Bozowans

He says all of this in the video though. You just made his point -- that the lack of oil ensured Germany's defeat from the beginning. And he didn't claim that oil was the only reason they lost, just that it was a major one, and probably the most significant one when looking at the grand scale. He didn't claim that Germany was defeated after they ran out of fuel either. His argument was not that the Panzer armies ran out of fuel and then were defeated, but that Germany lost because they didn't have enough oil to expand their armored and mechanized forces and keep them going to the level they needed to win the war. They had enough fuel to fight the war, but not to win it. They only had just enough fuel to run what little tanks they had, could only keep some of them activated at any one time, and even had to downscale mechanization from lack of fuel. At a time when the Soviets were motorizing and mechanizing their own armies on a massive scale, Germany was having to re-equip some of their recon units with bicycles. In late 1941, fuel rations were so tight that Germany's largest truck factory had to shut down production at one point. And then you have Hitler himself saying "If I do not get the oil of Maikop and Grozny, then I must end the war." Another one of the sources the guy used in the video said "The loss of the Caucasus would deprive the Soviet Union of half of its oil reserves and 80-90 percent of its crude oil production, refinery throughput, and pipeline capacity." So taking the Caucasus would have allowed Germany to expand their mechanization and offensive capability dramatically, while strangling the Soviets' ability to do the same, which could have been a major turning point of the war, or so he argues. The Germans did manage to take some of those oil fields, but were militarily defeated and driven out before they were able to make significant use of them. You also made a claim that "for Hitler the Ukrainian grain had a priority over the oil of the Caucasus". Where are you getting that from? Certainly it was a major priority, and the guy in the video said that. He put up another Hitler quote in there that said the "raw materials and agriculture of the Ukraine were vitally necessary for the future prosecution of the war." So it's not like the Germans were only looking at oil and nothing else. Even if what you said was true, and that Hitler thought the grain was more important than oil, that doesn't make it true. That only says what Hitler thought. Not what was actually the most important resource.

LOL I'm glad that worked! Maybe a firm kick in the rear by a new commander is just what my poor pixeltruppen needed to get the offensive going again after all. Thanks for testing that out for me. Sent you a PM.

Yeah Total War is fun, but strange to me, since the devs for those games spend a ridiculous amount of manpower and resources to produce these state of the art graphics and slick motion-captured animations for the soldiers, yet when you're actually playing the game, the battles are crazy fast-paced, and you have to spend most of your time zoomed way out clicking and clicking and clicking nonstop. If you zoom in and watch the stabbing and nice graphics, you're likely to miss some crucial event and lose the battle. It's even worse with Warhammer Total War, since on top of all the normal stuff, you have to micromanage your heroes and wizards and all their spells and stuff. I want to zoom in and watch, but I can't, so it's like the game is pulling me in two different directions there. It's nice that it has a battle replay feature, but it's not the same. In CM, there are so many crazy things that happen with the physics and ballistics, that I can spend a long time just rewinding and playing back some poor guy's death over and over. Like when a stray bullet from across the map ricochets off of a building, flies down an alleyway and smacks some guy in the face. Or a mortar shell falling into the open hatch of a tank, causing a giant ammo explosion. Or an AT shell flying between someone's legs without killing him. In my most recent game, an enemy AT gun fired at one of my tanks, missed, and the shell kept flying hundreds of meters until it slammed right into the window my artillery FO was looking out of, killing him instantly. I just don't get that kind of experience with any other video game.

Yeah same here. After playing CM for a long time, it's hard to go back to other RTS games, since I constantly want to rewind and watch what happened. It's fun to be able to zoom down to eye level and analyze every single little bullet impact and ricochet from as many different angles you want. It's hard to say what the best CM game is. They are all pretty much the same game anyway, but each one plays slightly differently since the army organizations are different. If I HAD to pick one and only one, it would probably be CMBN though. It has the most content for it.

