Real and Simulated Wars

DCS UH-1H Huey Beta: Of All Things That Could be Off ...

2013-05-12T22:35:00.003-04:00

... Why it had to be an over-reactive pitch angle?

Still a work in progress (it's a beta after all) but praised by enthusiasts and real life pilots all around discussion boards, this thing has all the signs of a big winner in the twitchy world of helicopter flight simulators. When real helicopter pilots say the DCS Huey flies very close to the real Huey, I listen.

According to the official discussion forums, one of the tweaks the flight model needs (besides a likely over-modelled vortex ring state) is the virtual Huey's over-sensitivity and over-response of the pitch angle.

The current DCS Huey bobs its nose up and down more than in any other axis. It's like it is saying "yes, this is how I kill your crew!".

Move the collective up? There goes the nose up! Move the the collective down? There goes the nose down! A bit of pedal to align your hover? Yes, nose up or down again (depending on which pedal you push)!

People in the know, including real life pilots, say that the nose will tend to go up and down when the collective is moved. What appears to be a tad off is how much that nose will go up or down.

The problem with the pitch angle/nose over-reaction in the DCS Huey? The pitch angle is the means a helicopter pilot has to adjust its forward speed!

So, right now DCS Huey is like a car with a pair of wonky gas and brake pedals, and it will let you down at the most crucial moments of your flight, like trying to land at an angle of approach bigger than 15 degrees or trying to catch a hover over a spot.

The DCS Huey cruises just fine. The transition from forward level flight to a hover or a descent will prove not so much fun.

I taxied this bird out of the airbase and into the streets of the nearby town.

Very proud of my work here. This time I managed to crash into the right airbase!

Give this blog entry some thought before you buy the beta, and maybe wait to see if this will get fixed.

Cheers,

Levels of Tactical Proficiency: The Beginner Wargamer and Terrain, Part 1 - Combat Mission Battle for Normandy

2013-05-05T22:52:00.000-04:00

This is is going to be a series of three blog entries. The main idea is to make an educated guess of what the game play of three war gamers (one beginner, one intermediate and one expert) would look like for the same scenario. The focus will be the use of terrain and depending on the reception I can expand it to other aspects of tactical proficiency. I have chosen just three levels but I am sure there are more in between and that what I will show for both the low and high end of the scale may be the subject of debate.

The current modules of Combat Mission are the mecca of tactical war gaming. Despite their limited capability in terms of forces and map sizes and some other minor peeves gamers may have out there, the series has become a genre in itself. Most importantly, the use of real life tactics is the bread and butter of gameplay.

I am going to use a very tiny stock scenario from the Combat Mission Battles for Normandy. This scenario features a platoon sized US infantry team supported by a mortar tube. Their mission is to secure a ford. Resistance is light and the terrain is close bocage countryside. Spoilers ahead!

This is the mission that I will use for the three levels of proficiency.

Right click and open in a new tab/page for a better view. This is the official briefing of the mission.

A panoramic view of the battlefield. Own forces (green icon) are on the left and the ford is in the center of the screen.

The beginner war gamer is able to recognize some relevant terrain features but it is unable to figure out how these terrain features impact his mission or how enemy actions and use of terrain may prevent him to accomplish it.

The first terrain feature to catch our gamer’s eye is the terrain objective. In this case it is the ford and the area around it. He recognizes that there is high ground beyond the ford (background) and that the ford itself is a chokepoint of sorts that he can't avoid. This somehow simplifies his maneuver options.

The approaches to the ford have some cover and concealment. For example, this trail leads to the river and it is covered in hedgerows and trees that offer a concealed approach. However, an enemy machine gun on the other side of the river (far background) could wreck havoc on the approaching troops. Cover and concealment may or not be recognized by the beginner player, but the subtle points of using them are not grasped.

The beginner wargamer only recognize the impact of terrain during the mission execution. The hedgerows pose a mobility problem to his troops, but he will only recognize the problem when the orders have been issued. In this picture, one hole in the hedgerow line is yet another dangerous chokepoint for the US troops approaching the ford.

The beginner player will certainly recognize obvious terrain features where his troops can move at ease. In this case, this open field on the near side of the river is a place where he can move infantry with no obstacles. However, the player doesn't recognize the high ground on the side of the river (background) as a position where the enemy can deploy and have good fields of fire upon his troops.

If at all, the beginner war gamer rarely goes beyond a mere checklist of terrain features.

His understanding of cover and concealment develops after or during contact with the enemy
His choosing of avenues of approach doesn't include any consideration of his own troops' or the enemy's possible fields of fire or the presence of obstacles
His appreciation of key terrain is limited by the piece of real estate he is assigned to occupy. He can only see his objective as the important terrain feature

In the next installment: how the battle goes for our beginner war gamer.

Cheers,

DCS World Gets an Update and a New (Beta) Chopper

2013-05-03T23:10:00.001-04:00

Both and update for DCS World and the DCS: UH-1H Huey have been released a few days ago.

In view of the usual servers' clogging immediately after release of anything, I procrastinated a couple of days until today and then treated myself to this fine update and new module.

The DCS: UH-1H Huey beta module is the first third party commercial project to grace the virtual skies of Eagle Dynamics. The Belarus-based company Belsimtek has done a fine job that has nothing to envy to the high fidelity previous releases A-10C and Ka-50.

I just spent a couple of hours flying the Huey and I am hooked. It will take some time to perfect the control of this helicopter, so if you get it take it easy, be patient and practice.

A Georgian UH-1H Huey

A Huey from Abkhazia.

Automatic start sequence. I am not smart or brave enough to do it properly ! :)

Before you put your virtual butt in the pilot's chair, the first thing you have to say goodbye to is hands-free control. This bird requires continuous input from the cyclic while in flight. Once you get the muscle memory, you don't even think about it and the Huey flies like a charm.

This is just a hover check before take-off. Hovering also may take some practice, but is no different than in other flight sims like MS Flight Simulator X or X-Plane 10.

Hover check. I have to learn how to get those door gunners to shoot at something.

Cheers,

Command and (Out of) Control: HPS Sims' Ancient Warfare Series

2013-04-30T23:38:00.000-04:00

Something different today, folks. Not only hexes and turns, but also a period of warfare I haven't visited in years.

I heard a lot about the Ancient Warfare series from HPS Simulations, but never actually had enough encouragement to try it. My friend Javier, who refuses to read my blog (will do when you post something about ancient or medieval warfare, he says), has always insisted that I should try it.

So here I am, liking this engine a lot, and disliking Javier's repeated "told you so!" grin.

For starters, I should warn you that neither eye candy nor a self-explanatory user interface are the series forte. The graphics are functional but rather basic and the interface is a rare mix of standard Windows elements with some sporadic more artistic nuggets. These two are never a deal breaker for me, but keep them in mind if you are going to purchase.

My first battle was the "getting started" scenario (an HPS Sims staple in almost all of their games). Quite simple setup: a Roman Republican force with a healthy mix of skirmishers, heavy infantry and both light and heavy cavalry is attacking a hill held by German forces.

The AI (Germans in this case) is running circles around me by just waiting with its infantry up in the hill. There is no way to lure them down the hill ... They know that sending down their skirmishers is enough to keep me busy in the low land!

Anyway, here are some screenshots of the command and control features of the game that impressed me quite a bit.

Right click and open in a new tab for a better view. This is just how the game looks like, with a couple of windows open for shows. From what I read in the manual, the game rules for combat and movement are quite elaborate.

Right click and open in a new tab for a better view. This is the left flank of my battle line. Thirty of my equites (center, hex outlined in red) have decided all by themselves (i.e. I didn't give them an order to do so) to charge the German skirmishers that were on front of them. My fault: if I didn't want such a thing I should have ordered them to hold.

Right click and open in a new tab for a better view. This is my right flank. It was supposed to be guarded by medium cavalry (Italian Allied Cavalry) and here I really wanted them to charge con gusto and in force. Although some of them did, most of my medium cavalry (one of the units has an hex outlined in red) remained in place. The problem? Inspired by stories about sweeping battlefield maneuvers on the battlefield, I decided to move my Triarii through my right flank and break with them towards the hill. What a fool! I ended up disrupting them and the formations they went through ... The dense columns also blocked the visual field of view of my Italian Allied Cavalry (field of view is highlighted in the screenshot above) and thus they don't have a compelling reason to charge anything.

