BLUFOR - Tourney Rd 1 vs John Osborne

[Ivan Rapkinov]

BLUE CO AAR

1600ZULU 18JUL05 (Set Up and T1)

My mission is to prevent the Red Scum(tm) from penetrating PL ORCA - a tough ask indeed. So Tough, given the set up lines, I think it's pretty much impossible. Thus I've resolved to defend the Primary Objective, Mykolaiv.

To do this, I've pretty much followed the OPORD. I've broken missions down to BDE level, as it makes it easier to demonstrate, what I'm trying to do.

- DIVCAV - this is the Cav element of 1BCT - they've been dragooned into service as the Corps cav element, and their main mission is to screen the various BCTs advance into OBJ LISA

- 17 ACR - as per OPORD, their mission is to cross the bridge north of OBJ LINDA, and hopefully lead the advance to OBJ WILMA, whilst screening the flank ofc...

- 1BCT - it's mission is to head SW towards OBJ LISA, and then defend in depth OR depending on Enemy situation, advance towards OBJ PAULA.

- 2BCT - It's mission is to advance towards PL ORCA, taking a defensive position north of Myskina - this BDE is to be the pivot point of my defense/offense depening on how the battle goes.

- 3BCT - first objective is to secure OBJ LINDA, and then Advance to OBJ BETTY. This is a gamble as it doesnt allow me to have too much freedom of movement, if any trouble comes from the north.

My UAVs are going on longe range recon to the North West, as per the OPORD enemy disposition. Everything else is moving in SW towards Myskina.

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 2

Every thing is going according to plan - my UAVs have found a lot of John's forces - the only hiccups have been the fact that John's somehow managed to put obstacles on the bridges I'm using - this ruined my nicely planned marching order.

the Attached JPGs show the movement of my BDEs and of the known enemy situation.

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 3

Bombs Away! John's planes attack the Bridge near OBJ LINDA with no success. Meanwhile my UAVs scout out some more, and my CAV unit up north runs into one of John's which has taken up residence in the restricted terrain gap near OBJ WILMA. This is nasty, as it'll be a while before I can get anything up there to help out, and I defintely can;t dig them out with one BN! For some strange reason that esacpes me, I sent a Coy of Cav helos to eithe scout them out or attack - ofc, the TAI isn;t active yet...

The Traffic Jam that is the bridge south of OBJ LINDA gets worse, and everything else moves along at a nice clip

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 4

note: this AAR is done after the fact, so some decisions made have been forgotten by me at least

1BCT and 2BCT have reached Myskina, and recon has spotted John's 3BDE moving into position as well - fight time it would appear. 3BCT is moving up to help the Cav Sqn defend the Gap, and now the taffic jam is clearing, the other Cav Sqn goes to help out.

One of the Cav companies screening the advance crosses over the only remaining bridge north of Myskina. For some strange reason, I told them to blow the bridge behind them, cutting themselves off...

My arty this turn lays down a few (bug: if you don't place all your obstacles at the start, you get an unlimited amount) FASCAM fields, bringing my game total up to 5 I think. Apologies to John for that - didn;t mean to be gamey.

My UAVs do their thing...find some more stuff

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 5

Time for John's 3BDE to die :devil:

my attack helos plot their strike to arrive after my Air anbd arty strikes on the 3BDE's position (My arty actually couldn't reach his "icon", so I just aimed it near the footprint ), TF 1-98IN moved up to support it's parent BCT, 2BCT, which was a bit worse for wear after the combat with 3BDE the previous turn (they had lost 11%, and the Red 3BDE had lost 19% for the turn) - my plan was to reabsorb the TF 1-98 in 2BCT when there was the need to consolidate.

Up north John has esconsced his Cav battalions in the mountain range protecting OBJ Wilma. My 3BCT and 2 Cav Sqns were ready to attack, but I wasn't sure if he had anything else - my UAVs had been used to establish where his assembly areas were.

I had spotted his EW unit far forward and in range of my MLRS units - I should have just used a Paladin battery, but it was much more fun to disrupt the sneaky EW boys - plus much more satisfying when you see each strike doing dobule digit percentage damage

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 6

Combat was nasty, with John's EW unit taking 58% damage from the arty strike . My Attack helo run came off perfectly, happening in an active TAI, and doing about 14% damage to the Enemy BDE overall - the airstrike also got through, doing 2% damage, despite being intercepted by John's fighters.

