NATO, WAPA and the indefensibility of LandJut in NGP and D85

[JDR Dragoon]

But to return to the original premasis of the thread: The imbalance of forces in the LandJut area in NGP and D85.

-I think it unlikely that any danes will be "retconned" into NGP 85 at this point and in any event people can download the AFNORTH expansion if they want to have danes in their NGP (although only for scenario purposes and not the main NGP 85 campaign).

-I distinctly remember reading one of the designers stating somewhere, that no more german territorial troops would be in the game due to scale and playability issues 8after all, if the TK-Schleswig Holstein gets its Territorials why not the rest of Germany?). In the same vein, the WAPA 2nd strategic echelon (the units from the Byelorussian, Ukrainian and Baltic military districts) would not be in the game either. So I guess that balancing measure is out of the question (unless we are talking about unofficial MODs here of course).

-Another balancing measure would be for a small percentage (between 5-10%) of the WAPA units using amphibious assault to be lost (and or Disrupted) upon landing (represents attrition from attack by the German Naval Air Arm and Fast Attack Missile and Torpedo armed craft of the german and danish navies plus Submarines). I think this should be possible using the Parameter Data log. Or am I mistaken?

-Another option (only available in Human vs. Human games) would be gentleman agreements. For instance the WAPA player agreeing to only exercise one or perhaps two of his "strategy" options vs LandJut (and then leaving the NATO player to guess which ones chaosen) instead of eating the "Free Lunch" wholesale and exercising all 4 options (Naval Spetznaz, Soviet Marines, Polish Marines and Polish Airborne) by default.

-Or one could of course choose to include some more Danish troops in the mix above the single reinforced brigade present in D85 V.1.01. Besides, if even british TA units can deploy to the continent, draw equipment and be in the field by noon on the 14th what should prevent the last two brigades of the Jutland Division from doing likewise?

[JDR Dragoon]

Based on my experience, it's hard for me to imagine that NATO would ever have been surprised by a WP attack.

I don´t think it would have been a surprise either. The question would more likely have at what point in WAPAs decision making process NATO would have become aware that this was "It". Probably more than a days warning, but probably not more than a week either (unless corroborated by solid HUMINT or some kind of code breaking bonanza). You can after all only tell so much from SIGINT (It could foretell that WAPA was up to something "big" in during the Prague spring of 1968, but just exactly what remained unknown untill the soviets actually marched into Czechoslovakia).

[Narwan]

The whole point of Danube 85 is that WAPA uses their spring maneuver (Zapad 85) as a cover for forward deployment of polish troops (among other things). Haven´t you read the games historical background folder ;-). About WAPA readiness: I am willing to accept that polish mobilization would have taken quite some time (and Czech too for that matter), perhaps up to a week. But the NVA retained 85% readiness among their standing forces (their reserve formations would of course have taken a few days to call up and equip) and the GSFG was not that far behind. That was after all the entire point behind Marshall Ogarkovs raising the operational readiness in the GSFG in the late 70s: Namely that WAPA would have a shot at beating NATOs "Vorneverteidigung" before it could be properly reinforced. Luckily we didn´t get to find out whether WAPA could actually have beaten us to the punch.

Besides even with a handful of MILANs and a few KaJaPas in their Schwere Kompanie it is not like the HS Regiments are swimming in AT weapons ;-)

Hehe, no I didn't read the background too closely. I already assumed this would be part of the background. But it's a myth that an excercise, even such a large one, could be used as a masquerade for the real thing. There are so many reason's why I could go into but I'll stick to just one; as soon as a single polish formation (the country where an organisation run from the capital of a NATO country was arguably the most powerful and influential organisation in the country) gets issued a full complement of live rounds every alarmbell in every NATO HQ would go off! ;-)

The readiness figures are propaganda figures. It's like the NVA being equiped with first line equipment; they had just enough T72's for one regiment and enough bmp-2's for a battallion. But guess which types were always paraded? The T55 was the standard tank for the WP allies and few of those were of the latest improved versions in 1985.

Same with the readiness; a few handpicked units (two divisions at most) had high readiness in the NVA which may have on occassion come close to 85% but no division can maintain that sort of readiness all of the time. Not in the west and certainly not in the shoestring budgets of the WP. The NVA did keep the highest readiness among the WP nations but that simply meant weeks instead of months to get ready.
One of the places I went to get more concrete info was to the NVA forum on the web (gathering of veterans from the NVA, all in german too btw). That cured me of a few conceptions I had. WP allied forces and readiness were far overrated in the west.

