HerrTom

Now the Next interesting topic is how you chose to validate your results namely with the one exception among major armies that doesnt use IFVs Israel.
"The only army to have much experience of APC operations in regular war did not adopt IFVs." p.122
Historically its actually exactly the opposite. The army with the most experience using APCs being the wehrmacht with the SdKfz 251 literally starting ww2 with an APC. And as soon as the Bundeswehr formed they went for getting an IFV with the HS 30 8 years ahead of the BMP1.
Out of all major militaries Israel is actually the exception in not having an IFV.
So lets examine what could have lead to this and what they are using instead.
The area Israel has to fight in has generally quite rough terrain and a fairly high number of highly build up areas. This generally puts a higher emphasis on the dismounts. It also decreases the value of the added speed of advance IFVs can give formations. Israel also had a fairly long history of Insurgency fighting where IFVs also tend to not excel (compare Iraq occupation) though htats straying away from the regular war narative.
Interestingly as much as the Arab Israeli wars were studied by Soviets and Nato alike neither abandoned their IFVs. The biggest influence being the development of BMP2. Curiously with 1 fewer dismounts compared to BMP1 so lack of dismounted infantry wasnt the takeaway.
What seems to be far more influential is that Israel maintains an army of a size it can only afford due to extensive military aid and during the cold war the same was true of its oponents. Its main aid contributor was the US which for the time of Israels major wars simply didnt own IFVs and so couldnt sell them but istead sold APCs. At that point Israel also had very limited AFV production capability so the combination of essentially free APCs and production of IFVs eating into the tank numbers its obviously the better choice to not produce IFVs.
To feed into this the heavy APCs build were primarily captured or outdaatet tank chassis repurposed and only with the Namer did they produce them from the ground up resulting in far lower numbers than they would like. These heavy APCs also face primarily Insurgents not a regular army so are in purpose closer to the modern US MRAP.
IFVs have also been used in several regular wars (2nd and 3rd gulf war, 2008 Georgian war and 2014 in Ukraine). So far they all seem to have accounted quite well for themselves seeing as no unser advocated to stop using them.

Jim Storr ive gotten the book a few weeks ago and have read through it a few times now. Generally i found it easy to read though somewhat heavy on opinions rather than analysis.
You might have found a quite critical audience here as i  as several before me take issue with a certain aspect of the book. In my case ill focus on the chapter Infantry and Antitank Forces specifically your discussion of IFVs.
 
I think wargaming is a valuable source if information but always needs to be cross referenced with rl data.
However the IFV section is entirely at odds with the vast majority of modern armies and from reading it seemed inherently at odds with what was being said. It is also at odds with my personal experience so i was trying to wrap my head around it until i started collecting quotes from it to make a rebuttal ten i realized where the issue comes from.
"Ground-mounted cannon, such as the French and German 20mm, would have beenhighly effectivea gainst enemy APCs." p.116
"Cannon and ATGMs could be very effective [...] Once dismounted in cover, they could be very difficult to locate" p.123
So the Weapons the IFVs carried were effective so why not the IFV itself? Lets see the defense:
"IFVs located in a defensive position [...] tended to be knocked out by artillery fire, or neutralized and then easy prey to the attackers, be it tanks or shoulder-fired antitank weapons." p.124
"If IFVs were sited outside defensive positions [...] being quite large vehicles, they attrackted fire from the attackers Tanks and ATGMs." p.124
This implies that either a dismounted 20mm cannon is more resistant to artillery bombardement or its position wont be spotted and so not bombarded. That is strange in two ways. The IFV should be more resistant to artillery and given its mobility should be sitting outside of view only to move into its firing position when targets are called my the infantry and so actually harder to spot. Or dug in and just have its turret exposed in which case it should be equally difficult to spot but still be more resistant to artillery fire.
Now looking at the offense
"vehicle-mounted cannon and MGs did not help. [...] difficulty in locating the defenders, who were invariably concealed and often dug in." p.123
"Conversely they made the [...] IFVs obvious and high-priority targets for the defender´s fire." p.123
This is strange in two ways. First for supressing defenders and assisting the own infantry exact locations of the defenders need not be known. Simply supressing areas that could be dangerous to the own infantry if occupied by enemy infantry will do the majority of work since 20mm cannons firing he at 1000rpm cyclic into the defenders general area is going to keep their heads down. Even more if there is a full platoon doing this.
Second is that in the game even with their aparently ineffective fire they were still the priority target and not the supporting tanks (and if there werent any why?)
But what about using their ATGMs?
"Where IFVs used  [...] ATGMs [...] they were highly vulnerable to enemy ATGM fire, from either dismounted launchers or specialist antitank vehicles. In both cases the enemy were much harder to locate" p.123
This is again somewhat strange. An IFVs turret is certainly larger than an atgm launcher alone but for the ATGM vehicle that is only the case if it can go hulldown in which case an IFVs turret still wouldnt be much bigger and far more importantly the main way an ATGM will get located is dust and smoke kicked up from the weapons launch which will be the same in either case.
These contradictions between observed results and expected results indicate to me that:
1. There is a spotting mechanic in the ruleset used and IFVs are at a higher disadvantedge as a result
2. Improper defensive doctrine at least for western vehicles who should have several fighting positions and frequently switch. Possibly combined with the ruleset not giving the bonus for a defensive position when employing such a strategy
3. Strange targeting priorities or improper support. A defending unit should prioritize supporting tanks when employing anti tank weapons as they are the biggest threat to the individual unit. In wargaming its easy to always target the unit that will result in the greatest chance of overall success but for the actual troops individual survival is key. A tank will given the choice between an IFV or a tank first shoot the tank because that is the bigger threat. If Tanks simply werent involved the quewstion becomes why not? IFVs are combined arms weapons and suffer when left alone just like any other weapon.

