A Modest(?) Proposal: Airpower and CM

[Michael Emrys]

It is well known that in CM air strikes are more than a little undependable. I think this is for the most part an accurate rendition of the historical realities. But I've been pondering this issue of late, and I have a thought or two that I would like to receive informed opinion on.

What brought all this to the forefront of my awareness was something that occurred in a QB that I tried to set up when I first got CMBB last month. It was a combined arms Blitzkrieg-style attack on a Soviet held village. Since I felt that this task group would have outrun its artillery support, I bought four Stukas as compensation. It was my idea that they would pound the village before my troops got close.

It was only after I began setting up my units that the recollection dawned on me that air units were not necessarily reliable, but I decided to "press on regardless". I waited a couple of turns for the Stukas to show, but when they didn't I decided it was best to wait no longer and get a move on.

A couple of turns after that, as my troops were approaching their first objective, still some distance from the village, I heard one of the planes fly over. He didn't attack anything though, just kept going. I assumed he wasn't able to identify any targets. The next turn, a plane, either the same one returned or a different one, did make an attack alright, but it was on my troops. Although the bomb landed about 50 meters from the nearest tank, it caused a casualty to its crew and shocked it. Even worse, it totally wiped out two MG teams that had earlier in the turn debarked from that tank and were in the process of deploying into a nearby wood. Another tank, also about 50 meters from the bomb was also shocked.

Now, this kind of thing is not exactly rare in CM and not exactly unknown in real life either, even in the present day, as recent unpleasant events in Afghanistan have demonstrated.

But as I say, it did get me to thinking. And this is where my thoughts have led me: Supposing there were a way to designate a zone on the map where the player would prefer to have his bombs drop. This could be done in one of two ways. The first would be that during the Set Up phase, the player presses the hot key that activates this function and then lassos the part of the map that he wants to be his bomb zone. Alternative to that would be that when a player buys planes, he gets an Air Target Reference Point (ATRP) that he places in the Set Up phase just as he would a standard TRP. The only difference is that only aircraft are effected by it. The effect would be that if and when they appear on the map, they would give strong preference to attacking targets within some game-defined distance—say 100 meters—of the ATRP. They would not be rigidly tied to it; there would still be some random chance that they would attack targets outside that radius, especially a "juicy" one, such as a vehicle in the open. But the preponderance of attacks should fall within target areas.

I don't want to swing too far and make air too powerful. As noted, planes may still pick targets outside the ATRP radius. And I feel that a player should get only one ATRP per game regardless of how many planes he buys. That represents the historical limitation on planning airstrikes. On the other hand, I would allow planes to bomb buildings and woods within the ATRP radius even if they contain no spotted enemy units. This strikes me as falling within historic precedent.

Forcing the placement of the ATRP during setup mirrors the way air-to-ground coöperation was limited except in the case of the late war Western Allies, a subject that can be reëxamined when we return to the ETO.

Finally, I would like to see the subject of friendly fire revisited. Yes, it did indeed happen as it was difficult to identify units from a fast moving airplane. On the other hand, armies took stringent measures to prevent it from happening. E.g. the Germans often stretched the Nazi flag across the rear deck of their tanks as a recognition signal to the air. Establishing a bomb line dividing the zone in which bombing and strafing could be done from that in which it was forbidden was also done, although again it didn't always work perfectly.

I don't expect to see any of this to show up in BB, but I wonder if something along these lines could be included in the engine rewrite.

So, any thoughts?

Michael

[Bruno Weiss]

Did ya shoot back?

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Bruno Weiss:

Did ya shoot back?

Forgot to bring along a FlaK whoosie. I thought the flyboys would be on my side.

Michael

[PeterX]

I think buying air units is worthwhile only if the map is relatively open- like steppe- and their are skads of roaming vehicles. In an infantry-heavy PBEM QB I'm playing my purchased Stukas have flown over the battlefield at lest twice for no effect. The reason: my advancing truppen had yet to flush the Soviets out of their foxholes, pillboxes, woods, and trenches. Now we're assaulting and the cards, so to speak, are on the table. But no sign of my pilots.

