After Action Report: Meeting Battle at a River Line, April 19, 1997 Like 'All Gaul', this AAR is divided into three parts: 1) Initial Orders, 2) What Happened, and 3) Lessons Learned. Initial Orders: The game took place on Map 100 using early-mid 1970's equipment - this meant that there were no thermal sights in the game (and to ensure that, all types of smoke were set to block thermals.) Every bridge on the map was declared blown before the start of play, and each side was provided with engineering equipment for bridging. These operated under the following rules: By a miracle, the river in this area is not fordable, but has firm, gently sloped banks allowing for easy bridging. Deploying a bridge requires 2 engineering vehicles and their associated squads, and takes 10 minutes. A platoon per turn can cross using these bridges. (Using umpire's CPX tool magic-move.) Bridges built at the sites of previous bridges take 15 minutes to build (by magic the debris is easy to clear away) and operate under no traffic restrictions. If the engineering vehicles and squads are destroyed after setting up the bridge, the bridge is also destroyed. The AAR uses some of the codenames from each side for some parts of the map. Their map locations are: The Cauldron: the small circular valley around 050020 Pluto: the town at 035025 Banana: the area of the bridges at 018030 and the ridgeline just north of them Uranus: the hills and woods close to 038038 Neptune: the hills and woods close to 042042 Beta: Uranus and Neptune combined Pivot: the hill at 023018 OPFOR's mission: CO and Defender commander: John Crawford 1st Battalion: Brian Rock 2nd Battalion: Luca Signorelli Orders: Your force is the Army's Forward Detachment - tasked to move well ahead of the main force and seize key pieces of terrain and routes of advance. Today, your mission is to secure a bridgehead into the area north-west of the river line at 036059 - 033041 - 031040 - 024028 - 000034. Where you cross the river is left to your discretion. Optimally, you will seize and hold the towns along the road in this area and begin preparing them, your river crossing, and your advance route, for defense. Forces available: (these are almost certainly not perfect for c. 1975, but close enough)) 2 Battalions of T-62 Tanks Each Battalion of 3 companies each company of 10 tanks 1 Mech Battalion 1 Company of BMP-1 12 BMP-1 12 Infantry Squads 4 PKM MGs 2 Companies of BTR 12 BTR-80 each 12 Infantry Squads each 4 PKM MG teams each 4 AT-3 Sagger teams each Scouts: 4 BRDM Scout cars with 4 infantry teams. Mortars: 6 BTR-80s carrying 6 120mm mortars. Bridging train: 6 MTLBs carrying engineering squads. Two command tanks: one for the CO, one for the Chief of Staff. Both T-62. Off-map artillery: available on contact with enemy forces: 3 152mm artillery batteries (40HE, 6 smoke fires) 1 122mm MRL Bn (5 HE fires) Air support: small probability of being available. (5% chance) Your force all enter via the road at 030000. The scouts must be the first to enter; subsequent companies enter at 3 minute intervals. You may choose the order of battalion entry. This force was rearranged into three: "Defender", which had all the BMPs plus the Saggers, was to enter first and hold Pluto, Pivot, and the town at 018002. 1st and 2nd Battalions each got a battalion of T-62, plus a BTR company. Opfor planned to move in quickly, and set up a bridge at 023007. While it was being built, 2nd Battalion was to move through Pluto into Beta, and from there attack across the river. 1st Battalion would arrive after the bridge was finished, and after moving south of Pivot, was to attack Banana from the south. This plan came in for a certain amount of criticism from the Battalion commanders, who were certain that the US forces would attack from the east or west and throw things out of joint. 2nd Battalion's commander asked for and got permission to sweep north via the Cauldron towards Beta, instead of through Pluto. The scouts were sent in two groups; one to north Pluto and one to the town just SW of Pivot. To the north, the US orders were: CO: Gary Wollbach Scouts, A and E companies: John Powderly B, C and D companies: Steven Sim Situation: The road leading from 041060 - 038054 - 033052 - 020050 - 007050 - 001058 - 000056 is soon to be a major supply route for our forces. However, enemy forces have been moving in this direction and the route is in need of protection. Orders: Your mixed battalion is to move onto the map via the road at 041060 and deploy to defend this MSR from enemy fire: this objective includes rebuilding and defending the bridge at 033052. In addition, enemy forces should not be permitted to cross the river barrier running along the line 036059 - 033041 - 031040 - 024028 - 000034. If absolutely necessary, the MSR can be rerouted somewhat to use the secondary road via 029060 - though this will seriously impede our logistic efforts because the "secondary road" is in fact little more than a disused goat track. Forces available: (these are almost certainly not perfect for c. 1975, but close enough) 3x M-60A1 companies (15 tanks each) 2x M-113 Mech Companies (15 M-113, 15 Squads, 3 SRAAW (Carl Gustav) Teams each) 4x Scout teams (2x Hummer and 2x inf team each) A bridging train of 4x M-113s and associated engineers. 