WWIII Scenerio (SP)

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felinis
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Location: Baltimore

WWIII Scenerio (SP)

Post by felinis »

I am starting a series of monographs chronicling my WWIII scenario exploits.

I will try to do one for each country that I conquer.

I will try to include the game dates, real-time dates, treasury bonuses from booty, and opponent military confidence (MC) ratings.

[NOTE:
Although you are perfectly within you rights to post comments to this thread anytime you please, I was hoping to maintain an unbroken, easy-to follow guide to WWIII in these pages. After this magnum-opus is completed, there will be plenty of time and room for questions and comments.

Meanwhile, if you wouldn't mind directing your questions and comments directly to to me via private BG-mail, I will be more than happy to reply.]

First, some general observations:

Game settings - player U.S., level = very hard, AI aggressiveness varied, no missile storage limits, range compensation on, FOG-OF-WAR ON (very important), extended LOS off, resources default, WMD allowed.

In the interest of full disclosure - on or about May, 2022 of the game I introduced my own game mod in mid-game. I call this the Cat-Mod and it and a full description of the first version is available on the SupremeWiki. I acknowledge that this will make it easier for me to win the game because it lets me man more bases with fewer personnel.

I am always pleased with the default arsenal that you get with the US - a good starting point.

In the very hard level, all of my neighbors hate me and diplomacy is a waste of time - I have ZERO credibility with the rest of the world, even when I put half of my military bases in reserve to lower my build capacity.

I ran into financial trouble early on and tried to sell bonds - that does not work.

At first I could trade with other countries, even if I could not establish embassies or treaties with them. That ended quickly when they all turned on me and declared war.

Another nice thing is that I started with Alaskan and Gulf of Mexico oil reserves.

Get used to not trading - you can sell to your domestic population at higher prices than you can for exports. And as you conquer more nations, you have more and more domestic customers.

I saw the Canada and Mexican attacks coming, so I made the mistake of building a string of rader stations on both borders. It turns out that these things cost about 9.6 BILLION PER STATION PER YEAR to operate. I also made useless fortifications and radars in Alaska, Washington DC and New England - as if any opponents was actually going to have the initiative to attack there.

My GOOD investments were the outposts and air strips that I also added along the borders. These were completed before the big attack and were very helpful.

Within about a year they all decided to declare war on me. That is OK, since only Mexico and Canada could reach US territory.
Last edited by felinis on May 19 2007, edited 9 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Canada

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 12/22/16
Real Game Duration: 4 days

The first two to declare war - the first two that mattered, were Canada then Mexico.

Having fought Canada once before, I knew exactly what tactics to use against them.

In the previous World scenario, defeating Canada was tough - real tough. I destroyed their industries, captured their capital, nothing would make them surrender. When they finally gave up their military approval rating was about 1%.

In this WWIII scenario, Canada jumped on me early on and I kicked their Lablatts-drinking butts. In this version, Canada is not strongly defended, as are the oil-producing states in the rest of the scenario

I had my bases and air strips in place at strategic spots along the border. They lacked a strong naval presence to protect the seaway at Buffalo, so I easily rolled up the Northern shore of Lake Erie from Detroit and Buffalo.

Seattle was well fortified and I easily took Vancouver.

Montreal and New England was harder, since it was more difficult getting units and air-support up there. But I held the border.

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I deployed and tasked some of my state-of-the-art aircraft - F-16, and F-15s, F-117s and B-52s - to provide air support to ground-pounders in need of assistance.

I took Ottawa in an airborne assault, air-dropping Special Forces there after neutralizing their air defenses.

I have a hard time coordinating my air-borne assaults with the progress of my infantry/armor. By the time I have conceived and organized an air-borne assault, I have usually pushed my dirt-pounders near the objective.

Any way, after capturing their capital, the wussies gave up with 30% of military confidence left. This was on January 16th, 2017.

The last time I was rewarded with a nice fleet of combat and transport ships. This time I just got $691 M, a few combat ships and the remnants of their beat-up infantry.

Canada does however have the best uranium mines in the world - and Lablatts.

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Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 9 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII- Mexico

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 01/16/17
Real Game Duration: 5 days

The next idiots to declare war on me were the Mexicans. I had established a fortified frontier at the Southern border, but only manned with a token force. I was still getting things in order from the Canadian war when Mexico attacked on January 18th, 2017.

My treasury was running a $2.4 Billion deficit.

I conducted a holding action until the boys could come sober up from all of the Lablatts, jump into their vehicles and come down from Canada and fight the Mexicans for their Corona, XXX and Tecate.

The first ones to have their act together were the San Digeo units. They rolled down the Baha in short order. I took La Pas with an air-borne assault using Army Airborne stallions

The Navy sailed down the Mexican West coast to take some Mexican ports, but discovered a Mexican naval force protecting them. I recalled them.

One of my objectives in this game is to try and preserve as many of the enemy units as possible so that I inherit them when their government falls. If enemy army or naval units can be safely by-passed on the way to capturing the enemy's capital, I will do it.

Meanwhile the rest of the Army was forming up in Texas. I assembled the entire National Guard into one big unit and sent it South. The armor and remaining infantry arrived later.

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of supply trucks on a champagne like this - you should have 1/3 as many supply trucks as combat units when you depart your own supplied territory. Otherwise, you will need to slowly wait for your new region's supply environment to rise and your armor will move like it is traveling thru mud.

After token resistance, all of my forces were poised North, outside of Mexico City.

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It was about this time that it became fashionable for all nations of the world to declare war on the US. I started to get E-mail after E-mail announcing that for some unknown reason such and such nation wanted to pick a fight with the US.

There was no easy way to take the capital - they had a lot of AA and their own aircraft too, so an airborne assault was out of the question. I decided on a frontal assault.

It was a blood-bath, a wild melee with two huge armies butting heads in northern Mexico City. As we approached the airport, I brought up AA to protect my guys and hopefully to take down some Mexican aircraft.

I left my own air support at home for this one.

AA is not very good offensively, since the airplanes just sharply move off as soon as they are hit once. They seem to be smart enough not to pursue my aircraft into AA traps too.

Of course, no good blood-bath is complete without MRLS - I brought up the mobile missile launchers and they did a fine job of pounding those Mexican units that were without AA protection.

When Mexico city fell on Feb. 8th, 2017, I got $2.2 Billion of their $22 Billion treasury. We then played tug-o-war with their capital. The second time I got $1.6 billion, then 1.5. When the Mexicans surrendered on Feb. 14th, 2017, I got a final $1.2 billion. This helped my treasury a lot, but I was still running a $1.6 Billion deficit.

Their military confidence was still 18% when they surrendered. I also got their little navy with several good destroyers, all of their army. Their air force at MC was wiped out, since I took their only air base, leaving only a few helos to the South..

Two conquests in my first year. Not a bad day's work.

Real-game duration - six days.

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Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 9 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII-Consolidation

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 02/14/17
Game Duration: Six days

After conquering Mexico, there was no pressing need to deal with the hostiles down in South America and Brazil. My treasury was still running a deficit. The whole world had declared war against the U.S.

After two major conflicts, it was time to pay some serious attention to my economy and other empire house-keeping chores. After a conquest is a good time to do these, since you need to integrate the resources of the new nations into your empire.

This usually entails culling and updating - scrapping old neglected facilities that have no potential to prosper, and up-grading ones that are favorably located.

Use a critical eye in picking sites for new facilities. Remember, if you have been culling and gradually improving the average "Active" rating of your facilities, you will be shopping for high-quality sites to replace inferior facilities.

Eventually you will build a large portfolio of lumber, coal pr other facilities. Deactivate the least efficient ones. Later, as the list grows longer, consider either upgrading the facilities at the bottom, or scrapping them.

If one of your product's surplus grows too large then de-activate all of the plants that produce that product until the surplus is consumed.