Yeah I kinda figured it might be something like that. The "calculating turn" bar also got really, really slow before it happened, as if the game was choking on all the stuff going on. What's strange though, is that this happened AFTER I cleared the town, after a large number of units had been eliminated, and after a lull in the fighting started. Maybe it's because I gave a large number of movement orders? But why didn't it do it before, during the huge assault on the town? I do have a savegame. Maybe this will work: https://ufile.io/a5fe8 For my computer, I have an Intel Core i7-4790K CPU @ 4 GHz, with 16 GB of RAM, and a GeForce GTX 1060 6GB video card. It runs most modern games just fine.

The great human wave attack on Hofen! From the scenario "Day of Attrition". This is supposed to be one of the opening German attacks on the first day of the Bulge. In this scenario, the Germans get two battalions of Volksgrenadiers and not much else. I think they have around 700 men in total. They must cross huge areas of open ground and capture two cities with little artillery support and no tank support, and no vehicles except a few trucks. They have some HMG platoons and some mortars, but their greatest asset is their enormous numbers of MP44s. Some squads are outfitted almost entirely with MP44s. So I figured my greatest chance was to attack en masse -- a giant human wave to cross the fields and get within rifle range as quickly as possible, so I can use the superior firepower of the MP44s. To my surprise, the advance goes much more smoothly than expected. Many of the American units are overrun and annihilated, and I take many prisoners. German troops overrun and destroy a battery of AT guns, gunning down the crews with their MP44s: German troops fire at retreating US infantry: About halfway there, some of the Germans halt while they wait for a smoke barrage to come in and cover the final assault on the town. They come under US artillery fire, but for the most part, the Germans are advancing too quickly for the shells to zero in on them. I managed to storm the town and drive the Americans out with ease, but before I could reorganize and move on to the next objective, the game seemed to bug out and it seems I'm unable to finish the scenario. All the movement orders for my whole force stopped working all of a sudden and nobody will move or even fire at the enemy. It's like my army is a bunch of robots and someone hit the killswitch on them, and the whole force shut down all at once. Very strange thing.

I've always wondered what the exact effect of fatigue was. It doesn't say anything about that in the manual. So it has no effect at all then? Other than limiting the movement options of course. That's good to know. Regarding how important it is to maintain C2 links though, let's not forget to mention information sharing between units. According to the manual, there are "strong" and "weak" C2 links. Strong will be a bright red line, and represent both visual and audio contact. Weak will be a darker line and might be visual only. If you have a strong C2 link, information about the enemy can be easily shared between units through the chain of command. So maintaining C2 will improve the spotting ability and reaction times of your units, as well as making them a bit more resilient under fire. In my experience, it's good to try maintaining C2 links, but it's not really THAT important. I don't think it would be worth it to risk the lives of your HQ teams to re-establish C2 with some isolated squad somewhere for example, and sometimes I think it's a better idea to spread your men way out as much as possible, instead of clustering them all together in one spot, just so they could all hear the leader.

It says so in the manual. I have no idea how big of a difference it really makes, but the manual does state that the faster a squad is moving, the less likely they are to spot things, especially to the flanks. The manual also mentions that squads using QUICK can lose unit cohesion and be more prone to bunching up.

I've been using the MOVE command quite a bit recently, even during combat conditions, and it's worked out surprisingly well sometimes. For one thing, troops using MOVE are more aware of their surroundings. When troops are running, they are gonna spend more time looking at the ground or what's directly in front of them, trying to maintain their footing and so on. They are less likely to spot enemies, especially to the sides and rear, and are more likely to bunch up. They tend to focus on getting to their destination quickly more than anything else. When troops are walking, they have better spotting ability and are more likely to fire at any exposed enemies in the distance as well. For an example of this, just recently I had an infantry company advancing through a fairly light pine forest. I had the whole company using MOVE, even though I was expecting contact. A small enemy team opened fire on one of my scout teams out front and caused one casualty. Within a few seconds, one of my other lead squads spotted them off to their left flank and let loose a volley of return fire, immediately routing that enemy team. My advance continued unimpeded. If I had everyone running forward, their reaction times would have been slowed and they probably would have been more vulnerable. If I had everyone using HUNT, then the entire company's advance might have been halted by just a few guys. Everyone would have hit the dirt, and they might have lost sight of the enemy completely while lying prone in the underbrush. While walking, your troops can keep their heads up and on a swivel while maintaining a steady advance, without being too vulnerable. If they get shot at, it's no big deal since they'll automatically switch to a run, seek cover and/or return fire if possible. I wouldn't use MOVE during heavy combat, or to advance across open fields under fire or anything, but I still find it useful.

