Rinaldi

Good things come to those who wait, hope things have calmed down on your end MMM 

The One Hundred and Fourth Minute (Much Delayed - soz)
KG Leino -  Die Mitte
I decide to pull Jean back under covering fire of T2 as he has the spotting contacts wrt the armour and I want to get the info to the Tigers asap.

He does not come under fire, and is almost back at turn's end.
On the right I've still got troops watching the road to the farm. I'm thinking of sending a team out to check if that T34 is still in the trees guarding that approach to make sure it isn't sneaking up on KG Perala on the right.

KG Koskela - die Links
The Panthers are area firing the trees and the bend in the road as that's where he seems to have concentrated his forces.

The dismounts come up level to the StuG and start taking scattered mortar fire. One man gets slightly wounded but there are no other casualties.

The culprit is soon spotted sitting out in a field. Strange choice of location, he'll get some love next turn.

KG Perala - das Rechts
The StuG nudges forward into visual range of the road...

...as does the Tiger...

...and the AT team stops in place hoping to get a shot into the flank or rear of the repositioning T34.

Alas they never get the spot and the T34 makes it to wherever it is going. It's time to begin the assault, the KG is far too exposed out here in the tundra and I've pushed my luck as far as I can, I'm expecting him to launch an attack to wipe out this force any moment.
SITMAP

A bit of a pity we couldn't get any spots on that T34 on the right but them's the breaks. I'll pull the Tiger and StuG back and start advancing on GRAU.
KG Koskela may be up against more than they can handle. I'm going to do a little test to see if he has infantry supporting the T34s in the trees, I would be shocked if he didn't but hopefully we'll know soon. I also am curious as to what he has done, if anything, with the forces that were in the trees "guarding" the highway.
In the middle I'm going to share the intel that Jean has gathered and then start to advance to see if we can find where those T34s went and if they are indeed still on this side of the stream.
MMM

Have been enjoying your AAR and it will be interesting to discuss the various strategies used in this scenario after the scenario is completed.  Personally, I thought it very risky to divide forces when I played.

Yes it would be good to compare. It's certainly an interesting dilemma: take a rag tag mix of units that are underpowered as far as infantry go and secure an area this size against overwhelming numbers. I thought long and hard about whether to split them up or not, we'll see how it turns out.
MMM

July 16th, 1145 hours.
Triumph to tragedy.
“Sir…I’m not raising TOC” the RTO said, hesitatingly. Booth met the man’s eyes. Silent dread communicated between them.  He was about to tell him to try one more time when the FSGT came trundling back around the corner in his ‘peep.’ That’s not good. A gnawing, creeping realisation made its way up out of the small of Booth’s back and crawled up his spine. The NCO’s face was boulder-like. Jaw set…
TOC had been hit. Hard. They had failed to displace for one minute too many and got plastered by Soviet artillery, much like the Soviets in Dorfborn were having their back broken by vengeful American artillery fire. Like one of the four horsemen, the FSGT had been tasked with riding back to his CO to deliver the grim news. Basically, every senior officer in TOC had been taken out: the LTC, S-1 and S-3 had all been wounded enough to warrant evacuation. The XO was severely wounded, an arm and a leg severed, his condition critical. The HHC CO killed, caught away from any cover momentarily, ripped to shreds by shrapnel. All that was left of the staff was the S-2, who refused to be evacuated despite painful neck wounds, and the duty NCOs.
“You’re it” the FSGT growled, “you got seniority. The Battalion’s yours, sir.” A thunderclap. Booth was in command. The entirety of TF Dragon. Well over 700 surviving men, 700 souls. The burden could’ve crushed him then and there, and likely should have, but something turned in him. Eyes narrowing, he quickly told the dependable NCO to hurry ahead back to what was left of the TOC and have the S-2 re organise the NCOs into acting battle captains. He would follow shortly in his command track, handing off command of the unit to his equally dependable XO, 1LT Noonan. He would hurl together a hasty TOC and strain every nerve to get the unit back under control.
Chapter 5: Thorn in the Side
Northwest of Neuhof, July 16th, 1600 hours.
Luckily, the TOC’s survivors showed themselves up to the task. They had worried Booth at first, most had some minor wounds and all had looked deeply shaken. The M577s were ruined messes, but neither had taken direct hits, and much of the vital planning material was salvageable. Whatever morale had been wavering was firmed up by the arrival of the CPT and the news that B Team had savaged the enemy to its front. Booth had energized the headquarters with his arrival, distracted grieving men by entrusting them with key tasks (appealing, subconsciously, to the professional pride of each individual NCO), and focused their efforts back on the fight – a fight he had convinced them they were winning. The impact was electric. Within the hour they were ready to receive orders from brigade, by 1500 the bulk of the battalion was pulling back, knowing full well the punch-drunk MRR to their front was in no condition to follow closely and fill the gap, let alone pursue with vigour or violence.
As the skeleton TOC organised the move and conformed with orders, Booth was presented with his first command decision: the TF had mauled the MRR so thoroughly that a neighbouring Soviet unit had begun to shake out into the attack on a town called Uttrichausen with its right flank twisting in the wind. Brigade was willing to move boundaries on a dime and have TF Dragon nail the lead MRB of that unit from the flank. Booth leapt at the opportunity, and task organised his Scout Platoon and surviving anti-tank platoon to do so. They hadn’t had time to resupply, and thus the fight was going to be a tight one, but the potential payoff was worth it; success could likely keep the entire brigade counterpunching whilst the next line of defence was constructed. The Soviets were templated to be passing through Dollbach around 1630 hours, beyond which was their probable line of departure.

 
Command devolved to 1LT Pemberton, the Anti-tank Platoon CO, and his surviving 6 ITOWs. 1LT Horning, the battalion scout platoon leader, would race ahead with his extremely depleted force; two M113s, an ITOW (with only 4 missiles) and a meagre 3 Dragon missiles. He had two scout sections to spare, led by SGTs Roy and Chung. They would engage forward elements and buy time for Pemberton’s two sections and the attached air-defence joes.
Pemberton, bumping along in his ‘peep’ hastily did a map recce and came up with BPs. He prayed to God the map was accurate to the terrain, there was no time to do a proper terrain walk. This was an aggressive interdiction, no doubt about it, the young man thought. His eagerness to hit the enemy when they were exposed was tempered by the ever-human fear of the unknown.  How to execute this fight? Across the valley the enemy would traverse was a thick treeline. The Soviets must have known their flank was in the air by now, and if he was the Soviet commander, he’d have units in that treeline dominating the heights overlooking Dollbach. How to fire into the valley without exposing his vulnerable ITOWs? A crossfire, that’s what he’d have to establish, keyhole positions, he thought with finality. Pemberton had his plan.
Taskings:
BP1: Scout ITOW, 1st AT section (alternate)
BP2 – 1st AT section (main)
BPs 3A & 3B – 2nd AT section (main and alternate)
EA Alpha – Forward of point 430, left-flank of Dollbach
EA Bravo – Forward of point 401, right-flank of Dollbach
***
The Soviets’ hackles were raised; thought 1LT Horning, as he watched a pair of Hinds flit in and out of sight across the valley, flashing over the thick, forested hills. They had put a lot of combat aviation forward, clearly cognizant of the exposed flank of this unit. It was a high summer day, and any vehicular movement kicked up hanging dust clouds, prompting Horning to spread his thin resources out, and give strict instructions for the tracks to make quick dashes, pausing frequently to let the dust settle as they sheltered under the next nearest copse of trees. Slowly, but surely, they managed to set themselves up in their assigned positions, finding decent concealment and cover to establish firing positions from.

By 1604 hours, Horning and SGT Chung have set themselves up in excellent firing positions on the extreme flanks of the AO.

As the scouts settled into their hides, a sudden pop is heard as a Stinger missile screeches upwards. One of the hunting Hinds had raised itself up too much, for too long, across the valley and an American AD man had chanced a shot.

The Hind’s weapons operator saw the tell-tale report and, swearing, alerted the pilot in time. The Hind bucked down sharply, and the missile failed to track. The other hinds, spooked by their comrades’ close call, follow suit. The air threat abates, for now.
SGT Chung, only momentarily distracted by the firing of the Stinger, shakes his head and concentrates. Over the distant thwock-thwock of the omnipresent Hinds, he can hear – more accurately, feel – the rumble of an approaching formation. A moment later, he can see it for himself: an entire MRC. He urgently whispers to his RTO to send the word. The RTO duly whispers the code phrase for contact: Rio Grande. The pre-arranged cluster mission begins to fire, forcing the BTRs to accelerate through the maelstrom.

“Jesus, Mary and Stonewall Jackson sir, that’s got to be an entire company – what the hell we going to do about that with just one shot?” whispers Horning’s RTO in an awed tone. Horning ignores the man and presses himself further against the ground, putting his hands under his chest. He awkwardly cranes his neck downwards and rolls his eyes up, attempting to keep a good eye on the BTRs while masking as much unnatural colour – his skin, the whites of his eyes – as he can. He wished he had time to apply camo paint. If any of this mass of enemy units spotted him, they were dead. BTR turrets were awkwardly trying to scan for targets, but their 14mm machine cannons were bouncing around visibly. Good he thought, hope the bastard gunners are blind. More problematic of course, were the Soviet rifleman hanging out of the rear hatches, with the occasional BTR having a Soviet soldier bouncing a SA-7 on his shoulder, scanning the skies for targets.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1 – “
Horning’s RTO scrambles to lower the volume on the receiver, as SGT Chung continues.
“- I am engaging. Making this missile count. Out.”

It takes a minute for Horning to spot an opportune target for his own position to follow the NCO’s lead. In frustration they watch BTRs briskly march past. Then, it happens: a BTR visibly slows down as it attempts to push through a small windbreak of trees. Tapping the Dragon gunner on his steel helmet, the 1LT points towards the target with an arrow-straight arm. The missile hits, but barely, almost passing between the wheels and underneath the BTR.


“Get the track to make a run for SGT Roy’s OP/LP, he’s got the spare missile. Run him down here and lets see if we can’t hit something else. Once you’ve passed that message on we are displacing, shift 30m right. One at a time, keep low and copy my stance.” The Officer whispers urgently.
***
Pemberton could see his young driver struggling to restrain himself from speeding forward. It was a battle the PFC was losing, as the distance inexorably widened between their ‘peep’ and the ITOWs and VADs that formed their small column. A soft word saw the vehicle pull back again. The 1LT couldn’t blame his driver’s haste. They had just arrived with the first section of his platoon, and already there was a thin spire of smoke reaching out from the valley, in what he estimated was EA Bravo. The lead Soviet elements were already in the area. There was no time to waste. The section raced towards its assigned BP, with VADs pulling off the road to take up covering positions.

Horning was desperately trying to shift the artillery fires to the overpass and road bridge; this lead Soviet company was making tracks, pushing through their anaemic ambush with remarkable discipline. The tail of the column was now entering EA Bravo. He could hear SGT Chung ordering SPC Brody, the commander of their sole ITV, to engage.
The ITV duly rumbled forward from the treeline it had taken as its hide in BP1 and inches forward along the flat plateau to its front. Brody soon identifies a plethora of targets. With a pop the first ITOW roars out, popping up then being pushed down by the gunner. It reaches out, a red dot in Brody’s field of vision. 

“Target!” the SPC roars, and then guides on: “Gunner, traverse right, two PCs forward of the line of trees”
“On. Firing!” comes the excited response. The second ITOW races out, but Brody can already tell its going to be a miss, as the Gunner struggles to both chase the accelerating BTR and keep the missile down. It passes just high.

Two sweating men in the cargo hatch quickly reload the last two missiles, but Brody’s crew once again have a mixed engagement. The third missile strikes another BTR, this one racing up a crop-filled slope towards a windbreak and the MSR. It explodes violently. Their fourth shot misses entirely, the missile going ballistic and slamming only a few dozen feet in front of them along the ridge, inert.
“Driver reverse, back to our original position.” Brody says through gritted teeth, whilst deploying smoke to cover the retrograde movement. Bitterly disappointed, nevertheless his part of the fight is over. Even as he pulls back, he hears 1LT Horning report the entry of yet another mass of enemy vehicles. If only we had time to resupply.

Unbeknownst to the disappointed Scout ITOW crew, however, Pemberton and his three anti-tank launchers had just taken up position in BP2. Pemberton and his RTO leapt from their Jeep and raced forward, taking cover among some trees at the lip of the ridge, to better direct fire whilst guiding his tracks into positions. The officer knew fire discipline would be key, not a missile could go to waste firing at a target another vehicle was already engaging. A bit awkwardly at first, but successfully, he used some landmarks to assign fire sectors to his three ITOWs.

Like their Scout counterpart, however, the anti-tankers have trouble striking their fast, fleeting targets. Two TOWs miss, badly. It is not until the third TOW that a target is struck successfully. Pemberton puts out a calming word, his unnaturally even voice having its intended effect. The gunners redouble their efforts, taking their time to line up the shots.
“Aim high, guide low boys, don’t rush things” the officer chides.
ITOWs begin to hit with regularity over the ensuing minutes, and the enemy BTRs stop manoeuvring so smartly. Casualties and evasive actions cause the formation to become strung out, which only increases their exposure. The young gunners stop suffering from “buck fever” and are better able to pick out lone targets. From his vantage point, Pemberton can report an increasing number of burning enemy BTRs with exultant satisfaction. Between 1615-1616 hours, 6 TOWs are fired for 4 kills, illustrating the furious rate of fire and the cornucopia of targets.


Whilst BP2 turns EA Bravo into a charnel house, the balance of the AT platoon arrives on the heights, and transit through the small town of Zillbach towards BP3. 

There’s just one problem, though: SGT Chung and his team, who boldly have remained in their initial firing positions to act as an OP/LP, spot a new threat.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1”
“This is Dragon 1”
“This callsign currently observing four times enemy tangoes, treeline near road bridge. Out to you.”
“Acknowledged, Dragon 2. We’ll let the AT know. Out.”

1LT Pemberton warns his leading SPC in the second section, and the determined enlisted man simply states they’ll keep the threat in mind and attempt to find positions masked to this new threat in BP3. Indeed, two of the three ITOWs can do just that. One, however, led by a SPC Catalano, running out of space to jockey, is surprised to find a T-64 aiming – at him!
Catalano’s gunner fires twice in rapid succession, more from shock than aggressive mindedness. The first TOW becomes a satellite, spinning off into space, and the second slams into the ground just on the other side of their hull down position. Catalano sees a giant burst of flame, and briefly and irrationally believes his gunner has scored a hit…then sees a small green dot grow larger and larger. It passes over their vehicle, and even ensconced inside the vibrating M113 and through his CVC, he can hear a faint sucking woosh. Too close for comfort. Gathering his wits, he gets his driver to reverse.

 
While BP3 struggles to find good positions, Pemberton continues to reap a grim bounty. Handing off targets personally and ensuring the pre-assigned fire sectors are maintained, BP2 continues to turn EA Bravo into a hellscape. Individual Soviet BTRs mill about in confusion. Their indecisiveness often fatal.

Despite the presence of the T-64s making BP3 a no-go for firing into EA Alpha, the three ITOWs (including a recovered SPC Catalano) can take positions that allow them to thicken the fire in EA Bravo. The initial engagements are frustrated by low field of view and limited time to target, but they eventually tally a few BTRs themselves. 

Perhaps spurred on by the suffering MRB’s survivors, the Hinds make a belated reappearance. This time any pretence of careful flying is tossed aside; the Hinds roar up and forward, seeking to strafe the assailants. One Hind is able to get a burst off, severely damaging one of Pemberton’s ITOWs, but four Hinds are swiftly destroyed by the overwhelming amount of SHORAD provided by Booth. One Hind is struck by a stinger and crashes in the valley, destroying a cowshed as its flaming carcass crashes through the structure’s roof.