Excellent post.  I gotta say that I do disagree with this part though, at least a bit.  Western Bias is a thing, don't get me wrong, so is Eastern bias.  Almost all of our sources are in English (we do use translated stuff when we can find it) and therefore are going to have that bias built in.
But as a Game Lead for CMCW, I gotta say I really agree with a lot of what Zaloga is saying and the game as modeled leans more in this direction.  Further it lines up with the single case analysis by Nordeen and Isby M60 vs T-62 Cold War Combatants 1956-92 almost exactly.  On pages 85 and 91 there are handy accuracy assessments that show exaclty what Zaloga is talking about, once you get under 1000m the disparity between NATO and Soviet tanks starts to evaporate. 
So what? Well as early as the Beta ARR it became apparent that for successful use of Soviet tanks you need:
- Mass - Soviets had lots of tanks so even at tactical level you need to manage for overmatch - the echoes what @Grey_Fox posted on the "other thread"
- Range - Get in close, do not play western style and try to play long range sniping-counter sniping because that will not work.
A Coy of T64s at 1000m versus a Coy of M60A1s (equal crew quality) is not a fair match up - I have run some basic test and am seeing 2 to 1 in favor of the Soviets, particularly if you open up the T64s and offset the ergonomic issues.
I think most of the Soviet-Frustration centers on employing western tactics on them. 
In the end the technical realities of Soviet equipment are likely accurate (night vision argument accepted) while Zaloga adds context.  Although one thing I cannot rationalize is that if Soviets knew they were looking at the close game, why did they keep trying to put ATGMS on absolutely everything, even tanks?  A long game eventuality had to be in the calculus somewhere.