Not only I am liking how difficult is to command troops in the middle of battle (units can go out of command while engaged) but also how I have to keep an eye on shaping the battlefield so all my troops something remotely similar to what I want them to.

Cheers,

Soviet Squad Tactics in WWII: Of Guides and Good Shots (Iron Front Liberation)

2013-04-28T00:11:00.000-04:00

The basic squad tactics do not differ that much among the major powers that fought in WWII. Achieve fire superiority, fix/suppress and assault (preferably in the flanks of the enemy). However, training, weapons and just plain cultural differences sometimes are interesting details to explore.

I am reading "Soviet Infantry Tactics in World War II", by Charles Sharp (available from Battlefront.com) and trying to polish up my tactics in Iron Front. Part 3 of this book is about the rifle squad and a translation of "Combat Instructions for the Infantry of the Red Army" (circa 1942). Off course the two year difference between the document and the game's time frame will be the source of some discrepancies, but I think the book is worth a look for an Iron Front player.

For starters, a thing that surprised me a bit in the Soviet doctrine was the gradual use of fire upon an enemy position. In Sharp's translation, paragraph 71 reads (bold is mine):

If the advance is pinned down by unsuppressed enemy weapons, the squad leader places fire oh them himself or on order from the platoon leader with the light machine gun opening fire at 800 meters, the best shots (among the riflemen) at 600 meters, and at 400 meters - all the soldiers.

I can only imagine that for the men under the command of a doctrine-conscious Soviet squad leader, those 400 meters must have felt like kilometers ...

The second "curiosity", if you allow me the term, is the use of a guide ("provodnik") when contact with the enemy was almost imminent. This guide was a man with very good soldiering skills and sometimes also named an "observer". He would be on point when ordered by the squad leader right up until an assault position was chosen. He was to make and maintain visual contact with the enemy and then return to his role as a squad member during the assault.

The TOE of the Soviet infantry squad in Iron Front is a bit different than the Soviet rifle squad of 1942. The 1942 Soviet rifle squad had only riflemen and a sub-machine gunner. In Iron Front we have AT soldiers who carry sub machine guns/pistols. Nonetheless, I wanted to try the two particulars mentioned above in the game.

The mission is to take a village that is under the control of a German infantry squad. I divided my Soviet infantry squad as follows.

Squad member number 2 is my guide. I set this soldier's skill to 75% within the editor.

Team red: the light machine gunner and a sub machine gunner as an assistant/ammo carrier. Skill level for both of these soldiers was set to 40% with the editor.

Team blue: all my riflemen. Half of these men have been set to 50% skill with the editor, all the others to the default (~10%?).

Team green: two sub machine gunners (I think they are actually AT soldiers) with default (low) skill. My virtual character is in the foreground.

The main screenshot shows a panorama of our area of operations. We are in open terrain in front of the enemy-held village in the far background. I sent my guide (diamond green marker crossing a plodded field, background). A few minutes later, my guide (lone red circle icon in the map insert at the top left) makes contact with the enemy (blue circle icons).

I advance the rest of my squad forward. Surprisingly, the riflemen (team blue) opened fire before the sub machine gunners (team green). The light machine-gunner opened fire some 30 meters behind this position.

The blue team (riflemen, to the right in this picture) sustained a not so great rate of fire, but the shots had silenced many of the enemy guns. The green team (sub machine gunners, right behind me) starting firing some timid shots at this point.

A few dozen yards from the objective (village in the treeline, background), I bring the light machine gun (red team) as much as I can to the front. Team green (sub machine gunners) and me will be making the last bound towards the objective.

Team green and me closing in towards the objective. We found just three German infantry men hiding in the crops.

All the squad was then ordered forward into the objective for re-grouping and consolidation. No casualties! Any day you get your men unscathed from the ferocious rate of fire of the German MG42 is a good day.

I am not claiming a perfect replica of the real drill. But this is the first time I have my best men at front (guide during pre-contact) and at the rear (riflemen during the assault) of my squad formation.

Cheers,

DCS World, Combined Arms - (Almost) New Stuff I Really Like in the Editor

2013-04-24T23:50:00.002-04:00

The wait for the new version V1.2.4 and the DCS UH-1H Huey is taking longer than most fans have thought. Oh, well. Nonetheless these are two things in the editor that were added more or less recently and that I love in the current version.

Number one: AI- controlled helicopters can now land in places other than airbases ramps and runways. This is great to simulate helo insertions.

Waypoint #2 in the flight plan (highlighted white) of the CH-47 shown above has an advanced action: land! You can even set up for how long the helo is going to stay on the ground.

Number two: in the Combined Arms module, you can create and adjust waypoints for AI-controlled units while playing an scenario. In this case, while I'm flying a Ka-50 I send this Ka-27 to find out targets for my flight. This almost simulates the real-world tactics a Ka-50 unit would use (a command/scout flight of Ka-27s acting as a "hunter", and the flight of Ka-50s acting as a "killer"). Unfortunately, the Ka-27 in DCS World doesn't have any type of specialized sensors for that mission ...

The Combined Arms module interface. The Ka-27 is ordered forward at low altitude ...

Cheers,

Hasty Defense at the Fulda Gap- Steel Beasts ProPE AAR - Part 5 and Final: Barely Winning at Attrition, Badly Losing at Maneuver

2013-04-23T23:41:00.001-04:00

This is the final part of the AAR I re-took on Saturday. In a textbook case of "overstaying at a battle position", the tank platoons are flanked by remnants of the Soviet armored thrust. Time to move out!

Tanks of the 2nd. Platoon (background) successfully engage some T-72s that made it through the central avenue of approach of our sector.

The 1st Platoon gets on the move too, but towards the rear. Under some pressure, they engage at very close range some tenacious Soviet BMP-2s that keep moving forward.

The 2nd Platoon, which by now is down to just two fully operational tanks is ordered to move northwest with the purpose of eliminating any enemy remnants moving through the center of our sector. A couple of T-72s are engaged and destroyed.

The 1st Platoon reached its new battle position at full speed and oriented its guns on the most prominent avenue of approach (a paved road that also crosses the southern part of our sector from east to west). A pair of T-72s engaged the 1st Platoon's battle position from the flanks (see white puff of smoke in the background), but were destroyed shortly thereafter.

An enemy's perspective view of the 1st Platoon's new battle position (hill in the background, tanks are deployed at both sides of the paved road), showing a T-72 destroyed by an armor piercing round. The T-72 has its gun oriented to the back of the hull, probably trying to fire a coup de grâce round to an immobilized M1A1 that remained at the previous battle position.

The 2nd Platoon, having cleared the center of our sector, is ordered to dash towards the rear in an effort to chase the BMP-2 that has been previously spotted making it through to our rear. During this mad dash, my forces suffered the most humiliating loss I ever witnessed in this simulation: an M1A1 tank lost to an BRDM-2 equipped with ATGMs.

The infiltrator BMP-2 turned out to be a two vehicle team. In this picture, the two HMMWVs that located (but off course couldn't engage) the infiltrators.

The scenario ends whenever an enemy vehicle makes it to our rear. In this image, the two BMP-2s that costed us the battle a few seconds before the scenario's end.

Seventeen minutes short of our objective time (prevent any enemy vehicle/team making it to our rear for one hour), the scenario ends.

My losses:

Total losses - tanks:	45%	(5 out of 11)
Total losses - PCs:	40%	(6 out of 15)
Total losses - troops:	21%	(10 out of 46)
Total losses - Others:	0%	(0 out of 4)

The enemy's losses (sorry for the horrible formatting of the table, it is just taken from the sim's combat report):

Unit			Start	End

tanks

helicopters

trucks

troops

111

Cheers,

Hasty Defense at the Fulda Gap- Steel Beasts ProPE AAR - Part 4: Main Battle Tanks Enter the Fray

2013-04-20T18:58:00.001-04:00

This is a continuation of my overdue AAR on this fantastic scenario. The Cavalry troopers did their job, but paid a high price in casualties. A flight of enemy attack helicopters forced the M3A2s to move too much around their fall back positions ... Never a good thing.