Balance social services, research and defense costs and adjust tax rates until your treasury is solid and on the increase. Over-taxing your empire or depriving your population of social services are both counter-productive.

Remember, at the very hard level, your best customers are your domestic population. And they vote too.

I totally gave up on world trade at this point. The whole world disliked the US when I started and now I had beaten up on two of their allies and everyone was at war with me.

If your treasury starts to crash, check the expenditures list under your Treasury department's budget report. See which item has grown out of reasonable limits. Resist the impulse to take control from your ministers.

Except to personally manage tax rates and social service expenditures, leave them in charge.

You will see some alarming red negative numbers in your product export reports. Ignore these. Your commerce minister is not selling anything abroad.

If you cannot figure out what expense to cut, and you are not in immediate combat, place all but the most critical of your military units into reserve.

Then wait and watch your treasury direction arrow. If it continues to fall, start placing ALL of your military bases in inactive status. Keep cutting domestic spending until your treasury begins to again increase.

Once you are on the path to financial prosperity, you can carefully start to restore your cuts.

The exploitation of new untapped resources is also something to look forward to after conquering a new nation - prospecting for new oil and minerals, searching rivers for ideal sites for water and hydro-electric facilities. Finding the perfect farming valley or the premo stretch of timber.
Last edited by felinis on Dec 02 2006, edited 2 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII- South America

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 02/14/17
Game Duration: Six days

Regarding weapons production - up to this point I have been building strong, modern armor and aircraft for the future battle with other modern military powers like England and Russia. These have stayed in reserve for future - far future, use.

Although the under-developed countries like South America and Brazil do have large standing armies, breaking out my best weapons to fight them just doesn't seem necessary. Instead I like to parley the captured weapons and turn them against the next opponent. The core of my Army remains the U.S. forces from CONUS, but it is strongly supplemented with Canadian and now Mexican equipment.

The only exception is that I brought out modern fighters, A-10s and B-52 bombers to provide close-in air support.

Now I turn my attention to South America (SA) - it is March 30th, 2017. I have turned my economy around until I have $4 billion in my treasury - good enough to go to war again. SA has already declared war on me, just like the rest of the world.

SA is going to be a tough nut to crack - their capital is at Buenos Aires - safely far away at the other end of the continent. My army is separated from it by a vast expanse of jungle and big rivers. My Navy cannot easily reach it and it is too far away for an air-borne assault.

I hope that they will fold as easily as my first two opponents did. A lot of their population is in the North and on their West coast. Hopefully, taking those will demoralize the government enough to make it surrender.

I start my invasion and am met with a medium amount of resistance. As usual, the plan is to not to wait to build my own supply and repair bases, but to move ahead quickly and take their bases. Engineers are essential to this process, since captured repair bases are rarely 100 functional and are in need of quick repair.

My forces take Panama and invade Northern SA. I direct them to quickly spread out and take all cities and town of any size. Captured territory counts heavily towards demoralizing the enemy government.

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Before long we are on the Western coast headed South towards the capital. The coastal road will not handle the huge volume of traffic presented by my huge Army, so I have to send them down in small groups.

I start to use attack helicopters for the first time - Blackhawk, SeaHawk, SuperCobra, Apache and Longbow.

I send a naval task force in parallel along the coast to take the enemy sea piers before my army arrives. I have A-10, Harrier II and B-2 Bombers for air support.

My land force consists mainly of light infantry and National Guard, with a strong AT escort. There is a log of MLRS and other artillery, including AA.
There are Bradley IFVs, but very little armor. What tanks there are are bringing up the rear.

Surprisingly, I have NO supply vehicles - OOPS! I have ignored my own advice - an over-sight in the heat of battle. I still make good progress, I think due to the conducive terrain and climate.

SA is not giving up easily and it is clear that I am going to have to take the capital. Their military confidence is very low, but they show no sign of surrender.

Eventually my army makes it South to Calama, Peru. Here I fight a pitched battle with closely matched opposing forces. I am clearly over-extended, supply is terrible and my blitz-krieg advance is halted.

Eventually I move up enough of the trailing forces to over-come the stiff resistance and improve supply. The attack helos are pivotal in the success of this battle.

Here I must make an eastern turn inland to approach Buenos Aires. We are 1650 KM North-West of the capital. Again the single road makes traveling difficult.

A group of tanks, helos and infantry make a dash directly East and take an air strip at Formosa, just 805 KM NW of BA. The date is August 30th, 2017.

Just two weeks later I am on the outskirts of the capital. An airborne force has been landed at the captured airbase in Formosa, but the fighter air-cover in BA makes an airborne assault there impossible.

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I have taken an air-strip West of the capital at Santa Rosa and it is full of my helicopters and several of my A-10s.

BA is protected by an air-base full of combat aircraft, as are most capital cities. Fortunately, I brought along AA for the occasion. I put them in the vanguard.

The BA harbor is protected by frigate and patrol ships.

My forces are approaching from the North, Northwest and from the South-West. The Northern force depends upon capturing two key bridges that cross the la Plata river.

Finally I take BA and am rewarded with $93 Billion of SA's treasury.
Their air force flees South and their military confidence is 3% and falling.
It is now September 20st, 2017.

Three weeks later on October 13 SA finally surrenders with a military confidence of just 1%. I got an extra $69 Billion. Most of the ships in BA harbor were destroyed when the capital fell, but SA had a surprisingly large fleet of diesel submarines, and a lot of frigates scattered at sea piers along both costs. There were also several DDRs.

The remaining air force was an eclectic mix of modern transport planes, attack helicopters and a bunch of out-dated Spanish fighter-bombers.

I also got a large army of units that were stationed in the South.

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Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 7 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Brazil

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 10/13/17
Real Game Duration: 8 days

I still had a lot of the SA continent to conquer. I had sent my US Navy units back to port for repair in Panama, but I had a new SA navy to work with.

My units were scattered all over SA, except in Brazil. The immediate task was to collect them all, repair them, select which ones to keep and organize them into an invasion force for Brazil.

The Brazilian capital of San Paulo is not far North of Buenos Aires and I had already taken several sea piers North of Brazil as far as Guyana. I used this small group to take another sea pier in North-Eastern Brazil, as sort of a diversionary action.

My newly combined army was grouped mostly in BA, but I had to gather the remaining SA's from the Southern horn of SA and from the SW coast.

Once I got the SAs sorted out and repaired, and took care of a domestic crisis, it was December 10th, 2017. The starting Brazilian military confidence was only 45% - they must have gotten beaten up pretty badly before I got there.

I had the three combat groups closest to the border move to take the Brazilian city closest to them. Meanwhile I ordered all other land units in Southern SA to converge on the positions of the three.

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The SA navy was gathered together just South-East of BA, awaiting orders to sail North.

My coastal units rolled North up the coast to San Paulo and took the Brazilian capital on January 3rd, 2018. My Western group never had to move. The Brazilians gave up $510 Million in tribute, but did not surrender.

I had my Navy stay put to preserve the big Brazilian fleet off San Paulo.

They moved their capital next door to Rio de Janeiro. I air-dropped a force of Airborne and Special forces there the next day. They surrendered then on the January 4th, with a military confidence rating of 11%. The airborne units paid a heavy price with about 80% casualties.

I received an additional reward of $626 Million. I also got a big fleet of more submarines, patrol boats, frigates, destroyers, AOEs and a one-plane aircraft carrier. Most of their army was destroyed, but I got a few fighter planes.

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Hail Felinis, ruler of all of the Americas!

But here is where the hard work starts. It is important to remember that you cannot continue moving on, building and capturing bases and air facilities indefinitely. Why? because even the lowliest radar station costs you 9 BILLION PER YEAR.

You reach a certain point where you are happily building units and capturing foreign bases when your treasury starts to drop. And drop. And drop some more. Why? Because you have too many active bases! You may very well have reserve personnel enough to man them all, but you still have to pay all of those guys if they are deployed.