2 Command tanks (1 each for the CO and XO, both M-60A1) 1 Mortar Battery of 6 M-106 mortars. 3 155mm artillery batteries are available on contact. 40HE and 3 smoke salvoes each. There is a small chance of air support. (5% chance) The first units onto the map will be the scouts. Subsequent companies will enter at 3 minute intervals. You may determine the order of entry of companies; you may form mixed companies if desired, using platoons of 5 vehicles. The US, like Opfor, reorganized its forces somewhat. Alpha company was pure mech infantry, tasked to enter right after the scouts, swim the river, and defend Banana. Bravo and Charlie companies were mixed, Bravo being 2:1 mech and Charlie being 2:1 tanks, while Delta and Echo were pure tank companies. The companies entered in alphabetical order; Bravo was to move immediately into Uranus or even Pluto, with Charlie and Delta in probable support, while Echo was the TF Reserve. The US players also voiced concerns that their intel was wrong, and worried about enemy forces from the east and west. The scouts, on the map first, were sent towards Pluto and down the main road to the north of the Cauldron. Despite everyone's warm trust of their intel sections, planning seems to have been largely based on what Intel claimed. ========== 2) What happened. After three minutes, the opposing scouting forces spotted each other moving towards Pluto. They also lost sight of each other soon afterwards. An umpire error left the US scouts stranded in the northern part of Pluto (sitting quite near the Opfor scouts, though neither saw the other); on discovering the error, they were magic-moved to their intended position on the NW finger of Pluto, where they and Opfor BRDMs spotted each other and exchanged fire. The US jeeps were destroyed, but the scout teams lived on, and a few minutes later (0713) they ambushed part of the Opfor Defender force that was intended to hold Pluto and killed a BMP platoon and a few Saggers. Both sides had begun bridging operations, and each side spotted the other's bridging attempts; both responded by ranging artillery in on the other's bridge and by firing smoke into the clear valley west of Uranus and Neptune, though the US was more systematic about maintaining the screen, a level of caution prompted by the occasional Sagger shot from Pluto. By 0722, the US Alpha company, arriving at Banana, took fire from Opfor forces across the river - in fact 2nd Battalion moving into the Cauldron via the area around 035015 - and retreated to positions overlooking the bridge, where Alpha company remained for the rest of the game. Activity at Pluto/Beta had been quiet for a few minutes, with the US Bravo company forming up in Uranus, Charlie around 051044, and Delta at about 042052. Echo company was getting ready to move across the almost-completed bridge at 033053, while Opfor was beginning to get 1st Battalion into position to cross via their bridge at 023007. The fighting in the east heated up again at 0729, as Opfor tried to drive north from the western end of the Cauldron, through the woods into Beta (Uranus/Neptune). The lines of sight in this area are confused and often short. Because of this and the smoke that both sides periodically dropped into the area, units tended to get patchy sightings of each other and the battles that resulted throughout Beta were a series of small ambushes, with one side getting the first sighting, firing for one round, and popping smoke as per SOP in order to escape retaliation. Rarely, however, was the target of the fire completely destroyed. Thus the initial exchange of fire, which resulted from Bravo company's tanks shooting at one platoon of B coy 2nd Battalion did little to prevent B/2 from continuing to move northwards into the Neptune position - though it did send the one surviving tank from that platoon into the north of the Uranus position, where it killed a number of M-113s and a Carl G. Team before infantry LAWs caught it. The US sent Charlie company into Neptune to help out Bravo.... as a result, B/2 got sandwiched in the middle of Beta, and was eventually wiped out in savage see-saw fighting that also went a long way towards gutting both Bravo and Charlie companies. This stage of the battle only wound down slowly; as it ended, in stage two (0743) A/2 was sent north into Beta from 038028. A/2 destroyed most of Bravo's vehicles and some of its infantry before Bravo's infantry wiped out A/2's tanks. In stage three (0753) D/2, a BTR company, charged north along the 044 easting, taking heavy fire as it hit the small clear valley. It lost most of its vehicles, but in the ensuing firefight its infantry killed all the