Solution= player ability to designate the relative time of arrival of air support.

[Bruno Weiss]

Ah ya seen one speck on the ground, ya seen em all.

Nothing so much wrong with your proposals from my viewpoint. Me own opinion is that there's a slight overabundance of unreliability with air power in CM. Though I confess not to have used it very much and I admit and agree to the apparent BTS principle that they did not want air power to become dominant in any fashion. I would be in favor of seeing it tweaked, slightly anyway.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by Michael emrys:

It is well known that in CM air strikes are more than a little undependable. [snips]

So, any thoughts?

In Real Life, at least in Western armies, you would have specified a "bomb line", indicating that you would prefer not to have any air-delivered ordnance this side of it, thankyouverymuch. The scale of this sort of thing is a bit off for CM -- I would expect the bomb line to be several kilometres ahead of your forward localities. One could even argue that any appearance of aircraft in such close proximity to friendly forces as happens in CM implies that someone or other has forgoten about the bomb-line anyway.

All the best,

John.

[Eric Alkema]

Originally posted by Bruno Weiss:

Did ya shoot back?

Is that really an option? That would be sweet. And by sweet I mean really useful.

[Grisha]

I see what you're saying, Michael, and agree to some extent. However, you do run into historical issues, since air-ground cooperation varied from nation to nation. On the other hand, maybe if the demarcation zone for air targets was made in the scenario design, rather than by the player, it might be a way around this. And, if the scenario designer could create air target zones, then it would be the scenario designer's job to inform the player with air support in the briefing just where they can expect air strikes.

[Bruno Weiss]

I don't think so Eric, but come to think of it by golly, that would be a fine thing to be able to do now wouldn't it?

Hey, what about purple smoke fired by designated armor units. Like in the movie. Ooo, then I could pretend to be Michael Caine, START THE PURPLE... START...THE...PURPLE!

[ October 30, 2002, 06:25 PM: Message edited by: Bruno Weiss ]

[OddjobXL]

I was reading "Panzer Battles" by F. W. Von Mellinthin and there's a passage in the beginning where he describes his, then green, troops firing on a circling plane. It turned out to be a Storch carrying the Luftwaffe officer responsible for the formation's air support. Von Mellinthin notes dryly that this officer failed to see the humor.

So, evidently, friendly fire works both ways especially with inexperienced troops. I wonder if anyone's seen any of this yet or if it's modelled. Heck, getting some friendly fire payback would be pretty amusing at this point.

BTW, I think the air strike TRP idea is a good one if it holds up historically.

[Zitadelle]

John D. Salt wrote:

In Real Life, at least in Western armies, you would have specified a "bomb line", indicating that you would prefer not to have any air-delivered ordnance this side of it, thankyouverymuch. The scale of this sort of thing is a bit off for CM -- I would expect the bomb line to be several kilometres ahead of your forward localities. One could even argue that any appearance of aircraft in such close proximity to friendly forces as happens in CM implies that someone or other has forgoten about the bomb-line anyway.

Bit of follow-on evidence from the 1944 Operation Cobra. The 'bomb-line' was placed extremely close to allied troops (about a 1.5 kilometers IIRC) and the pilots were allowed to bomb perpendicular to FEOT ("Forward Edge Our Troops") rather than parallel. There were quite a few cases of allied casualties caused by friendly iron bombs and rockets.

So, a bomb-line could possibly be within the scope of CM- they would be within the distance on very large maps (consider the edge of your deployment zone plus a kilometer). Also, a bomb-line does not remove the chances of friendly aircraft dropping their presents in the wrong location.

As for the ATRP concept, I think it is an interesting one, but I am not sure that it is within the realm of CM. Particularly in the form of available command and communications. CM takes the view that you are in command of your own forces- or those that have been assigned to your activity by the higher command structure (e.g. "loaned support of corps level artillery").

