AAR - The Wiessenberg Counter Attack, Part 2 Opening Moves

The Soviet Army's 280 Motor Rifle Regiment had by 13:00 hours on 19 August established a hasty defence around the area of Weisennberg where they intended to block 12 Panzer Brigades continued movement North into the flank of 18 Gds Motor Rifle Division which was driving towards Stuttgart. 18 Guards Motor Rifle Divisions anti tank reserve, 136 Independent Anti Tank Battalion had been heavily reinforced by elements of 280 Motor Rifle Regiment and the resulting combined arms force had built the blocking position around two fire pockets, fire pocket Влад in the West and Fire Pocket Александр in the East. Both lay between the Western edge of Wiessenberg and the Hochwald.

79 MRB's HQ and support weapons occupied a position at Schmalwiesen, whilst the motor rifle companies deployed to a number of forward ambush sites. The position was prepared by 18 Independent Engineer Battalions field fortification detachment who also provided defensive works for the two gun batteries of 136 Independent Anti Tank Battalion.

The first of these batteries was located in the lea of Weimensheim effectively astride the two fire pockets and capable of engaging targets in both, forward of them was a company of 151 Air Assault Battalion in an ambush position (marked with a Blind) In post action debriefs the Commander of 136 AT Battalion was to note how very exposed this battery was.

280 MRRs Anti Tank Battery also sat forward in fire pocket Александр in what would turn out to be a disastrous position that fundamentally failed to exploit the capabilities of their weapons, some have speculated that they ended up in this position through an error of navigation. The battery had ceased to exist by 14:00 hours on 18 August.

To the rear of fire pocket Александр sat two of the 3 Artillery battalions in the regimental Artillery group, 28 Battalion the regiments own 122mm battalion was located on the North Western Edge of Weisenberg whilst 161 Battalion a 152mm battalion Allocated from the DAG sat in the Wald to the North of Weimensheim both were to end up in a shoot out with the leopards of 12 Panzer brigade by the end of the days fighting.

Weisenberg itself was covered by the regimental Recce company whilst one of the Motor Rifle companies from 79 MRB occupied a position in the industrial area covering into fire pocket Александр

The defence around Fire Pocket Влад in the West had been similarly structured by Colonel Rokovski. Forward in Weiemenshiem and in the Hochwald were elements of 151 Air Assault battalion located in ambush positions, to there rear in both locations sat the remaining two motor rifle companies from 79 MRB and the ATGW battery of 136 independent AT Battalion.

The hardstop on Fire Pocket Влад was provided by 136 AT Battalions second gun battery excellently positioned in the Russian farm along with its PSNR 5 Radar equipped observation post and an SA9 platoon from the regimental air defence battery. At the rear of the Hochwald sat the second battalion of 122m guns in 280 MRRs Regimental Artillery Group.

With some Soviet units still out of position elements of 4 Aufklärung Battalion started to arrive along with 12 Panzer Brigades Aufklärung platoon in the Weissenberg area, unnerved by there appearance the Soviets unmasked a significant number of assets in an attempt to blind 12 Panzer Brigade. On the Western Flank the Soviets lost an Artillery observer which drastically reduced the effectiveness of artillery fire into Fire Pocket Влад. The did however manage to destroy and badly damaging 2 Luchs of 12 Panzer Brigades Aufklärung platoon.

On the Eastern Flank elements of 4 Aufklärung battalion approached from the South of Hattenhof pushing through the gap between Hattenhof and Wiessenberg. They two were quickly engaged from the MRB position south of Schmalweisen and lost two Luchs in quick succesion.

There appearance to the rear of 280 MRR AT battery, and the engagement of that battery lead to its rapid redeployment, not that this move would save the battery who continued to take casualties over the first hour of the battle. The remaining elements of 4 Aufklärung Battalion followed hard on the heals together with the lead elements of the 121 mixed battalion the force splitting with the initial units taking cover in Hattenhof. The two groups quickly closed down the Soviet AT Battery that clung on stubbornly just north of the Schmalwiesen Road.

On the Western Flank 122 Panzer Grenadier battalion pushed into Weimenshiem with its panzer grenadier companies whilst pushing on with the Panzer Company which lost a leopard 2 to the AT Battery at Russian Farm whilst destroying one of the forward deployed Motor Rifle companies.

The initial engagements caused problems to both sides and caused the advancing 12 Panzer brigade troops to pause to asses the problems that faced them before proceeding further.

