Some painting

I managed to paint some more. I now have 4 of these tanks painted up. They are smaller than my other Soviet tanks and I am not sure what they are. I think they look like T-55s but a bit smaller than others. I may add some dust to them. Not sure what else I will do with them. Once again, the pictures came out poorly.

I also assembled some T-72s. I have one more left in the box of Team Yankee T-72s that I bought still on the sprue.

I also finished the basing of my painted Flank March Soviets. I really like these figures. The picture came out dark. I really don't have good lighting for my painting area.

Cold War - New Minis

I got back my Flank March prints that I had done. They came out great. In addition I had some Berstrom (Might have that wrong) vehicles printed. The vehicles are a pair of BRDM-2s and two of the rocket mounted versions which I can't remember the names of. The other vehicle that I had printed was a FV432 to finish out the platoon I bought. I hope I can match the paint.

I have a few other things ready for priming as well. You can see the turret of an M60A3 there. I also have an M113 command track (I forget the actual designation) and a T-72 as well.

For the infantry, I have cleaned the supports off of the models to get ready to prime them. I need a new can of black primer.

For the Soviets, I had printed three troops with RPG18s, a pair of medics, a pair of officers, a radio operator, and three engineers (wire cutter, mine sweeper and Demolitions).

You can make out that the Medic figure dragging the casualty is a partial failure. The casualty is missing part of its leg. I can probably work with that. There is another guy on the back row next to the officer with raised pistol that has a bad arm. That figure I may discard.

For the US, I have a pair of officers, two senior NCOs, a radio operator, a Mark 19 with two crew, an M40AI with crew and three engineers (same types as soviets).

Somehow this picture came out clearer. I still have to glue the Mark 19 in place as well as the recoiless rifle. Both should be straight forward.

Weekend Painting - Cold War Soviets

I was able to break out my Cold War minis and get some work done. I had some Khurasan Miniatures Soviets on painting stick that had been primed. I pulled out a copy of Team Yankee and used the colors listed in the book. I used a slightly wattered down Soft Tone Army Painter wash on them. I suspect that I should not have watered it down. I will look again later and may redo it.

It is sixteen miniatures that include: an officer, an NCO, two ammo bearers, 3 men carrying additional rockets for RPGs, 3 guys carrying RPGs, 3 LMG gunners, a sniper and two rifle-grenadiers. All useful figures for additional supports for a base platoon.

I also started work on a BMP2 that I built but never painted and did some repair work on some T-55s that had paint chipped off of the barrels. I am hoping that these will come out OK. I am also not sure how well these will match with the existing paint job but hopefully it will be close.

I am waiting on some 3d Prints of some BRDMs and miniatures including engineers, medics, RPG-18s and Recoiless Rifle teams. They should be fun to run on the table.

I pulled out some US Infantry that needs to be finished. I found the painting guide I originally used as well. I want to get this on the table pretty soon. A priority will be to finish the M113 that is not in MERDEC camo and the additional infantry.

I picked up some M114s off of eBay not realizing that these were not is use by the 1980s. They are nice little models and I may try to figure out how to use them.

I also found my British Infantry! Unfortunately, I had some wishful thinking and thought they were all painted. They are QRF models. I think i have a full platoon. I am contemplating reaching out to GAJO Models and buyig painted Team Yankee models instead.

Terrain and Miniatures - Clearing out the backlog

Well, productive day. Managed to finish a bunch of stuff. First, a Things From the Basement house. I really liked this house but the roof was modeled to be a tin roof. I decided to make it a thatched one instead. I tried for a different paint scheme as it was a fancier place. I like it.

Next up is some fantastic Charlie Foxtrot casualty dials. These are flat and lay fairly low even though they were designed with 28mm models in mind. I can't wait to use these. I need probably two more packs.

Then there are my Dux Britanniarum items. Sabot bases and some looting Saxons. And a bishop that is upset. These were fun figures to paint up.

Last item is two haystacks from Six Squared Studios. I really like these. The picture is not the clearest though. Sorry about that.

I still have three buildings and a well to do for Things From the Basement. And the watermill from Star Fort Miniatures. I will thatch the roof of the watermill. Not sure about the others yet.

And a quick update on the Second Kharkov Campaign. I have finished the first 3 scenarios of the second campaign. Three more to go and I am making good progress. I anticipate a release within a month or two.

Until next time...

Distractions

Well, I have just a bit more painting to do and I can finish out the pictures for the new version of This Land Divided. I managed to undercoat the block house that I need and started work on a palisade wall. I have cut enough sticks to make a palisade a whole 3 inches long. It is taking far more time than anticipated.