I would argue that during World War II there were few forces that had the command and communication structures and technology in place to support close coordination between the ground pounders and air support; especially at the lower command levels (regiment and battalion). Yes, by late 1944 the US Army and Army Air Corps were working together through an assigned Air Officer. However, I am not aware of other nations that had that close coordination. The result is that air units act as they would in CM- typically flying overhead and providing some support, but not necessarily what and when you need it.

I would be interested in other opinions and sources/evidence of coordinated air support at the battalion and regimental levels.

[ October 30, 2002, 08:15 PM: Message edited by: Zitadelle ]

[JonS]

Originally posted by Zitadelle:

...I would argue that during World War II there were few forces that had the command and communication structures and technology in place to support close coordination between the ground pounders and air support; especially at the lower command levels (regiment and battalion). Yes, by late 1944 the US Army and Army Air Corps were working together through an assigned Air Officer. However, I am not aware of other nations that had that close coordination...

For starters:

Luftwaffe and Heer

RAF (and other associated airforces) and British Army (and other associated armies)

Regards

JonS

[Tarquelne]

The scale of this sort of thing is a bit off for CM --

And, of course, in CMBB you can specify a "damaged" map and pre-game enemy casualties, and then say they're both the result of air-attack. But yeah, having it happen during the game would be better - more fun, if nothing else.

I played a batch of 20-30 turn scenarios with quite a bit of German airpower in 'em recently. The planes seemed to show up around 10 turns into the game with fair consistency. I wasn't really keeping track, though...

But what I really want to say is:

Where's the cannibalism, pray tell? When I see "a modest proposal" I expect to see some cannibalism, OK, Michael? Do better next time.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Zitadelle:

As for the ATRP concept, I think it is an interesting one, but I am not sure that it is within the realm of CM. Particularly in the form of available command and communications. CM takes the view that you are in command of your own forces- or those that have been assigned to your activity by the higher command structure (e.g. "loaned support of corps level artillery").

I would argue that during World War II there were few forces that had the command and communication structures and technology in place to support close coordination between the ground pounders and air support; especially at the lower command levels (regiment and battalion). Yes, by late 1944 the US Army and Army Air Corps were working together through an assigned Air Officer. However, I am not aware of other nations that had that close coordination. The result is that air units act as they would in CM- typically flying overhead and providing some support, but not necessarily what and when you need it.

I get what you are saying. I was assuming that the air/ground coördination was going on at a higher level, say at division. This is much in the same way that the larger artillery prep barrages are handled in the game.

Michael

[Michael Dorosh]

I would like to have the ability to mark targets, either with, say, 20mm tracer fire, or smoke directed on a target by a gun or mortar - these were methods used historically.

Stukas were also sometimes controlled via radio from the ground. Artillery control in CMBB has become more sophisticated, but could stand to be even more so, the same with air power.

Your concern is correct though, where do you draw the line at making it too powerful or easy to control?

I think one needs to take a hard look at historical practices to see how the Russians and Germans handled it. Maybe BFC has hit it on the head, for all we know. Another reason for detailed designer's notes. I'd pay 20 dollars for such a bound document.

"We're to use purple smoke...."

"First class!!"

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

I always knew you were "swift"....

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> The scale of this sort of thing is a bit off for CM --

And, of course, in CMBB you can specify a "damaged" map and pre-game enemy casualties, and then say they're both the result of air-attack.</font>

[Grisha]

I would argue that during World War II there were few forces that had the command and communication structures and technology in place to support close coordination between the ground pounders and air support; especially at the lower command levels (regiment and battalion). Yes, by late 1944 the US Army and Army Air Corps were working together through an assigned Air Officer. However, I am not aware of other nations that had that close coordination. The result is that air units act as they would in CM- typically flying overhead and providing some support, but not necessarily what and when you need it.