The flight of the Hinds proves to be a bookend for the engagement at Dollbach. In BP2 the ITOWs begin to report going “black” on ammo, and one by one pop smoke and retreat into the cover of nearby trees. Pemberton himself taps his RTO on the helmet and dashes back to firmer concealment, where he begins to issue orders for the retreat.
The last of the mauled MRB, under the cover of the suicidally courageous Hinds, presses past EA Bravo and out of sight. Trailing them come the T-64s, who break cover and roar forward, in odd mimicry of the Hinds. They wheel to their left and attempt to break past EA Bravo.
Catalano is waiting, and along with the rest of his section in BP3, savage the tanks. In short order, 5 T-64s are burning.



An eerie silence descends… the only living creatures in the valley are wounded and burned Soviet riflemen and crewmen, painfully crawling away from their stricken mounts. The silence does not last, as mortars begin to search out for the Americans in BP3. A round crashes just behind SGT Chung.
“Displace! Back to the track” he screams with furious urgency.
The sound of the mortars fade, and all the SGT can hear is his own rattling breath and a pounding in his ears. He never hears the fateful round: there is just a flash of red, and then a disconnected awareness that something is not right…why am I on my back he ponders? He tries to get up. He cannot. He has no left leg. The realisation sends his mind into overdrive for a few moments, and his last conscious thought is simply an Oh my God before he lapses into unconsciousness and shock. Lying beside him are two of his men. One is killed, the other so severely wounded that he can only lay there in a heap, sucking air in a hideous rattle, before he shortly passes away. Chung’s RTO, on the verge of panic, drags his SGT back to the M113.  

It is the final part of this drama in miniature. As the mortar rounds continue to search out targets, the order from Pemberton is acknowledged across the net: the job was complete. Across the three BPs, the Scouts and Anti-tankers reverse out of sight, and then, slowly pick their way back to the rendezvous point.

Accurately assessing the damage was difficult, and Pemberton could only provide his new boss an estimate. The measure of success would only come in the following hour: the attack had been stopped cold, and the enemy’s lead element was barely a MRC in strength.


 
 

July 16th, 1145 hours.
Triumph to tragedy.
“Sir…I’m not raising TOC” the RTO said, hesitatingly. Booth met the man’s eyes. Silent dread communicated between them.  He was about to tell him to try one more time when the FSGT came trundling back around the corner in his ‘peep.’ That’s not good. A gnawing, creeping realisation made its way up out of the small of Booth’s back and crawled up his spine. The NCO’s face was boulder-like. Jaw set…
TOC had been hit. Hard. They had failed to displace for one minute too many and got plastered by Soviet artillery, much like the Soviets in Dorfborn were having their back broken by vengeful American artillery fire. Like one of the four horsemen, the FSGT had been tasked with riding back to his CO to deliver the grim news. Basically, every senior officer in TOC had been taken out: the LTC, S-1 and S-3 had all been wounded enough to warrant evacuation. The XO was severely wounded, an arm and a leg severed, his condition critical. The HHC CO killed, caught away from any cover momentarily, ripped to shreds by shrapnel. All that was left of the staff was the S-2, who refused to be evacuated despite painful neck wounds, and the duty NCOs.
“You’re it” the FSGT growled, “you got seniority. The Battalion’s yours, sir.” A thunderclap. Booth was in command. The entirety of TF Dragon. Well over 700 surviving men, 700 souls. The burden could’ve crushed him then and there, and likely should have, but something turned in him. Eyes narrowing, he quickly told the dependable NCO to hurry ahead back to what was left of the TOC and have the S-2 re organise the NCOs into acting battle captains. He would follow shortly in his command track, handing off command of the unit to his equally dependable XO, 1LT Noonan. He would hurl together a hasty TOC and strain every nerve to get the unit back under control.
Chapter 5: Thorn in the Side
Northwest of Neuhof, July 16th, 1600 hours.
Luckily, the TOC’s survivors showed themselves up to the task. They had worried Booth at first, most had some minor wounds and all had looked deeply shaken. The M577s were ruined messes, but neither had taken direct hits, and much of the vital planning material was salvageable. Whatever morale had been wavering was firmed up by the arrival of the CPT and the news that B Team had savaged the enemy to its front. Booth had energized the headquarters with his arrival, distracted grieving men by entrusting them with key tasks (appealing, subconsciously, to the professional pride of each individual NCO), and focused their efforts back on the fight – a fight he had convinced them they were winning. The impact was electric. Within the hour they were ready to receive orders from brigade, by 1500 the bulk of the battalion was pulling back, knowing full well the punch-drunk MRR to their front was in no condition to follow closely and fill the gap, let alone pursue with vigour or violence.
As the skeleton TOC organised the move and conformed with orders, Booth was presented with his first command decision: the TF had mauled the MRR so thoroughly that a neighbouring Soviet unit had begun to shake out into the attack on a town called Uttrichausen with its right flank twisting in the wind. Brigade was willing to move boundaries on a dime and have TF Dragon nail the lead MRB of that unit from the flank. Booth leapt at the opportunity, and task organised his Scout Platoon and surviving anti-tank platoon to do so. They hadn’t had time to resupply, and thus the fight was going to be a tight one, but the potential payoff was worth it; success could likely keep the entire brigade counterpunching whilst the next line of defence was constructed. The Soviets were templated to be passing through Dollbach around 1630 hours, beyond which was their probable line of departure.

 
Command devolved to 1LT Pemberton, the Anti-tank Platoon CO, and his surviving 6 ITOWs. 1LT Horning, the battalion scout platoon leader, would race ahead with his extremely depleted force; two M113s, an ITOW (with only 4 missiles) and a meagre 3 Dragon missiles. He had two scout sections to spare, led by SGTs Roy and Chung. They would engage forward elements and buy time for Pemberton’s two sections and the attached air-defence joes.
Pemberton, bumping along in his ‘peep’ hastily did a map recce and came up with BPs. He prayed to God the map was accurate to the terrain, there was no time to do a proper terrain walk. This was an aggressive interdiction, no doubt about it, the young man thought. His eagerness to hit the enemy when they were exposed was tempered by the ever-human fear of the unknown.  How to execute this fight? Across the valley the enemy would traverse was a thick treeline. The Soviets must have known their flank was in the air by now, and if he was the Soviet commander, he’d have units in that treeline dominating the heights overlooking Dollbach. How to fire into the valley without exposing his vulnerable ITOWs? A crossfire, that’s what he’d have to establish, keyhole positions, he thought with finality. Pemberton had his plan.
Taskings:
BP1: Scout ITOW, 1st AT section (alternate)
BP2 – 1st AT section (main)
BPs 3A & 3B – 2nd AT section (main and alternate)
EA Alpha – Forward of point 430, left-flank of Dollbach
EA Bravo – Forward of point 401, right-flank of Dollbach
***
The Soviets’ hackles were raised; thought 1LT Horning, as he watched a pair of Hinds flit in and out of sight across the valley, flashing over the thick, forested hills. They had put a lot of combat aviation forward, clearly cognizant of the exposed flank of this unit. It was a high summer day, and any vehicular movement kicked up hanging dust clouds, prompting Horning to spread his thin resources out, and give strict instructions for the tracks to make quick dashes, pausing frequently to let the dust settle as they sheltered under the next nearest copse of trees. Slowly, but surely, they managed to set themselves up in their assigned positions, finding decent concealment and cover to establish firing positions from.

By 1604 hours, Horning and SGT Chung have set themselves up in excellent firing positions on the extreme flanks of the AO.

As the scouts settled into their hides, a sudden pop is heard as a Stinger missile screeches upwards. One of the hunting Hinds had raised itself up too much, for too long, across the valley and an American AD man had chanced a shot.

The Hind’s weapons operator saw the tell-tale report and, swearing, alerted the pilot in time. The Hind bucked down sharply, and the missile failed to track. The other hinds, spooked by their comrades’ close call, follow suit. The air threat abates, for now.
SGT Chung, only momentarily distracted by the firing of the Stinger, shakes his head and concentrates. Over the distant thwock-thwock of the omnipresent Hinds, he can hear – more accurately, feel – the rumble of an approaching formation. A moment later, he can see it for himself: an entire MRC. He urgently whispers to his RTO to send the word. The RTO duly whispers the code phrase for contact: Rio Grande. The pre-arranged cluster mission begins to fire, forcing the BTRs to accelerate through the maelstrom.

“Jesus, Mary and Stonewall Jackson sir, that’s got to be an entire company – what the hell we going to do about that with just one shot?” whispers Horning’s RTO in an awed tone. Horning ignores the man and presses himself further against the ground, putting his hands under his chest. He awkwardly cranes his neck downwards and rolls his eyes up, attempting to keep a good eye on the BTRs while masking as much unnatural colour – his skin, the whites of his eyes – as he can. He wished he had time to apply camo paint. If any of this mass of enemy units spotted him, they were dead. BTR turrets were awkwardly trying to scan for targets, but their 14mm machine cannons were bouncing around visibly. Good he thought, hope the bastard gunners are blind. More problematic of course, were the Soviet rifleman hanging out of the rear hatches, with the occasional BTR having a Soviet soldier bouncing a SA-7 on his shoulder, scanning the skies for targets.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1 – “
Horning’s RTO scrambles to lower the volume on the receiver, as SGT Chung continues.
“- I am engaging. Making this missile count. Out.”

It takes a minute for Horning to spot an opportune target for his own position to follow the NCO’s lead. In frustration they watch BTRs briskly march past. Then, it happens: a BTR visibly slows down as it attempts to push through a small windbreak of trees. Tapping the Dragon gunner on his steel helmet, the 1LT points towards the target with an arrow-straight arm. The missile hits, but barely, almost passing between the wheels and underneath the BTR.


“Get the track to make a run for SGT Roy’s OP/LP, he’s got the spare missile. Run him down here and lets see if we can’t hit something else. Once you’ve passed that message on we are displacing, shift 30m right. One at a time, keep low and copy my stance.” The Officer whispers urgently.
***
Pemberton could see his young driver struggling to restrain himself from speeding forward. It was a battle the PFC was losing, as the distance inexorably widened between their ‘peep’ and the ITOWs and VADs that formed their small column. A soft word saw the vehicle pull back again. The 1LT couldn’t blame his driver’s haste. They had just arrived with the first section of his platoon, and already there was a thin spire of smoke reaching out from the valley, in what he estimated was EA Bravo. The lead Soviet elements were already in the area. There was no time to waste. The section raced towards its assigned BP, with VADs pulling off the road to take up covering positions.

Horning was desperately trying to shift the artillery fires to the overpass and road bridge; this lead Soviet company was making tracks, pushing through their anaemic ambush with remarkable discipline. The tail of the column was now entering EA Bravo. He could hear SGT Chung ordering SPC Brody, the commander of their sole ITV, to engage.
The ITV duly rumbled forward from the treeline it had taken as its hide in BP1 and inches forward along the flat plateau to its front. Brody soon identifies a plethora of targets. With a pop the first ITOW roars out, popping up then being pushed down by the gunner. It reaches out, a red dot in Brody’s field of vision. 

“Target!” the SPC roars, and then guides on: “Gunner, traverse right, two PCs forward of the line of trees”
“On. Firing!” comes the excited response. The second ITOW races out, but Brody can already tell its going to be a miss, as the Gunner struggles to both chase the accelerating BTR and keep the missile down. It passes just high.

Two sweating men in the cargo hatch quickly reload the last two missiles, but Brody’s crew once again have a mixed engagement. The third missile strikes another BTR, this one racing up a crop-filled slope towards a windbreak and the MSR. It explodes violently. Their fourth shot misses entirely, the missile going ballistic and slamming only a few dozen feet in front of them along the ridge, inert.
“Driver reverse, back to our original position.” Brody says through gritted teeth, whilst deploying smoke to cover the retrograde movement. Bitterly disappointed, nevertheless his part of the fight is over. Even as he pulls back, he hears 1LT Horning report the entry of yet another mass of enemy vehicles. If only we had time to resupply.

Unbeknownst to the disappointed Scout ITOW crew, however, Pemberton and his three anti-tank launchers had just taken up position in BP2. Pemberton and his RTO leapt from their Jeep and raced forward, taking cover among some trees at the lip of the ridge, to better direct fire whilst guiding his tracks into positions. The officer knew fire discipline would be key, not a missile could go to waste firing at a target another vehicle was already engaging. A bit awkwardly at first, but successfully, he used some landmarks to assign fire sectors to his three ITOWs.

Like their Scout counterpart, however, the anti-tankers have trouble striking their fast, fleeting targets. Two TOWs miss, badly. It is not until the third TOW that a target is struck successfully. Pemberton puts out a calming word, his unnaturally even voice having its intended effect. The gunners redouble their efforts, taking their time to line up the shots.
“Aim high, guide low boys, don’t rush things” the officer chides.
ITOWs begin to hit with regularity over the ensuing minutes, and the enemy BTRs stop manoeuvring so smartly. Casualties and evasive actions cause the formation to become strung out, which only increases their exposure. The young gunners stop suffering from “buck fever” and are better able to pick out lone targets. From his vantage point, Pemberton can report an increasing number of burning enemy BTRs with exultant satisfaction. Between 1615-1616 hours, 6 TOWs are fired for 4 kills, illustrating the furious rate of fire and the cornucopia of targets.


Whilst BP2 turns EA Bravo into a charnel house, the balance of the AT platoon arrives on the heights, and transit through the small town of Zillbach towards BP3. 

There’s just one problem, though: SGT Chung and his team, who boldly have remained in their initial firing positions to act as an OP/LP, spot a new threat.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1”
“This is Dragon 1”
“This callsign currently observing four times enemy tangoes, treeline near road bridge. Out to you.”
“Acknowledged, Dragon 2. We’ll let the AT know. Out.”

1LT Pemberton warns his leading SPC in the second section, and the determined enlisted man simply states they’ll keep the threat in mind and attempt to find positions masked to this new threat in BP3. Indeed, two of the three ITOWs can do just that. One, however, led by a SPC Catalano, running out of space to jockey, is surprised to find a T-64 aiming – at him!
Catalano’s gunner fires twice in rapid succession, more from shock than aggressive mindedness. The first TOW becomes a satellite, spinning off into space, and the second slams into the ground just on the other side of their hull down position. Catalano sees a giant burst of flame, and briefly and irrationally believes his gunner has scored a hit…then sees a small green dot grow larger and larger. It passes over their vehicle, and even ensconced inside the vibrating M113 and through his CVC, he can hear a faint sucking woosh. Too close for comfort. Gathering his wits, he gets his driver to reverse.

 
While BP3 struggles to find good positions, Pemberton continues to reap a grim bounty. Handing off targets personally and ensuring the pre-assigned fire sectors are maintained, BP2 continues to turn EA Bravo into a hellscape. Individual Soviet BTRs mill about in confusion. Their indecisiveness often fatal.

Despite the presence of the T-64s making BP3 a no-go for firing into EA Alpha, the three ITOWs (including a recovered SPC Catalano) can take positions that allow them to thicken the fire in EA Bravo. The initial engagements are frustrated by low field of view and limited time to target, but they eventually tally a few BTRs themselves. 

Perhaps spurred on by the suffering MRB’s survivors, the Hinds make a belated reappearance. This time any pretence of careful flying is tossed aside; the Hinds roar up and forward, seeking to strafe the assailants. One Hind is able to get a burst off, severely damaging one of Pemberton’s ITOWs, but four Hinds are swiftly destroyed by the overwhelming amount of SHORAD provided by Booth. One Hind is struck by a stinger and crashes in the valley, destroying a cowshed as its flaming carcass crashes through the structure’s roof.

The flight of the Hinds proves to be a bookend for the engagement at Dollbach. In BP2 the ITOWs begin to report going “black” on ammo, and one by one pop smoke and retreat into the cover of nearby trees. Pemberton himself taps his RTO on the helmet and dashes back to firmer concealment, where he begins to issue orders for the retreat.
The last of the mauled MRB, under the cover of the suicidally courageous Hinds, presses past EA Bravo and out of sight. Trailing them come the T-64s, who break cover and roar forward, in odd mimicry of the Hinds. They wheel to their left and attempt to break past EA Bravo.
Catalano is waiting, and along with the rest of his section in BP3, savage the tanks. In short order, 5 T-64s are burning.