Given this, the logical thing to do is work on my Chain of Command Soviet forces for the Second Battle of Kharkov, right? Ugh, I have no focus. Anyway, I did a good inventory of my Soviet forces. With the last order I placed with Gaming Models, I have the anti-tank guns I need for my Soviets now. Probably more than I really need. Since I got just the guns, I need to get crews. Looking through my cabinets, I found two packs of Soviet ATG crews from FOW. Perfect except that they come in groups of 4 instead of 5 and one of the four is the leader. So I need two extra troops for each team. The plan is to make a base with the crew on it and leave the ATG's loose. That way I can use the crews for any of the guns that I have that are not already based. Seems like a good solution now. But it's still early in the day.

In terms of Armor, I am doing pretty good on that front. I have most of what I need from the support lists. I don't have some of the odd ones like a T35 but that is easily remedied by an order to Gaming Models or Wargame Models of Ohio. Both are great companies to work with that really make it easy to get tanks on the table. They come pre-painted (not the best in the world but OK). For about $5/tank, you can get a game of What a Tanker going very reasonably. While I like Old Glory and FOW vehicles more, as I think the detail is better, you just can't beat the price from these two places.

And so, while working on this, Jon Y made a post on Twitter that sent me off in another direction and cost me a bunch of money on Amazon. I ordered the Dubno 1941 book by Aleksei Isaev. I have a couple of other books on this battle that formed the basis for the Ustilug supplement. If I ever finish with the Second Battle of Kharkov book, I will probably work on that one with some of the larger tank battles. That could prove to be interesting.

I will take stock of my Germans this afternoon at some point. First I want to see if I have enough miniatures to pull off a Scout Squad as a soviet support. I know I nearly have enough miniatures painted up.

Reading Material & Santa Clause Update

I have been thinking of doing a Pint Sized Campaign for the later war period. The problem was, I did not have any good references for it. All of my books cover the early war period. After asking a few questions online, I ended up ordering Zhukov at the Oder. I have only just started to read it but it is an interesting book covering the Soviet push into Germany and its ultimate goal, Berlin.

Thus far it has not offered much on small unit actions that I am looking for but it is still very interesting. What is better, is I got it dirt cheap on Amazon. I also purchased Jentz's Panzer Truppen volume 1. I had picked up Volume 2 a long time ago but never got around to purchasing the first volume. I found it for a decent price on Amazon and one click and it was on its way. Should arrive in the next couple of days. Now to find time to read with all of the hustle and bustle of the season going on.

It seems like the Santa Clause is running successfully. I have heard from most of the participants that gifts are on their way or will be shortly.

Working on Terrain

I did some more work on my Impudent Mortal buildings. They are starting to come together. I bought some styrene to use for window sills (1.5mm x 2.0mm strips). I am cutting these down to a centimeter in length for the window sills. It looks about right to my eyes. Once the sills are applied, I am going to spackle the building. We will see how that turns out. I am nervous about it.

I also bought some more styrene to use on the top of the 3 story Game Craft building. I need some sort of roof access item or chimney up there to use to remove the roof. Have not figured that part out yet. TheScene.co.uk has some interesting looking stuff. These look ideal if they were not out of stock. (http://thesceneuk.com/shop/building-accessories/mv001/)

I am debating on balconies to add to the back of the 3 story one. We shall see what happens.

Need some help Identifying tanks

I have been working on my tanks that I received from my Santa Clause. They are five really nice M4A2 tanks from Plastic Soldier Company. They are proving to be a bit fiddly to assemble. But they seem OK.

I assembled and put a base coat on one so far. I am going to do two of them as US vehicles and three as lend lease Soviet tanks for late war.

With the one I was working on, I got curious and wondered what the rest of my US armor looked like. Well, I have no idea of what I have. A bunch of shermans and two other types. Can y'all help me figure out what I have?

First picture:

And the next Set:

Thanks for your help.

Now, i did get in my brand new Khtz-16 self propelled guns. Craig over at Gaming Models did a terrific job on these.

I really like these and hope to have them on a table pretty soon.

Cold War Campaign - Game 3

Following the bloodless second game, the third game looked as if it were going to be harder fought. This time the terrain was in a large village that the IDF had fallen back to. The platoon was largely untouched so there was no rearranging of the platoon that was necessary. Again for support, the platoon had their M113 vehicles and a single Dragon ATGM team.

The town had been shelled by the Soviets prior to the attack. This left a large portion of the table in ruins.