There was a thread on this very thing wrt the VVS, or Soviet air force. You'll be surprised to know that by 1944 there was quite a bit of ground-air cooperation in the Red Army, going down as far as brigade, if not regiment. This includes, of course, an air liaison officer colocated with ground units for the purpose of directing air support. During the Vistula-Oder operation Soviet air units were even directing forward detachments as to the location of enemy forces and the best routes to takes.

[Tarquelne]

Re: Michael D.'s post... tracers, smoke, radio: How common was such ground-based control? It sounds like it'd be a lot of fun if included in the next CM game, and if it's not too rare I wouldn't feel bad about pestering BFC about it.

Also:

Well, a tender young newborn...

I could ask: "The ambiguity of 'Papal cannibalism.' What's worse: Popes eating people, or people eating Popes?"

But that would be off topic, so I won't.

[WWB]

Originally posted by Grisha:

I see what you're saying, Michael, and agree to some extent. However, you do run into historical issues, since air-ground cooperation varied from nation to nation. On the other hand, maybe if the demarcation zone for air targets was made in the scenario design, rather than by the player, it might be a way around this. And, if the scenario designer could create air target zones, then it would be the scenario designer's job to inform the player with air support in the briefing just where they can expect air strikes.

I have proposed such an idea myself on occasion, and I hope this gets a good look for the rewrite.

Lots of these things where players should not have control due to historical scope should be at the whims of designers. Just imagine the evil one can create when one could have airstrikes, arty and other nasties in the designer's control.

WWB

[Andrew H.]

I do think that giving the player too much control over air verges on unrealistic for most cases. What I think might address some of these issues, and be somewhat realistic as well, would be to give players the option of having regular airstrikes or "pre-game bombardment" air strikes.

This would work basically like artillery does, except that the attack point indicated by the player would what the planes would attack if they found no better targets. The planes could even return on the second and subsequent turns if they still had ordinance.

I think that this would do a good job of both simulating a bomb line, and of reflecting those frequent occasions where troops waited for the planes to bomb before starting their approach.

[Michael Emrys]

Just a brief nudge, not really a *bump* actually (those are so vulgar, don't you think?), in case anyone else might care to comment and not bother to read the third page.

Michael

[TSword]

We need air FOs that's all....

Greets

Daniel

[Sgt. Schultz]

I think that one might be able to buy a Forward Air Controller(FAC) HQ-type unit seperate from any plane purchases and not go too far out of the scope of these battles.

When the plane flies over on his 1st look-see run, this 'activates' the ability of the FAC to target just like an arty FO. Make it just as fuzzy and unreliable as a non-TRP arty strike, though the FAC MUST have LOS to the target area, but without the wait an arty strike has. The next time the plane flies over, he targets that area regardless of units present. I would love to lay down a stream of those little 5 pounder cluster bombs on a tree line.

Give the FAC unit binocs and radio and let's say ... 2 men with pistols only. You could even make this unit part of the TOE of any historical units that regularly had use of such.

FACs must be in C&C of Company or Btn HQs to work. That is where they would be right? Hangin' with the brass. This would keep the 'toon hound players from having FACs without actually going out and buying at least one full company. This could allow the reinstatement of the CMBO model as well. You don't buy a FAC and you buy a plane .... the plane might not even show up... because some other unit that DID have one radioed for an air strike and took your plane. You buy a FAC and the plane will definitely show and might even hit something.

This way you can buy just a plane and take your chances, or spend some more points for more control. Make the FACs expensive enough to give a player pause as to how bad he/she wants that airstrike to land on a particular place. NOT a unit ... a place on the map.

Definite engine rewrite request I know, but worth a think or two.

[ November 01, 2002, 09:57 AM: Message edited by: Sgt. Schultz ]

[76mm]

Don't know much about WWII land/air coordination, but I was a tank company executive officer in Desert Storm (as part of the left hook) and can tell you that I was much more worried about US aircraft than Iraqi tanks. My unit was short a couple of flourescent orange air recognition panels and people got really excited about who would get them. And this, mind you, was in the vast open desert with 1990s vintage commo gear.