A Trip Back in Time; Normandy 2017 By Glenn Goddard

Ed Note: Glenn Goddard is a huge friend of WWPD has provided this excellent article and pictures for you to enjoy!

As a player of FOW since 2003, and posting when I have time, on the forums (Baghdaddy), I thought you might enjoy hearing about my latest adventure.  Some people are lucky and then there is me, the luckiest guy in the world.  No, I am not talking about my die rolls at last year’s Nationals, I am talking about the fact that I was invited to be part of the U.S. Army contingent who jump into Normandy every year to re-create the D-Day jump by the American Airborne troops.  I expect most military veterans and gamers dream of going to the annual celebration of one of the most epic battles in history, the Allied invasion of Normandy to liberate France and defeat the Nazi regime.

Ed Note: I did the jump at Nijmegen and the subsequent walk to Arnhem many years ago and it was a blast!

Our first day involved a commemoration ceremony at Carentan.  We started at the site of the "Cabbage Patch".  This was an epic battle between the 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division and the 2nd Fallschimjager (German airborne).  This battle of Carentan was finally settled by a hand grenade and bayonet charge by the American paratroopers at great cost.  Read about the battle here.

At the ceremony, the French Government awarded several of the American veterans and one French Resistance veteran the Legion of Merit.  It was amazing to see the veterans, most of whom are in their 90s.  You really get perspective when you realize that there won't be many of these veterans left soon.  I should note that we had representatives from all the Allied nations plus German Soldiers.  Some might think it strange to have Germans at a ceremony like this, but what better way to demonstrate that we will never fight each other again than to be unified in commemoration.  After laying wreaths and a flyover by four C-130s, we then marched through the center of town with bands playing.  It was pretty cool and almost every structure in the town remains just as they were in World War Two.

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Team Yankee: The British Army of the Rhine in Iron Maiden

The British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) has its roots in the British forces that occupied Germany at the end of World War Two. Initially made up  of the units from Field Marshall Montgomery’s 21st Army Group, these units found themselves busy in rebuilding post war Germany and preventing the westward expansion of the Soviet army.  When the occupation of Germany changed to the front line of the new Cold War, Great Britain, a founding member of the NATO alliance pledged forces for the defense of Western Europe and the BAOR was stood up as the administrative command for these forces.

The BAOR commander was dual hatted, and not only served as Royal Army’s senior officer in Germany, but also as commander of NORTHAG, or the Northern Army Group which consisted of the 1st British Corps, III US Corps, Dutch and Belgium Corps, 1st German Corps, and depending on the year some French forces as well. The territory that NORTHAG was responsible for was the area north of the Harz Mountains to the Elbe River near Hamburg. This area is well known as the North German Plain and factored in many battle plans drawn up by both NATO and the Warsaw Pact.

Many felt that the flat farmland in this part of Germany would be a great axis of advance for an army.  While this fact is true, it is also the widest part of what was West Germany and it is dotted with rivers and towns that also form natural defensive barriers. No matter the suitability of the terrain, the British and the Warsaw Pact forces would have had a bloody fight if WWIII ever kicked off.
The BAOR was made up of forces that were stationed in Germany permanently such as the 1st, 3rd and 4th Armored Divisions, and the 2nd Infantry Division that was based back in the United Kingdom. In the event of a conflict, the 1st and 4th ADs would meet the Soviet attack at the frontier, with the 3rdAD held in reserve. Once the 2nd ID arrived from the UK it would be used as a reserve force and to provide rear area security.  The other major British force in Germany was the “Berlin Brigade” which was not a part of the BAOR and was based in West Berlin.

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Flames of War - Analysis of Unit Rarity in Flames of War

During the course of World War II, both the technology of warfare and how war was conducted changed greatly. The importance of combined arms - infantry, armor, artillery, and airpower - quickly became obvious to all major powers as the German Blitzkrieg rapidly subjugated much of Europe and spread into North Africa. Rapid technological advances in tanks, aircraft, guns and rockets quickly rendered what had once been cutting edge designs obsolete - necessitating ever more capable weapons.