The Israelis would defend the top portion of the table. The Soviets would enter from the bottom. The Soviets had two turns of movement in the patrol phase before the IDF moved. In the end, the IDF got the upper hand in the deploying the Jump Off Points.

The IDF JOPs are at the bottom of the picture. In the center of the table are the road blocks that I won from the Lardy Force List Contest. They are nicely made Dragon Teeth type road blocks. I really need to paint them but I wanted a game more than I wanted pretty. I think I had most of my buildings on the table for this.

Having the first initiative the IDF did not deploy anything on their first initiative. The Soviets quickly tried to move troops up. They deployed a BMP-1 and a squad on the cobblestone road. With a double six they were able to rush them forward. The infantry moved up behind a ruin.

The Soviets had some amazing luck as they had three initiatives in a row and ended up startlingly close to an Israeli jump off point. The Soviet BMP was placed on over watch. It would not advance more than an inch beyond this point for the rest of the game.

The Soviets also brought forward a T-55 in support. The T-55 has Syrian markings and was from a diverted shipment that never ended up in its destination country.

The Israeli initiative has the first combat of the game. The Israelis deployed into the ruin and initiated close combat. This proved to be a very bloody encounter that destroyed the Soviet squad to a man and the Israelis took six men killed from their squad. The IDF leader survived and they only took two points of shock.

This initial loss did not shake the Soviet morale badly. With the ruins secure, they deployed the Dragon team to the top of the ruin and fired on the T55. The T55 sustained damage to its main gun.

With its remaining command dice, the IDF deployed another squad behind the ruin. The squad leader ordered the RPG gunner to fire on the BMP-1 which resulted in a killed gunner. (The picture has been left out due to terrible quality of our combat photographer)

The Soviets rushed to support their troops and deployed anther squad and another BMP-1. To support the damaged T55, they moved a squad and a BMP-1 up there as well.

The Soviets continued to push and closed in on the known Israeli position.

They did not just get double sixes once but twice in a row. They brought up their second senior leader and pushed up into the ruins across from the IDF positions.

The squad that was not invested in the ruins began to advance cautiously on tactical once they realized they were directly under the defenders guns. On the next Israeli activation, the lead BMP took another RPG hit forcing it to fall backwards once its morale was broken. The Dragon gunner on the roof launched another rocket at the BMP that was supporting the damaged T55 tank. The hit was not fatal and the BMP took some shock.

The Soviet squad came off of tactical and attempted to charge their way forward to the ruins. This failed. They did not reach close combat range. The Soviet squad in the house fired on the men in the ruins and pinned them. They did manage to kill the Dragon gunner though.

The IDF squad behind the ruins moved to the side of the building to engage the Soviet squad. Not calculating distances well, I ended up moving them to withing close combat range and anther deadly fight ensued. This time the Soviets lost six men including their Platoon Sergeant. The remnants of the squad (squad leader and one man) broke and ran. The IDF squad lost four men in the brief fight.

This cost the Soviets some significant morale loss. Now they had a squad, one whole BMP-1 and three damaged vehicles left. With only 3 command dice left, the squad in the ruins attempted to take as many of the enemy as they could. Firing on the soldiers now in the open, they managed to kill one of the Israelis. This would force them to move backwards to cover.

The T55 attempted to move up and do something. To counter it, the Israelis deployed their final squad on the far end of the board. Over the next few turns, a leader would pick up the Dragon and attempt to engage the T55. He missed. At that point I declared it to be out of ammunition. The new squad moved down the street from cover to cover until it came in contact with the remaining BMP-1. It engaged it with its RPG and caused the crew to abandon it. At this point, the game was all but over.

The IDF lost no morale during the fight. The Soviets ended up withdrawing after loosing another command die. They abandoned two of their BMP-1s in the process. It was a significant victory for the IDF. The men's opinion went down after all of the losses that they took. The COs opinion went back up after the win. The platoon leader's assessment of himself came out to be Steady.

In the end it was a very fun game. What I need to do is figure out how many shots the RPG troops should have and how many shots the Dragon team should get. I decided three for the game but I have no idea how many they should have. Also I am not sure I am doing the damage right for these. No vehicles ended up taking more than superficial damage. Even when being shot by a Dragon. Two games with vehicles and no vehicles were destroyed. I will just have to wait for the Modern Version of Chain of Command to figure out what I should have done.

Cold War Campaign - Game 2

Setup

After the victory that the IDF element achieved in the initial skirmish, Raul Speyer's platoon was left to defend the area against any further attacks. They brought their vehicles forward and took a Dragon ATGM team as a support. They believed that the Soviets would doubtless bring some form of armor as support.