There was an interesting discussion on Soviet and Western tank comparative capabilities in "International Security" magazine between Malcolm Chalmers and Lutz Unterseher on one side, and Steven Zaloga on the other side in 1988-1989. Those debates, that happened almost 35 years ago, resemble the discussions we have today on this forum.
First, Malcolm Chalmers (University of Bradford, UK)and Lutz Unterseher(Chairman of the European Study Group on Alternative Security Policy, Germany) published an article "Is There a Tank Gap? Comparing NATO and Warsaw Pact Tank Fleets". In this paper they compared Warsaw Pact and NATO tank armies both quantitively and qualitatively. They argued that, despite WP had slight advantage in number of tanks, qualitive advantage of NATO equipment closed the gap and even provided some superiority to NATO.
This article is a real goldmine for those who want to prove that Soviet tanks were inferior, but for the purpose of intellectual honesty I will cite it here and do their homework for them 🙂 It really translates CMCW underlying concept. Anyway, as we will see later, this claims were confronted  by Steven Zaloga. 
Authors estimated that  a ratio between Warsaw Pact and NATO tank numbers in Central Europe of 1.47:1 three days after mobilization, 1.41:1 after ten days, 1.24:1 after 40 days and 1.31:1 after four months.
The average Warsaw Pact tank weighs only 38 metric tonnes compared with 49 metric tonnes for NATO. While the Warsaw Pact has a 2.1:1 lead in numbers of tanks worldwide, therefore, it has a lead of only 1.6:1 in total tank tonnage.
NATO's comparative advantage is also stocks of older generation models. NATO has followed a policy of carrying out major upgrades to ensure that, although the bodies of these tanks are 20 or more years old, the technology is almost comparable to that on its most modern tanks. As a consequence, the quality gap between old and new-generation models is relatively small. In contrast older models of Pact tanksave not been significantly upgraded.
As Chalmers and Unterseher argued, NATO tanks had technological edge in almost every aspect.
They claim, that earlier Soviet tank models are far inferior to any post-1950 Western tank in the all round orientation capability which they give the crew. Soviet tanks have fewer and smaller viewing points on commanders' cupolas, and commanders still have to stick their heads out more in order to observe their surroundings. All Soviet tanks rely on "active" illumination of their nighttime surroundings with clumsy searchlights.
In Soviet tanks, the commander's and gunner's sights used in targeting generally exhibit a low level of sophistication. Soviet range-finding technology lagged for many years well behind that of the West.  The Soviets did not begin to incorporate the more accurate optical base-on-own-vehicle range-finders into some of their tanks  until 20 years after the U.S. had begun to do so.
With the introduction of its T-62 tank in the early 1960s, the Soviet Union pioneered the extensive use of a large caliber, smooth-bore gun. Muzzle velocities of kinetic energy rounds fired from these guns are high. But this advantage is largely wasted because of the gun's poor accuracy, a result of stability problems with the gun barrel and of inadequate quality control on ammunition production.
The difficulties caused by these cramped and dangerous conditions are such that Soviet tank crews must be less than 1.65 meters tall, a constraint that severely limits the recruiting pool for tank crews and could therefore have adverse effects on crew quality.
To conclude, USSR actual numerical advantage is relatively small, ranging from 1.24:1 to 1.64:1. But the qualitive difference transforms it into a NATO combat potential lead of between 1.06:1 and 1.42:1.
In 1989 well known tank expert Steven Zaloga published his answer in the same magazine ("The Tank Gap Data Flap"), where he called  Chalmers and Unterseher arguments "too one-sided and simplistic". In his words, they "in many respects  overstated their case".
Although the authors spend a great deal of time pinpointing technical deficiencies in older Soviet designs like the T-55 and T-62, The Soviet forward deployed forces have been in the process of removing these older tanks from their units in favor of T-64, T-72, and T-80 tanks. 
The authors' description of shortcomings in Soviet tank design suffer from factual inaccuracies and Western biases in tank design. For example, their assertion that "all Soviet tanks rely on 'active' illumination" is simply false. All Soviet tanks do carry an active infrared search light for nighttime illumination, but the same is true for most NATO tanks produced up to the early 1980s, including the M60A3, Leopard 1 and Chieftain.
In fact Soviets introduced passive night gunner's sights using image intensification technology in the late 1960s with the T-64 and in the early 1970s with late model T-62s; they have been using them ever since. NATO enjoys a comfortable lead in second generation night sights using thermal imaging technology. About a third of NATO tanks have thermal imaging sights, and about 15 percent still rely on the older image intensification sights. But over half of NATO tanks still rely on older active infrared night sights or have no night fighting capability at all. The Soviets have been adopting thermal imaging sights at a much slower pace due to high cost, but over a third of their tanks now have passive image intensification night sights.
The authors' description of shortcomings in Soviet tank fire controls reveals a distinct NATO bias in favor of long-range tank engagements. The use of ballistic computers, wind sensors, and other fire control improvements greatly increase tank gun accuracy at long ranges (over 1000 meters), but have little effect at close ranges. The Soviets feel that simpler fire controls are adequate due to the prevalence of "close-grain" terrain in Central Europe. In German border region, 55 percent of the terrain has sighting ranges of 500 meters or less, 28 percent from 500 to 1500 m, and 17 percent over 1500 m. 
Stadiametric sights, as used on the T-62 and earlier types, are not substantially inferior to advanced fire controls when using Armor Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Sabot (APFSDS) ammunition at ranges up to 1000 m, since the ballistic arc of the projectile is so flat. For example, U.S. Army trials suggest that at 500 m, a tank using a stadiametric sight has a 98 percent probability of hit, and a tank with a laser range finder has the same 98 percent probability.In any event, the tanks most likely to be encountered in the first weeks of a conflict in Central Europe, namely the T-64, T-72, and T-80, are all equipped with laser range finders and ballistic computers.
The authors' general conclusion that Warsaw Pact tanks are "much less capable" than comparable NATO tanks is a gross simplification. NATO tanks do enjoy substantial advantages during certain types of tank engagements, such as long-range duels, or night engagements where there is not enough ambient moonlight for image intensification sights to work. But under many average situations, such as tank combat at average (under 1000 m) ranges during daylight, NATO advantages rapidly diminish. 
To draw my own conclusion, I would say that both  Chalmers and Zaloga made strong arguments. It shows that there is no single, already scientifically proven point of view. The thing that we discussed here were debatable earlier and they remain debatable today (though we gain new knowledge and data since then ).   
In my opinion CMCW and CMBS designers have chosen the concept of force balance that is based on arguments as those that were proposed by Chalmers and Unterseher. This is their right of course, and they can provide some arguments to defense their position. 
But what Chalmers-Zaloga discussion showed is that this concept is far from being the only one.  There are other views that can be grounded in facts as well. Which one better for the purpose of game simulation, balance and - the last but not the least - fun, is up to game designers to decide and for players to evaluate. 

Some questions for Jim Storr.
Starting with something non-contentious. You indicated that you and your brother developed a method in your gaming that reduced the "God's Eye View" factor and it seems allowed for actual surprise to occur on the game board. Would you care to tell us what you did to achieve this?
In your footnotes you reference particular games you and your brother played (e,g. "Battle 164, 12 January 2003." - pg. 231). Are these games referred to in the footnotes available somewhere to examine? If so, where? If not, why the footnote?
More contentious:
On page 149 you state: "Soviet artillery fire would probably be very heavy but inaccurate, and its fire planning crude." I don't feel you properly justified this comment in the preceding text and to be frank I find it doubtful for two reasons. First the importance that artillery has played in Russian and Soviet military tactics. And second, your assessment suggests a low standard of training. I know that the Soviets had artillery academies devoted to producing artillery officers. These were academies with four year programs that produced company/battery grade officers with engineering degrees. I can't imagine that such an education would produce incompetents. My wife's deceased father was a colonel in the Soviet artillery and was on the faculty of such an institution. He was a university mathematics student when he was recruited into the Soviet Army. Perhaps I am wrong, so can you explain why an army that prized artillery, seems to have placed it high in their tactical system and seems to have invested quite a bit in the education of its artillery officers would produce and be satisfied with such dismal results as "... heavy but inaccurate [fire], and its fire planning crude"?
Regards.