I've been getting back into CM lately after a long time and I haven't noticed that issue before. That's unfortunate. When I read the patch notes for the 4.0 upgrade for the first time and it said the AI would "proactively avoid incoming HE fire", I got excited and thought that they would duck down and cower from it better, not just get up and run away like that. Maybe this has already been discussed ad nauseam on here, but whenever I read memoirs or eyewitness accounts from the war, soldiers often say that you could hear incoming artillery shells from a long way off, and sometimes even see them flying through the air. After some experience, you can start to tell if an incoming shell will land next to you or not, so you know when to take cover. That seems like the best way to fix the issue. Troops in CM already seem to be able to tell when artillery is coming in, because you can hear them yell about it. They'll shout "Incoming! Take cover!" and so on. Instead of running away, can't they make it so the troops proactively hit the dirt and cower before the shells start landing? More experienced troops should be better at it of course. Once they hear shells whistling in, veterans should be smart enough to know when to keep their heads down at the bottom of their holes, and not break cover and run out into the open. If you have a movement order going on, and the troops detect artillery coming in, they should cancel it and cower. Conscripts and green troops could just ignore the incoming shells, and only react to them afterward.

Somehow I knew I would get this response. I'm sorry but that's not really an argument. You're not actually addressing the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of German half-tracks in WW2, you're flippantly dismissing it while bringing up a single unrelated anecdote from a different war and time period. Nobody in this thread has put up any authoritative source stating that half-tracks were ineffective in combat, and that the Germans always dismounted their mechanized infantry far away from the enemy, never actually using their half-tracks as assault vehicles because they were "useless." The only people I've seen argue this in my searching so far are wargamers on internet forums (not just this one). All the evidence points otherwise. The Germans seem to have relied on them very heavily, not tucking them away out of sight the moment the shooting started. The main problems the Germans had with them were that there weren't enough of them. As I pointed out before, the Germans even had flamethrower half-tracks intended for assaults at close quarters (range of 40 yards). From what I've read of their flamethrower vehicles, they would operate in platoons behind normal infantry half-tracks. Covered by fire from the other vehicles, the flamethrowers would drive right up to enemy positions and blast them. Trenches would be crossed and engaged from the flank. Why did the Germans train their troops to do this? Because they were stupid? They had years of combat experience. Why did they produce detailed manuals outlining this? For no reason? Mechanized panzergrenadiers were highly specialized units intended to follow closely behind tanks as they break through enemy lines as quickly as possible. The tanks would lead the way. These were shock tactics. They were used en masse, designed to move large numbers of infantry through ground swept by small-arms and shell fire as safely and quickly as possible. According to the Osprey book on the Sdkfz 251, "The tactics employed by the Panzer Divisions were well thought out, and efficiently executed under the best of circumstances - good preparation, the element of surprise, and sufficient armoured infantry in SPWs to exploit the gains won by the tanks. More importantly, for much of the war these tactics were sufficiently flexible and effective that they usually worked under less-than-ideal conditions, and occasionally succeeded under appalling circumstances. Where they failed the cause was usually massive enemy opposition especially co-ordinated air cover - which caused such heavy attrition in men and material that the Panzer Division no longer had sufficient forces to carry out their assigned tasks." That book even went so far as to describe in detail the distances and frontages the vehicles kept from each other while rolling over the enemy line. It's just not believable to me that the Germans conducted their famous rapid mechanized attacks by dismounting all of their infantry and then hiding their vehicles out of sight, while maybe having a guy in the turret plink away at the enemy from 1000m away. I found another interesting picture. Most pictures of half-tracks have the men hanging way out of the cabin, on a road march. This one has the men sitting in the back mostly obscured, with just the tops of some of their helmets peeking out. If they were under fire, I would imagine it would be very difficult to cause casualties to the men inside with just small-arms fire if they had their heads down. In CM, the passengers are so vulnerable with all their heads right next to each other at the same height, sitting like mannequins. I've seen three men get hit by one bullet.