The battle was still young and the confidence on the M1A1s Abrams was high. The tankers of First and Second platoons sat tight in their battle positions were with their sights on EA Pirc.

After the remainder Cavlary M3A2s at last lost contact with the enemy, the pause in the shooting was very short. But the interlude was not wasted and it was decided to reinforce the left (north) flank of our sector with one M3A2 vehicle from the center.

During its march towards the left (north) flank, the crew of this M3A2 pays a high price for its poor route planning. The final trajectory and point of impact of a perfect flank shot by a BMP-2 with a Spandrel ATGM is shown as a green rod.

At this point of the battle, it was more or less clear that the enemy's main effort was to come through our right (south) flank. So any attempt to reinforce the left flank was abandoned.

The first shot of a long firefight. An M1A1 opens up at a range of 2,000+ meters and scores the first kill of the First and Second platoons.

This is the final trajectory and point of impact of the round fired by the unit depicted in the previous screenshot.

The enemy tanks, still short of EA Pirc suffer losses, but they still press on (background) favored by their numerical superiority.

The engagement ranges shrink, and with that, some enemy rounds star to find their way to the turrets and hulls of our tanks.

Now in EA Pirc proper, entire enemy tank platoons get destroyed as soon as they crest a hill. Note the other enemy tanks in the background, moving forward.

While we were busy with all the carnage of steel in our right flank, this BMP-2 managed to infiltrate right at the center of our sector.

The single BMP-2 had some company with him (red icon). They crossed our phase line un-molested and laboriously moved west with us unable to throw anything at them.

The pressure at our right flank never wanes. The T-72s keep coming.

The tactical situation 30 minutes into the scenario. Right click and open in a different tab for a better view. In the south, the M1A1 tank platoons have destroyed no less than 9 enemy tanks (brown diamonds are enemy tanks destroyed). In the center, the pressure is quite small but nonetheless at least two BMP-2s had made it to our rear. In the north, the enemy keeps contact with reconnaissance vehicles.

Our first tank loss came at the hands of an enemy tank firing an AT-11 ATGM. This M1A1 from the Second Platoon has received a direct hull hit (green rod) as it was attempting to stay in a hull-down position.

Right click and open in a different tab for a better view. The company commander (blue round icon labeled "Co A") tank was in the center of our sector to provide early warning about any type of movement along the central road that crosses our sector from the east to the west. This tank got decisively engaged as soon as it made contact with the enemy (in this case an enemy tank platoon outflanking the First and Second Platoons positions.

The Company Commander's tank at work. That black smoke billow is from the impact of an enemy ATGM.

Now pressed from the front and left (note missile impact), the Company Commander's perspectives of survival did not improve despite his desperate effort to get out of the way.

The demise of the Company Commander's tank. Again, an enemy ATGM and a poor hull-down position are to blame.

With the center road now some enemy tanks move forward. This is the view from the Second Platoon's position (tank hull in the foreground is an M1A1). The First and Second Platoon are at risk of being outflanked.

To be continued ...

ArmA 3 Alpha - The Rescue of Agent Vidales - Mission Available

2013-04-11T15:46:00.000-04:00

Better done than perfect, they say. You can grab the mission from this link.

The mission doesn't include helicopter transport as shown in this picture. I am showing it here because it just looks great.

The mission should be playable both multiplayer and single-player. You and your team start in two assault boats off the coast of Agia Marina.

If you play this in singleplayer, be mindful of getting ashore. The AI bots get easily stuck in rocky areas, so try to choose an open beach.

In single player, the command to get your guys out of the assault boats is "disembark".

Your tasks are to find Vidales, extract him to the pick up area and to destroy his truck. There are markers for finding Vidales and for his truck.

Vidales is a civilian but on the blue side. This means that he will be shot by the OPFOR if he gets spotted. Vidales should not move until the team leader enters his house and both can see each other. At this point Vidales will join the player's squad.

Depending on the volume of fire in the area, there is a chance that Vidales will go prone and clip himself under the floor of his house. In those cases, fire a couple of rounds in front of him to gain his attention.

Get ready for some oddities of the Alpha, like OPFOR bots dancing back and forth at bridges.

Cheers,

ArmA 3 - The Rescue of Agent Vidales

2013-04-08T00:18:00.000-04:00

This is my first serious attempt to mission editing on the ArmA series. What I mean serious is having a briefing, tasks and an end triggered by accomplishing one of those tasks. Nothing cinematic in the introduction and the ending (no cutscenes), but it was quite a journey and I enjoyed it.

I had to give up on the divers as the special forces conducting this raid. Their organic weapons are apparently from Airsoft and I couldn't figure out how to change their weaponry (always missing something).

Right click and open in a new tab/window for a better view. The tactical situation, map view.

Right click and open in a new tab/window for a better view. Briefing.

Right click and open in a new tab/window for a better view. The mission.

Right click and open in a new tab/window for a better view. Support.

Right click and open in a new tab/window for a better view. Tasks list.

Own forces are a full 10-men squad. I know I am crazy trying to manage so many AI bots in such a perilous situation ... But this time I went crazier: when the player enters Vidales' hideout, the latter joins the former's squad. And so the fun of commanding an 11 men squad starts! Maybe I should give Vidales a gun?

Congrats! You have been given a toxic tactical asset ... Vidales (the guy with the civilian clothes) becomes #11 when you find him.

Who the hell has the demo charges? I've almost blew half the squad trying to destroy the truck with a grenade.

I played this mission plenty of times and my success rate has been less than 25%.

Cheers,

ArmA 3 Alpha Lite - Who Wants a Free Key?

2013-03-27T22:48:00.006-04:00

There are a free keys available from a reader of the blog and myself. All you need to do is email us and provide your e-mail or Steam user name. If you are not a Steam member yet, you can create a free account here.

~~Limited availability!~~

~~freekeys at aa-vcp dot com~~
~~realandsimulatedwars at gmail dot com~~

Update: we ran out of keys. Thanks James and Johan for helping out with theirs.

What is ArmA 3 Alpha Lite?
From Bohemia Interactive's website:
Arma 3 Alpha Lite is similar to the regular Arma 3 Alpha in terms of content. However, modding and multiplayer are not supported. People can access Arma 3 Alpha Lite for free, but will require an ‘invite’ to do so. These invites can be obtained via people who have purchased the regular Arma 3 Alpha. They will also be randomly dispersed via our social channels and selected media outlets.

Cheers,

ArmA 3 - It's Not Always Sunny in Stratis

2013-03-22T08:19:00.001-04:00

Can't un-glue myself from ArmA 3. Come on! There is not too much virtual hardware or real estate to play around.

Last night I got a chance to start seriously testing a mission I assembled in the editor. It's a tactical surface water infiltration mission: a group of six NATO divers must secure intelligence assets caught in the middle of the blitz the Iranians discharged on the island of Stratis.

The thing that caught me during this first test was the immersion factor. I'm not a "bang-bang-boom-ooohhh" type of gamer. Indeed not a shot was fired before I called it a day. Neither I need a compelling narrative to enjoy a good scenario. But I was sitting there in the assault boat, with a storm throwing its last fists, and I cringed at the mission and all that has to be accomplished.

Iranian infantry patrolling Stratis.

A good tactical diver doesn't hate bad weather. It welcomes it as the best of friends.

Back to reality now, I noticed that as soon as I mount those divers into the boats, they loose their backpacks. More editor fun before the shootout, I guess.

Cheers,

Hasty Defense at the Fulda Gap- Steel Beasts ProPE AAR - Part 3: The Cavalry Fight

2013-03-17T19:04:00.001-04:00

What a battle! The enemy opens fast and unforgiving. The thin and undermanned line of US troopers falls back. Half pushed. Half pulled. But never completely cut.

In this part of the AAR, my cavalry gets a glimpse at the enemy and retreats with expediency.

It was part of the plan for the M3A2s to get a glimpse of the enemy and then fall back to successive battle positions. The Soviets threw a ball curve that killed many men and crushed too many hulls.

Each of these teams is composed of 2 M3A2 cavalry vehicles. North and south, the width of the sector was to be watched.