An eerie silence descends… the only living creatures in the valley are wounded and burned Soviet riflemen and crewmen, painfully crawling away from their stricken mounts. The silence does not last, as mortars begin to search out for the Americans in BP3. A round crashes just behind SGT Chung.
“Displace! Back to the track” he screams with furious urgency.
The sound of the mortars fade, and all the SGT can hear is his own rattling breath and a pounding in his ears. He never hears the fateful round: there is just a flash of red, and then a disconnected awareness that something is not right…why am I on my back he ponders? He tries to get up. He cannot. He has no left leg. The realisation sends his mind into overdrive for a few moments, and his last conscious thought is simply an Oh my God before he lapses into unconsciousness and shock. Lying beside him are two of his men. One is killed, the other so severely wounded that he can only lay there in a heap, sucking air in a hideous rattle, before he shortly passes away. Chung’s RTO, on the verge of panic, drags his SGT back to the M113.  

It is the final part of this drama in miniature. As the mortar rounds continue to search out targets, the order from Pemberton is acknowledged across the net: the job was complete. Across the three BPs, the Scouts and Anti-tankers reverse out of sight, and then, slowly pick their way back to the rendezvous point.

Accurately assessing the damage was difficult, and Pemberton could only provide his new boss an estimate. The measure of success would only come in the following hour: the attack had been stopped cold, and the enemy’s lead element was barely a MRC in strength.


 
 

July 16th, 1145 hours.
Triumph to tragedy.
“Sir…I’m not raising TOC” the RTO said, hesitatingly. Booth met the man’s eyes. Silent dread communicated between them.  He was about to tell him to try one more time when the FSGT came trundling back around the corner in his ‘peep.’ That’s not good. A gnawing, creeping realisation made its way up out of the small of Booth’s back and crawled up his spine. The NCO’s face was boulder-like. Jaw set…
TOC had been hit. Hard. They had failed to displace for one minute too many and got plastered by Soviet artillery, much like the Soviets in Dorfborn were having their back broken by vengeful American artillery fire. Like one of the four horsemen, the FSGT had been tasked with riding back to his CO to deliver the grim news. Basically, every senior officer in TOC had been taken out: the LTC, S-1 and S-3 had all been wounded enough to warrant evacuation. The XO was severely wounded, an arm and a leg severed, his condition critical. The HHC CO killed, caught away from any cover momentarily, ripped to shreds by shrapnel. All that was left of the staff was the S-2, who refused to be evacuated despite painful neck wounds, and the duty NCOs.
“You’re it” the FSGT growled, “you got seniority. The Battalion’s yours, sir.” A thunderclap. Booth was in command. The entirety of TF Dragon. Well over 700 surviving men, 700 souls. The burden could’ve crushed him then and there, and likely should have, but something turned in him. Eyes narrowing, he quickly told the dependable NCO to hurry ahead back to what was left of the TOC and have the S-2 re organise the NCOs into acting battle captains. He would follow shortly in his command track, handing off command of the unit to his equally dependable XO, 1LT Noonan. He would hurl together a hasty TOC and strain every nerve to get the unit back under control.
Chapter 5: Thorn in the Side
Northwest of Neuhof, July 16th, 1600 hours.
Luckily, the TOC’s survivors showed themselves up to the task. They had worried Booth at first, most had some minor wounds and all had looked deeply shaken. The M577s were ruined messes, but neither had taken direct hits, and much of the vital planning material was salvageable. Whatever morale had been wavering was firmed up by the arrival of the CPT and the news that B Team had savaged the enemy to its front. Booth had energized the headquarters with his arrival, distracted grieving men by entrusting them with key tasks (appealing, subconsciously, to the professional pride of each individual NCO), and focused their efforts back on the fight – a fight he had convinced them they were winning. The impact was electric. Within the hour they were ready to receive orders from brigade, by 1500 the bulk of the battalion was pulling back, knowing full well the punch-drunk MRR to their front was in no condition to follow closely and fill the gap, let alone pursue with vigour or violence.
As the skeleton TOC organised the move and conformed with orders, Booth was presented with his first command decision: the TF had mauled the MRR so thoroughly that a neighbouring Soviet unit had begun to shake out into the attack on a town called Uttrichausen with its right flank twisting in the wind. Brigade was willing to move boundaries on a dime and have TF Dragon nail the lead MRB of that unit from the flank. Booth leapt at the opportunity, and task organised his Scout Platoon and surviving anti-tank platoon to do so. They hadn’t had time to resupply, and thus the fight was going to be a tight one, but the potential payoff was worth it; success could likely keep the entire brigade counterpunching whilst the next line of defence was constructed. The Soviets were templated to be passing through Dollbach around 1630 hours, beyond which was their probable line of departure.

 
Command devolved to 1LT Pemberton, the Anti-tank Platoon CO, and his surviving 6 ITOWs. 1LT Horning, the battalion scout platoon leader, would race ahead with his extremely depleted force; two M113s, an ITOW (with only 4 missiles) and a meagre 3 Dragon missiles. He had two scout sections to spare, led by SGTs Roy and Chung. They would engage forward elements and buy time for Pemberton’s two sections and the attached air-defence joes.
Pemberton, bumping along in his ‘peep’ hastily did a map recce and came up with BPs. He prayed to God the map was accurate to the terrain, there was no time to do a proper terrain walk. This was an aggressive interdiction, no doubt about it, the young man thought. His eagerness to hit the enemy when they were exposed was tempered by the ever-human fear of the unknown.  How to execute this fight? Across the valley the enemy would traverse was a thick treeline. The Soviets must have known their flank was in the air by now, and if he was the Soviet commander, he’d have units in that treeline dominating the heights overlooking Dollbach. How to fire into the valley without exposing his vulnerable ITOWs? A crossfire, that’s what he’d have to establish, keyhole positions, he thought with finality. Pemberton had his plan.
Taskings:
BP1: Scout ITOW, 1st AT section (alternate)
BP2 – 1st AT section (main)
BPs 3A & 3B – 2nd AT section (main and alternate)
EA Alpha – Forward of point 430, left-flank of Dollbach
EA Bravo – Forward of point 401, right-flank of Dollbach
***
The Soviets’ hackles were raised; thought 1LT Horning, as he watched a pair of Hinds flit in and out of sight across the valley, flashing over the thick, forested hills. They had put a lot of combat aviation forward, clearly cognizant of the exposed flank of this unit. It was a high summer day, and any vehicular movement kicked up hanging dust clouds, prompting Horning to spread his thin resources out, and give strict instructions for the tracks to make quick dashes, pausing frequently to let the dust settle as they sheltered under the next nearest copse of trees. Slowly, but surely, they managed to set themselves up in their assigned positions, finding decent concealment and cover to establish firing positions from.

By 1604 hours, Horning and SGT Chung have set themselves up in excellent firing positions on the extreme flanks of the AO.

As the scouts settled into their hides, a sudden pop is heard as a Stinger missile screeches upwards. One of the hunting Hinds had raised itself up too much, for too long, across the valley and an American AD man had chanced a shot.

The Hind’s weapons operator saw the tell-tale report and, swearing, alerted the pilot in time. The Hind bucked down sharply, and the missile failed to track. The other hinds, spooked by their comrades’ close call, follow suit. The air threat abates, for now.
SGT Chung, only momentarily distracted by the firing of the Stinger, shakes his head and concentrates. Over the distant thwock-thwock of the omnipresent Hinds, he can hear – more accurately, feel – the rumble of an approaching formation. A moment later, he can see it for himself: an entire MRC. He urgently whispers to his RTO to send the word. The RTO duly whispers the code phrase for contact: Rio Grande. The pre-arranged cluster mission begins to fire, forcing the BTRs to accelerate through the maelstrom.

“Jesus, Mary and Stonewall Jackson sir, that’s got to be an entire company – what the hell we going to do about that with just one shot?” whispers Horning’s RTO in an awed tone. Horning ignores the man and presses himself further against the ground, putting his hands under his chest. He awkwardly cranes his neck downwards and rolls his eyes up, attempting to keep a good eye on the BTRs while masking as much unnatural colour – his skin, the whites of his eyes – as he can. He wished he had time to apply camo paint. If any of this mass of enemy units spotted him, they were dead. BTR turrets were awkwardly trying to scan for targets, but their 14mm machine cannons were bouncing around visibly. Good he thought, hope the bastard gunners are blind. More problematic of course, were the Soviet rifleman hanging out of the rear hatches, with the occasional BTR having a Soviet soldier bouncing a SA-7 on his shoulder, scanning the skies for targets.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1 – “
Horning’s RTO scrambles to lower the volume on the receiver, as SGT Chung continues.
“- I am engaging. Making this missile count. Out.”

It takes a minute for Horning to spot an opportune target for his own position to follow the NCO’s lead. In frustration they watch BTRs briskly march past. Then, it happens: a BTR visibly slows down as it attempts to push through a small windbreak of trees. Tapping the Dragon gunner on his steel helmet, the 1LT points towards the target with an arrow-straight arm. The missile hits, but barely, almost passing between the wheels and underneath the BTR.


“Get the track to make a run for SGT Roy’s OP/LP, he’s got the spare missile. Run him down here and lets see if we can’t hit something else. Once you’ve passed that message on we are displacing, shift 30m right. One at a time, keep low and copy my stance.” The Officer whispers urgently.
***
Pemberton could see his young driver struggling to restrain himself from speeding forward. It was a battle the PFC was losing, as the distance inexorably widened between their ‘peep’ and the ITOWs and VADs that formed their small column. A soft word saw the vehicle pull back again. The 1LT couldn’t blame his driver’s haste. They had just arrived with the first section of his platoon, and already there was a thin spire of smoke reaching out from the valley, in what he estimated was EA Bravo. The lead Soviet elements were already in the area. There was no time to waste. The section raced towards its assigned BP, with VADs pulling off the road to take up covering positions.

Horning was desperately trying to shift the artillery fires to the overpass and road bridge; this lead Soviet company was making tracks, pushing through their anaemic ambush with remarkable discipline. The tail of the column was now entering EA Bravo. He could hear SGT Chung ordering SPC Brody, the commander of their sole ITV, to engage.
The ITV duly rumbled forward from the treeline it had taken as its hide in BP1 and inches forward along the flat plateau to its front. Brody soon identifies a plethora of targets. With a pop the first ITOW roars out, popping up then being pushed down by the gunner. It reaches out, a red dot in Brody’s field of vision. 

“Target!” the SPC roars, and then guides on: “Gunner, traverse right, two PCs forward of the line of trees”
“On. Firing!” comes the excited response. The second ITOW races out, but Brody can already tell its going to be a miss, as the Gunner struggles to both chase the accelerating BTR and keep the missile down. It passes just high.

Two sweating men in the cargo hatch quickly reload the last two missiles, but Brody’s crew once again have a mixed engagement. The third missile strikes another BTR, this one racing up a crop-filled slope towards a windbreak and the MSR. It explodes violently. Their fourth shot misses entirely, the missile going ballistic and slamming only a few dozen feet in front of them along the ridge, inert.
“Driver reverse, back to our original position.” Brody says through gritted teeth, whilst deploying smoke to cover the retrograde movement. Bitterly disappointed, nevertheless his part of the fight is over. Even as he pulls back, he hears 1LT Horning report the entry of yet another mass of enemy vehicles. If only we had time to resupply.

Unbeknownst to the disappointed Scout ITOW crew, however, Pemberton and his three anti-tank launchers had just taken up position in BP2. Pemberton and his RTO leapt from their Jeep and raced forward, taking cover among some trees at the lip of the ridge, to better direct fire whilst guiding his tracks into positions. The officer knew fire discipline would be key, not a missile could go to waste firing at a target another vehicle was already engaging. A bit awkwardly at first, but successfully, he used some landmarks to assign fire sectors to his three ITOWs.

Like their Scout counterpart, however, the anti-tankers have trouble striking their fast, fleeting targets. Two TOWs miss, badly. It is not until the third TOW that a target is struck successfully. Pemberton puts out a calming word, his unnaturally even voice having its intended effect. The gunners redouble their efforts, taking their time to line up the shots.
“Aim high, guide low boys, don’t rush things” the officer chides.
ITOWs begin to hit with regularity over the ensuing minutes, and the enemy BTRs stop manoeuvring so smartly. Casualties and evasive actions cause the formation to become strung out, which only increases their exposure. The young gunners stop suffering from “buck fever” and are better able to pick out lone targets. From his vantage point, Pemberton can report an increasing number of burning enemy BTRs with exultant satisfaction. Between 1615-1616 hours, 6 TOWs are fired for 4 kills, illustrating the furious rate of fire and the cornucopia of targets.


Whilst BP2 turns EA Bravo into a charnel house, the balance of the AT platoon arrives on the heights, and transit through the small town of Zillbach towards BP3. 

There’s just one problem, though: SGT Chung and his team, who boldly have remained in their initial firing positions to act as an OP/LP, spot a new threat.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1”
“This is Dragon 1”
“This callsign currently observing four times enemy tangoes, treeline near road bridge. Out to you.”
“Acknowledged, Dragon 2. We’ll let the AT know. Out.”

1LT Pemberton warns his leading SPC in the second section, and the determined enlisted man simply states they’ll keep the threat in mind and attempt to find positions masked to this new threat in BP3. Indeed, two of the three ITOWs can do just that. One, however, led by a SPC Catalano, running out of space to jockey, is surprised to find a T-64 aiming – at him!
Catalano’s gunner fires twice in rapid succession, more from shock than aggressive mindedness. The first TOW becomes a satellite, spinning off into space, and the second slams into the ground just on the other side of their hull down position. Catalano sees a giant burst of flame, and briefly and irrationally believes his gunner has scored a hit…then sees a small green dot grow larger and larger. It passes over their vehicle, and even ensconced inside the vibrating M113 and through his CVC, he can hear a faint sucking woosh. Too close for comfort. Gathering his wits, he gets his driver to reverse.

 
While BP3 struggles to find good positions, Pemberton continues to reap a grim bounty. Handing off targets personally and ensuring the pre-assigned fire sectors are maintained, BP2 continues to turn EA Bravo into a hellscape. Individual Soviet BTRs mill about in confusion. Their indecisiveness often fatal.

Despite the presence of the T-64s making BP3 a no-go for firing into EA Alpha, the three ITOWs (including a recovered SPC Catalano) can take positions that allow them to thicken the fire in EA Bravo. The initial engagements are frustrated by low field of view and limited time to target, but they eventually tally a few BTRs themselves. 

Perhaps spurred on by the suffering MRB’s survivors, the Hinds make a belated reappearance. This time any pretence of careful flying is tossed aside; the Hinds roar up and forward, seeking to strafe the assailants. One Hind is able to get a burst off, severely damaging one of Pemberton’s ITOWs, but four Hinds are swiftly destroyed by the overwhelming amount of SHORAD provided by Booth. One Hind is struck by a stinger and crashes in the valley, destroying a cowshed as its flaming carcass crashes through the structure’s roof.

The flight of the Hinds proves to be a bookend for the engagement at Dollbach. In BP2 the ITOWs begin to report going “black” on ammo, and one by one pop smoke and retreat into the cover of nearby trees. Pemberton himself taps his RTO on the helmet and dashes back to firmer concealment, where he begins to issue orders for the retreat.
The last of the mauled MRB, under the cover of the suicidally courageous Hinds, presses past EA Bravo and out of sight. Trailing them come the T-64s, who break cover and roar forward, in odd mimicry of the Hinds. They wheel to their left and attempt to break past EA Bravo.
Catalano is waiting, and along with the rest of his section in BP3, savage the tanks. In short order, 5 T-64s are burning.