What is the solution? DEACTIVATE A BUNCH OF BASES. Any air strips not being used? Deactivate (close) them. Any abandoned outposts? Close them. Any unused sea piers that are not supplying oil derricks? Close them. Any supply depots not supporting oil fields? Close 'em.

Note that there really is no need to scrap any unused base. Once de-activated, they cost you nothing or near nothing, mostly due to the lack of expensive personnel. Think twice about closing air bases - they are used to store missiles. You can also empty reserve units from big expensive bases and consolidate them into reserve in small cheap outposts, then deactivate the big bases (ones that you are not using for arms production.)

Any strong modern units that you do not plan to use immediately? Put them in reserve. Any lamo foreign units that you will never use (like patrol boats)? Sell them. Build too many artillery pieces? Sell them too. Have more of any unit in reserve than you can possibly ever use at one time (like FIMs)? Sell them.

You will be amazed - after a though house-cleaning like that, your treasury indicator will turn up and green. (unless your domestic affairs minister is giving it all away to your populace.)

Another big job was to cull and update all of SA's facilities, pick new sites and build on them.

Anyway, I digress. After a good house-cleaning I began the job of emptying out South America - literally. I planned to move every last unit, land, sea and air to Africa.

P.S. In reality, it proved useful to maintain an air base at Natal on the Eastern tip of Brazil, in addition to a chain of air-strips from Panama along the Eastern coast of SA. These air-strips can be activated and de-activated on demand as you ferry aircraft or troops to Africa.
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 10 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
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tkobo
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Location: In a vast zionist plot ...RIGHT BEHIND YOU ! Oh Noes !

Post by tkobo »

I havent noticed a new of these in awhile, glad to see one.
This post approved by Tkobo:Official Rabble Rouser of the United Yahoos
Chuckle TM
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Libya

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 01/03/18
Real Game Duration: 12 days

So, I now ruled all of the Americas, except for some little islands owned by Britain (Bahamas) and India. I even landed some marines on a few of the Bahamian towns but the island chain stayed British.

But NA and SA are sort of a super island - how do you get off and attack other countries? One way is by naval assaults or by air assault.

I choose a center path - the Canary Islands are near. Most transport aircraft can fly that far without refueling. But they need a friendly air-strip to land on. So I air-dropped four Airborne Engineers on two of the islands and had them construct sea piers and then air-strips.

Actually I planned early on for this sort of expansion by developing the Hawaiian Islands, New Foundland an the Azores the same way as with the Canary Islands.

BTW - the Azores are in the center of the Northern Atlantic. The WWIII map shows them just 350 KM West of Portugal.

So, the Canary Islands were my sea and air foot-hold on Africa, or in this scenario - Libya. I also needed to take a sea pier and an airstrip in NW Africa. My long-range objective was Gibraltar.

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So for now I wanted to plan an amphibious assault on the African coast from SA. The closest point to Africa in SA is at Natal, Brazil, on the Eastern-most tip of SA - 1850 KM air miles from the coast of NW Africa.
An easy trip there and back for most transport planes.

I built sea piers and two air strips in Natal. One air strip I later upgraded to an air base.

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Next, I looked for a site on the African coast near to Natal that I could take and land a force on, relatively unopposed. I picked the coastal town of Monrovia in Liberia. It didn't have a sea pier, but all of the sea piers North of it were well defended. Monrovia would be my land-foot-hold in Africa.

Since it had no pier to land transports on, I would need to stage an amphibious landing. I started organizing it on May 8th, 2018.

I first sent an AWACS plane over to reconnoiter the region. Then
I sent a naval combat group there consisting of submarines, four cruisers, five Frigates and two aircraft carriers with attack aircraft. The submarines swept the waters for enemy subs, and the combat ships destroyed the few enemy patrol craft.

By June 4th, 2018, I had anchored three loaded LSTs, LPDs and LSDs off Monrovia, and had supplemented them with AO and AOEs for supply.
On the Natal side I had eight more amphib ships, more supply ships and combat ships. I was staging combat helicopters and more aircraft carriers and attack planes. Supply trucks had been flown in from reserve in CONUS.

Further North up the coast I was organizing a second air-borne assault with light infantry and other para-dropable units.

On July 8th, more amphib and transport ships were carrying tanks and supply trucks to the Monrovia off-shore staging point. Others had already arrived to supplement the original three. LPHs were carrying helicopters and tanks both.

Up the coast at Belem at another sea pier, I was organizing a second landing force.

The airborne group continued to grow. All of the time I am reviewing the mass of units now in reserve in SA, re-deploying appropriate ones for transport to Africa.

On July 10th the landing operation began.

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In Monrovia, the only opposition was a single Garrison, which was easily dealt with by the combat ships. All units were landed safely and they began to construct a base, two air strips, two sea piers and a perimeter.

The non-amphibious transports that had accidentally loaded with units were returned to Natal to await the construction of a pier in Monrovia.

By August 6th, both sea assault groups had been landed, and the beach-head consisted of a well balanced force of infantry, armor, supply and air support. The beach-head was attacked by some light infantry from a nearby base, but was easily repulsed. Both air strips had been completed and carrier aircraft landed there

Construction of two sea piers was begun improperly and due to poor supply conditions and since the engineers were not present when the piers were started, the construction stalled. These piers never got finished and cannot be scrapped. A third one needed to be built.

By August 21st the landing force had spread Northward up the coast and had begun the construction of a second sea pier. The nearby Libyan base and its landing strip had been taken and were in US hands.

Another large landing force of loaded transports was awaiting the pier completion in Monrivia. Supply conditions were well established on the beach-head, but not in the adjoining waters. This greatly delayed pier construction.

Construction of an air base and seaport in the Canary Islands was also proceeding, but supply problems were also hampering those efforts.

By October 6th, the two piers near Monrovia were complete and Africa was open for business. The 18 transports waiting in Natal for pier space had finally landed near Monrovia.

By October 29th, new transports from CONUS had been anchored North of Monrovia at Nouakchott to create a new beach-head at the Libyan pier there. These ships were filled with Engineers, Marines and supply trucks. Naval combat ships were arriving to take capture this pier in preparation for a combat landing by the transports.

The airborne force that was a long time organizing in SA had successfully landed even further North on the coast of Western Sahara.

Units of every sort were being deployed from reserve in SA and staged in Natal to await transport to Africa. By November 9th, transports are streaming these units out of SA to land at the new second beach-head, just South of the Canary Islands.

Libyan military confidence is 68%.

By November 20th the landing force anchored at Nouakchott have landed and taken the pier and the Libyan outpost, creating a third African beach-head.

I controlled nearly half of the Libyan Atlantic sea coast. Resistance has been light.

By December 7th I have 540 land and air units in Africa. My three beach-heads have linked up and I now control over half of Libya's Atlantic sea coast, from Monrovia in the South to the Canary Islands and Laayoune to the North. I have one seaport, one air base, eight air strips and numerous outposts.

Libyan military confidence is 47%.

My recon satellite system is beginning to work and I can now spot large units such as tank battalions all over the globe.

It wasn't long before I had accomplished my goal of taking Gibraltar I don't know the date - sometime in January, 2019. But I still had to go 2240 KM to get to the Libyan capital.

I now had two objectives to consider - how to capture the Libyan capital and how to keep the African Republic and Egypt from eating up a large part of Libya when it surrenders.

I was tempted to by-pass the Libyan Mediterranean coast and take the desert route, attacking the capital from the southern desert. I decide against that for three reasons:

1) Poor supply in the desert.

2) Most of the close desert roads to the capital also skirt the coastal enclaves - I might have to fight those coastal guys anyway if they detected me.

3) I would lose the Libyan military confidence points that I would gain if I took the coastal cities.

