Review - Book, Todays Army Air Corps, Paul Beaver, 1987

The first thing to point out about what I think is a very handy little reference is that the title is a complete misnomer.  Written in 1987 the Today in the title very much refers to the Army Air Corps of yesterday and you will certainly struggle to find even a mention of the AH 64 which was a distant aspiration at the time of writing.  What the book does do well is provide a compact overview of the British Army Air Corps This includes:

• A Short History of Army Flying
• Structure and Command Arrangements
• Regiments Squadrons and the AAC Center
• Aircraft
• Weapons Roles and Equipment
• Future Programme
• Training and Tactics

This book is an excellent snap shot of the Army Air Corps at the backend of the Cold War. The Historical section is too short to do anything but provide pointers to conflicts in which the Army Air Corps had previously played a role.  The real value to the Cold War Gamer lies in less than half the book, primarily in the sections on:

• Structure and Command Arrangements. This section is a little thin but provides an overview of how the Army Air Corps supports the rest of the Army with both Aviation Advice, staff support and planning functions as well as the broad structure of the units and a view of the organisations that support is provided to essentially BAOR, UKMF, Special Forces and Northern Ireland.

• Regiments Squadrons and The AAC center. This section is the first of the two absolute nuggets in this book this covers each regiment and independent squadron and in a terse paragraph summarizes location role, equipment holdings and the HQ they report to, which is immensely useful for context and scenario planning if you want to refer to the real units.

• Training and Tactics. The second nuget is the training and tactics section which is sadly all too short and in a few pages talks through HELARM tactics with Gazelle and Lynx as they would operate in Germany.  This looks at both the Anti Armour and Recce/Air Op roles. It would have been nice to see something on Forward Air Refueling and cross FLOT (Forward Line of Own Troops) operations but the data supplied is enough to give you a basic understanding of how the Aviation assets would be used.  Its easy to forget that other missing items such as JAAT (Joint Air Attack Teams) post date this title, within the British armed forces.

The rest of the books information is useful but can be obtained easily else where, including online sources. For an out of print obscure little book it contains some very useful information. It can be picked up on Amazon, last I looked for .01p, at that price it pays for itself if you can use it to make the gaming table more stable by sticking it under one of the table legs. A thin tome but a worthwhile addition to the Cold War library if you have an interest in British aviation capability at the back end of the Cold War.

Today's Army Air Corps @ Amazon

Other Book Reviews:

Review-Book, The Race to The Swift, R Simpkin, 1985

Soviet/Russian Armour and Artillery Design Practices
Modern African Wars (3) South West Africa
Red God of War, Soviet Artillery and Rocket Forces
Iron Division, The History of the 3rd Division 1809-1989
Jane's Armour and Artillery 2002/2003

Rats Tales and Royal Scots in The Gulf

Warpaint, Colours and Markings of British Army Vehicles 1903-2003, Volumes 1-4

Air Battle Central Europe, Alfred Price

Confrontation, The Strategic Geography of NATO and the Warsaw Pact

Mil Mi 8/Mi - 17 Rotary Wing Work Horse and War Horse

A History of Soviet Airborne Forces 

Soviet Tactical Aviation

A History of Soviet Airborne Forces

Soviet Tactical Aviation

Armies of NATO's Central Front

Red Thrust, Central Front

The Soviet Afghan War, How a Super Power Fought and Lost

Weapons and Tactics of the Soviet Army

Soviet Air Land Battle Tactics

The Military Balance

Encyclopaedia of the Modern British Army

The Soviet Conduct of Tactical Manoeuvre

First Clash

The Third World War

The British Army in Germany

The Cold War Bookstore contains links to over 60 Cold War titles covered in my book list

Review Book - Modern African Wars (3) South West Africa

On the essential reading list for the SA Border War is the Osprey Modern African Wars (3) by Helmoed Romer Heitman a writer eminently qualified to pen the title.  The title contains a set of useful uniform colour plates covering a fairly wide range of SADF uniforms but with more limited coverage  of SWAPO/PLAN, UNITA and FAPLA uniform detail, additionally it contains a wealth of useful information that make it an ideal primer on the SA Border War this includes:

• A broad timeline of the conflict which covers the main political and military events from the occupation of German South West Africa by South African forces in 1915 through to the end of the conflict. This names all the major South African external opperations together with commentary on the evolution of SWAPOs tactical doctrine and operational statistics for each year. 
• A Review of the Organisational Structure andd equipment of the various different elements of the SADF including:
• 32 Bn
• 61 Mech Bn Group
• 1 Para Bn
• Marienes
• SAAF
• SWATF
• SWASpes
• Modular Bns
• Kovete
• SWA Protection Unit
• A Short Overview on the principal Angolan Forces covering at a high level UNITA and FAPLA
• A Short overview of SWAPO/PLAN,
• A Review of the Major external operations adding brief descriptive detail to that provided in the timeline
• A  description of the Colour plates which includes a look at both Unit and Rank insignia

This book provides in a very consumable fashion enough of an overview of the conflict to get you started on the period with limited effort. As might be expected this has a South African perspective and coverage of the SADF forms the bulk of the content. Despite this it is a good primer for use before engageing in further internet research or reading some of the more weighty tomes that cover the political and military history at a greater level of detail.  

