New module - Combat Mission:Afghanistan?!

[John Kettler]

Vark,

I think whoever wrote that article didn't realize a) how important fast decision making is in battle, how few decision makers the Red Army has, and c) the vital facts that only officers have maps and that the staff is minuscule.

When the M1 Abrams first arrived in Europe, we soon began receiving reports of the havoc it was causing because the type was so unprecedentedly fast and quiet, resulting in overrunning the encampments of a sleeping foe in combat exercises. What was happening is that the M1 was rewriting the book on armored warfare because it could operate inside the foe's OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) loop. Now, imagine trying to deal with a force trained to operate on such principles which is systematically killing scarce leaders whenever and wherever found.

The Red Army's battle drills and prebattle terrain orientation are helpful, but only up to a point, in dealing with "Kill the command vehicle!" attacks. That point is when the attacking force first leaves what it was directly shown and/or the enemy does something unexpected, causing the smooth mechanism of the assault to jam, kink and tear. A good time for NATO to COMJAM, I might add! At the company level, if Tank, there is no XO. If Motor Rifle and he survives the same blow that kills his CO (in same BMP or BTR!) I think the zampolit might be able to step in, and he may or may not be any good. If not, a surviving platoon leader (and PLs would be Priority 2 targets in either type of company) just inherited the company and now has to assume command while his formation is being cut to pieces. He has no maps, for those died with his company commander. Now what?

Here's what! If it happened in the Cold War, with nothing exploding and no projectiles rending the air, units are going to start to get lost! Plenty of accounts exist of Western military observers and such helping lost Red Army formations find their way even in East Germany. Care to bet the signage will be right? They won't dare retreat (KGB and political reliability stool pigeons in their own unit will shoot them), but they may very well simply stop. Exercising initiative to reconnect will be alien to these "battlefield promotees," and there will likely be bedlam in and between the tanks. In this situation, the leanness of the Red Army works against it, acculturation works against it, military tradition works against it, as do human nature and conflicting political power centers. Multiply this across an entire zone of contact, and the sharp spearhead gets blunt in a hurry. Throw in unending pressure from behind, and it starts to create a "trying to push a wet noodle" effect, in turn creating a succession of juicy interdiction targets at all levels. If things start to slow down the advance, the Red army's attack begins to fall apart. This is precisely why things like FASCAM and GATOR, not to mention EXJAM (Expendable Jammers) caused so much consternation when identified, especially when applied to the deep exploitation OMGs, for they threatened to negate the entire approach and could simply be injected into the formation proper, rather than merely wreaking havoc on the point elements as would be the case for a normal minefield or roadblock. How do you clear a route when anything that moves is likely to set off another mine, further screwing up the route? When the radio is a sea of earsplitting screeching? Even worse after MLRS, SADARM and the Air Force's SFW arrived!

Nor are higher HQs (regiment up) themselves immune from attack. And they're easier to find, less mobile and have substantial emission signatures. They are, in today's parlance, HVUs. In between, I'd be gunning for every ACRV ( http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/row/mt-lbu.htm), PRP-3 ( http://topgun.rin.ru/cgi-bin/units.pl?field=8&unit=2376&lng=eng ), SNAR-10 ( http://www.janes.com/articles/Janes-C4I-Systems/SNAR-10-battlefield-surveillance-radar-Big-Fred-Russia-and-the-CIS.html ) and anything with a "K" in its designator (T-64K, BMP-1K, etc) , since that letter denotes a command function and a 10-meter antenna on a static vehicle if it's actually exercising command. This would wreak havoc on seeing the battlefield, gutting fire support and actually being able to control now decapitated formations.

Naturally, there'd be other targets, but I provide this to show what can happen when command is systematically targeted, with "eyes" poked out, "ears" removed (SIGINT would be on high ground, at least initially, and intercept vans are soft targets), "fingers" lopped off or broken along the way, "fists" shattered before/during slicing off the various "heads," leaving the rest to be dealt with later.

