The Battle of Qala-i-Jangi

[Dietrich]

Little by little I've been gathering info about this battle (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qala-I-Janghi for an overview), so it's sounding plausible to design a scenario based on it.

The basics of the battle: At 11:15 a.m. on November 24, 2001, about 300 foreign fighters (Taliban-allied) which are being held prisoner under minimal armed guard in the southern yard of the mud-and-brick fortress Qala-i-Jangi ("house of war" in Persian) riot and kill one of the two CIA operators present. The other CIA operator flees to the opposite end of the fortress, where he encounters two German journalists (one of whom has a working video camera) and 'borrows' their satellite phone to call for reinforcements. Meanwhile, the Taliban break into the armory in the center of the fortress, arm themselves handsomely and fight fiercely to break out. The couple dozen Afghan militia positioned on the fortress' walls struggle to contain the all-of-a-sudden armed prisoner revolt. Around 2:00 p.m., a mixed team of special operations forces, nine US Special Forces and six British Special Boat Service operators, arrive and join the effort to contain the attempted breakout. From 4:00 p.m. until nightfall, the SOF operators direct nine airstrikes (from one F/A-18, perhaps more air assets) against the Taliban. (The fighting doesn't really die down until Nov. 28, but a two-hour battle should be plenty for one sitting. hehe)

One of the reasons I've started this thread is to get some feedback from y'all about how the Experience, Motivation, etc., for the Taliban forces should be set. Three hundred Uncons in a not-very-wide area (according to a National Geographic Channel video on YouTube, Qala-i-Jangi is "three-quarters of a kilometer around" with walls "20 meters thick and 30 meters high") and fully supplied with ammo (they broke into the armorr, getting small arms as well as RPG-7s) should make for quite a firefight. I think the key thing is not how well armed the Taliban were, but how fiercely they fought -- the fact that the Afghans drove a T-55 into the fort to fire directly at buildings the Taliban were occupying gives you some idea of how intense the battle was. The Taliban were obviously fanatical in their fighting -- even four days after the battle began, the Taliban were fighting from basements until Northern Alliance troops flooded the basements with water. Thus I figure the Red force Motivation should be set at Fanatical. What about their Experience? These were all fighters, rather than dragged-from-the-village-and-given-an-AK conscripts, so a range of experience from Green to Veteran could make sense. What do y'all think?

The Red AI plan will be for the some of the Uncons to fight to the death in the armory and nearby buildings while some of the other Uncons try to break through to the fortress' entrance. The overall objective for Blue will be to prevent the Taliban prisoners from escaping -- and, by extension, to inflict heavy casualties, since the Taliban are not going to give up. (In footage taken by Arnim Strauth's cameraman, Strauth was interviewing a turbaned fighter and asked him: "Can you tell us, why did you decide to surrender?" The fighter looked at him as if he thought Strauth was taking him for a fool, then shook his head and replied (in English, remarkably): "We are not surrender." --see http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=1db_1188948068&p=1)

The challenging part of the map design will be the fortress' curtain wall, which are basically 90-feet-high embankments which are almost a truck's width at the top, with brick/stone walls on each side (to simulate parapets) which are not too high to see/shoot over from a standing position.

The OOB will go something like this:

BLUE:

- 9 US Special Forces operators, including a JTAC team (standing in for a USAF CCT team)

- 6 USN DEVGRU (USMC units standing in for SBS)

- 2 civilian pickup trucks (the SOF guys arrived in 'technicals', but in-game technicals can't carry passengers)

- 1 ??? (standing in for surviving CIA operator Dave Tyson, who had an AK-47)

- 1 F/A-18 (for beaucoup JDAMs :cool:)

- 2 friendly Spies (standing in for German journalist Arnim Strauth and his cameraman)

- c.80-90 Syrian Militia (standing in for Afghan militia)

- 2 T-55 (in the actual battle, one got its turret blown off by an errant 2,000# JDAM)

RED:

- c.300 Uncon Fighters (with AKs, RPKs, and a fair number of RPG-7s)

Yes, I know some of the prime Blue forces involved were SBS operators, and we don't yet have British units, so any pre-British-Forces-module version of a Qala-i-Jangi scenario would be semi-historical, with Army or Marine units standing in for SBS.

When the beta is done, I'll post it on the Repository and at CMMODs so y'all can check it out. If you DL it and play it, please let me know what you think of it and what could use improvement. =)

[meade95]

Sounds very interesting - This is where CIA Mike Spann was killed -

[Los]

There were three agents there not two...