You seem to take it for granted that this is true. You think the Germans never did that at this point in the war? Real life tactics are not always the same as wargame tactics. Doing a bit more digging, I found a photo of a training exercise showing a half-track crew being trained to literally drive right over a simulated enemy trench while firing down into it. The half-track is literally on top of a slit trench, and as the description notes, the soldiers are being conditioned to fight from inside the vehicle. The German field manual I posted as well as that panzergrenadier training film all demonstrate the exact same thing. This is what they were teaching their soldiers to do.

Why do you think those sources are "rarely true"? How do you know what is true then? They are training manuals. It's not an "ubermensch propaganda piece." That's what they are teaching their soldiers to do. The language is very blunt. Can you point me to something more convincing? I'm going to believe a wartime German army field manual more than some guy on the internet who says I should believe him because he says so. Where are you getting your information from that is more credible? Do you know of any good personal accounts or memoirs about panzergrenadiers? I am not an expert on this. I am only getting this stuff from googling for 30 minutes. If you read those sources, they did not say that they always fought mounted. Only that they preferred to. They say that they dismounted often only when they had no other choice, such as going into a built-up area like a town or forest. It was very clear about that. You said "When no further advance is possible could simply mean unsuppressed enemy that are gonna hurt your Hannomags." The sources said clearly that they can drive around under enemy infantry fire and still be protected. Specifically small-arms fire and "light infantry weapons." That manual said that the carriers are "the chief fighting agent" of the infantry. If the enemy has anti-tank weapons, then yes, that would be a situation in which no further advance would be possible, and the troops would likely dismount to deal with them, or move to attack another, weaker area. In CM, half-tracks simply cannot stand up to small-arms fire. Why is it so realistic to have your infantry guys in a video game sit there with their heads poking up over the sides of a half-track like that, like they are posing for target practice?

Haha. You were the one who brought up doctrine. Well as I said, according to an actual German field manual captured and translated during the war, troops fighting from inside their half-tracks were more effective, more accurate, and less vulnerable than on foot. From the way that manual sounds, huddling up inside those carriers was the most effective way to avoid those terrible and senseless losses during a characteristically aggressive German assault. It said that mechanized troops should preferably only fight on foot if the ground is not favorable for vehicles, and that the vehicles should not be used to cover the march. Instead, they should be thrown right into the attack. Here is another source. From the book "Schutzenpanzerwagon - War Horse of the Panzer Grenadiers": "Later these vehicles [Sd.Kfz.251] were more correctly called riflemen's armored trucks [Schutzenpanzerwagen, SPW for short], since they were used - as it soon turned out - not only for transport, but also for shooting from the vehicle, and the grenadiers were unloaded only in country with a poor view, such as forest, town and night battle." And another. From the book "Sd.Kfz 251 Half-Track 1939-1945": "Important combat lessons from the Spanish Civil War showed, among other things, that in many cases tanks in restricted areas - towns, mountain passes, woods, etc - were vulnerable to enemy anti-tank weapons. In such circumstances, infantry support and protection were badly needed. Guderian submitted proposals to develop a specific vehicle designed to carry supporting infantry into action, allowing them to fight from the vehicle on the move if necessary, or to dismount and engage the enemy on foot." These are infantry fighting vehicles, not trucks.

That's certainly true. I've only played against a human player a couple of times. I would imagine that when playing against a human, a harassing barrage with a low rate of fire would be good for area denial over a very long period of time. But would that be more effective than trying to call a quick, intense barrage on his men before they can get away? I guess that would depend on the scenario.

