A Close Run Thing

[Jim von Krieg]

To give everyone an overall view of the battle, one of the things I'll do, is add some of my commentary about those forces commanded by my teammates.

Turn 4: Salerno Falls



SOF Sector: On the northern end of our beaches, Salerno falls in the SOF area of operations commanded by Larry Reese. He is also the overall commander. Larry will focus on taking Mt de Chiunzi and Salerno.

In Salerno, the Commandos advance with no enemy contact. Salerno falls without incident. In the northern suburbs, naval gunfire saturates the enemy’s high speed avenue of approach. If we can hold Salerno, we can bottle up the bulk of the German reinforcements late in the game. Commandos will push out into suburbs to establish a defensive line.

What is interesting is that we haven’t seen any enemy activity in or around Salerno. We expected a fight, but so far our foes appear content to let us march unmolested onto our initial objectives. Larry will push out his defenses as his units flow from the beachhead. Once we establish a corridor from the X Corps beaches to Salerno, Scott will rapidly reinforce Salerno to build our strength for the inevitable German counterattacks later in the game.

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Turn 4: Rangers Climb to Glory



SOF Sector: As the Rangers advance, there is no enemy contact. We expect little threat in this sector until we get in the vicinity of Mt De Chiunzi. Our plan is to get up on the mountain peak first to establish defensive positions, then rely on our artillery to keep the German Para’s off the heights.

I expect this will probably be our toughest fight due to its relative isolation and our inability to reinforce should trouble develop.

For now, the anticipation of contact near Mt de Chiunzi and Salerno builds with every passing turn, but for now all is quiet throughout the SOF Sector.

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Turn 4: Reinforcing Salerno



X Corps Sector: In the center sector, X Corps is commanded by Scott Cole. I feel his forces are key to the victory as Scott will support both Larry to the north and me to the South. While doing this, he will also have to handle any enemy activity in the center. X Corps is a very powerful organization and has a lot of combat power to accomplish all the missions we’ve saddled Scott with.

To support the defense of Salerno, one of the 46th Inf Div (UK) brigades will move north into the city. While this happens, the remaining units of the 46th will move to hold the road open between the beaches and Salerno to facilitate further reinforcement if required.

In the previous turn, enemy reconnaissance elements moved to the high ground to observe our movement. There is not much we can do about this except to drop some airstrikes on them if they linger too long. Conversely, until the Germans bring some additional firepower forward, there is not much the scouts can do to stop our infantry columns. At some point, I expect artillery will rain down on our exposed positions.

One thing about the scenario is that controlling the high ground gives excellent observation of the surrounding countryside. Once the German artillery is available in strength, this could give them many targets to shoot, resulting in much pain for us. Control the heights if we can, don’t expose ourselves unnecessarily, no bunching up, and keep moving over the exposed ground will need to be our mantra.

Scott will need to move inland to push those all seeing eyes back from Route 18 to facilitate our transfer of troops into the SOF Sector.

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Turn 4: Beginning the Long March



While the 46th Division moves towards Salerno and cutting Route 18, the 56th Division moves to threaten Battapaglia in the center and link up with VI Corps near Ponte Alla Scafa. It will be quite some time before we generate enough combat power to assault “Bat”.

At the moment our priority of effort is to reinforce Salerno and link up with VI Corps IVO Ponte Alla Scafa. Yet, we want to make our presence known near Battapaglia so we can force our more mobile adversaries to keep their forces in defensive positions.

Fighting on the British beaches consisted of clearing enemy coastal batteries and watching enemy 88’s pull back. Nothing significant developing in the X Corps sector at this point.