[Dietrich]

*shrug* All the sources I've checked name only two CIA agents present. In any case, since the scenario begins after the prisoners have started their revolt and broken into the armory, it thus concerns, not the actions of the CIA agents (however many there were), but rather the efforts of the Coalitian SOF troops and the Northern Alliance troops to contain the revolt.

Would you be so kind as to enlighten us about this third agent? =)

[Cpl Steiner]

If you can wait for the Brits module you could have the British SBS (Special Boat Service) in the scenario too, famously filmed firing M240s from the hip at the enemy!

SBS at Qala-i-Jangi

[EDIT] Sorry for not reading your full post - I see you are aware of them already. Great footage though!

[Dietrich]

At this rate, I'll hardly have the map done before the British module comes out, so crack or elite British infantry (standing in for SBS operators) will be included.

[CogNative]

A semi-historical Qala-i-Jangi scenario would be appreciated.

Your OOB looks good to me and even better with Brits.

1 F/A-18 for beaucoup JDAMs ...

Does anyone know how this happened?

Didn't they have guidance or was it a mayhem malfunction?

Thanks,

[Dietrich]

Another reason a Qala-i-Jangi scenario would have to be semi-historical, even if it included units from the British module*, is that the battle spanned almost five days, while in CMSF a two-hour battle is the max. Overall, I think the scenario notes will say "based on an actual event"; it'll be a distillation of the battle's events.

Most all the sources I've read mention a CCT team which talked to the 'bird'. One video I've seen online states that the CCT team had a laser designator which they 'painted' target buildings inside the fortress with. That said, a JDAM is not a Maverick. I don't know per se why the JDAM in question went errant, but even if the air assets were using strictly guided munitions there still could have been a Blue-on-Blue incident. In playing CMSF, I've never had a JDAM land on friendly forces, but then again I've always been careful to keep my troops well back, especially if the air asset in question is a jet fighter (which would be dropping JDAMs) rather than an attack helo (which would either be firing missiles or its cannon). I'm tempted, though, to set the F/A-18's skill at just Regular or lower in hopes of simulating the potential for their to be an errant air strike as happened in the actual battle.

* Interestingly, the SBS troops (as can be seen in the video taken at the time) were armed, not with SA80s and L86A2s but with M4s/M16s and at least one M240. I don't know how British squads are organized, but I suppose the performance of the more characteristically Britsh weapons is similar enough to the ones the SBS operators were armed with that there wouldn't be a need to worry about the British units in the scenario not having the same equipment.

[CogNative]

Thanks Dietrich,

"based on an actual event" ... sounds like a very reasonable way to distill 5 days into two hours.

With a system reliability in excess of 95% with a published accuracy under 10*metres (33*ft) Circular Error Probable (CEP) one would hope your unit got one of the 95% units, a fully functional JDAM when you are Blue and close.

In playing CMSF, I've had a JDAM land on my friendly forces when I was pinned and not too careful. Ruins your game day rather dramatically.

I know nothing about Special Boat Service (SBS) but the equipment issue should be able to be adjusted in the British squad settings.

Ironic that the US prisoner became the USA media focus and not the 5 Days of The Battle of Qala-i-Jangi.

[Gpig]

Deitrich, sounds great. Thanks for working this up.

Can I ask you where did you get your map reference?

[Dietrich]

The only map reference I've come across is in a video I found on YouTube which was apparently put out by National Geographic -- the clip shows a CG rendering of the fortress and zooms up to a brief plan view. The CG rendering is at least somewhat simplied, though, since the eyewitness video footage shows rather more trees in the fortress' northern yard as well as the southern yard. LiveLeak also has a series of videos about Qala-i-Jangi (see second link in first post of this thread) which include footage shot by the German cameraman who, along with journalist Arnim Stauth, was inside the fortress before the prisoner revolt began and who filmed much of it before they were able to escape the fortress itself.

If my financial resources were not so limited, I would take the time to look for, buy, and read several books (hopefully ones with lots of pictures, maps and diagrams) about Qala-i-Jangi and the battle thereof, but then again, I'd like to do that with each historical/semi-historical scenario I'd like to create. *shrug* So I'll have to do the best with the sources I can acquire.

[Gpig]

Dietrich, did you ever finish this scenario?

Gpig

[Dietrich]

Sorry, no. For one thing, my pre-alpha mock-ups showed that the battle would be extremely hard to simulate in a way that would be true to the actual event but would also be playable or fun to any extent. For another thing, I've gotten the impression that a lot of people regard the Qala-i-Jangi incident not as a battle but more as something resembling a massacre, and thus the level of interest in any scenario based on the event would be rather low.

In the meantime I've been working on other scenarios, but only time will tell if I'll be able to bring those to fruition.