Saint_Fuller

Good day everyone. This AAR is based on a PBEM of a quite interesting scenario created by @Rinaldi, "Action at Chervona Hirka", and based on the (quite well-made, I would say) master map by @H1nd.
 
SITUATION AND BRIEFING
It's the early hours of June 11th, 2017. I have command of the Ukrainian 15th Mechanized Battalion of the 58th Mechanized Brigade, deployed to hold up the brigade's northern shoulder around the town of Chervona Hirka.
My primary objective is to retain control of the town itself, as it sits adjacent to the enemy's MSR and controls access to side roads that could let the Russians bypass Krolevets. This is Objective Aleksej.
A roadblock positioned astride the road to the south is a secondary objective, designated Objective Vasilij. It is held by the battalion recon platoon occupying Battle Position 1. I do not expect to hold the position for very long against enemy attack, if it comes to that. However, forcing the enemy to deploy to destroy the roadblock will cost him precious time, and hopefully, the recon platoon will provide me early warning of enemy movement.
My third objective is to attrit and delay the enemy as much as possible: inflicting losses and forcing him to deploy a significant amount of forces to overcome my position will cost him time and weaken his ability to continue the thrust. In this case, the priority is to engage and destroy his infantry and their carriers, with armor and logistical vehicles to be engaged as targets of opportunity.
At my disposal is the aforementioned 15th Mechanized Battalion, reinforced by a platoon of armor (BM Bulats) from the Brigade and a platoon of MT-12 antitank guns.
The enemy force is a BTR-equipped motor rifle unit with armor support, and the incoming attack is likely going to be in battalion strength, though possibly somewhat diminished: a company-sized enemy force was repulsed yesterday, leaving behind several BTRs and T-72s.


PLAN
There are three probable routes for the enemy to attack down, by my estimation. Map is hopefully legible enough to interpret.


My intent is to cover all three probable axes of advance:
The field, Axis Alpha, is the fastest and most direct approach to the town.
However, it is covered from three sides, forming a fire sack to attrit the enemy as much as possible if they choose to advance there. The Bulats and antitank guns will engage from BP 3, ATGM teams of the battalion antitank platoon are situated in BP 2, and the right flank is covered by infantry with RPGs as well as their BMP-2s, occupying BP 4.
Axis Bravo, along the river on my left flank, would potentially allow the enemy to maneuver very close to Objective Aleksej while remaining out of my view. A rifle platoon is deployed on the north side of BP 2 to keep the area under observation. If the enemy chooses to focus his main effort down this axis of advance, that platoon is to act as a delaying obstacle so I can shift my forces accordingly.
Axis Charlie, the road on the south, is the third potential route for the enemy to take, and the one I judge to be least likely: it is constricted and forces the enemy to drive straight along a fairly narrow path, directly into any potential ambushes. Nevertheless, if the enemy chooses to move through here, my intent is, much like with Axis Bravo, to delay them with the limited forces I have at BP 6, to buy time for shifting around other forces to BP 9 at the south end of Chervona.
The artillery has pre-registered target points on positions on the east edge of the field: these are where I expect the enemy to position support by fire elements in case of an attack along Axis Alpha. Artillery fire on the TRPs will hopefully obscure the vision of and damage/disrupt any SBF elements on these positions.
Phase Line Forward is the first position where the enemy is likely to be engaged, by the battalion recon platoon at BP 1.
PL Midfield is the forward line of the battalion's main body.
PL Stop is the no-pass line.
 
If the enemy attacks along axis Alpha:
Forces at BP 2 and BP 4 are to put flanking fire on enemy forces as they move across the field, and then withdraw to contract the line when the enemy approaches PL Midfield: the forces at BP 2 will move to BP 8, and the units at BP 4 to BP 9. Alternatively, units at BP 2 and BP 4 will be kept in place to strike at the enemy's trailing elements, if he chooses to pass them by.
Forces in BP 3 just past PL Midfield will be the first to engage the enemy when he breaks into Chervona Hirka from the field, and will if necessary cede the edge of the town and attempt to conduct a fighting withdrawal to BP 12.
BP 8, 9, and 12 are the final fighting positions, being directly in front of PL Stop.

If the enemy attacks along axis Bravo:
Forces at BP 2 will engage the enemy first, and fight to delay the enemy as long as possible.
They may attempt to conduct a fighting withdrawal toward BP 10, and then either fight in position there or withdraw a second time to further strengthen BP 3.
Units at BP 3 and BP 8 will reorient to face a thrust from the northeast. If they can be safely pulled out of their position, forces from BP 4 will move to BP 12.
If necessary, forces at BP 8 will conduct a fighting withdrawal to BP 12.

