A Race to a European Conflagration

Hi all

I guess that a Happy New Year is warranted.

As foreshadowed in my last post I felt a need to do some gaming but also within the context of a broader campaign.  I therefore planned to a rejig a modern spearhead campaign called "Race to the Rhine" (RR) by the Wellington Warlords, with credit to several other predecessors.  This has turned into something I've called "Race to a European Conflagration" (REC).  The system follows RR closely but is modified to reflect the rules I wished to use, that is FoB:Modern.  It covers maps and axes of advance, AA, EW, weather engineering and air support, the types of battles and thus what Soviet forces and supports, and randomised NATO forces and supports, are available.

 

The year is 1982 and each of four Russian teams commands a Combined Arms or Tank Army (bathtubbed as a Division) in the Group of Soviet Forces, Germany, and the Central Group of Forces, that is tasked with advancing to the Rhine as fast as possible.

There are 4 possible axis of the advance to the Rhine:

• The first is the northern axis through Luneberg, Bremen – crossing the Weser river – to a crossing of the Ems river into the Netherlands aiming to cross the Rhine just north of Koblez.
• The second is through the tank country of the North German plains from Braunschweig, south of Hanover crossing the Weser river, then crossing the Ems river north of Dortmund, meeting the Rhine river at Dusseldorf.
• The third axis follows the fulda gap, passing by Frankfurt above the Main river, and crosses the Rhine river in the Vicinity of Mainz.
• The final axis is the southern one through rougher terrain from Czechoslovakia, south of Nuremberg to Stuttgart, crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg. 

 This results in the following Strategic Map:

 

Thus there are Four Armies present: GSFG – 2^nd Tank Army, 3^rd Shock Army and 8^th Guards Army, and CGF – 4^th Guards Army. The forces are as follows:

• Black Route: GSFG, 2^nd Tank Army – 94 GMRD, 21 MRD, 25 TD, and 16 GTD;
• Green Route: GSFG, 3^rd Shock Army – 10 GTD, 12 GTD, 47 GTD and 207 MRD;
• Purple Route: GSFG, 8^th Guards Army – 20 GMRD, 39 GMRD, 57 GMRD and 79 GTD; and
• Orange Route: CGF, 4^th Army – 31 TD, 18 MRD, 51 TD, 55 GMRD and 66 GMRD.

Each of the Divisions listed will be represented by a FoB regiment.


The unit types for these Divisions will be roughly defined by the following set of rules:

• Guards TD will have T64s and BMPs; except in CGF will have T62
• Guard MRD will have T64/62 and BTR or BMP; except in CGF will have T62 or T55
• Ordinary TD will have T64/62 and BMPs; except in CGF will have T62 or T55
• Ordinary MRD will have T62 and BTR; except in CGF will have T55
• Independent tank units – T62 or T64 in GSFG, T55 in CGF
• Guard Divisions will have SP artillery, while Ordinary Divisions will have Towed artillery, except all Divisions in CGF will be Towed.

The Strategic Map, above, was converted to a map, based on that for the boardgame Third World War, that indicated terrain types from which the tables for battles could be drawn.

 



















I used six hexes around each route number to form the basis for the terrain on the gaming tables, with the map defining four terrain types: Open, Forested, Rough and Forested Rough.  Then using a set of Tables and die rolls the gaming table is developed with towns, Cities, hills, forests, rivers and key terrain features as objectives.

Battle types are: Russians attack, Meeting engagement, Russians defend. Which battle applies randomly chosen, with a bias to Russians attack. The Russians have the option of delaying their advance and undertaking a Prepared attack, with additional supports.

The rough force matches, excluding supports, are:
A Russians attack result is likely to be 12 Soviet battalions versus about 4 NATO battalions;
A Meeting engagement result is likely to be 10 Soviet battalions versus 6 NATO battalions;
A Russians defend result is likely to be 10 Soviet battalions versus 8 NATO battalions; and
A Russian Prepared attack could be about 18 Soviet Battalions versus 6 NATO battalions.

NATOs forces may be weaker depending on the level of Soviet success in previous battles.

The forces available to the Russians in the campaign are essentially those that they start with with limited opportunities for replacements.

That, I hope sets the scene. Next I will set out the situation for the first battle - an attack by the 2nd Tank Army on BAOR defenders along the black route.

See you then.