As I recall from Hunnicutt's book the TV-8's unusual turret was supposed to give the tank a swimming capability. Think a DD Sherman, except the turret's buoyancy would be ensured by its design. Theoretically if the tank's crew compartment could be adequately waterproofed the TV-8 could 'sail' through open ocean in a mild sea state. While I haven't read this explicitly I always assumed that the TV-8 was intended to be an expeditionary tank for the Marines or for a channel crossing back into Europe as had been planned in OFFTACKLE. 
Anyway all thats to say the TV-8 project gave us one of, IMO, the funniest paintings of a tank ever. 

I like to think the TV sank that poor little destroyer down there. I also think there are no fish and plenty of withered vegetation thanks to a leaky reactor containment unit. 

A while ago I came across a few games over at Decision Games which fall under the title of the Commando/Raiders series. 
Other systems such as Ranger and No End in Sight by Ivan Sorensen also get a nod in their direction.
Basically they are solo games where you move from 'point to point', fight your way to an objective. Achieve objective and head home.
One such game in the series is Long Range Desert Group set in N. Africa where Commando types go behind the lines blowing up stuff and getting into mischief.
Well it gave me an idea.
So I started on a Afghan type game where a player is in command of a platoon size infantry formation (nothing over powered). 
The concept is that a couple of players who'd normally play together to play a narrative campaign where each player gets to play both 'NATO' forces and insurgents.
So the campaign starts thus.
Player 1 fancies been a recon Platoon commander, so he will be in command of a American Infantry Recon platoon for up coming mission.
SEQUENCE OF PLAY
1. Roll for nationality (optional).
2. Place Base Icon in a Open terrain box.
3. Roll for missions.
4. Move your unit on the campaign map.
5. Roll on the event table.
6. Play out CM scenario.
7. Adjust stability tracker.
8. Repeat steps 3-7 until your mission is completed.
So for example, Player 1 places the NATO base marker and then rolls on the following table to decide what mission he gets.
Mission Generator Roll 1xD6
Note, for each mission roll on the random location table for objective.
1    Escort a VIP to location. ** 
    Starting from the base, escort the Battalion commander to mission objective.

2   Kill or capture enemy leaders ** 
    Roll on the random location table for three objectives. When then platoon ends up at the a objective roll on              the Bad Intel table.
    Starting from your base, travel to the objectives.
3    Destroy target ** 
      Travel to objective area and roll on the table below.
    
    Target     (Roll a D8)
    1-2    Transport Truck
    3-4    Technical Armed with 7.62mm RPK
    5-6    Technical Armed with 7.62mm Goryunov or PKM
    7-8    Technical Armed with 12.7mm DshkM
4    Reach and hold location ** 
    Take and hold objective area on the battle map. 
5    Seek and destroy *** 
      Travel to objective area and destroy any targets.
6    Routine patrol*
      Travel to objective area and back to base.    
* indicates Low Motivation missions.
** indicates Normal Motivation missions
*** indicates High Motivation missions.
Set NATO Platoons the correct motivation in the scenario editor.
Player 1 rolls a '1', escort the Battalion Commander.
Player 1 then rolls on the Random Location Table.
Random Location table roll d10
1. Pasha     
2.  Jaba    
3.  Kunar 
4.  Karam 
5.  Ada
6.  Darha
7.  Tagab
8.  Bagar
9.  Kuz
10. Nulu
Player 1 rolls a 7 and is escorting the Bn CO to Tagab.
In this map  below Camp Able is placed South West of JABA as 1st Plt travels to Tagab on a mission.
Depending on the unit type, light vehicles move three boxes, APC's two and foot slogging infantry move 1.Player 1 moves his recon unit three boxes, when done, Player 1 rolls on the Random Event Table. 
Event Table. Roll 2xD6
Note Insurgent units are medium size teams. If the number of insurgent teams goes below 1 skip the CM battle.
Battle maps should be 1.5km x 1.5km and setup zones should be at least 300m apart.
2     Cross battlefield (NATO Player must exit units opposite side of map).
Roll 1xD6 divide by two, place that many Insurgent units in scenario.
If the NATO player loses the scenario, they move back the box they travelled from.
3    Meeting engagement.
Roll 1xd6, place that many Insurgent units in scenario.
Roll 1xD6 -2, place that many Technical in scenario.
If the NATO player loses the scenario, they move back the box they travelled from.
    
4    Prevent target being destroyed.
Local government forces are under attack, place a Syrian infantry platoon on the map in full view of insurgent forces. Your platoon must rescue them.
Roll 1xd6, place that many Insurgent units in scenario.
5-6    Ambush! Your platoon is ambushed.
Roll 2xd6-2, place that many Insurgent units in scenario, add mortar team.
Roll 1xD6, place that many TRP’s on the map for insurgents.
Insurgents may place a small I.E.D. on the road.
Scenario note, NATO units must be setup along a road with insurgent set up zones on either side of the road. Insurgents have exit zones on all sides of map.
7-8    I.E.D.’s detected! 
Skip a turn while the engineers clear the area.
9    Search and secure
Locals have spoken of an insurgent weapons cache near by. Your CO. has ordered you to check it out.
Roll 1xd6 -2, place that many Insurgent units in scenario.
Roll 1xd6 -2, place that many Insurgent techicals in scenario.
10    Insurgents peeved.
Roll 1xd6 +2, place that many Insurgent units in scenario.
Set insurgent motivation to fanatic. 
    