Ground combat in Myskina was also nasty, With John's BDE taking more damage, but actually handing out some in reply. Up North, the 1-17 ACR ran into John's 1-13 CAV, and the resultant combat saw no clear winner - well, John's unit suffered 13% losses, mine suffered 24%. John won that round

My UAVs were woefully inadequate, basically the only good thing they did was find John's "airfield" - the location where he'd parked all his helos and UAVs.

The mission this turn was simple - to take out the 3BDE in Myskina and prevent a breakout from the mountain Passes near OBJ WILMA. John's 3BDE was down to 55% at this stage, but the lack of intel regarding movements near those passes up north had me concerned.

I thought because I'd blown the bridges John couldn't cross at OBJ WILMA, well he could...

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 7

well, combat was fairly uneventful. The 3BDE was now down to 39%, and up North, I managed to dislodge one of the Cav units guarding the passes. My cav got hammered by arty yet again, and my UAVs didn't manage to find anything new.

not much strategy here - just keep plugging away. Darkness was running out so I decided to use my helos again to bloody John's nose - the ATK Bn went after 3BDE, and the Cav helo units went after the Cav units guarding the pass - that was the plan anyhow.

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 8

Well combat was interesting

John decided to detach all of his subordinate battalions in 3BDE (and I guess his 1BDE too) too either reduce the total damage, or let them withdraw easier, not sure. Unfortunately for him, detaching his units made his HQ unit almost crumble to the touch - my arty pounded the 3BDE, with hits doing 20% damage to the HQ unit doing only 1% to the attached battalions. His MP subordinate unit faced the same fate, and with a few strikes, his HQ unit was destroyed, as was his MP unit.

To add insult to injury, my ATK helos arrived on scene and savaged the disparate battalions that were scrambling for safety. The helos inflicted 19% damage to the Armor BN, 14% to one Infantry TF, and 7% to another.

Up North, my Cav helos redeemed themselves immeasurably, instead of going after the Cav units near the TAI, they engaged the HQ unit of John's 1BDE that must have got there last turn - my little cav helos managed to do 96% damage to that unit, rendering it completely combat ineffective!

As ground combat began, John's armour and one of his Infantry battalions surrendered in Myskina, this was closely followed by the other infantry Battalion, and finally, the arty unit that belonged to BDE was destroyed by ground fire.

John's CAv managed to force my own Cav units near the passes back through a combination of determination and overwhelming Arty

This was consolidation phase - I'd shattered the force at Myskina with relatively little harm to myself, and I had fenced in the Units near OBJ Wilma - also known as I couldn't force them out of the mountains, so I was content to withdraw and set up a defensive belt further back. My unit is Myskina were looking forward to recuperating after nearly constant combat for 12 hours.

 

[Ivan Rapkinov]

Turn 8

Combat again was very interesting

My arty was the main killer - John's Engineer Bn near Myskina (running for their lives ) suffered 18% damage from arty, and his units up in the passes did not fair well either...

1BDE (HQ) suffered 20% damage and was destroyed
1-41 AR suffered 11% losses
2-68 AR suffered 8% losses
TF 1-8 IN suffered 10% losses
1-19 FA suffered 17% losses
A/1-77 EN suffered 41% losses
A/4-701 MP suffered 58% losses

all this just from the arty.

It didn;t get any better for John either - my 3BCT was withdrawing, but it gave John's forces a kicking as it left.

1-41 AR took another 10% damage (21% for the turn)
2-68 AR took another 20% damage (28% for the turn)
TF 1-8 IN took another 7% (17% for the turn)

John's airstrikes also were relatively ineffectual, with one 6 sorty mission being driven by my Fighters, and the other 4 sorty mission being disrupted by ADA, which result in the strike doing a dismal 1% damage to the massive 1BCT (53 RCP @ 98%)

By this stage I was content to hold Myskina and just keep using arty to attrit the units holding the passes - as soon as it was night, I would send the attack helos in to finish the job, but I was happy for now to resupply, and just keep my forces healthy.

Every unit on the frontline went to Hasty Defence, and I prepared to repel any advances. There was another BDE out there somewhere, and I wasn;t sure where the hammer would fall - so my defensive line was 1BCT and 2BCT holding Myskina, and 3BCT and 1-17 ACR holding a defensive line parallel to the mountain passes.

At this stage John contacted me to concede defeat.

attached are the final victory totals, a pic of my defensive line, and a pic of the Battle for Myskina at it's height