Silly After Action Report

Colonel Ion Surchanrescu checked himself in front of the mirror, his uniform fit him like a glove, medal ribbons and braid gleamed against the dark background.  Taking his cap from the waiting adjutant he strode out to face the paraded soldiers.  A second later he was back again.

"Who the hell are they?" he demanded of his adjutant.

"That's your regiment sir," replied the adjutant.  "You've commanded them for five years."

"So that's what they look like, fascinating."  Surchanrescu settled his cap firmly on his head and went back out to face his command.

"Brave soldiers of Romania," he began.

The brave soldiers of Romania politely waited for him to continue.  Seeing they weren't actively throwing things Surchanrescu took heart and continued,

"Brave soldiers of Romania, the day you have long awaited has finally arrived.  Today the glorious arms of Romania sally forth against the Soviet oppressors.  For too long our brothers in beloved Bessarabia have groaned under the foreigners yoke.  Now you, the cream of the Romanian army, will be their deliverers.  Mighty forces have been gathered, our matchless tank forces ride with us," he gestured at a half dozen small, rusty tin boxes studded at random around the field.  A soldier was ashing his cigarette into one.  "There can only be one battlecry; Liberate Bessarabia!"  He pointed helpfully, "it's that way.  Let me know how you get on."

As the colonel retired to his quarters one of the Romanian soldiers turned to his neighbour.

"Are we really the cream of the Romanian army?"

"Must be," replied the other, "look at all of the clots at the top."

Having failed dismally with elite German troops I have swung to the opposite pole and will now be commanding the "cream of the Romanian army" (sadly true) in ASL Scenario 113 - Liberating Bessarabia.  Here I shall command some fourteen first line Romanian squads as they attempt the aforementioned liberating depicted here by capturing half a dozen multihex buildings.  Along with my squads I have three officers, a trio of light machine guns, two medium machine guns and a second hand french mortar.  Armoured support is provided by a pair of R-1 tanks (essentially a machine gun carrier) and four R-2s which at least have a 37mm gun in addition to a pretty impressive collection of machine guns.

Facing this unstoppable Romanian horde are the hapless Soviets commanded by Ivan Kent, my god I feel sorry for him.  He has seven first line squads and four conscripts to hang onto this small slice of Bessarabian real estate.  Backing up these troops are two officers, a pair of light and a pair of medium machine guns plus an anti tank rifle.  In a futile attempt to stem the Romanian tide he also has armour, a pair of BA-6 armoured cars and a pair of BT-2A tanks.  All four, whatever their shortcomings are capable of pounding my armoured force to scrap.

Ivan surprised me with his set up.  Not one squad was up on the first level.  Instead the bulk of his force occupied the ground floor of buildings facing the road with a speed bump forward on the (his) left.  Ivan also surprised me by presenting me with not four but six large concealment stacks obviously trying to spread a little confusion about the location of his vehicles

My plan was to hit hard on his right and firmly in the centre while trying to avoid his tanks until things had become a little more clear.  Over on the left I sent a flanking force of three squads and a 7-0 (shepherded by my little R-1s) to at least give him something to think about.  On the right my 9-1 guided a pair of mmg toting squads forward to the closest of the victory buildings.  In the centre my tanks escorted the rest of my force forward to the gully.  On the far right I sent a squad racing directly up the road.  Ivan knew this was simply to tempt him to drop concealment on a vehicle but ultimately he couldn't resist the temptation.  His machine gun fire was wayward but a MA shot pinned my guys in the street.  Mission accomplished, I prepared the letters for their families but to my astonishment they would survive.

End of Romanian turn 1

The first turn had been light on fire as my troops had done their best to close the range without getting hurt and there aren't too many good fire opportunities from where Ivan has to set up.  Come my second turn this would change.  Badly.

But first a brief moment of delight.  Ivan opened up on the squad that had been pinned in the street and only succeeded in breaking his MA.  Result!  After that things went downhill a bit.  Actually a lot.

In the centre my troops and tanks emerged blinking from the gully to snatch another victory building.  I also pushed a tank up behind a wall to where it had a line of sight to his own vehicles behind a wall on the other side of the road.  A little risky I know but I had a wall to be hull down behind.  Ivan didn't worry about the wall, he just blew the turret off my tank with his first shot.  After that inadvertently wandering into a 2-2 shot, boxcarring the morale check and converting a first line squad into a broken conscript half squad was simply icing on the cake.  Worse was to come though, in the left centre I had pushed a pair of lmg toting squads forward to seize another multihex building.  Technically I succeeded.

Over on the far left came a modest success.  Having shepherded my flanking force to some convenient buildings my little R-1s turned around and bypass sleazed a conscript squad sitting out alone in a building, Ivan tried to street fight them without success and return fire pinned them.  I boldly sallied forth with a couple of squads to close combat them but Ivan declined to hang around and voluntarily broke them.  Meanwhile my mortar and a tank were pounding away at the big building on the left.  They weren't achieving much but the double acquisitions disinclined Ivan to hang around.

Things look good apart from the destroyed tank

 Then in his turn Ivan fired on my troops in the building and achieved a morale check.  With an 8-0 leader and two seven morale squads you might expect me to pass one of the checks.  You would be wrong.  Suddenly I was desperately short of infantry on the left.

On the right my infantry survived simply because I didn't do anything with them.  I told myself I was preparing for a major push, its entirely possible that I was too scared to move them.  On his third turn Ivan broke the malfed MA on his armoured car on the right and it had to retire.  Not wishing to let it go at that I fired at the damned thing and blew it up (because I'm a sadistic bastard).  Ivan moved the other vehicle over to the centre to dominate the middle road.

