Battle for Tula - Kamanevo

 Time for another little One Hour WW2 Eastern Front trilogy, this time on the Battle for Tula in Autumn/Winter 1941. My plan was  to do a battle from October, November and December 1941, ideally in the corresponding months in 2025. As ever my blog backlog means the posts may not appear until some time afterwards! I ran this game back in October. 

I'll focus on Guderians 2nd Panzer Group and the battle for Tula, as that is reasonably well documented, certainly enough for what I need for game purposes. We start in early October 1941, Operation Typhoon has just started after weeks of dithering and just as the first snow and sleet falls prior to the autumn rains. Guderians 2nd Panzer Group is tasked with taking Moscow from the south via the Tula road, but two of Guderians three Corps have been sent off on subordinate tasks leaving just 24th Panzer Corps to drive on Moscow. The Corps managed to break through at Orel but then got tied up in mopping up operations and fending off counterattacks, leaving just 4th Panzer Division to exploit northwards. 

The Corps combined its remaining armour into 'Panzer Brigade Eberbach' and set off up the road to Tula, and on 9th October ran into Major General Leylushenkos hastily formed '1st Guards Special Corps' across the River  Lisiza near the village of Kamanevo.

Battlefield from the south. The River Lisiza is near the camera, the main road to Tula runs N-S between a pair of low ridges (hard to see), and right centre is the village of Kamanevo. The village of Voin is top right and the woods top left are the Pivoi Voin woods. I'm using my snow boards although at the time of the battle there was only a very light dusting of snow and it all turned to thick mud a few days later.

The terrain layout is partly based on the Command Decision 'Kamanevo' scenario published in CPQ, but also for OHW fans, the 'Bridgehead' scenario, which is what I'm using as a basis for the game. The battle revolves around control of the north end of the bridge over the river, both sides need to keep the enemy away (2 hexes) from although real battle was more about the Germans pushing up the road to Voin.

I really like this scenario as it is the classic reinforcing engagement, with both sides getting arrivals in a continuous stream.

The Germans start off with an armoured car company holding the bridge, having bounced the river the previous day. The units for this are half battalion (or equivalent) so these are the 20-30 armoured cars of the division Panzerspahwagen company. I'm treating it as armoured recce, and all German units are Veteran. The models are a FiB 222 and a BF 231.

Riding to the rescue, at one unit per turn starting on turn 2, is the rest of Panzer Brigade Eberbach. Essentially 4th Panzer Regiment and 34th Motorcycle battalion. John A commands the Brigade and the armoured car company.

24th Panzer Corps concentrated all its operational armour into 4th PR and ended up with around 50 operational tanks. I've modelled this as two tank units, both commanded by Tim (who is also apparently riding on the back of one of the tanks).

Behind them are two elements of 34th Motorcycle battalion, each representing two companies. The lead unit has some towed 37mm AT guns, and the rear unit is supported by 75mm infantry guns making it a 'heavy' unit. John will command these on Tuesday, with Ian taking over on Wednesday. The 37mms will be fine against BTs and the like but will struggle against T34s. Door knockers and all that.

And bringing up the rear, support and logistics. Colonel Eberbachs command bus (my Krupp Protz radio truck), a couple of supply trucks and a pair of 105mm artillery batteries. The Germans will need those to make up for their lack of numbers.

The Luftwaffe has put up a showing but is hampered by bad weather and long supply lines, the Stuka only has one mission before needing resupply and only one of either the He 111 or Dorner will be available for interdiction each turn. I wanted to get the Dornier out as it was largely withdrawn from frontline service after 1941.

In the immediate vicinity the Russians have the remains of an NKVD Border Regiment and the remains of 11th Tank Brigade. Jerry commands these and Terry is overall Russian CO. The NKVD are my firing squad figures plus some normal infantry. 11th Tank Brigade has a BT7 and a T28. The latter is a bit of an indulgence, but like the Dornier, marginally justifiable in 1941. In the CD scenario, the Brigade has BTs and T26 and both units are positioned along or behind the river, but I moved them back to the western edge to more line up with the OHW scenario.