Reflections

In this game I was trying to examine the use of Soviet defensive doctrine in the context of a wider meeting engagement. On reflection a mini campaign would be better to look at this as the displacement to new positions was usually over significant distance a two stage game with the first focused on a forward delay battle and the second on the blocking action would work better. We used Rapid Fire with some amendments for Modern warfare, the principal difficulties with this approach are the relatively short weapon ranges, identification ranges and low cross country performance of the vehicles that probably need adjusting to better reflect modern armoured warfare, this was brought out by the size of the 16 x 8 playing area, which was supposed to represent a 4km x 2km playing area, but with the reduced weapon ranges was more like 8km x 4km and the terrain density was therefor a little out.

Whilst the general deployment of the Soviet force worked I didn't really consider the artillery in sufficient detail so in my mind failed to exploit there potential although the German players had a different view. Whilst terrain and artillery fire slowed the Germans down, the Soviets didn't really manage to capitalise on this particularly in the East where the forward deployment of the GW battery was a significant error. The initial phase of this game produced an interesting battle with the Germans attempting to secure the forward urban areas whilst duelling with long range ATGW fire. The Soviet concept of using the SP batteries to cover secondary approaches and provide depth to the defence seemed like a useful concept. The final post in this series will focus on the ensuing tank action.

References:

AAR - Wiesenberg Counter Attack, Part 1 Ground

AAR - Wissenberg Counter Attack, Part 3 Counter Strike
TTP - Soviet, Forward Detachments as a Covering Force

Scenario - The Wiessenberg Counter Attack

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Review - Product, Coresec Flight Stands

Corsec Engineering are a US company offering a wide range of flight stands and other gameing accessories.  As I am currently working a large Soviet Airmobile force I thought I would take a look at what they have to offer to see if they were worth buying.  The Aircraft I am aiming to mount using the Corsec system are 20mm or 1/72 plastic aircraft from the cold war.  The majority are helicopters which suit quite small stands in the 1" - 3" category although the aircraft needed something with a bit more height.

In addition some of the models notably the Mi 26 Halo and Mi 6 Hook are not small and you need a degree of assurance with larger models that what your building is robust.  Having reviewed the product range I went for:

• 20mm plastic bases

• 3" screw top flight stands

• 17" Telescopic Flight stands

• Mounting pegs

The flight stands have been made by attaching the 20mm bases to either CD Roms for the large Helicopters or High Flying aircraft and 60mm laser cut MDF bases from East Riding Miniatures.  Whilst I have yet to use the product and the resulting stands in action I have been very impressed with the service, the quality of the products, the ease of use and the ease of storage.  

Drilling a 5mm hole in the base of the aircraft and inserting and gluing a mounting peg sorts the aircraft end of the problem.

Glueing the plastic base ti the CD ROM or MDF base sorts the other after that you just screw in the rod to the base of the aircraft and the stand and your done.  Which is an immensly time efficient solution compared to most methods I have tried.  In addition it all collapses for storage - so in summary:

• excellent product
• excellent service
• simple time efficient solution

Terrain - Byzantium 20mm, German Buildings

A couple of years ago I bought a number of Byzantium Models excellent German buildings which are suitable for either the second world war or modern periods and provide a range of homes and farms found in small villages and isolated settlements throughout Germany.

The buildings are all resin and came in excellent condition, requiring little clean up.  They have done that very clever thing of varying the vertical and the horizontal scales to keep the building footprint down while maintaining proportion and looking good next to figures and vehicles.  As well as the main buildings you can also buy a number of small extensions which fit onto any of the models these along with the metal chimneys allow a variety of buildings to be created from the core models

In preparation for the Wissenberg Counter Attack game I had a bit of a blitz on terrain making and decided to get on with the building of these. I settled on three standard base sizes for all my buildings 1 large and two varieties of small, these all went on the small apart from the farm buildings.

Bases were cut from MDF and tidied up with a sander, before the buildings were glued in place. I then added walls gardens and the extensions as well as filler around the base of the building to ensure it sat "in the ground".

 My interpretations of BMG 1+ 2 the farm house and German barn with the addition of a hedge and a wall for the farm house along with room for a couple of trees when complete.

I had two BGM 6 buildings so added an outhouse to one and mounted them both on the larger of the base sizes used adding walls and sand, whilst masking off an area to represent paving, as all urban spaces need plenty of grey.  Walls are made from Foam core covered in filler.

I had two BGM 4 but swapped the roof of one with the BGM3 roof and put different styles of outhouses in different locations and mounted the buildings different ways round on the bases, before adding walls and garden.