The view from the north-est battle position. A small village in the background, sounds can be heard but still no contact.

First contact, a Soviet BRDM-2 in the north flank. It was engaged immediately.

It took several rounds from the M3A2 cannon to destroy this Soviet vehicle.

The first Soviet T-72s emerge from the distance. The enemy's main effort appears to be in the center or in the south.

Too eager to report as much as they can, the troopers in the center of our sector find themselves almost surrounded by the Soviet's rapid advance. In this picture, an M3A2 vehicle retreats leaving his troopers behind (house in the background).

The troopers left behind immobilize three T-72s but in the end are killed by the overwhelming enemy firepower.

To the north of the sector, the fall back was abruptly cut off by Soviet Mi-24 attack helicopters who attacked from our left flank. In this picture, our first vehicle loss.

The attack helicopters gave no quarters to our left flank.

A very intense fight developed when the other remaining M3A2 vehicle could catch a hill as cover. In this picture, one of the Soviet attack helicopters is shot down. Note the Soviet artillery barrage (black smoke) in the background. That indirect fire is falling onto the M3A2s previous battle position.

Not even the infantry teams (white smoke) left behind as observers were spared the Soviet helicopter's ferocious guns. Note the dirt of the retreating M3A2 in the background.

The last of our two-vehicle team in the north flank of our sector falls to a Soviet attack helicopter.

Leaving our left flank completely open, the Soviet attack helicopters moved south where they met the crew of this M3A2 who proceeded to shot down one of them. Note the how the hill is protecting the right flank of the M3A2 from the last remaining Soviet attack helicopter. That helicopter managed to stay in the battle for a couple of minutes more, when it was shot down by an M1 tank ... Our main effort was arriving to the battle positions!

Forced to fight and retreat but with their eyes well open, our troopers see no less than 4 platoons of T-72Bs advancing straight into our south flank.

The battle is about to begin ...

Cheers,

Opa! Arma 3 Alpha Lands in the Mediterranean

2013-03-14T23:41:00.001-04:00

According to my Steam guilt-o-meter (the thingy that details how many hours I've spent not completing my chores, including blog updates), out of the last seven days I dedicated an entire one playing the new ArmA 3 Alpha.

I approached this thing with some considerable reluctance. My opinion of alphas was very low and I pretty much considered them as useful as bug-ridden demos. This time though, even yia-yia approves. There are bugs off course and the contents are limited. But Bohemia Interactive have crafted a cool mix that worked for me beyond just simple showcasing.

The setting for the upcoming ArmA III is in three Greek islands of the Aegean Sea during a massive Iranian invasion around the mid-2030s.

I have to admit I'm not very fond of the futuristic setting and some of the gear presented in the alpha, but certainly can see the forest behind the trees ... And I like what I'm seeing.

The helmet of the Iranian infantry men make them look like termites. Oh, well ...

A close up of the British infantry featured in the Alpha.

Iranian infantry. I want those gloves for my next fist-fight!

Besides a noticeable more fluid movement of my pixel-self, there are options to fine tune my stance to in-between the classical standing, crouching or prone. In this picture, a marksman shoots at a distant hill from a low window at a building.

For the time being, the only artillery available are mortars.

Modules extravaganza. The new available modules will reduce the programming skills threshold needed to edit solid and engaging missions. Case shown here, the artillery and helicopter support modules. The player (icon with red outline) is synchronized with a "support requester" module (blue circular icon to the east). In turn the support requester module is synchronized with a "support provider" modules to the north and south. Each support provider is synchronized with its corresponding asset(s): a helicopter transport to the north and two mortars to the south.

The options of the support requester module synchronized with the player. In this case, just 5 indirect fire missions.

This is me playing the mission discussed above. Note how I have helicopter transport and mortars as support.

On time, on target, every time. Scary stuff.

A 10 men squad is a very welcome change from ArmA 2's eight ...

Another interesting module is the "observation post". Just add the module in the editor and a team of infantry will man the position. I was almost floored to find out that this automatically placed infantry occupies military buildings ... And on a second floor!

But wait, there is more: the observation post module placed one infantry inside a military building ... It will be fun to storm and clear these AI controlled OPs.

The setting of the game feels a bit like pushing it too close for the Call of Duty/Tom Clancy crowd. But the ability to produce user content remains and is now more accessible. The future seems bright. Let's shoot at it!

Cheers,

Insurgency in the North Caucasian Federal District - War Stories From the Front Lines: # 11 Georgian Army Patrol Secures an UAV Crash Wreckage Site (Intro)

2013-03-04T00:01:00.000-05:00

An UAV has been shot down in Georgian sovereign skies and the Georgian Army scrambles to secure the pieces from infiltrating Abkhazian militias. First to make contact with the Abkhazians, a Georgian Army squad with a lot of determination.

This #11 episode will be from ArmA 2 gameplay, modded with the Georgian Armed Forces package.

Tactical SITREP and mission. The Georgian Army squad (blue icon) has to secure the crash site. A mix of Abkhazian militia and regulars (platoon size) are known to have crossed the border and likely to be around the crash site.

Lt. Jaba Chkhetidze, in charge of a border patrol detachment, faces a daunting task. Pictured here with the handful of HMMWVs that he used as transport.

The smoke billow (far background) made it very easy to locate the objective.

[Short post again, fellows! Enthusiasm is always inversely proportional to free time]

Cheers,

Hasty Defense at the Fulda Gap- Steel Beasts ProPE AAR - Part 2: Tactical Plan

2013-03-03T01:01:00.000-05:00

This a continuation of a previous blog entry. Today, the tactical plan.

The eyes of the company (+) -sized combat team I am commanding: and M3A2 (a cavalry infantry-fighting vehicle) at the very hot edge of our sector.

First, a correction. In my previous entry I indicated that the enemy force is a tank-heavy Soviet regiment. That was wrong: it's actually a Soviet tank battalion reinforced by a mechanized infantry company. Still outnumbered, still scary if you ask me ...

Please right-click and open in a new window or tab if you want to read this. OPORD is in, listen up!

The mission is a defense in sector against a battalion of Soviet T-72Bs reinforced by a mechanized infantry (BMP-2) company. My forces are two platoons of M1A1 (HA) tanks, one platoon of mechanized infantry (M2A2) and a small supply and combat supply train. I have indirect fire support from three batteries of M109 self-propelled howitzers. Reconnaissance units (4, 2 vehicle teams/sections of M3A2s) are on the ready at the front of our sector.

Please right-click and open in a new window or tab if you want to read this. These are designer's notes.

As you can read in the designer's notes, there is a slight twist in this scenario: if any enemy unit of any size crosses a line in the rear of my sector, the scenario ends automatically in a defeat. Great! Not only I have to stop the tide but also I have to prevent ~~smuggling~~ infiltration!

Below is a screenshot of my sector as I received it.

An 8 km wide, 10 deep sector of beautiful German country side. Note the phase-lines: I will be referencing to them on occasion.

Tactical planning is not a simple task and it requires a lot of thought. The convoluted route from which I arrived to my tactical plan is beyond the scope of this blog entry. But still, here are some brief notes.

I want to concentrate my tank force ...
... on small-sized enemy teams ...
... taking advantage of the slight edge the M1A1 has over the T72-B in terms of range and target acquisition

Remember the article I mentioned in the previous entry? I don't feel that the mission, the size and terrain of the sector or the the enemy force lend themselves to an ambush approach. The enemy may choke up here and there, but he will be still racing towards our rear with other elements elsewhere. So, a series of engagements with the so-called "aimed fire" will be the thing.

Let's take a look at the terrain. I've divided the width of my sector in four chunks, and I will show you images of each starting from north to south.

At the north edge of my sector there is narrow and relatively deep valley. The enemy may use this approach but he will be liable of bunching up on a perfect kill zone. This view looking east, towards the enemy's approach.

Moving a couple of kilometers south from the previous valley, the terrain is a bit broken with many patches of woods. This view looking east, towards the enemy's approach.

This is the center of our sector just behind phase line Knight. I can't imagine better tank terrain than this glorious plain. This view looking east, towards the enemy's approach.