Hackett, in both of his Third World War: August 1985 books, fully subscribed to the "Kill the commander!" model clear up to Front in his first book, and I don't recall Suvorov's presence in the second changed that. Indeed, this was one of the things that forced the hardliners to go nuclear, for their grand offensive had stalled, in significant part, precisely because of that core NATO practice. In reality, there'd be a judgment call made, assets permitting, on whether to jam or destroy a given command node, depending on how good and useful the intel "take" was from intercepts. In battle, lots of stuff goes out in clear or with minimal coding of key aspects, such as terrain references. This is because there's so much going on and there's no time. How much more would this be true were commanders and their radio/cipher guys blowing up left and right or being sniped by SBUs (Stay Behind Units)?

The author of that article would have to mount an incredibly compelling argument to offset what I've just described as likely.

As for Assault, I own the series, including the Suvorov module Reinforcements, but I haven't played it much (showed up after my gaming group both semi dissolved and had moved into things like Up Front). I do agree that the order system is pretty slick, since it rewards battle drills and punishes excursions therefrom, neatly reflecting how the Russians operate. If you want real initiative from the Russians, play Spetsnaz!

jjhouston,

I own several in that series and have read all but the last, which is wholly new to me.

hcrof,

Glad you enjoyed that, but you're definitely going to want to read the other two. The second's on supply and logistics, while the third has the nuts and bolts of who and what's in a given formation.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Michael Emrys]

John, you are saying something similar to my own thoughts as I read vark's post, except you have a much greater breadth and depth of information to draw on in forming your reply. My own would have been the more general observation that the Red Army's system works fine as long as the enemy is doing what you expect him to do, but stalls as soon as he does something unexpected. Time and time again it has been shown that when information has to flow up through several layers of command before a decision as to what to do can be made, and then the orders have to flow down those same channels—which are subject to disruption—before they reach the echelon that has to act on them, the situation may well have changed entirely and the orders may be useless. This is probably the most important reason why the French lost to the Germans in 1940.

I suspect that the reason the Soviets adopted that system was not because it was necessarily the best on the battlefield, but because it was the best their particular social/political/military culture could come up with. Whether it would have worked in a real showdown is problematical, as you indicate. NATO had problems of its own through the '70s and into the '80s, so I for one can't answer that except to say that it would have been ugly, probably very ugly indeed.

Michael

[John Kettler]

Michael Emrys,

Helps if you spent 11+ years at it professionally and had multiple personal stakes in a potential war there (brother in the 2/11 ACR on the IGB, brother-in-law at Rhein Main flying Hercs and a family friend flying an F-16)! Throw in the real threat, with such nightmares as broadband obscurants (which would've thwarted the critical early attrition from long range ATGM fires), ERA, DU, M1 killing HEAT, SFW, whole families of laser guided munitions from numerous air and ground platforms, add in a sea of chemical munitions (very bad when POMCUS sites dosed with persistent agents), rear area bioattack to degrade or kill key personnel, Spetsnaz, Fifth Column and finish with a combat doctrine that considered nukes just another tool in a warfare continuum. The seriousness of that viewpoint was terrifyingly shown when the an actual Russian war plan surfaced and was reported in Armed Forces Journal after the Berlin Wall fell. Envisioned 200 NUDETs and making the Channel in two weeks!

Agree with you that the Russians were fundamentally limited by their political system's need for ironclad control and the ceaselessly warring factions in the "tripod"described by Suvorov: Party, KGB and the Army, leading to such "fun" as being stuck in the BTR-60 command carrier during the 1968 Invasion of Czechoslovakia with not one but two stukachi (KGB and GLAVPUR), both happy to shoot him should he "fail in his socialist duty"--as per their (secret) instructions. In one of the Hackett books there's a great example of this idiocy as applied to warfare. A commander needs an MRL strike on a stretch of road, but the long axis of the pattern merely cuts it perpendicularly. The Chief of Artillery requests permission to retreat a bit and move laterally, thus enabling him to put fire where it's needed, only to run headlong into the "not one step back" mentality from his zampolit. Care to guess how sober considerations of military ballistics fared vs. GLAVPUR? And how about the risk taking index of the Chief of Artillery's XO in the aftermath? Am taking bets on how the supported commander will do!

Regards,

John Kettler

[Michael Emrys]

And keep in mind that all this is going on in a fairly densely populated area of the world, so the expected (and unexpected) civilian death toll could have been enormous, something that must have weighed heavily on the minds of the involved governments, especially the Germans.

