India Pattern Carrier

 I was planning purchases for my Operation Crusader operational game, and as 4th Indian Div was one of the participants, I 'needed' an Indian Pattern Carrier, which I'm going to use for the divisional recce battalion (as it was configured as a Motor Infantry Battalion, not a Divisional Cavalry Regiment). I ordered one from BPM along with some other stuff. 

And what a beautiful model it is. This is a resin one, so more expensive but just look at all those rivets!

It is just lovely, really crisp and captures the feel of the original so well.

It has nice internal detail too. The driver is a PP 'Seated British' figure in a tin hat, and the other guy is a spare PP mortar (?) crewman - he is equipped as an officer anyway.

This was a joy to paint. I did my usual coat of Light Stone, a dark brown inkwash then a heavy drybrush of Light Stone and a light drybrush of Pale Sand and it brought the rivets and hard edges out really well. What a beauty, can't wait to get it on the table.

More 15mm British artillery. 6 and 25 pdr.

 I was planning a game and I "needed" some more British artillery in theatre neutral colours.. I put an order in to QRF back in January but it never turned up (lost in the post),  so I put in order to BPM instead. 

Another pair of 25pdrs, and some more 6pdrs. I discovered a couple of spare British Para gunners, so wanted another 6pdr, but BPM only supply them in pairs so... 

Lovely little single piece resin models. I did one with a para crew and one with normal British gunners. Yes, I know it isn't an Airborne version, but really, who cares. 

The guns are painted in VJ Russian Uniform and given a wash of Bronze Green. After all the desert stuff, it is a very long time since I painted anything green! 

More 25pdrs, in cheaper APL. A bit grainy but fine for wargaming.. Although I undercoated the limbers, I didn't bother finishing them as they are unnecessary clutter. 

I would have ordered some Quads too, but BPM don't do them.... Another component of my missing QRF order. I've ordered some from another manufacturer. 

I did the guns in the later Mediterranean scheme, mid brown with black disruptive. They will do for the desert and NWE at a pinch. The crews are mainly spare 8th Army gunners with some others mixed in.. I did them in dark khaki drill with khaki helmets (hessian covers?), but not green or luminous sand, so they are good for a range of theatres. 

3D Printed planes

 Although I swore I wouldn't paint any 15mm desert planes, Tims generous contributions of free stuff meant I actually had a substantial collection of British and Italian 1/144th scale planes, and having added a 1/144th Bf 109, I thought I might as well go the whole hog and get some more German planes.

I was actually putting in an order to Hannants for something else anyway, so I could have bought another Zvezda Stuka, but I really wanted a 1/144th Ju 88 (mine are either 1/300th or 1/200th) and I couldn't find an affordable Ju 88 at all. I'd noticed BPM do a range of 3D printed aircraft and as I was also ordering some stuff from them as well, I thought I'd give them a go.

And here they are, 3D printed Ju 87 and Ju 88. Done in desert camo to join my expanding 1/144th desert air forces. They are fairly basic wargaming models, but good enough. They are quite large pieces so striations are visible but they sanded down OK. Both planes come printed in two halves (one half of the fuselage, plus a wing etc etc), with some extra bits too. They stuck together fine though, and the join line was fairly unobtrusive and could be sanded once dry.

The Ju 87 has lovely raised supports on the cockpit canopy, which made if very easy to paint them in after doing the perspex dark blue. You can see the tail is slightly on the thick side, a result of the two halves being stuck together. Obviously they don't come with propellers, although I usually snap those off anyway, before other people do it for me by accident.

You can see the join line more on the underside, I didn't bother sanding this down as much. The wheel farings come in two halves each (why?). They stick together OK, but have no locating pins, you just have to bond them to a flat area on the base of the wing. This took me a few attempts with layers of UHU and superglue but they stuck on firmly in the end. I suppose I could have drilled in a support rod, but didn't. 

The Ju 88 is similar in construction, you can see the thickness of the tail more here. Again, the raised cockpit detail made it very easy to paint the window struts.

On this model the engines each come in two halves, but have a much bigger flat area to stick to than the Stuka wheels. It  also has this odd hole in the bottom of the fuselage. I just drilled further into it for the flight stand.

I did them both in desert camo schemes lifted from my 'Axis Aircraft of WW2 book'. They both have a dark sand base, the Ju 87 is stippled in red/brown camo and the Ju 88 is stippled in green camo (actually a unit based in Sicily). They got the North Africa white recognition bands and wing tip undersides.