And finally, an image of the south flank of our sector, looking east towards phase line Knight. Here the terrain is a bit more broken but not as much as in our north flank. There is plenty of potential battle positions with good and long fields of fire. Most importantly, there are small hills that provide excellent cover.

Regarding the enemy's probable course of action, I am guessing the enemy will prefer the center and south approaches, as they offer better terrain and fields of fire for their tanks. But I will have to provide the means to maintain the north flank watched upon and eventually just in case.

As for my forces, there is simply no way to be everywhere if I want to concentrate forces. So I chose to concentrate my two tank platoons in a series of battle stations at my south flank, nearby phase line Knight. Depending on the findings of my scouts across the width of the sector, on order they will engage the enemy sequentially from south to north. That's my company's main effort. The supporting effort will be my 3rd platoon (mechanized infantry) deployed in a defensive position at my center with fields of fire over that superb tank terrain that I showed above. They are tasked with delaying or at least maintain contact with an enemy thrust through the center of my sector.

You may wonder why I didn't chose to concentrate my forces at the center plain that looks so appealing. I declined from such a thing because I am wary of the enemy having so much real state to deploy an outrageous amount of tanks. Keep in mind I have only 2 platoons of tanks and that the enemy has one battalion of them. Attrition can catch up with you really fast after a couple of untimely tank losses ... That's what I read in that article.

The tactical plan. Right click and open on a new tab for a better view. Starting from south to north: (i) 1st and 2nd Plt. (M1A1 tanks) occupy a series of battle positions in front of engagement area Pirc, attacking by fire enemy forces moving west. Be ready to move on order to battle positions south of engagement areas Checkmate and Reti. (ii) 3rd Plt. (M2A2 infantry fighting vechicles), delay and/or maintain contact with enemy forces moving into engagement area Checkmate. Be ready to move on order to battle positions south of engagement area Reti or observation posts north of your current position.

That's pretty much it and I hope it works.

I don't want to give you the impression that I left the scouts at the front at the mercy of the enemy. I spent as much time planning for their mission as I did with the main effort. The least thing I want is to go blind in the north flank of my sector.

A scout M3A2 vehicle at the center of my sector. He looks a bit too exposed at this stage (deployment) but I gave this team an order to occupy a battle position that will eventually put all the vehicles in a hull-down position. Note the excellent field of view this battle position has.

The view from an scout battle position at the north of the sector. This time a bit more hull down-ish. Still, a great field of view.

Steel Beasts ProPE allows the player to plot battle positions and routes during the planning phase. This is very useful because things get hairy pretty fast in armored warfare. Having your routes selected beforehand is so convenient. In this screenshot, I have instructed this scout team to get the hell out of his battle position (route indicated in a pink line) 1 minute after he observes enemy forces. This is to avoid the scout team to stick around the position if he spots enemy tanks or enemy scouts. The former will just crush them, the latter will put artillery fire on them a couple minutes after they see them.

Cheers,

Insurgency in the North Caucasian Federal District - War Stories From the Front Lines: # 10 To Catch a Predator (Part Two)

2013-03-01T20:11:00.001-05:00

This is a continuation of a previous entry.

I entered the engagement area (the vicinity of the Kodori Gorge) with the hope of acquiring the drone with the radar. However, I was not able to get even the most nimble radar return with my intensive scanning of the are. After some tense minutes, the AWACS vectored me towards the target. The drone has either gained some altitude or it was suddenly unmasked from the cover of the mountains.

The vector provided was useful and I locked on the drone one first time. Unfortunately my high airspeed of approach threw me too close to even fire one radar-guided missile. In the picture above, I am zooming out of the area of operations, just to lock and fire from a higher distance.

During the time I spent zooming out, the AWACS lost track of my target and I was left to myself to acquire it again. I took a bit of a leap of faith to fly in the general direction where the drone was last reported. But the most faint radar return I ever seen gained strength until I could lock onto it. I found the drone flying back towards Georgia, but it turned around in all defiance ...

It took just one radar-guided missile to bring the drone down (see smoke in the center of the picture). I nervously checked my position and realized that I have crossed the border into Georgia. My RWR didn't sound even once: the Georgians likely have their air defenses down to not make us suspicious of their US-assisted surveillance.

The cockpit during my return to base. Some 60 km ahead ...

The involvement of the US in this incident were not good news. For years the US has backed Georgia politically, but always fell short of providing any meaningful military aid. An insurgency in the North Caucasian District and the beans spill outside the Russian border ... This can't be good.

On final approach, testing the autopilot system which can guide your glideslope to nearly a couple of hundred meters before the runway. I've had issues getting my aircraft to a correct angle of attack/airspeed before, but this time everything worked like a charm.

I always get a kick of opening the braking chute, even when I don't need it. I've landed on the right side of the runway, force of habit of being wingman for so many years.

Cheers,

Insurgency in the North Caucasian Federal District - War Stories From the Front Lines: # 10 To Catch a Predator (Part One)

2013-03-01T00:25:00.000-05:00

This entry is the second of two debriefs from two Russian officers involved in the same action at the Kodori Gorge, Abkhazia. [ Part 1 only today, folks. I'm dead tired! :) ]

Story based in single-player gameplay from a custom-made mission edited in DCS World, Flaming Cliffs 3.

Mayór Mikhail Osipov, 6972nd Aviation Base (temporarily operating from Mineralnye Vody, 4th Air and Air Defence Forces Command).

Our orders to scramble came exactly at 0533, sending both my wingman and me down the corridors of a hangar fully packed with replacement parts and repair equipment. The morning shift of techs and mechanics was in full swing already, tending to an increasing population of aircraft arriving to the Mineralnye Vody base.

My flight of two MIG-29Ss was actually scheduled for a familiarization flight along the Russian-Georgian border. The take off for this flight was about one hour ahead and we had our heads already in the fighters, fully briefed. The adrenaline rush of getting airborne sooner than anticipated could not come at a better time, but to be sincere we would have preferred to be ready in our battle stations.

Our rushed arrival to the jets was received by the spectacle of the airmen crews working on the last touches and checkups as two tractors pulled the jets out of the hangar. That was definitively not in the regulations. I was handed a paper containing coordinates and cleared to climb into the cockpit. My wingman, not so lucky. There was a crewman with half his body into the second Mig's cockpit, bringing yet one more power or data line into it. It turns out that the second Mig's TACAN system was not working properly. The inertial navigation system of the MIG-29 is so unreliable that it was now standard procedure to declare the aircraft not mission ready if there is the most minimal TACAN system failure. Given the proper approvals, rules have been bent in the past but under no circumstances I was going to let my young wingman to go fly around the Caucasus mountains with such a handicap. He was not happy.

During the engine startup, I got briefed by radio of my mission: to intercept and shoot down an UAV (likely a US Predator drone) in the area of the "three corners" (borders between Abkhazia, Georgia and Russia). I was to make contact with an Beriev A-50 (AWACS) for vectors, with full clearance to engage after de-conflicting with a flight of two SU-25s operating in the area, with a time on station left of less than 10 minutes.

Take off time from Mineralnye Vody: 0540. Armed with radar-guided missiles, the engines of my aircraft roared one more time.

What a fine morning to fly! Mineralnye Vody is in the background, just below the sun.

En route towards the intercept. That trail is our AWACS changing stations.

The flat terrain of the North Caucasian District quickly gave way to the Caucasus mountains as I flew south. Given the relatively short distances involved in this mission, I could afford a liberal use of fuel. My radar was good enough to acquire the two Su-25s flying among those massive peaks and valleys. The radar returns are those dotted bars almost in the center of the HUD. The box nearby is the radar cursor.

The radar/navigation display, showing the engagement area (waypoint 2) and steerpoint 3. Steerpoint 3 marks the border between Abkhazia and Georgia and I was ordered not to cross into the latter. Here I am avoiding to fly directly into the engagement area (waypoint 2) in order to let the Su-25s clear for their return to base.

Cheers,

Unity of Command - The Road to Berlin

2013-02-28T02:11:00.002-05:00

... is longer than I thought! :)

It's very hard to be on the offensive with the Soviets ... The lack of offensive punch is dreadful at this point of the war. In this scenario, I even have logistics problems!

