"Come on lads, there can be no better place to die for the emperor than some god forsaken chunk of Burma that even the Burmese don't seem to be keen on keeping." This was straight out of the "rallying the troops" text book but it didn't seem to be working. Most of the men's attention was fixed on the cockroach a lucky soldier had caught, someone would eat well tonight.
Captain Kitimura sighed, glanced up and his depression deepened. Major Jin Tanaka was approaching. He turned his attention back to the cockroach, tempted to pull rank, but Major Tanaka gave him a cheery wave.
"Hello Kiti," he called. The men chuckled and Kitimura cringed. Tanaka dropped into the spider hole next to him. "Heads up Kiti, apparently there's a whole bunch of Chinese coming this way. Best be on your guard." He glanced to the east, "Oh look, there they are now."
Kitimura stared at the waves of serious looking and depressingly well fed soldiers dashing from one patch of cover to another brandishing American made weapons.
"Don't worry Kiti," said Tanaka, "they're only Chinese. They'll probably run if you shout loudly." Suiting words to action he suddenly stood bolt upright and screamed "BANG!" The Chinese kept coming. Tanaka ducked back down again.
"Well I'm out of ideas, let me know if you think of something." He started to unlace his boots.
"What are you doing?" asked Kitimura.
"Do you know how hard it is to run in these things?"
So this is my latest clash with Ivan Kent. We're playing scenario AP 99 - Bare Foot Beating which sees a large group of rather well armed and motivated Chinese troops (from the famous 38th Division) taking on a rather tatty bunch of Japanese who have the added handicap of being commanded by me. Ivan, commanding the Chinese, has to sweep the Japanese defenders from a small village in Burma (I know, Japanese fighting Chinese so naturally they're doing it in Burma. If you have to fight a war the best place to do it is somewhere else). The Chinese have to capture a group of buildings (about eight in number) adjacent to a small stretch of road. Failure will allow the Japanese to continue to starve slowly to death a long way from home. How's that for motivation?
To prolong the Japanese agony I have seven squads, four first line and three second line with a couple on lmgs and a single mmg. To add a little firepower to this ragged force I have a pair of 50mm knee mortars and a 70mm gun. Fortifications are present in the form of one trench and four foxholes. Ivan gets ten and a half elite Chinese squads with impressive firepower but less than brilliant range and a flanking force of four more that come in on the second turn. Two mmgs, two lmgs a 60mm mortar and a bazooka for some reason add more firepower to the Chinese attack.
Don't forget his reinforcements! I repeated that over and over to myself as I did my set up. Ivan's main force comes on the east (bottom) but he gets four squads of reinforcements that enter from the north thus threatening a flanking manoeuvre. Once I had done my set up and we settled down to play I had a horrible realisation. I had forgotten his reinforcements.
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| My set up |
In fact "north" is a better description of the location Ivan chose for his attack. I trembled for my mortar and gun. And then I remembered his reinforcements. Crap! Ivan sent his half squad charging boldly forward but my men retained fire discipline and waited for the better targets. They came and I managed to get a couple of acquisitions while Ivan shook himself out and prepared to unleash massive death on my isolated position.
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| End of Ivan's turn 1. Already I feel doomed. |
In my turn I managed to strip some concealment and broke a squad toting a mmg (that was the 70mm) while behind the scenes I desperately started shuffling forces over to the north to stem the Chinese tide. Fortunately time was bought for me by my gallant gun crew who attempted to overcome the limitations of their commander with raw courage. The mortar crew died under a hail of fire but the gun crew stood up nobly until his halfsquad jumped into CC with them. Then my sniper pinned the halfsquad and my crew killed them, remanned the gun and with a plethora of targets broke another Chinese squad running through the palm trees.
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| End of Chinese turn 2 |
Ivan had moved a CX squad into a building next to a second line squad of mine and I licked my lips at the prospect of CC however in his defensive fire phase he gained a morale check and sent my boys berserk. This meant they couldn't advance and had to sit there until the next turn when he advanced without CX against my now lax berserkers and killed them.