Unlike kits, they don't come with any decals, and I ran out of crosses part way through - I thought I had more in stock. Fortunately I was going to Hammerheasd anyway, so I picked up a pack of I94 German 1/100 or 1/144th scale decals. These had a nice range of crosses as well as some tail swastikas, which you don't get with Zvezda kits. The Ju 88 got a swastika which would make Hitler proud, while the Ju 87 is a bit more understated. 

I think these are fine for what I intended, but in general I think I'll stick to kits for this sort of thing for now, they are decent gaming pieces though. 

Bf 109 (Trop)

 Ah well, the rot starts here. My original plan was to use my 6mm tropical aircraft with my 15mm stuff, but Tim has already donated to me a load of 1/144th Italian and British planes in desert camo, so the Lufwaffe was never going to be far behind.

I picked up this old Bf 109 from the collection of Frank, a long standing SWS member who sadly died suddenly. I've no idea of the original manufacturer, but it is a plastic model. It was originally done in green splinter with blue undersides, but I thought it was worthy of a repaint in North Africa splodge camo. 

I left the original decals on and left a gap in the sand paint around them to show the original dark green camo, rather like some of my DAK panzers. Otherwise it was just a job of adding the red brown blobs and the various white trimmings. I did the H insignia on the fuselage stripe with a paint pen. I also painted the canopy dark blue as it looks better than battered clear plastic, and shows the perspex support frame better.  

I left the underside as it was, but added the white FFI wingtip bands.

Job done, it will be appearing in a game shortly.

Making Sure of Savelborn

 Tim put on another 54mm Bulge game using his Funny Little World Wars rules. This time we are off to a hasty counterattack mounted by 9th Armored Division on 18th December 1944  near the town of Savelborn.

Area of Operations. Units from 276 Volksgrenadier Division have occupied Savelborn (centre). TF Hall and TF Philbeck, CCA, 9th Armored Div are counterttacking. The hills are all wooded and bad going.

I commanded TF Philbeck, Graham TF Hall and our CO was Jim. The wicked Germans were Micheal and John. TF Hall was approaching from the south and TF Philbeck from the east. My chaps had a recce troop, Armored Infantry Company and a couple of Sherman platoons. Graham had an engineer company, platoon of Stuarts and two 105mm batteries in support.

Battlefield from the south. I hope those cards aren't anything nasty! The general plan was for Graham to pin the enemy frontally while my guys went right flanking via the woods north of the town and cleared it from the rear.

The leading elements of TF Hall. The Engineer company has a rather beautiful Corgi diecast M3 halftrack to ride in.

M8s from TF Philbeck. These are both Solido models, tweaked by Tim.

German reinforcements start marching on from the north. The Hetzer is another stunning diecast model, the gun even elevates and depresses. I can't recall the manufacturer.

Grahams engineers debussed in the open in front of the town. Maybe not the best idea. The rest of the column tried to go cross country along the edge of the woods as they sorted themselves out. Personally I would have led with the armour in the open country here, but they aren't my guys.

The Germans in the woods are revealed! MG platoons, Panzerschreck teams and a rifle company. My guys are dimly visible in the distance. We lost some Shermans to Panzerschreck fire so I pulled the tanks back. The rest of the column is bypassing to the north as per the plan.

The German reinforcements apparently amount to an entire battalion, supported by a platoon of Hetzers. They are certainly a pretty big column anyway. 

Grahams guys in the open are pinned and shredded by massed MG42 fire. Fortunately the US artillery also plasters the German positions.

A bit hard to see but my M8 crews have dismounted and have taken the position on the ridge, the Armored Infantry are coming up behind them. I've left the Shermans down on the road to duel with the Hezter, which dashed ahead and appeared at the crossroads. The Germans have evacuated the wood having suffered heavy losses and the remnants are lurking behind that big wooden building. 

We broke for the night at that point, everything to play for!

The activation cards fell in my favour and I decided that Fortune Favours the Brave, so my Recce teams piled into the village and occupied the big wooden house and forestalled the VG marching down the road. My Armored Infantry also dismounted and fanned out through the trees.

Grahams battered Engineers (now reduced to platoon strength) finally struggled into the woods where they stopped. The German MG position up on the hill had decimated them.

Half the Germans on the road deployed into the woods to counter my infantry, and the other half assaulted my building from the line of march. The attack failed (I'm not wildly surprised, the 267 VG Div was rated as one of the worst in the German Army) and the road was left scattered with German casualties.

Elsewhere things weren't going to so well. Grahams Stuarts were still manouvering through the snowy woods, having not fired a shot all game, and the Hetzer managed to knock out all the Shermans! The German gunnery was very good, and mine was appalling. What a disaster.