Michael

[Schmoly War]

John, im curious if you are able to dig up more info (specific or general, especially from detailed russian reports) regarding these incidents in the chechen war:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimry_fighting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Komsomolskoye

[hcrof]

Vark,

I think whoever wrote that article didn't realize a) how important fast decision making is in battle, how few decision makers the Red Army has, and c) the vital facts that only officers have maps and that the staff is minuscule.

When the M1 Abrams first arrived in Europe, we soon began receiving reports of the havoc it was causing because the type was so unprecedentedly fast and quiet, resulting in overrunning the encampments of a sleeping foe in combat exercises. What was happening is that the M1 was rewriting the book on armored warfare because it could operate inside the foe's OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) loop. Now, imagine trying to deal with a force trained to operate on such principles which is systematically killing scarce leaders whenever and wherever found.

The Red Army's battle drills and prebattle terrain orientation are helpful, but only up to a point, in dealing with "Kill the command vehicle!" attacks. That point is when the attacking force first leaves what it was directly shown and/or the enemy does something unexpected, causing the smooth mechanism of the assault to jam, kink and tear. A good time for NATO to COMJAM, I might add! At the company level, if Tank, there is no XO. If Motor Rifle and he survives the same blow that kills his CO (in same BMP or BTR!) I think the zampolit might be able to step in, and he may or may not be any good. If not, a surviving platoon leader (and PLs would be Priority 2 targets in either type of company) just inherited the company and now has to assume command while his formation is being cut to pieces. He has no maps, for those died with his company commander. Now what?

Here's what! If it happened in the Cold War, with nothing exploding and no projectiles rending the air, units are going to start to get lost! Plenty of accounts exist of Western military observers and such helping lost Red Army formations find their way even in East Germany. Care to bet the signage will be right? They won't dare retreat (KGB and political reliability stool pigeons in their own unit will shoot them), but they may very well simply stop. Exercising initiative to reconnect will be alien to these "battlefield promotees," and there will likely be bedlam in and between the tanks. In this situation, the leanness of the Red Army works against it, acculturation works against it, military tradition works against it, as do human nature and conflicting political power centers. Multiply this across an entire zone of contact, and the sharp spearhead gets blunt in a hurry. Throw in unending pressure from behind, and it starts to create a "trying to push a wet noodle" effect, in turn creating a succession of juicy interdiction targets at all levels. If things start to slow down the advance, the Red army's attack begins to fall apart. This is precisely why things like FASCAM and GATOR, not to mention EXJAM (Expendable Jammers) caused so much consternation when identified, especially when applied to the deep exploitation OMGs, for they threatened to negate the entire approach and could simply be injected into the formation proper, rather than merely wreaking havoc on the point elements as would be the case for a normal minefield or roadblock. How do you clear a route when anything that moves is likely to set off another mine, further screwing up the route? When the radio is a sea of earsplitting screeching? Even worse after MLRS, SADARM and the Air Force's SFW arrived!

Nor are higher HQs (regiment up) themselves immune from attack. And they're easier to find, less mobile and have substantial emission signatures. They are, in today's parlance, HVUs. In between, I'd be gunning for every ACRV ( http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/row/mt-lbu.htm), PRP-3 ( http://topgun.rin.ru/cgi-bin/units.pl?field=8&unit=2376&lng=eng ), SNAR-10 ( http://www.janes.com/articles/Janes-C4I-Systems/SNAR-10-battlefield-surveillance-radar-Big-Fred-Russia-and-the-CIS.html ) and anything with a "K" in its designator (T-64K, BMP-1K, etc) , since that letter denotes a command function and a 10-meter antenna on a static vehicle if it's actually exercising command. This would wreak havoc on seeing the battlefield, gutting fire support and actually being able to control now decapitated formations.

Naturally, there'd be other targets, but I provide this to show what can happen when command is systematically targeted, with "eyes" poked out, "ears" removed (SIGINT would be on high ground, at least initially, and intercept vans are soft targets), "fingers" lopped off or broken along the way, "fists" shattered before/during slicing off the various "heads," leaving the rest to be dealt with later.