This technology race, combined with often desperate conditions at the front, resulted in a number of unusual or rare weapons being fielded. In some cases these weapons were expedient conversions of existing vehicles to fill a specific battlefield role. In other cases, prototype or limited production vehicles were committed to the front. Various gaming systems deal with the more unusual weapon systems in different ways, but this article will be primarily focused on how these units are fielded in Flames of War.

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Osprey Books - Finland at War Vol 1 - A Review

By Old Man Morin

Many of us in the wargaming world, particularly those of us who come from fantasy or sci-fi based
games systems, rely heavily on background material, or 'fluff' to inspire our choice of armies and units. When I started playing Bolt Action I discovered a new world, rich with information about units and battles within what some consider to be a "short" war. 'The Armies of...' and the Bolt Action Theatre books provide a glimpse into these conflicts and the forces that fought in them but because of their length and purpose, this information is condensed down to brief overviews. Now there is quite a lot of information online and there are literally thousands of books and biographies about this global conflict and to be honest the sheer volume of text can be daunting. To focus my searches I have been researching things that I find interesting when reading Bolt Action books. Not the most holistic view of the war but it is a starting point (and I have been at it for close to 4 years now). Now Osprey publishing puts out vast numbers of short, soft cover books covering everything from specific units and battles to technology and tactics. These are great resources and I am sure I will discuss them again in an article soon. Today though, I want to talk about something else. Their 'Finland at War' series.

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Treasure Trove - The Combined Arms Research Library (CARL)

If you are REALLY in to World War Two military history, there is a lot of information on the web.  One of the best places for free, primary source information is the Combined Arms Research Library (CARL) hosted by the Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  This institution hosts a huge volume of information that is vital to training up the next generation of US Army staff officers.  It really is amazing that this material is offered free of charge to the general public, and you should take advantage of it.

The Digital Library is where you want to be for your WWII fix.  If you visit often, pay attention to the Recent Additions section to the right of the page - this will show the latest scanned documents that have been entered into the collection.

When searching, you will be searching through the scanned PDFs in the collection.  My experience is that you have to be fairly specific in your search, and rarely get what you want back by putting in one word.  If your specific search isn't found, go WAY general - like "3rd Infantry Division" - and just page through the results.  The search is very fiddly, but it is worth browsing until you find what you want.

I have used CARL's digital library many times when researching articles, scenario games and just for fun.  I will warn you - you can lose hours of time browsing the catalog.  Below, I will list some of my favorite things in CARL.

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Rafah Junction - 20,000 point Fate of a Nation Throw Down

By Tom Burgess

I am truly fortunate to part of a great group of gamers who can come together to play huge scenarios like the Rafah Junction game. In the past we have run a large Kursk battle and a large Hannut  battle as well as several campaigns where we have been able to employ Flames of War as our common rule set.

With the release of the new “Fate of a Nation” Arab-Israeli War book from Battlefront, we thought it might be fun to get out all of our Six Day war forces and run a “Tanksgiving” mega battle. However scheduling precluded us from being able to run a mega game until  a few weeks after Thanksgiving. The good news was this delay allowed our group member Greg to design a scenario for a big multi-player battle that would allow us to use our full current Six Day War collections (and then some) in a mostly historical situation with relatively representative orders of battle.

Greg settled on the Jun 5th 1967 Battle for Rafah Junction where the Israeli 7th and 60th Armored Brigades had to breach the defenses of the United Arab Republic’s 7th Infantry Division near Rafah Junction and then withstand a counter attack by the UAR’s 4th Armored Division and after defeating that, drive on to El Arish.

Greg not only designed the scenario, he also hosted the game in excellent game room using his 6’ x 10’ desert terrain board. To that our group brought 8 players, over 20,000pts total of forces, and over 200 tank models!