The Germans had pulled back from the edge of the woods to avoid the US artillery which now belatedly started shelling the German positions on the hill. My Armored Infantry company now faced two companies of Volksgrenadiers supported by SFMG42 platoons... to add insult to injury, German AT teams knocked out the halftracks.

In danger of being completely wiped out my TF commander and medic picked up the wounded US infantry and pulled out of the woods back down the hill, the M8s acting as improvised ambulances. My Recce guys still had an escape route open, so with a parting shot managed to knock out the Hetzers with Bazookas (the Germans were ignoring them for some reason) and then legged it back through the woods to link up with the rest of the TF.

The 9th Armored attack had failed utterly.

Well we made a right balls up of that. I let my armour get too close to the German infantry (despite planning not to), and Graham, dismounted in the open far too early before our artillery had worked the Germans over and didn't get his armour into action at all. We thoroughly deserved to lose. Well done Germans for giving us a good kicking.

Tims 'worms eye view' of the game is always very atmospheric and produces a real fog-of-war. It isn't something I cannot replicate with my setup of a laptop on a pile of boxes.

Ponyri Station

 Continuing my Kursk mini campaign, the next stop was Ponyri Station on 7th July 1943. With the defeat of the ill timed counterattack by 2nd Tank Army, Model committed his Panzer Divisions to force a breakthrough into the Russian rear. At Ponyri Station, on the rail line to Kursk, 18th Panzer Division ran into units of 13th Rifle Corps. The Russians threw in everything they had left to stop the Germans. 

Battlefield from the south. Ponyri Station is at the crossroads, Ponyri village is on the road leading south. The rail line runs beside the E-W road. In this scenario, the hills and woods are bad going due to recent rainstorms. Astute readers will note the resemblance to Neil Thomas's 'Take the Crossroads' scenario.... Although irl many battles were fought over road junctions.

The initial Russian defenders are the remains of 307th Rifle Division, dug in along this low rise astride the railway. They have also erected some obstacles across the rail line. Each unit is a (very weak) Rifle Regiment. They still have some anti-tank guns, who are positioned with the 1010th Rifle Regiment along with an FAC. The trenches are all wired with field phones. 

John B commanded the 307th.

13th Corps HQ in the rear. As a very ordinary Rifle Corps, this is almost all horse drawn, including the combat debut of my horse drawn Field Kitchen! The Corps Commander and his friendly NKVD detachment get to ride in the command Gaz.

The Corps orders are to hold the crossroads at all costs. John A was Corps Commander.

307th Artillery Regiment offtable. Horse drawn 76mm guns.

Reinforcements on the way! 85th Rifle Division with attached Corps level assets. In the lead is the 85th Rifle Div Advanced Guard, a Rifle Regiment reinforced with 129th Tank Brigade, 237th Tank Regiment and 22nd Guards Mortar Brigade, all independant Corps level units. The tank units were designated for infantry support and a low priority for modern equipment. 

I based the 129th on the 225th which had a battalion of T70s, a battalion of Valentines and a 'heavy' battalion of 3" gun CS Matildas, so I gave it a Valentine and Matilda. The Valentine should be a 6pdr version, but I only have a 2pdr MK III. 

The 237th was based in a typical 1943 Independant Tank Regiment, which usually had a company of medium tanks and a couple of companies of light tanks, generally T60 or T70, so I gave it a T70. Later in the year they were standardised to be organised the same as the Tank Regiments in Mechanised and Cavalry Corps, with four companies. I rolled this into the Rifle Regiment.

This unit was commanded by Pete (in the snazzy BA64 Armoured Car) and the Katyusha Brigade had an FOO in a Gaz jeep. These chaps would arrive along the road to the east.

The 85th Div Main Body had two Rifle Regiments, the Divisional AT battalion and Division Field Artillery Regiment (horse drawn 76mm guns). John A commanded this as well as the Corps. These chaps would arrive late in the day from the north.

Along with their Field Guns and Katyushas, the Russians had the inevitable Sturmoviks. Another outing for my Stripey Tail.

To roll over the Russians we have the entire 18th Panzer Division! You don't often get an entire Panzer Division to play with. The 18th wasn't a great division, being a third wave unit and based on a converted infantry division (the 88th). It only had a single panzer battalion at Kursk, consisting of two companies each of Pz III and Pz IV. I was very generous and allowed them to form into two battalions, which basically meant 60 German tanks had the same combat power as 100 Russian ones, the Panzerblitz approach.

Tim G was division CO and organised the three Regiments (18th Panzer, 52nd and 101st PGR) into Kampfgruppen. The division would enter in column along the road from the west, their orders, to take and hold the crossroads.