Hackett, in both of his Third World War: August 1985 books, fully subscribed to the "Kill the commander!" model clear up to Front in his first book, and I don't recall Suvorov's presence in the second changed that. Indeed, this was one of the things that forced the hardliners to go nuclear, for their grand offensive had stalled, in significant part, precisely because of that core NATO practice. In reality, there'd be a judgment call made, assets permitting, on whether to jam or destroy a given command node, depending on how good and useful the intel "take" was from intercepts. In battle, lots of stuff goes out in clear or with minimal coding of key aspects, such as terrain references. This is because there's so much going on and there's no time. How much more would this be true were commanders and their radio/cipher guys blowing up left and right or being sniped by SBUs (Stay Behind Units)?

The author of that article would have to mount an incredibly compelling argument to offset what I've just described as likely.

As for Assault, I own the series, including the Suvorov module Reinforcements, but I haven't played it much (showed up after my gaming group both semi dissolved and had moved into things like Up Front). I do agree that the order system is pretty slick, since it rewards battle drills and punishes excursions therefrom, neatly reflecting how the Russians operate. If you want real initiative from the Russians, play Spetsnaz!

jjhouston,

I own several in that series and have read all but the last, which is wholly new to me.

hcrof,

Glad you enjoyed that, but you're definitely going to want to read the other two. The second's on supply and logistics, while the third has the nuts and bolts of who and what's in a given formation.

Regards,

John Kettler

Interesting post John, I spent so long researching Soviet practise I never got around to finding out what NATO planned to do to stop them at the tactical level. I asked a couple of old BAOR officers but they were not very helpfull (we'll just muddle through, we always do).

I think I agree with Vark though here. You kill the company commander but the platoon commanders have been briefed on what the immediate and subsequent objectives are so would just roll forward to take them. At the end of the day, even if just one platoon commander keeps going, all the others have to do is follow him! Because the company commanders have so little authority, their loss is not that important.

Even if they subsequently stop due to lack of comms (Quite likely IMO) they have done their job. The second echelon rolls on through to continue pressing the attack.

Result: Battalion becomes combat ineffective but it has torn a hole in the defences through which the rest of the regiment pours.

Now if you were able to take out the regimental commander you would cause some serious problems. In that case the attack would probably grind to a halt because the second echelon would never be committed.

Edit: Surely a better way to stall an attack would be small, local counterattacks to the flanks of the attacking force? This would cause a monumental amount of confusion amongst the junior commanders who wouldn't be able to deal with the change in circumstances.

About the MRL story. On paper at least, the political officer does not have authority over the commander he is attached to. I wonder where the difference is between paper and practise?

[Vark]

John, intersting post, as for 11 years professional experience I can only offer a well informed semi-amateurs perspective (wrote my Masters dissertation on the RMA) though so not quite a neophyte. I agree with everything in your post, the articles author I seem to remember was an M1 tanker who I think was trying to dampen down the air-land battle hype and reminding people, as you and Michael have vividly done that if the balloon had gone up it would be a hard, viscious slog with victory not a foregone conclusion. Don't also forget the Soviet laser blinding systems fielded at regimental level, the intelligence suggestions to counter such weapons were, use the other eye or fogged optics!

I remember a discussion with an intelligence officer whose analysis, of a European conflict, was brutally brief. "By the third day no one would know where they were meant to be and they'd probably be killing their own side as much as the enemy!" I think I read a US study suggesting blue-on-blue incidents running at 30% after the initial clashed shatter and merge both sides FLOT's so that much loved terms like the FEBA become redundant.

My point was that the tactics might not have worked quite so well and the Russians might not have conformed to their stereotypical portrayals in manuals and countless exercises. In fact the NTC regularly showed that US forces, when confronted by the sheer tempo of a Soviet assault rarely had the time to execute their carefully planned decapitation strikes. In fact the much vaunted flexibility, created by doctrine and advanced technologies often worked against the defenders. All the Soviet approach needed was a weak link, as hcrof has pointed out a Soviet regimental attack would be a success if just one company managed to breach the MLR and create an exploitable breach. Who cares if the other twenty odd companies lie eviscerated, as per the nice DoD paintings, the weaklink has been found, FOFA not withstanding.