The game board looking west from the Israeli deployment areas (inside the blue markers) .

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Behind the Scenes (Part 2 of 2)

Looks like it's time for the second part of my visit to the War Museum in Ottawa. Sorry it took so long to get to the presses! The sheer amount of WW2 pieces in this museum is staggering, among the top draws are a Panther, Hitler's staff car and the 'only' Land Mattress Rocket artillery piece in existence!

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Gaming the Great War: Part 2

Editors Note: In our last installment of Gaming the Great war Mitch gave you a general overview of the war up until 1918 along with some first thoughts on getting your Great War game on. Now, in this second and final installment we'll take a deep dive into the grand Allied offensives of 1918 and what makes that period so ripe for gaming.





By Mitch Reed

Part Three: The 100 Days, the Allies Strike Back.

After recovering from almost six months of German attacks, the Allies, now including the Americans launched a series of attacks in August of 1918 that lasted until the Armistice that became known as the “100 Days” or the “Peace offensives”.  This period saw all three of the Allies launching attacks simultaneously to push the Germans out of France and Belgium. While the French were limited in manpower and the Americans attacked recklessly intent on not heeding advice from the British and French, the British were the ones who adopted new tactics and weapons to break the deadlock.  To say “British” is almost misleading because it was the Canadian and Australian forces assigned to the British command that made the biggest impact in the closing days of the war.

German and Entente Advances in 1918, German in Red, Entente in Blue.

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Gaming the Great War, Part 1

By Mitch Reed

Overview

As a veteran gamer and someone with a big interest in the “Great War” (purists never call it World War One), I have gotten used to the fact that my two passions would seldom be combined.  However, 2014 being the centennial anniversary of the start of the Great War, many games are coming out and are filling this void including Battlefront which has plans to add another era to its line by introducing us to a system that covers the last stages of the war in 1918. 

While many have commented on the choice of 1918 as the choice for the new line, I think it is a much overlooked period in the Great War and has a unique flavor that sets it apart from the rest of the conflict.

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Snakehead Ridge US 36th Infantry Division Vs 1st Fallschirmjager Division

By John Desch and Eric Lauterbach.

Flames of War is great tournament system, but it's even better at historical battles.   Our job was to take the idea about a battalion size fight of the Cassino battle area and make it ready for the gaming table.  In this particular fight the US 36th Infantry Division (Guard troops from Texas) was tasked to hold its hard won gains on Snakehead ridge, northeast of Montecassino against a night counter-attack of the elite German 1st Fallschirmjager Division.  This was an all infantry fest designed for about six players on Eric's mountain terrain.

Our approach in building the forces was to keep it simple and put out full strength platoons as a representation of a larger force.  The Americans, for example, represented a reduced battalion, so we put out a full strength single company with supporting arms.  The Germans had two multi-platoon parachute companies and, as a last minute addition, a Gebirgsjager company.  (The Gebs weren't there in the battle, but it was a golden opportunity to showcase the pretty figs in John's collection. Sean Mackintosh did a masterful job with the basing, as ya'll can see!) Each force was supported with artillery, mortars, recoilless rifles, heavy machine guns, and in the case of the Americans, a reserve platoon of Combat Engineers. We classified both sides as veterans, with the Gebs and the Americans being confident, and the FSJ fearless.  We did not count up the points.

The American deployment

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Historical Lesson: Ranging In

By Robert Kelly

This is the second installment of the Gospel According to Saint Barbara. Saint Barbara is the patron saint of artillerymen and those who work with explosives. My first instalment dealt with bringing guns into action and the use of those red and white aiming posts, which can be found here.

In Flames of War all you have to know about ranging in on a target is that you have to have guns available, an observer with eyes on the target and that you have to roll dice. In real life it was a bit more complicated than that, but not much. Having served 18 years in the Royal Canadian Artillery I’ll explain how the Commonwealth artillery would have ranged in, but the same principles apply to other countries as well.

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