The book was recently reprinted, prior to that copies were reaching prices of £60 - £90 now its back in easy reach with a second hand copy on Amazon currently commanding a sum of £4.50 at this price it really is a steal, particularly if you are new to the period and the conflict and want to get your teeth into it in a hurry.

Modern African Wars (3) South West Africa @ Amazon

Other Book Reviews:

Review-Book, Red God of War, Soviet Artillery and Rocket Forces
Review-Book, Iron Division, The History of the 3rd Division 1809-1989
Jane's Armour and Artillery 2002/2003

Rats Tales and Royal Scots in The Gulf

Warpaint, Colours and Markings of British Army Vehicles 1903-2003, Volumes 1-4

Air Battle Central Europe, Alfred Price

Confrontation, The Strategic Geography of NATO and the Warsaw Pact

Mil Mi 8/Mi - 17 Rotary Wing Work Horse and War Horse

A History of Soviet Airborne Forces 

Soviet Tactical Aviation

A History of Soviet Airborne Forces

Soviet Tactical Aviation

Armies of NATO's Central Front

Red Thrust, Central Front

The Soviet Afghan War, How a Super Power Fought and Lost

Weapons and Tactics of the Soviet Army

Soviet Air Land Battle Tactics

The Military Balance

Encyclopaedia of the Modern British Army

The Soviet Conduct of Tactical Manoeuvre

First Clash

The Third World War

The British Army in Germany

The Cold War Bookstore contains links to over 60 Cold War titles covered in my book list

Wargames Unit - Soviet Late 80's, Flame thrower Company Group

The Flame Thrower Company Group was a composite Flame Thrower Unit formed by the Army Independent Flame Thrower Battalion to support a Motor Rifle Regiment.  It Consisted of a Flame Thrower Company of 2 Platoons and a Flame thrower Tank Platoon from the Flame thrower tank Company.  Details of the organisation and composition together with the associated research and thinking can be found in the post ORBAT-Soviet Late 80's Breakthrough Capability, Part 2 Army Independent Flamethrower Battalions

I have built this unit as part of my Soviet Breakthrough Capability project and it is the first of a number of breakthrough related unit's I will be producing.  The TOS-1 is produced by modelcollect and can be sourced direct through them or through Brian at the Hobby Den.  It has been built straight from the box.

The BMP 2 and BMP 2D are both produced by S&S, and I have a sneaking suspicion this is about the only BMP 2D that you can get these days.  Both vehicles are simple resin models that require a reasonable degree of preparation before building but build into reasonable representations of the Wagons. The Weapon systems are all white metal.  

I must admit to a bit of an aversion to resin BMPs but having built these two am pretty pleased with the results.The vehicles are airbrushed with Tamiya XF-13 JA Green and the panels are oversprayed with a mix of JA Green and Tamayia XF-65 Field Grey, the pin was has been done using the Humbrol Blue Grey enamel wash and weathering is an on going experiment with air brush and washes, in this case the Humbrol enamel Dust Wash featured heavily.  The Decals are either QRFs white number set or from model collect.

For the Figures I have used Elhiems Cold War Soviet Range which have had Green stuff hoods added so they could be painted up in Sunbunnies in line with the rest of my Infantry.  The figures are actually carrying RPG-22s but I am using them to represent RPO-A teams.  

The RPG-22 gunner comes in CWR-18 a pack of three with a sniper and a SA-7/14 gunner and if your building a late period Motor Rifle Regiment you need a lot of SA-14 so quite a useful set from my perspective.  I am told Shaun at S&S does an RPO-A gunner but I have yet to find it on the S&S site.  

All up an unusual and interesting unit that I can't wait to get into action against my dug in Brits, although to some extent I need to build the BTR regiment to go with them as BTR regiments would be more likely to carry out this type of assault operation against a formed defence rather than the BMP regiment.  How the Soviets conducted the Breakthrough can be found in the TTP post on Breakthrough Attacks

Related Posts:

ORBAT - Soviet Late 80's Breakthrough Capability, Part 1 overview
ORBAT-Soviet Late 80's Breakthrough Capability, Part 2 Army Independent Flamethrower Battalions
ORBAT-Soviet Late 80's Breakthrough Capability, Part 3 Non Divisional Artillery Assets

TTP -Soviet Breakthrough Attacks 

Review-Model 1/72, model collect TOS-1 Buratino

Modelling - Cold War Soviet Vehicle Markings and Decals

Other Soviet Wargames Units:

Wargames Unit - 468 MSB, Divisional Forward Detachment at Waidhause
Wargames Unit -Soviet, Combat Helicopter Regiment, Assault Helicopter Squadron
Wargames Unit - Soviet, Combat Helicopter Regiment, Attack Helicopter Squadron
Wargames Unit - Soviet Late 80's Independent DShV Battalion
Wargames Unit - Soviet Late 80's MRB
Wargames Unit - Soviet MRR, Anti Tank Reserve
Wargames Unit - Soviet MRD, Anti Tank Battalion
Wargames Unit - Soviet MRR, Air Defence Battery
Wargames Unit - Soviet MRR, Recce Company
Wargames Unit - Soviet MRR, Regimental Artillery Group
Wargames Unit - Soviet early 80's MRB
Wargames Unit - Soviet VDV Regiment

Wargames Unit - British 1980's Tracked Rapier Battery

The concept for this years game pitched the British in defence and knowing the amount of Soviet air power that could be deployed against them I knew they needed to up their air defence game. The Rappier battery should be an HQ and 3 Troops but that seemed a little excessive given that I would only deploy two battle groups.

Rapier was an area air defence weapon and was deployed as part of the overall air defence plan rather than being attached to particular units. having said that units would end up under their umbrella so it seemed sensible to have some level of representation. The tracked Rapier battery is implemented at a vehicle scale of 1:3 which creates problems when representing troops that contained 4 launchers, I have gone for the following organisation:

• Battery HQ of 1 Saxon
• 2 Troops each of 1 Tracked Rapier and 1 M548

The M548s towed or carried the blind fire Radars along with immediate missile reloads for the launch vehicles. Given the cramped conditions on the launch vehicles I suspect the M548s carried a lot of other stuff.

The launch vehicles are from Cromwells range and the M548s are from S&S. All the stowage is locally produced using green stuff and bandage with white glue. Painting is in line with the model review posts on the vehicle and the crew commander is a Britania FV 432 commander.

 

Altogether I think the unit makes a nice little addition to my Brit forces and hope to get them into action latter in the year together with the Javalin detachments I am also engaged in building at the moment.

Related Posts of Interest:

Review - Model 1/76, Cromwell Tracked Rapier
Review - Model 1/72, S&S M548
ORBAT - 1980s British Air Defence

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Cold War Gamer, a Post War Gaming Facebook information stream.

Wargames Unit - British 1980's BG Armoured Squadron, Challenger 1

I started building this unit a long time ago, the first break in production was a fairly long wait to get the stowage sorted, the particular issue being crew figures. Then it spent an age waiting for the paint job to get completed. Primarily because I was not sure where the black lines should go, which is a bit of a sad story. I finished it off this week with quite a drastic revision to the painting process over the original British units and I am reasonably pleased with both the finish and the fact that it can be used alongside the rest

All my units are built for a Rapid Fire adoption to enable Cold War Games to be played out using that rule set and rather than the traditional 1:5 Ratio we use 1:3 for vehicles and major equipments giving me 4 vehicles in a 12 or 14 tank Squadron so capable of representing either of the two Orbats I saw deployed at Squadron level with no change.

The vehicles are all from Revell, stowage is all Green stuff bandages and plasticard. The crew figures are from the ex CMSC range now produced by Wee friends. Crew are portrayed in coveralls with the kevlar crew guard helmet which really places them in the latter part of the period.

The changes on the painting front other than using an airbrush included sealing the paint job with a semi gloss coat prior to weathering and pin washing and applying enamel based filters and washes, using the humbrol enamel wash range and Tamiyas flat clear acrylic paint which all went off pretty well.

I used decals from 4 different sheets of the TL Modelblau set and have accepted the limitations of using the yellow sets as these give better contrast with the Cam scheme, Whilst their will be enough decals to do both the Armoured Regiment and the Mechanised battalion on those sheets I will have to buy more if I want the mech boys in yellow.

This is the first of a number of Squadrons of CR 1 that will build into an armoured battle group, probably 3 in total that I will use as either a 3:0 or a 3:1 Battle group.  In addition to the CR1s I will get a couple of Scorpions, a Sultan for BHQ and probably a CRARV if I can source one from Cromwell. There are probably a couple of Orbat posts to pop out around the Armoured corps as I would also like to generate a Divisional Recce Squadron later this year in order to support a variety of the lighter role reinforcement battle groups.

The Revell model is a great vehicle probably one of the best detailed kits I have built, sadly let down by the smoke grenade discharger units, which I have yet to find an after Market replacement for, although some of S&S's FV432 ones whilst wrong would probably look better than those supplied with the kit.

Squadron two is already built but yet to be stowed and Squadron three needs ordering. The armoured Regiment will play the Brigade Reserve for a couple of Big Soviet deliberate attack games that I have a hankering to play and will probably have to take on the Soviet Air Armada at some stage which would be used to block reserve deployments.

Other Posts of Interest:

Review - Model 1/72, Revell FV 4030 Challenger 1
ORBAT - 1980's British BG Part 7, The Infantry Battalion

ORBAT - 1980's British BG Part 4, Recce Group

Jezamonous' 2010 22 Armoured Brigade Build Thread

Revell 1:72 Challenger I Tank @ Amazon

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