This video is my latest play of the scenario "The Advance to Kiev". I failed to take the fourth objective at the north and got defeated. I took Kiev, though, which is a bit ironic.

The YouTube version can be seen in a larger format.
A dedicated blog entry about the plan and what went wrong will follow.

Cheers,

Armchair General's Col. Paulding Combat Mission Videos - A+ Material You Need to Watch

2013-02-24T17:13:00.000-05:00

It's not only the great tactical advice but also the impeccable editing what makes Col. Paulding's videos the unofficial tactical manual for Combat Mission.

Episode VI (video above) is the final one and has been out for a while but I didn't want to pass an opportunity to praise the brilliant work of Col. Paulding.

In this episode:

Contact! (always establish contact with the enemy using your smallest formation/unit)
Spread out! (in open terrain, you will be held accountable for bunching up)
Fire superiority and bases of fire (this has been covered in previous videos, but this time he is commanding the Italians and the issue is very important)
Different Armies, different tactics! (not only different organization but also different weaponry requires slight adjustments on the way the same tactical songs are played)
"Matchups" (understanding what own and enemy weapons systems can and can't do: match them up to your advantage)
Shoot them in the flank! (enfilade fire during a correct matchup works marvels)
It's not only what you see, but what it means (situational awareness: what can you imply from the enemy fire)
Put the ground under your feet (use the camera at a very low level to better appreciate the terrain)
... and more

The user contributions and official forum discussions at Battlefront have changed a lot since the last 5 years or so. Thanks Col. Paulding for reminding everybody that this great series is not all about more and better looking floating icons, or more camouflage patterns for the tanks!

Cheers,

Hasty Defense at the Fulda Gap- Steel Beasts ProPE AAR - Part 1: Pre-Battle Thoughts

2013-02-24T00:43:00.000-05:00

The simulated World War III battlefield with a phalanx of Soviet tanks crushing NATO forces makes up one of those tactical nightmares that I never wake up from in great shape.

Lately I had a lot of time to read and to catch up on many books and articles I had left un-read for a long while.

One of them is an article entitled "Efficient Concentration of Forces, or How to Fight Outnumbered and Win" by David Bitters (this article was published as part of the "Warfare Modeling" compilation, MORS, VA USA). Although the topic of the article applies to many wars and warfare eras, the WWIII overtones were remarkable. During the Cold War, the Soviets developed a series of formulas to calculate the amount of tanks, infantry and artillery tubes needed to breakthrough the NATO defenses. I don't know too much about military operations research from the NATO part, but it is unlikely that the West left military analysts un-busy at that crucial time. The article I am referring to is from 1995, and I wonder if the research and conclusions could be ten years younger than the publication date.

The article is entirely theoretical but wholesome enough to sit down and reflect from the virtual commander's hatch. As I said before, scholars foretell battles that can’t be won and soldiers win battles that can’t be foretold. So, I am not going to throw differential calculus into Steel Beasts but rather be aware of the conclusions that Bitters arrived to with his equation-intensive model of war.

The article goes through two types of scenarios. One is the so-called "aimed fire" scenario, where the attackers and defenders are assigned a sector of responsibility to detect and fire upon the attackers. The other is the "ambush" scenario, where the attackers suffer casualties according to the "aimed fire" equations and the defenders (ambushing force) suffer casualties to a set of equations that take into account aiming and firing inefficiencies. Both scenarios are solved for a series of battles where the attackers are partitioned into equally sized elements (defenders engage or ambush a series of chunks of the attacker force, one at a time). It turns out that the optimal amount of enemy attackers "chunks" to engage at a time can be optimized in theory, which is fascinating but I will leave it as an academic topic for the time being. Divide and conquer, no surprises there.

But ...

One of the conclusions that can be extracted from the article is how abrupt is the likelihood of defeat when the defending forces shrink in size. Bitters uses differential equations and the size of forces is a continuous, but translated into real life it means something like: "if at the beginning of the battle you have 13 tanks you win, if you have 12 tanks you are gone". The effect is astonishingly dramatic when the defender side choose an "aimed fire" type of tactic. It looks like the ages-old principle of concentration of forces has an evil twist in modern war, and failing to get a couple of tanks to the battle position means risking the pain of defeat.

The other striking conclusion is that the choosing of an "aimed fire" or "ambush" tactic is neither trivial nor inconsequential. In the case of the scenario I am about to play, the superior range and target acquisition systems of the NATO forces made me think that the choice of an "aimed fire" tactic would be superior at all times. It turns out that if my defending forces are below certain threshold, I am better off with an "ambush" tactical approach (figure 1, page 267 in the before-mentioned book). This threshold is easy to calculate in the equation-driven, theoretical battlefield but almost impossible to calculate in the simulated (or real) battlefield.

So, in the end I am left with my gut-feeling-based tactical decision-making. I read a mathematically consistent, in-your-face summary of the perils of my own decisions and I knew that being outnumbered was though. But THAT though? Thanks Mr. Bitters for the extra pressure!

Without further fuss, this is the Steel Beasts ProPE scenario I am about to play as the defending (and outnumbered) blue (NATO) forces.

Right click and open in a new tab for a better view. In this classic scenario by legendary grog (and ex-US Army) "Volcano Man", I am commanding US mechanized Co (blue icons) against a tank-heavy Soviet regiment. The objective is to avoid any Soviet unit crossing the red line in the west extreme of the map.

A detailed explanation of the tactical plan will follow in a separate blog entry. For the time being, and in the spirit of the above discussion, I will fight this battle with a concentrated force composed of the 1st and 2nd Plt. (4 M1 Abrams tanks each) leaning on the south flank where the best tank terrain is apparent.

I already screened and chose a series of battle positions (blue brackets) and as you may have guessed I am going for an aimed fire approach. I just can't envision an opportunity to conduct a series of ambushes in a sector that is relatively shallow.

Cheers,

German Squad Tactics in WWII: Live and Die by the Light Machine Gun (Iron Front Liberation D-Day)

2013-02-03T02:32:00.003-05:00

I've got flanked pretty bad today, and I shouldn't have ...

Another custom-made, single player scenario in Iron Front Liberation D-Day. This time is way more dull and just for practice. I am commanding a German infantry squad against a platoon of US infantry that is advancing over open terrain.

Panoramic view of our starting position. The US infantry (platoon-sized infantry unit) is advancing from the far background (* symbol, way behind that tree line) towards our rear. Their path of advance passes through the left of those ruins in our front.

The cover of the ruins and its surroundings was too enticing to let go, so I did set my defensive position around it. I chose a couple of firing positions for the light machine gun. The one pictured here is on the left flank of our defensive position.

The main firing position for the light machine gun, though, was in the second story of the ruins. Here I placed my gunner in a prone position with a narrow field of fire centered around the road the US troops are likely to cross.

With the exception of a couple of riflemen that I left on the ruins to cover the front of the position, the rest of my rifle infantry was placed on the left flank. These men were more for flank protection than anything.

Contact! I kept myself close to the light machine gunner. He mowed down some enemy troops but most of them just sprinted across the road and through the narrow light machine gun's field of fire.

The fire fight raged at a crazy pace. The cracking of rifles, Browning automatic rifles and the sporadic Tommy gun shifted to the left of our position. As for the light machine gunner, he ran out of targets soon enough ... Unfortunately, mostly to the lightning movement of the US infantry getting out of his iron sights.

A quick check at the mini-map revealed no less than 18 US infantry on our left flank.

It was not until I moved the light machine gunner to our left flank that the threat was eliminated. In this screen shot, I am located at the rear of our position, looking at the front of it.

After a short push towards the left flank, we killed the majority of the enemy forces. Not bad, but getting flanked is just too close to my adrenaline tolerance limit.

The issue of how to use a modern infantry squad effectively is like a virus I can't take out of my head. The transition of monolithic company/battalion formations in close, almost Napoleonic, formation during the Franco-Prussian and Russo-Japanese Wars towards the more open formations used during the Second Boer War and (in some cases) first stages of WWI is just a fascinating topic. All culminating in the birth of the squad as a usable tactical unit ...

There is an excellent vintage bulletin (circa 1943) about the organization and tactics of German squads during WWII written by the US Military Intelligence Service . I actually have a printed version of it, profusely annotated by Matthew Gajkowski.

