MeatGrinder Posted December 5, 2007 Share Posted December 5, 2007 I don't know if everyone is aware, but www.books.google.com Has many books on it that you can read for free. One book I've been reading lately is called, "Bear Went Over the Mountain" which is a treatise on the soviet experience in Afghanistan. It includes tactical vignette's, commentary by the Soviet high command, and further commentary from the editor. There are many lessons from this book that are applicable to modern war and CM:SF. Some of it isn't terribly relevant, for example the Mujahadeen often operated in mountainous areas that were only approachable by vehicle from one direction. So they would leave a token rear guard to slow the Soviet's, and then let the main body retreat. The soviets often did well by inserting air-assault troops by helicopters (or other means) to take dominant terrains and achieve overwatch along the retreat route before the main attack. This allowed for some substantial victories. The book illustrates alot of things really well. People often think teh soviets did poorly over there and blame it on a bad military, poor equiptment, not enough troops etc. However, they often had many missions and operations that were tactically very successful (often for little strategic gain, however). On thing I have gleaned from this that the key to victory is first and foremost, a good plan. They often had platoon, company and battalion commanders who had excellent plans, were adaptable on the battlefield and as a result achieved very good victories with low casualties. The book has the good and the bad though, so you can also read vignettes from officers who didn't have a clue. But a good plan is always the backbone of what makes a victory in that book at least. This means good recon, and good execution of the plan as well (coordination between units, etc). It's interesting to read a company or battalion commanders AAR and see how their plans produced a rousing success, or to see how a regimential operation can fail after 3 days of fighting to size a few villages and be forced to withdraw. Anyway might be worth a read. Definately some of lessons therein apply to warfare in CM:SF. For example, teh soviets usually dismounted their troops, and then formed all of their IFVs into a mobile reaction force or sent them to blocking positions. This went against their doctrine in europe, which always had their troops dismounting and never straying more then about 300 m from the vehicle for firesupport. However, their willingness to deviate from this doctrine provided them with some great benefit in alot of fights. Anyway, it's definately worth a gander. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikoyanPT Posted December 5, 2007 Share Posted December 5, 2007 Good reading ! Thank you MeatGrinder. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hoolaman Posted December 5, 2007 Share Posted December 5, 2007 Is it this one? Sorry. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted December 5, 2007 Share Posted December 5, 2007 TBWOTM (the R18 version) is available as a PDF download at ... erm ... somewhere. One of the US mil sites - CARL, maybe, or CGSC? It's pretty big though, as I recall - 100M or sumfink. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Other Means Posted December 5, 2007 Share Posted December 5, 2007 It's pretty good though. I d/l it to my laptop and read it in snatches when I was on a long train journey. I'd bet it's required reading in certain barracks. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wunwinglow Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 we're going on a bear hunt, we're not scared..... Tim PS good read by the way! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SgtMuhammed Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 That google books site is nice. You can download all kinds of out of copyright books and print them out. I grabbed a bunch of stuff for my MA research. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlapHappy Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 http://www.ndu.edu/inss/books/Books%20-%201996/Bear%20Went%20Over%20Mountain%20-%20Aug%2096/BrOrMn.pdf 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StellarRat Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 WARNING: I got an AVAST virus detection from the above link! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Webwing Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 I did not have a problem with virus. Thanks MeatGrinder and also SlapHappy for the PDF. This book is fantastic. Just printed the whole 248 pages! I don't like to read long texts online. Most maps would be too big in size for the game, 4km upwards. But there are some maps that would fit perfectly in CM:SF. I selected 2 to study and will do at least one as a scenario for the game. --- 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
massive1974 Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 Very useful read, thank you MeatGrinder! SlapHappy! How did you turn it into a pdf file? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeatGrinder Posted December 6, 2007 Author Share Posted December 6, 2007 Webwing, if you make any scenarios from the book I would love to try them! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
massive1974 Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 Well, for me the lesson from this book is that recon and overwatch are paramount. And that applies well to CMSF except that time for recon is a bit limited. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Webwing Posted December 6, 2007 Share Posted December 6, 2007 Originally posted by MeatGrinder: Webwing, if you make any scenarios from the book I would love to try them! MeatGrinder, What a lucky coincidence for me! I was looking for exactly something like that to help me with my missions. I'm almost finished with reading the book. I can't seem to able to put it down!!! I'll have to come back many times. This first read is just to get a general idea and select the most suitable missions for CM:SF. I'm not sure if Red on Red would be ideal for the units. Russians (Syria) X Muhajdeen (Unconventional)?? I'll sure let you know when I have something. -- 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taki Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 Very Very good link. I just started to Read "Ambush Alley" again on a Bloody Battle on Nasirya. Also a good Read. My English isnt best but when i got time this one is my next MIlitary book to read. THX for the Link! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taki Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 I just started to Read that Book. But can someone from USA or England give me an Internet link where i can Find all that Militiary abbreviations like LZ: Landing Zone DAG = ??? Is there any Internet Site that got a Searchfunktion for that abbreviations? And are the Symbols Nato Symbols used in that Book? Then i can Find them in Wikipedia i guess. What about the Numbers of Soldiers and Tanks/Arty and so on in a Division, Battalion, Platoon and so on? Thx for your help Greetz Taki 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dennis50 Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 you can try this one http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/doddict/acronym_index.html Regards, Gunz 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tankibanki Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 Most of the terms are explained at the end of the book itself, e.g. DAG. The symbols are mostly Soviet, not NATO, which requires some getting used to. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnO Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 Another book that may help is On Point - OIF You can read it here On Point JohnO 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Webwing Posted December 7, 2007 Share Posted December 7, 2007 I'll try this one as well JohnO. Thanks One thing I found interesting about the BWOTM book is that the maps are approximations of the places. Most of the action/missions they still don't really know where exactly they took place. The maps where made based mostly on soldiers reports. So they say in the introduction of the book. I was worried about making them accurate in CM:SF but I guess is just a matter of transposing the situation itself. -- 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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