Section Leaders:
  Fionn Kelly & Madmatt 

The Sunken Lane

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NOTE: SPOILER INFORMATION. This After Action Report contains detailed information regarding units and  terrain disposition to a scenario that may be included in the release version of Combat Mission. If you wish to play this game Blind or partake in a Double Blind match then READ NO FURTHER!!!!

Conclusions and Analysis of Sunken Lane PBEM

Disclaimer: The vast majority of the discussion contained herein is aimed at clarifying issues which readers might have and to ensure that sufficient facts are provided to allow the readers to draw their own conclusions. For this reason I will go into a great deal of detail regarding comparative force structures, doctrinal thinking etc. After asking Bil to read the first half of this article it came to my attention that it is necessary to state clearly that I did NOT use this mathematical model to determine my in-game actions and did not spend hours thinking of doctrinal implications. I merely drew on my own rules of thumb, instinct and innate knowledge of German, modern American and Russian doctrines as well as my own innate style to come up with the aggressive defensive plan I carried out. I play very much by “ instinct informed by experience and previous doctrinal contemplation” and feel that this is the best way to play CM. My decisions are obviously informed by doctrinal issues but not consciously so. It is difficult to explain but basically I look at the situation and within a matter of seconds of opening up the orders phase a basic plan of what to do now pops into my mind and I then spend the next couple of minutes issuing the necessary orders so that each tactical unit can play its part in that plan. I estimate that I spend, perhaps, ten seconds or so thinking about what to do every turn. My decisions are very much spur of the moment, instinctive decisions. Certainly they are informed by doctrine but I’m never consciously aware of this influence until I analyses why I did what I did after the game has been completed.

E.g. In the analysis below I calculate out that I am outnumbered by 2.86 to 1. This is a calculation I did after the game. In-game I merely figured out that I was outnumbered by FOUR companies + 9 tanks vs TWO companies. This is a perfect example of the basic level of instinctual analysis which I undertook in-game compared to the vastly more detailed analysis which I partook of when writing up my AARs and the post-battle analysis.

Introduction:

I will begin by focussing on the most simple and obvious aspects of the PBEM AAR which has just been completed before I touch on some of the more complicated aspects such as the application of historical tactics and doctrine and the corollaries between warfighting throughout the ages and the lessons which can thus be gleaned from reading even the most primitive of sources and accurate works. Once that is completed I will touch on some of the lessons learned and some aspects of the performance of the various weapons involved after which I encourage you to re-read the AAR with these lessons in mind and view how they were, unconsciously and consciously, applied to all the successful movements during play.

Firstly I will deal with the gross aspects of the Sunken Lane PBEM represented by comparative numbers and fighting potentials.

Total British Manpower Committed:                584 men

In addition 9 British tanks were committed.

Of the 584 British soldiers committed 42 manned their tanks.  Another 102 functioned in support roles. E.g. 24 soldiers manned 12 x 2 inch mortars, another 24 manned the units’ PIATs and the remainder were either FOs or members of machinegun teams.

This left a total of 440 combat infantry organized into 4 companies ( there were a few spare Platoon HQs etc wandering around but I’m counting them in with the support troops.). These 440 men would form the spearhead of any attack on my positions. It would be up to the tanks and soldiery manning support weapons to provide them with covering fire and protection from counter-attacks.

Total German Manpower Committed:            336 men.

Of these 92 men manned support weapons. These men manned eight MG42 teams, four 81mm mortar teams, 2 Panzerschrecks and were accompanied by their various platoon leaders.

So, using the same reckoning as I applied to the British troops there were some 244 combat infantry available to me. This works out as a 1:1.8 ratio in the favour of the British in terms of combat infantry. This ratio isn’t so daunting but, unfortunately for me the British had 9 tanks to back them up. This meant that they had 1 tank for every 27 Germans and this meant that every one of my platoons could be brought under fire from at least one tank, possibly two. What this really meant was that not only would each of my platoons be facing two enemy platoons but they would also be being bombarded by 3 tanks by the time the two enemy platoons attacked. As anyone who has played CM knows any platoon being attacked by twice its number of enemies and being bombarded by 3 enemy tanks ( 1 tank can be dedicated to suppressing each squad) is doomed.

Even in the best of anti-tank terrain such as was prevalent in the Sunken Lane scenario I take it as a simple rule of thumb that each isolated tank destroyed by means of close assault will destroy one German squad before being destroyed. In open terrain the cost of close-assaulting rises to one platoon per isolated tank. What this really meant to me was that I could expect to lose at LEAST 90 men to the enemy tanks under the best of circumstances and thus I had to plan on facing the other 440 British combat infantry with a force reduced to 154 infantry  ( a 1:2.86 ratio in favour of the British ).

These simple sums lead to a rather inescapably gloomy outlook for the German forces in this scenario IF they gift the British the time and space to set up their attacking forces perfectly and in synchronicity with each-other.