I've been trying to find information online about how the Germans used their half-tracks. After googling for a bit, I can't find anything that says they always kept them back, AWAY from the enemy. Everything I read seems to be the opposite. Here's a link referencing the US War Department "Handbook on German Military Forces" (Mar '45) http://etloh.8m.com/strategy/offense.html "The coordination between tanks and Panzer Grenadiers moving into combat on armored half-tracks is similar to the technique employed in a purely armored formation, since the armored half-tracks are not only troop-carrying vehicles but also combat vehicles. When the terrain is favorable for tank warfare, the Panzer Grenadiers in their armored half-tracks follow immediately with the second wave, after the first tank wave has overrun the opponent's position. A deep and narrow formation is employed. After the penetration, the main mission of the Panzer Grenadiers is to overcome the enemy positions which survived the first wave." That manual also makes a reference to German infantry disembarking, "at the last possible moment." Here's a link to a German field manual: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/cgsc/carl/wwIIspec/number04.pdf 1) "The possession of armored personnel carriers enables motorized infantry units to overcome comparatively weak opposition without dismounting. They can follow up tank attacks on the field of battle without dismounting." 2) "Firing from the carrier increases the effectiveness of the weapons. This improvement is due to the greater mobility, the constant readiness to open fire, the armor (which affords protection against enemy infantry fire), and the greater accuracy of fire." 3) "The cross-country performance and armor, of this vehicle, together with the possibility of fighting from it, make the armored personnel carrier the chief fighting agent of motorized infantry. It can cover long distances rapidly and at the same time conserve the energies of the men. It can travel on all roads in any season. Its fording, climbing, and crossing abilities combine to give a high cross-country performance. Providing the ground is firm and level, the normal road speed can be maintained off roads and tracks. Its armor gives protection against small-arms fire, light infantry weapons, and shell splinters. The vehicles can therefore be brought up to the battle area and moved about under fire from enemy infantry." 4) "In order to conserve the valuable fighting powers of the armored companies they should not be used as covering parties on the march, nor split up into separate reconnaissance patrols. It is equally inadvisable to weaken these companies by allotting single armored carriers to other units and headquarters." 5) "Unless otherwise ordered, the attack will be carried out on vehicles. Dismounting takes place when no further advance is possible. The decision to fight on vehicles or on foot is as a rule left to the company commander. When it appears impracticable to continue fighting on vehicles, a resourceful commander will always look around for the possibility of continuing the attack on vehicles at another point." According to this, you should NOT dismount unless you absolutely have to. Half-tracks should be used en masse to overrun the enemy, driving right at them, and right over them, firing from the vehicle, preferably in coordination with tanks. The half-tracks should always keep up with the tanks, and the infantry should only dismount if necessary to clear some troublesome patch of resistance. Then they quickly get back into the vehicles and move on. Here's a training video, depicting half-tracks with flamethrowers overrunning enemy positions at close range: The way they make it look, it's like they're mowing the lawn or something.

No, I'm talking about halftrack passengers in a video game, and whether or not they are too vulnerable. I said the Germans were often very aggressive historically. The player in this game can behave any way he chooses. And you didn't answer my question. You seem to think that the Germans never used halftracks in an aggressive role historically. Why? Because US Army doctrine says they have to be 2000m away? You brought up one example of the Panzer Lehr division moving its halftracks back one time because they were supposedly "useless." What is your source for this?

So you're claiming the Germans historically never used their halftracks in an aggressive role? Where are you getting that from? "US army doctrine" doesn't count. German training and fascist ideology put heavy emphasis on individual initiative and aggressive, dynamic action during combat. They were taught to act quickly, often without waiting to be told what to do. Fascist ideology and everything that entailed -- its hero worship, parades, medals, self-sacrificing behavior, and sense of innate superiority led to highly aggressive, often reckless behavior on the battlefield, especially among the Waffen SS. From the book "Soldaten" by Sonke Neitzel and Harald Welzer: "Wehrmacht soldiers generally agreed that the SS troops were 'bullish' extremists, heedless even of death, marching into the crossfire to the strains of 'Deutschland uber alles' and suffering 'terrible,' 'insane,' and 'senseless' losses." There is an account of Haupsturmfuhrer von Benden leading an attack in his car, with his battalion marching in step behind him under fire. There are panzergrenadier training films that show halftracks literally driving right over enemy positions and firing down into them as they go past, at point blank range. The Germans had flamethrower halftracks for getting in close to burn out enemy positions, mostly issued to SS panzergrenadier units. Do you really think nobody ever drove their halftracks up close to their enemies? People were often literally run over and crushed by tank treads during that war. CM isn't always a realistic representation of combat, as much as we would all like it to be. Really, all I want is some way for halftrack passengers to not stick their heads way up over the sides like they're trying to present themselves for target practice.