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As for my southern border with the African Republic, I did not have enough southern units left to take Abidjan.

I need not have worried - I took the coastal towns with light resistance.
Their only air base at Tunis was damaged, destroying all of their fixed-wing aircraft, but I left their nice naval group ported at Al Jazair intact.

I took their capital city at Tarabulus on March 7th, 2019 and Libya surrendered. I received $8.7 Billion for my efforts. Libyan military confidence was 16%.

I got their large army near the Egyptian border and a smaller group of units in central Libya. I also got another small group on the South-West coast, perfectly positioned to guard my southern coast from the African Republic.

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Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 4 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
Lt. Colonel
Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Egypt

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 03/07/19
Real Game Duration: 15 days

My next decision was - who would be my next conquest? Egypt or the African Republic? Both have oil, but I already have plenty of my own oil.

Egypt's populated area is smaller, and it provides a gateway to the Persian Gulf - where I can deprive the rest of the world of a LOT of oil.

Egypt it is!

My units are still in good shape and I have just gotten a large infusion of new Libyan units. I have a lot of supply trucks. Meanwhile back in CONUS they are building re-enforcements and a lot gnarly cool new weapons based upon Metal Storm technology - such as RCM-1 Storm Trackers, AMH-01 Rotor Storm helos and Dragon Fur MTVL mobile artillery. They are also stocking up on state-of-the art combat aircraft.

I own FOUR - count them - four sea piers on the Med, and I have combat ships in place.

I am 1/3 of the way towards finishing research on Fusion Power.

This is going to be a GREAT war!

The Egyptian capital of Al Qahirah (Cairo) is 2135 Km East, and most of the route is unpopulated. One of my new Libyan units has already crossed the border! My treasury has $805 billion - time to go to war!

Egypt starts out with an MC of just 61%. They have a treasury of $707 billion - also worth going after.

The threat of the African Republic looms dark to my South, so I decide to take measures to fortify my southern border. I post garrisons and small groups of units to occupy southern border towns.

The good thing about hostile neighbors is that the only get foggy at two times - once when they declare war and again when they detect movement. If you quietly fortify a border they will usually stay put with just a little probing reaction. Unfortunately, this is not always true, as we shall see.

I am also developing the new Libyan oil fields - building supply depots to increase the supply to the best areas.

They have pathetic farms here, so I am scrapping them and replacing them with hydroponics. I can hear the new jingle already:

"When it says Libya, Libya, Libya on the label,
You will like it, like it, like it,
On your table, table, table."

or how about:

"He spread her swollen Libya and prepared to..."

Sorry - you wanted to fight a battle here - OK.

By April 24th I have crossed the Egyptian border and have amassed 410 land units and about ten attack helos South-West Al Bayda. More are on the way from Western Africa.

Egypt counters with 23 defending tanks, most of which are well South of the road in the desert. Fine - I would love to own those tanks some day. I decide to by-pass them and just take out the ones on the road.

My southern border fortifications are now in place. Egyptian MC is down 10 points.

By May 4th I have advanced East along the coast to Tobruq.

I have a feeling that taking Cairo is going to be a blood-bath, so I have devised a strategy to perform a flanking maneuver on Cairo. I sent a force South to take an African Republic base and air strip. From that new Southern base, I can move units East and cut off any Egyptian retreat South along the Nile River.

The Egyptian population resides from Cairo in the North to Al Khartum in the South, all along the Nile. It is likely that I will need to move down the Nile after them after I take Cairo in the North.

on June 6th, I have advanced 600 Km East of Tobruq and have captured the oil field West of Cairo. I am beginning to spot air activity from the Egyptian air base near Demanhur.

I have also discovered a large fleet of guided missile patrol boats, AOEs and Landing Craft transports in port North of Cairo. I want those transport ships intact, but I will need to use submarines to surgically remove the patrol boats that are anchored among them. Unfortunately, there are also about eight active American-built FF-1052 class frigates each with anti-submarine capabilities, patrolling the coast.

I have moved a combat task force into the Med from Norfolk consisting of two cruisers, three frigates, a missile patrol boat and several submarines. They will have to do the job.

I have also noted that my Mediterranean "neighbors" to the North are not asleep. They are all at war with me and I have discovered that there are two choke-points where they can restrict my shipping into the Med. One is at Spanish Gibraltar - although there are no anti-ship units stationed there now.

The other is the Italian force stationed at Palermo. 245 Km North-East of a protruding point of land at Tunis there are nine Italian cruisers. They can spot any of my naval traffic around the point and can and will sink it with anti-ship missiles. These is no way for me to destroy them at this point without confronting them with an equal or greater naval force. I am unwilling to risk nine of my Cruisers at this point.

My southern flanking force has made progress East and has established their own second base along the road eastward.

I start building my first fusion power plants!

On June 18th, ASWACs surveillance flights have revealed that the Egyptian fleet is larger than first predicted - 90 vessels. It includes six PTG-6 Bayou patrol ships with anti-submarine capabilities, mixed in with the transports that I want to preserve.

Taking out the combatant ships is the easy part. Convincing my combatants not to fire on the defenseless transports before they have surrendered is going to be hard.

The southern flanking group has advance further East and is constructing its third and final operating base consisting of an air strip, an outpost, a radar station and a full-scale air base.

Image

Units are massing in the North for an assault on the air base West of Cairo. Many AA units are being prepared.

Both my treasury and public opinion are falling, so I need to get on with this and attend to domestic issues.

On June 21th I have new naval combat re-enforcements in the Med to supplement my naval forces. They have safely passed thru the naval ambush from Palermo and are headed for Cairo.

I have assembled a huge air-borne force of 140 units at my air base at Tunis, consisting of light infantry, FARPS, M119 artillery, airborne engineers, Marines, Special Forces, Airborne and M113A1 APCs.

The attack force West of the Cairo airport numbers 93 land units, and they have a back-up force to their West of another 163 units.

My treasury rises to above the one trillion dollar mark.

On July 21st, my team of submarines has cleaned out all of the missile patrol boats, leaving me with 40 pristine transports.

Attempts to sink the Italian cruisers at Palermo with submarines or anti-ship missiles have been futile. I currently have a backlog of ships waiting to continue further into the Med but cannot pass the Palermo trap.

On July 29th I started the attack on the Cairo air base. The force was heavy with AA and took the air base in short order, but with 27% damage. All of their intact aircraft headed South to the first air strip there. Egypt has no other air base.

The original plan was conservative - to take and destroy the air base in order to deny it to the enemy. But in order to destroy it once I own it, I must scrap it, and that takes a long time. But once I had taken the air base, without committing my entire force to do it, I had second thoughts.

I decided to stay and take just the West bank of the Nile. I was not yet ready to take on all of the Egyptian defenses around their capital. But this is a slippery slope - the capital is on the East bank of the Nile - how do you take the West bank and not take the capital?

And my flanking force in the South was still not in a position to cut off an Egyptian retreat.

On July 30th I had reached the Nile. As I feared, my units were attacking the Egyptian transport ships that I had so carefully been shepherding.

I made the decision - go for Cairo and take the East bank too. I called in the backup force and ordered all units to Cairo.

Image

On August 3rd we took the capital for $230 billion. Egyptian MC fell to 41%. By August 6th the job was complete, all my units needed to do was clean up the delta to the South. This includes the back-up Egyptian air strip at Al Quhirah.

But taking the whole Nile delta East to the Suez canal causes another problem - the Israelis. Israel, detecting movement on its Western border, attacked in force with tanks at the bridge at As Suways. Their attack was successfully repelled by my entrenched units in As Suways, which is fortunately the only remaining bridge across the Suez.

The Southern flanking force had still not been ordered to move.

By August 11th, my precious 40 transports had been reduced to just 18.
Egypt's MC was down to 39%.