An eerie silence descends… the only living creatures in the valley are wounded and burned Soviet riflemen and crewmen, painfully crawling away from their stricken mounts. The silence does not last, as mortars begin to search out for the Americans in BP3. A round crashes just behind SGT Chung.
“Displace! Back to the track” he screams with furious urgency.
The sound of the mortars fade, and all the SGT can hear is his own rattling breath and a pounding in his ears. He never hears the fateful round: there is just a flash of red, and then a disconnected awareness that something is not right…why am I on my back he ponders? He tries to get up. He cannot. He has no left leg. The realisation sends his mind into overdrive for a few moments, and his last conscious thought is simply an Oh my God before he lapses into unconsciousness and shock. Lying beside him are two of his men. One is killed, the other so severely wounded that he can only lay there in a heap, sucking air in a hideous rattle, before he shortly passes away. Chung’s RTO, on the verge of panic, drags his SGT back to the M113.  

It is the final part of this drama in miniature. As the mortar rounds continue to search out targets, the order from Pemberton is acknowledged across the net: the job was complete. Across the three BPs, the Scouts and Anti-tankers reverse out of sight, and then, slowly pick their way back to the rendezvous point.

Accurately assessing the damage was difficult, and Pemberton could only provide his new boss an estimate. The measure of success would only come in the following hour: the attack had been stopped cold, and the enemy’s lead element was barely a MRC in strength.


 
 

In what possible context did you think this was about Quick Battle points?

All points-buy systems are bad, and CM's is no different - typically they're a least-worst option for design. If you're going to shift the goalposts to discussing the formations in QB efficiency terms then sure, only a minority of possible units and formations and unit are actually going to be worth taking, this is why they're bad. 
Quick battle points have no influence or meaning on the CM model, campaigns, scenarios or any PBEM which are outside of the context of Quick Battles. That might be the only thing that matters to you, but it's a minority of what CM actually is.

So obviously the response was a more generic one than for any specific formation, there will always be exceptions.

Stryker Cavalry is firmly not one of them. They absolutely have disproportionate firepower for it's size - as Cavalry they'll typically have far more CAS and artillery support per-man than that of the rifle formations, but even on the level of an individual platoon, you're looking at three five man squads with two M240Bs, and one javelin per squad. 

That's 16 men, two GPMGs and three ATGMS, not counting the Strykers themselves. Compare that to the Stryker infantry with 37 men and the same number of weapons, and the cavalry unit is disproportionately powerful for it's size - it has twice as many weapons per man as a Stryker platoon.

The Bradley platoon comparison becomes even more stark, since the Cavalry Bradley squads are four men, with the remaining space being taken up by extra TOW missiles.

July 16th, 1145 hours.
Triumph to tragedy.
“Sir…I’m not raising TOC” the RTO said, hesitatingly. Booth met the man’s eyes. Silent dread communicated between them.  He was about to tell him to try one more time when the FSGT came trundling back around the corner in his ‘peep.’ That’s not good. A gnawing, creeping realisation made its way up out of the small of Booth’s back and crawled up his spine. The NCO’s face was boulder-like. Jaw set…
TOC had been hit. Hard. They had failed to displace for one minute too many and got plastered by Soviet artillery, much like the Soviets in Dorfborn were having their back broken by vengeful American artillery fire. Like one of the four horsemen, the FSGT had been tasked with riding back to his CO to deliver the grim news. Basically, every senior officer in TOC had been taken out: the LTC, S-1 and S-3 had all been wounded enough to warrant evacuation. The XO was severely wounded, an arm and a leg severed, his condition critical. The HHC CO killed, caught away from any cover momentarily, ripped to shreds by shrapnel. All that was left of the staff was the S-2, who refused to be evacuated despite painful neck wounds, and the duty NCOs.
“You’re it” the FSGT growled, “you got seniority. The Battalion’s yours, sir.” A thunderclap. Booth was in command. The entirety of TF Dragon. Well over 700 surviving men, 700 souls. The burden could’ve crushed him then and there, and likely should have, but something turned in him. Eyes narrowing, he quickly told the dependable NCO to hurry ahead back to what was left of the TOC and have the S-2 re organise the NCOs into acting battle captains. He would follow shortly in his command track, handing off command of the unit to his equally dependable XO, 1LT Noonan. He would hurl together a hasty TOC and strain every nerve to get the unit back under control.
Chapter 5: Thorn in the Side
Northwest of Neuhof, July 16th, 1600 hours.
Luckily, the TOC’s survivors showed themselves up to the task. They had worried Booth at first, most had some minor wounds and all had looked deeply shaken. The M577s were ruined messes, but neither had taken direct hits, and much of the vital planning material was salvageable. Whatever morale had been wavering was firmed up by the arrival of the CPT and the news that B Team had savaged the enemy to its front. Booth had energized the headquarters with his arrival, distracted grieving men by entrusting them with key tasks (appealing, subconsciously, to the professional pride of each individual NCO), and focused their efforts back on the fight – a fight he had convinced them they were winning. The impact was electric. Within the hour they were ready to receive orders from brigade, by 1500 the bulk of the battalion was pulling back, knowing full well the punch-drunk MRR to their front was in no condition to follow closely and fill the gap, let alone pursue with vigour or violence.
As the skeleton TOC organised the move and conformed with orders, Booth was presented with his first command decision: the TF had mauled the MRR so thoroughly that a neighbouring Soviet unit had begun to shake out into the attack on a town called Uttrichausen with its right flank twisting in the wind. Brigade was willing to move boundaries on a dime and have TF Dragon nail the lead MRB of that unit from the flank. Booth leapt at the opportunity, and task organised his Scout Platoon and surviving anti-tank platoon to do so. They hadn’t had time to resupply, and thus the fight was going to be a tight one, but the potential payoff was worth it; success could likely keep the entire brigade counterpunching whilst the next line of defence was constructed. The Soviets were templated to be passing through Dollbach around 1630 hours, beyond which was their probable line of departure.

 
Command devolved to 1LT Pemberton, the Anti-tank Platoon CO, and his surviving 6 ITOWs. 1LT Horning, the battalion scout platoon leader, would race ahead with his extremely depleted force; two M113s, an ITOW (with only 4 missiles) and a meagre 3 Dragon missiles. He had two scout sections to spare, led by SGTs Roy and Chung. They would engage forward elements and buy time for Pemberton’s two sections and the attached air-defence joes.
Pemberton, bumping along in his ‘peep’ hastily did a map recce and came up with BPs. He prayed to God the map was accurate to the terrain, there was no time to do a proper terrain walk. This was an aggressive interdiction, no doubt about it, the young man thought. His eagerness to hit the enemy when they were exposed was tempered by the ever-human fear of the unknown.  How to execute this fight? Across the valley the enemy would traverse was a thick treeline. The Soviets must have known their flank was in the air by now, and if he was the Soviet commander, he’d have units in that treeline dominating the heights overlooking Dollbach. How to fire into the valley without exposing his vulnerable ITOWs? A crossfire, that’s what he’d have to establish, keyhole positions, he thought with finality. Pemberton had his plan.
Taskings:
BP1: Scout ITOW, 1st AT section (alternate)
BP2 – 1st AT section (main)
BPs 3A & 3B – 2nd AT section (main and alternate)
EA Alpha – Forward of point 430, left-flank of Dollbach
EA Bravo – Forward of point 401, right-flank of Dollbach
***
The Soviets’ hackles were raised; thought 1LT Horning, as he watched a pair of Hinds flit in and out of sight across the valley, flashing over the thick, forested hills. They had put a lot of combat aviation forward, clearly cognizant of the exposed flank of this unit. It was a high summer day, and any vehicular movement kicked up hanging dust clouds, prompting Horning to spread his thin resources out, and give strict instructions for the tracks to make quick dashes, pausing frequently to let the dust settle as they sheltered under the next nearest copse of trees. Slowly, but surely, they managed to set themselves up in their assigned positions, finding decent concealment and cover to establish firing positions from.

By 1604 hours, Horning and SGT Chung have set themselves up in excellent firing positions on the extreme flanks of the AO.

As the scouts settled into their hides, a sudden pop is heard as a Stinger missile screeches upwards. One of the hunting Hinds had raised itself up too much, for too long, across the valley and an American AD man had chanced a shot.

The Hind’s weapons operator saw the tell-tale report and, swearing, alerted the pilot in time. The Hind bucked down sharply, and the missile failed to track. The other hinds, spooked by their comrades’ close call, follow suit. The air threat abates, for now.
SGT Chung, only momentarily distracted by the firing of the Stinger, shakes his head and concentrates. Over the distant thwock-thwock of the omnipresent Hinds, he can hear – more accurately, feel – the rumble of an approaching formation. A moment later, he can see it for himself: an entire MRC. He urgently whispers to his RTO to send the word. The RTO duly whispers the code phrase for contact: Rio Grande. The pre-arranged cluster mission begins to fire, forcing the BTRs to accelerate through the maelstrom.

“Jesus, Mary and Stonewall Jackson sir, that’s got to be an entire company – what the hell we going to do about that with just one shot?” whispers Horning’s RTO in an awed tone. Horning ignores the man and presses himself further against the ground, putting his hands under his chest. He awkwardly cranes his neck downwards and rolls his eyes up, attempting to keep a good eye on the BTRs while masking as much unnatural colour – his skin, the whites of his eyes – as he can. He wished he had time to apply camo paint. If any of this mass of enemy units spotted him, they were dead. BTR turrets were awkwardly trying to scan for targets, but their 14mm machine cannons were bouncing around visibly. Good he thought, hope the bastard gunners are blind. More problematic of course, were the Soviet rifleman hanging out of the rear hatches, with the occasional BTR having a Soviet soldier bouncing a SA-7 on his shoulder, scanning the skies for targets.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1 – “
Horning’s RTO scrambles to lower the volume on the receiver, as SGT Chung continues.
“- I am engaging. Making this missile count. Out.”

It takes a minute for Horning to spot an opportune target for his own position to follow the NCO’s lead. In frustration they watch BTRs briskly march past. Then, it happens: a BTR visibly slows down as it attempts to push through a small windbreak of trees. Tapping the Dragon gunner on his steel helmet, the 1LT points towards the target with an arrow-straight arm. The missile hits, but barely, almost passing between the wheels and underneath the BTR.


“Get the track to make a run for SGT Roy’s OP/LP, he’s got the spare missile. Run him down here and lets see if we can’t hit something else. Once you’ve passed that message on we are displacing, shift 30m right. One at a time, keep low and copy my stance.” The Officer whispers urgently.
***
Pemberton could see his young driver struggling to restrain himself from speeding forward. It was a battle the PFC was losing, as the distance inexorably widened between their ‘peep’ and the ITOWs and VADs that formed their small column. A soft word saw the vehicle pull back again. The 1LT couldn’t blame his driver’s haste. They had just arrived with the first section of his platoon, and already there was a thin spire of smoke reaching out from the valley, in what he estimated was EA Bravo. The lead Soviet elements were already in the area. There was no time to waste. The section raced towards its assigned BP, with VADs pulling off the road to take up covering positions.

Horning was desperately trying to shift the artillery fires to the overpass and road bridge; this lead Soviet company was making tracks, pushing through their anaemic ambush with remarkable discipline. The tail of the column was now entering EA Bravo. He could hear SGT Chung ordering SPC Brody, the commander of their sole ITV, to engage.
The ITV duly rumbled forward from the treeline it had taken as its hide in BP1 and inches forward along the flat plateau to its front. Brody soon identifies a plethora of targets. With a pop the first ITOW roars out, popping up then being pushed down by the gunner. It reaches out, a red dot in Brody’s field of vision. 

“Target!” the SPC roars, and then guides on: “Gunner, traverse right, two PCs forward of the line of trees”
“On. Firing!” comes the excited response. The second ITOW races out, but Brody can already tell its going to be a miss, as the Gunner struggles to both chase the accelerating BTR and keep the missile down. It passes just high.

Two sweating men in the cargo hatch quickly reload the last two missiles, but Brody’s crew once again have a mixed engagement. The third missile strikes another BTR, this one racing up a crop-filled slope towards a windbreak and the MSR. It explodes violently. Their fourth shot misses entirely, the missile going ballistic and slamming only a few dozen feet in front of them along the ridge, inert.
“Driver reverse, back to our original position.” Brody says through gritted teeth, whilst deploying smoke to cover the retrograde movement. Bitterly disappointed, nevertheless his part of the fight is over. Even as he pulls back, he hears 1LT Horning report the entry of yet another mass of enemy vehicles. If only we had time to resupply.

Unbeknownst to the disappointed Scout ITOW crew, however, Pemberton and his three anti-tank launchers had just taken up position in BP2. Pemberton and his RTO leapt from their Jeep and raced forward, taking cover among some trees at the lip of the ridge, to better direct fire whilst guiding his tracks into positions. The officer knew fire discipline would be key, not a missile could go to waste firing at a target another vehicle was already engaging. A bit awkwardly at first, but successfully, he used some landmarks to assign fire sectors to his three ITOWs.

Like their Scout counterpart, however, the anti-tankers have trouble striking their fast, fleeting targets. Two TOWs miss, badly. It is not until the third TOW that a target is struck successfully. Pemberton puts out a calming word, his unnaturally even voice having its intended effect. The gunners redouble their efforts, taking their time to line up the shots.
“Aim high, guide low boys, don’t rush things” the officer chides.
ITOWs begin to hit with regularity over the ensuing minutes, and the enemy BTRs stop manoeuvring so smartly. Casualties and evasive actions cause the formation to become strung out, which only increases their exposure. The young gunners stop suffering from “buck fever” and are better able to pick out lone targets. From his vantage point, Pemberton can report an increasing number of burning enemy BTRs with exultant satisfaction. Between 1615-1616 hours, 6 TOWs are fired for 4 kills, illustrating the furious rate of fire and the cornucopia of targets.


Whilst BP2 turns EA Bravo into a charnel house, the balance of the AT platoon arrives on the heights, and transit through the small town of Zillbach towards BP3. 

There’s just one problem, though: SGT Chung and his team, who boldly have remained in their initial firing positions to act as an OP/LP, spot a new threat.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1”
“This is Dragon 1”
“This callsign currently observing four times enemy tangoes, treeline near road bridge. Out to you.”
“Acknowledged, Dragon 2. We’ll let the AT know. Out.”

1LT Pemberton warns his leading SPC in the second section, and the determined enlisted man simply states they’ll keep the threat in mind and attempt to find positions masked to this new threat in BP3. Indeed, two of the three ITOWs can do just that. One, however, led by a SPC Catalano, running out of space to jockey, is surprised to find a T-64 aiming – at him!
Catalano’s gunner fires twice in rapid succession, more from shock than aggressive mindedness. The first TOW becomes a satellite, spinning off into space, and the second slams into the ground just on the other side of their hull down position. Catalano sees a giant burst of flame, and briefly and irrationally believes his gunner has scored a hit…then sees a small green dot grow larger and larger. It passes over their vehicle, and even ensconced inside the vibrating M113 and through his CVC, he can hear a faint sucking woosh. Too close for comfort. Gathering his wits, he gets his driver to reverse.

 
While BP3 struggles to find good positions, Pemberton continues to reap a grim bounty. Handing off targets personally and ensuring the pre-assigned fire sectors are maintained, BP2 continues to turn EA Bravo into a hellscape. Individual Soviet BTRs mill about in confusion. Their indecisiveness often fatal.

Despite the presence of the T-64s making BP3 a no-go for firing into EA Alpha, the three ITOWs (including a recovered SPC Catalano) can take positions that allow them to thicken the fire in EA Bravo. The initial engagements are frustrated by low field of view and limited time to target, but they eventually tally a few BTRs themselves. 

Perhaps spurred on by the suffering MRB’s survivors, the Hinds make a belated reappearance. This time any pretence of careful flying is tossed aside; the Hinds roar up and forward, seeking to strafe the assailants. One Hind is able to get a burst off, severely damaging one of Pemberton’s ITOWs, but four Hinds are swiftly destroyed by the overwhelming amount of SHORAD provided by Booth. One Hind is struck by a stinger and crashes in the valley, destroying a cowshed as its flaming carcass crashes through the structure’s roof.