What bothers me is that passengers just calmly sit there, bolt upright, like statues, with their heads sticking way up over the sides, even with a hail of bullets coming at them. It's always been a weird thing about the game. The game needs a "cower" animation for vehicle passengers and gunners. You should be able to suppress them and force their heads down just like any other man. Let's ignore all the tactical doctrine and whatnot that says you shouldn't move halftracks forward into combat or closer than X number of meters or whatever. That's not really relevant to whether the game mechanics in themselves are realistic or not. What if a halftrack gets ambushed? Look at the 15 second mark, and you will see passengers in the back of that halftrack sitting down with their heads far less exposed than how they would be in the game. The camera appears to be at a slightly higher elevation than the vehicle, and even then you can see only the tops of their helmets at best. If they're getting shot at they can just scrunch their bodies down a little bit lower and they would be fine. I'm sure you could chew up the armor by shooting up the side of the halftrack with a machine gun or something, but vehicle passengers are far more vulnerable in the game than they would ever be in reality. IIRC, BFC fixed halftrack gunners a bit in a patch by lowering them a bit, but they never did the same thing for passengers.

The AI can be hilariously sadistic in this game. I've seen guys keep firing into dead/wounded bodies on the ground quite often. I've seen SMG guys bump into an enemy at point blank range, kill him, then unload the rest of the magazine into the corpse at his feet. I've seen riflemen casually snap off a round into a corpse as they walk by, shortly after clearing the position. There's always a delay before the AI will stop firing, so sometimes they'll shoot people as they're surrendering. I swear one time I saw one of my men shoot a corpse and it must have been 20+ seconds after the position had already been cleared. It was all quiet and we were already moving onto the next position when *bang* some guy fired right into a random body. Even though there isn't any blood or gore in the game, it can still be disturbing to watch sometimes. Half the time your men are gunning people down as they lie scared and cowering in a hole in the ground. And then you watch a guy calmly cycle the bolt on his rifle and fire two more shots into a body at his feet before moving on.

Artillery can be incredibly destructive in this game. I like to call in very long bombardments using very low rates of fire, usually at the harass or maybe the light setting depending on the situation. If I have four guns in one of my off-map batteries, I might just use one or two tubes during a mission. Then I can keep a barrage going for a very long time, sometimes for the length of the entire scenario if I have enough ammo. The game is very slow-paced, and I don't often see a need for fast bombardments. I think the most devastating barrage I've ever seen was in a CMBN scenario, during one of the campaigns. I was the British defending against an SS battalion. I had a couple batteries of heavy off-map guns and a few TRPs. The SS had to run across a few wheat fields and then reach a long line of low hedges at the end in order to fire on my positions. I had a feeling they would mass their troops behind that hedgeline for a base of fire and staging point for their assault. I put down a TRP on each end of the hedgeline, slightly inside the wheat fields, so I could draw a linear bombardment line between them, from one TRP to the other, like a curtain in front of my position. When they started streaming across the fields, I called in all of my guns, on harass mode, using airbursting shells. The barrage was slow and lasted like 15-20 minutes, and they walked right into it. An entire SS company was annihilated, and another took heavy losses. The attack was shattered and I took almost no casualties during that scenario. I was kind of stunned when the scenario ended and I got to scroll around the field looking at all the bodies, almost all of them from the shelling. When I'm attacking, I like to call in point target missions on harass mode. I'll destroy one foxhole/gun position and then adjust the same mission over and over to walk the shells onto new targets. I rarely call in heavier bombardments unless I'm playing as the Russians, since their artillery is so much less responsive. If you call in a heavy, intense barrage onto a line of foxholes for example, you might hit a couple of guys when the first shells impact, but the rest of the enemy will drop down into their holes and wait out the rest of the barrage. The shells are wasted unless you get a rare direct hit or if you have assault troops already waiting nearby, ready to take advantage of the suppression. However, if you have shells hitting intermittently over the course of 5, 10 minutes or longer, it can be deadly. The enemy will keep popping their heads up out of their holes between shells only for another one to land nearby 30 seconds later, spraying shrapnel into their faces while they're sitting up in their holes. They'll duck back down, and then the suppression will wear off and they'll pop back up again only for another shell to hit. Having random shells falling amidst the enemy over a very long period of time will also help your infantry get the upper hand in firefights throughout the course of the game.