The Egyptians moved their capital to the far South, to Adis Abeba. A long way for my units to trek. The Southern "flanking" force heads South in pursuit.

By September 10th, I had airlifted all of the unmounted, artillery and supply units of my huge airborne force from Tunis 2000 KM South-West to a new desert base. But I forget to send the mobile units who remain neatly sorted near Tunis.

My ships at Tunis were still stuck there waiting for air cover to pass the Point of Death.

My only solution at this point was to station eight of my very best AA units there on the point to knock down the enemy missiles as they are fired at my passing ships. That and adding combat escort ships with strong AA was my only solution at this point.

My unit now controlled the Nile South to Malakal, 800 Km North-West of Egypt's new capital. Egypt's MC was at a new low - 26%.

My guys took Adis Abeba on Sept 19th, netting a cool $172 Billion.
Egypt's MC fell to 21%.

My airborne force dropped on the new Egyptian capital of Nairobi on October 8th, earning me another $155 Billion. Egypt's MC fell to 16%.

The new capital becomes Muqdisho. My airborne forces hopped and dropped there. On October 14th Egypt surrendered with a final MC of 13%. I got an additional $130 billion to mark the occasion.

Image

I now have over two trillion in my treasury. I won just seven of my hard earned transports ships - my unsupervised forces destroyed the rest. I also got the 24 tanks that I had been protecting up North. Aside from that, most of Egypt's army was destroyed. I got one small group and all of the single ones stashed in the odd corners.
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 4 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
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Location: Baltimore

WWIII - African Republic

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 10/14/19
Real Game Duration: 21 days

That last round was intense. And costly - I lost 313 units and took 200,000 casualties. Guess what I lost the most of - supply trucks. I have just ten supply trucks left and about twice that many F.A.R.P.s.

HINT: When you enter a major battle - leave your AA and supply trucks behind the main battle line.

My unit kill ratio is 4 to 1 - I destroy four enemy units for every one I lose.

It is difficult to decide what country to conquer next. It is however not a good idea to leave enemies to your rear. If I take out the African Republic and then South Africa, I will have a secure southern flank.

So, I am ready to take on the AR. I have prepared for it by fortifying my southern border. There are two big problems:

1) My forces are depleted
2) Most of my forces are in northern or eastern Africa.

AR's capital is at Douala, which is in South-West Africa. It is however on the coast, so maybe I can use some sea and air power.

Maybe I can reach it from South America. I can bring in fresh units, especially supply units from CONUS.

On September 23rd in eastern Africa, I have reached Berkley Bay on North-Eastern Lake Victoria, down from my base at Adas Abba.

Image

On the West coast, I am fortifying the AR border in preparation for an assault South to their capital.

Image

Back in CONUS, thousands of airborne troops and light tanks are being readied for rapid deployment to Africa.

On December 16th 90 units have formed up at a border base in Western Africa. In the East, two groups totaling 234 units have established a base East of Lake Victoria. They are meeting some resistance from the AR, who's MC is 47%.

All along the AR's Northern border US invasion groups are forming at all roads that lead into the AR.

In the CONUS, five air-borne armies have deployed, totaling 560 units. The word is that they plan a massive record-setting air-lift to the AR's West coast capital at Douala - a 7500 mile trip.

On January 15th, 2020 the first fusion power plants have been completed in the CONUS and dozens more of these projects are begun throughout CONUS, South American and Africa.

On February 15th, the biggest military air-lift in history is begun. Airborne troops - light infantry, Marines, Green Berets, Special Forces, Rangers and Army Airborne have massed around six air strips along the East coast of CONUS, awaiting air transportation to Douala.

At the last minute it is noted that the northern-most group at Bangor Maine is beyond the operating range of the C-130, the plane in the operation with the shortest range. Other transports are the C-5 Galaxy and the C-141 Starlifter. Alternate plans are made to air-lift these units South to Charleston once the group now there has moved out.

The treasury has grown to over 2 Trillion dollars and public opinion is 29% and rising.

Twenty-four hours later the operation is called off. Commanders discover that although the chosen air transporters have the required range to make the 7500 mile haul to Africa, plus the extra 1200 mile leg to a friendly re-fueling point, the pilots veer off-course to re-fuel without orders to do so. This makes them forget the way-point at which they are suppose to turn East towards the target, therefore avoiding flying over enemy territory.

Those who recover from the 1st refueling must manually be re-set to the safe way-point and then re-directed West to the drop-point.

The second problem is that the target is not clear of AA. When pilots are on their final approach to the drop at Douala, many are hit by anti-aircraft fire, at which time they drop they unload their cargo short of the city. This would be acceptable, except that these drop ineffectually onto a small unescapable island in the bay.

Fortunately not many units were dropped onto the island and they can safely be picked up at a later date.

The plan is revised to air-lift the units first to North-East South America, where they will be transported by sea to Douala.

On March 12th, 225 of my units are on the border North of Douala at Lome, ready to invade Legos. The Legos coast has been swept for submarines and AR patrol craft have been neutralized. Combat vessels are preparing to perform the same operation South in the Bay of Guinea, and to secure the pier at Douala for a sea assault.

On the eastern tip of Brazil five groups of units, 650 in all are poised at piers, prepared to be sea transported to the pier at Douala.

Two weeks later on March 30th, the first NTCSM missile is fired at defenders in Douala from naval forces off-shore. Transports are streaming across the mid-Atlantic from Brazil, and ten are awaiting landing orders in the Bay. Intelligence reports state that Doula is defended by only 45 units, which include a handful of tanks.

Image

On April 3rd, Douala falls and I get $137 billion.

On April 8th, the region around Douala is in US hands and the beach-head is well established with light resistance. A new out-post is being built. In Brazil, the last Marines are being taken off the beach and packed onto transport ships.

The AR's MC is now 24% and dropping.

To the North, US land forces on a wide front have advanced to the Northern side of Legos and are about to move South to take it. Ironically, Legos is the new capital of the AR. It falls on April 10th and I get $132 Billion.

In East Africa, US forces have broken out of their camp at Nakoru and have spread South as far as Songea, East of Lake Nyasa. All along the border similar groups are also headed South into the AR. One such group has already met up with the sea invasion beach-head to the South.

On the domestic front my treasury is again growing and domestic approval is at 34% and raising.

The new capital becomes Dar Es Salaam on the East coast. This capital also falls on to US forces on April 26th, awarding me $98 Billion.

The African Republic surrender the next day and I got an additional $98 Billion. The former AR's MC was 5%.

Image
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 8 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
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Post by Lightbringer »

very well written, good details, and it sounds like you are having a blast! :D
"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” -Winston Churchill
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII- South Africa

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 04/27/20
Real Game Duration: 27 Days

I have 2.6 Trillion in my treasury.

I now have 100% satellite recon coverage, which tells me that in the whole of South Africa (SA) there are about 17 tanks. How hard could this be?

The SA MC started at 73% and is falling. Their capital is at Pretoria, in the South of the country. It is not accessible from the sea. It is 1470 KM from my nearest unit.

It was May 13th as I started to move my African army South into SA. My units were evenly distributed across the SA Northern border, heavier in the East.

I met light resistance.

An uneventful three weeks later, after many unnecessary attempts at construction, and doing a lot of domestic stuff, my units have advanced South to Pretoria. Just like in the song.

Like most capitals, Pretoria was protected by an air force at an air base. I had AA along so that enemy aircraft were no problem.

Image

Pretoria fell on June 5th leaving me a mere $433 million. Their capital then moved West to Kimberly.

On June 18th I took Kimberly and SA surrendered leaving me no more tribute. But I did get their air force, consisting of attack helos and Cheetah fighter jets, a 170 ship navy consisting of SAR Missile Frigates, Bayou patrol boats, submarines, AOEs and a LOT LCPL Transports and ten of their tanks.