First up was KG Markus (Mark) with a panzer battalion and motorised infantry battalion with attached combat engineers. Their job was to form up and bash through (or at least keep busy) the defenders across the road. I gave each panzer battalion a Pz III and a Pz IV as real panzer regiment had two companies of each. 

Then KG Wilhelm (Simon), another panzer battalion plus the armoured panzergrenadier battalion. Their job was to go right flanking and attack Ponyri from the south.

Finally we had KG Gow (Tim commanded these guys too). Two motorised infantry battalions, reinforced with Marders from the divisional panzerjaeger battalion. Their job to go left flanking and lock down the road from the north.

Indirect fire support included the 88th Panzer Artillery Regiment with battalions of Wespe and towed 105mm guns, the Luftwaffe with Hs 129s and 150mm Army Artillery which would fire a preparatory bombardment. 

Finally there was Divisional HQ, with a command halftrack, ambulance and my Bergepanzer III conversion.

The action opened with a heavy preparatory bombardment on the 307th, which suppressed the defenders and inflicted a couple of hits.

The lead elements of 18th Panzer began to drive on. KG Markus evidently hadn't received the orders about what they were supposed to be doing, but eventually formed up across the railway. The Panzer battalion of KG Wilhlem followed behind. 

From their vantage point on the rise, the Russian spotters could see the Germans and called in air and artillery on the Panzergrenadiers in their lorries.

Undeterred, the Panzers rolled forwards.KG Markus headed for the southern positions of the 307th. KG Wilhelm formed up on the reverse slope of the hill, prior to conducting an outflanking manouvre to the south, and 101st PGR finally rolled on heading north east.

The Russians continued to fire on Marks infantry, who became disorganised. Marks Panzers were very wisely uphill, which gave them some protection from the Russian AT guns.

All hell then broke loose as the 85th Div Advanced Guard (lets call it the Forward Detachment or FD) came storming on from the east, led by 129th Tank Brigade. The Russian tankers parked up across the railway, but both sides threw all their air and artillery into the battle for rise E6. Both the Russian and German infantry hit the deck and reorganised, ambulances ferried away the wounded while the Russian Field Kitchen brought up fresh supplies of bread and vodka.

In all the kerfuffle, KG Wilhelm advanced southeast across the muddy hills, while 101 PGR continued to march northeast.

Back at Ponyri Station 255 Rifle Regiment and their accompanying T70 Regiment began digging in, encouraged by the proximity of the Corps CO, the NKVD and Pete in his BA64!

On the rise, the 1020th Rifle Regiment was in dire straits, reduced to just one hit, and made the bold move of retreating (advancing?) north to join the 1019th. This left KG Markus a bit puzzled as to where all the Russians had gone.

KG Wilhlem had meanwhile swung around the south. Russian defensive fire hammered the panzergrenadiers who were forced to stop and reorganise, while 255 RR in Ponyri redoubled their digging in efforts. German fire meanwhile switched to 129 Tank Brigade, including the attentions of the Hs 129s. The Russian tanks were in a poor tactical position, trying to find cover behind the railway embankment while overlooked by the Panzer units on the hills to the south.

101st PGR had made it through the hills in the north and now fanned out, II/101 pinning the 1019th RR, while I/101 (with the Marders) parked up on a rise in the rear of 129 Tank Brigade! The Russian tankers were in danger of behind completely surrounded.

Hard pounding ensued, 129th Tank Brigade hung on and Simons Panzergrenadiers took heavy losses, while the defenders of Ponyri, supported by Sturmoviks, took on the nearby Panzers, inflicting light losses.

More seriously I/101 PGR was absolutely hammered, being reduced to two hits and requiring attention from the medical column to deal with the casualties.

The Panzergrenadiers had also taken heavy losses, but the Panzers finally got the upper hand against the Matildas and Valentines of 129 Tank Brigade, and the steppe was left littered with burning tanks and fleeing Tank Riders. To add insult to injury, the 1020th RR was destroyed by German artillery fire before to had a chance to reorganise.

The Russian position had been blown wide open, and the response from the defenders was muted, mainly concentrating on Simons Panzer Battalion, which took enough losses to disorganise it.

Up in the north. II/101 PGR and 1019th RR continued to trade shots, but I/101 PGR retired to the ridge behind. A rather healthier spot and out of sight of the Russians, to hopefully reorganise in peace. Both sides logistic units had been kept very busy, both in dealing with casualties, but also shifting shed loads of ammunition to the artillery, whose barrels were red hot by now. The Katyushas of 22 Guards Mortar Brigade in particular needed 'feeding' regularly as they were salvo firing two loads of ammo at a time.  