I determined that, given these calculation, that the one thing I could NOT countenance was giving Bil the time he needed to line up his forces just so and launch a single devastating mass attack. In the defense I am definitely a believer in pre-war Soviet doctrine which basically taught its officers to plan their defenses to defeat enemy tanks and basically rely on the fact that any defense which could fight off enemy tanks would benefit so hugely from this driving off of enemy support that it would be able to deal with the enemy infantry at its leisure. Perhaps the greatest example of this doctrine in history was the creation of the defenses in the Kursk salient which focussed almost solely on destroying German tanks. Minefields and anti-infantry measures were effected only insofar as they stripped infantry protection from the German tanks and thus aided in the prime aim of enabling the destruction of the German tank forces. Your interpretation of the defensive belts at Kursk may differ from mine but that is probably only because you don’t look at combat in the same manner I do and don’t adhere to Soviet doctrine in this regard.

In any case I wholeheartedly agree with this doctrine and approached this battle from the point of view of determining what I needed to do to nullify the threat posed by Bil’s armoured force. I realized that the structure of the scenario leanded itself to interpretation as a variant of a Red Army multi-echeloned attack. And decided to adapt some of the recent American strategic doctrine to this tactical level and deal with Bil’s forces according to the tenets expounded in the “Air-Land Battle” doctrine which was in vogue from the mid-80s.

Basically this doctrine is based on some interesting findings by researchers at the United States Army’s Field Artillery School in the late 1970s in which simulated battles were simulated on computer to determine a way in which a US multi-divisional force could survive against a Soviet-style echeloned attack. One book I have describes the findings well and simply. It states "“If they made no attempt to block the follow-on echelons, the enemy’s frontline strength remained at about the same level and the defenders eventually lost, no matter how well they fought….. The conclusion was that carefully planned and timed interdiction of the follow-on forces could have a dramatic impact on the battlefield by creating opportunities for counterattack… He (the defender) could shape the battlefield situation and muster his forces to fight at a time and place of his choosing where he would have the initiative and might well outnumber his enemy.”

This doctrine depends on having the strategic assets to interdict the enemy’s follow-on forces. This aspect of doctrine is well beyond the scope of CM and beyond the control of the player BUT the ten minute time gap between the beginning of the PBEM and the arrival of Bil’s two reinforcing companies is akin to one of the windows of opportunity which Air-Land Battle 2000 seeks to create.

I recognized that ten minute time period as being my chance to act aggressively and ensure that I wouldn’t be vastly outnumbered at the 11^th minute. By striking aggressively at this time when I was only slightly outnumbered I could ensure that I wouldn’t be as badly outnumbered as I otherwise would be when Bil’s reinforcements arrived on the scene. I also had the possibility of dictating the shape of the battlefield onto which Bil’s reinforcements would arrive and knew that I could wrest the initiative from him until such time as his reinforcements could truly enter the battle fully ( a time which I reckoned to occur about the 12^th or 13^th turn).

So, what would be my prime target during the first few turns? Well, obviously my prime target would be the enemy tanks. Everything I did would be aimed at allowing me to destroy or neutralize the offensive potential of the enemy tanks since once they broke through my advance defensive line they could pound my HMGs and mortars into dust. I realized I’d have to take the long-term view though since I simply didn’t have the weaponry available to kill enemy tanks protected by infantry. I DID however have the weaponry to kill isolated British tanks which had outrun their infantry support and thus I decided that my prime objective in the first few turns would be to kill as many British infantry as possible since this would enable me to lessen the offensive potential of the enemy tanks. Once those were killed I would advance to the line created by the crossroads and the road traversing my front and would try to kill as many tanks and support weapons as possible. I reasoned that if I could move to that line whilst still relatively intact that I would:

Have inflicted massive infantry casualties on Bil’s combat riflemen.

Have over-run many of his support weapons thus robbing him of their support during his upcoming main attack

Have had to catch a couple of his tanks unaware and knock them out

Prevent him from conducting any coordinated attacks and would, instead, convert his forces into two isolated kampfgruppe, one on each flank.

Be able to trade space for time and kills once his reinforcements showed up.

Shock Bil intensely. This shock would last for the entire game and greatly aid me even after his reinforcements showed up. I always say that if you “beat your opponent psychologically then he will defeat himself on the field of battle”. I firmly believe that I defeated Bil by turn 5 of this game since, by that stage, he was mentally in shock and contrived to defeat himself from then on with his excessively costly human wave attacks.

The AAR showed the values of the following:

Not being where your enemy expected you to be.

Maintaining a strong reserve force. At times I had 1/3^rd of my entire force in reserve even though this gifted Bil extra numerical superiority.

Fluidity. My plan was broad-based. It was, in effect, an example of auftragstaktik wherein the “general aim” of my mission remained constant but improvisation and changes in the modalities by which it was accomplished were encouraged.

Concentration of force. When I attacked I generally did so against an inferior force or a superior force which, by virtue of its position, was momentarily in a disadvantageous position.