As for the use of tactical nuclear weapons and chemicals, any person studying the BMP's design would have no misconceptions about the reality of Soviet thinking. The machine was designed so that infantry could rapidly exploit the breaches made by such weapons, without these NBC force-multipliers their design short comings become glaringly obvious, as per Afghanistan, Chechnya, etc. I remember a game of GDW's "Arctic Front", a force of Royal Marines were holding up my Norwegian armored spearhead, in the montain passes North of Oslo. My timetable was slipping badly and victory was slipping away, answer nukes, no more Booties and the armour rolled into a radiation blasted objective (once I'd overcome my moral objections I used them regularly). I guess the Soviet plan was clinically simple, attack, wait for the inevitable counter-attacks with attendant massing of forces and nuke them. The evidence is in the Soviet advance to battle drills that including seperation distances of Regiments/battalions that were designed to minimise the effects of convential CAS and nuclear weapons. They expected us to use them, is there any doubt they would no have done so? I guess it's why they used their formidable propaganda assets to stop enhanced-radiation devices being deployed in Europe. Oh, and don't forget in your list of horrors, EMP would have crippled the sophisticated Western forces proportionally far greater than the cruder Warpac units.

I guess the only way we will find out whose doctrine would have likely prevailed is if BF produce a Cold-War game and we can battle it out. See, I'm nothing if not persistent, perhaps somebody could set up an online petition to see if there is a market for the game.

Final point have you read Brixmis?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brixmis-Untold-Exploits-Britains-Mission/dp/0006386733

It has some very interesting accounts of how traditional, military, perceptions of the Soviets was all too accurate and all too inaccurate. The intelligence gathering operation on the Soviet tanks is worth it alone. Facinating thread, thanks to all contributors.

[hcrof]

One question I have to ask is about the effect of western air power on Warpac forces in our hypothetical mid 80's war. It was the one area in which the west had an advantage but how vital would it be?

Given that the soviets had a huge and sophisticated air defence network ready to protect its troops as well as thousends of planes ready to intercept western attackers, would the west be able to inflict significant damage on the ground forces? Even if they could, would massive attrition render air power irrelevent within a few weeks?

On the other hand, recent wars have shown that air power has a tremendous effect on the troops on the ground. Even if there is no significant material damage, the morale effects are huge and the confusion that results from a successful attack multiplies its effects many times.

So, would western air power significantly hamper progress in any campaign in europe or had the Soviets managed to nullify its effects?

[Vark]

hcrof, as for airpower these factors might apply

1. Spetsnaz/fifth column

2. Maskirovka

3. Real world examples of the efficacy of Western airpower v's Warpac equipment and docrine. Take any factors, and multiply by a factor of ten.

4. Soviet CAP, GCI, CAS and AD docrine and real world examples.

5. Priority targets for Soviet nuclear and chemical strikes were, amongst other HVT's, were airfields.

It was not for nothing that in the event of of likely threat all US bases in the UK were given powers to impose martial law in a 10 plus mile radius.

[John Kettler]

hcrof,

As I indicated earlier, the sequence is kill the company commander, followed by his only slightly less identifiable PLs. SBUs and longer ranged weaponry would probably have to deal with HQs much higher than battalion. A regimental commander is by definition emitting if he is to command in a fast moving situation, is DFable and can be targeted in a variety of ways.

When you talk about the second echelon, you're obviously not talking about what we meant. The first echelon to us was the GSFG (incorporating DDR forces = 2 Fronts) + GSFC (another Front, located in Czechoslovakia), the second echelon is a Front in Poland, and the third echelon the Sunday punch in the Western Military Districts, a Group of Tank Armies, the last with the really good, carefully kept secret equipment and high quality troops. Contrary to popular belief, the best weapons weren't in the GSFG conveniently close to western spies and intel means. In Hackett's books, what pooches the main Russian attack is that the bridges over the Oder are shattered, completely derailing, figuratively and literally, the introduction of the massively powerful third echelon, allowing the second echelon to be slowed and eventually stopped.

The problem with local counterattacks is that they play right into Russian hands, putting outnumbered forces out into the open without the force multipliers of cover, prepared positions, alternate firing points, etc. Such attacks would simply be smothered by trailing formations, if not eaten alive by HIND, FROGFOOT, FLOGGER D, etc. Russian commanders pray for such opportunities! In Hackett's books, the NATO counterattack comes only after certain conditions are met: third echelon blocked, REFORGER forces in country and deployed, second echelon slowed and stalled (allowing pulling some units out of line and their secret concentration elsewhere) and local air superiority in the zone of the attack.