Time to finish the job. KG Markus and Wilhlem rolled up to assault Ponyri, while repair teams frantically tried to sort out the damaged Panzers on the hill. Dimly visible in the distance, 1019th RR has taken enough losses to become disorganised.

The Russians fired everything they had against Marks lorried infantry and engineers. Artillery, Katyushas, Sturmoviks, infantry, tanks... Under the sheer weight of fire the battalion disintegrated and the survivors fled for the rear. 

Going into turn 9, we broke for the evening. An overhead view of Ponyri. The Russians will have to hope their trenches save them.

An interesting situation in the north. The Russians are coming off worse here for now, but the Germans didn't have enough logistic units to reorganise I/101 PGR either. What the Germans don't know of course is that the rest of 85th Rifle Division is about to coming marching on down that road, right next to those disorganised Germans on the ridge! Well, lets see what happens tomorrow.

The first assault on Ponyri failed. The Panzergrenadiers were routed despite supporting fire from the entire divisional artillery and panzer regiment. 

And in the north the ongoing duel between the 101 PGR and 307 Rifle Div sputtered on. Supply columns and ambulances kept both sides in the fight, neither was strong enough to strike a decisive blow. 

At this juncture the rest of 85th Rifle Div rolled up, straight into the ZOC of the Marders on the ridge. The Germans had managed to inadvertently block their entry route. 

Back at Ponyri, Mark's Panzers launched another assault, covered by massed artillery fire. The defenders were disorganised from the previous attacks and unable to reorg due to last turns assault. 

Defensive fire did enough damage to disrupt the Panzer attack, and the Germans only scored one hit on the defenders. The attack was repulsed. Sturmoviks hammered the retreating tanks and they were reduced to one remaining hit! 

In the north the 307th received the attention of the Luftwaffe and had to be reorganised, while I/101 PGR was plastered by Russian artillery and the battalion became disorganised too.

Ambulances raced to the rescue of the beleagured Panzergrenadiers, apparently (based on this photographic evidence!) while being strafed by Sturmoviks. The 85th Rifle Divs leading Regiment sidestepped the obstruction while the Germans were busy, clearing the road.

Back at Ponyri, both sides paused to regroup after the previous few turns heavy fighting. Bergepanzers fixed up Marks Panzer battalion, while the doughty Field Kitchen sorted out Petes boys in Ponyri.

The Panzers rolled forwards once again, covered by Simons tanks on the hill and artillery, and once again took massive losses from Russian artillery and Katyusha fire. They were however adjacent to Ponyri once more. The Field Kitchen (and NKVD) once more had to encourage the wavering defenders.

At the 307th Div position things quietened down as both the 1020th RR and II/101 PGR needed reorganising. The Russians kept up a steady fire on I/101 PGR to cover the entry of the third Regiment of 85th Rifle Div.

At Ponyri Mark bravely volunteered to charge the town with his few remaining operational tanks to pin the defenders and allow Simons tanks to close. Von Gow vetoed this suggestion and instead ordered Mark to refit his battered tanks, while Simon and the artillery continued to pound the blazing village.

The gunners finally got their eye in and the battered defenders broke and ran under the heavy German fire, leaving burning houses and wrecked T70s behind them.

In the north the Russians continued to plaster I/101 PGR, keeping them thoroughly pinned.

This allowed one Regiment of the 85th Div to break free and rapidly march south through the woods towards Ponyri.

Sadly it was too late, Ponyri was now undefended and the Russian infantry was still a move away. Tims blocking action in the north had held up the Russian reinforcements just long enough.

As time ran out, Simons Panzers cautiously entered the demolished town and the Germans claimed victory.

Well done to all sides, that was a very close run thing! I was very impressed with the standard of play on both sides, there was admirable concentration of effort, economy of force, maintenance of the aim etc and both sides respective commanders were faced with tough decisions allocating their logistic efforts between keeping their indirect fire assets supplied and their combat formations effective.

A breakthrough here would have forced the Russians to commit some of their strategic reserves, which in turn would have hampered their strategic offensive towards the Dneipr later that summer. In reality 18th Panzer Div failed to break through at Kursk, and in fact suffered such heavy losses that the division fell apart with low morale and high rates of desertion. It was dissolved and struck from the Order of Battle. Elements of the division later reappeared in 1944 as 88th Artillery Division, but it never got any tanks again.

The failure at Ponyri ended 9th Army's hopes of breaking through the northern flank of the Kursk Bulge, and although the fighting fizzled on for a few days longer, Model essentially gave up at that point and instead starting looking nervously as the massed Soviet Armies behind his rear left flank. Something for another day perhaps.