If the enemy attacks along axis Charlie:
Forces at BP 6 will be the first to engage the enemy, to delay and attrit them.
Units at BP 4 will move south to strike at the enemy's flank where they are strung out along the road, and units at BP 8 will move to BP 9 to receive a thrust from the south.

In the event I fail to stop the enemy and lose control of Chervona Hirka, I am counting on inflicting enough losses to leave the enemy unable to effectively take advantage of the ground they have taken.
My briefing does not indicate that force preservation is a critical concern, but ideally, I want to keep losses below 30%, to ensure the battalion remains capable of further combat operations.
 
And well, that's it for the opening post.
The next update (and first actual AAR content!) should be along fairly soon.

The more relevant issue is that the barrel change system on MG34 is much better for use in a ball mount than the system MG42 used.
With a 34 you just rotate the receiver out of the way and pull the barrel out straight backwards, like so:


In an MG42, you pull barrels out like this:

There isn't really room to do this were the gun to be mounted into a Kugelblende.

The more relevant issue is that the barrel change system on MG34 is much better for use in a ball mount than the system MG42 used.
With a 34 you just rotate the receiver out of the way and pull the barrel out straight backwards, like so:


In an MG42, you pull barrels out like this:

There isn't really room to do this were the gun to be mounted into a Kugelblende.

The Vickers Medium Mark I predates the Panzer III by over a decade, and had a three-man turret. The Swedes also made a prototype design with a three-man turret in 1934, which eventually ended up as Strv m/42. The Germans were not first with the 3-man turret, and it's hard to claim they were "ahead of their time" with it when the British did it over a decade before them.
Panzer III is hardly the originator of the MBT concept, at least not any more than any other medium tank is. In fact, if any WW2 tank in particular can be said to be "the grand daddy of the MBT" (and I honestly don't think any of them truly can be), the British cruisers would have more of a claim than Panzer III, given cruiser tank development led basically directly to Centurion, the "Universal Tank".
The Panther's side armor wasn't particularly thin by the standards of the time: both the T-34 and Sherman had about 40mm thick sides as well, and Centurion had 50mm. The shot trap was a problem, but all it took to fix that was adding the "chin" to the mantlet and it was a non-issue.
Finally, the interleaved suspension achieved good flotation by reducing peak ground pressure (by spreading the weight out over more contact points), and also saved on rubber, which was a scarce resource in wartime Germany. It was a nightmare to take apart, especially if you needed to get at one of the inner wheels, and it liked to get all stuck together with frozen mud overnight, but for what Germany's requirements were, the interleaved suspension was really not a bad design choice.

Vickers Mk 11. A wheeled IFV with 14 dismounts and the entire turret from a Vickers VFM5 with a 105mm L7 mounted on top.

It's somewhat unfortunately also the size of a house.

The Vickers Medium Mark I predates the Panzer III by over a decade, and had a three-man turret. The Swedes also made a prototype design with a three-man turret in 1934, which eventually ended up as Strv m/42. The Germans were not first with the 3-man turret, and it's hard to claim they were "ahead of their time" with it when the British did it over a decade before them.
Panzer III is hardly the originator of the MBT concept, at least not any more than any other medium tank is. In fact, if any WW2 tank in particular can be said to be "the grand daddy of the MBT" (and I honestly don't think any of them truly can be), the British cruisers would have more of a claim than Panzer III, given cruiser tank development led basically directly to Centurion, the "Universal Tank".
The Panther's side armor wasn't particularly thin by the standards of the time: both the T-34 and Sherman had about 40mm thick sides as well, and Centurion had 50mm. The shot trap was a problem, but all it took to fix that was adding the "chin" to the mantlet and it was a non-issue.
Finally, the interleaved suspension achieved good flotation by reducing peak ground pressure (by spreading the weight out over more contact points), and also saved on rubber, which was a scarce resource in wartime Germany. It was a nightmare to take apart, especially if you needed to get at one of the inner wheels, and it liked to get all stuck together with frozen mud overnight, but for what Germany's requirements were, the interleaved suspension was really not a bad design choice.

The Vickers Medium Mark I predates the Panzer III by over a decade, and had a three-man turret. The Swedes also made a prototype design with a three-man turret in 1934, which eventually ended up as Strv m/42. The Germans were not first with the 3-man turret, and it's hard to claim they were "ahead of their time" with it when the British did it over a decade before them.
Panzer III is hardly the originator of the MBT concept, at least not any more than any other medium tank is. In fact, if any WW2 tank in particular can be said to be "the grand daddy of the MBT" (and I honestly don't think any of them truly can be), the British cruisers would have more of a claim than Panzer III, given cruiser tank development led basically directly to Centurion, the "Universal Tank".
The Panther's side armor wasn't particularly thin by the standards of the time: both the T-34 and Sherman had about 40mm thick sides as well, and Centurion had 50mm. The shot trap was a problem, but all it took to fix that was adding the "chin" to the mantlet and it was a non-issue.
Finally, the interleaved suspension achieved good flotation by reducing peak ground pressure (by spreading the weight out over more contact points), and also saved on rubber, which was a scarce resource in wartime Germany. It was a nightmare to take apart, especially if you needed to get at one of the inner wheels, and it liked to get all stuck together with frozen mud overnight, but for what Germany's requirements were, the interleaved suspension was really not a bad design choice.