remaining vehicles in Charlie and Bravo companies. After this (around 0800) the battle slowed down to occasional bursts of firing from remnant infantry units. While the fight at Beta was underway, the US had been carefully moving Delta company via 063030 to the NE edge of the Cauldron, then sneaking it across the Cauldron to 035015 - a move that Opfor potentially knew about in great detail due to the move order accidentally being typed on an open channel. Opfor didn't change much as a result of the info, shifting a few infantry units to watch the SE edge of Pluto; this probably came from two reasons: 1) Opfor never saw Delta until it began its attack and 2) Opfor knew it had forces positioned in the south to deal with such an attack. That Delta was not spotted in the Cauldron was a matter of extreme luck; Opfor was also moving forces through it regularly and that these usually managed to avoid each other was a source of some amazement to the umpire. Nonetheless, Delta's appearance, headed SW, in the valley at 033013 was a moderate surprise to Opfor. They responded by moving a tank company in Pivot from facing NW to facing SE and braced to the attack. Delta company moved to about 030005 and then headed NW, trying to grab Opfor's bridge. Delta did reasonably well in the face of light Sagger and BMP fire, shooting up vehicles in the vicinity of the bridge (023007) and interrupting the activity of Opfor's mortar battery. However, once it came into view of the Opfor forces on Pivot it was swiftly destroyed by massed tank and missile fire. The US extracted soon thereafter a measure of revenge with an airstrike that did a phenomenal amount of damage to the Opfor forces crammed into the northern end of Pivot. The destruction of Delta (0802) left the US with very little forces on the eastern bank of the river. Bravo and Charlie had been shattered and their remnants were in Beta. The two TF command tanks were defending the town at 036054, the mortar battery was sheltered nearby, and otherwise the position was open. Opfor's forces in the same region were also mauled; only C/2 tank company remained of 2nd Battalion. While the Opfor CO wanted to remain defensive in the area, the 2nd Battalion Commander wanted a move by C/2 up the valley north of Cauldron and Beta, beginning at 057034 and moving NW. Permission was given and the move began; moving slowly but against only token opposition, C/2 was arriving at the NW mouth of the valley by the game's end (0823). Meanwhile, the US Echo company had taken up positions to defend Banana along with Alpha, while the Opfor 1st Battalion slowly moved forward to attack them. Opfor finally began to launch this attack, under cover of their MRL battalion (its one and only fire mission of the game) and a large number of airstrikes, at 0820. It became obvious that the attack would succeed and the game was called and ruled an Opfor victory.. Final "Game Status Report": US UNIT START NOW ELIM EXITED HMMWV 8 1 7 0 Inf Team 8 4 4 0 M113 APC 34 4 30 0 M60A1 Tank 47 3 44 0 M106 Mortar Carrier 6 6 0 0 Inf Engineer Squad 4 2 2 0 Inf Squad 30 10 20 0 SRAAW Team 6 1 5 0 Force Lethality Value, Start: 6628 Force Lethality Value, Now: 1270 Casualty percentage: 80 Force Lethality Ratio, Start: 1:1.2 Force Lethality Ratio, Now: 1:3.1 OPFOR UNIT START NOW ELIM EXITED BRDM2 APC 4 2 2 0 Inf Team 40 20 20 0 T62M M1975 Tank 64 32 32 0 BMP1 IFV 12 5 7 0 BTR80 APC 30 7 23 0 PKM MG Team 12 7 5 0 AT3 ATGM Sagger 8 5 3 0 120mm Mortar 6 5 1 0 Inf Engineer Squad 6 4 2 0 MTLB APC 6 3 3 0 Force Lethality Value, Start: 8238 Force Lethality Value, Now: 3889 Casualty percentage: 52 Force Lethality Ratio, Start: 1.2:1 Force Lethality Ratio, Now: 3.1:1 ========== 3) Lessons Learned. In many ways this is a difficult scenario to write up in this section. Both sides had reasonably solid plans given what they knew beforehand; neither side committed any glaring errors. Both sides could probably have conducted the battles in Beta (Uranus/Neptune) better, by stopping to let the other side come to them more, but the move orders generally made sense given the information available at the time. Delta company's flanking move was the move controversial move in the game and it is discussed below; - and only with 20-20 hindsight can it be seen as a mistake that may have cost the US the game. Some of the Opfor commanders didn't like their side's plan for its lack of flank protection to the east and west, and its division of effort; in the event, the flank protection worked well enough to wipe out Delta company in minutes, and the division of effort served to split the US defense effort and made it much more likely that one of the attacks would succeed. (Imagine trying to drive both battalions through Beta, or both trying to attack across the river into Banana and the riverline to the west of Banana - both would let the US concentrate most of its firepower against whatever Opfor units happened to be moving, and then pop smoke to hide until