Image

Hail Felinis - Ruler of Africa, Emporer or North and South America!
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 6 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Sicily

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 01/05/21
Real Game Duration: 28 days

As I have been bemoaning, the Italian navy at Sicily has been causing me headaches every since I entered the Med. The Italian's main (I hope) fleet was anchored at the port of Trapani near the western tip of the island, close to Palermo. Unfortunately, this port was full of twelve Italian cruisers armed with anti-ship missiles that commanded the straight off Tunis.

As a stop-gap measure, I fortified the point off Tunis with my eight of my best MIM-201 and MIM-204 AA units. These intercepted all missiles at the point, but ships approaching and departing the point still were catching long-range missile-fire. So I started escorting non-combatant units with warships.

But the problem with this is that my cargo ships do not alert me when they are making the transit. This problem was distracting me from my real objective of taking Israel. Finally I just got fed up and decided to end the offending fleet permanently. My strategy - destroy the Italian fleet and the naval station at Trapani.

I had tried a large-submarine attack earlier and that failed miserably. Trapani is protected by twelve Cruiser/Destroyers and as it turns out, five submarines. So the concentration of AA and anti-submarine power there made the port impenetrable to missile and submarine attack. That only leaves land or sea attack as options. Any land units attacking naval units are in a gun-battle that the ship's big guns usually win.

The only way to attack such a powerful force is to be willing to take the initial damage that they can dole out. The only acceptable way of doing that is to distribute the damage over a lot of heavy units that can withstand the pounding without taking major damage. So, this time I decided to roll out some big guns of my own - my modern BB-7 Kansas Battleships. I deployed the BB's from their ship-yard and home port of Pascagoula, Mississippi - their first shake-down cruise.

The BBs would join my eight Cruisers to form a formidable sea force of my own.

I had been stock-piling units in anticipation of the invasion of Europe, and been loathe to risk my major assets such as carriers and cruisers up until now. But I figured that this was the right time if I was to actually command the Mediterranean

A second-level threat in Sicily was the Italian air force. Attacking units would quickly be hit by aircraft from mainland Italy. The defending enemy ship's AA, plus this combat air patrol from the mainland discouraged any air-attack on the port.

I had already ferried my naval aircraft across the Atlantic and was holding them in reserve in the Canary Islands. Now I rendezvoused all of my carriers in the Canary's and loaded them with Tomcats and F/A-18s. They would serve as air-cover for my ships during the attack on Trapani.

In addition, I deployed eight P-3C Orion aircraft at Tunis, armed with Harpoon missiles. Then I supplemented them with another ten F-111 Aardvark bombers, which it turns out are quite good ship killers too.

A word about aircraft carriers - they have excellent anti-air defenses. However, if their rules of engagement do not include aircraft, they will not even DEFEND themselves from aircraft. Also, in a large naval attack such as this, it is important that your ships keep station - you must set their initiative to "none" to keep them from moving in on the enemy on their own.

The third threat was from land forces on Sicily. The garrison there was token, but re-enforcements could quickly stream there from the mainland. So I arranged for an amphibious blocking force to take Messina, cutting Sicily off from the mainland.

I gave the BBs and CGs a supporting screen of destroyers and frigates - all ships were armed with Harpoon missiles. I called in a squadron of my new DDX-24 destroyers as well. Simply trying to overwhelm the port with missiles is futile - the ship's AA will intercept 99 percent of them.
The trick will be to degrade the port's defenses directly to the extent that a parallel indirect missile attack will eventually succeed.

I have tried a submarine attack on the port earlier. Now I brought the eight SSNs back loaded with Harpoon missiles. These I infiltrated into the Tyrrhenian sea North of the port to sweep for submarines and to sink any patrol vessels. They found and sank three frigates.

I also brought in my new submarine wolf-pack - sixteen SSN-8 Walrus subs. These are small subs that carry size 2 missiles (which I don't have any of - I guess they haven't been invented yet). But they are silent and deadly. I used these to sweep the South and East approaches of Sicily for subs and patrol ships. They sank one submarine in the South and two to the East. They also sank two patrol frigates.

Now that the waters were free of submarines, it was time to mount the assault. I had the SSNs in the Tyrrhenian sea form a semi-circle around the North of the port, just out of ASW range.

Next, I sent in the destroyer and frigate escorts into the Tyrrhenian West of the port to screen the capital ships. Then I slowly brought in the precious carriers. I stationed the carriers in a semi-circle around the port at a distance - but close enough so the the naval aircraft could cover the port.

Lastly I brought in the Battleships and Cruisers, packed with Harpoon missiles, in two tight groups.

When it was finally time to start the battle, I gave the general order to all units - "Weapons Free". Harpoon missiles began to fly as I ordered the combat surface units to move in for the kill. I inched the BBs, Cruisers, Destroyers and Frigates up closer to the port, hex by hex. Italian warplanes came down to investigate, but were driven off my my Combat Air Patrol. At the same time, I tightened the circle of subs and carriers.

Image

The timing of the blocking amphibious force was off - they should have been on station when the attack began and they weren't. I hurried them to their objective.

My CAP was effective - the Italian aircraft were turned back. I launched the P-3C Orions and the Aardvark bombers, who also began firing Harpoons.

The gun-fire of the my surface units began to have the desired effect - Italian Cruisers began to take damage and the cloud of Harpoons stated hitting their mark. I watched the read-out at the right of the HUD for battle reports - then I see it: "Italy loses Vittorio Veneto Cruiser/Destroyer". Then again and again.

I risked the SSNs and brought them in closer - they began to score hits on the doomed Italian fleet. Before long the port was a melee of ships, aircraft and missiles.

As predicted, an Italian tank column formed on the mainland to the North and began to move East towards Messina. Would my amphibious forces arrive in time?

I periodically stopped the action and checked on the health of my units. Badly damaged ones were sent back to port to repair. The health of the enemy fleet continued to decline. The battle raged on.

Finally, in the nick of time, my amphibs hit the town of Messina which has a sea pier immediately to its South. My units quickly invested Messina and began fighting their way across the straight to take the town of Riggio de Calibria.

It is at this point that I re-thought my strategy - did I want to destroy the Italian fleet and its naval station, as my vengeful inner-child dictated, or did I want to take Sicily? Hey, I was there, I had the guys, why not make myself at home and stay a while (or forever)? It's good farm country.

New plan - entrench my blocking force at the straight of Messina and keep the sea port. Neutralize the Italian garrison on Sicily.

Most of the Sicilian land units launched a futile counter-attack at the sea port. They were quickly pacified with naval gunfire.

I was in the processes of mopping up the port (several Italian ships are holding out) when I discovered that there were five Italian submarines lurking beneath the pier at Trapani. Just the job for the ASW hungry P-3C Orions. They quickly dispatch the offending submarines.

January 20th - the sea port is mine!

The amphibian force was well constituted with plenty of Engineers who mopped up the remaining Sicilian garrison and began rehabilitating the bases. I decided to re-decorate. I destroyed the two pathetic oil wells and build a nice farm where one well had been. I also began construction of my own air base.

The blocking force at Messina easily held off their attackers, with the help of my entire fleet of destroyers and frigates firing NTACM missiles at them. To disrupt the stream of Italian units towards Messina, I had a squadron of eight SSBNs pound a huge formation of Italian units at Cosenza with Tomahawk missiles, until this grew tiresome. The enemy column streaming towards Messina turned around to see what was happening in Cosenza. My guys at Riggio de Calibria were left with nothing to do. They had taken the toe of Italy and could have easily taken the heel as well. I left them entrenched at the more defensible site until later.

Image

Then It suddenly occurred to me - I HAD MY FIRST FOOTHOLD IN EUROPE!
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 10 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
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Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

WWIII - Israel

Post by felinis »

Game Date: 02/18/2021
Real Game Duration: 37 days

How do you solve a problem like Israel?