Although I recognize that warfare is a system of expedients, it is interesting to read the somewhat stiff field manuals not to follow recipes but to find general trends. In the introduction of his publication, Gajkowski writes:

In contrast to the doctrine of other nations the German army holds that the machine gun, not the rifle is the backbone of infantry tactics. The German squad is built around the light machine gun. It is the squad's base of fire. The riflemen support it and provide ammunition for it. In the US squad, the rifleman are the base of fire and the BAR supports the riflemen. This may be one of the reasons why the Germans stayed with the K-98k rifle (designed originally in 1898 and modified last in 1930). In the US squad the M1 rifle (adopted in the 1930's) was the newer weapon while their automatic weapon, the BAR (originally an 1918 design) was old. In the German squad the MG-34 (introduced in 1936) was the new design. The Germans even came out with a replacement for the MG-34 in 1942 (the MG-42).

It doesn't take long for the Iron Front player to fall in love with the long range and high rate of fire of the MG-42. Taking proper advantage of both is an entirely different matter. Page 14 of the bulletin makes a point that is repeated over and over:

Victory comes to the one who fires the largest number of well-aimed shots against his opponent in the shortest time.

Ideally, the light machine gun fire should be the sudden, devastating opening (and only) act of the firefight. This is the point where I can find some basis to explain my du jour misgivings in the virtual battlefield. I just handicapped my light machine gun's firepower with a narrow and shallow field of fire.

Aftermath. The center of the light machine gun's field of fire, from the enemy's point of view. The light machine gun was located in the second story of the building in the background.

A narrow filed of fire was good to protect my gunner (only a few enemies could hope to engage him) but allowed the enemy to move through it fast and towards a tactically advantageous position (my left flank). A shallow field of fire meant an inability to take advantage of the enemy's deep formation and long exposed flank.

Cheers,

Insurgency in the North Caucasian Federal District - War Stories From the Front Lines: # 9 To Miss a Drone

2013-01-31T19:50:00.000-05:00

This entry is the first of two debriefs from two Russian officers involved in the same action at the Kodori Gorge, Abkhazia.

From a custom-made mission edited in DCS World.

Mayór Vitaly Studitsky, 6971st Aviation Base (temporarily operating from Mineralnye Vody, 4th Air and Air Defence Forces Command).

My wing man and me (a two aircraft flight of Su-25Ts) were on a holding pattern at the border between Russia and Abkhazia. The original mission was to join a flight of Abkhazian Su-25s for an early morning joint exercise at the Kodori Gorge. As a part of the exercise, a Beriev A-50 (AWACS) was flying on the Russian side of the border. The Abkhazian Su-25s were late to the rendezvous, but we could hear their intermittent radio chatter (probably masked by the mountains).

Mount Elbrus (far background) is always a great landmark for orientation in this mountainous region.

At 0521, I requested and was granted permission to enter the Kodori Gorge in order to establish radio contact with the elusive Abkhazian allies. I was asked to leave my wing man on the Russian side of the exercise area.

The Abkhazian Su-25s were nowhere to be found.

A couple of minutes later, a tiny dot at 10 o'clock low flying along the gorge caught my attention. It was rather small and flying too slow to be an Su-25.

I closed in to obtain a visual ID, but the low speed of the bogey (green cross, using the in-game padlock view) made me overshoot in the first attempt. At this point, AWACS didn't have this bogey in its radar screens.

I trimmed my aircraft for the slowest speed available in an attempt to shadow the bogey's flight path, but it then became obvious that it was maneuvering to avoid me. At least I could get a visual ID (US MQ-1 Predator Drone). The pass in the picture above was so close that I could even determine that the drone was not armed.

The aggressive maneuvering forced the drone to climb, and it ended up being detected by AWACS. After quickly obtaining authorization to engage, I started maneuvering against the drone, but the advantage was not to my side because these unmanned aircraft have an incredible maneuverability at low speed. In the picture above, after a futile attempt to turn into the drone's flight path, I ended up stalling and the drone escaped through a climb.

Devoid of a chance to get this drone in a turning fight, I extended out some 7 kilometers and returned to the fray from the distance. The drone dived some 2,000 meters, dragging me into an unwanted high speed frenzy (see HUD, 700 km/h) that would make the use of my guns too tricky. I quickly switched to IR-guided missiles, and got a good lock tone (see HUD, "LA" stands for launch authorization).

Two IR-guided missiles going downrange, as seen from the cockpit.

The drone (the aircraft on top) turns on a dime and towards my direction. Both IR-guided missiles missed their target (one shown here, the other one can only be guessed by its smoke trail).

I repeatedly engaged the drone using the same tactics (zoom and boom), but was unable to achieve good firing solutions for either the missiles or the guns. I shadowed the drone until 0545, when I was ordered to clear the area.

Commentary:
-The Kodori Gorge is a true thermometer of the tensions in the Caucasus region. Whenever something is about to happen, you can be sure it will be reflected in this area of Abkhazia
-The low speed and maneuverability of the Predator drone made it difficult for pilots without extensive air-to-air combat training to keep up with the situation. The Su-25T relies on the pilot's sight to acquire airborne targets and this target acquisition always materialized too close to the lower limits of the weapons envelope.

Close Combat: Panthers in the Fog - Review

2013-01-23T23:50:00.002-05:00

Close Combat: Panthers in the Fog
Developed by Black Hand Studios
Published by Matrix/Slitherine Games
39.99 US Dollars (Download)
49.99 US Dollars (Download and CD)

07AUG1944. The German XLVII Corps launches a counter-offensive east of Mortain with the objective of cutting-off the US 3rd Army. Operation Lüttich is one of the best known German counterattacks during the Battle of Normandy and one of the most poorly executed German attacks in record. Plagued by lack of coordination, poor logistics and in some cases just the lack of will by some commanders, the Germans lost the initiative to the Americans in just one day. The close terrain was ill-suited for the German tanks and the Americans, although outgunned on paper, were ready to bring up a significant amount of reserves to the fight. This was a fluid battle of punches and counter-punches. Men, tanks and fire support weapons skating on the unforgiving thin tactical ice of the bocage. It doesn't get any better for tactical war gaming.

Close Combat is a tactical war game that, believe it or not, has been inspired by the extremely complex board game Advanced Squad Leader. The first Close Combat was released back in 1996 and it was a game changer (pun intended). Besides its simple game mechanics and (for the time) great graphics, the virtual soldiers had morale, combat experience, physical state and stamina modeled as variables. No longer could a player order a suicidal charge against a machine gun nest: the virtual soldiers would literally have a morale breakdown seeing their buddies mowed down by the bursts of lead. In addition, only the fittest soldiers could withstand the exertions of continuous forced marches and assaults. It was a true revolution in computer war gaming. The most hard core qualities and the satisfying tactical experience of those"cream of the crop" board games, adapted to a computer game ... The Close Combat series continued for four more years, and then waned down significantly between the years 2000 and 2007, when Matrix Games started re-packaging the old series. Enter Panthers in the Fog, released in late 2012, which is the first Close Combat with original content (i.e. not a re-make of older titles).

The Close Combat game is composed of two layers. The top layer is the so-called "strategic" and this is where the player moves regiments and battalions across a map that covers the historical area of operations. The movement is turn based and the regiments and battalions can be given offensive, defensive and maneuver stances. Other specific actions for them include rest, relieve, merge and disband. The player can also allocate air interdiction and artillery support into specific areas of the "strategic" map. Once two opposing sides collide into the same region of the area of operations, the lower "tactical" layer comes into play. This lower tactical layer is played a 2D, exquisitely drawn 2D maps that are a handful of hundred meters (average) in size. Before the battle starts, the player is able to choose among the different subunits of the regiments and battalions available in the specific subdivision of the "strategic" map region. Once deployed, the battle is played in continuous time. The units (fire teams, MG teams, individual tanks and support systems) are given commands with a left-click and point, very intuitive interface. For movement, the commands are "move", "move fast" and "sneak". For firing there is an obvious "fire" command and for protection there are "defend" and "ambush" orders. Included also is a "smoke" command (throw smoke in a specified direction). Each soldier, crew, tank vehicle and gun has a damage/status (healthy, unconscious, wounded, immobilized, destroyed, KIA, etc) followed by the game engine. The morale status for every single man in the battle is also taken into account. The system is so detailed that even ammunition is tracked. Defeat or victory is decided by a combination of the amount of victory locations taken and the overall morale of both sides. If men on one side have seen too many deaths among their buddies, their morale will drop and this not only result in a lack of offensive spirit but also a sudden tactical scenario termination if the overall morale level falls below a specific mark.