I haven't read his other book, but I did see a lot of negative Amazon reviews for it, including someone claiming to be from the 84th questioning it. That isn't enough for me to dismiss the book though. While reading Inside the Battle of the Bulge, I did think some of the experiences he wrote about could be exaggerated or half-remembered, like how war memoirs often are (like how every German tank always seems to be a Tiger tank), his writing style can be kind of melodramatic, and he does get into some bizarre and seemingly unbelievable situations. I can understand how some might question it. Some soldiers writing about their experiences can get dates and place names wrong, or confused with each other, thinking that one action happened at a particular time or at a particular place, while the reality may have been a bit different. So something might not add up when looking back. The day-to-day grind of front line fighting during a long campaign can be a confusing, exhausting blur for the soldiers on the ground. Bizarre and unbelievable situations happen all the time in war. Some medal of honor citations I've read sound outright ridiculous to me, like it's right out of Call of Duty or something, with guys running around mowing down enemies left and right while getting shot, stabbed, blown up and clubbed over and over again, and yet they still keep going. Blunt's book actually seems tame compared to some of those guys, and most of his book is not unbelievable at all. Blunt is on record receiving a bronze star, a purple heart and a few combat infantry badges. So I don't know really. I would still recommend reading the book for anyone interested in war or a game like Combat Mission.

I like to use them as fast moving flankers. They're small and fast and can zip around just about anywhere, squeezing through tight spaces. I use the same tactics with Bren carriers. Use them to flank and encircle enemy troops, or drop off scouts and fireteams behind enemy positions if the jeep has no MG. American squads can chew through ammo really fast, so I'll put down a massive hail of covering fire with everything I've got toward some German position and then rush a jeep up to their flank real fast, before I go through too much ammo. I might have some assault troops out on foot accompanying the jeep if I can. There have been times where I've rushed a jeep right up to a suppressed enemy position and watched it mow down whole squads from a few feet away. You can do this even with jeeps that don't have the MG on the back. You can have an assault team pile into the back, and do a drive-by shooting, with the guys in the back spraying wildly with their SMGs at everything that moves. It's hilarious if you can pull it off. This is obviously risky and works best against isolated groups of infantry who are pinned down for the moment.

If anyone wants a personal account of the battle, I recommend this: Inside the Battle of the Bulge: A Private Comes of Age by Roscoe C. Blunt Jr. http://www.amazon.com/Inside-Battle-Bulge-Private-Comes/dp/0275945456 It's a pretty violent book filled with a lot of front line combat, written by a US infantryman. He got himself into some really nasty fighting (including hand to hand), against infantry and tanks, and almost got himself killed many, many times. He was also part of the same division my own grandfather was in during the battle (84th Railsplitters) so I'm fascinated by it. The author spoke German as well, which led to some interesting situations the common soldier wouldn't have experienced. I would definitely recommend it to anyone who plays these games. It has some nice, detailed, hand-drawn maps of a few different towns where the fighting was. It makes me want to get into CM scenario design so I could recreate these.

I'm curious about that myself. They can fire through the woods? Or over the woods because of a hill? If they can see that field, they can tear those guys to pieces as they run across. Could you post a screenshot looking down the barrels of those tanks maybe?