The whole country is an armed camp. Make a reconnaissance flight and the picture is unbelievable - units are stacked on every hex, except for some small streches of desert. And everything is protected from the air by dozens of FIM AAs. In their Eastern desert are rows upon rows of stacked hexes of armor! They start out with a MC of 70%.

Step over their borders and you are attacked by tank COLUMNS and multiple aircraft. For every base or air-strip that you take or destroy, they have five more. And the country is big - they control the whole Sinai peninsula, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. I dreaded the certain blood-bath that would ensue if I were to make a frontal assault.

They have some weaknesses:

1) They only have one air base.

2) They only have two oil wells left, one right by our border.

3) Their capital is only three hexes away from their coast.

4) They have a weak navy.

OK, their only airbase is nearby so if I destroy that, then their multitude of aircraft can still fly, but when damaged they have no place to repair. Then maybe we can wear them down.

I took a string of oil wells along the Suez canal when I took Egypt. Some of them might have been Israeli. One of their two current oils well is on the far East side of their country in Syria, but it is possibly reachable by long-range bombers. I tried this deprivation tactic on Canada once and it did not work - they continued to trade for oil and continued to get all of their supplies from somewhere.

If I destroy their navy, maybe we can get close enough to their capital to capture it.

They have been quiescent until now. They only time that they attacked me was when I took the Cairo area. They were turned away by my city-entrenched units and by the Suez canal. The canal is only crossable at one point from Israel and I destroyed the bridge. I control the canal, but they can station tanks on their side and take pot-shots at any shipping.

The battle for Israel began quite by accident. Back in the CONUS, I had deployed some armor and ordered it to sea transport to the Middle-East. The AI obligingly called up sea transports units - including 63 AOE that I was parking on the Horn of Africa, at the Southern mouth of the Red Sea/Suez canal.

On February 19th, I was occupied elsewhere when I got the warning message "AOE lost at X:475 Y:179". "What now?" I thought- these units are like children, you have to watch them every minute. Five Israeli tanks were taking pot-shots at my passing AOEs, who were obediently trying to go North along the canal into the Med for a long trip to CONUS.

I stopped all of the ships, but the AI kept grabbing them away. Finally I canceled the transport of the armor back in the CONUS, in order to get these 63 ships to obey me. Then I backed them up into the Red sea.

The Israelis have a string of missile patrol boats nestled among a bunch of their transport ships nestled in the Akaba waterway off the Red sea. I discovered this when I started to pack my own little transports there.

I brought up some combat helos to blow up the nearest troublesome patrol boats.

I couldn't easily cross the canal to go after the offending tanks, so I brought up fifteen BGM-109 Gryphon mobile launchers with MGM-52 Lance and AMCMS missiles and blew the tanks up.

On February 26th I went to work on their Navy. Their patrol boats and transports down South are quiet and need not be touched - maybe I will inherit them if I take down Israel.

The only other naval presence is along their Mediterranean coast. I made a sweep of that coast with my wolf-pack of SSN-8 Walrus submarines. Sure enough, there were about three submarines patrolling there, all of which my Walrus's destroy. They also took out several picket frigates. By March 5th, the coast is now clear for my own naval forces.

On March 7th I attempted the destruction of their single air-base. Almost everything in Israel is protected by FIM AA, rendering both planes and missiles ineffective. This airbase was no different. I pulled up to the shore-line with four SSN-688, ten SSN-751 and one SSN-21 SeaWolf submarine, loaded with Tactical Tomahawk missiles.

The air base was located just one hex from the coast, and it was guarded by just one FIM-92 battalion. The facility in front of it had a lot more FIMs in it, but I stationed my subs to shoot around it. They all opened fire on the Israeli air base.

The attack failed. I had tried to divide the missile fire between the target and the FIM defender, but it did no good.

[Note to GB - hand-held FIM-92 Stinger and SA-7 AA sholder-fired missiles, with IR detectors and contact fuses CANNOT knock down other missiles. Only radar guided, computer controlled AA can do this. Currently in SR2010, one Stinger stallion's can neutralize a missile attack on its hex from a single attacking unit, consisting of hundreds of missiles.

THIS IS WRONG!

Part of the problem is the air defense modeling - there are three classes of air threat -
Close: low slow helos and tactical missiles.
Medium: fast-movers - high-speed aircraft or ballistic missiles.
High: the SR-71 Blackbird or a ballistic missile.

A tactical missile is not a close threat and is nothing like a low, slow helicopter. It should have its own classification, or should be classed as Medium, like the Lance]

On March 13th, I went after the nearest oil well - the one by the border. I moved my mobile missile launchers further South to avoid some enemy FIM AA out on the desert. This attack was successful - the oil well was toast.

On March 15th I re-tried attacking the air base, this time using my 15 mobile missile launchers loaded with Lance and Tomahawk missiles. The Lance missiles took out the FIM AA and the remaining missiles destroyed the air base.

The capital still seems impregnable, so I decided to try to take out their coastal air strip two hexes North of the sea pier. It is protected by four FIM battalions

I lined up six carriers full of planes, plus two LHAs with jump-jets along their coast for CAP. Then I moved in a task force of cruisers with a large screen of DDGs and FFGs. With four FIM battalions on guard, I didn't even bother arming my ships with missiles. I brought the ships off-shore of the air strip and attacked the FIMs with naval gun-fire.

But guess what? THEY DO have missiles. And they will REALLY shoot them at you.

My attack was ineffective and my ships were heavily damaged. Some of the Israeli planes were damaged by my CAP. Since their aircraft now have nowhere to repair, this is a good thing.

I was running out of options - they were as strong as ever. Now that I had started actively attacking them, they were becoming more active along the Suez border. After my naval mis-adventure, I looked and found about thirty enemy units, mostly tanks, trying to attack from the Sinai. With the opportunity to take out that many enemy units, I amounted a strong counter-attack.

I called in all of my tank killing aircraft, including F15E, F-16Cs, A-10, C-130 Specter gunships and AHM-01 Rotor Storm, Blackhawk, Apache and Longbow attack helicopters. One half of the attackers were clustered in the Northern Suez, near the Med, so I called in my BB-7s and my new DDX-21 Destroyers to hit them with naval gunfire. I also deployed my F15A and F15K Interceptor aircraft to handle the inevitable Israeli aircraft.

This worked fine, but then they started to run away for repair before I could finish them off. Now I really got worked up - I deployed my reserve armor from Cairo - M1 Tanks of various models, dozens of M106 Dragon Fur and M109A3 Paladin mobile artillery, Engineers, AT LOSAT AAs and more Strykers. A new supply of AT Stryker MGS had started to arrive at the sea port form CONUS, so I sent them too. I have my premo MIM-201 mobile AA lined up protecting my border, so I sent them along for AA protection.

My invasion was well underway when I discovered that I had forgotten supply trucks (again). I had about 75 of them stashed away at Alexandria, so I re-deployed them and sent them running after the armor. My new plan was to make an incursion to cut off the attacking units from their repair base and kill them. That accomplished, while I had the force in Israel, I would cut South-East and destroy one of their small bases in Jordan.

This would put one of their alternative energy plants behind my lines, so I could destroy that too. I had no intention to stay, since the Suez line was so defensible.

I went after the enemy units, keeping my aircraft away from their numerous FIM AA. Once the ground units had neutralized the FIMS, my air could attack freely. I surrounded and destroyed all of the enemy units. The counter response from the main body of Israel was surprisingly muted. I expected them to release their hordes of units upon me, but that did not happen.

Once all of my intended victims had succumbed, I turned the force South-East for the isolated base. The base was heavily guarded - I hadn't done my recon and it had looked undefended. But I over-came the defending enemy units and took the base. The problem with taking a base is that it is hard to destroy then - you have to either "Destroy" or "Scrap" it, and these both take a long time.