The BGM 3 Unit I built straight from the box but had swapped the roof.  All up no two buildings looked the same and with the liberal use of some filler around the outhouse construction and base they all looked excellent and ready for the hard bit - painting

The buildings were painted with a mix of poster colours and vajjelo. avoiding flat white like the plauge and using washes to create a variety of shades of the core coloures. various basing products were then used to finish them off.

References:

Byzantium Models German Buildings


Terrain - Modern Farm Buildings
Terrain - Modern Supermarket

Terrain - Hikki Trees, Pine Forests

Terrain - Making It Modern

Terrain - Camouflaged Hides 

AAR - Wissenberg Counter Attack, Part 1 Ground

On the 19th of August 1988 Germany's 12 Panzerbrigade launched itself across the Weissenberg gap into the flank of 18 Guards Motor Rifle Division part of 20 Combined Armies Army of the Central or Czechoslovakian Front.  In a gruelling day long battle the Germans struggled hard against a mix of Soviet ATGW fire and the massed artillery fire from 280 Motor Rifle Regiments Regimental Artillery Group.  The Brigade eventually broke through the Soviet hasty defence with a panzerkiel formed by the Leopard 2A1s of 123 and 124 Panzerbattalions in a scene reminiscent of the Eastern front some 43 years earlier.  The Weissenberg gap is and was ideal tank country, an area of flat open agricultural land to the west of Weisenberg that lent itself well to the swift armoured thrust that 12 Pz Brigade intended to deliver into the flank of 18 Guards Motor Rifle Division, which with 201 Tank Regiment leading was driving hard for Stuttgart.

The major features of the area included Wissenberg and the surrounding villages of Schmalwiesen Hattenhof and Weimensheim along with the wooded high ground of the Hochwald that bounded the area to the West.  

The town of Weimensheim in the South western corner of the Weissenberg Gap was set to become the seen of fierce resistance by forward ambush groups of 151 Air Assault battalion who fought from the town and the nearby Hochwald feature against the troops of Panzergrenadier batalion 122 and the brigade  Aufklärungszug.

above and below air photo shots of Weimensheim taken by the Luftwaffe's Aufklärungsgeschwader 51 "Immelmann" Photo reconnaissance squadron flying Tornadoes out of Bremgarten Airbase, these images were taken 6 hours before the arrival of 12 Panzer Brigade

This shot below from the same set of photos shows the town of Hattenhof from the East bypassed by Aufklärungsbataillon 4 who drove to link up with the 46 Jägerbataillon who should have been in Schmalwiesen

Looking South from the"Russian Farm" towards Hattenhoff and Weimensheim the open nature of the ground can be appreciated from this shot.

The "Russian Farm"  so called after it was occupied and used by 27 Anti Tank Battery from 136 Independent Anti Tank Battalion which together with elements of 151 Air Assault Battalion and a Company from  79 MRB held the Soviet Eastern flank successfully during the Weissenberg Counter Attack.  This position formed the core of the Soviet defence around fire pocket Влад. 136 Anti Tank Battalion was one of the first to receive the new Sprut 2A45 anti tank guns and they used them to deadly effect.

The western Edge of Weissenberg the large town at the Eastern end of the Weissenberg Gap creating an area of difficult terrain which the Soviets hoped would be by-passed by the Germans. this was lightly held by an artillery battalion and Recce Company from 280 MRR

and Finally the village of Schmalwiesen which formed the Northern boundary of Fire Pocket Александр which unfortunately for the Russians they would be unable to close due to an inability to communicate with the Divisional BM 27 battalion which should have provided a scatterable minefield as part of the on call fire plan of 79 MRB. 

This then was the historic site of the last charge of 12 Panzerbrigade, which now like so many of the battle sites of World War Three is now designated a UN World Peace site. It was the scene of a dramatic and confused meeting engagement that lasted for three days and eventually prevented the penetration of 4 Panzergreinader division's area of responsibility by 20 Combined Arms Army though at a significant cost to the men of 12 Panzerbrigade amongst others.

References:

Steel Leopards, 12 Panzer Brigade at Wiessenberg,  BrigGen A Wittenberg, 2020

Red Highway, The Drive into Germany, Colonel Professor Valentine Runov, 2015

War and Reconciliation, UN World Peace sites 

TTP - Soviet, Forward Detachments as a Covering Force

Scenario - The Wiessenberg Counter Attack

AAR - Wissenberg Counter Attack, Part 2 Opening Moves

AAR - Wissenberg Counter Attack, Part 3 Counter Strike