As for the MRL example, I find it frighteningly credible, considering the penal battalions existed (read about Suvorov's experience in the Glass House in The Liberators), Russian history of draconian measures to enforce aggressiveness by commanders during the GPW, as well as continued use of barrage units to deal with shirkers/deserters during Suvorov's active service. The commander commands, but he answers with his head if he doesn't succeed (best to die in battle), let alone shows signs of "defeatism." Likewise, if the situation requires it, he will unflinchingly shoot his own men, lest he join the shot!

Vark,

Would love to read it! Yes, I skipped the lasers, EMP and some other nastiness, probably because I was fried at the time from insomnia and because I figured the post was already a lot to take in. But lasers are why we have orange vision blocks and bino objective lenses. The U.S. military ran tests with weak lasers on tacair pilots flying simulated CAS missions and was horrified by the cataclysmic impact on mission effectiveness. Word was that the radio traffic from the pilots was completely unprintable! I heard a bunch of blinding reports at briefings and got some even juicier ones via back channel contact, to include Muj blinding incidents from Afghanistan. The T-72's commander's hatch had a special laser hardened window so the TC could see the battlefield and not be blinded by laser rangefinders and such. As for fratricide, as long as the advance continued, the Russians wouldn't care much. See the huge fratricide incurred at the Battle of Berlin in fulfillment of the mission. There, Zhukov and Koniev both shelled the other's troops with massive artillery and Katyusha fires and the Red Air Force bombed both because of lousy ability to accurately navigate and find the right targets. Haven't read BRIXMIS, but know a bit about its American counterpart and have, I think, a SOXMIS card.

http://www.militaryimages.net/photopost/showphoto.php/photo/2927

If there was any good news in this mess, it was that the actual East German ground didn't permit massing the forces we expected to encounter in the Fulda Gap and that the Russian leadership was conservative and risk averse, especially with immolation of the homeland and themselves in the balance.

hcrof,

How badly does NATO not want to lose? It has lots of high quality planes, flown by aircrew who make most of their Russian counterparts seem like lousy trainees by comparison (huge flight hour difference) and operating with a flexibility and initiative all but beyond Russian comprehension. If NATO started going deep to attack airfields and such, it was definitely going to take some lumps, especially in laydown attacks (see Jaguar/Tornado casualties in the Gulf Wars) with JP233 to kill runways. Back then, hardened aircraft shelters (HAS) were practically immune to our weaponry, so it was runways, revetted aircraft and other key facilities. OTOH, operating SAMs and interceptors together would've been a bear for the Bear, a decidedly nontrivial, complex problem! There was also the small matter that at altitude microwave emissions with all the defenses powered up and the sky full of planes were so high that they exceeded that of a microwave oven. Talking "fried" eyeballs! I think the NATO planes would've gotten through and done loads of damage, but it would've been expensive, especially in the early stages before attrition, resupply and tired air defenders reared their heads. Going the other way, scary! We expected a huge integrated air attack, the "Air Operation," against NATO and had it come unhindered, successfully "corridor busting" through NATO's SAM belt, it could've been disastrous. Unlike us, the Russians had not only a plethora of runway busters, but guided munitions and large rockets which would eat our TAB-V HAS, ARMs to kill our long range radar installations (see Israeli experience with AS-5 KELT) and AWACS, SSMs with lots of warhead options, Spetsnaz, etc.. The last would've been delivered on the heels of major attacks on the NATO air defense network. Espionage had horribly compromised NATO, to include specifics of where the nukes were stored, war plans, etc. Deprived of effective defensive counterair (DCA) and offensive counterair (OCA), NATO, IMO, would've lost.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

While we're on fratricide, here's what happened in Grozny 1994-1995, per Grau in his report for RAND. (Fair use)

www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1289/MR1289.ch2.pdf

"On more than one occasion, aircraft targeted Russian troops instead. In one instance, aircraft destroyed the five lead vehicles of the 104th Russian Airborne Division.32

Aviation was not alone in causing fratricide. Poor training and the

lack of coordination also contributed to a significant number of such

incidents. One participant estimated that fratricide accounted for as

much as 60 percent of Russian casualties in Chechnya.33 Russian

motorized rifle troops were particularly in danger of both inflicting

and becoming “friendly” casualties. Untrained troops who panicked

and shot wildly at anything that moved were at least as likely to hit a

fellow Russian as they were the enemy. Night-vision equipment

proved ineffective in the smoke, fire, and steam of the city and led to

accidental attacks on friendly forces. Inaccurate maps added further

to the confusion. Poor use of equipment also helped the enemy.