Riding to the rescue here is Colonel Katukovs 4th Tank Brigade. They have a battalion of T34s (irl it also had a KV company), a battalion of BTs, a motorised infantry battalion and a battalion for 1st Airborne Corps. I'm treating the T34s as heavy tanks for this scenario as 4th Panzer really struggled with them. The Airborne guys are SMG infantry so get +1D6 at close range, while the motor rifles I'm treating as a heavy infantry unit as it is a whole (smallish) battalion rather than a half battalion.

Russell commands the T34s and Paras, while Terry commands the BTs and motor rifles. These come on in turn 3 and 5 respectively.  Colonel Katukov is riding on the back of one of the tanks and is treated as a 'heroic leader', so gives a morale bonus to a unit he is stacked with.

In support we have a couple of supply trucks, and General Lelyushenkos HQ. The Red Airforce has got some IL4s for interdiction and an IL2 Sturmovik for ground attack. This is rather better supplied and operating from close bases than the Stukas, so gets two missions. However it requires an FAC to call it in (the little guy on the motorcycle).

Right, off to battle!

The action opened with IL4s bombing the German supply train, but to no effect. It looked good though.

The NKVD and 11th Tank Brigade shuffled east. The bridgehead is now unaccountably empty of Germans, what happened?

The German armoured car company took a bit of a 'swan' right over the ridge into the depths of Russian territory, but the only thing they could see were the Russian bombers returning home. That was certainly a bold move as the rest of the German column was a turn behind them.

The Russians couldn't believe their luck and parked up next to bridge and blocked the road. Is it game on very already? 

More Germans rolled up next turn, Dorniers ineffectively bombed the Russian supply lines, but the armoured cars motored back south over the other ridge while I/4th Panzer Regt rolled up to the bridge from the south.

The Russians engaged the Panzers supported by the Sturmoviks, but only managed to knock a couple of hits off the Germans. The Germans responded with a massive artillery barrage and air strikes on the NKVD followed up by concentrated fire the from panzers and armoured cars while another panzer battalion appeared.

Heinkels bombed the Russian supply lines as Katukovs T34s appeared down the road and Soviet Paras trudged south through the snow.

But too late for the NKVD who disintegrated under the weight of fire. 11th Tank Brigade was looking a bit isolated now.

So the pulled back north the ridge, joined by Katukov and the Paras. The FAC moved to join the T34s. First blood to the Germans!

The Germans followed up with more (ineffective) bombing.

And expanded the bridgehead as the first of the motorcycle infantry arrived. They parked up on the T junction with their anti-tank guns while ambulances resuscitated  the battered panzer battalion by the bridge.  

Katukov and 11th TB engaged the motorcyclists while the VDV slipped into Kamanevo. The rest of the Russians shot up the motorcyclists who took some hits but were still in good order.

Much manouvering on the German side! The revived panzers from the bridge swung out to the left flank, supported by the armoured cars who didn't fancy sitting next to the VDV in Kamanevo. The second unit of motorcyclists came motoring on but could only get as far as the bridge crossing due to the congestion ahead. The remaining panzers and motorcycle AT concentrated on 11th Tank Brigade up on the ridge, supported by the artillery, to little effect as artillery isn't much use against armour and the Russian tanks had the benefit of the higher ground.  

The He 111s did generate an excellent photo op as they bombed the Russian logistics. They made a very menacing shadow on the snow!

The Russians were all in good positions and just hunkered down and shot up the Germans. The Germans now concentrated on the T34s, but again to little effect. The Pak 36 shells just bounced off their sloped armour and as usual the artillery did little to the heavily armoured units.

The Russians were getting the idea though, despite wasting the last Sturmoviks on supporting Katukov shooting up the leftmost panzers, the rest of the Russians concentrated on the eastern panzer unit and inflicted enough hits to disorganise it. At some point the motorcyclists with the infantry guns seem to have joined the panzers but I don't recall when.

The Russian motor rifles however moved onto the defile between the ridges, about the worst possible place for them as they had absolutely no cover and were in range of most of he German forces.

The Germans had both supply columns available so reorganised their battered panzers. The 'heavy' motorcycles moved back to the left flank again, taking up the position previously occupied by the armoured cars, who had very bravely moved closer to the T34s. 