they became unspotted again....) Fog of War, Delta Company, and Scenario Balance: While this may seem an odd trio, they seem to me to be linked issues. As an umpire one is always worried about balancing scenarios, and one of my primary tools for scenario balance is my guts - if I feel uneasy about the prospects for victory for *both* sides, I figure it isn't too bad. In this case, I figured for mutual defeat - I wasn't certain that the US could adequately protect its MSR, but I also thought the US could probably prevent an Opfor crossing of the river. The kicker to all of this was Delta company's flanking move and its source in the fog of war. Opfor wanted to play it safe, and so held back forces to protect their rear against flanking movements by the US - fear of the fog. The US decided to launch a company into the unknown in hopes of damaging the Opfor position by a flank or rear assault - operating in the fog and trying to use it to advantage. As it turned out, D company's move may have cost the US the game; had D company remained north of Beta to defend the MSR there is a good chance it would have stopped the remnants of Luca's 2nd battalion from nearing the US bridge and MSR on the east bank, and the resistance might have prompted Opfor to abandon its attack at Banana - which abandonment nearly occurred. Things might have gone differently, however; if there had been no Opfor forces in the south, and no tank company at Pivot that could rapidly switch to engage Delta, Delta's appearance in the south might have wreaked complete havoc with Opfor's plans, destroyed the bridge at 023007, and prevented an Opfor victory. The US couldn't know; they took a risk and in this instance it didn't pay off. On the other hand, it is possible that the US needed more forces than it got; I'm not convinced that another company of tanks would have been a bad thing, though perhaps that would have been too much - it's hard to tell. The eventual Opfor victory at Banana was bought mostly with airstrikes, not tank fire - and had TacOps rolled its 5 percent chances for airstrikes differently then the same fight might have gone much the other way, with massed US airstrikes obliterating 1st Battalion's attack on Banana and 2nd Battalion's drive on the US bridge. (The latter drive did, in fact, take moderate losses to US airstrikes.) While the US lost 40% of its force in Beta, it also retained control of it, and Beta was a key piece of terrain for their mission. Opfor lost 33% of its force in the same area and failed to capture it. The fight in Beta was a confused mess and the US probably won it through the greater staying power of their larger infantry force; their force was 50-50 tanks and mech while the Opfor force was 2:1 tanks:mech, and in the close terrain, the infantry were often able to make short work of the tanks they met. Meeting Battles and Forward Detachments: In the run-up to the game, Brian Rock commented to me and his side that, 'Just one point about this week's scenario. James advised it's "a meeting engagement", but the mission brief reads more like an assault on key objectives with a reasonable expectation of opposition.' I bring this up simply because I don't agree that there is the dichotomy implied in his comment..... the scenario was, for Opfor, both a meeting battle and an assault on a key objective, while for the US is was both a meeting battle and the defense of key objectives. It largely depends what scale you view the action on. From a wider scale, both forces are moving into the area; neither knows the other's strength or location, though probable points of conflict can be predicted - Beta, Pluto, and Banana to name a few. Neither side is deployed for a set-piece battle, and must throw things together mostly on the fly as forces enter the map in march column. On the other hand, at other levels it is very much an assault-defense scenario. The US must hold onto the pieces of ground needed to accomplish its mission, and is able to get to some of them before Opfor can (Banana and vicinity). Opfor needs to probe the US positions and seize a bridgehead. This makes a small-scale set piece attack likely at some point, although in theory it might not occur. Equally, on a wider scale, the Opfor force is conducting an assault into the general area defended by the US. I found the differences in the perceptions of the nature of the mission interesting. Part of his comment, I think, springs from my explanation of the role of a Forward Detachment - "to move well ahead of the main force and seize key pieces of terrain and routes of advance" - which implies assault. Partly this is bad phrasing on my part - if an FD can find a good route that bypasses resistance it is expected to do so! However, the FD is also expected to be able to overwhelm light resistance and its mission is viewed as being likely to produce meeting battles with enemy reserves, rear defense forces, and frontline forces forming new fronts of resistance.