Because "heavy tank" refers to a tank's intended doctrinal role, and not an arbitrary physical quality like weight?

The Bundeswehr is in terrible shape. It was only a couple of years ago that it came out that they could barely get Panzergrenadierbataillon 371 up to its paper strength even when stripping the rest of the army for equipment.
https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article144983577/Muessen-uns-fragen-ob-wir-im-Ernstfall-abwehrfaehig-sind.html
In a normal army and with a regular unit, this wouldn't really be a big deal. No one is able to fully meet their paper allocations anyway in most units. When they do get up to paper strength, it's by stripping parts and materiel from other battalions or brigades.
But this is supposed to be Germany's contribution to the NATO VHRJTF, effectively Germany's highest readiness unit. It's supposed to be as well equipped as the Bundeswehr can get. Yet they can barely keep their vehicles running and weapons shooting. It isn't much of a leap to assume that the rest of the Bundeswehr is in similar dire straits with regards to equipment availability.
The state of the German military is a trainwreck, even the Germans acknowledge it and have been wringing their hands over it for years, but no one knows where to find the money to pay for the things the Bundeswehr need to do their jobs.
 

The Bundeswehr is in terrible shape. It was only a couple of years ago that it came out that they could barely get Panzergrenadierbataillon 371 up to its paper strength even when stripping the rest of the army for equipment.
https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article144983577/Muessen-uns-fragen-ob-wir-im-Ernstfall-abwehrfaehig-sind.html
In a normal army and with a regular unit, this wouldn't really be a big deal. No one is able to fully meet their paper allocations anyway in most units. When they do get up to paper strength, it's by stripping parts and materiel from other battalions or brigades.
But this is supposed to be Germany's contribution to the NATO VHRJTF, effectively Germany's highest readiness unit. It's supposed to be as well equipped as the Bundeswehr can get. Yet they can barely keep their vehicles running and weapons shooting. It isn't much of a leap to assume that the rest of the Bundeswehr is in similar dire straits with regards to equipment availability.
The state of the German military is a trainwreck, even the Germans acknowledge it and have been wringing their hands over it for years, but no one knows where to find the money to pay for the things the Bundeswehr need to do their jobs.
 

Some Ukrainian soldiers wearing steel pots.
A mod done at the request of @Rinaldi.

I have already asked for a demonstration of Olek's tips 'in the wild' as it were and for my trouble have received nought but evasion and, to be frank, barely coherent gibberish that can be summed up as "my tactics are beyond criticism, how dare you ask me to put my money where my mouth is." But very well, I'll bite. I think that the use of 203mm heavy artillery not to suppress, mask or destroy the enemy, the raison d'etre of any artillery piece, but to make foxholes for the purpose of advancing over open terrain in the face of the enemy, is, to put it mildly, a gross misapplication of a rare and expensive asset. Let us consider the picture he presented back there: a mechanised infantry attack is made, but instead of using the cover available, the commander intends to make his attack across open ground. Now, if the artillery had been used to suppress the enemy, as any sane commander would have used it for, this type of attack might not be a bad idea. However, the artillery is instead used to make foxholes in the open ground in front of the enemy. The attack goes in and the battlegroup is flayed alive by the very much alive and unsuppressed enemy. The foxholes so thoughtfully provided by the artillery are a cold comfort surviving infantry, as whatever had the power to wipe out an advance by IFVs or APCs is presumably well able to eviscerate a force of decimated and demoralised dismounts. The infantry is now pinned in the field, unable to either advance or retreat. Now, if the enemy hadn't been present, or if they had been weak enough to be overcome by the mechanised attack alone, then congrats, you've just used a very rare and expensive asset for absolutely no gain whatsoever.
Is that a detailed enough analysis for you?

Just spitballing, but @Saint_Fuller and myself once tried fooling around with the models and animations in CMSF - we were able to get the Black Sea animations working, but the way the models are done between CMSF and CMBS are too different for clean model ports, it seems CMBS models are broken up into different parts. I'm hoping that changes with CMSF2. If it does, we might make a wee port. Nothing to be done with the TO & E, but a small palette swap of the Russian digi to its arid variation and you might be able to sell the point. 
Tagging @Sgt.Squarehead because he may be keen to see this. 