Talking of highreadiness, the one part of the NVA I would expect in a from the barracks attack are the border regiments which were elite units specially trained for quick assaults into the border area in case of war. I'm surprised they're not in the game.

Soviet troop readiness in the GSFG was nowhere near the required levels at any point. Don't forget we are talking about a planned economy system here. Readiness states, production numbers, training levels were all planned ahead and carreers determined by who 'reached' the required levels; ie who managed to tweak the real numbers without getting caught.
There were shortages of everything in the SU, certainly by 1985 and keeping stockpiles of stuff and spending resources to keep formations at high readiness meant huge expenditures while production numbers for basic equipment, and certainly AFV's was far behind requirements.
What happened was the figures that could be verified from a distance were made to look as good as possible (nr of tanks, apcs's, men, hours trained etc). But quality of troops, readiness status, training levels, are all very subjective. Those were easily tweaked and that's what happened. Just like the nr of tanks didn't equate to the same number being in working condition. Had war broken out the category A divisions would have robbed the B's to get their TO&E's full (with only marginally inferior equipment); the B's would have stripped the C's down to bare bones and the C's would get whatever there was left leaving the D's as nothing more than administrative cadres on paper.

Good thing indeed we never had to find out if that was true either.

True about the not swimming AT weapons but up to three milan launchers per company in addition to PZF's and carl-gustavs and a (small) SP-AT cie per battallion is not much less than what the run-of the-mill NATO infantry-company had.

Narwan

[JDR Dragoon]

Well I talked to a few old NVA soldiers as well over the years. Of course they might just have been bragging for "ostalgic" reasons ;-). The NVAs internal documents (http://www.eurobuch.com/buecher/isbn/381...1/Nva.html) also shows how the "Mobilmachungsdauer" was succesfully brought down from about a week in the 1960s-70s to just a few days by the early 80s (”Die Mobilmachungsdauer konnte von fünf Tagen (1976) auf zwei Tage (1986) reduziert werden”. page. 90) About the NVA and the T72, they still had over 500 of the critters (still only 1 T72 for every 2-3 T54/55s though ;-)). As for the BMP, they only had a battalion of BMP 2s, yes. But they had quite a few BMP 1s (over a 1000). Not quite enough to equip their units to soviet standards though, but still nothing to sneer at.

[Narwan]

Well I talked to a few old NVA soldiers as well over the years. Of course they might just have been bragging for "ostalgic" reasons ;-). The NVAs internal documents (http://www.eurobuch.com/buecher/isbn/381...1/Nva.html) also shows how the "Mobilmachungsdauer" was succesfully brought down from about a week in the 1960s-70s to just a few days by the early 80s (”Die Mobilmachungsdauer konnte von fünf Tagen (1976) auf zwei Tage (1986) reduziert werden”. page. 90) About the NVA and the T72, they still had over 500 of the critters (still only 1 T72 for every 2-3 T54/55s though ;-)). As for the BMP, they only had a battalion of BMP 2s, yes. But they had quite a few BMP 1s (over a 1000). Not quite enough to equip their units to soviet standards though, but still nothing to sneeze at.

Those numbers are a good illustration of the paper magic that was running rampant in the wp armies. I seriously doubt their real value. Semantics are part of it. Mobilmachungsdauer looks to me to reffer to the influx of reservists into parent units. That's not the same as getting a unit combat ready (if half the tanks are in the repairshop forexample, or if the nr of supply trucks are far below the minimum, etc).

Those nr for the T72's seem to be those of the official numbers for the NVA of the late 80's. AFAIK the numbers of T72's in 1985 was substantially lower (as the SU was not able to meet it's own requirements and had to sell as much as possible to non-WP nations for cash there weren't many left for the WP allies in europe).
Totals for 88/89 showed about 4 T55's for every T72.
But those bmps were mostly OLD bmp-1's. You know, the type where the Sagger tended to fall off the launcher when driving over anything but a flat road. ;-)

Narwan

[JDR Dragoon]

Yeah, DF85 is probably a bit "large" with the issue of NVA T72s (by my loose count they get about 450 of the things in the game).

[JDR Dragoon]

But to return to the situation in the LandJut area as presented in DF85:

-The Corps HQ is called "Schleswig Holstein" in the game and is based in Kiel. I propose renaming it to LandJut. and basing it in Rendsburg (which is where its constituting elements were garrisoned). It was a mobile HQ so unless WAPA manages to bomb it into slag it should be able to move way at some point.