11-12    Morale Check.
If your platoon has taken 5+ casualties (WIA or KIA) in the campaign so far lower your platoon’s morale by one level.

Player 2 builds the CM battle and plays the insurgents.
After the CM battle, adjust headcount and ammo load out (ammo loadout optional) for player for player Player 1 the adjust the stability tracker.
I would recommend that you play with the Hard Cat Rules by @IanL & @Bil Hardenberger
The idea of this system is to have a fast narrative campaign, Player 2 can also command a NATO platoon, roll for a mission and a event and Player 1 can build scenarios for him and play as the insurgents. Or maybe a third player can be the GM, it's a flexible system you can make your own Mission/Event list or add to what's already there. I will make a Vassal module with charts and what not.
The terrain boxes are a guide to what type of QB battle map you might want to use.
I have made this ridiculous large graphic just so you can have a glance, please note that most of the charts will be tabbed so there'll be no clutter on the game board.
I also have a CMRT Partisan and a CMFI N. Africa Long Range Desert Patrol versions in the works.
I still have a couple of things to work on, a play test will needed.

I follow this guy on Twitter - Jon Hawkes, who is an industry commentator on land warfare technology and a Principal at Janes, where he previously was Associate Director and Head of Land Warfare for some years having fulfilled a range of military ground vehicles market forecasting, industry analysis and defence research roles before that.
He shares some interesting posts re modern AFV/IFV design and technology and he's shifted a lot of stuff to his new blog which some of you may find interesting.
https://www.tanknology.co.uk/post/welcome

Hi Forum, 
Hi Jim, 

I was looking for reviews about the book and found this thread. I have read it as well. I just registered for posting here and hope that's okay, haven't played CM in years but I might get back into it. 
I was reading the info on the "Bundeswehr" with great interest, in particular after I wondered for some time what the "untapped" sources would be. I was thinking about two claims for a while now:
 
1.)
I am not quite sure how well the book is served by explaining Bundeswehr tactics from the 80s by overrelying on two books by Middeldorf from the 50s. That's 30 years of tactical development in between. I don't say Middeldorf is irrelevant, but I felt that overall it would have been more appropriate to work with sources from the 80s or late 70s, simply for the sake of being closer to the scope of the book, especially since Middeldorf is cupiously quoted for relatively banal things (the faster the persuit, the greater the success" p. 201).
So when you say "Unsurprisningly, the best discription of the tactics of the delay come from the Middeldorf books." (p. 178) What do you compare that with? Middeldorf himself keeps developing his thoughts on the delay for example until, at least, the 60s when he is trying to take into account the changed environment of the 60s in his later publication "Führung und Gefecht" (1968).
Middeldorf is very important, but I personally feel that he would have required more contextualization to tranasfer his books into the 1980s.
2.)
Similar things go for the size discussion of the divisions. You write that "Both v. Manstein and Speidel wrote divisions over 12 or 13.000 men were unwieldy" (p. 161) and quote v. manstein from 55. That pre-dates the development of the brigade structure in Germany, that is then adopted by most of NATO, hence the shift from the division as the smalles operational element to the brigade. Hence, when Speidel and v. Manstein complain about division size, they still assume the division as the smalles building block. They came up with the brigades after that. The very intense discussion from 55-58 is basically missing. 
When you say "West german Planners really should have payed more heed to Speidel and von Manstein" (p. 173)....that's literally what they did. Speidel and gang came up with the solution further down the road (smalles combined arms element "brigade") to the problem they identified (too large divisions).
There are a few more oddities here and there, like claims that would have needed some source to back them up, mistranslations/misinterpretations of German language/tactical thinking, some quotes that don't seem to add up at times (p. 162, fn 21: The source does not claim this?) , a lot of anecdotes, strong relying on world war II wisdom to explain the 80s, some odd claims about the role of Middeldorf, occasional snarky comments (accepatble style devices though) a la "agilty has been overlooked" (p. 173, and no, it wasn't). Maybe your thoughts on the German perspective should have been subject to a seperate publication, since I feel at times it is overly simplified/shortened. So I am empathatic to your quote from p. 58. "German doctrine is often poorly understood by English-speaking readers." after which you continoue on to give an incorrect explanation of Fingerspitzengefühl. (I have the u with the funny points, so my authenticity is hereby proven 😉)
I really enjoyed the read though! Great to see someone take on this topic and express his thoughts on divisional structure and hypothetical WWIII Combat. And taking on Middeldorf is certainly something! I really appreciated that and learned a few things about BAOR as well. A great non-academic addition from an experienced officers perspective.
I know in these kind of blogs discussions can turn into bilateral "back and forths", so I would like to reserve the right to reply once if thats okay and leave it at that. If you (Jim) or anybody else like to exchange more thoughts, I am happy to exchange contact details (facebook or similar). 
All the best to everyone,
 
LD
 

A couple of points on this.

A representative line from the Gefechtsausbildung der Panzergrenadiere (Helmut von Wehren, 1944), translates as:

"The squad fights mounted from the vehicle, as long as enemy fire, terrain and mission permits."