The flight of the Hinds proves to be a bookend for the engagement at Dollbach. In BP2 the ITOWs begin to report going “black” on ammo, and one by one pop smoke and retreat into the cover of nearby trees. Pemberton himself taps his RTO on the helmet and dashes back to firmer concealment, where he begins to issue orders for the retreat.
The last of the mauled MRB, under the cover of the suicidally courageous Hinds, presses past EA Bravo and out of sight. Trailing them come the T-64s, who break cover and roar forward, in odd mimicry of the Hinds. They wheel to their left and attempt to break past EA Bravo.
Catalano is waiting, and along with the rest of his section in BP3, savage the tanks. In short order, 5 T-64s are burning.



An eerie silence descends… the only living creatures in the valley are wounded and burned Soviet riflemen and crewmen, painfully crawling away from their stricken mounts. The silence does not last, as mortars begin to search out for the Americans in BP3. A round crashes just behind SGT Chung.
“Displace! Back to the track” he screams with furious urgency.
The sound of the mortars fade, and all the SGT can hear is his own rattling breath and a pounding in his ears. He never hears the fateful round: there is just a flash of red, and then a disconnected awareness that something is not right…why am I on my back he ponders? He tries to get up. He cannot. He has no left leg. The realisation sends his mind into overdrive for a few moments, and his last conscious thought is simply an Oh my God before he lapses into unconsciousness and shock. Lying beside him are two of his men. One is killed, the other so severely wounded that he can only lay there in a heap, sucking air in a hideous rattle, before he shortly passes away. Chung’s RTO, on the verge of panic, drags his SGT back to the M113.  

It is the final part of this drama in miniature. As the mortar rounds continue to search out targets, the order from Pemberton is acknowledged across the net: the job was complete. Across the three BPs, the Scouts and Anti-tankers reverse out of sight, and then, slowly pick their way back to the rendezvous point.

Accurately assessing the damage was difficult, and Pemberton could only provide his new boss an estimate. The measure of success would only come in the following hour: the attack had been stopped cold, and the enemy’s lead element was barely a MRC in strength.


 
 

July 16th, 1145 hours.
Triumph to tragedy.
“Sir…I’m not raising TOC” the RTO said, hesitatingly. Booth met the man’s eyes. Silent dread communicated between them.  He was about to tell him to try one more time when the FSGT came trundling back around the corner in his ‘peep.’ That’s not good. A gnawing, creeping realisation made its way up out of the small of Booth’s back and crawled up his spine. The NCO’s face was boulder-like. Jaw set…
TOC had been hit. Hard. They had failed to displace for one minute too many and got plastered by Soviet artillery, much like the Soviets in Dorfborn were having their back broken by vengeful American artillery fire. Like one of the four horsemen, the FSGT had been tasked with riding back to his CO to deliver the grim news. Basically, every senior officer in TOC had been taken out: the LTC, S-1 and S-3 had all been wounded enough to warrant evacuation. The XO was severely wounded, an arm and a leg severed, his condition critical. The HHC CO killed, caught away from any cover momentarily, ripped to shreds by shrapnel. All that was left of the staff was the S-2, who refused to be evacuated despite painful neck wounds, and the duty NCOs.
“You’re it” the FSGT growled, “you got seniority. The Battalion’s yours, sir.” A thunderclap. Booth was in command. The entirety of TF Dragon. Well over 700 surviving men, 700 souls. The burden could’ve crushed him then and there, and likely should have, but something turned in him. Eyes narrowing, he quickly told the dependable NCO to hurry ahead back to what was left of the TOC and have the S-2 re organise the NCOs into acting battle captains. He would follow shortly in his command track, handing off command of the unit to his equally dependable XO, 1LT Noonan. He would hurl together a hasty TOC and strain every nerve to get the unit back under control.
Chapter 5: Thorn in the Side
Northwest of Neuhof, July 16th, 1600 hours.
Luckily, the TOC’s survivors showed themselves up to the task. They had worried Booth at first, most had some minor wounds and all had looked deeply shaken. The M577s were ruined messes, but neither had taken direct hits, and much of the vital planning material was salvageable. Whatever morale had been wavering was firmed up by the arrival of the CPT and the news that B Team had savaged the enemy to its front. Booth had energized the headquarters with his arrival, distracted grieving men by entrusting them with key tasks (appealing, subconsciously, to the professional pride of each individual NCO), and focused their efforts back on the fight – a fight he had convinced them they were winning. The impact was electric. Within the hour they were ready to receive orders from brigade, by 1500 the bulk of the battalion was pulling back, knowing full well the punch-drunk MRR to their front was in no condition to follow closely and fill the gap, let alone pursue with vigour or violence.
As the skeleton TOC organised the move and conformed with orders, Booth was presented with his first command decision: the TF had mauled the MRR so thoroughly that a neighbouring Soviet unit had begun to shake out into the attack on a town called Uttrichausen with its right flank twisting in the wind. Brigade was willing to move boundaries on a dime and have TF Dragon nail the lead MRB of that unit from the flank. Booth leapt at the opportunity, and task organised his Scout Platoon and surviving anti-tank platoon to do so. They hadn’t had time to resupply, and thus the fight was going to be a tight one, but the potential payoff was worth it; success could likely keep the entire brigade counterpunching whilst the next line of defence was constructed. The Soviets were templated to be passing through Dollbach around 1630 hours, beyond which was their probable line of departure.

 
Command devolved to 1LT Pemberton, the Anti-tank Platoon CO, and his surviving 6 ITOWs. 1LT Horning, the battalion scout platoon leader, would race ahead with his extremely depleted force; two M113s, an ITOW (with only 4 missiles) and a meagre 3 Dragon missiles. He had two scout sections to spare, led by SGTs Roy and Chung. They would engage forward elements and buy time for Pemberton’s two sections and the attached air-defence joes.
Pemberton, bumping along in his ‘peep’ hastily did a map recce and came up with BPs. He prayed to God the map was accurate to the terrain, there was no time to do a proper terrain walk. This was an aggressive interdiction, no doubt about it, the young man thought. His eagerness to hit the enemy when they were exposed was tempered by the ever-human fear of the unknown.  How to execute this fight? Across the valley the enemy would traverse was a thick treeline. The Soviets must have known their flank was in the air by now, and if he was the Soviet commander, he’d have units in that treeline dominating the heights overlooking Dollbach. How to fire into the valley without exposing his vulnerable ITOWs? A crossfire, that’s what he’d have to establish, keyhole positions, he thought with finality. Pemberton had his plan.
Taskings:
BP1: Scout ITOW, 1st AT section (alternate)
BP2 – 1st AT section (main)
BPs 3A & 3B – 2nd AT section (main and alternate)
EA Alpha – Forward of point 430, left-flank of Dollbach
EA Bravo – Forward of point 401, right-flank of Dollbach
***
The Soviets’ hackles were raised; thought 1LT Horning, as he watched a pair of Hinds flit in and out of sight across the valley, flashing over the thick, forested hills. They had put a lot of combat aviation forward, clearly cognizant of the exposed flank of this unit. It was a high summer day, and any vehicular movement kicked up hanging dust clouds, prompting Horning to spread his thin resources out, and give strict instructions for the tracks to make quick dashes, pausing frequently to let the dust settle as they sheltered under the next nearest copse of trees. Slowly, but surely, they managed to set themselves up in their assigned positions, finding decent concealment and cover to establish firing positions from.

By 1604 hours, Horning and SGT Chung have set themselves up in excellent firing positions on the extreme flanks of the AO.

As the scouts settled into their hides, a sudden pop is heard as a Stinger missile screeches upwards. One of the hunting Hinds had raised itself up too much, for too long, across the valley and an American AD man had chanced a shot.

The Hind’s weapons operator saw the tell-tale report and, swearing, alerted the pilot in time. The Hind bucked down sharply, and the missile failed to track. The other hinds, spooked by their comrades’ close call, follow suit. The air threat abates, for now.
SGT Chung, only momentarily distracted by the firing of the Stinger, shakes his head and concentrates. Over the distant thwock-thwock of the omnipresent Hinds, he can hear – more accurately, feel – the rumble of an approaching formation. A moment later, he can see it for himself: an entire MRC. He urgently whispers to his RTO to send the word. The RTO duly whispers the code phrase for contact: Rio Grande. The pre-arranged cluster mission begins to fire, forcing the BTRs to accelerate through the maelstrom.

“Jesus, Mary and Stonewall Jackson sir, that’s got to be an entire company – what the hell we going to do about that with just one shot?” whispers Horning’s RTO in an awed tone. Horning ignores the man and presses himself further against the ground, putting his hands under his chest. He awkwardly cranes his neck downwards and rolls his eyes up, attempting to keep a good eye on the BTRs while masking as much unnatural colour – his skin, the whites of his eyes – as he can. He wished he had time to apply camo paint. If any of this mass of enemy units spotted him, they were dead. BTR turrets were awkwardly trying to scan for targets, but their 14mm machine cannons were bouncing around visibly. Good he thought, hope the bastard gunners are blind. More problematic of course, were the Soviet rifleman hanging out of the rear hatches, with the occasional BTR having a Soviet soldier bouncing a SA-7 on his shoulder, scanning the skies for targets.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1 – “
Horning’s RTO scrambles to lower the volume on the receiver, as SGT Chung continues.
“- I am engaging. Making this missile count. Out.”

It takes a minute for Horning to spot an opportune target for his own position to follow the NCO’s lead. In frustration they watch BTRs briskly march past. Then, it happens: a BTR visibly slows down as it attempts to push through a small windbreak of trees. Tapping the Dragon gunner on his steel helmet, the 1LT points towards the target with an arrow-straight arm. The missile hits, but barely, almost passing between the wheels and underneath the BTR.


“Get the track to make a run for SGT Roy’s OP/LP, he’s got the spare missile. Run him down here and lets see if we can’t hit something else. Once you’ve passed that message on we are displacing, shift 30m right. One at a time, keep low and copy my stance.” The Officer whispers urgently.
***
Pemberton could see his young driver struggling to restrain himself from speeding forward. It was a battle the PFC was losing, as the distance inexorably widened between their ‘peep’ and the ITOWs and VADs that formed their small column. A soft word saw the vehicle pull back again. The 1LT couldn’t blame his driver’s haste. They had just arrived with the first section of his platoon, and already there was a thin spire of smoke reaching out from the valley, in what he estimated was EA Bravo. The lead Soviet elements were already in the area. There was no time to waste. The section raced towards its assigned BP, with VADs pulling off the road to take up covering positions.

Horning was desperately trying to shift the artillery fires to the overpass and road bridge; this lead Soviet company was making tracks, pushing through their anaemic ambush with remarkable discipline. The tail of the column was now entering EA Bravo. He could hear SGT Chung ordering SPC Brody, the commander of their sole ITV, to engage.
The ITV duly rumbled forward from the treeline it had taken as its hide in BP1 and inches forward along the flat plateau to its front. Brody soon identifies a plethora of targets. With a pop the first ITOW roars out, popping up then being pushed down by the gunner. It reaches out, a red dot in Brody’s field of vision. 

“Target!” the SPC roars, and then guides on: “Gunner, traverse right, two PCs forward of the line of trees”
“On. Firing!” comes the excited response. The second ITOW races out, but Brody can already tell its going to be a miss, as the Gunner struggles to both chase the accelerating BTR and keep the missile down. It passes just high.

Two sweating men in the cargo hatch quickly reload the last two missiles, but Brody’s crew once again have a mixed engagement. The third missile strikes another BTR, this one racing up a crop-filled slope towards a windbreak and the MSR. It explodes violently. Their fourth shot misses entirely, the missile going ballistic and slamming only a few dozen feet in front of them along the ridge, inert.
“Driver reverse, back to our original position.” Brody says through gritted teeth, whilst deploying smoke to cover the retrograde movement. Bitterly disappointed, nevertheless his part of the fight is over. Even as he pulls back, he hears 1LT Horning report the entry of yet another mass of enemy vehicles. If only we had time to resupply.

Unbeknownst to the disappointed Scout ITOW crew, however, Pemberton and his three anti-tank launchers had just taken up position in BP2. Pemberton and his RTO leapt from their Jeep and raced forward, taking cover among some trees at the lip of the ridge, to better direct fire whilst guiding his tracks into positions. The officer knew fire discipline would be key, not a missile could go to waste firing at a target another vehicle was already engaging. A bit awkwardly at first, but successfully, he used some landmarks to assign fire sectors to his three ITOWs.

Like their Scout counterpart, however, the anti-tankers have trouble striking their fast, fleeting targets. Two TOWs miss, badly. It is not until the third TOW that a target is struck successfully. Pemberton puts out a calming word, his unnaturally even voice having its intended effect. The gunners redouble their efforts, taking their time to line up the shots.
“Aim high, guide low boys, don’t rush things” the officer chides.
ITOWs begin to hit with regularity over the ensuing minutes, and the enemy BTRs stop manoeuvring so smartly. Casualties and evasive actions cause the formation to become strung out, which only increases their exposure. The young gunners stop suffering from “buck fever” and are better able to pick out lone targets. From his vantage point, Pemberton can report an increasing number of burning enemy BTRs with exultant satisfaction. Between 1615-1616 hours, 6 TOWs are fired for 4 kills, illustrating the furious rate of fire and the cornucopia of targets.


Whilst BP2 turns EA Bravo into a charnel house, the balance of the AT platoon arrives on the heights, and transit through the small town of Zillbach towards BP3. 

There’s just one problem, though: SGT Chung and his team, who boldly have remained in their initial firing positions to act as an OP/LP, spot a new threat.
“Dragon 2 to Dragon 1”
“This is Dragon 1”
“This callsign currently observing four times enemy tangoes, treeline near road bridge. Out to you.”
“Acknowledged, Dragon 2. We’ll let the AT know. Out.”

1LT Pemberton warns his leading SPC in the second section, and the determined enlisted man simply states they’ll keep the threat in mind and attempt to find positions masked to this new threat in BP3. Indeed, two of the three ITOWs can do just that. One, however, led by a SPC Catalano, running out of space to jockey, is surprised to find a T-64 aiming – at him!
Catalano’s gunner fires twice in rapid succession, more from shock than aggressive mindedness. The first TOW becomes a satellite, spinning off into space, and the second slams into the ground just on the other side of their hull down position. Catalano sees a giant burst of flame, and briefly and irrationally believes his gunner has scored a hit…then sees a small green dot grow larger and larger. It passes over their vehicle, and even ensconced inside the vibrating M113 and through his CVC, he can hear a faint sucking woosh. Too close for comfort. Gathering his wits, he gets his driver to reverse.

 
While BP3 struggles to find good positions, Pemberton continues to reap a grim bounty. Handing off targets personally and ensuring the pre-assigned fire sectors are maintained, BP2 continues to turn EA Bravo into a hellscape. Individual Soviet BTRs mill about in confusion. Their indecisiveness often fatal.

Despite the presence of the T-64s making BP3 a no-go for firing into EA Alpha, the three ITOWs (including a recovered SPC Catalano) can take positions that allow them to thicken the fire in EA Bravo. The initial engagements are frustrated by low field of view and limited time to target, but they eventually tally a few BTRs themselves. 

Perhaps spurred on by the suffering MRB’s survivors, the Hinds make a belated reappearance. This time any pretence of careful flying is tossed aside; the Hinds roar up and forward, seeking to strafe the assailants. One Hind is able to get a burst off, severely damaging one of Pemberton’s ITOWs, but four Hinds are swiftly destroyed by the overwhelming amount of SHORAD provided by Booth. One Hind is struck by a stinger and crashes in the valley, destroying a cowshed as its flaming carcass crashes through the structure’s roof.