While I was waiting for the captured base to melt - I decided to take out the final Israeli oil well. I launched two groups of my long-range bombers- eight B-2s and about ten F-111s. The B-2s were filled with air-to-ground missiles, but the F-111s were not. That is OK, since bombers have an intrinsic bomb-damage ability, even without missiles.

The bombing runs went OK. The fly-over revealed the breath-taking number of armored units lined up in the Eastern Israeli desert. But the path was clear for the bombers and both groups arrived OK. The F-111 did their bombing and the B-2s launched their missiles at the oil facility. The F-111s went bingo fuel pretty quickly and departed - thru the enemy cities! I had to quickly grab them under manual control and actually pull them out of heavily fortified enemy territory. Thankfully they were not heavily damaged. I led them by the hand back to their base.

Meanwhile the B-2s had emptied their missiles and I had instructed them to bomb the oil facility. When I want back to look, they had given up and were headed back, also into Indian territory. I pulled them out and checked their fuel. These things can fly for 5500 KM and were not near bingo fuel. So I sent them back to bomb the oil well some more. They wouldn't go. They insisted on going RTB so I just let them go back using the safe route.

[Note: the Hex Information screen that you get by pressing the space bar will show info on enemy hexes too! You can use this to perform a BDA on your bombing targets.]

Once the B-2's RTBed, I sent the F-111s back to finish off the target. They did just that and destroyed the oil well before I needed to send the B-2s for a second run. Then they headed back into the enemy units again! I had to rescue them a second time.

OK, it was time to retreat. I started withdrawing my units back West of the Suez. They were about 1/3 of the way back when I noticed that the indicators on the enemy units near the front were staring to turn red. They were running out of FUEL! Hold your horses I yelled to my men. I turned everybody around and brought them back to where the destroyed base had been. There were three hexes between my large force and the Israeli capital I also had to get around a lake that I guess represents the Dead Sea.

I also went back to Egypt and deployed EVERYTHING that I still had in reserve. I was gratified to find about 20 National Guard. I released the remaining supply trucks fro Alexandria. I emptied out both big bases around Cairo - everybody went in an all-out effort.

It took a while for everyone to arrive in Jordan, but when they did I selected them all and pointed them towards Jerusalem. Israel had a military confidence of 67%.

Whenever an opposing unit on the battle line turned red, I sent units to attack it. Oil or no oil, resistance was fierce, as I had initially expected. I had wanted to disassemble Israel, to subtlety make it die from a hundred cuts so that I could take all of that armor lined up in the desert. Now here I was banging on it with a hammer, starting the blood-bath that I had dreaded.

The casualty's went slowly but I steadily progressed those three hexes until my units were just outside of the capital. I really hoped that they would surrender if I took their capital. Fat chance!

All enemy units disappeared from the capital and my units rushed in. I kept listening for the audio message that my men had taken the capital - it never came. I did soon get an E-mail stating that I had gotten 1.2 billion dollars from the Israeli treasury.

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Soon they moved their capital farther North to Halab, in Northern Syria . My men were still a long way from there, but we had taken at least half of the cities and towns of the whole country. Israeli MC went down to 37%. No sign of surrender. My guys kept pushing ahead to completely take the main body of towns around the capital.

I decided to play my trump card - I deployed two large airborne groups that I had been sorting out and building for months. Neither one was near the new capital, but C-5 transports really don't mind. One was near Dlaga on the South Nile and the other was in Sidi Barrani on the Med. I deployed all of my local C-17s, C5s and C-130s for a big air-drop on their new capital.

This was a good idea and it worked fine. Some of my transports got a little bent, but thousands of Light Infantry, Marines, Green Berets, Special Forces and Airborne were dropped with their support Engineers, LOSAT ATs, M113s, M-119s, FARPS and AA, just as planned.

But the capital wouldn't fall. At first I didn't notice, since all of the airborne units did not arrive at once. But as the drop went on, there were so many units being dropped on the capital that they started to spill over into Turkey. And still, lost in that sea of yellow markers, there reminded one or two blue Israeli markers, an indication that the city had not yet actually fallen. My yellow border appeared East of the new capital in Turkey and them West of the capital, but not around the city itself. By this time my main-body force from the West had reached the new capital on their own and joined up with the airborne force.

Still nothing happened - no fallen new capital, no audio messages, no E-mail. I directed the main body to head towards the Med and take Tel-Aviv. They did and I looked around - there were a few coastal towns that had been by-passed so I ordered my units to finish those off.

Finally on April 28th the bell went off and the big yellow message at the top left of the HUD announced that Israel had surrendered. Whew!

I didn't get any more tribute, all of my lovely new, shiny tanks, that had been lined up so neatly in the desert were now destroyed. I can't believe that my guys destroyed all of those tough units.

I got the Southern Israeli fleet of transports and missile patrol boats. It turned out that they had been hiding a large fleet of submarines down there, so I got those too.

They surrendered with an MC of just 8%.

Post mortuary:

I lost 250 units in this operation and 110,000 troops.
Israel lost 800 units and we can estimate 400,000 troops.
My military now has 2.55 million personnel.

This loss was unacceptable to me, so I re-played it and lost only 150 units and 10,000 fewer men. Here is what I learned:

1. Sap their air strength with a line of aircraft carriers and planes off their Northern coast. They will need to be screened at first with a lot of combat vessels with good AA. ASAP take out their only air base, so that the planes that you damage with your carrier aircraft have no palace to repair. After a while they hide at their air-strips and are not nearly so frisky. The air base in on the coast and it has AA. You can suppress the
AA with naval gun-fire, while drawing off the tanks and missile launcher with a ground assault from the West. Once the AA is suppressed, hit the air base with a Tomahawk assault from nearby submarines - use at least eight.

[NOTE: Counter to my previous belief, you can use a missile attack to overwelm and destroy a facility defended by one or two FIMS. You need to "Fire Missile" , "Advanced Order" and "Attack Facility" . As the attack progresses, all units will begin to take damage (first?), then the facility will degrade and hopefully destruct. It takes a LOT of missiles.]

2. Take out their oil. There is one oil well by the border, take it out with planes or missiles. The other one is at the far North-Eastern end of the country and your Tomahawk missiles will be eaten up by Saudi and Israeli AA. Invade the South-West Israeli desert, or do an airborne drop on the nearby Saudi base, take it and then take the single Israeli outpost on the desert there. That will clear enough of the AA that you can access the oil well with Tomahawks or bombers. Taking their oil will really slow them down and solves the problem of their air-cover too.

3. You DO have to invade them and fight unit-to-unit up to their capital, but do it slowly. Gradually move your line East AS THEY GIVE WAY. Aim prongs of you attack at their MANY bases, not at cities or troop formations.
Go slow, take bases only, wait for them to give way - remember, they are low on gas. I accomplished this with no heavy armor, heavy AT, heavy artillery, light infantry, lots of helicopters and supply trucks.

4. They WILL NOT GIVE UP. After you take their capital, they still have 40% MC - what chutzpa! They will keep moving it North-West until there are no more Israelis. Their final capital will be at Halab - air-drop there as soon as you take Jerusalem , otherwise your main force will get there at the same time as your airborne. Keep up your main assault towards Halab. You want to have plenty of fresh units at Halab when Israel surrenders, because then you will have to contend with the invading Turks!

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Finally - the strangest thing happened after my second invasion of Israel - you remember all of the neat rows of armor in the Israeli desert that I longed to inherit? They mysteriously appeared after the Israeli surrender, in a different place - in the Western desert by the Egyptian border. They were arranged in large, concentric circles. All of them had red indicators and were nearly depleted. Too Weird!
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 4 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
felinis
Lt. Colonel
Posts: 229
Joined: Jan 10 2006
Location: Baltimore

Italy

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This is a duplicate entry. See "Italy" on page two.
Last edited by felinis on May 20 2007, edited 3 times in total.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
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