed a problem/bug with the B-2 dive bomber not dropping any bombs or is it just me??

Is the Soviet staff study worth buying if I already have Glantz and House book on the battle of Kursk ?

Thanks guys. DEY nice find on the bomblets. So it was an area-saturation fragmentation weapon, that means anti personel right? I have been running some tests with the different Henschel models and I had some pretty weird results with the B2 dive bomber. It seems that half the time the Henschels don't drop any bombs at all, although they definitely strafe a lot. All the other variants (HS 123A and B1) seemed fine and I ran the test several times. I also ran tests with the Stuka 87D and they almost cleared the whole trench line when the Henschels would only shake the infantry and panic it at best. Concerning the bomblets they are pretty useless against entrenched infantry thats all I can say. Also it is funny how a puny 25mm AA gun at 13 pts will distract the bombers and make them completely miss their targets.

I tried building a July 43 Soviet defense by setting up a rifle company in trenches on a steppe map with small hills and almost no trees. Then I gave the Axis 2 Henschels 129 B with a Messerschmitt escort and a sharpshooter to observe the results. I had to play in hot seat mode because the AI would try to walk the sharpshooter right up to the Soviet position, get killed and surrender. Ok so the Messerschmitt made a couple of strafing runs but when it was the Henschels' turn they both dropped dozens of small bombs on the Soviets. The strikes were pretty accurate and definitely spectacular, but didn't cause any casualties. I go in the editor and find that this model of Henschel is carrying : 2x20mm, 2x8mm (5 strafes max) 2x550 lb bombs or 48x5 lb bombs Now the 550lb bombs while not the biggest can seriously hurt infantry but a 5 lb bomb :eek: what type of bomb is this? Is there a way to know what payload you will get beforehand or is it random? Also what is the best way to use them bomblets? At first I thought it might be a bomb designed to destroy landing strips. Another thing that bugs me : can you have more than one plane attacking each turn or do they only come one after the other?

I dont think the site is down, but it surely takes a while to load (the pdf is 30 meg). The problem is that the Soviets were reorganizing their army in 1940 but Barbarossa forced them to proceed to another reorganization shortly after. So you have a TOE for 1940 and another for 1941 but it is difficult to know what equipment they really had in practice and what was only paper strength. Airborne Brigade 1940 : Strength : 3000 men and 11 tanks It had the following elements : 1/ A parachute group with 2 battalions (546 men each). Each battalion had 3 companies of 141 men; and each company had a 50mm mortar platoon. On top of this they also had a signal platoon, a sapper/demolition platoon and a small recon platoon (37 men) and possibly a company with motorcycles/bicycles. 2/ A glider group with the same organization as the parachute group. 3/ An airlanded group with the heavy weapons consisting of : 1 mortar company (9x82mm) 1 aa company (12 heavy aa mgs) 1 tank company (11 T-40 or T-38) 1 arty battalion with a battery of 4x45mm and a battery of 4x76mm Then in 1941 the new airborne brigade TOE seems to get rid of the gliders, increase the number of light tanks, reinforce the battalions and equip them with flamethrowers (1 platoon/battalion ) Airborne Brigade 1941 : 4 parachute battalions (678 men each) 1 tank battalion (50 T-37 later reduced to 32) 1 brigade arty with 6x76mm, 12x45mm and 6x82mm 1 recon company (bicycles) 1 aa mg company So yes there was a tank battalion, well at least in theory. In practice it seems that although the airborne corps were at full personel strength, they lacked equipment especially tanks and radio. Besides it was not until mid 1942 that the reorganization was complete.

It is really surprising indeed that they didnt fire a single round of 3" mortar during the whole campaign but instead seemed to rely almost exclusively on 25 pounder for HE. The bit on morale was pretty interesting too.

http://www-cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/csi.asp The Soviet Airborne Experience by Glantz (pdf). Scroll down the page it is located under Research Surveys I think the heavy weapons were supposed to be airlanded after the initial para detachment had secured a landing zone. The only support weapons mentionned are antitank rifles, 82 mm mortars and light mortars. The Germans also report Soviet troops with machine guns and grenade launchers along the Smolensk-Vyaz'ma highway. So I dont know if they received all the 45mm guns and flamethrowers they had on the TOE. Concerning the light tanks (T-37) I am pretty sure they didnt have any at least in the Viaz'ma operation in 1942.