Co-ordination. Bil had the numerical superiority to smash my force with the hammer-like blows of his human wave-style attacks, my counter to this was to try to keep my units separated widely enough that he couldn’t over-run two or three of them in one turn. However, this dispersion of forces necessitated the maintenance of a great degree of co-ordination in order to allow my independently maneuvering groups to maneuver in such a manner as to support each other when facing enemy attack or counter-attacking the enemy.

Massing a large number of soldiers into a small area is NOT the same as concentration of force. Bil’s human wave attacks are a great example of concentration of force through the application of mass. I’ve looked at the game from his perspective and his two reinforcing companies literally entered the battle in column formation. When the first platoon was stopped by my fire the platoon next in line charged through its position until it too was stopped whereupon the third platoon of the company charged into my position and finished the job.

On my left flank his first platoon was severely attrited in reaching the trees across the road from my forces. His second platoon made it across the road but suffered extensive casualties in so doing. Finally Bil committed his third platoon ( which was only metres behind the second platoon) in the hope that this would breach my line. By the time the fight between Giesey, Wittenberg and the first reinforcing company was over that company had been reduced to roughly a platoon’s worth of men in strength. Bil’s only reaction was to pass the second company through the 1^st company’s positions and continue the line ahead assault with the 2^nd company.

It has always been my contention that one should mass strategically but disperse tactically. At Midway the Japanese made the mistake of dispersing their forces strategically into multiple decoy groups, subsidiary raids etc etc but then proceeded to tactically mass the relatively small carrier force they mustered to attack Midway. The end result of this was that when their deception plan was rendered worthless by code-breakers their force was gathered into one vulnerable group instead of tactically dispersed into two or more groups.

In this game I decided to disperse my forces as widely as possible whilst ensuring sufficient co-ordination that they could combine to deliver counter-attacks when appropriate.

If you look at the movies of the game you will see many instances in which one of my platoons coordinated its movements against an enemy platoon with another friendly platoon 200 or more metres away. I firmly believe that the only thing that matters is getting a sufficient mass of firepower on target. Getting firepower on target doesn’t necessitate having the various units which are firing on the target in close communication. It only requires these units to have LOS to the target. In fact, it is preferable if an attack can come from multiple directions since that has the effect of complicating the enemy’s defensive provisions AND of coming up with a single one-axis counter to one’s attack.

In the same way that a one-axis ambush is, generally speaking, ineffective so is a one-axis counter-attack since it invites a one-axis counter. The clearest example of multi-unit co-ordination over great distances against a single target leading to multi-axial attack can be seen near the end of the game when both Bertram and Sehmel’s platoons combined to quickly attack two slightly separated enemy units on my right flank thus robbing each enemy component of the ability to lend its fire in support of the other. Furthermore this attack was timed to occur at such a time that the enemy was in the midst of moving from one firebase to the other. The end result of this was that many units were in transit and so neither firebase was even at half the strength of the previous single firebase.

Bertram’s unit  took part in very little fighting. Basically the drive against the right-flank firebase was the only fighting in which it got heavily involved. It took a total of THREE casualties but inflicted roughly NINETY and captured 3 enemy soldiers including the Battalion Commander. These are the benefits of dispersion to protect against attack and co-ordination between disparate, dispersed elements to deliver a hammer-blow counter-attack of their own. A 30:1 exchange rate isn’t to be trifled with ;)

Sehmel, who led the other portion of this action suffered a loss of a total of 17 men ( 13 or so of whom were wounded prior to this action) but caused the loss of roughly 50 enemy soldiers and 2 tanks, the majority of whom were killed during this counter-attack.

All in all this attack accounted for roughly 120 enemy soldiers and a tank at the cost of roughly 7 German Panzergrenadiers. Admittedly I was attacking Bil’s soft underbelly here since I was attacking mostly support units ( MMG teams, mortar teams, PIAT teams, shattered infantry etc) but I believe that the figures speak for themselves in showing how dispersal of force but co-ordination and concentration of firepower can combine to yield great benefits.

Anyways, I’ve repeated myself quite often in this analysis since I really wanted to drive some of the points home. I hope that those of you who realized them instantly weren’t too annoyed at the constant repetition and that those of you who didn’t realize them instantly take them to heart.

In general the three lessons I’d take from this AAR if I was reading it are as follows:

Just because I am defending doesn’t mean I can’t be aggressive.

I should geographically concentrate the squads in my platoon, geographically disperse the platoons in my company but ALWAYS, ALWAYS concentrate the fire of ALL my units.

If you scare or psychologically convince your opponent of his imminent and inevitable defeat early on in the game then you have already won. It may take some time before your opponent makes the necessary errors for you to capitalize on but once he is mentally beaten his defeat on the virtual battlefield will follow. ALWAYS seek to establish “moral superiority” over your opponents. Convince them that, as far as you are concerned victory is already assuredly yours and you’ll be surprised at how many players will “gift” you victory in what otherwise would have been a hard-fought battle. Never forget that you are playing a human and that ALL humans have the faults of pride, ego, self-doubt and fear. Play on these and you will win many of your battles irrespective of what goes on in the virtual field of battle.

Perhaps I will cover that particular aspect of PBEM conflict in a later article.