Day of Days: The 101st Airborne Division dropped in the early hours to capture key objectives to support the landings and disrupt German defences.
Soon after arriving at Company HQ in the first hour of daylight, Lieutenant Rich Summers was instructed to take as many men as he'd been able to gather from his and other platoons and take out a battery of German '105s' (which tuned out to be 15cm heavy artillery) that could be heard just a few hundred yards away shelling the exits to the landing beaches. Summers was a few men short of a regulation platoon, but he headed out nonetheless, with reliable comrades Lieutenant 'Stag' Crampton, Staff Sergeant Teas, and Sergeant Guardiner leading one of the squads, as well as a few French Resistance explosive enthusiasts and a lost British medic.
The assault that followed would, however, not be taught at staff colleges or infantry schools for decades to come as a textbook example of tactics and small unit leadership, nor would it become a focal point for TV series' and video games. At best it would enter the regimental history as a short note about some hard fighting that was done.
The Mission
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| Thanks Google Maps and MS Paint. (The actual terrain differed somewhat from the map above of course, as you will see). |
I took command of my US paratroopers, and my opponent commanded the regular German infantry platoon. The American paratroopers had to advance out of the hedgerows and into the German trenches before the defenders could react. The image above explains the scenario and victory conditions.
Deployment
The German defender had pushed his JOPs pretty far up the position to guard two of the four guns and the HQ dugout as well as manning the covering weapon pit. The paratroopers had most of their JOPs back on the board edge but at least got one in a hedge near the first gun.
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| The first phases of the action. |
Initial break-in
Anticipating a German machine gun covering the open field behind the artillery position, SGT Guardiner first positioned his MG team to cover south down the trench line and moved his squad up close to the first gun. They then threw smoke grenades out behind the gun pit, rushed the crew and took the gun. The other squad also moved through a stand of trees to likewise cover the trench and got into a heavy firefight with a German squad moving up toward them. With the German section leader directing his squad's MG fire, the paratroopers had the worse of the exchange, and lost a couple of men - first blood to the Germans.
LT Summers established the 60mm mortar to start bringing down fire, and then sprinted toward the action, while S/SGT Tees set up in some bushes to snipe at the Germans near the HQ bunker. All his shots went horrendously wide though - possibly his sights got knocked out of alignment during the previous night's jump. He was much shamed by jeers of "jeep jockey!" from nearby paratroopers, who didn't know who they were paying out.
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| SGT Guardiner's squad rushes the first gun (15cm gun and crew from Old Glory miniatures). |
Guardiner's squad attacks down the trench
With SGT Guardiner busy demolishing the first gun. LT Crampton kept Guardiner's rifle team moving and hurling grenades, and kept the MG team firing down the trench. The firepower of two belt-fed machine guns started to tell against the Germans, and their platoon leader, who had been bringing down the shock levels and keeping his men in the fight, was wounded.
Right then, for some reason a Panzerschreck rocket projectile sailed past the Americans and landed somewhere behind them.
When a second German squad got out of the trench behind their own smoke grenade screen, SGT Guardiner realised it was now or never and took his squad charging down the trench into a close assault against the weakened first.
The hard fighting bloodied both sides, but in the end Gardiner's squad was forced to fall back from the trench and get behind the hedgerows, having lost several men. Guardiner spent the rest of the fight sorting his guys out [i.e. bringing down their shock levels so they didn't rout]. The German squad broke immediately afterward though, as a lucky 60mm mortar round landed near enough to shock the men. At this point the German platoon commander, who was certainly a grizzled veteran of many battles, rose to his feet despite his wound and directed the second German squad to hop back into the trench and hold the line. [The German player took the tough decision to use a Chain of Command die to end the Turn - this led the battered and broken first squad to rout from the table, but removed the wounded status from his platoon commander and getting this hardcore fellow back into the action. The Turn End also let the smoke dissipate and gave his tripod MG42 a clear shot at all the Americans].
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| Guardiner's squad assaults down the trench line. |
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| (Truck miniature from Plastic Soldier Company). |
LT Summers takes the second gun
With the attack falling apart, LT Summers, by himself, rushed forward and plunged into the trench. Seeing this, the three Resistance members, who had accompanied the paratroopers to bring explosives [a Demolition team support choice], followed him in. LT Crampton directed the two MGs to Summers' rush very commendably, but while Summers ran down toward the second gun a fusillade of MG42 fire peppered the lip of the trench. Sadly one of the Resistance fighters, Old Jean, was hit and killed as he followed the charging American.
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| Old Jean and the Resistance fighters follow LT Summers into the trench. (Left two are Peter Pig. Old Jean on the right is from Eureka miniatures). |
With enemy troops beginning to move up toward him, LT Summers quickly spiked the second gun and readied himself for a close assault. However, realising how far behind were his fellow paratroopers and with the fire from multiple MG42s not letting up, LT Summers prudently took the remaining two Frenchmen and pulled back.
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| A poor and blurry photo not doing justice to the heroic LT Summers destroying the second German gun. |
Outcome
With two guns destroyed the American paratroopers got 2 VPs while the Germans retained 2 VPs for the surviving guns. No American got close enough to take a look at any classified maps on the table in the HQ dugout. American casualties were seven killed and wounded, plus one French Resistance fighter, while German casualties were about the same. Both platoons started with 11 Force Morale. While the Paratroopers' morale stayed high despite setbacks, the Germans were hit hard and brought down to five by a combination of a wounded Senior Leader, and a broken and routed squad and Junior Leader.
It might have been possible for me to carry on the fight to attempt to break the German Force Morale or at least push them back from the HQ dugout. I still had six Command Dice to my opponent's three, could have rallied Guardiner's squad (which was still five men plus an MG team), and charged back toward the trench, together with the remaining second squad and four (potentially) heroic SMG-armed leaders. However, it could also have gone very badly due to German fire superiority (five MG42s against my two M191A2s). With losses high and lessons learned, we decided to call it.
German MVPs were their platoon commander, who overcame wounds to keep his men together and fighting, and first squad, who bore the brunt of the combat, including defeating US paras in a close assault.
On the American side, medals will likely be awarded for LTs Summers for single-handedly taking out the second gun, and SGT Guardiner for his aggressiveness in attack and for destroying the first gun.
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| The German platoon commander directing the action, while first squad's squad leader signals across the open field to third section and their MG42. (Battlefront miniatures). |
Commentary on the Scenario and Rules
I based the game on the Chain of Command scenario 'Brecourt Manor' written by one William Thorpe, but simplified it in several ways, including allowing each force to take their standard platoons, plus five points of support. To represent their already being in the position, the Germans were given D6 free initial moves with their patrol markers. On this occasion they got three, and occupied the positions of all but one gun. I, leading the US paratroopers, did not use their Patrol Markers all that effectively although it was probably good enough and actually led to deployment similar to what appears to have happened at Brecourt Manor.
Overall the scenario worked well, giving us a fun and challenging game that could easily have gone either way. The only thing I'd change would be perhaps give the Germans fewer support points than the Americans, as they already have the advantage of being the defenders, and start with a large extant network of trenches and weapons pits.