The flight of the Hinds proves to be a bookend for the engagement at Dollbach. In BP2 the ITOWs begin to report going “black” on ammo, and one by one pop smoke and retreat into the cover of nearby trees. Pemberton himself taps his RTO on the helmet and dashes back to firmer concealment, where he begins to issue orders for the retreat.
The last of the mauled MRB, under the cover of the suicidally courageous Hinds, presses past EA Bravo and out of sight. Trailing them come the T-64s, who break cover and roar forward, in odd mimicry of the Hinds. They wheel to their left and attempt to break past EA Bravo.
Catalano is waiting, and along with the rest of his section in BP3, savage the tanks. In short order, 5 T-64s are burning.



An eerie silence descends… the only living creatures in the valley are wounded and burned Soviet riflemen and crewmen, painfully crawling away from their stricken mounts. The silence does not last, as mortars begin to search out for the Americans in BP3. A round crashes just behind SGT Chung.
“Displace! Back to the track” he screams with furious urgency.
The sound of the mortars fade, and all the SGT can hear is his own rattling breath and a pounding in his ears. He never hears the fateful round: there is just a flash of red, and then a disconnected awareness that something is not right…why am I on my back he ponders? He tries to get up. He cannot. He has no left leg. The realisation sends his mind into overdrive for a few moments, and his last conscious thought is simply an Oh my God before he lapses into unconsciousness and shock. Lying beside him are two of his men. One is killed, the other so severely wounded that he can only lay there in a heap, sucking air in a hideous rattle, before he shortly passes away. Chung’s RTO, on the verge of panic, drags his SGT back to the M113.  

It is the final part of this drama in miniature. As the mortar rounds continue to search out targets, the order from Pemberton is acknowledged across the net: the job was complete. Across the three BPs, the Scouts and Anti-tankers reverse out of sight, and then, slowly pick their way back to the rendezvous point.

Accurately assessing the damage was difficult, and Pemberton could only provide his new boss an estimate. The measure of success would only come in the following hour: the attack had been stopped cold, and the enemy’s lead element was barely a MRC in strength.


 
 

I have been enjoying this one a lot. So much that I want to share it. I will show how I dissect this tactical dilemma my way from the beginning. Whether it's right or wrong, this is how I approached this scenario and why.
The location:
We are fighting on the map Summer In The City by The Forger. The map is originally for CMBS, but I've ported it over to CMRT since it's that good. 
Here is the particular section we are fighting over. I start in the East as the German attackers and Sgt. Grunt starts in the West as the Soviet defenders.

The theme is a 1942 battle during the winter months. Forces are around 1700 men per side.
The Soviet force consists of the 2nd Guards Rifle Brigade backed by elements of it's parent formation; 3rd Guards Tank Corps. While this is a motorized brigade, I removed the trucks for the standard infantry squads. While this brigade may look dumb and harmless to the untrained truppen's eye, these badass mot. infantry battalions come with 4 infantry squads per platoon along with snipers totaling around 40 men each. This - when used right - nearly evens the firepower against German platoons. Additionally I expect the Soviets will have substantial armor support in the form of T-34/76. This will probably employed in a counter attacking force somewhere down the line.
The German Force is as follows:

Both panzer companies each have 12 PZIIIG Short barrel, 4 PZIIIM L, 5 PZIV L and 1 PzIIIN stubby. The support company and HQ section add 6 PzIV L and 2 PzIIIN stubby.
Altogether 24 PzIIIG Short, 8 PzIIIM Long, 16PzIV Long, and 4 PzIIIN Stubby. 52 tanks supported by a pioneer and anti-air platoon.
1/14 is fully mechanized with 3 companies of panzergrenadiers supported by a stummel and mortar platoon.
14th pioneer company is a typical motorized pioneer company with one flamethrower per platoon.
14th cannon company has 4 on-map 150mm grille howitzers split between two platoons.
89th Pioneer is in halftracks.
1/288 is stationary and pretty much useless, but is there for moral support.
4/288 has 6 anti aircraft guns
53rd panzerjager is armed with 14 marder II's.
And I have 12 guns of 105mm, and 6 of 150mm off map.

Great read once again - thanks! 😀

Great work as always, love it ❤️.

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...

Bit late on this one. Busy week at work. We're at the main event now: Germany. We don't join our intrepid core force just yet, however...
***
The war arrived like a thunderclap.
NATO units were doing a summer exercise, something had become almost rote in the decades since the Iron Curtain had fallen over Europe, when the bolt fell. Confusion reigned supreme. Some units at first even believed this was a highly realistic, unannounced part of the exercise. When real rounds of artillery began crashing around them and men began to die, that mistaken belief was rapidly abandoned. The Soviets had gained near total operational surprise.
The only saving grace was the equally routine paranoia that gripped NATO forces when the Soviets conducted summer exercises (the cover for their invasion) themselves. When the Soviets rolled across the border, they found themselves tangling with strong, and alert, covering forces. Operational and Strategic surprise did not always translate to the tactical level. In the CENTAG zone, that meant bruising brushes with the 11th and 2nd Armored Cavalry regiments.
Chapter 3: Apache Pass
Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 13th, 0600 hours.
1st Battalion, 15th Tank Regiment, 39th Motor Rifle Division

“That is the plan, comrades. Combat aviation goes in at 0600. Our friends in the VVS follows 5 minutes after that. Artillery begins on these marked targets at 0615. We are across the line of departure in strength by 0620 hours. Questions?”
Lieutenant Colonel Burobin looked around at his company commanders. Silence. Stony, determined stares.  He folded the map and lightly slapped it against his knee. The briefing was over.
“Very well. To your tanks, mount up.”
They had several kilometres to traverse to get to the assembly area, a large, forested hill, labelled as the Dorn Berg. Recon was already well forward and had reported apparently light enemy forces entering the valley, no doubt to block further advances. His primary objective was a town in the middle of the valley, called Mittleaschenbach, which had vital bridges over the muddy streams that dominated the approaches to, and through, the valley.  Seizing the town was key to creating manoeuvre room for the balance of the regiment. He had been tasked, as well, to take the next town (Hofaschenbach), if possible.
As Burobin climbed on top of his T-64, he thought over the situation. The first hours of the war had gone exceedingly well, better than they it should have. The lead units had been lower echelon units with equipment in the process of being phased out, which had apparently set off less alarms with the enemy than the shock units normally would. Forward forces had brushed away surprised NATO forces, many of which were still on their routine summer exercises. Where breakthroughs hadn’t been made, the enemy had to pull back due to a lack of ammunition. In theory they had created the ideal scenario for his force: the “meeting engagement.”
His mind turned to his immediate problem. The reports from regimental and divisional reconnaissance hinted that this window of opportunity was rapidly closing, if it was not already closed. They had no run-ins yet with the US so-called “armoured cavalry”, which he knew the Capitalists would put much faith in to hold, delay and destroy forces like his own. If he was the American, he thought grimly, this valley is where he would begin that delaying action. He was no fool and respected his opponents. If he realised the value of this terrain, he was assumed his counterparts did to. Where would they deploy? There were only two options, really…

The terrain was complex and canalized. Muddy streams would force movement down only a handful of viable alleys. Thick forested hills blocked massed vehicular movement or restricted it to small dirt paths. A small force on these pieces of terrain could savage him. Speed. Speed was key.  Without their air power, which regiment said would be negligible, the Americans could not hope to stop him. He did not share the Colonel’s belief that they were living under a ‘Red Sky.’ Not quite yet. Speed…speed was key. Even if it came at the cost of effective fire. Grab them by the belt…
His thoughts were interrupted, the sanctuary of his thoughts shattered by a loud, booming roar. He looked up just in time to see two fighters, their wings swept back, red starts prominent on their tail, streak overhead in tight formation. Hugging the earth, they dipped out of sight, the canopy of the trees visibly swaying. The preparatory strikes had begun. He keyed his microphone and signalled the Battalion to begin its march. Then he slid down into the turret, ‘buttoning up’ his hatch as he did so. 
***
Darting forward cautiously, Soviet BRDMs nose into the Mittleschenbach valley. Moments earlier, four “Hind” helicopters had passed overhead, crossing the valley swiftly before disappearing over the opposite hill. The reconnaissance men could not yet know it, but the Hinds were already engaging American forces which were advancing to take blocking positions. Like their grandfathers in IL-2s, they swooped low, strafing enemy personnel carriers, and firing rockets in salvos. Two Hinds equipped with wire-guided missiles attempted to hit heavier targets, but were repeatedly forced to break off their attacks by enemy anti-helicopter missiles.  


Some BRDMs briefly halt among the treeline at the base of the Dorn Berg, having finally spotted the enemy: personnel carriers advancing despite the Hinds, into the valley. They duly report these contacts and decide to halt in their present positions to set up observation posts. Anti-tank BRDMs push into Oberaschenbach, losing a vehicle to an unseen assailant as they break cover. A survivor swiftly reports the village devoid of the enemy. 

The Soviet helicopters initially press their attack, despite the missiles. The BRDMs can see their handiwork now, as the Americans press on, zig-zagging and deploying smoke to frustrate the Hind’s aim. A Hind is blotted out of the sky by a missile, whilst an American APC explodes in a fireball from a direct hit. Panicking, the destroyed Hind’s wingman breaks off his attack entirely. A second APC is destroyed by a rocket run a moment later. With the APCs are tanks, who also zig-zag and pop smoke. They fare much better, and slide into the trees that line the Linz Berg – Ulmenstein gap. The enemy are on decisive terrain, although it has cost them. Would it be enough?


Then the Migs arrive. Guided In by observation posts scattered around the valley, they scream in towards their pre-planned objectives, dropping cluster bombs on the towns that line the valley floor. Black smoke rises, evidencing their success.

Despite the seemingly powerful air assault, the picture being built up by the lead recon elements is grim. The Americans have boldly seized decisive terrain, locking down the two best routes into the valley. Judging by the burning BRDM, they were also supported by anti-tank missiles of some kind.
This was the situation which greeted the lead platoon of the 2/15th Tank Regiment as it entered the area of operations. They were met by one of the observation teams, who clambered on top of the lead T-64 and briefed the young (extremely young!) lieutenant. 

The lieutenant, wisely, if somewhat passively, decides to report the situation and hold for the rest of his company. He directs his tanks into the treeline, trusting even less than his battalion commander the assurances that the sky is Soviet.

The next tank platoon to arrive from the company has a more aggressive, more senior lieutenant. Seeing six T-64s and supporting anti-tank BRDMs, he urges an engagement by fire on the powerful blocking force across the valley. If the enemy forces strung between Linz Berg and Ulmenstein were not destroyed or reduced, the attack would falter. The logic is iron-clad, despite the immense risk and the long odds. At 0610 hours they conduct their combined attack.  The results are mixed. Gunnery is about even, despite the superior volume of fire the Soviets put out. Vehicles burn on both sides, and surviving T-64s pull back into the trees, their efforts spent for now. They leave two burning hulks, fires hissing away, as they do so. The surviving lieutenant, a bit alarmed at the enemy’s expert gunnery, urges his superior to hurry. A sharp rebuke - “Discipline, discipline, get off the air! Essential communications only!” – is his reward for his efforts.

Burobin, monitoring the engagement on his second radio, is disquieted. He was in column with the battalion’s attached MRC and had just crossed the line of departure. It sounded like he was going to get a hot reception. He unbuttons briefly, and is engulfed in the dust being kicked up by the thundering herd. Coughing, he cranes his head up momentarily. A gap in the dust gives him a brief sight of the morning sky…there! Screaming overhead are two flying cruciform-like shapes. Suddenly, a BMP explodes. A second shortly follows.
Sliding back into the turret, the Lt. Col hollers with such an urgency he fails to provide his callsign: “Air warning, air warning. Smoke and wheel right!” Thick, oily-black smoke blooms as more than 20 vehicles contribute to creating a smokescreen. They run the gauntlet, losing a few more vehicles in the process to both direct fire and air attack. The unit disperses into a small copse of trees, and the Shilkas deploy to defend the temporary harbour. The MRC’s air defence troops roll over the sides of their BMPs and attempt to engage the enemy air. It is uncertain what they accomplished.


In cover of the forests and pines near the Dorn Berg, Burobin counts heads and collects his thoughts. His second company was still on its way but was surely also under air attack at present time. The enemy clearly had won the race; the meeting engagement was rapidly turning into a deliberate attack. It mattered not: he would have to accept a high attrition in men and material to seize the objective if so. He clambered out of his tank and looked for Major Istmin, the rifle company leader. The Major was alive, though looking decidedly unwell. Doing his best to ignore the pale pallor on his subordinate’s face, Burobin ordered him to disperse the BMPs and hold for now. They will go in as a unit. Striding back to his command tank, he stops to speak to the nearby FO in his specialist MTLB. The artillery will have to redouble its efforts.
So it does. Guided on by the FOs, the Soviet artillery ponderously shifts its fire, striking enemy anti-tank vehicles that had taken hull down positions in a field of crops. Burobin requests for a repeat of the air strike, and to his shock, it is approved immediately. Regiment and Division, monitoring the situation, seem to have grasped the gravity of the situation.

Under this cover of this artillery, Burobin urges on his point company. He knows the order has condemned more of his young tankers to fiery fates, but they must inflict more casualties on the enemy platoon holding the opposite heights if the rest of the Battalion are to safely transit. They do not, however, push heedlessly over the exposed ground. Realising the dangerousness of the mission, and the omnipresence of enemy air, the Major opts to push his surviving tanks through the claustrophobic hiking paths that line the Dorn Berg. This pushes the tanks several hundred meters forward. The hope is that the closer engagement range swings the balance in favour of the massed firepower.

Time, the most precious resource the Soviets have, ticks away as the T-64s carefully pick their way down the path and fan out among the pines. The Major is patient. Not until every tank appears abreast of its partners does he order them to move forward.


The excellence and effectiveness of enemy fire continues to shock the Soviet tankers. Several T-64s are burning within minutes, almost every other has sustained several hits. The massed fires, however, are inexorable. The MRC’s weapons platoon add to the fire, pushing their BMPs up to fire off missiles. One is destroyed, but its wingman reaches out with its Spandrel missile, destroying an enemy tank.

Soon enough, most of the enemy vehicles between the Linz Berg and Ulmenstein are burning. All that remains is a single, unseen tank that sporadically fires. The timing is fortuitous, for Burobin's second tank company has arrived. 

Believing they are through; the Lt. Col immediately hurls his companies forward with an urgent word. Acknowledgements flood in. Then the enemy air power reappears, popping up over a neighbouring hill, their guns flashing. The Major commanding the second company is seen bailing out of his ruined tank, along with his crew.

ZSU fire chases the enemy planes, and one explodes in a fireball as it careens into the side of a hill several kilometres away. The ZSUs themselves, out of ammunition, pull back into the treeline. Unknown to Burobin, the SA-7s are long dead. Their BMP hit by an air-delivered missile whilst the crews displaced to new firing positions.
It is too late to stop now, however. The Battalion, what is left of it, lunges forward, the trailing platoons of T-64s stopping on occasion to deliver crashing volleys to any enemy targets they identify. 


The casualties are appalling. The Americans have put them in a vice. If they halt for any length of time to put down effective fire, they are smashed by American air and artillery. If they push forward, they find themselves moving into a storm of enemy direct fire. Despite destroying the enemy positions to their direct front, the battalion is punished by fire from secondary positions nearer Hofaschenbach. Burobin is faced with an unpalatable choice: butchery in place, or butchery forward. He chooses the latter, continuing to place his faith in speed.
Soviet airpower makes a belated reappearance, and even the score card, somewhat. Enemy direct fire slackens, but bereft of anti-air defences, it is merely pro-forma. By the time the battalion has passed through Oberaschenbach, it is reduced to 5 tanks and 5 BMPs. 

It is a miracle that Burobin is alive. Even more miraculously, the Major leading the first company is among the living as well.  Istmin burns along with his BMP, free from fear now. The MRCs only surviving officer is a young junior lieutenant. The other squads are not from his platoon. It matters not – what can be done except to accomplish their objective? Despair will not raise the dead.
“All callsigns, guide on me” The Lt. Col speaks a terse word. There is no acknowledgement save from the first company leader’s tank. The other units cannot send, only receive. He must trust they are following. The surviving T-64s fan out on a hill just opposite the Linz Berg. They halt briefly in good hulldown positions. Burobin spots the surviving enemy tank first. A volley crashes out from the line of T-64s. The M60 burns.

