CMSF inspiration?

[Erwin]

Read "Not a Good Day To Die" (by Sean Naylor) about Op Anaconda in Afghanistan after 9/11. HIghly recommended good read. 

While probably not practical to create a simulation closely based on the historical events, the things that happened during Anaconda seemed like xnt inspiration for CMSF2 scenarios and/or campaigns.

In addition to the inhospitably craggy desert terrain, the book details the operation consisting of an amazing melange of forces - 10th Mountain, Rangers, US and Australian SEALS, Delta, CIA plus a whole mess of other elite special forces with airpower and drones providing the "heavy artillery" - all supporting what was to be the main attacking force of Afghan Army under warlords who hated each other.

Given what MOS has achieved with his amazing TOC scenario, the above seems to provide additional rich inspiration for (largely fictional) interesting and challenging CMSF2 COIN or Uncon scenarios set in Syria.  

 

BTW: The reason it's not practical to base a scenario too closely on Anaconda is that, despite months of training and planning, the whole op is described as a massive cock-up with senior commanders thousands of miles away trying to control things while the sods on the grounds fail to be able to communicate, radios not functioning, misunderstandings abound, chains of command are messed up by ego-driven commanders back at remote bases, helicopters landing in the wrong places and getting shot up, airpower not arriving as expected or shooting up friendlies.  Basically, anything that could go wrong did.  One gets the sense from the book that this was a military force used to peacetime exercises and failing to understand the frictions and realities of war.  

 

 

[sburke]

 Outstanding read, I have it on my kindle.  I toyed around with it quite a bit, but on top of the items you noted, CM doesn't do caves, the mountainous terrain would probably be really hard to do as well.  Shame as I got hooked on this book too.

Edited July 22, 2018 by sburke

[c3k]

My only idea for caves is to allow trigger points to occur which then are linked to reinforcements appearing in craggy spots. They would have various orders. Sometimes, they would go to an exit zone right nearby. Pop up, shoot, disappear.

[Erwin]

12 hours ago, sburke said:

 Outstanding read, I have it on my kindle.  I toyed around with it quite a bit, but on top of the items you noted, CM doesn't do caves, the mountainous terrain would probably be really hard to do as well.  Shame as I got hooked on this book too.

That's one of many reasons that one wouldn't want to design a simulation of exactly what happened in Anaconda. 

What is fascinating is the descriptions in the book of the wide mixture of units, from Conscript/Green and Vet Afghan Army under CIA and spec ops control, to the elite SEALs. Delta operators, and many other Spec Ops units as well as Rangers & 10th Mountain.  Some hiking, some helicoptering in to LZ's, others in convoys of assorted pick ups, trucks, armored wheeled vehicles.  Elite snipers and FO's on mountain tops etc.  

My bias is always towards scenarios that feature a wide variety of different units as most CM2 scenarios feature too many cookie-cutter units imo.  The scenario concept of a main effort by less capable units like the Afghans - but heavily supported by elite units and airpower and arty sounds fascinating.  I can't recall ever playing a scenario like that.  Even MOS's TOC scenario depends on US forces doing nearly all the heavy lifting right from the start with the Ukr forces being only capable of garrison duty (aside from the brittle QRF units).  

However. if you've looked at MOS TOC scenario and how it brilliantly enables intel to affect what the player's objectives are, the Anaconda book could be the (loose) basis for a similar compelling (fictionalized) CMSF2 scenario.