Infuriated by the defiance of my gun crew Ivan committed three full squads to taking
out the gun crew in CC. They succeeded but doing so tied them up for a
while Meanwhile he had raced a fanatic squad around behind them who were crushed by fire from berserkers before they succumbed in CC. Meanwhile his reinforcements came on as far to the west as they could and pushed towards the village. Now however I had managed to scramble some troops up to positions where they might be able to put up a defence. It hasn't really happened yet but one lives in hope. I abandoned my positions in the south, the squads heading towards the village to bolster the garrison. The mortar lugging halfsquad I advanced forward. I figured they were doomed anyway so I might as well try to shoot some of his troops in the back.
At the end of Japanese turn three I have managed to build up a defensive position but with the Chinese having taking few casualties it remains to be seen whether or not I can survive the firepower about to rain down on my troops unhappy heads. So far my own shooting hasn't been stellar but there was one happy moment when I advanced a second line squad into CC with what turned out to be a dare death squad and an 8-0 leader. Everyone died but I like to think that benefited me. Certainly Ivan seemed a little upset.
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| My defenses are set but there are a disturbing number of Chinese bearing down on me. |
I had decided that cowardice would be the better part of valour and as Ivan gradually brought up his forces for the final push I skulked and tried to snatch what concealment I could. Sooner or later he was going to have to charge forward and I would be ready. Of course it would have been nice if I could have shot some of his troops en route but Ivan produced enough smoke for a decent sized bushfire and got up adjacent to the road largely unscathed. The one morale check I did inflict resulted in the target squad going fanatic and generating a hero. Defensive fire got a little unpopular after that.
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| My, that's a lot of Chinese |
I had successfully pulled back and faced the future with relative confidence. Ivan had it all to do and was running out of time. With an lmg squad positioned in the furthest victory building as a backstop I challenged Ivan to do his worst. I suppose I shouldn't complain when he did precisely that. Firstly he cheerfully wounded my best officer and tactically routed a broken unit to where it would cause great pain when it self rallied. Then a half squad of mine toting an lmg was broken and fled to a foxhole from where it would be in a terrible position when it failed to self rally.
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| Before the human wave |
Still I was reasonably confident. My main
problem was that I didn't have that many troops left. Of the
impressive looking force shown above two stacks are dummies. Still with only
two turns to go the pressure was on Ivan.
Ivan's response? A massive human wave to get him across the road and into my defences. I should have expected this, it's just a variant on his usual running around in the open tactic but with an added morale benefit. I don't think I've ever been the recipient of a human wave before. I can't say I like them. His boys, eight squads worth I think guided by a 9-1 and a hero poured out into the street and met a hail of fire. An 8-2 shot, a 4-2 shot, a 2-2 shot and a 1-2 shot. The result, one Chinese squad killed and another broken. The rest surged on and quite literally obliterated my remaining OB.
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| After the human wave. Can you spot the subtle difference? |
Just to add icing to the cake Ivan moved an unemployed unit next to my mmg team who failed to inflict any harm on them. They too would die without inflicting the slightest pain on the enemy. I guess the human wave was a bit risky but Ivan set it up well. His guys didn't have far to go and my propensity for failing FPF didn't help my cause. When the dust had cleared I had one second line half squad locked in melee with two Chinese squads and my rear position occupied by a second line squad, lmg, a leader and a broken half squad. The latter was dealt with efficiently when I killed it attempting a rally. I stumbled on into my turn hoping for a miracle although possibly only a plane crash landing on Ivan's house would have helped me at this point. When Ivan striped my remaining squad with a single shot and had half the Chinese army lining up to kill it I took the hint and surrendered. Once again I had gone from quietly confident (Ivan might dispute the "quietly") to a tear streaked gibbering wreck in the space of a single turn. Kudos to Ivan who out manoeuvred me at the first and then kept me on the backfoot until the final, in retrospect, inevitable end.
Two Chinese soldiers were searching through the wreckage of the Japanese position. They knew better than to expect to find food but perhaps a little military loot was a possibility. One of them suddenly lunged forward and held up his prize, a pair of beautifully kept officers' boots.
"Nice score Wang," said his comrade enviously, he peered a little closer. "But why does it look like a couple of bites have been taken out of them?"
This was more
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