“We have no cover here. Follow me, we must head for that treeline. BMPs, break left and assault objective Fedor. Out.” Any idea of appropriate radio protocol died somewhere with his lead company. For the surviving "runners" in the unit there can be no doubt it is the Boss speaking. 
Spotting a gap in the trees and trusting that it heralded another wide trail through the forest, the T-64s break forward again. One explodes just as it begins to roll forward. It is unclear what destroys it. Nevertheless, the gamble pays off. A narrow, traversable path through the trees deposits the 4 remaining T-64s onto the flank of Mittleschenbach. They begin to fire systematically into the village, smashing suspected positions and covering the BMPs. 

The motor riflemen, for their part, also suffer in their final dash to the objective. Two BMPs are destroyed by American helicopters, skilfully flitting up and down behind a treeline somewhere to the left. The lieutenant, more frenzied by panic than determination, pushes forward. His men follow his example. They slow down, only briefly, to allow accurate cannon fire to be put down onto suspected positions. In one of the BMPs a sergeant orders his men to put down suppressive fires. The squad dutifully fire in staccato bursts through the firing ports. They know now who, or what, they are supposed to see. 

The American defenders, a rifle platoon, fight back viciously. The T-64s break cover and successfully rejoin their comrades in the village. Tank and BMP once more fight in close tandem. The order “dismount!” does not come until the town square is penetrated by surviving vehicles. Mittleschenbach is reduced to a charnel house as 125mms fire HEAT and HE into houses yards away. The Soviet riflemen are routinely forced to hurl themselves to the ground and duck into alleys to avoid the deadly overpressure from the high calibre cannons. Somehow, the shattered battalion manages to compel the defenders to retreat. A single American APC careens out of the village at 0655 hours, dipping into dead ground on the far side of town, before it motors away, out of sight. 

Any thought of pushing forward is out of the question. Even if Burobin’s shattered unit had the ammunition left to fight, they did not have the strength to advance. Even as the Soviets began to flatten Mittleschenbach, surviving OPs on the Dorn Berg report a platoon of enemy vehicles take blocking positions in the gardens and hedges at the forward edge of Hofaschenbach. The way forward had been closed, and leaving the safety of the town would only invite further air attack. The surviving vehicles circle the wagons as Burobin reports the objective clear and his casualties.
“Regiment will deploy behind the Dorn Berg and pass through your unit at 1300 hours. Assume and maintain the defence in your current locus” comes the response with calculated disinterest, squealing through the enemy’s interference.

On opposite sides of the FEBA, two counterparts, Colonels both, receive reports with some satisfaction. Casualties heavy, yes, but initial objectives met. 

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...

Just noticed the latest posts on this.  Absolute masterpiece.  Dang, I gotta get outta this day job & house maintenence gig and pursue my true calling full time, CM.  Just skimmed this so far, after work will get a bowl of ice cream and savor this.  THANKS for all the effort you put into this.

Ok, I am sold, let's do the first CM Movie - Dust in the Firestorm. 

Many thanks. 
Some thoughts on this last chapter...
Firstly, apologies for in media res. The idea to start doing the AAR only occurred to me three missions in to the campaign, when it hit me that this was probably one of the best designed campaigns to date (which is saying something, as I'm not light with praise for many others). Secondly, wow: a lot of targets serviced in a short amount of time. I'll try to unpack. 
If the standalone version of this mission isn't a planned demo mission, you're selling the game short. The fight for Neuhof might as well have leapt out of FM71-2. You're well rewarded for earlier successes by the time you get to this mission. Key cross-attachments that bring you up to a 'square' combat team, broad daylight (and all the forewarning of an attack that would bring), obstacle belts in place, and a battlefield where there are no discernible flanks for the enemy. What you get is a fairly doctrinal battalion level breakthrough attempt by the Soviets, which is again, high praise to the scenario designers. The enemy clearly came on in two main echelons, or more accurately, the battle begins with the second and third battle lines being deployed. The first battle line, in this case, was all the prepositioned Recon and ATGM support they had.
What I think is most useful is comparing the final mission of the NTC campaign with the fight for Neuhof. If you paid attention, you could see the similarities between the two immediately. In both instances, the Soviet (or "Soviet" in the case of the NTC) battalion came in roughly 2-3 echelons, and the first companies always attempted to pry open the flanks and bypass poor terrain. 


So, in the first image, they tried to avoid the washboard and scrub-like terrain that is (like in reality) atrocious for any type of vehicular movement, and in Neuhof, they flowed like water around manmade obstacles, such as villages. My experience in the former helped me anticipate the latter. The enemy largely conformed to my expectations. In sum: the NTC campaign is a good investment of your time if you want to avoid later frustrations.
As to what precisely was my thought process in this last chapter, obviously I provided some overlays about my defence, but I rarely give details. I'll try to do so now. 
My plan was based around the presumption that having multiple BPs you fall back to in succession is a recipe for disaster. CM has a bird's eye view and a lot of the natural friction that comes from falling back successively (like blue-on-blue, failure to communicate, etc) isn't necessarily modelled; and it's still complete chaos every time I have ever tried it. So I chose instead to make a fight from one main BP and ensure that I shaped what that fight looked like early on. It's easier to manage a few forward deployed units than it is to place entire platoons and companies forward and fall back with them. When you have picquets forward and you stay longer than expected, you lose a section of vehicles at most. When you mistime falling back from a BP, you lose entire platoons and companies. This, of course, is a criticism that was levelled about the tactical doctrine of active defence:

(Source: https://youtu.be/QgwqT4fqU2E)
Of course, it's much more difficult to capture AirLand Battle as so much of it relies on operational concerns that cannot be captured in CM. At the tactical level, it might be hard to distinguish between Active Defence and  AirLand Battle. Nevertheless, I tried my best to open up the 'close' battle aggressively, with air and artillery and well forward deployed units. The idea of course was to create space and avoid a lot of the Soviet strengths (such as artillery integration). I think I did that well; notwithstanding the insane losses suffered from the A-10s in a short amount of time. 
As for what I chose for the forward deployment, ITOWs naturally dominate the list. In terms of situational awareness, they are king in this game; relatively common vehicles with excellent thermal sights that are essentially on an antennae-like stock. Much easier to hide, therefore, than a barn-sized TTS or an Abrams, who have similar or better sensor suites. Putting the attached scout section in Dorfborn was a massive assumption of risk but was absolutely vital to actually developing an idea of what the enemy was doing. Scouts win battles, even when they do not fire a shot. 
For the record, I'm currently on "The Citadel" in the campaign and I am hoping that the third time is the charm with this approach to defence against an enemy regiment.

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...

Amazing AAR Rinaldi.  Very entertaining.

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...

In the Fulda Gap, that most terrible dawn came and went for the US V Corps. The 11th Cavalry had bent, but it had not broken. Exercising units that had been caught flat-footed largely made good their escape, battered but capable of reconstitution. NATO deployed, alarmed but resolute, to protect this retreat.  The allied air forces made a herculean effort to create space through strikes in the enemy rear areas. The Elbe crossings were hit, hard. Much closer to home, crossings over the Werra were hit with equal violence. The cost was great, the Soviet air defence asked a high price for admission to these lucrative targets. Nevertheless, the initial Soviet supplies and follow-on forces were slowed.  The powerful shock forces immediately in the battle area still had to be dealt with, but that was a more manageable battle.
Anyone who knew anything, knew this: the initial move was a Soviet masterstroke and had shaped things to their advantage nicely. NATO, however, hadn’t been put in checkmate.
It was a different B Team, but the situation is not all that different: once again thrust into a nightmare scenario against the best an enemy had to offer. That is the situation B Company, 2nd of the 28th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division found itself in as July 16th dawned.
CPT Booth was still attempting to recover his balance. The war had come as a violent shock to everyone. His company’s war was not even 24 hours old, and yet his command had already been handled roughly.
First had come hurried orders on the 15th of July to take blocking positions. They were to hold until friendly exercising units could retreat through them. The friendlies had all gotten away and clean, but the enemy forward security element that had been hot on their heels had only been stopped at egregious cost. B Team’s first ever fight started well enough: the company’s ITOWs and attached scouts had flamed several enemy BMPs and a tank. Then the sheer force of enemy fire had sent them reeling backwards to new, hasty positions. An unexpected and sudden flank from several T-80s creeping through dead ground had almost spelled disaster. They been stopped at the ten-yard line in a point-blank engagement. The effort had nearly destroyed Booth’s command. When they received the order to pull back, they left behind three burning M60s – one containing the decapitated corpse of the Tank Platoon leader (he couldn’t even remember the man’s name) – a scout track, and several ITOWs, some from the Scouts, some from his Weapons platoon.
That had been the toughest moment of his life so far. Booth had learned from his first day of OCS: don’t leave your dead, never, ever, leave your wounded. The bastard that had said that had clearly never imagined what this war would look like. Booth’s FSGT, a dependable, quiet Vietnam veteran found him early that evening, weeping in the woods, a shuddering mess. Without a word the NCO clapped a hand on his shoulder, then turned around to go make sure no one would find their CO before he regained his composure.
Though Booth could hardly take credit for it, things had improved after that. An ambush conducted by his 2nd Platoon, surviving scouts and ITOWs had mauled a Soviet security element in the thick forest astride the MSR.  When they pulled back in their M113s, th
ey had left a platoon of T-64s and almost a company’s worth BMPs burning, piled up on the asphalt and along the shoulders. Similar, less dramatic, ambushes had been pulled off by the TF’s scouts and A Company. It had bought the battalion what Booth had already learned was the most precious resources of all in war: time. More importantly, it had burgeoned their sagging morale and showed them that the enemy could be defeated. So violent were these ambushes, they had compelled the Soviets to halt for the evening and night, to deploy their main forces for a deliberate attack.
TF “Dragon” had been able to dig in, lay obstacles, rest, reorganize, conduct proper terrain walks of their next intended battleground and even rehearse planned movements and retreats. Better yet, Booth had been able to sleep. The Soviets were now facing the unenviable task of regaining momentum through a set piece attack into prepared defences. Booth’s company, deployed in front of the suspected main effort, was going to stop them.
Chapter 4: Equilibrium
Neuhof, Forward Edge of the Battle Area. July 16th, 1100 hours.
Ten Fateful Minutes

A quiet stand-to. The Soviets didn’t come in the morning mist. The TF’s S-2 had estimated they were not capable, but Booth hadn’t really believed it. It had given the men a chance to have a hot breakfast, and for his rifle platoons to rehearse their drives into their pre-selected fighting positions. They had now once again returned to their hides, and Booth was going over the plan one last time with the headquarters’ team. Sitting on the ramp of the M113 with an overlay awkwardly spread out over both knees, he went over the scheme, taskings and timings once more.

He had called in the unfamiliar commanders of two attachments made to his unit: 1LT Lyles, a tanker cross-attached from a neighbouring armour Battalion and 1LT Swafford, a platoon leader from the Anti-tank company. They so far had made good impressions. They had been deferential but confident in advising how their commands should be used and had had a great role in shaping the battle plan. Lyles’ M60s were equipped with Tank Thermal Sights and were referred to as TTS. They would be a key component of the plan, a potentially decisive advantage. Swafford’s TOW launchers were older M150s, and would work closely with the TTS to make up for this.
“Let’s make sure we’re all clear on this. Each BP needs to position its vehicles to be able to fire into at least two EAs. We need to create a cycle of combat.”

There it was again. Booth had used that phrase ad nauseum all through yesterday evening and morning. It would have made his special platoon leaders exchange wry looks if the situation wasn’t so serious, and if the plan didn’t make so much good sense.
“Forward deployed units need to get their shots in and hand off the engagement quickly, falling back after the first couple of shots. No delay. The scouts, with some help from your platoon, Lyle, will handle those early engagement areas.”

Nods all around.
“We’re going to operate on the assumption that the other team are going to get to the goal line. We’re going to let em through but make sure they arrive in no position to cross it. Rifle platoons will clean up, Lyle’s main BP will hit anything heavy that manages to get into these final EAs.”


"Alright. That’s it. Get to your positions. Expect them before the morning is through.”
Booth had learned from his first encounter with the enemy. If they wanted to get through somewhere, they could do it the first time with high probability. It was better to bend rather than put up a wall early and watch the Soviets knock it down. He also remembered how his Company had almost immediately descended into chaos when trying to fall back to several successive positions. Too many successive BPs complicated things. A set of main BPs to fall back into was preferable.
He moved into the cargo space of his command track. As the ramp closed behind him, he went over his scheme once more…
His thoughts were interrupted by a squawk over the radio. Through light interference came the report: Dorfborn was coming under artillery fire.

“The centre of town is being hit hard. No casualties so far.” Dull crumps reverberate through the hull of Booth’s M113. “Sir, Neuhof is getting hit pretty hard” the gunner informs him. In the latter case, at least, the Soviets were not at risk of hitting any of his men, who remained to the rear in hides. The locals who had remained had, he hoped, listened to his missive to remain in their basements.  

Here we go. Booth thinks to himself as he tightens the straps of his steel helmet. Further reports were coming in now from Dorfborn: enemy vehicles in column, fanning out into line. Nodding at the company FIST, pre-planned fires are called upon to begin laying a thick fire down in front of the enemy’s axes of advance. The battle for Neuhof had begun.

For the Soviets, the fight begins disastrously. Several BMPs are destroyed trying to run the gauntlet of artillery fire. The FIST’s face betrays no satisfaction, or any other emotion, as he acknowledges the fire and attempts to keep the artillery fire shifting in line with the enemy’s advance.
Despite the pounding the bulk of these lead forces push through the fire, T-64s in the lead. The first direct fire engagement then begins, as the forward deployed TOWs and armour pick up these targets. In two minutes, TOWs managed to destroy several enemy recce, anti-tank and ADA elements that had exposed themselves in the treelines lining the valley floor. They also engage several T-64s that are furtively pushing forward, with catastrophic effect. Within two minutes, a platoon of the enemy’s tanks are burning. 


Scattered throughout the valley are American OPs, who help Booth tightly control the battle and report these initial successes. Prompted by the reports of the continuing Soviet advance, Booth’s attached TACP requests the pre-planned interdiction sorties to begin. A-10s which had been flying a race-track pattern behind friendly lines acknowledge, drop altitude and vector themselves in.

Within two minutes, the better part of an enemy company has suffered severe attrition. The start of the battle has gone almost precisely as Booth had planned. Almost. The initial exchange of fire is not one sided, and just as one of the forward ITOWs start to pull back, it is struck by a Spandrel. Its crew does not survive.


In Dorfborn, the NCO leading the scout section can see another enemy company crossing the River Fleide, entering into engagement area Blue. His men take up the awkward, cross-legged firing position with their M47 Dragons and remove the covers from the thermal sights. Concentrating hard, and trying to ignore the reverberating thumps of artillery hitting the town only a few dozen meters behind their positions, they begin to engage. A T-64 is soon burning.



A second soon joins it. The third shrugs off the Dragon as if it was nothing. Its turret orients towards the village, and sweeps back and forth, trying to pinpoint the firing position.
“That’s it, pack up and move next door. They’re onto us!” a SGT screams at his two scouts, straining to be heard over the screaming howls of the still-intensifying artillery. The Scouts brave the streets for brief moments at a time as they dash between houses, safety, and new firing positions. As new positions are taken up, they continue to report back to Booth. The enemy are flowing like water on either side of the village, and are beginning to present their flanks. These are choice shots, and the scouts make the most of the opportunity, hitting another pair of BMPs.
Then, the A-10s arrive. Two are shot down immediately by ADA, but the other pair close up and push through. Cluster bombs drop onto a buildup of enemy BMPs crossing the bottleneck at the River Fliede.