There has been a very common trend, both on this forum and elsewhere, of focusing more on the first part of that sentence than the last.
Indeed, that same manual has a lot of examples of squad attack, and the majority of them are dismounting for combat, with the SPW in support.

I'd suggest that the circumstances where "dropping grenades from the halftrack" are reasonable are going to be those similar to the use-case of the Flamm SPW 251/16 - e.g., used as a reactive force against a counter attack (as per that Panzergrenadier training film, which itself is rather optimistic), and employed against the enemy occupied trenches after the firefight has been won. You can see this kind of situation rather more clearly in Combat Mission that something with the granularity of the WRG rules - since spotting can be on an individual soldier basis, it's not impossible that you can "clear" a trench position, but actually miss an enthusiastic individual with an ATR, who could recover and shoot you in the rear.

A burst of flame or two against an "empty" trench is a quick way of ensuring that there's no surprises waiting for you. This is going to be of chief importance when under significant time restraints, as with the counter-attack example. In that kind of use-case you're trying to seal up the breach in your lines very quickly, before the follow-on forces can exploit it. The expectation, though, is that the fight has been won, so any enemy extant are having some kind of emotional event, and you can reasonably expect to roll up to within grenade range of these trenches without return fire.
Further, the above manual was produced in 1944, but would have been derived from earlier in the war. Earlier in the war, infantry-held AT options were limited, and that's inevitably going to be the chief concern with this.


The second is the essay that John Curry wrote in the back of his publication of the Contact! rules, about the way the BAOR intended to fight. I've asked him for sourcing, since it's the best description I've read for the BAOR doctrine from the strategic to the combat team level. He mentioned that "This should be considered first hand testimony. I was there as an officer. I worked with a number of units and I was briefed on lots of things including the BAOR operational plan."

In that, he discussed the relative paucity of offensive doctrine in the BAOR. Specifically in terms of dismounting FV-432s, and how close this should be to the objective. In that essay, he makes the claim that opinions on this varied, and there wasn't a definitive answer in the British doctrine.


For what it's worth, my opinion on this is that whilst dismounting inside grenade range gets you across the last 300 yards, it represents a tremendous risk. You can't ever know for certain that 100% of their AT assets are supressed or out of action, especially from the back of a vehicle, so leaving the vehicle blind and potentially under fire seems like a huge roll of the dice to me.

It's also worth considering tactical problems such as these: http://armchairgeneral.com/tactic-101-103-bradley-platoon-attack.htm

Where the (modern) Bradley platoon is dismounted a full 2km away from the objective, to make the most use of the Bradley's weapon systems, with the mounted element advancing once the dig-in BMP has been removed. Clearly this increases the time of this platoon attack significantly - pushing it up to 90 minutes, but I suspect it's a good indication of what this kind of thing should look like.


Incidentally, there were two things which I really hoped Battlegroup would do, and was disappointed to see that it didn't really do either. The first was a comparative study on the various NATO concepts of the battlegroup, for instance how British, US and German doctrine differed on the subject, especially at the Combat Team and Battlegroup level. My sources on the Bundeswehr are distressingly limited, and the aforementioned John Curry, uncited essay is the best I've seen on the BAOR. I'm desperate for more on this subject.

The second is a lot more rigor around outlining your methodology. I'm very much a proponent of the power of wargaming as a instructive or investigative tool, but it's extremely hard to understand your conclusions in this case. There's a lot of telling, but not much showing. To use the IFV assault example, I'd have hoped to have see some diagrams and discussion illustrating your attempts to make IFVs work under the WRG rules, and where and when those failed, even if the examples were only representative. Without that grounding, it's very hard to engage with the argument, because an argument isn't really being made - there's no listed assumptions or method to base things on, so the only element the reader has is the claimed result.

So the fragmentation bug has been logged but I was wondering if information about this had also been logged as a bug or linked to the fragmentation ticket? It seems related to the fragmentation bug as the impact on armor (track only damage) is also occurring here. However in this case it is triggered by a direct impact on the vehicles ERA.

Issue
When artillery shells impact an ERA block it shows the same effect as an air burst or near miss. Damage will only be done to the tracks and no other tank systems are effected. In the attached images/file you can see an Oplot take a hit to the ERA directly adjacent to the main gun and suffer only track damage.

Test
Game: Black Sea
Artillery: 203mm 2S7M
Target: Oplot

images and saved game

https://we.tl/t-J0iGUhNcgn

https://imgur.com/a/ynY0LkL

Yes. IIRC positive is towards the base of the round, negative is towards the nose.
That's a great video. I think it demonstrates particularly well the key principle of closing with the enemy. Advance, advance, advance and shoot as much as possible! It's served me well in scenarios though I haven't had the chance to dig into the campaign yet.

Let me offer some friendly advice. Don't get all butthurt by this kind of comment. Learn from it - it's probably given in good faith. Someone is telling you based on the snippets of information, this is the impression he is getting and his decision on when (or if) he will buy will be based on that impression. That's actionable information.
Those snippets thrown out by someone were also made in good faith. When one compresses a 312-page book into a web review or first impressions, inevitably detail would be lost. A book is also about what people take away from it. That's also a lesson.
Besides, IMO there's no point in blaming the "leakers", b/c people will get similar suspicions re the probable content of Battlegroup if they had read your immediately preceding work Hall of Mirrors.
I can't make this decision for you, but I think the best damage-control tactic at this point is not to insist on what you didn't say, but simply to cite (extensively) what you did say. You've already told us the Soviet Ground Forces will be far from the focus of the book. If that's so, you can spoil that part without ruining the sale value of your piece. At least now you know what kind of preview snippets to offer up to convince your potential buyers your rather expensive book (~US$45!) is a safe bet.