The Soviets assigned a new platoon for this attack. They were assigned an East Bratislovakia surplus T-55. It seemed that the Soviets diverted part of a Syrian shipment of T-55s to East Bratislovakia sometime in the 1970s. Not thrilled with cooperating with the East Bratislovakians, the Soviets were going to only call them in as a last resort. It seems that the Soviets did not believe that the candy makers could fight. They needed to stick to what they knew and knew well - Beet Flavored Candy.

Oddly enough, whenever a Soviet citizen requested to visit the factories, they never touched the candy again afterwards and would never explain why.

The Battle

The battlefield was identical to the one previously fought over. The Soviets had two turns unopposed for the patrol phase. This gave them a good edge and were able to rapidly move their patrol markers forward.

This produced the following Jump Off Points.

The Soviets had a big advantage with a jump off point nearly to the middle of the saddle. With the other they occupied two buildings. The IDF had a tougher time with a poor disbursement of JOPs. All three were fairly close to the table edge. The one furthest to the left turned out to be very vulnerable.

The IDF had the higher morale. They began by deploying two squads and the Dragon ATGM team. The Dragon team attempted to sneak around the far end of the Saddle. In reality, they would end up playing no role in the game. One Squad was deployed on the far jump off point by a house and the other was in the hedges.

With the Soviets taking the initiative, they roll 3 6's and a 2 & 3. Ending the turn so early had no real impact but it kept the initiative with the Soviets. They immediately deployed a squad on the Saddle and another in a house. Thus far, all of the Soviet troops were across the stream and not bottled up the way they were in the previous game.

The game really turned into one of maneuver. The Soviets had a great advantage and were pushing it hard. The Israelis were not in a position to stop them without taking casualties that they did not think would be worth while. The IDF brought up a single M113 track that never advanced beyond its entry point. The Soviet brought up a single BMP-1 that reached the center of the saddle. The M113 was on over watch and engaged the BMP-1 with its .50 MG. This had no result. The BMP-1 fired its Sasgger missile and managed somehow to only daze the driver.

Here is where I think some updated charts are needed. I am not sure that my older ratings for things are exactly right. Anyway, What happened was a prolonged fight between the BMP-1 and the M113. The M113 got the best of it. They achieved a result where they forced the BMP back off of the Saddle which bought them time to escape.

Elsewhere on the table, the Dragon team saw that they were about to be engaged by a full squad of Soviets so they ran off. The squad in the house did nothing for the whole game and fled with no losses. And the squad in the center reached the bottom of the saddle before pulling back and fleeing.

The end result of the game was that the IDF gave ground but did not loose a single man. The CO's opinion dropped by one but the men's opinion went up by two. This set the stage for the third game of the campaign. I wanted to continue the Soviet push into West Bratislovakia. Game 3 was played out on Friday. This game was done on Wednesday night.

Next installment coming up.

Cold War Project Progresses

I managed to finish out the infantry for my Soviet Motor Rifle Platoon. I followed the painting guide that I posted earlier. I like how they turned out. I have the bases done but the glue holding the flock was not quite dry when I took the pictures so it looks a bit off.

I was attempting to get better light for the pictures. I am not sure that I succeeded. The motor rifle platoon normally would carry two more people per squad. But these are the vehicle commander and the driver. I figure they would remain with the vehicle and not dismount under normal conditions. So I just left them off.

Here is the vehicles that I had completed earlier.

Here the lighting was worse. I have some desk lamps but they are not really doing what I want them to. Still, this side project came out quite nicely. Let me know what you think.

Sick Day, Research and Painting

I ended up catching a cold over the weekend. Despite this, I was able to get some painting done. I have painted up my first Cold War Soviet Motor Rifle Squad and three BMP-1s. I have most of the miniatures that I need. I really don't have appropriate looking Squad leaders but they really do not differ from the other AK toting fellows so I will use regular riflemen to fill in the vacancies and base them on a round base. Below is what I have done. They still need some Matt Varnish but are just about there.

I found some books that I managed to locate to help me out for this. The first set is an Army Field Manual set on the Soviet Army.

THE SOVIET ARMY : Operations and Tactics FM 100-2-1 (Soviet Army)

FM 100-2-3, The Soviet Army, Troops, organization and equipment

The FM 100-2-2 is available on the net. There is the 1985 version floating around somewhere that I managed to find. Unlike the much shorter field manuals for The Infantry Platoon and Squad, these are huge volumes with an incredible amount of information. I started to read the Operations and Tactics Field Manual. It is interesting but probably not what I am ultimately looking for.