Back in Booth’s command track, 2LT Bartels, the TACP officer, officer looks shaken. Despite all the artillery fire onto identified enemy ADA, the Soviets still had more out there. It had been so effective. The remaining pair of A-10s don’t try their luck for a second pass and try to burn their way out. One of the two remaining A-10s is badly damaged by an anti-air missile and comes down extremely hard on landing back at base. Three A-10s for, at best, a handful of BMPs. He reports the ineffective air attack to the CO. His part in the battle is done. He can’t help but feel he’s somehow let his comrades down.
Meanwhile, the enemy continues to bypass Dorfborn on either flank. The Scouts are beginning to run low on Dragon missiles and their escape window is closing. Radioing a warning to the forward deployed TTS on their left flank of the targets coming their way, they close up shop and mount up. A harrowing cross-country dash in their M113s shortly follows, but they are all able to pull back behind Neuhof intact and in good order. The scouts never learn just how timely their retreat is, for as they are pulling back, a platoon of enemy BMPs finally breaks off from the pack and enters Dorfborn.

As the scouts are preparing to pull back, Booth is able to piece together the battlefield based on the reports from them, and the forward deployed armour. The enemy, as was expected, is bypassing the village on either side. Neuhof was clearly their destination. With the covering forces displacing, it was time to put the rifle platoons into their battle positions. With a terse codeword across the company net, he orders his tracks out of their hides and into their positions around Neuhof. They had rehearsed things excellently: it will take around 5 minutes to get set up.


As the tracks rumble towards BPs 1A and 1B respectively, the platoon leaders exercise the independent authority Booth has trusted them with. The first of many decisions: do the M113s remain in the BP, or out? In 1B, the platoon leader decides he will order his three M113s to pull back to their hides. His position is closest to Neuhof’s town centre and he knows enemy artillery fire can intensify on it quickly. In 1A, the platoon leader has already decided he will disperse the tracks into fighting positions. He needs as much firepower as he can get, as there are a lot more ingress routes to his position for an enemy to take.
The covering battle is over, and the fight begins to shift to the main BPs. SFC MacDade, Lyles’ platoon NCO opens up the engagement. Hidden away in BP2 with a OP/LP, he is told that a better part of a MRC is fully in EA Blue now. He orders his TTS and his wingman forward, using the treeline, a cottage and its hedged garden as a attack by fire position. MacDade accounts for two T-64s in rapid succession, guiding his gunner on with alacrity with his commander’s override.



The savage enfilading fire seems to sap the Soviet company in EA Blue of some impetus. They hesitate, then briefly halt. MacDade and his wingmen hit several more BMPs, despite the enemy attempting to return fire. The laser rangefinder equipped TTSs are proving as decisive as Booth had hoped.

The BMPs surging to the left of Dorfborn run into the outposted TTS that had covered the scout sections’ retreat. In quick succession, the gunner knocks out two BMPs as they push past the treeline. The TC, a SSGT, is too focused on looking through the CTSD at his gunner’s handiwork. He never identifies the third BMP, skulking in the treeline, as it hits his tank with a Spandrel. The jet of chemical energy eviscerates the entire crew. The SSGT never knows why he died, indeed never has a chance to realise he is dying. The M60 shudders and burns.


The surviving Soviet squad leader has no radio transmitter with which to report that the way around Dorfborn is open; and so he clambers out of the forward hatch, awkwardly fumbling to produce a green flare pistol from below. Aiming straight at the sky he fires it through the canopy of the treeline, willing it to be seen. His prayers are answered: his Battalion commander sees it, even in the bright summer morning, and immediately orders the surviving elements of this MRC to push towards it. He promises a redoubling of the artillery effort to the Major leading this thrust.
There’s a gap in Booth’s armour, and he doesn’t yet realise it.
MacDade, for his part, knows he’s overstayed his welcome in the firing positions. It has only been two minutes, but he knows that is a long time in this type of environment. He orders his wingman to pull back after his own tank. Just as his tank is arriving in cover behind one of the German cottages in the BP, his wingman’s tank is struck by a missile. He doesn’t see from where. Immediately, he thinks: that could’ve been me, and then, glad it wasn’t. A pang of guilt at the selfish thought when four men have just died. Then, relief: the TTS stirs. A slight move of the gun. Hatches open, cautiously, and a man clambers out of the turret. He turns around and helps lift an unconscious second crewman out, aided by the third, who unceremoniously is pushing the stricken man out by his boot soles . A fourth crewman is seen rounding the front end of the tank, arriving to help take the wounded, with almost careful reverence now, down from the engine deck of the tank.
MacDade waves them into the nearby cottage. The three men, a bit shocked but otherwise alright, quickly comply, the burly driver fireman carrying the wounded, unconscious gunner.

Across the battlezone, the Soviets bite back, no longer mere targets in the distance. Unbeknownst to MacDade, the T-64 that took out his wingman is itself shortly knocked out from BP 3B, as 1LT Swafford orders a pair of his TOWs to move forward and engage from the giant potash pile that looms over Neuhof.  As these TOWs are pulling back from the edge of the plateau, one is struck, and it is ripped apart in a blinding flash as its missiles touch off.

This gory disaster doesn’t discourage them. Swafford then orders his other pair of TOW carriers forward in BP3A. These, at the base of the potash mound, creep into hulldown positions on a forested slope. Another T-64 burns. This time they pull back safely into their hides.

The direct fire engagement in EA Red and Blue slackens as MacDade and Swafford pull their vehicles back into hides. The Soviets regain their composure, close formation, and surge onwards. The battle will have to be picked up again in EAs White and Yellow, as Booth’s infantrymen bottle up the Soviets on the mine fields protecting the approaches to Neuhof. For now, the tanks and TOWs lay low, their commanders seeking new firing positions in their respective BPs, anticipating the next engagement.
In BPs 1A and 1B, the infantrymen have debussed from their M113s. Booth and his command team have joined them in 1B, near the two intact bridges that help the town straddle the river Fleide. The decisive engagement was now a sure thing, as the Soviets seemed intent to press forward despite the mauling. 

Booth was fighting the surging adrenaline, trying to stay objective whilst monitoring the engagements on the company net. His XO was sending him SITREPs from the rest of the TF but whatever he was told was forgotten almost immediately. The rest of the Battalion could be on Mars, as far as he was concerned. His entire universe had shrunk to the small area of Neuhof and its approaches. So far, he was still master of this domain. Despite the almost non-factor combat aviation had been, the engagement had gone almost as well as he had planned it. He took mental stock of the situation, collating the many reports that had come in over the last few minutes, trying to form a cohesive image:

The company team was doing alright. For the loss of two tanks and two TOWs, they had accounted for an estimated eight T-64s, nine BMP-2s and five BRDMs.  The equivalent of a tank company and an MRC had been mauled across the first two EAs. So far, the enemy’s courses of action had conformed to what he had expected. They were bypassing Dorfborn, and appeared to be aiming to strike Neuhof from his left flank with one MRC, whilst another beelined for the train station to his front-right. What remained to be seen was whether they would stick to the low ground on the right, heading directly for BP1A, or try to climb the flat hill he had emplaced his surviving two M60A1s, under the command of SGT Marx, on. Another unknown, and a growing disquiet in his mind, was what was happening on his left. They had no eyes there since the scouts had pulled out, and the outpost TTS never pulled into MacDade’s position. It was tough terrain, but if the Soviets wanted to squeeze through it, they could.
It was 1110 hours. It had taken only ten minutes for this carnage to develop.
The Decisive Engagement
Artillery once again dominates the battle on both sides. Dorfborn, despite the Soviet intrusion into it, is hit once again, hard, by their artillery. Just as they did in the start, they pummel empty air. BMPs begin to press forward again, a bit more raggedly now, behind this renewed barrage.
American artillery answers, with fires coming down on TRPs that hope to close the exits from Dorfborn. 1LT Snook, the company FIST, had rode into BP 1B with Booth and had deployed forward in a rail house so to better guide the artillery. Now that his fires were under direct observation, rather than simply being from an overlay, the American artillery began to show increased agility. Fires chase the Soviets all the way and punish any halt.
A brief conversation between Booth and SGT Marx about the situation, results in his tank section pulling back to an alternative position behind BP 1A. They pull back swiftly, grateful to no longer be out on a limb with what’s left of a MRC bearing down on them.

A brief lull, filled only by the artillery fire from both sides, ensues. At 1116, the first Soviet BMPs erupt forward, nosing into the second and final set of EAs. A BMP enters into EA white, and is engaged from BP3, with Lyle and Swafford’s vehicle creeping forward once more. A TTS misses, but a TOW doesn’t. A second one follows, and this time it is shot up by the riflemen of 2LT LeBlanc’s platoon stationed in BP 1A.

The OP/LP assigned to MacDade’s BP feeds a steady report of more enemy vehicles.
“Oscar 2 send for Bravo 26. This callsign currently observing three times BMP in EA Blue and two times BMP in EA Yellow.”
“Bravo 26 copies. Out.”

Booth forewarns BP 1B’s platoon of the encroaching Soviets. It’s leader, 2LT Clausen, affirms and goes about ensuring his Dragon teams are deployed and ready. By 1117 they spot the enemy. Clausen wisely orders his men to hold fire, waiting for clearer shots, husbanding the limited ammunition his M47s have. Over the next three minutes, the OP/LP report more and more contacts heading for Neuhof via Dorfborn. It is the missing third Soviet MRC.
At 1120, the BMPs in EA Yellow are close enough and providing good silhouettes. Clausen orders his anti-tanks to engage at will. A BMP platoon is destroyed several hundred meters away from Neuhof. 


Clausen, like the scouts before him, instructs his Dragon teams to displace between shots. The men dash between neighbouring suburban houses. The civilians, almost all sheltering in their basements as instructed, wince every time they hear the heavy thuds of GI’s boots thumping against their floorboards and stairwells. Their terror is borne out of a helplessness, and ignorance.
“The Soviets must be at the edge of town!”
“Hush! Stay quiet, lay still”
A whispered exchange in German between an elderly man and his wife. They cannot know that the battle is going splendidly, that the Soviet advance, in the face of their losses, means nothing.
1LTs Lyle and Swafford continue to conduct berm drills in BP 3, nipping at the flanks and rear of the enemy surging into EA Yellow. What the infantry are unable to see or engage, they do. The dispersion of fire is excellent, and to Swafford’s particular relief, none of the finite number of TOWs are wasted firing at already destroyed enemy targets. 


The fight in EA Yellow reaches a crescendo as the reinforcing enemy MRC arrive in strength. Burgeoned by the reinforcements, the Soviets redouble their efforts to break into Neuhof. As the BMPs surge forward, they strike the minefield that had been laid through the middle of EA Yellow. Many strike mines and are immobilized. Several other BMPs managed to skirt the edge of the obstacle belt, moving along the rail line. That fight falls to Clausen.

For the majority of the MRC, milling along the obstacle belt, their situation soon becomes incredibly hot. First, they come under crushing artillery fire. Booth, from his forward command post in BP 1B, can see that a unique opportunity has come to destroy the majority of this MRC in a very short span of time. The ITOWs that had fallen back harass the halted enemy, knocking out a few from the agricultural plots behind Neuhof. 


Booth thinks quickly. Then, taking the handheld from the RTO, broadcasts across the company net. Like the voice of God, his voice punches into the ears of all his mounted platoon leaders.
“This is Bravo 26, all Bravo Tango callsigns to move forward and attack by fire enemy MRC in EA Yellow at 1125 hours. Repeat: H-hour is at 1125 hours.”
To Booth’s grim delight, he sees more and more enemy BMPs begin to pile up in front of EA Yellow’s obstacle belt. A target rich environment.
For surviving veterans of 2-28 INF, in the decades that follow, at reunions amongst themselves and in interviews for the media, much will be made of B Company’s “mad minute at Neuhof.” For the men who were there, it would become a moment of pride. Enlisted men would, during their dusty recollections, say this was the moment they believed they would win the war.
At 1125 hours, SGT Marx, 1LT Lyles, and 1LT Swafford order all their vehicles forward. Booth, likewise, orders the ITOWs under his command to engage. The TTS open the wound, with Lyles’ tank striking a BMP in EA Yellow. 

Then, an ITOW behind BP 1A adds to the tally.


The surviving TOW vehicle on the potash mound picks off a straggling BMP in EA Blue.

A TOW in BP3 claims a second BMP in EA Blue. The carnage proceeds: SGT Marx’s wingman — even with the far less accurate M60A1 — manages to destroy a BMP in EA Yellow as well - an ITOW behind Neuhof hits a BMP skulking in Dorfborn. Finally, Lyle’s wingman engages a BMP just as it fires a Spandrel missile. The BMP explodes as its missile pitbulls harmlessly off into the sky, to destinations unknown. 


The assault is utterly devastating on the Soviets. Within 60 seconds, 7 BMPs are burning. All that make it through the gauntlet of fire are the aforementioned pair of BMPs, which snake their way into Neuhof along the low ground. Dutifully, amazingly, fanatically, they disgorge their infantry, who storm into Clausen’s positions. The 2LT cannot but admire the courage of his Soviet counterparts.

Nevertheless, admiration doesn’t translate to pity. A M60 and a Dragon were already pre positioned to watch this entrance into town, and their fire forces the Soviet dismounts to duck into an alley, and right into his first squad. It’s hardly a fight. Caught in the open, the Soviet riflemen are gunned down in a violent fusillade. The only return fire the infantry receive comes from the final Soviet, caught by a M60 burst, who fires his AK in a reflexive spraying arc as he slumps over, dead. Mercifully, his steel helmet slides forward and covers his face, sparing his killer from having to humanize him in the fatal moment.


By 1135 hours the enemy’s attack is clearly shattered. The only surviving enemy are seen deployed at the forward edge of Dorfborn. An eerie silence momentarily falls…but is quickly shattered by a heavy Soviet barrage on 2LT’s Leblanc’s position in BP 1A. The initial pounding kills a pair of men, but the platoon is able to crawl into shelter on the bottom floor, and wait out the barrage in relative safety, even as it ruins and rubbles the buildings they are in.

Again, the American artillery responds in kind, with much more effect. Guided on by 1LT Snook, 155s expend their remaining munitions on the forces in Dorfborn. The fire, so heavily concentrated in such a small space, rips some BMPs apart, flips others, and peppers the survivors with shrapnel. 

Booth briefly toys with the idea of counterattacking Dorfborn, encouraged by the scout sections report that a covered, undefended route onto the flank of the shattered village is open through the trees. He ultimately declines to do so, however. Cognizant of the diminished ammunition of both his direct and indirect fire weaponry, and the importance of making sure Lyles’ and Swafford’s platoons do not suffer unnecessary losses (their parent units will need them, after all), he decides against risking a broken neck so late in the battle.

It becomes a moot point: under the cover of smoke and diesel splashed on engine decks, the surviving Soviets pull out of Dorfborn, slinking back in the direction they came. The Battle for Neuhof is over. It is 1142 hours.
As the pounding of artillery fades, the first thing Booth notices – strange as it seemed – was that he could hear birds chirping; had they returned that quickly, or had they simply stayed throughout the fire and fury? The next thing he noticed is that he didn’t feel tired, at all. Wasn’t he supposed to feel fatigued as the adrenaline poured out of his body? All he felt was exhilaration, and satisfaction. They had stopped the Soviets cold, and mauled (no, he corrected himself, destroyed) a MRB for functionally no loss.
His XO was already taking stock of the casualties. Booth knew he would not have many more letters to write, not much more than a dozen, at best. Unlike yesterday, he did not feel a man’s life had been lost in vain. That made it easier. His dependable FSGT had already departed in the TACP’s track to go fetch ammunition from Battalion. Battalion, he thought, how had the rest of the TF done? He couldn’t hear any sounds of battle on either flank…but he could see in the distance to the right, black smoke spires wafting over the forest dividing him from A Company’s engagement areas. A good sign. He concluded. Turning to his RTO, he dictated his SITREP for TOC...