-The german addition to the Landjut Corps troops looks accurate if a bit on the small side (only a single ENGBTN instead of an ENG Brigade etc.). As mentioned above no other territorial troops apart from the single brigade attached to 6th PzG.

-6th PzG looks fairly accurate as well.

-The parts of the danish Jutland Division that shows up in the game is quite hard to interpret in places. The divisional artillery is the most obscure, with a bewildering array of towed guns, M109 SPGs and even 4 Gepard SPAA units showing up under this heading, even though the danish army never had any Gepards (too expensive apparently). The Reconnaisance Battalion is also there (with unupgraded M41s) just as it should be, so no biggie there. There is no Divisional Engineer battalion though.

-The 3rd Jutland Brigade also looks allright from a purely organisational point of view. There is no Brigade Artillery battalion though and the brigade engineer company is also missing (although for some reason the LandJut Corps ENGBTN is attached to this brigade instead).

-The Jutland Battlegroup is not composed of MOTINF BTns here, but consists of a a single Armored Battalion (3 Leopard Companies and a single MOTINF company plus an artillery battery of FH70 howitzers, even though the unit text claims that it consists of 105mm howitzers..).

-Most of the danish Corps Troops attached directly to LandJut are eaither missing or placed elsewhere (like the ENG BTN).

-Most of the troops are (probably correct) classed as D, but units from "The Prince´s Life Regiment" (Prinsens Livregiment) are all classed as C. What gives? Does the person responsible for this part of the OOB have some neboulous connection to this nefarious infantry regiment? ;-)

-The number of RDAF planes likely to support this theater in a ground attack capacity is likely correct and on the money. The quality likewise. So props for getting this just exactly right :-)

Getting late again. Tomorrow: What could be changed to make the Jutland Division and LandJut appear as close as possible in the game to what it would have looked like in 1985.

[Narwan]

Getting late again. Tomorrow: What could be changed to make the Jutland Division and LandJut appear as close as possible in the game to what it would have looked like in 1985.

I'm new to the game so not familiar with the engine limits but what seems clear to me is that for a game that is basically company to battallion level (and even the occassional platoon) a simulation of the whole war is undoable and unplayable. So it would have to be detached from the other fronts.
Right now the baltic coast is undefended but in reality there plenty of naval (infantry), security and HS units to make a landing and the subsequent advance not the cakewalk it is now. At least the NATO player will know about it in some detail.

The 'small' units (even down independent HS and security platoons) will slow down WP advances. Right now if there isn't a major unit on hand they can roll on through unopposed and undetected.

This attached OB for NATO in 1989 is a good starting point for the NATO troops available. The detail for the HS, german naval and air force formations is incredible. It may be of some use. It shows just how extensive the german land forces besides the bundeswehr was.

Narwan

[Glenn Saunders]

No - 1989 is not a good start for 1985 - there were a lot of changes happening at around '84 and '85, now that said, you're certainly welcome to do with it and the game OOB as you see fit based on your own vision.

We gave a lot of consideration to the model we used for this what if war.

Glenn Saunders

[Glenn Saunders]

Based on my experience, it's hard for me to imagine that NATO would ever have been surprised by a WP attack.

The premise with FG85 was one day the Russians just marched out of their Barracks and caught Nato Napping. Bill Trottier (PC GAmers - the Desktop General and author of a number of historical books) wrote an essay for this. And while it wasn't his best work, it worked for that title. We used the smae thing for NGP and just carried the game northward into the other Nato Partners sectors.

But for Danube Front, we began to rethink this "blot from the Blue" and we alterned the setup to a more forward position but not a full Nato Defense. We went to a fair bit of effort to explain how we saw this situation develop - it is in a series of PDFs in a folder under Historical in the game - I will attach a ZIP to this post for those who don't have the game.

Now you still may not buy it - that is OK - and you may want to redesign the game for your model of Nato Forward Defense. We considered that too but we really didn't think that the WP would attack in that situation and I guess with hindsite we are correct because they didn't attack:).

But seriously - enjoy working over what we have done for 1989 or whatever period you think works best. You have the tools to do so. And I'll be happy to post your results for everyone to download - just drop me a line.

Be sure however to look over our designer notes - we didn't just throw Danube Front together. A lot of work and rework into what was previously done - what player wanted from FG85 and NGP85 was added to the game as well as correction we learned about post FG85 and NGP 85 release were encorporated.

Glenn