Anyway, The miniatures painted up quickly and I should be able to knock out the other two squads in no time. Probably once I can breathe again. Breathing is definitely not over rated.

Cold War Gone Hot Miniatures (15mm) - Suggestions Requested

I have been going through my shelves recently and am rediscovering some old projects. One in particular that is grabbing my attention was my stuff for Lebanon in 82. What got me thinking were the figures that I had not done anything with.

I had three BMP-1s that were assembled but were not yet undercoated. I also had almost a platoon's worth of figures as well. Now, I could easily add these to my existing Syrian collection but I want to do something else. I have been jealously reading some of NickO's AARs for his I Ain't Been Nuked Mum rules that he is working on. While I don't want to invest in a company sized force, I was thinking maybe a Chain of Command sized force might do. I have plenty of Europeish terrain from my WWII collection. Why not try to get something together that I can use there?

I started to fool with this a bit last night and put minis on painting sticks and went to prime the miniatures. My black spray primer decided to die. I was sure I had another can of black primer around and was rather disappointed when that came up as empty as a politician's promises. I reached for the darkest can of spray paint that was there in the cupboard. It was a rustoleum flat camo green. I am going to try this out and see if it works. It could be a complete disaster but this is a trial balloon project anyway.

Now at this point I am stymied. I need some help. How does one exactly paint Cold War Soviets (Circa 1980 or so)? Some surfing got me a uniform color of Vallejo Russian Uniform. But what about the rest of the kit? I am comfortable painting the weapons. but what color are the helmets? What about pouches and web gear? Any thoughts? What color should the BMP-1s be? I know the answer is Green but what green? Any help will be gratefully appreciated.

My other concern is getting the troops right for the platoon. What was the composition? When I did Rock the Casbah all those many years ago, I knew the Syrians based their units off of Soviet units. But did the platoon have any Anti-tank elements? Did they have a three man Sagger team as part of the first squad? I found FM 100-2-3 which probably has what I want in it but is painful to search through as it is a huge doc.

Now I do not have any US military figures. I really would like to get some that would reflect the US Army in the early 1980s. Who does figures in 15mm that would do the trick? Would Peter Pig US Marines work or is there something better? Also what would the organization be? In the early 80s would the vehicle of choice be the M113 or would the Bradley be present? I am going to ship off any infantry to be painted as I do not want to try to do the woodland camo pattern. Life is too short.

Soviet Chain of Command Forces for 1941

Following up on my Early War Germans, I have put together my Soviet forces. This time I split things up a bit more for the platoon and put all of my available elements for the supports together. Thanks to everyone who helped yesterday with tank identification. Its coming along. I was surprised that I had all of the Engineering elements. Nothing like sorting through your figures to figure out what you actually have.

Soviet Rifle Platoon

The Soviet Rifle Platoon was commanded by a Leytenant and a Starshina. Rounding out the headquarters was a M39 50mm mortar team.

These were over the four squads. Each squad was commanded by a Serzhant and had nine riflemen, a rifle grenadier and a DP-28 LMG with two crewmen.

Supports Lists	Picture
List One
2x PPD-40 SMG
2x SVT-40 Semi-Automatic Rifles	- None Yet -
Satchel Charge	- No Miniature Needed -
Medical Orderly	- None Yet -
Engineer Mine Clearance Team
Engineer Wire Cutting Team
Engineer Demolition Team
Minefield
Barbed Wire
Entrenchments
List Two
50mm Mortar Team
PTRD AT Rifle
Commissar
Pre-Game Barrage
ROKS2 Flamethrower Team
T-20 Komsomylets Tractor
T-37 Tank
T-27Tankette
BA-20 Armored Car
List Three
Sniper Team
M1910 Maxim MMG
Ten Man Rifle Squad
T-26 with 37mm Gun
T-26 Twin MG Turrets
T-38 Tank
List Four
M1937 45mm ATG
76.2mm IG
Engineer Squad
Regular Infantry Squad
BA-6 or 10 Armored Car
T-26 with 45mm Gun
BT-2 Tank
BT-5 Tank
BT-7 Tank
BT-7A Tank
T-40 Tank
List Five
KhT-26 or 130 Tank
T-28 Tank
T-35 Tank
List Six
T-28E Tank
T-34 M1940-41 76mm Tank
List Seven
KV-1 Tank
List Seven
KV-2 Tank