Gotta say I'm with @IanL on this one. If your tracks get hit in masking terrain the dismounts can just dive into fairly dense cover - without what can only be described as total wasteage of heavy arty. I also doubt the efficiency of trying to advance tracks through fields you've just cratered into a mudpile (game models that iirc) with 203.
The ideas in this thread are interesting though, I'd be open to doing a PBEM so you could put them to the test in a flexible environment. Slots are opening up on my end. 

Yep.
Polish T-54A. Can apparently be found at Panzermuseum Thun in Switzerland.

There have been a lot of attempts and proposals to stick an autoloader in M1, actually.
The thing is that the US regards (and rightly, IMO) the advantages of an autoloader as being outweighed by the problems, as well as the benefits of a fourth crew member. With a human loader, you get an extra pair of eyes, an extra pair of hands for maintenance, your loader can actually think for himself, and he performs faster in the short term. Just having that extra pair of eyes is a serious advantage in the see-first shoot-first environment of tank combat.
Ultimately, the fact that the US hasn't elected to buy into any of the proposals for an autoloader for M1 should be enough of an indication of its (lack of) interest in the idea.

Thanks @Rinaldi for doing that. I personally had not fired 122 precision at anything during testing but I did 155 vs M1s and T90s and get expected results the vast majority of the time. This test shows yet again the artillery doing the expected thing - serious effect - on targets. So, I just do not believe that you frequently see Bradley's shrugging of hits and carrying on as if nothing happened. These test shows that is not common. Sure it can happen - I saw T90s that survived a hit from a 155 - it was not common but it did happen. Just because it can happen and it sucks when it does *does not mean it is common*.

It took one round. You can see the impact point on the front of the turret, actually.
And it's more evidence than you've ever bothered to show, to my knowledge, of these alleged super-Bradleys that shrug off PGMs and ATGW with no significant damage.
Because it's sure as hell not the case with the Bradleys I've seen in game, but who knows, maybe I'm just inordinately lucky (because I have in fact found that I can kill Bradleys fairly reliably using Russian artillery-fired PGM). Maybe it is in fact the case that M2s that somehow magically absorb direct PGM hits are the norm for everyone else???

Hmmm...

I ran a quick test since my curiosity piqued and I'm not doing anything productive with this hangover. 
4 Bradleys; 2 in vehicle fighting positions, 2 in the open. 1 Russian FOO set to "veteran" with a 6 gun battery of 2S1 122mm, also set to veteran. All precision missions were 3 shell protocol. I only ran the test three times.
  

Hmmm...

Hmmm...

While the Israeli's have long been an ally of the West, that does not mean they were given access to the same technology and equipment as NATO states were during the Cold War. This means that what the Israeli's designed was their own, and not a derivative of US, UK, and German tank designs. The reason I mention these 3 NATO nations specifically, is because these three nations worked together during the 1960s-70s to develop tanks that all shared similar traits. Chobham armor is one of these traits, along with other advances in armor technology. All of these advances were primarily aimed at increasing the survivability of tanks against ATGM threats, as during the 60s-70s ATGMs fielded by the Soviets were outmatching NATO armor capability. The new generation of tanks jointly developed by these three nations were all designed to defeat Soviet ATGMs. 
Just because the Israeli's had a hard time with ATGMs in 1973, does not mean they had the capability to design new tanks with armor that could effectively defeat ATGMs. As I said, this armor technology was not shared with the Israeli's when it was devised and put to use in the early 80's.
In the 2006 Lebanon war, the Israeli's were using the Merkava tank, which does incorporate some Israeli designed composite armor. During the conflict, a grand total of 50 Merkava tanks (primarily the Mark 2s and 3s) were hit by ATGMs. Only 6 of these were fully destroyed. The source I'll provide here is a wiki link, but there are many cited sources to back up the blurb. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkava#2006_Lebanon_War
Its also important to note that this was irregular warfare in an urban environment. A base RPG-7 warhead is enough to punch through the top hatches on the M1A2 Abrams if fired from above or at other appropriate angles. This further reinforces what I said about TROPHY. TROPHY isn't meant to save tanks from frontally impacting ATGMs in a Fulda Gap style armored engagement, it is designed to protect the more vulnerable parts of tanks from complex geometry in urban warfare settings. Yes, it has an application in large scale conventional armored conflict, but its primary purpose is for urban settings. 
As an additional note, some analysts propose that the primary reason Israeli tanks were lost was due to bad tactics at the time, and not due to overly vulnerable tanks. 
All of this is to say, the M1A2 SEPv2 Abrams is extremely survivable against ATGMs in a conventional conflict. In dense urban warfare, tanks always have been and likely always will be extremely vulnerable to a multitude of both low and high tech threats, to include ATGMs, but this can be mitigated by employing proper tactics, and further bolstered by systems like TROPHY to pick up the slack where tactical lapses are made.