Punishing the Afghans - 1920s style

 Today I popped over to Matt's for some back of beyond action with Afghans vs British beyond the Khyber Pass. These punishment raids were common place in the late 19th and early 20th Century and they followed a common theme. Tribesmen would stir up trouble with unreasonable demands, like freedom and self determinaton, and the British would relatiate by attacking the village, at which point the Afghans would melt away, then blowing up the watch tower and stealing the wood (a precious resource in that part of the world). The Britsh would then start to retreat and all hell would break loose as the Afghans reappeared and attacked. So that was the scenario. Matt was the British and I was the Afghans. I would start with a handful of units and recieve significant reinforcements at random locations during the battle

THe table, Brits at far end about to leave the village

The only bridge over the wadi, with my guys waiting in ambush

More Afghans hiding in the hills and a walled field

My heavy weaponss, a maxim and a stolen mountain gun

Loads of Brits with 3 AC, field gun, machine guns, cavalry inc Bengal Lancers and loads of infantry. I have to stop the trucks getting off the far end of the table

Brits advance and there is a sharp exchange of fire

My 1st batch of reinforcements arrive to support the front line

on the central hill

and brilliantly and large group of sword and spear armed men appear out of caves amongst the British machine guns and promptly take the guns out

THe brits push forward. I fire but the Afghans are inexperienced which makes them worst shots with lower morale that the Brits, but they do fight as well as the Brits. So I'm stuggling to lay down enough fire

My Afghans taunt the Brits from the hill but are soon mown down

Cavalry reinforcements arrive

The Brits plough forward but I'm fighting hard

The Brits attack the fram on my left, and I unleash a killer volley that routs the Bengal Lancers. I bring up reinforcements 

But the British cavalry catches them in the open and destroys them

I counter charge with my cavalry from the wadi and rout the British Cavalry

An armoured car makes to  the bridge and the Afghans attack, but only manage to scratch the paintwork. Some T-cut will fix that

The supporting British take out the ambushers

THe farm on te right is still holding out and the Brits are paying for it with their lives

They even try and unsuccessful assault

The lead AC has crossed the wadi and I charge it, but again there is barely any damage and it costs a lot of lives

Rifle fire from the RHS farm takes out one of the supply trucks

and then the maxim gun takes out the other one. At which point we call it a day and the Afghans melt away. A minor victory for the Afghans.

A fantastic battle, perfectly balanced and great fun.

Battle of Campanilla - Spanish Civil War AAR

 Today I went down to sunny Redcar to visit Ian and Jane and play in Ian's games room / garage/bike shed. We were giving my SCW armies a 1st try out and testing my Land and Freedom Rules, see pages above.

The battle was fictional one based around the campaign to capture Santander by the Nationalists, evil fascist scum (EFS) in 1937. The aim of the EFS was to secure the river crossings over the Pisuena river, whilst the the Republicans, brave socialist workers (BSW) were racing to stop them. Each side had 2 brigades, a couple of tank companies and artillery support.

The battle, EFS (me) to the right and BSW (Ian) to the left. Victor holds both river crossings

On my left Ian is advancing with a tank supported brigade of regulars

I've taken the wooded hills on the left with 2 brigades of regulars but have no tank or AT support

I do have artillery spotter with commanding view of the battle field. Artillery is good in my rules, but only one off map and 1 martor battery attack per turn max. The black and white numbers are priority points that decide when inte turn each unit is activated. Battalions have D3 (set at start) and these were pretty even across the armies. These can be added to by brigade and army commanders. I had 1 brigade commander with only 1 point to allocate and my army commander only had 1. Ian's were more even

I have rushed forward with a Moroccan Falange battalion, with AT support, in trucks, debused and occupied the town because...

Ian has done the same and tanked the bridge with a T26 and battalion in trucks.

On my right I'm advancing with a Falange battalion with Pz1 support

Ian debuses and tries to form a bridgehead, but I rain in fire

My AT takes out his T26

A brief firefight on te right and I've destroyed a International battalion

Ian has siezed the other bridge.

My supports have arrived to attack and wipe out his bridgehead

I now have a lot of forces in the line but Ian is still struggling to match me

I advance to the edge of town

I advance on the right and take out the battalion on the hill. The tank is important and I wipe them out. The flank is now open

I bring a battalion from the left to attack the bridge but in the open they get battered by artillery.

I storm the bridge with a Pz1 and Ian counter attacks with Molotov cocktails and take out the tank

Ian is still holding the bridges but on the left is very reduced, remove 1 more base and they will rout

My weight of numbers has wiped out Ian in the centre and we ended it there

It was a fun battle, very brutal and the rules worked well. We played on a 6x4 table and it was a bit packed. The messengers weren't really needed, mainly I had no points to give them and Ian was generally close enough with his commanders to not need them.