Russian infrared night-vision devices highlighted their users when

viewed through the passive night-vision goggles used by the rebels."

This gives some idea of how bad things can get, and this is without NATO's attacking HQs, jamming the radios, etc. Granted, the attacking Russians weren't well trained and weren't expecting to have to fight, let alone deal with cleverly structured and deployed ferocious defenders.

Regards,

John Kettler

[jjhouston]

jjhouston,

I own several in that series and have read all but the last, which is wholly new to me.

The Novikov & Sverdlov work is a nice little book. I find it interesting mostly because my copy was printed in Moscow in English, back in '72 right before the Yom Kippur War.

As far as Brixmis and SMLM, this is a great link for the US mission: http://www.usmlm.org/

Check out the library tag. Here you can download the voluminous and now declassified USMLM annual reports: http://www.history.hqusareur.army.mil/uslmannual.htm

Here is another great document for us cold war history dilettantes: http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?id=46280&lng=en

A round table discussion of the end of the cold war having taken place in 2006 with several high ranking NATO and WARPAC participants.

[Lampshade111]

I too would love to see a NATO vs USSR/Warsaw Pact version of Combat Mission. Personally I think the "victor" would vary depending on the date of the war and some luck. As per the year of the conflict, the Russians would certainly have a greater advantage before the new generation of NATO armor arrived (Challenger, Leopard 2, Abrams) for example.

[Vark]

Dammit, more juicy things to read! Just for interest, if anyone is aware of The Miniatures Page (TMP) there is a thread on Soviet tactics, in the modern gaming discussion forum. One of its most knowledgeable contributors is very dimissive of the traditional view.

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=188798

Quote from 5:19PM post

"I had commented on the drafts of FM 100-2-1, -2, and -3 from our detachment at Fort Hood in 1982 and 1983. Bill Gray may have been on some of that before he PCSed, too. At that time, we had very little in the way of current Soviet doctrinal literature to draw from. The manuals were published in 1984; they were in many ways not much better than Isby or the ITAC "Red Book" when it came to combined-arms tactics.

"I showed up at Leavenworth in 1985, and after helping kill the "Sergeant York" DIVAD, was given the specific job of revising chapters 2, 4-7, and parts of 13 in FM 100-2-1--basically all the combined arms subjects--and the tank and other AFV sections of FM 100-2-3.

We started working with the newly-formed Soviet Army Studies Office, particularly COL Dave Glantz and LTC Les Grau, to exploit Soviet materials (and also, sometimes even more so, with their counterparts at RMA Sandhurst). With the help of these gentlemen, as well as with individuals who had actually been through the Soviet system, we began to develop a better understanding of what Soviet tactics were really like.

We had updated versions of 100-2-3 and 100-2-1 basically "in the can" ready to go to publication, when I left Leavenworth to come out here to California in late 1989. By that time, Training and Doctrine Command was not interesting in publishing anything on the defunct Soviet Union; they wanted a generic, "world class" OPFOR model for training. Some photocopies of the revised volumes were circulated to the schools and centers, but the new manuals never went into the doctrinal literature publication system.

From Fort Irwin, I continued to use the Army's OPFOR professional bulletin to disseminate useful stuff, particularly as Les Grau was researching the Frunze Academy materials from Afghanistan, and Michael Orr at Sandhurst was digging fascinating bits out of military journal articles. And of course, the NTC OPFOR eagerly siezed on every snippet of Soviet tactical art that could give them an advantage.

But basically, a more sophisticated understanding of Soviet combined-arms doctrine was never passed on to the US Army at large The British Army likewise moved on from updating the threat volumes of the Army Field Manual to Genforce, a generic potential adversary, the same way the US Army went.