After all the disastrous morale checks I was then the recipient of a bit of good luck on the left when a sniper broke one of his squads in the main building there.  This allowed my pair of squads to sneak into the building.  I was tempted to race my 7-0 and remaining squad over to join them but feared Ivan's mmg firing down the road so they stayed in their building.  Ivan's mmg then promptly broke them both building or no building.  To press further on the left I sent my little R-1s on a loop around to the rear which they managed, even surviving a shot from an atr in passing.  Nothing loathe I sent one of my remaining R-2s to join them.  On the right I rolled my tank forward to engage his infantry.  My only achievement was to break my own MA but I still have the machine guns.

End of turn 3 not looking so good

This is where we left it for the night.  I'm hoping I'm in a good position and if I manage to pass the odd morale check I might even win.

Part 2 - Tanks Burning Bright

Over on the right Ivan conceded territory as he was disinclined to allow his troops to face the awesome machine guns of my tank.  This allowed me to pour infantry across the road and snatch positions in the victory building.  I had the bit between my teeth now and was eagerly anticipating the win.  I was looking forward to enveloping him on both flanks.  Frankly I should have known better.  

Over on the left Ivan failed to hurt my troops in the building and I managed to break his atr squad in return.  Bereft of rout paths it surrendered to the tender mercies of my troops who at present were more than ready to take prisoners.  My broken squads managed to rally, finally, and somewhat nervously slunk back into the building they had been unceremoniously shot out of.  In the left hand building Ivan surprised me by advancing the concealed stack I was certain were dummies into close combat with one of my squads.  Then suddenly close combat was my friend.  Despite being concealed he failed to ambush me and I rolled snakes annihilating his squad and generating an 8-0 leader into the bargain.  Which was useful as my broken 7-0 had self promoted itself to angel having boxcarred a rally attempt.  In my next turn I would massacre a squad and a half of broken troops to fully claim the building as my own.  Meanwhile I swung my tanks around into his rear.  His guns were all pointing the wrong way and my own tanks were small targets into the bargain.  I thought it was a risk worth taking.

Looking good

I was terribly, terribly wrong.  In Ivan's next turn he fired on one of my tanks with his armoured car, rolled snake eyes and burnt it.  Maintaining rate he fired through the smoke at my R-2, rolled a three and burnt it.  Switching to one of his other tanks he fired at my remaining vehicle, rolled a snake eyes and burnt it.  Half my tank force wiped out in a single fire phase.  Eventually Ivan coaxed me out of my foetal position and persuaded me to keep playing.  There had been one bit of good news.  Ivan had a squad/mmg combo guided by his 9-1 hiding under one of his tanks and controlling the road.  My sniper, activated by one of the snake eyes leapt on these wretches and broke the squad.  Suddenly Ivan was bereft of infantry on the left.  Which didn't seem to matter too much.  As part of my general advance I had pushed a squad with a captured atr next to one of his tanks.  When I had three tanks in the vicinity this seemed a calculated risk.  With nothing else to shoot at Ivan cranked his turret around and broke them.

Oh dear Christ almighty!

Fortunately while things were going to hell on the left they were developing quite nicely on the right.  Ivan was running out of troops.  He had pulled a squad and a leader back to a more rearward building (scotching idle plans I had of a deep flanking manoeuvre) but abandoning the rest of his defence to a ravening mass of Romanian troops out for revenge.  Methodically I pushed troops to the left, not taking any chances, and slowly squeezed him out of his forward positions while my mmg squads pushed forward to take out his rearward troops.  Even better news was that Ivan had finally broken the MA of that bastard armoured car.

Pushing forward despite the losses

I even managed to rally the squads in the building on the left.  Ivan now had too many holes to plug and not enough troops.  Abandoning the left he raced first his armoured car and then both tanks over to the right. Bizarrely he drove his armoured car right next to an mmg toting squad with the crew exposed.  A 12+2 shot promptly stunned it.  The next turn he would attempt to repair the main armament, roll a six and lose it to recall.  The recalled armoured cars were the only vehicle losses he suffered in the entire game.  With the left open I raced a squad and leader down the left to start grabbing undefended buildings while planning a more methodical push on the right.  But before that could happen Ivan fired in the advancing fire phase at my tank on the right, rolled a three and burnt it.  I had precisely one tank left however it didn't matter.  With the left completely open and only a couple of squads left unbroken Ivan had nothing to stop my infantry.  He surrendered at the end of Romanian turn six.

End game.  A rare triumph.

Ivan felt this one to be hard for the Soviets and I've got to admit that while losing three tanks in one turn was a shocker for the personal morale I never felt like I was going to lose (well, maybe briefly).  The sniper taking out his mmg position was a bonus but I had a mortar zeroed in on that hex and surely it would have got a result eventually.  Eventually my squads overwhelmed him by weight of numbers on the right.  Thanks to Ivan for the game and with ASLOK fast approaching a much needed morale boost for me.

Colonel Surchanrescu picked his way gingerly across the battlefield carefully avoiding getting smudges on his gleaming cavalry boots.  Spotting a rather scruffy soldier and (after peering carefully) determining that he was Romanian he called him across.

"Did we win?"

The soldier made a gesture that could generously be interpreted as a salute.

"Yes sir, six buildings worth of Bessarabia have had the crap liberated out them."

"Exellent, I'll get a medal for this."  Surchanrescu beckoned to his adjutant and pointed to a burning tank.  "Did you bring the marshmallows?"