Thank you for clarifying.
Also thanks to @The_Capt for asking the right questions and for other testers to confirm that this was logged recently as a problem. So, it turns out this *is* on the list to be looked at.

1: air burst will only do damage to tank tracks no other subsystems

2: ground bursts will only do damage to tank tracks no other subsystems

3: direct hits will cause subsystem damage

Well I think you may be onto something wrt fragmentation of airburst, and maybe ground burst.  Having seen what can happen in RL, it does look anemic vs tanks at least.   Cluster munitions, particularly the US DPICMs are showing a lot of sub-system damage (HMGs etc) but they are modelled individually.

You've got to be kidding me...
 
50+ 130 mm guns do not damage a single subsystem other than tracks to yellow. This weight of artillery falls onto these 3 tanks and yet every AA MG on the three tanks remains intact.
 
I just ran a quick test in Black Sea and showed the same issue unless I'm expected to believe that 12.7mm machine guns are made of Unobtainium.





------------------

What seems to be happening is that fragmentation effect will not do any damage to tank subsystems^1 . I've tested that by dropping a stupid amount of artillery onto tanks in airburst mode. After hundreds of rounds the tank can just drive off as if nothing as occurred.

I've also ran tests using general and again tanks will not take subsystem damage^1 when a round lands nearby. A shell landing onto a tank will sometimes cause subsystem damage but its not 100% (might be due to ERA?) but that also seems sorta incorrect.



^1 The only subsystem that will show any damage is tracks. No other subsystem will.

Hey Jim,
  Welcome, and you have my sympathies, trust me.  These are a good bunch for the most part but like any bar there is always a few "guys" who just gotta be.  So have you tried CMCW by any chance?  

Thought I'll chime in here. I wouldn't go as far as to call myself an expert, but I am about a semester away from an MA in International Relations with a focus on Eastern European security, so I'm not exactly talking out of my ass here.
First off, Hal Turner is a bumbling idiot. That's probably the least credible source out there. If you see anything by him, COMPLETELY disregard it. He peddles in conspiracy theories, instead of doing any kind of "analysis".
With that out of the way, what's going on in Eastern Europe right now is still concerning, and I would go as far as to say that this is the most dangerous crisis that we've seen since Able Archer. Even if we strip away the whole NATO-Russia angle, there is a realistic chance of war between the two largest military forces in Europe. If that turns into a full on conflict it would not be crazy to imagine a six figure death toll. That said, I am growing increasingly convinced that this is just Russia trying to increase pressure on the West and roll back their expansion to a state that Russia would feel more comfortable with. In fact, I don't think the Russian buildup has as much to do with Ukraine as it does with Belarus. One of the main areas where Russian equipment is being stockpiled is Yelnya. Most analysts that I've seen works from or talked to personally agree that Russian forces in Yelnya (even prior to this current buildup) serve two purposes: for a rapid drive on Kyiv should the situation in Ukraine devolve into open warfare, or to transit through Belarus and cut off the Baltic states in the event of hostilities with NATO. Given the fact that most of the rhetoric from Russia about this mess has been about NATO (instead of Ukraine), I find it hard to believe that they'd build up forces there, then use them to attack Ukraine, removing one of their main assets in conflict with NATO from the board, so to speak. Instead, I think they're building up forces so that they can establish a military presence, including a large portion of the 41st CAA as well as ballistic missiles, in Belarus should this week's talks fail. This isn't necessarily a preparation for war, but is instead Russia's way of saying "NATO expanded uncomfortably close to our borders, so we'll do the same thing and send our troops uncomfortably close to your borders as well". They could also up the intensity of their efforts in Donbas, but the most aggressive move I can see Russia making in the near future would be a move for Mariupol, MAYBE Kharkiv, but the latter is incredibly unlikely.
 
A couple other notes about crap from the Turner piece
I have not seen any good evidence for a Ukrainian buildup in preparation for a military operation to retake the Temporarily Occupied Territories. Can't say 100% that it doesn't exist, but I suspect that at least someone I know would have heard about it. Plus it Zelensky has been fairly passive regarding the war, and such an operation would be out of character for him.
I have also not seen any evidence that the mess in Kazakhstan is related to the Ukraine/NATO-Russia situation. Timing seems to have been a coincidence. That said, Central Asia is a bit out of my wheelhouse so I can't comment much beyond that.
The whole "NATO missiles in Romania" thing is mostly BS. The US Army has been developing a ground-launched version of the Tomahawk, possibly to be deployed to Europe, but those are not yet operational, and despite all the complaints from Moscow, there is no good evidence that the Aegis Ashore system in Romania is anything but defensive in nature.
There is also no evidence that the US has deployed tanks to Europe (Moving that number of vehicles without somebody noticing is nearly impossible), nor is there evidence of American aircraft being moved to Ukraine. Russia would be publicly freaking out if either of those happened.
 