FM 100-2-1 (1984) is OK, but it was still a stereotyped, misleading, and woefully incomplete view of the subject. And I'm afraid that very few people know that as intimately as I do. Sorry."

Most Cold-War 'veterans' I have talked too are very thankful that it never came to a shooting war, as they witnessed enough cock ups and confusion in the peace-keeping era to realise the big one would have been utter hell on earth. If we attack our troops in open deserts, where enemy AD assets are minimal what would happen in the close terrain of Europe where over-exposure is fatal and the pilots are under far greater stress?

[hcrof]

John - A bit of a mix up of terminology there, as seems to be pretty common with this subject By second echelon I was deliberatly being a bit vague but I ment the rest of the battalion or regiment.

Thanks for the insight as to the air situation. I guess the whole thing would have been pretty messy! Could it ever get to a point where attrition means neither side has enough aircraft to achieve any major goal?

Grozny is a wierd one. The Russian army demonstrated everything bad that could go wrong with the system but to be fair, it was in desperate shape and all of the well trained troops from the soviet era had rotated out of the ranks. The Chechens however were all Soviet trained and demonstrated how the Soviets could be more resourceful and clever than the west had given them credit for!

Certainly if the poster that Vark quoted is correct, it would make a lot of sense

jjhouston - Thanks for the link, I have read the first few sections and it is fascinating stuff!

Vark - I would love to see what that guy wrote but I suppose we will have to wait untill he gets around to publishing it. Hopefully, demand from historians and wargamers will mean that valuble information wont be lost! I think the true story is that the Soviet army was very mixed. Some units were well trained and flexible while others failed to elevate past box ticking and textbook manouvre.

What do you mean by 'Real world examples of the efficacy of Western airpower v's Warpac equipment and docrine. Take any factors, and multiply by a factor of ten'? Western planes have never attacked a modern, integrated air defense system. The most dangerous thing they have fought is one or two SA-2 systems as far as I know. (Which isnt that much TBH).

[John Kettler]

jjhouston,

Cool and thanks!

Vark,

Am definitely going to have to read that thread. For the record, the referenced FM was one of a plethora of sources I used in my work. Was rather a one-man all source analyst.

hcrof,

If you run the numbers, a strike force taking 3% losses per sortie is about the limit of what's bearable. Much higher, and pretty soon you have no air force. Regarding Vark's integrated air defense assertion, Hanoi had probably the second densest in the world circa early 1970s: Russian structured, Russian advised, backed by some secret Russian flown MiGs and Russian crewed SA-2s, with many key defense elements off limits. (See summary here) www.vietnam.ttu.edu/star/images/024/0240306035.pdf By 1972, there were 300 SA-2 sites operational in NVN. http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Gal6/5601-5700/gal5696_Sa2_Brundt/00.shtm SA-2 was running a .5 PK when it first debuted, but was undone by new tactics, jamming (hugely facilitated by CIA Op HABRINK, which got uplink freqs), Iron Hand/Wild Weasel intimidation/hard kill (guns, rockets, later Shrike and Standard ARM) and the havoc the climate wrought on the missile. Hand nursing a few birds is one thing, but running sustained air defenses on a large scale something else. Hanoi lacked SA-3/SA-9/13 and got ZSU-23/4 very late in the game. Baghdad also had very nasty defenses, but we had scads of new toys in play there, so it's less applicable to this discussion. Imagine, though, trying to do the same basic job sans F-117, stealth cruise missiles, compromised Iraqi C3I, intimate knowledge of key underground facilities, deep penetrator bombs, Tomahawks, etc.

People,

Recommend next person start a new thread, lest we crash the Forum!

Regards,

John Kettler

[Michael Emrys]

Recommend next person start a new thread, lest we crash the Forum!

As a community service I have done so and it may be found here:

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=90564

This thread may now be locked. Go to it, guys! This has been an interesting discussion so far.

Michael

[MikeyD]

Ha ha, instead of locking this thread they built a whole new forum for it!

[Sequoia]

From an old post almost a year ago:

Oh, and no water or bridges in Afghanistan. We've only got the basic elements of that working right now and haven't yet begun to test the PathingAI, which no doubt has bugs in it since, well, it's untested. Charles writes excellent code on his first pass, but he isn't perfect

Steve

[Sequoia]

Opps, sorry-posted in wrong thread...