Hamburg Central Station, 23:00 Zulu Time
Sergeant Sidorov's tank company stopped for the night near Central train station, after sixteen hours of fighting and two others T-72 lost."And so we're down to six", He thought. "Luckily the Germans left yesterday, and all we had to fight were Danish reservists and small groups of armed civilians."
He reached his backpack for some bratwurst and a chunk of black bread, taken a few hours ago from a grocery store. Probably a grocery reserved to the ruling class only, judging by the amount of food it had.
To tell the truth, every store he has seen in Hamburg had an impressive amount of goods of every kind; in several cases, he wasn't even able to discern what that stuff was for.
"Why in the hell they were preparing to attack East Germany? I've been stationed there for four years, and cannot imagine what they could hope to get they don't already have. Maybe my old Sergeant Instructor was right, after all; a German is always a German, no matter what."
He gnawed the black bread, watching the lights of the city fires.
20th Guards Army HQ, near Bremen, 23:00 Zulu Time
"Are you sure of your conclusions, Anton Vladovich?"The commander of 20th Guards Army looked intently at the 40 years old man in front of him: shaggy uniform, tired look, dirty. A good soldier. Too many of his officers looked always ready for a parade in the Red Square, even after six day of war.
"Yes, Comrade Lieutenant General. Our reconnaissance forces have identified elements from three different brigades belonging to 11th West German Mechanized Division, all defending Bremen.
The strength of the defense lines bring us to conclude that the enemy has regrouped and is now maneuvering at division level in Bremen area."
"Thank you, Anton Vladovich. Dismissed."
He closed his eyes and tried to organize the hundreds of small information pieces constantly flowing to his desk. NATO operating at division level, inside Bremen. According to Intelligence the same thing happened in Amsterdam, where a Dutch Division fortified the city.
A new strategy, or a defense against the unavoidable retaliation following a tactical nuclear attack?
Hard to guess. No doubt SHAEF was deeply worried by the collapse of NORTHAG. Maybe desperate enough to ask for tactical nuclear release.
Disperse the divisions to avoid offering juicy targets in open field? Risky.
Ignore the possibility and keep the concentration of forces for tomorrow's attack? Risky.
He stared at the situation map again, but it didn't help.
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| WP advance at D+6, 23:00 Zulu Time |
The Netherlands front is the weak link. Hazard all for glory and try and jump the border and, if lucky, force a Netherlands surrender.
ReplyDeleteThat will unhinge the northern front, possibly beyond repair.
I try to bypass hogged cities, but sometimes you have to leave a fair amount of force to watch them.
Great writing, reminds me of reading Hackett's WW3. I keep looking at your maps and wondering what the US Army is doing in the South?
ReplyDeleteAlso, just curious about this game, does the Italian army have any capability to deeply north of the Alps?
Cheers,
Michael
Thanks Michael! I'm obviously a big fan of Hackett's book.
DeleteI'm also wondering about US Army inactivity, but I'm not complaining...
Regarding Italy, the Scenario political rolls made at war start forbid Italian ground forces to move outside national territory, unless Italy is invaded. Being Italian, I can assure you that's a more than realistic behavior :(
Same thing happened in my game, though it was balanced (a bit) by Czech unrest, which froze a couple of Soviet divisions in CZ until Munich and/or Nuernberg fell.
DeleteAll those F-104s and G-91s don't last long, either.
Any more progress with this one?
ReplyDeleteWe had a temporary stop due to NATO player job change, but i'm confident we will resume in a couple of weeks :-)
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