 

I never knew about Hal Turner either before now, but let's see what Wikipedia has to say about him:
"ld Charles' "Hal" Turner (born March 15, 1962) is an American far-right political commentator and convicted felon from North Bergen, New Jersey.
Turner's viewpoints typically encompass Holocaust denial,[1] conspiracy theories,[citation needed] white supremacy,[2] and have included calls for assassination of government officials. In August 2010, he was convicted for making threats against three federal judges with the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, for which he spent two years in prison.
Turner has sporadically hosted The Hal Turner Show, usually on shortwave radio station WBCQ, since 2002, as well as a corresponding blog, which has changed URLs frequently and has spread hoaxes and fake news."
 

When active measures meet grifting.

Oh, no...
And welcome! 

This is something I am a bit interested in for the later Cold War era, the relationship between German Generals, Nazis, and the US Army has always been....... weird. After all we forced many of them to write us histories while they were in prison camps, histories which were pretty influential in how the civilian community has gone on to remember WWII and especially the Eastern Front. From what I've read of both documents and of writing on the subject, the US Army was pretty uncritical when it came to the Nazis. There is even an infamous Military Review article which is very flattering to Joachim Piper and has, as I recall, one line in it about all the bad stuff he did. The interviews with Hermann Balck I linked in that other thread are also interesting, I've always gotten the vibe from reading the interview transcripts that what theyre really saying is that the Russians are incapable of being good soldiers, Germans are inherently good soldiers, etc. Balck also definitely takes the line in his memoir that Berlin and the rear area troops were responsible for the brutality not the troops on the line. Thats not really true (see the work of Omar Bartov who takes down that specific myth). Yet the US Army took those lessons seemingly uncritical and really adopted the German lessons from fighting the Soviets without any comment on all the nasty parts of WWII on the Eastern front. Also no comment on the fact that the Germans lost(!!!) and why that may have been the case. Its interesting stuff.
Back on schedule @marais the Amazon page suggests he has some SHOCKING revelation about the Bundeswehr. Is that just selling fluff or does he seem to have something to say there? Is it just 'the Germans were really good?' Also for those who have read it, where do you think this falls on the memoir to scholarship spectrum? Sometimes you get these guys who do this annoying thing where they want to contribute to bigger questions about a subject, but are too lazy to do more research so they just take their own direct experience and apply it writ large to the whole Army or the whole system. Or just ignore everything they didn't directly engage with. It makes me wary of these kinds of books sometimes. Do you think he does a good job of striking a balance? 
If his big revelation re: the Germans is that 'they had learned lessons from WWII and that made their doctrine good' I hate to break it too him, but the US also did that, both AD & AirLand Battle were directly based off WWII experiences generally, German experiences specifically, and were written in combination with German doctrine. The 1980s HDV 100/100 and FM 100-5 were very similar, and DePuy was PROUD that he had gotten the Germans to rewrite the 1970s version of HDV 100/100 to make it like Active Defense. I wonder how much of 'German doctrine is good!' stems from biases developed during WWII and the 1950s, applied to the 1970s & 80s. My own work looks to conclusively show that German and American doctrine werent all that different in theory, and were written jointly together at multiple levels. So why would someone like Storr rate the US and Germany differently, as often happens? (I dont want this to sound rotely nationalistic, but rather why the Germans get elevated so highly) Is it that their WWII experiences look good and carried their reputation through the Cold War? Or that they were still doing something nobody else was? If there were I havn't figured it out. 

Another  very good book is "Schlachtfeld Fulda Gap – Schriftenreihe Point Alpha, Band 2", published by Dieter Krüger.
But the English language version ("Fulda Gap: Battlefield of the Cold War Alliances" ) is expensive...
content (chapters):
1: Fulda Gap: A Flashpoint of the Cold War between Myth and Reality, Helmut H. Hammerich
2: The Eighth Guards Army of the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany and the Fulda Gap, Matthias Uhl
3: The Strategic and Operational Considerations of NATO in Europe since the 1970s, Helge Hansen 
4: The Development of the Military Conceptions of the Warsaw Pact in the Last Two Decades of the East–West Conflict, Siegfried Lautsch
5: The Development of NATO Defense Plans for Central Europe in the Final Decades of the Cold War, Gregory W. Pedlow
6: The Defense of Highway 84: Recollections of the Commander, B Troop, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, 1978–1980, Roger Cirillo
7: The Fulda Gap: A Personal Perspective from Platoon Leader to Army Group, Crosbie E. Saint
8: The GDR and its Mission in the Warsaw Pact, Torsten Diedrich
9: The Wartime Mission of the Border Troops of the GDR, Detlef Rotha
10: Brinkmanship in the Cold War: Theoretical Foundation and Application, Mathias Rupp
11: When the Cold War Almost Turned Hot, Albin F. Irzyk
12: When the World Stood at the Abyss—and No One Knew It, Volker Bausch
13: The Military Relationship of Forces between the North Atlantic Alliance and the Warsaw Pact, Michael Poppe
14: The Alliances and the Fulda Gap: A Balance between Ideology, Politics, Strategy, and Operational Plans, Dieter Krüger
 

We need an editor which can read bitmap (topographic maps) and convert to our 3D map editor code. I can't even find a means to convert them to BRZ files let alone generate a 3 D map.