The emphasis of Close Combat is in the tactical 2D map battles. The upper layer has come a long way since the previous releases and re-releases (better graphics and interface), and there is a good amount of decision-making for the player to do at this level. But the verisimilitude of the game system leaves a glowing gap between moving up battalions and regiments to the front (strategic level) and fighting with just a reinforced company (24 units per tactical map at maximum, to be chosen among fire-teams, MG/mortar teams, tanks, vehicles and guns). One could argue that the 2D tactical maps are just too small to deploy a battalion on them and that is a fair argument. However, each strategic map region features just one playable tactical 2D map so a series of company-sized fights is what decides the occupation or withdrawal of entire battle groups. This modeling of grand-tactical/operational warfare by a series of combat patrol skirmishes has been creeping release after release during the history of the franchise and has achieved a point where a mere paint of good-researched orders of battle doesn't cut it anymore. A game or simulation of combat that follows each soldier's attribute battle after battle is unlikely to have no cracks in its way up of the fighting leagues of divisions and corps. Nonetheless, if you park your generals and colonels outside and you enter the game with just your captains and sergeants, you are guaranteed a very good tactical war game, with immersion added by battles that follow a continuity in events down to soldiers acquiring more experience, abandoned vehicles and artillery craters remaining in the map along the way.

What's new in Close Combat Panthers in the Fog, besides the setting? Graphics have been brought to modern 32 bit standards. The eye-strain of previous releases is gone, but be aware that your screen is showing now less of the 2D terrain than before (a consequence of lower meters per pixel resolution), so there is some serious scrolling needed to play the tactical battles. The interface of the "strategic" layer has been significantly improved in look and functionality, now including NATO icons and graphs plus animations during the review of the whole turn-based movement phase. The new Battle Group system keeps and tracks every soldier's statistics and it has been modified to allow the player a troops selection process more in accord with historical orders of battle. In the "strategic" map, it is now possible to add air interdiction and artillery to hamper the enemy's movement. Some regions of the strategic map feature heights that allow either side to observe enemy movements from longer ranges. For the tactical battles, the setup and fire by mortars has been brought to more realistic standards and now it is possible to load troops and hitch guns onto vehicles.

The game play at both levels will find the player making relevant decision making. At the strategic level, the concept of main effort is crucial as the resources, though not minimal, are eaten up by an enemy that is not passive and a terrain that favors sudden death by ambush. At the tactical level, suppression and the use of cover are crucial. The tactical landscape depicted in Panthers is just plain unforgiving. There is plenty of cover and concealment and the novice player is advised not to get too fond of speed just because the game's interface make it look so easy to just move the troops relentlessly. The player's troops have a sense of preservation that gives a small margin of time for looking elsewhere, but it is always better to practice the principle of mutual support. The computer opponent makes very good use of indirect fire but will rarely throw a curve ball once you figure out how it operates.

The multi-player system has been re-built from the ground up. It is now a lobby-based system and it doesn't allow direct connection. This lack of an alternative connection method has been lamented by veterans of the series. The lobby got off to a rocky start with some players experiencing disconnections and lags during play. The developers moved really fast to fix these problems. I have played no less than eight online games without any lags or disconnections. The only noticeable thing for me was the lack of opponents online at most of the times I logged in. Maybe I'm just unlucky, but I would recommend to prearrange with your gaming buddy a day and time for an online match.

Fog has played and important role in the real operation. It helped the Germans to move during the early day hours without being targeted by Allied aircraft and it cut short more than one movement to contact. Panthers has implemented fog as part of the game play. In some specific scenarios, the entire 2D battlefield is covered by a milky cover of simulated fog, making it a bit cumbersome to spot not only enemy units (maybe a good thing) but also own forces (huh?). After a few games, the eyes get accustomed to the fog (outlining one's units in black helps a lot) but nonetheless the byproduct is friendly fog of war enforced by eyesight. The amount of information and how it is delivered to the player is one of the biggest assets a war game design has and in my opinion the developers should have thought this feature more thoroughly. A patch is on the works and it will include an option to remove this effect.

Score: B. A solid and successful franchise was given a face lift in appearance and content. This is the best Close Combat in many years and features great war gaming value that will appeal both the novice and veteran.

Insurgency in the North Caucasian Federal District - War Stories From the Front Lines: #8 Brief Firefight After a Crash Landing in Ingushetia

2013-01-13T22:26:00.003-05:00

Mládshiy Serzhánt Yuri Bubunenko's squad (18th Independent Motor Rifle Brigade) narrowly escaped death after a crash landing of their helicopter transport.

Played as a custom-made single player scenario in ArmA 2. The map is Chernarus (is there a good Georgia map for ArmA 2?) The mod for the Russian forces has been kindly recommended by a reader of the blog. It's the "Armed Forces of the Russian Federation" mod. Thanks, NW! The strength of the enemy is known to me (16 insurgents, including an AA team, moving in two trucks, one of them with a mounted ZsU gun ), but their initial position and way points not (random placement radius from 0 to 2 km).

Our brigade was not even deployed. We were moving out from Ingushetia to where the insurgency was more active (Mineralnye Vody). A few detachments were left here and there, more like rear guards than anything else. Needless to say, these detachments were very weak and spread thin. A few disturbing reports of increased insurgent activity in Ingushetia indicated that rebel forces were on the move ... towards Georgia!

The odd-marriage between Georgian intelligence services and the Ingushetians was no news to us. They obviously waited for us to leave before making their move. It was a prime opportunity to catch them on transit but the resources were not there. Our orders were to interdict their movement towards the Caucasus Mountains. The morning of these events, my squad was given the choice of a blocking position along a main road or an ambush. One or another depending on the strength of the insurgent forces, but significant damage to the enemy was expected.

Due to the great amount of terrain to be covered, we were provided transport by Mi-8 armed with rocket launchers. The helicopter would come in handy to locate the enemy, but its lack of high tech sensors was worrisome.

We boarded the helicopter and quickly departed to find out the insurgents.

The plan was to locate the enemy, determine its composition and proceed to block or ambush them. The enemy's route was supposedly along that valley on the background. The enemy is moving somewhere from our left to right.

The lack of sensors in the Mi-8 was a complete let down. We stayed at the edges of the valley, wary of the enemy's anti-aircraft capabilities. But after some long minutes it was evident we were not going to be able to detect them from the distance. So the helicopter pilot started a series of zig zag maneuvers, getting in and out the valley, trying to find the enemy.

The smoky trails and tracers of ZSU rounds on our left alerted the pilot of the enemy's presence. The enemy was way past the observation positions we occupied before. A bit overzealous (for my already charred nerves, anyway), the pilot charged against two insurgent trucks all rockets blazing.

The rockets attack destroyed both trucks, but the surviving insurgents dismounted before the explosions and fire. One of the insurgents fired a IR-guided portable missile that cut short the helicopter's second attack run. The pilot crash landed just a dozen meters from the remaining dismounts.

Still shaken by the forces of the landing, we all came out the helicopter with our guns on the ready. In the middle of the open, we were spared some enemy bullets because a good portion of the enemy dismounts were running away.

In a very uneven firefight (10+ insurgents against six of us), we managed ... Barely. Three of my men were wounded.

None of my men liked the task to advance and clear any remaining insurgents, but it had to be done.

The detection of the enemy from the transport helicopter proved to be very ineffective. The insurgents literally moved half way through the valley without detection. After contact, the pilot went too far engaging the enemy. I have wished for locating the enemy, establishing a strong defensive position using the helicopter's guns and rockets as fire support. The entire action lasted 30 minutes and left us guarding the helicopter for either repair or demolition. But at least we destroyed the insurgent team.

Cheers,