The non moving units and artillery pounded the vulnerable motor rifles who took some hits.

The Russians made an all out effort on the eastern panzers who were still quite shot up, every unit in range plus the Sturmoviks. Katukov kept plinking away at the other German tanks.

The overwhelming Russian attack finished off one of the panzer battalions and the other took sufficient damage to disorganise it and it fell back to the river to reorganise next turn. The German line was suddenly looking a bit ragged, and the heavy motorcycle unit started digging in. The armoured cars had to move back to the German right flank to plug the gap left by the dispersed panzer unit.

The German artillery had shot its bolt and was resupplied this turn, so the Germans just kept up enough fire on the motor rifles to keep them disorganised.

A final casualty of the fighting was my poor old Dornier as various bits fell off the model as I handled it! I've had issues with it disintegrating before, it is a Japanese pre-painted model but not very well assembled, and this time some of the canopy fell off. I retired it for more repairs.

We broke for the night at that point after eight turns. Still everything to play for, but I wonder at what point the Russians will actually read their victory conditions! They need to retake the bridgehead, not just stop the Germans advancing, although perhaps they are playing a long game of attrition.

Equally, at some point the Germans may realise that although individually their units are much better than the Russian ones, they are now at a dreadful positional disadvantage. They need to get up on the ridge to negate the Russian terrain advantage, or at least start shooting at the weakest Russian units instead of the strongest ones. Well, we shall see how it pans out tomorrow. 

Looks like attrition was indeed the Russia plan. The German motorcyclists on the T junction vanished in a hail of fire! The German response was muted, the remaining panzers reorganised (again) and the armoured cars moved up to occupy the T junction, taking some pot shots at the Motor Rifles as they did so. The other motorcyclists finished digging in, which given the volume of incoming fire was very sensible.

More pounding next turn, the Russians hammered the German armoured cars with tanks and Sturmoviks. The Germans may be armoured, but against three enemy tank battalions they took heavy losses and became disorganised.

Again the Germans rolled with the punches. The armoured cars fell back to the south side of the river behind an artillery barrage and  the panzers reorganised (again) and were now almost back up to fully operational status again. The entrenched motorcyclists just plinked away at Katukov to little effect.

The Russians took a look at the clock and decided it was time to attack. Covered by Sturmoviks and the T34s, 11th Tank Brigade, the BTs and VDV rolled in from the northeast.

A hail of defensive fire engulfed the Russians, the VDV vanished under a heavy artillery barrage.

When the smoke cleared, the Russian paras were scattered to the four winds. The Germans also reorganised their armoured cars and bombed up the Stukas.

The Russians switched their focus to the German tanks (their armour was more effective against them than the dug in motorcyclists). They managed to get six hits on the panzers, but their Veteran status just saved them with one hit to spare.

The German return fire, supported by the Stukas and last of their artillery ammunition, was devastating and the BT battalion was reduced to blazing wrecks. The Germans hastily reorganised the battered panzer battalion too. The earlier Russian caution had been justified. 

On the last turn, the Russians tried one more fire attack, but they no longer had the firepower to overwhelm the Germans and although they chipped a few hits off, the Germans held firm. 

The German return fire was also fairly ineffective and 11th Tank Brigade lived to fight another day.

At the end of all that, the Germans still held their bridgehead, but the Russians had a unit within two hexes of the bridge, so it was a draw! As in real life, Eberbach had suffered heavy armour losses and didn't really have a tactical answer to the massed T34s of Katukovs brigade, but shot up the weaker Russian units instead.

That was very exciting and went right down to the wire. I found the first evening quite tiring to run as a lot was going on, but the second evening went faster and smoother. It was nice to see so much mobility on display, although the game did stagnate into a shooting match for a few turns - I think it is inevitable with fairly evenly matched forces. The overall count of SP and combat dice are similar for both sides, but they are distributed very differently across the unit types. 

IRL Having given Eberbach a bloody nose, Leylushenko fought a delaying action back up the road to Tula via Voin and Mtensk for several days until eventually the weather broke and slowed the German advance to a crawl and finally a halt until the ground hardened again. We shall be back in November 1941 to see what happens next.